After almost 50 years of doing this, I have always disagreed with bottom posting and I think the arguments for it are bogus. The subject determines whether or not you are interested in the thread and, if you are, you've likely read all the prior posts and in each new one you are only interested in the pertinent part, i.e., the new information. I have no interest in wading through the prior four or five posts to get the "answer". In fact, I find it annoying that I have to go find it, particularly if it's below the visible message "window". So much for the "natural order." The mind handles this inversion with ease.
The only time bottom posting is necessary is when the prior post raises several subjects, in which case interspersion of the answers makes more sense. We are better served by having the poster cut all but the relevant part of the previous post and giving us the response right at the top, which is where the readers put you. The prior post, below, actually responded to two messages and puts the one not relevant to the subject at the very bottom after the "signature", raising questions in the mind of the reader about whether it's a previous post or part of the same one. It's also cute by reversing the messages all together to make the writer's point. However, these messages would not naturally have occurred together but instead would have occurred as four posts and the "need" for order would have disappeared. The reader would not have been confused by top-posting. FWIW, Jerry -----Original Message----- From: delphi-boun...@elists.org [mailto:delphi-boun...@elists.org] On Behalf Of Doug Chamberlin Sent: Friday, August 06, 2010 9:07 AM To: delphi@elists.org Subject: Re: Determine line number from MAP file This also might be helpful: http://www.drbob42.com/delphi/findmap.htm -- Cheers! Doug C. -- A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail? _______________________________________________ Delphi mailing list Delphi@elists.org http://lists.elists.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/delphi _______________________________________________ Delphi mailing list Delphi@elists.org http://lists.elists.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/delphi
