[WikiEN-l] A plea

[Andrew Gray]

On 15/07/05, Skyring <skyring at gmail.com> wrote:

> While I endorse your comments, Chris, may I note that the reason I use
> GMail for mailing list traffic is because it is so very good at
> handling threads (which it calls conversations).
> 
> So long as the subject doesn't change, all unread messages are
> presented on a single page one after the other. Messages already read
> are shown in a "stacked up" manner. I keep my normal email for
> personal stuff, but I've transferred all of the several lists to which
> I subscribe onto GMail.

The problem is that GMail is not the only threaded mailreader, and
that some of them (esp. older ones) work in a different way.

In the mail to which I'm replying, there's two header lines showing
the threading information:

In-Reply-To: <42D71B2F.5020808 at starglade.org>
References: <42D71B2F.5020808 at starglade.org>

Many systems use *these* to thread, rather than subject line (which
can be very handy when subject lines start picking up or losing extra
Re:'s), in much the same way as Usenet posts. Hence the desire to send
a new message, which wouldn't have this internal information, and thus
wouldn't be threaded...

-- 
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk