Hi John
>
>Date: Wed, 7 Mar 2001 13:35:00 +0100
>From: John Neale <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: Re: plain-text mail from AOL 6.0
>
> >Rumor has it that AOL has posted instructions on the web on how
> >to make AOL 6.0 send plain text messages. In my mind this is
> >a good thing because it now permits AOL customers to once again
> >send commands to the ListProc command processor that Cornell University
> >uses.
>
>I'm left scratching my head wondering why system administrators feel unable
>or unwilling to put a filter on the front end which will convert HTML
>encoded text to plain text. It's not hard.
My question was entirely focused on the interaction between HTML
and *command* processors that expect plain text. I was not concerned
about postings to the list it self.
Perhaps there is a way to reliably strip the HTML to the command processor.
However, there is another issue ..... so I find someway to accomodate HTML
in my command processor ... then some large organization decides, ....
lets not only make plain text impossible, lets make HTML impossible, lets
demand XML, and what is more we will constantly change the XML because
we can with DTDs and such, and to understand it you have to subscribe
to get the ever changing DTD to be able to communicate with us and our
customers. It is not that *I* want to outlaw HTML, XML, etc and force only
plain text. Rather it is that I object to large organizations
making plain text impossible. It should be *possible* to send plain text
from *every* email client, even if it is almost never done. I should
not *have to* modify my MLM command processor that already handles plain
text just fine, to handle something else.
I'd go even further and claim that e-mail-clients should include in there
menues, options that automatically generate commands to majordomo, mailman,
listserv, listproc, listar, ..... with little fuzzy prompts and such to
help people use them ... and then send the command out properly formated
for existing technology.
It is my intent, this summer, to begin putting together a coalition of
interested parties to lobby groups like AOL to get them to agree to plain text
support. Have I a chance? I don't know. But being at a university, there
is a chance that I can get a whole bunch of universities to collaborate
on this, and maybe others and that might be big enough to at least engage
AOL in a discussion.
Regards,
Todd Olson
Cornell University
