At 6:06 PM -0800 2/2/97, Merrill Cook wrote:
>On a simpler level, how about: people send an unsubscribe message
>to the list address. It gets filtered and forwarded to the list
>owner, who unsubscribes them manually. The lesson? "To
>unsubscribe, you don't have to learn anything or RTFM; just reply
>to the list address, someone will take care of it." That's the
>message we give.
This is a religious issue among list admins. I'm of the belief that
admins should design systems that don't screw over OTHER lists -- the
idea being that you don't build a Fiat that makes it impossible for a
person to drive a Lexus because of the differences. To me, that means
trapping misplaced messages and sending information, instead of
"helping" the user by redirecting and fixing the problem silently. By
doing it "for" the user when they do something "wrong", it makes it
easier on both the user and admin, but makes it difficult if the user
is trained to believe this is the right way of doing things (after all,
it worked), and goes and tries the same thing on other lists without
that intelligent front-end.
I don't mind doing as much gruntwork for the user as I can -- as long
as it doesn't create negative implications for other lists which aren't
as well instrumented. In those cases (mostly, in my eyes, cases of
intercepting admin commands in the posting stream), I'll trap and
inform instead of trap and redirect.
Now, there are other admins who disagree strongly with this philosophy,
and they have good arguments on their side as well. I just don't agree
with them. Hence this being a religious issue, much like emacs and
vi....
--
Chuq Von Rospach (chuq@apple.com) Apple IS&T Mail List Gnome
<http://www.solutions.apple.com/>
Plaidworks Consulting (chuqui@plaidworks.com) <http://www.plaidworks.com/>
(<http://www.plaidworks.com/hockey/> +-+ The home for Hockey on the net)
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