** 2. TECHNICAL ADVICE ** °°° Abstract: This concerns the form and the coding of a message, that is, in practice: - diacritical signs (accents and such) - enrichments (bold, underline, italics, etc.) - inserts (e.g.: images) - enclosures (e.g.: Word files) - layout. °°° _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ ------------------------ A FEW BASICS ------------------------ Diacritical signs ------------------------ For all these features, and in the current state of the Internet network and miscellaneous working stations, the rule is simple: - for * personal * mail, and in agreement with your recipient (make a few tests first with him / her), do * just as you please *; - for all * forums *, always restrict yourselves to * text only with no accents and no enrichments * (bold, underline, italics, etc.). Otherwise you can be quite sure that several recipients will receive some strange symbols and esoteric signs. The general idea is to be sensitive to the whole of the forum participants. As soon as one mentions some reading difficulty, the rest of the forum participants should adapt to formats that can be read by all. Attached Files ---------------------- Do not send attached files as the forum is about discussion and exchange as in a physical meeting. ==> However, if, in addition your comments, you wish to share a document with the other members of the forum, send to a message saying that you are making a document available, describe it in a few words, and state its relevance to the discussion. The Forum Co-ordination will publish your document on the Web site and will indicate, in your message, the address on the Web site where it can be read or downloaded. --------------------------------------- LAYOUT / FORMATTING OF THE MESSAGE --------------------------------------- Layout ---------- The missing accents in French or Spanish, the smallish window, the lack of rich formatting, all of this makes an e-mail message uncomfortable to read at best. You can make your message more comfortable to read by applying a few layout rules: - Air out your text. - Skip a line between every paragraph. - Insert "headings", if appropriate. * If you want to draw attention to a sentence or a paragraph, put asterisks around it, but leave a space between them and the nearest word. * This is preferable to using all upper case, which can "upset" the machine-translation software. More generally, take your inspiration from messages that you find pleasant to read! Formatting --------------- In the "Subject" field write a few words -- evocative and short -- indicating the content of your message. * In the message proper *, once you have written your message, add at the beginning of your message: - a more explicit title than what you wrote in the "Subject" field; put it between two sets of ** - then write "by" followed by your name and your e-mail address between < >. The address that appears with your name in the "From" field is the moderator's address. - a short two- or three-line abstract of the content of the message; put it between two sets of °°° In the above example you could have, at the beginning of the message: ** Title: Disagreement with the relevance of topic X and a proposal for a new debating angle ** by John ROBERTS °°° Abstract: Topic X, which we are broaching in this debate, seems mistaken to me. It would be wise to consider broaching this issue from the angle of ... . (This is a purely fictional example made up for our demonstration.) °°° And your message. Finally, limit the length of your messages under 500 words. If your message is longer than that, it probably deals with more than one subject. This means that you can divide it, and send two, or even several separate messages, which will facilitate making your Subject fairly specific, and a simple abstract at the beginning of the message. Please do not fail to read the message " 3. Writing in view of machine translation". It is important, while writing your message, not to forget that it will be translated with the help of machine-translation software, which implies a few constraints. Don't forget to print this message and read it over again from time to time. ------------------------------------------------------ European Continental Assembly FORUM Web site: http: www.echo.org e-mail : fax : 33 (0)1 43 14 75 99 - to unsubscribe, for new subscriptions, or for additional information, send a message to that effect to