What is the best email quoting for blind users?

What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[M. Fioretti]

Greetings,

besides this mailing list, I also lurk on an italian one focused on
web and internet accessibility. Some subscribers there told me that
the only right (accessibility-wise) way of quoting email is to remove,
or not add, all the "greater than" signs at the beginning of each line.

In other words, instead of:

>Marco wrote:
>> I want to know something

one is supposed to format quotes in this way:

Marco wrote:
I want to know something

...even if it breaks replies markup in all the email clients I know
of, is not written in any netiquette guide I ever read and, basically,
makes much, much harder to figure out who answered to who in long
email threads.

As far as I remember, I have never encountered this other "quoting" on
this list. Therefore, I'd like to ask:

* is it true that no screen reader can handle traditional email 
  quoting, with all "greater than" signs appended at the beginning of
  each line? Are such messages really harder to read for blind users?

* if this is a problem, how come the other rule is not followed on
  this list?

Thank you in advance for any feedback,

	Marco

-- 
Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
Fedora Core 5 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/

We need to focus on how to be productive, not just active.
        Scott McNealy, chairman, CEO, and cofounders, Sun Microsystems.

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Samuel Thibault]

Hi,

M. Fioretti, le Thu 01 Jun 2006 12:19:32 +0200, a écrit :
> besides this mailing list, I also lurk on an italian one focused on
> web and internet accessibility. Some subscribers there told me that
> the only right (accessibility-wise) way of quoting email is to remove,
> or not add, all the "greater than" signs at the beginning of each line.

For speech, probably yes.  For braille, maybe not so sure.

> * is it true that no screen reader can handle traditional email 
>   quoting, with all "greater than" signs appended at the beginning of
>   each line?

It is possible that no one does this indeed, but they should.

The issue here is that you can't ask the whole planet to change their
habit.  So your tools should cope with > signs.

And as a sighted user, I really prefer the > quotation mark.

Samuel

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Geoff Shang]

Hi,

Most lists tend to have their own rules about this sort of thing.

Here are my views, in no particular order:

1.  I prefer to have the > signs in replies, so I know what is quoting and
    what is not.

2.  I prefer not to have > signs in forwards, as they serve no real purpose 
and multiple forwards can end up with multiple >'s at the start of each 
line, which is tedious to say the least.

3.  Most screen readers I know of can be configured not to speak the > 
sign.

4.  I know of at least one Email client, pine, which can be configured to 
not display quoted material.  It may well rely on the presence of > signs 
however.

5.  Several Email clients allow you to configure the quote character or 
disable it entirely.  Pine even allows you the ability to edit it on a per 
message basis.

6.  Some lists prefer the so-called jepardy style of quoting (i.e. answers 
first).  I don't, since it means that you can't intermingle quoted text 
with your responses.

7.  Jepardy style quoting is most often on lists with Windows users, where 
the OUtlook family of Email clients is set to include the original message 
by default, which most Blind people may not even be aware of.  This can 
often result in an entire thread being quoted right back to the beginning 
with most having no idea that it's happening.

But now I'm digressing.

Geoff.

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[M. Fioretti]

On Thu, Jun 01, 2006 21:37:37 PM +1000, Geoff Shang
(geoff@hitsandpieces.net) wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> Most lists tend to have their own rules about this sort of thing.

Yes, but my point was that I had never, ever heard of this particular
rule before, including other fora dedicated to accessibility

> 3.  Most screen readers I know of can be configured not to speak the
> > sign.

Sorry, just to be 100% sure: here you are referring only to speech
syntesyzers, or also to braille terminals? Also:

 you mean that these screen readers can be configured to do so only
 when reading email messages?

 is there a list of which screen readers can handle normal email
 quoting, and instructions on how to configure them for this specific
 task?

Thanks,

	Marco

-- 
Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
Fedora Core 3 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/

You can't build a reputation on what you are "going" to do.
                                                        Henry Ford

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[M. Fioretti]

On Thu, Jun 01, 2006 13:53:05 PM +0200, io (mfioretti@MCLINK.IT)
wrote:
> (geoff@hitsandpieces.net) wrote:
>> > 3.  Most screen readers I know of can be configured not to speak the
> > > sign.
>...

Marco Fioretti wrote:
> you mean that these screen readers can be configured to do so only
> when reading email messages?

One extra question on this: I have found an italian page saying that

	"if you disable the speaking of the ">" sign, blind users
	won't know what is a reply and what is new text. If you don't
	disable such reading, blind users will hear one or more ">"
	signs at every new line, which is terribly annoying and
	confusing".

Is there no other way? That is, is there some assistive sw which can:

   not speak the ">" sign but, at the same time,
   indicate to the user in some way what is a reply and what is new?

TIA,
	Marco

-- 
Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
Fedora Core 5 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/

Be the change you want to see in the world - Gandhi

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Dave Mielke]

[quoted lines by Samuel Thibault on 2006/06/01 at 13:34 +0200]

>And as a sighted user, I really prefer the > quotation mark.

