I’m not proposing to change how any messages look in Delta Chat. If both sides use DC, everything will stay the same. This is just about how messages look for non-DC users.
Quotes should be over the message (that’s how it is today)
Personally I am very much against the use of quotes after the reply message, it is true that nowadays many clients use this mode to display e-mails but nevertheless I find it annoying.
Top posting (and also TOFU) I find them annoying because they reverse the method of reading posts.
Bottom posting I do not think is the best solution but still, personally, I find it less annoying.
I think the best method of replying to a message is inline quoting which can easily be done in xmpp (for example), at this point, perhaps, it might be useful to add the ability to quote individual parts of the message to replicate inline (as is possible to do in xmpp by adding “>” before the quote).
In this way one could choose between replying to the full message, or an inline reply to individual parts, and I think that a solution of this kind could be beneficial both between DC<>DC users, and DC>“other client” users.
Here is a link about it (unfortunately it is in Italian because I could not find the English version, but it should not be complicated to translate it, eventually): Top-posting - Wikipedia
One solution might be that when you swipe to reply to a message it is quoted in its entirety (as it is currently), while long-pressing on a message is given the option to quote it with “>” and in this way reply inline, the problem is that in the latter case one would have to change the display of the message in DC as well so I understand that it might be more complicated to implement.
Yes, plus everything that requires all the UIs to change has to be implemented at least 3 times (Android, iOS, Desktop, plus maybe some other implementations like Ubuntu Touch) and has to be coordinated between lots of people, so that’s not really an option here.
Well, in many cases I still remember what I talked about with this person, so there is no need to read the replied-to message, and I find it nicer to have the replied-to message out of my way. If after reading the answer I notice that I forgot what I wrote, I can read on to the replied-to message.
That’s actually also the order in which I read chat messages: I first only read what the other person sent, and only if I forgot what the topic was do I visually jump up to the previous message(s).
No at this point, after making me think about it, all in all it may be a good solution, honestly and personally in the end I’m not particularly affected by the problem, as I said, so I think it’s good to retrieve other opinions as well.
I would say that improving communication with non-DC users is generally a good thing.
If everything is presented in DC as it is now (quote above), but for the non-DC recipients the quote is put under the answer, I would be fine with that.
Certain it’s a ‘fast-eating’ habit to display context, quote, after the new message. So why not leaning toward more correct and lesser ‘shooting’ ways, letting the quote be leading to the response.
(btw. multiple quotes would be great to insert in an replay, and then it might easy look also more reasonable why first things first)
But of course just for food for uncommon thoughts thought, this here.
