Re: Postings (was Re: HP Forum location)

From: AEF (spamsink2001_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 09/12/05 

Date: 11 Sep 2005 20:12:51 -0700

Ken Robinson wrote:
> Bill Gunshannon wrote (in part):
> > > If you have web access, you can use Google Groups
> > > <http://groups.google.com/group/comp.os.vms/>
> >
> > I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy!!!
>
> Why not? If you have no other way to access the newsgroups, it's a
> perfectly usable interface, as long as you take the time to learn about
> its quirks.
>
> When Google Groups2 first came out,it was very unusable and filled with
> bugs, but Google has improved the product greatly.
>
> The biggest beef I have is the two ways to enter a reply.
>
> The first, with the reply link at the bottom of the post is the wrong
> one to use, since it doesn't quote the original artical and looses all
> trferences.
>
> The second way, visible after one clicks "More Options" is the correct
> one to use, since it does quote and referencing fine.
>
> The long times to post are history also.
>
> Ken
> BTW, this was posted via Google Group2.

I agree that the new beta Google groups (group2?) is much better than
when it first came out, but it's still bad in many ways. Here's my
re-updated scorecard (you asked!):

I sent the following to Goggle and add some up-to-date comments:

>>From 2005/04/01:

Favoring the new "Google beta groups":

o Faster post udpates [updates]
o Have to click "read the rest of the message" much less often
o No time wasted with having to click "See this message in context"
link
o Mail addresses hidden from spammers (admittedly this is good and bad
either way)

[OK, now you can get the email address using the human-readable-only
type-in after clicking ... . When was this added?]

o Times of last post given on thread listing page (but time zone is not
given!!!)

[ OK, I live in the US Eastern Time Zone and the times are now in that
time zone ! But I came across at least one case in which a message
arrived from the future. See (sorry about any url-wrap)

[[ I saw another post from the future since. Why is time such a hard
thing for Google? ]]

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.os.vms/browse_frm/thread/36912eb7f8ee7779/5df4f664c4ab086b?lnk=st&q=future+group:comp.os.vms+author:aef&rnum=4&hl=en#5df4f664c4ab086b

(But I recently looked at sci.math and the times were in some mystery
time zone or perhaps just a few more messages from the future.)

Why don't they just use UTC time in yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss format like
they used to? Before they "fixed" it they called it the time, or local
time, or something stupid and it was in Palo Alto time (PT). I
previously sent them a message telling them that some of us don't live
in the Pacific Time Zone and that UTC was more appropriate in 24-hour
format, not the pesky am/pm format. ]

Favoring the old "Google groups":

o Dates in msg. headers were in yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm:ss time-zone format,
incl. 24-hour time! (Not this wimpy am/pm nonsesnse.) [Although they
were labeled as PST even though it was really PDT when daylight saving
time was in effect.]
o Fonts
o Format of all pages, all views, better

(Well, I do like not having to click for a new page as often with the
new format.)

o Visual esthetics

[[ This is still much better in the old version. ]]

o Banners containing useful info separate messages
o Said useful info includes From, Subject, Newsgroups list, Date (and
time
-- with time zone!, albeit incorrect when DST is in effect)

[Yes, you can get these by clicking, but you have to do it for each
one!]

o Message number in banner of message!!!

[OK, they finally added this just recently.]

o "Post a follow-up to this message" link at bottom of each message

[OK, they now have this but it doesn't quote the old message.]

o Home page lists alt, biz, comp, etc. In the new way there is no way
you
could go from comp to comp.os. to comp.os.vms the way you can with the
old
groups groups page. You have to know at least the comp.os part first in
the beta groups.
o List of threads page neater
o Useful | and \ and - symbols outlining thread trees on left
o Prev m and Next n links at top and bottom of page of messages

[Finally this is back, but slightly uglier, at least on my setup.]

o Can read mail addresses when I need to (admittedly this is good and
bad
either way)

[see comment in old format section]

o More room for messages increasing chances that an 80-column-wide
output
will fit without wrapping.

[[ Actually this always seems to be a problem. ]]

o No "hide quoted text" errors. Often, in the beta groups, a word is
subsumed into quoted text when it is part of the reply.

[[ Quote hiding is still buggy. Sometimes the post is entirely hidden!
]]

o No stupid warm and fuzzy stars wasting screen area. (What is this,
kindergarten? |:-)

Bad about both:
o After postiing, "Click here to continue" still takes you to pages
where
you can't function. You often get the messages with no links to go to
the
next set of messages and no link back to comp.os.vms thread list.
What's
the deal with this? In one case I ended up with two tree panes!

[[ This seems to work better now, but I rarely use it for fear of
ending up on a dead-end page. ]]

p.s. The box to input this is WAY TOO SMALL!

2005/07/30:

Also, when you click on a thread, you have to hit F6 four times to get
the focus to the articles box. (I hate the mouse.)

If we're lucky, they'll keep fixing it until it has all the good points
of the old format, in which case -- actually in any case -- they should
have never come up with the new format and just simply added the few
good features of the new format to the old format.

As for me, I've finally gotten used to the new format and just live
with it. I still don't like it, but what ya gonna do?

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