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A question regarding answering mails

A question regarding answering mails

A question regarding answering mails

(OP)
I use Outlook Express for most of my business mails. However, I notice that while receiving the mails from my contacts my original mail is omitted and they start with a new mail. This is very clean and neat as compared to my mails which has all the past communications. I retain this as a means of ready reference.

I am wondering now if my practice is considered inappropriate .

RE: A question regarding answering mails

Perhaps you need to add a proper title to your emails that describes the content of the email so that you don't have to add old correspondence to remind you of the content. It's not inappropriate to add the previous email as reference but it can be annoying if you are replying with history that includes attachments.

corus

RE: A question regarding answering mails

(OP)
My titles are very topical and correct,but my adding history for ready reference may not be.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I am often asked by project managers to comment on a design issues that have cropped up during construction. It is so frustrating when they simply forward the last e-mail in the discussions they've been having with site and expect me to be able to know what has been going on. If all the communication is retained in the e-mail, I can follow the conversation and find out how and why the problem cropped up and comment accordingly. Its much easier than having to spend hours on the phone trying to discover the origin of the problem.

So I'd say your practice is still appropriate, at least in my line of work.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I also prefer your practice, unless pertinent information is included the the previous message(s).  What really frustrates me is reading some BBS sites where EVERY message on a topic is include in every post.  There may be only a few messages, but you still have to scroll quite aways to get to the last posting.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I prefer to see what my replies were. I forget what the conversation is because I have a few going on for different projects at once.
If I get an email without the history, I can deal with it.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP3.1 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site (updated 06-21-05)
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: A question regarding answering mails

It always annoys me when people simply add more text to the top of a huge email.  I find it diffult to read from the bottom-up, especially if I have to sift through copies of copies of disclaimers.

Ideally, people should trim the previous message to leave its content intact and then answer underneath it.  That way you get to read the whole conversation in a sensible order.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

arunmrao,

I'm pretty sure this is a setting within Outlook.  Even if you "reply," the previous message is not included.  This way it can be your choice.



RE: A question regarding answering mails

I agree with SomptingGuy, reading an email trail is annoying. When this happens I do tend to break the pattern and start a new one. The problem then is that weeks later (if the topic drags out that long)it can hard to pick up the thread. I also like to keep my emails archived for months/years so that I can refer back to them whereas it seems to be our company's policy to dump them all every six months or so - that is annoying and causes the 'I did - no you didn't' type of arguement.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I find it best to keep the history of the discussion, as I've been tossed into "he-said-she-said" arguments in the past. Keeping an e-mail trail helps put these to rest.

One MAJOR pet peeve of mine is images (company logos in particular) attached to signatures. My former boss had a 25 kb image attached with each signature, which was added to each of his replies. The other management in the company thought this was a great idea and followed suit, and eventually tried to make it company policy. I would sometimes get e-mail with the same image attached more than 10 times. One manager even got upset when I changed my signature to not include the image (it made our internal company correspondence look "unprofessional".)

RE: A question regarding answering mails

Here's a realted question:

I save all of my important e-mail correspondence.  A lot of them are replies and forwards that contain the whold conversation.  When you save your e-mails do you delete the origional ones and just save the last one since it contains all of the same text?

I ask becuase if something came up where it's a "he said, she said" type of deal could the last e-mail saved approach be considered less credible since the "trail" of past e-mails inside of the message could be assumed to have been altered?

I go back and forth between clean new messages and the old messages embeded in the new.  I'm not sold on either way, and no two people seem to follow the same criteria so it's really hard to pick just one to begin with.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

If one message contains the whole thread (especially if there's a little quote line showing sender and time), I kill the other messages.

Hg

Eng-Tips guidelines:  FAQ731-376

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I guess it's time for MS to revisit the way Outlook stores its data, because right now it's just a huge bunch of text. I could think of a relational database composed of bunches of text referring to each other (sender, recipients) so you don't store double/triple/quadruple data. Storage of emails could be much better integrated with storage of other elements (xls etc.) that are often fired back and forth as attachements (and stored again each time). Hard disk manufacturers wouldn't be happy but millions of users would.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I tend to cut long e-mails (i.e. start a new message) but use Outlook's filing system to create a folder for a specific job. Then I have the old messages if I need them.

I think it very much depends on your job function. Some require better traceability than others.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

i never read the messages, except my manager's and his boss... they are really good guys.

the others... if it is important enough, they will call me asking: have you read my msg?

later.

saludos.
a.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I prefer a combination of methods.  Keep the thread if it's relevant, but delete non-relevant info when replying.  I regularly print 5 page emails for "the file" and throw 4 sheets in the recycle bin.  So when replying, I decide if teh thread is relevant.  If not, it gets cut from teh reply.

Another important note......when replying, don't just add your comments to a thread AND forward to a new party.  I've received emails from clients with a testy internal argument that I'm sure I wasn't supposed to see.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

I have a gmail account and it has quite a unique feature that i think will help alot of you fellows out. It arranges emails into conversations, thus instead of having each new email come up on it's own, if someone has replied to your email it will open the whole conversation. I find this very easy to use because it allows one to quicly scan back over the whole conversation quickly.

It also has another unique feature in that it automatically omits any quoted text from your view. However it can be readily accesed if required as it is only hidden from view, not actually deleted.

For most of you who use company emails I realise that this may not be a viable option, however it is nice to know that there is a better method out there.

RE: A question regarding answering mails

GroupWise in theory has "threaded view" but it doesn't work very well.

Hg\

Eng-Tips guidelines:  FAQ731-376

RE: A question regarding answering mails

security note:
What are you discussing in the messages?
email is insecure, but I've heard that gmail is expecially so. Is this the case?

I thought the 'rule of thumb' is to trim the quoted text to just provide any needed context. Rip the unneeded stuff, repeated long sig blocks, etc...

Jay Maechtlen
http://home.covad.net/~jmaechtlen/

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