About Those 10 Reasons My Emails Are Too Long

Dear Craig,

Thank you for your essay on why my emails are not getting read on account of the fact that they are too long and apparently not because you have the attention span of a high school jock on speed.  While I appreciate the (ironically) lengths you went to in order to describe the problem, I do have some issues with your specific ten reasons, which I will go into below.

You don't know what you are trying to say.

Yeah fair enough, that happens, but usually I don't know what to say because you've given me a five word trigger like it broke, what up with that? And I don't know about you, but most of the time the answer is a bit more complicated than because you are a moron who doesn't know what to do with it, an answer which itself is almost three times the length of the trigger; being politically correct (and more accurate) takes more words than that.

You don't know what you are talking about.

Well I'm probably an anomaly here, but if you could see my sent-items it contains a bunch of emails complaining to people that the things they've stuck me with the responsibility for I don't know anything about. Besides, as we saw in point one, you probably don't know what we are talking about either. At least I'm up front about it.

Your signature is unnecessary.

Now if my signature is fifty words with an animated .gif plus a corporate-mandated useless "legal" "disclaimer" appended to it, then yes it could use some trimming. But mine isn't. Two words for my name, two words for my company name, and a .jpg that has the company logo on it.

Email is mail. It isn't a tweet. It isn't an instant message. It is possibly (or probably) saved for long term information. It could possibly be dragged out in court. So given all that it should be a little more formal, and presented nicely. It doesn't take any extra time, since that's the template my mail reader pops up when I ask for a new message.

I understand if that all you are doing is spitting out missives like it broke, what up with that? you might not want incriminating information on future copies like your name, but frankly if you are doing that, you should be using an instant messenger. (Or Twitter, however the hell that is supposed to work.) Not email.

At least when I'm sent to prison for failing to stop whatever scheme is in play, I won't look like an illiterate felon.

You are writing a book. Emails are not books. If there is additional information, attach supporting documents.

So you're OK with large volumes of information as long as they are easily-ignorable, probably-inconvenient-to-search, written-by-me-in-a-separate-editor large volumes of information? I thought the whole point of this exercise was to get the information read, not to make it easier for you to tune it out.

Look, if I have to write it out, it is probably going in an email. If it has to be "doc-u-fied" in the future then there's copy&paste into Word and we can then get on with the important business about arguing about the formatting details. But when it is you and me, it is going in the email. If you want supporting documents, then google can help you with all the supporting documents you want.

You are spamming.

Look, the definition of "spam" is not "stuff I don't care about." This is the corporate culture in this company where email is used to keep everyone in the loop with stuff which might or might not be immediately and directly relevant them. When you do it (because your boss told you to) then you are "spamming," too. And if you don't do it, then you become a hindrance to the way that the company runs.

You are rambling.

Context is everything. The answer to "how do I..." is almost always "why do you want to..." and there's usually details that matter that give context to even a "yes" answer.

I don't know where you work, but most of the time when I ask a question I want to show some context -- like the customer or situation, like that I've done at least paper-bag levels of research on my own, like I'm concerned that making this change will have an effect on something else important -- before bothering you. Your time is valuable. So I'm not going to treat you like my personal living google unless I have to.

You are forwarding a mess.

I try not to say "See?" at the tops of the email threads I forward back. There are two reasons for that.

First, I'm rarely involved in long email threads. When I reply, I usually try to trim everything after the email I'm immediately replying to (and usually savage that down to the key points I'm addressing). My sent-mail folder keeps a record of the thread, most of the time, if I care; and involved stuff all goes through the RT system, which keeps a record of every email sent in the issue for ever and ever.

Second, if I do find myself with a problem, I'll put a two-sentence summary at the top of the email I forward you -- but you'll get the last exchange or last couple of exchanges because sometimes there's no substitute for seeing how the hole was dug.

It shouldn't be an email.

If we need to have a record that it happened, or what was said, or what was decided -- then yes, it should be an email. Phone calls, meetings, whatever should always be followed up with an email that highlights at a minimum what happened. Why is always better. Because I'm going to keep that email I sent you and hang you with it in three weeks when you deny it ever happened.

It should be multiple emails.

Sometimes. You are right with this one. Yes. Important information can get lost if it is buried in an omnibus. But again, sometimes we need to bundle things up so we can try to keep all the relevant issues together so nothing gets missed. For some, that's easier in a single message.

You don't edit your emails.

