abma.x-maru.org Forum Index
 FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   MemberlistMemberlist   UsergroupsUsergroups   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile
 Log in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 

How not to write a subject line
Goto page 1, 2  Next
 
This forum is locked: you cannot post, reply to, or edit topics.   This topic is locked: you cannot edit posts or make replies.    abma.x-maru.org Forum Index -> Newsgroups Misc
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
(inc)



Joined: 18 Feb 2002
Posts: 356
Location: San Diego

PostPosted: Thu Sep 12, 2002 9:43 am    Post subject: How not to write a subject line Reply with quote

With posting this here instead of the ng, I'm probably preaching to the choir. Oh well... Just trying to see how many *bad habits* I can put into one subject line:

[$1/$2] - $F - [a #cantreallyspeakenglishorjapanese production, find us on irc] - My Two Thousand, Four Hundred and Twenty-Third Post - Little-Bitty Mind Really Annoying Fairy Queen episode 23 - (read the nfo file, you shmucks) - [yenc] - REQ ==>> full Ranma repost, TIA!!! - 1000000 bytes

...with the attachment file name: "--#cantreallyspeakenglishorjapanese_Little-Bitty Mind Fairy Queen episode 23 (SBC) (HQ) (1024x320).rar".

Of course, no nfo file is ever posted...

(inc)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
xo
Site Admin


Joined: 09 Feb 2002
Posts: 466
Location: Los Angeles [comcast]

PostPosted: Thu Sep 12, 2002 11:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

You go inc!

Actually, that brings to mind this: what is a good recommendation for a PowerPost subject line? The FAQ section on posting mentions some "guidelines", but I think having an explicit PowerPost string as a recommendation would be a good thing. Even if it were used by one FAQ reader, I think that would be a win.

Perhaps if we can hammer out a consensus, then it can be incorporated into the FAQ's next rev.

-xo (who's never used PowerPost)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website
~Lain of the Wired~



Joined: 27 Feb 2002
Posts: 27

PostPosted: Thu Sep 12, 2002 3:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I find those long subject lines very annoying too; they make me slow down quite a bit when I skim through newsgroups looking for what I want. This is how I would put in the subject line if I were to post:

(Series Name) (Ep #) (Part#/Total Parts) (Comments) - (Filename)
Ex. RahXephon 26 (10/20) Read NFO - RahXephon26.r10

It'd be nice if posters keep the following in mind:

- Specify whether something's dub, raw, subbed in another language, need to be opened with some weird codec etc.; I would expect the video to have Jap audio & Eng subs, and can be played using Real Player, WMP, or DivX player unless otherwise stated.
- Don't put ads in the subject line, attach an NFO file and tell people to read it instead. It's unnecessary to advertise (especially channels) in the subject line. Just tell us where we can find the channel inside the video as part of the credits; people will come to the channel if they think that the sub is good, vertical spam-advertising drives people away instead.
- Requests should not be in the subject line either; it's very hard to figure out what you are posting if the request and the posted files are both in the subject line. Again, ask people to read the NFO or 00 file. I would ignore requests if the person put them in the subject line even if I can post, simply because I find vertical spam very impolite.

A little off-topic, but I think these are important as well:

- Always post PAR files. There are many servers out there with horrible completion. I suggest 1 PAR for every 5 parts.
- No floods! As said in a section of the FAQ, flooding creates chaos in low-retention servers. I'd say that no one should post more than 2 episodes a day (~400MB). It's also a good idea to spread huge posts (i.e. movies) over several days; not many of us have the time and energy to spend 24/7 downloading.
- Please keep individual parts small; this helps with completion. I suggest 10-20MB per part.

That's all I got to say for now. Sorry for the long message; I just wanted to explain the reasoning behind the Do's and Don't's. Additions, suggestions, comments are welcome. I too, think it's reasonable to come to a consensus for subject lines and other posting rules.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail MSN Messenger
Gorunova



Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 318
Location: Burnaby, B.C., Canada

PostPosted: Thu Sep 12, 2002 8:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It sure would be nice for us AnimeUsenet folks if there were some standardization of subject lines. Especially if they were shorter.

