The topic of “mailing list etiquette” has come up in a number of Workgroups. This page is to provide some best and worst practices for sending emails to OSLC’s mailing lists.
Correct Subject Use an accurate and descriptive subject for your email messages and when the topic of conversation changes in a thread, then please change the subject to match.
Preserve the thread When responding to a message on the mailing list make sure you respond directly to that message. Don’t start a new thread to respond and don’t reply to a digest message, because that will split the thread of conversation.
Do not participate via Digest If you intend to participate in mailing list conversations, then do not subscribe to the digest list. Responding to digest emails does not preserve threads of conversation.
Post in plain text Configure your email client send plain text emails to the mailing list and no rich text or HTML. If you need pretty colors and formatting to get your point across then create a wiki page. Note that attachments are preserved but not within the context of where you composed it in the original email.
Prevent out-of-office replies. Make sure your email client does not send out-of-office or on-vacation emails to the mailing list.
One item that I did not mention was “top-posting” which is a good practice for some and an anti-pattern for others. I’m not sure we need to mandate top or bottom posting. See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style
Email client settings
Lotus Notes
Send as text (avoid HTML)
File->Preferences->Mail->Internet
Internet mail format: (you can set to “Text” or “Prompt Me”)
Then make sure to reply with this action:
“Reply to All with Internet-Style History”
Then trim out any additional content as needed, ensure to leave enough context and clearly indicate where you chopped text.
Category:Supporting Documents