As a totally blind braille user, I prefer the > quotes as well. They very 
quickly clarify who said what. I've read messages wherein the > quotes have 
been removed, and they often leave me quite confused and having to reread the
message several times in order to make sense of it.

-- 
Dave Mielke           | 2213 Fox Crescent | I believe that the Bible is the
Phone: 1-613-726-0014 | Ottawa, Ontario   | Word of God. Please contact me
EMail: dave@mielke.cc | Canada  K2A 1H7   | if you're concerned about Hell.
http://FamilyRadio.com/                   | http://Mielke.cc/bible/

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Dave Mielke]

[quoted lines by M. Fioretti on 2006/06/01 at 13:53 +0200]

>Sorry, just to be 100% sure: here you are referring only to speech
>syntesyzers, or also to braille terminals?

I didn't make the original statement, but, as a braille user, I'll respond to 
it anyway. The > quotes at the beginning of a line are nowhere near as annoying 
in braille as they would be if individually spoken. It's very easy to skim over 
them with ones fingers, or, in fact, to just begin to read each line a little 
bit in from the start. A line with lots of leading > signs is indeed annoying, 
but I suspect that they're just as annoying to sighted readers. The fact that
they're occasionally encountered, though, is acceptable given the far greater
inconvenience of not having them at all.

-- 
Dave Mielke           | 2213 Fox Crescent | I believe that the Bible is the
Phone: 1-613-726-0014 | Ottawa, Ontario   | Word of God. Please contact me
EMail: dave@mielke.cc | Canada  K2A 1H7   | if you're concerned about Hell.
http://FamilyRadio.com/                   | http://Mielke.cc/bible/

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[M. Fioretti]

On Thu, Jun 01, 2006 08:52:22 AM -0400, Dave Mielke (dave@mielke.cc)
wrote:

> I didn't make the original statement, but, as a braille user, I'll
> respond to it anyway. The > quotes at the beginning of a line are
> nowhere near as annoying in braille as they would be if individually
> spoken. It's very easy to skim over them with ones fingers, or, in
> fact, to just begin to read each line a little bit in from the
> start.

Marco Fioretti answers:

Dave,

Thanks for sharing this information. Yes, the more I read and think
about it, the more it looks like there is no real reason to ever
remove > quotes in email messages.

One final question. As a braille user, what do you think of the
quoting style I have used in this email, that is, keeping your quote
with > signs and attribution, then starting my answer with the "Marco
Fioretti answers" line?

Could it be the best of both worlds, that is complying with
traditional quoting netiquette and, at the same time, separating
quotes from replies for speech readers or braille terminals which
ignore the ">" signs?

TIA,
	Marco

-- 
Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
Fedora Core 5 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/

Non si vive se non il tempo che si ama.		   C. A. Helvetius

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Dave Mielke]

[quoted lines by M. Fioretti on 2006/06/01 at 15:14 +0200]

>Thanks for sharing this information. Yes, the more I read and think
>about it, the more it looks like there is no real reason to ever
>remove > quotes in email messages.

Here's another, potentially controversial, thought of mine on this topic. 
Blind people who push for some sort of special pract5ices on "their" lists are
doing no less than voluntarily excluding themselves from all the other lists.
We should learn to function adequately on all lists so that we won't be
isolating ourselves into our own subcommunities, thus creating the very
segregation that we resent so much when others do it to us. Since we can't
change evryone else, especially on all the other good lists, it's essential
that we learn to live within the practices of the majority, and even to use
them, and, where necessary, to advocate for accessibility aids, tool
accommodation, etc.

>One final question. As a braille user, what do you think of the
>quoting style I have used in this email, that is, keeping your quote
>with > signs and attribution, then starting my answer with the "Marco
>Fioretti answers" line?
>
>Could it be the best of both worlds, that is complying with
>traditional quoting netiquette and, at the same time, separating
>quotes from replies for speech readers or braille terminals which
>ignore the ">" signs?

I suppose, although my initial reaction, having not paid enough attention to
your actual name on the "From:" line, was that you were beginning to quote some
other person.

I think that you, as the author of a message, shouldn't need to 
attempt to accommodate 
all possible ways of viewing your message. If some screen reader or message 
filter strips out the > quotes, then, in my opinion, it's also the job of that 
very same screen reader or message filter to add whatever annotation, e.g. 
"author answers", in order to help reclarify what its editing has unclarified.

-- 
Dave Mielke           | 2213 Fox Crescent | I believe that the Bible is the
Phone: 1-613-726-0014 | Ottawa, Ontario   | Word of God. Please contact me
EMail: dave@mielke.cc | Canada  K2A 1H7   | if you're concerned about Hell.
http://FamilyRadio.com/                   | http://Mielke.cc/bible/

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Andor Demarteau]

well never mind what the ebst is, that is personal at best.
IMHO the style proposed in RFC 1855 (entiquets) is the best, meaning
context sensative  quoting.

And yes I'm not quoting anything form a previous message in this posting
otherwise you would have seen lines starting wiht ">" before lines in this
message.

