[Tutor] Replying to the tutor-list

[Alan Gauld]

"Richard Querin" <rfquerin at gmail.com> wrote
>>
>> > The following tutor faq has an explanation:
>> >
>> > http://www.python.org/infogami-faq/tutor/tutor-why-do-my-replies-go-to-t
>> > he-person-who-sent-the-message-and-not-to-the-list/
>
> It seems like this is designed for the 5% case when it makes the 
> other 95%
> of normal reply cases more difficult.

I dunno about you but 95% of my email is private, only
about 5% comes from mailing lists.

> I would (like to) think that the vast majority of replies are
> meant for all eyes.

Thats why its called Rely *ALL*. Private is Reply, Public is Reply 
ALL.
Thats what email tools have done from day one.

> responsibility of the person replying if he/she wants to respond 
> privately
> only rather than making that the defacto default.

The default is hit ReplyAll.
Only use Reply when you specifically want to send privately...
If there is only one sender ReplyAll will only send to them (unless
you have asked it to send to you too, but thats nearly always
configurable and only useful if you don't automatically create a
Sent entry)

> Hitting reply in Gmail responds only back to the sender and not to 
> the list.

That's true of the vast majority of mail tools.
Its what the email usability standard says is supposed to be the
meaning of those buttons. Thatsd why they are named that way.

> I've been corrected (politely I might add) on more than one 
> occasion.

So just use ReplyAll all the time... unless you only want to send to
the sender. (What I have noticed is that some web based mail tools
don't seem to have ReplyAll as the default which is downright 
unfriendly
design...)

I'm really confused about why mailing lists seem to be moving in
this direction. It adds nothing and makes a very inconsistent user
experience IMHO.

(But then, I'm equally confused as to why anyone would prefer a web
forum over a news group, and that seems to happen too. Newsgroups
are far more powerful and web forums add zero so far as I can tell...)

Alan G
An internet old-timer :-)