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Re: html, styled e-mail vs. plain text (was: I agree. LKS)



HTML is written in ordinary ASCII; the only problem is that there
apparently has to be a MIME header specifying something like "text/html"
so that the newsreader knows to interpret the HTML commands instead of
passing them along in the text.

The cute diagrams are another matter. They are not ASCII and could
conceivably be messed up somewhere in transit or at the place of arrival
if there is still software around that can't handle 8-bit messages.

In a pinch you can read HTML pretty well by ignoring everything enclosed
between "<" and ">", for instance <HTML>.

Rick Tarara wrote:

----- Original Message -----
From: "Hugh Haskell"
Well, I have to admit that I am pretty ignorant of all the ins and
outs of network stuff, so I have no idea what this thread is all
about. If it means those occasional e-mails (usually spam) that
include all sorts of different fonts and little pictures, then forget
it. All they do is take forever to load and you can't delete them
while they are loading. On the other hand, if you are talking about
technology that will let me send equations and technical figures in
e-mails and have them be readable at the other end, then I'm all for
it. If the latter means I have to put up with the former, well, I
guess that's a reasonable trade-off, but so far I have seen plenty of
the former and none of the latter.

Yes the technology that lets people be cutesy with their colored backgrounds
and animated signatures IS the technology that allows (or will even more so
with XTML) send fully formed equations and small diagrams. The various
attempts at drawing with ASCII are almost always disasters as the lines get
shifted around by the time our readers get them (worse if incorporated in
digest form) and equations are difficult, at best, to write in plain text.
It is to improve our ability to communicate PHYSICS that Jim and I are
advocating that the plain text (ASCII) limitations be removed as soon as
possible--understanding that the ListServe software must become available
and there will always be a few people unable to read HTML or XTML text even
once adopted. {Maybe future listserve software will automatically convert
HTML to the best equivalent ascii and let people subscribe to either
form--seems like there would be a market for such ;-) }

Rick

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Richard W. Tarara
Associate Professor of Physics
Department of Chemistry & Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
219-284-4664
rtarara@saintmarys.edu

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--
Maurice Barnhill, mvb@udel.edu
http://www.physics.udel.edu/~barnhill/
Physics Dept., University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716