I do. I know I'm writing potentially for history here -- in the future, someone (most likely me, but you never know) is going to be looking for this email, for evidence about this point in time or this specific issue. So I try to write clearly. And that means words, usually more than simple words.

My conclusion

I think the problem here is that we disagree how email should be used. I think it should be used like writing a letter: formal, detailed, a self-contained snapshot of whatever we're talking about including the relevant context. It should have your name at the bottom of it, like you are professionally accepting responsibility for whatever the content is. It should be written like it will get read out in court at a trial or printed on the front page of the newspaper.

If what you are doing isn't that, then you are using email wrong. Mostly, you are using email when you should be using an instant message.

So we go back to my first point -- I think the problem here isn't that I write long emails, it is that your attention span is too short. Maybe you are over-worked with your own responsibilities and feel overwhelmed. But frankly we have to work together, and that means sometimes you bother me and sometimes I bother you.

We work in a complex world with complex projects and complex tools. If everything was simplified down so that high-school dropouts could do our jobs, then that's who would be doing them -- and getting paid a heck of a lot less than we are.

Suck it up.

Love,
David.

Standing Desk: 2nd Iteration

So using the cardboard box as a keyboard base makes the whole thing kind of rickety.  So I brought in a monitor hutch from home and repurposed the overhead cube shelf that I took down immediately upon taking up residence here:

This makes things a lot more stable to type on.  The keyboard is maybe a little low for my tastes now.

The other unexpected benefit is that using both the hutch and the cabinet on top of the desk has radically increased my available desktop space, since things can go under the various surfaces now.  This might be abused by my packrat tendencies but I hope not.  I have not had a cabinet or drawers at all at this desk, and that's sharply limited my ability to hoard.

All the things I read on the net about standing desks claim that it only takes about a week to get used to them -- for me it took much longer.  The first week I had to start sitting early in the afternoon.  Then one co-worker brought in a half-inch rubber mat (one of those jig-saw type floor coverings) and I found that using that made a huge difference.  At this point I can stand without thinking about it for several hours, although late in the afternoon I'm still finding that when I want to think, I end up sitting down.

I briefly tried using the laptop LCD panel as a second screen, and found my eyes/glasses are not good enough to read the tiny fonts on the laptop from that far away.  So I gave up on that fairly quickly.  I guess since my glasses prescription hasn't been changed in like 12 years it might be time to do something about that...

(Previously.)

I guess I am officially old

dwmw2 comments about sys-v semaphores in LVM:

It's a generalisation. Of course it isn't 100% accurate but it's a good predictor. It's much the same as "code stored in BZR or SVN probably isn't worth the pain of trying to get it out of its antiquated version control system to look at it" — there are exceptions, but they are few.

Am I the only one who remembers digging around in sccs archives while dealing with "the new hotness" that was RCS?

These "ancient" vcs systems didn't exist when I got started.

(Previously.)

Economic Idiocy

Blather on:

"The actual government on the Canadian side needs to actually start regulating their toll rates because we have the highest toll rates in Ontario for a bridge that has the highest volumes," (Windsor West NDP MP Brian) Masse said. "I can't understand why we continue to allow that situation to exist when it's clear that volume should actually dictate price, and we should actually be reducing the rates."

Welcome to Economics 101.

Volume is a symptom of demand. Demand is driven by accessibility and prices. Prices are used by businesses to throttle demand and maximize their revenues -- that's why they call it "business", not "charity". So if you have a situation where more people want your service (ie use of a bridge to another country) than you can serve -- you raise prices, which reduces some people's willingness or ability to pay. So profits per transaction go up, and total volume goes down.

Now in the case of the Ambassador Bridge, there are no other bridges to compete with this one, so it enjoys a natural monopoly over international travel in this location. Building a second bridge will increase carrying capacity, and over time, the prices should come down.

Just making things cheaper will not, in the long run, help anybody.

The fact that people without an understanding of economics (or those who choose to pander to citizens without an understanding of economics) continue to get elected is a sad, sad commentary on the electorate today.

Tech Fanboi-ism

I'm a little put off by the ecosystem of Apple bloggers.

Right now Microsoft is going through the release of Windows 8 and their Surface tablet-thing.  And the Apple bloggers I follow are all going around to the new Microsoft Stores to play with them.

They do have some valid criticisms, but too often their complaints boil down to:

• It is different from the Apple product, so who would want one? or
• It is exactly the same as the Apple product, so why not just by an Apple product?