I've seen a few good ones around and many bad ones. The things that really annoy me are duplication of the filename and/or series/episode info, and requests in the subject line. Sometimes I accidentally enter the request info instead of the actual post info.

Here's what I'd like to see in a subject line format:

ACRONYMnn - $F [format][lang][encoding] [$1/$2]

Where:
ACRONYM is a suitable short form of the series name, like ES for Excel Saga. Possibly ambiguous, but helps the message sorting.
nn is the episode number.
$F is the file name - typically includes the full series name and episode number and fansub group.
format is the video codec.
lang is sub/dub/raw etc.
encoding is the post format - yEnc, UUE etc.
$1/$2 is the file and total, and is optional.

I don't put the $1/$2 part in my posts because I think it's redundant. You can tell from the SFV and the PARs how many parts there are, and it's also clear which part is the last one from looking at the part size in the post headers.

Posting of PARs is, of course, mandatory. It would be nice if there was a cross-platform alternative to SFVs - I've been using md5sum as a file checker under Linux lately.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
HollyBerries



Joined: 06 Apr 2002
Posts: 32

PostPosted: Fri Sep 13, 2002 10:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Oooh, you've hit one of my latest pet peeves. I just love it when I extend Agent out to full-screen and have the subject line be the ENTIRE SPACE and I STILL can't see the whole damn line, including what parts I'm getting. I don't like to waste my time and HD space getting PAR parts except for the main PAR file if the rest of the post looks complete on my server, although I appreciate them being there in case something came across wonky I don't want to HAVE to download them just because I can't tell which are the actual parts and which are the PARs because of HUGE SUBJECT LINES! ARR! I don't CARE how many posts you've done! I don't CARE what you're requesting! I don't NEED a detailed description of how your server gave out and you had to restart, I'll figure it out!

HB
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Gorunova



Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 318
Location: Burnaby, B.C., Canada

PostPosted: Fri Sep 13, 2002 3:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

HollyBerries wrote:
I don't CARE how many posts you've done! I don't CARE what you're requesting! I don't NEED a detailed description of how your server gave out and you had to restart, I'll figure it out!


More to the point, *messages* belong in the *message body* and not in the subject line.

As for PARs, lately I've been having trouble with things that are complete on the server being corrupted when I download them, and often people forget to include the (should be mandatory again) RAR recovery record. So I now make a habit of downloading at least one PAR even if it doesn't look like I need it. Saves me having to come back later and download 12MB of headers again.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Melchior



Joined: 19 Feb 2002
Posts: 190
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

PostPosted: Sat Sep 14, 2002 2:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

...two of my pet-peeves (aside from channel names and requests in the subject line) is posters who put their name in the subject line and posters who start their post with a filecount, or have a filecount before the episode number of their post.

Yeesh, I don't need to see the poster's name in the subject line-- it's already sitting in the "From" field! And for the people who start their posts off with a filecount, do they not read the groups? Don't they realize that if there are multiple episodes that they've posted it's a pain in the ass to queue any one of them up?

Last week my 20" monitor's cable went a bit wonky on me, so for a few days (until I had enough time to repair the cable-- it's a homebuilt 13W3-to-VGA cable) I had to (gasp) use an old 15" monitor from the garage. That old fuzzy monitor looks like hell at resolutions higher than 800*600, so that's what I was limited to (normally I run 1280*1024). Wow, what a pain it was reading peoples' ridiculously-long subject lines!

...Anyway, just wanted to add my complaints to the list.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Musicman



Joined: 25 Feb 2002
Posts: 18
Location: Memphis,TN

PostPosted: Sat Sep 14, 2002 5:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

All I can add to this wonderful subject is that it is spreading to other groups.

My next post is going to look like this....

You assholes can download the whole stinking anime and won't you be surprised when you find out it's another posting of something that has been posted 20 times this month (1/10000) Day 1 of ?? request full repost of POT FMP FB COTS POTA pars will follow and no repost Part1.rar

I'll of course change my nickname to inc or Melchoir before posting!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
(inc)



Joined: 18 Feb 2002
Posts: 356
Location: San Diego

PostPosted: Sat Sep 14, 2002 8:12 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Heh....
Quote:
...change my nickname to inc...
Shocked

From all the above, here's what I forgot to include in my SL:

-- " - And here's another great post from <me> - " < insert posters nick in <me> location.

