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Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-tis!mcb
From: mcb@lll-tis.UUCP (Michael C. Berch)
Newsgroups: news.misc,news.admin
Subject: Re: Wish list
Message-ID: <21454@lll-tis.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 18-May-87 16:55:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: lll-tis.21454
Posted: Mon May 18 16:55:29 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 19-May-87 04:22:00 EDT
References: <969@bobkat.UUCP>
Reply-To: mcb@lll-tis.UUCP (Michael C. Berch)
Followup-To: news.misc
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore CA
Lines: 66
Summary: Changing the subject line
Xref: mnetor news.misc:398 news.admin:467

In article <969@bobkat.UUCP> pedz@bobkat.UUCP (Pedz Thing) writes:
> . . .
> On a different subject and not related to sources is my wish for
> everyone who responds to an article to post it as a response, do not
> change the title, and keep all of the appropriate info in the header
> to make it look like a response.  Frequently I have to resort to the
> kill file technique just to get around something that the k key could
> and should solve if everyone cooperated.  Do not think that your two
> cents on a subject is completely revolutionary and requires a whole
> new base article even if the subject has drifted off the original
> topic.

This is self-contradictory -- if the subject has "drifted off the
original topic", it SHOULDN'T be killed by the rn 'k' command. It is
a new topic. That is why I usually make sure to change the subject
line (retaining "Re:" as directed by RFC850; see below) when
responding to exchanges where the either the subject has already
changed, or my own article changes it. The question is not whether
someone's two cents is "revolutionary" -- it's whether it's on a new
topic or not. It is considered desirable to have subject lines accurately
reflect the content of articles; remember, not everyone came in at the
beginning of the discussion. 

The idea that subject lines should both indicate that they are a reply
to an article and disclose the actual subject is from RFC850, which
says:

	From Mark R. Horton, Standard for Interchange of USENET Messages
	(RFC 850, June 1983)
	
	[. . .]
	2.1.6  Subject   The  Subject  line  (formerly    "Title")
	tells  what the article is about.  It should be suggestive
	enough of the contents of the article to enable  a  reader
	to  make  a  decision whether to read the article based on
	the  subject  alone.   If  the  article  is  submitted  in
	response  to another article (e.g., is a  "followup")  the
	default subject should  begin  with  the  four  characters
	"Re: "   and the References line is required.    (The user
	might wish to edit the subject of the  followup,  but  the
	default should begin with  "Re: ".)

Thus given an original article

	Subject: University support of UNIX
	Message-ID: <123@foo.bar.org>

a reply on that topic might contain

	Subject: Re: University support of UNIX
	Message-ID: <456@frob.com>
	References: <123@foo.bar.org>

while a followup on a tangential topic might contain

	Subject: Re: 4.3BSD licensing agreement
	Message-ID: <789@gargle.blat.edu>
	References: <123@foo.bar.org>

The interface software can then identify the last of these as a reply
to the original article by noting the "Re: " and examining the
References line, if it so chooses.  Everybody got that?

Michael C. Berch 
ARPA: mcb@lll-tis-b.arpa
UUCP: {ames,ihnp4,lll-crg,lll-lcc,mordor}!lll-tis!mcb