Posting in a style where you put your reply below the part of the message
you are actually refering too is the best way IMHO.


-- 
Andor Demarteau                 E-mail: andor@nl.linux.org
student computer science        www: http://www.nl.linux.org/~andor
UU based & VU guest-student     jabber,icq,msn,voip: do ask ;)
-----------
chairman Stichting Studiereizen Storm 2002-2004
vice-chairman USF Studentenbelangen executive committee 2002-2003

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Tim Chase]

The below python script I cranked out will convert mail from the 
">" style of commenting to blocks marked by text (and for deeper 
levels, will note what level of quoting it is).

It can just be used as a filter, if your mailer supports it, as 
it reads from stdin and writes to stdout.

That way, if you need to convert the "usual" style of quoting to 
a more TTS-friendly style of quoting, this should automate the 
process for you.

Consider it public domain :)

Hope someone finds it useful,

-tim


#!/bin/env python
# By Tim Chase, June 2006
# Public Domain
from sys import stdin

# if you have more than one character that
# can be a leading quote character, you can just
# add it to this string.  E.g.
# QUOTECHAR = ">!#"
# will treat leading ">", "!", and "#" characters
# as quote-leaders.
QUOTECHAR = ">"

def getLineQuoteDepth(line):
     depth = 0
     for char in line:
         if char in QUOTECHAR:
             depth += 1
         elif char != " ": break
     return depth

levels = []
for line in stdin:
     line = line.rstrip("\r\n")
     depth = getLineQuoteDepth(line)
     if depth:
         if levels and depth < levels[-1]:
             depth = levels[-1]
             del levels[-1]
             print "Ending quote",
             if depth > 1:
                 print "(level %i)" % levels[-1]
             else: print ""
         elif levels and depth == levels[-1]:
             pass
         else:
             levels.append(depth)
             print "Begining quote:",
             if depth > 1:
                 print "(level %i)" % levels[-1]
             else: print
         line = line.lstrip(QUOTECHAR + " ")
     else:
         if levels:
             del levels[-1]
             print "Ending quote"
     print line

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[M. Fioretti]

On Thu, Jun 01, 2006 09:31:06 AM -0500, Tim Chase
(blinux.list@thechases.com) wrote:

> The below python script I cranked out will convert mail from the ">"
> style of commenting to blocks marked by text (and for deeper levels,
> will note what level of quoting it is).

Tim,

I think this is a very useful tool. You should advertise in other
forums too, and/or give it a permanent web address. It may solve a lot
of problems.

Thanks,
	Marco

-- 
Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
Fedora Core 3 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/

Life is what happens whilst you're busy making other plans
                                                 (John Lennon)

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Tim Chase]

> I think this is a very useful tool. You should advertise in
> other forums too, and/or give it a permanent web address. It
> may solve a lot of problems.

I'm not sure what other sorts of forums (forae?) would be 
interested in such a script.  It worked on my Linux box...whether 
it works on Windows is another matter.  It should, as python is 
fairly portable, but there are no guarntees.

I've posted at

	http://tim.thechases.com/bvi/textquote.py

in case you want to post the link anywhere.

It assumes folks know how to deal with python scripts.  Folks on 
this list are pretty savvy about doing that sort of thing, but 
hoi polloi require a lot more hand-holding.

Do with it as you please. :)

-tim

Re: What is the best email quoting for blind users?

[Willie]

A really simple solution to all this is to suggest to those 
complaining that they adjust the amount of punctuation their screen 
reader is speaking.  Instructions for this should be in all of their manuals.

At 09:14 AM 6/1/06, you wrote:
>On Thu, Jun 01, 2006 08:52:22 AM -0400, Dave Mielke (dave@mielke.cc)
>wrote:
>
> > I didn't make the original statement, but, as a braille user, I'll
> > respond to it anyway. The > quotes at the beginning of a line are
> > nowhere near as annoying in braille as they would be if individually
> > spoken. It's very easy to skim over them with ones fingers, or, in
> > fact, to just begin to read each line a little bit in from the
> > start.
>
>Marco Fioretti answers:
>
>Dave,
>
>Thanks for sharing this information. Yes, the more I read and think
>about it, the more it looks like there is no real reason to ever
>remove > quotes in email messages.
>
>One final question. As a braille user, what do you think of the
>quoting style I have used in this email, that is, keeping your quote
>with > signs and attribution, then starting my answer with the "Marco
>Fioretti answers" line?
>
>Could it be the best of both worlds, that is complying with
>traditional quoting netiquette and, at the same time, separating
>quotes from replies for speech readers or braille terminals which
>ignore the ">" signs?
>
>TIA,
>         Marco
>
>--
>Marco Fioretti                    mfioretti, at the server mclink.it
>Fedora Core 5 for low memory      http://www.rule-project.org/
>
>Non si vive se non il tempo che si ama.            C. A. Helvetius
>
>_______________________________________________
>Blinux-list mailing list
>Blinux-list@redhat.com
>https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list

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