-- " - no repost/fills - no way, no how - "

-- " - server tanked, so I'm starting over, and, by the way, I hope setting the number of lines to 5 per message works okay - "

-- " - let me know if this comes through alright as I'm posting it to news.siberia.com - "

(inc)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Gorunova



Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 318
Location: Burnaby, B.C., Canada

PostPosted: Sat Sep 14, 2002 1:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Melchior wrote:
And for the people who start their posts off with a filecount, do they not read the groups? Don't they realize that if there are multiple episodes that they've posted it's a pain in the ass to queue any one of them up?


They probably haven't learn how to sort by subject yet, so they see everything localized by post time. I remember my early days with Free Agent, having to visually search for each segment to tag... god, those days sucked.

Melchior wrote:
That old fuzzy monitor looks like hell at resolutions higher than 800*600, so that's what I was limited to (normally I run 1280*1024). Wow, what a pain it was reading peoples' ridiculously-long subject lines!


Hey, I live with that all the time. None of my PC monitors are larger than 15" and none will do over 800x600 without making scary noises. Some day I'll get a job and get the fattest-ass flat screen display ever... Wink
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Gorunova



Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 318
Location: Burnaby, B.C., Canada

PostPosted: Sun Sep 15, 2002 2:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Another peeve: A lot of people seem to be using 20MB parts these days. That means when a part gets corrupted I have to re-download 20MB instead of 5MB or 9MB. Smaller parts are better, modulo having too many of course.
I like 5MB to 9MB parts.

Strange thing though: Often when I re-download corrupted parts they come out OK. It's almost as if the data is getting corrupted when I download it, not when it's posted.

Also: Why are there so many new posters? It seems like every day for the last couple of months a new poster has posted at least one episode.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
matt



Joined: 11 Feb 2002
Posts: 34
Location: Cleveland Ohayo

PostPosted: Mon Sep 23, 2002 7:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

As i was doing the logging tonight i noticed this one and could not resist:
(this is the acutal subject line)

"ATTN: ThaWyze1 - Now and Then Here and There Ep. 4 - REQ: N&T,H&T Ep. 8 Please! TIA! - (BTW, my first post) - File 09 of 18 - yEnc "Now and Then, Here and There - 04.part04.rar" 15000000 bytes (~~/30)"

I think he/she is going for the no-no's record here. Smile
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Melchior



Joined: 19 Feb 2002
Posts: 190
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

PostPosted: Mon Sep 23, 2002 8:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

matt wrote:
I think he/she is going for the no-no's record here. :)


Heh, it could've been worse-- the poster could've put the filecount after the filename!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Gorunova



Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 318
Location: Burnaby, B.C., Canada

PostPosted: Mon Sep 23, 2002 9:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeesh.

Lately I've noticed a lot of people appending the part size to the end of the subject line. Is this the new default subject line in PowerPost or something?

I mean, really. We can see the part size by downloading one of them, and it's rare that knowing that info is going to make a difference in the decision of whether or not to download the ep. Why clutter things up with that?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Orqyman



Joined: 27 Feb 2002
Posts: 98
Location: Dallas, TX

PostPosted: Mon Sep 23, 2002 11:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow, another interesting thread I missed.

I guess I can breath easy knowing I don't do these mundane items. Correct me if I'm wrong here.

I've got senioritis. Again. Meaning, I just don't seem to give much a damn anymore. Kinda like that guy in Office Space.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website AIM Address
Display posts from previous:   
This forum is locked: you cannot post, reply to, or edit topics.   This topic is locked: you cannot edit posts or make replies.    abma.x-maru.org Forum Index -> Newsgroups Misc All times are GMT - 8 Hours
Goto page 1, 2  Next
Page 1 of 2

 
Jump to:  
You can post new topics in this forum
You can reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group