The Vent and Rant Thread

[ApK]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Bummer - best wishes.

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

Yikes...here's hoping for quick recovery to full health.

Thanks, but I think I'm going to have to patch and repaint the wall....oh...you mean the other thing.....thanks. Trying to keep a positive attitude. My wife is nervous about some increased risk factors, but for the rest of us, so far it's just like a cold.

I hate colds.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by binaryhermit

Oof, I feel bad for not even noticing the second part of ApK's post.

Good luck, hopefully you and your family all come out of it reasonably unscathed.

Hehe, thanks. You know I almost made a V&R post about all the people at work who only read the first line of any email I send. If I ask more than one question I'm virtually guaranteed to only get a response to the first thing I ask. Very frustrating.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by ApK

In other vent and rant news, my whole family and I tested positive for COVID-19, so I guess it wasn't just allergies, or a cold my son brought home from work.

I hope you all have mild cases with quick recovery.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by ApK

Hehe, thanks. You know I almost made a V&R post about all the people at work who only read the first line of any email I send. If I ask more than one question I'm virtually guaranteed to only get a response to the first thing I ask. Very frustrating.

Aren't they the same ones who complain you're sending too many emails if you send individual emails, each with a different subject?

[mlewis78]

Good luck ApK. Hope you all get well soon.

[Rumpelteazer]

Originally Posted by ApK

In other vent and rant news, my whole family and I tested positive for COVID-19, so I guess it wasn't just allergies, or a cold my son brought home from work. And the towel bar came off the bathroom wall. Rough week.

I hope you and your family get well soon!

[ApK]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Aren't they the same ones who complain you're sending too many emails if you send individual emails, each with a different subject?

They're also the ones who repeatedly ask for status updates, to which I want to reply "if you had read to the SECOND line of my last email, you'd already know the status is that I'm waiting for answers from you..."

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by ApK

They're also the ones who repeatedly ask for status updates, to which I want to reply "if you had read to the SECOND line of my last email, you'd already know the status is that I'm waiting for answers from you..."

OH-EM-Gee. Honestly, I must say this, or start to say it, 5-10x daily. It drives me insane. I actually have an email-checker now, to keep me from saying impolitic things like that to our customers (usually, our repeat customers that are on their 3rd, 4th, 5th book and you'd THINK that by now...)

And why, Why, WHY? Can anyone explain to me why it is that people who are writing books, have written books and have published books, cannot seem to communicate clearly in writing? Vis: instructions from them to us? And can't read the ones from us to them?

Am I the only person who finds that utterly mind-blowing???? I mean, the irony is so thick you couldn't cut it with a tree axe!

So, ApK, you have my complete and total sympathies! When did people just develop first-line-skimming? Is that new or was it always like this?

Hitch

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by ApK

They're also the ones who repeatedly ask for status updates, to which I want to reply "if you had read to the SECOND line of my last email, you'd already know the status is that I'm waiting for answers from you..."

What do you use to read emails at work?

I'll make a guess that your email client displays an Inbox with From: and Subject: fields, and the Subject likely includes the first line of the email. Reading the second line would require actually opening the message.

I might respond exactly as you are tempted to, and if I were really annoyed, BCC their boss on my reply.
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Hitch

So, ApK, you have my complete and total sympathies! When did people just develop first-line-skimming? Is that new or was it always like this?

As mentioned by ApK, I think it's a matter of the email client.

When I was in the corporate world, we read email in MS Outlook, with mail coming from an Exchange Server instance. Outlook could be set the preview mail and show the first couple of lines in the Inbox. At one employer, that had to be turned off. There were an assortment of attacks that could be sent in email and triggered when the email was opened. Outlook would have to open the email to display the preview, even if the recipient didn't open the message to see the full content, and the attack would proceed. Until we had a block for those attacks, no previews.

My pet peeve is "top posting", where replies to email are placed above the mail that they are replies to, and you may have to dig down though a long message to understand what the top post is a reply to.

I create interspersed replies, trimming stuff I'm not replying to to make everyone's life easier, but I seem to be a lone voice crying in the wilderness about stuff like this.

I blame Outlook for that, to, as top posts were its default. And made more annoying by defaulting to Rich Text or HTML in messages. At one employer, I discovered posts I sent to a tech mailing list were bouncing. The list was "plain text only". I had laboriously configured my Outlook client to default to plain text, and that was what I sent, so WTF? It turned out that Exchange Server was undoing my good work and what it sent out on my behalf wasn't plain text. The Exchange Admin had to dig a bit to get it to stop doing that.
______
Dennis

[ApK]

Dennis, your guess and your assessment are correct.
But while Outlook Preview is an enabler, I still put the blame on the individual.
If people can't use inbox preview responsibly, it's their own fault.

[Tarana]

"Sorry, I'm having trouble understanding right now. Please try a little later...." right in the middle of a battle in Battle Ground (Jim Butcher). Arrrgh!!

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

As mentioned by ApK, I think it's a matter of the email client.
(snippage)


I create interspersed replies, trimming stuff I'm not replying to to make everyone's life easier, but I seem to be a lone voice crying in the wilderness about stuff like this.

I blame Outlook for that, to, as top posts were its default. And made more annoying by defaulting to Rich Text or HTML in messages. At one employer, I discovered posts I sent to a tech mailing list were bouncing. The list was "plain text only". I had laboriously configured my Outlook client to default to plain text, and that was what I sent, so WTF? It turned out that Exchange Server was undoing my good work and what it sent out on my behalf wasn't plain text. The Exchange Admin had to dig a bit to get it to stop doing that.
______
Dennis

The problem with interspersed replies, for many of us, is we're not using email clients, in the usual sense. We're using Salesforce or another messaging system, like Teamworks. Anything "below the line" is completely nuked, with a reply, so we can't see it.

Just in case you're ever dealing with customer service, somehwere, sometime and you can't understand why they aren't answering your interspersed replies....

Hitch

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by binaryhermit

I mean, I still maintain the current basic kindle's a better bet than the KK...
Frontlight > keyboard for most people.

Yes, it has some advantages but it doesn't have clicky keys. Amazon also took away some options that make editing a book SO much easier. So it's better than the current basic. And yes, I do have a current basic. I have increased needs for a cheap unit that has a light as many offices have dimmed them for laptops and phones.

OH and ApK, hope you and your family feel better soon. My cousin had a case of Covid in July and it wasn't much worse than a cold for her.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Hitch

And why, Why, WHY? Can anyone explain to me why it is that people who are writing books, have written books and have published books, cannot seem to communicate clearly in writing? Vis: instructions from them to us? And can't read the ones from us to them?

If they're mystery or fantasy fiction writers they will habitually conceal and deflect to keep the reader guessing, if they're technical authors they will assume the email recipient is, like them, all knowing of everything in their domain and beyond



The other day I come across a phrase I've not heard used in the way it was: 'stay in your lane'.

It's what a bureaucrat is told to do should they show any signs of curiosity in what other bureaucrats are doing/not doing. Whistleblower prevention. In this instance the consequences were tragic.

BR