[imp] Signature

[Michael M Slusarz]

Quoting Ralf Lang <lang at b1-systems.de>:

> I understand the arguments for and against showing/editing signatures.
> Still I do not find it very intuitive and when H5 goes into production
> this month, I am sure users will ask for patches to at least see the
> signature.

To summarize dozens of previous posts why signatures can NOT be added  
to compose text:

1.) A signature MUST MUST MUST be added to the bottom.  For those that  
top-post on replies, your signature MUST NOT appear after "your" text,  
because then there is no way of telling below the signature what is  
YOUR data vs. what is OTHER'S data.  You can't allow users to change  
this, period.

If someone tells me this is how outlook/Gmail/some other MUA does it,  
I will slap them.

2.) Signatures have an "unofficial" delimiter that has a specific  
format (although unofficial, it is reference in at least one official  
RFC).  A user MUST NOT be able to change this delimiter.   
Additionally, this delimiter can get munged during draft  
saving/resuming, or browser refreshes/sending.  This kind of  
structural element should never be exposed to the user.

3.) Resuming drafts.  It is possible to keep track if IMP adds a  
signature to a draft message, but other MUAs have no knowledge of  
this.  By not adding a signature to a message, it at least fixes the  
issue of a draft message saved by IMP and resumed by another MUA from  
having duplicate signatures.

4.) Regardless of #3... a signature should NEVER EVER EVER be added to  
a draft message since a signature CAN BE CHANGED BETWEEN DRAFT SAVE  
TIME AND SEND TIME.  A signature is potentially dynamic.  A USER  
SHOULD NEVER BE EXPECTED TO MANUALLY CHANGE A SIGNATURE IN THIS  
MATTER.  "Placeholder template code/text" is not an option (see #3).

5.) SIGNATURES ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE EDITED PER MESSAGE!!  This is  
NOT what a signature is.  This is a fundamental misunderstanding of  
what a signature is supposed to do (and the point most other MUAs  
miss).  This describes instead a "template" or "auto-append" feature  
rather than a signature.

People keep bringing up the idea that "users want to alter their  
signature".  Why?  Someone give me ONE REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE OF WHEN A  
USER WOULD CONCEIVABLY DO THIS.

Here's an example signature:

John Smith
Manager, Widgets LLC
Email: foo at exaple.com
Mailing Address: 123 Main Street
                  Anytown, Anystate 12345 USA

What part of that signature would a *realistic* user change on any  
given e-mail message?

The only thing I could potentially see is sending a message using a  
"personal" signature vs. a "business" signature, and needing different  
signatures for both.  But that is the entire point of multiple  
identities in the first place.

6.) Signatures make no sense to add in the minimal or smartmobile  
view.  In both of these cases, signature information (which may be  
quite long) simply detracts from being able to actually enter text to  
send a message.  So now you have the case where you have inconsistent  
UI between different views (some show signature, some don't).  That is  
*VERY* confusing for users.  If UI elements are shared between views,  
they must act similarly.  The only practical answer is to never show  
the signature data.

7.) It is IMPOSSIBLE to reliably switch signature data when switching  
between HTML/Plaintext, and switching between identities.  The code in  
previous versions of IMP DID NOT EVEN PRETEND THAT THIS WOULD RELIABLY  
HAPPEN.  There's nothing worse than writing code that "might" work  
depending on how the user has altered the compose text.  The amount of  
time spent trying to maintain this terrible mess of code far exceeded  
the benefit it ever provided.


That's *7* reasons why this is a terrible idea.  I could go on more -  
such as with how the real-world example of letterhead, quoted as  
reason why signatures need to be displayed, actually is a slam-dunk  
argument as to why signatures should not be displayed - but I have  
better things to do today rather than continuing this argument that is  
well-settled.

This is the last time I will discuss this topic.  Rest assured, it is  
not happening in IMP ever so everyone can stop wasting their time  
bringing it up.  This time is better spent patching IMP locally as you  
see fit (the benefit of open-source).

michael

___________________________________
Michael Slusarz [slusarz at horde.org]