I also enjoy the discussions on price, where they note that the Microsoft product is more expensive than the Apple product... so why not just buy the Apple product?... studiously ignoring the fact that Android devices are typically cheaper than Apple products.

This is the same ecosystem that recently went through a spasm of criticizing reviews of non-Apple products for not explicitly calling out the manufacturers for doing something in a similar way to Apple.  One went so far as to imply it was a conspiracy to deny Apple the credit it so richly deserves.  Or something.

Look, the list of Apple products I own or have owned is embarrassingly long:

• iPod Shuffle 1st gen
• no fewer than four iPod Nanos of various generations
• iPod Touch
• iPad (3rd generation)
• iPhone 4

...so I think I can say with some authority that the Apple product experience is excellent -- if that's the way you want to work.  And if it isn't the way you want to work, an Apple product is painful.

Some people don't want to be told how to do things.  They want to explore, to make their own ways of doing things.  And I think that's fine.  But Apple products are not going to meet that need.

The point of Surface and Windows 8 is to try to bridge the Windows desktop with a tablet environment, so that there is program and interface consistency   Say what you want about the iPad, they make a very poor tablet extension of a Windows desktop environment.

Sometimes to find better things we have to try new things that may or may not look good initially (or ever).  But rejecting something on the grounds that it is different/the same/more expensive is short sighted.

You don't like it?  Fine.

Don't use it.

Done.

Driving Miss Crazy

One of the memes that floated around recently on Jalopnik was the idea that just being able to drive a manual transmission does not, in and of itself, make one a better person.

Thing is, I disagree.

In the context of driving, if I can use a manual transmission and you can't, that means I can do something you can't, which in the context of driving makes me a better driver than you (all other things being equal).

If you can't drive a manual, well I'm sorry for you.  It is possible to drive a car extremely well without knowing how to drive a manual*. No, not knowing how doesn't make you a bad person, or even a bad driver.  But the fact that someone who has a skill you don't could be considered better than you in relevant context is just life.

---
* == ...unless, of course, the car has a manual transmission, in which case it isn't possible to drive it well, if at all.  Duh.

Gone, Just Like That

...or wherever it is that computer recyclers send old computers to.

Over the last six months or so, the Dell Dimension 5150 that's been the family's main "business" computer has been having problems powering back on after being turned off. Described online as "the dreaded blinking orange power light", it required much fiddling to get the computer to restart. Most of the time the voodoo required has been unplugging everything (including the power cable), letting the capacitors drain, then connecting only the power and monitor cables -- and hoping. Then repeating as necessary when it didn't work.

Three weeks ago it took me a half hour under the desk to get it to start again, and Jenn said well if this is the case then it is time to replace it.

Some fiddling around on Dell.com and I came away with an entry level Inspiron 660 of some kind with a decent amount of RAM. I decided to go the cheap way because as you went up in price the main cost sink was a gaming-caliber video card and frankly we don't game on this computer and probably never will. All it has to do is have two people logged into it full time (me and Jenn) and not fall over when Nathan logs into it at the same time. We mostly just use web browsers and text editors on it. So a fancy video card? Not much point. Besides, I still have the nVidia card that I added to the 5150 to get multihead (of course the fact that I never did multihead with it is irrelevant).

I might have liked an i7 processor instead of the i5 I came away with, but I couldn't figure out how to order an i7 without having a monster video card as well.

So I took the implied savings from that and went off to Tiger Direct and ordered myself a 256GB SSD. I have a SSD in my work laptop and I don't think I'll buy a computer which boots off of rotational media ever again. This new Dell boots so fast that the Windows 7 animation doesn't have time to finish before it flips to the login screen.

Getting this all together and transfering the data from one system to another was is an ongoing pain. The Easy Transfer Wizard didn't transfer anyone's IE or Firefox bookmarks and a few other things didn't seem to get transferred either. I've got the old boot drive installed in the new system so that I can get the old data off of it. Once we're happy with that I'll replace it with the 1TB drive from the old computer, and that'll mean I'll have 2 TB of storage -- plus the SSD to boot from.

Crazy. Although it means that for the first time in a long time I have more RAM, CPU, and storage in my home system than I do in the laptop that work issued to me.

So in less than three weeks I've gone from not thinking about a replacement to being replaced. And it happens that one of the vendors we do business with is having an electronics-recycling day today. So along with the old Voyager (which died a year ago September), a Netopia R910 router that's older than God, a busted Compaq laptop, and a big box of IDE disks, I've put out the 5150.

Maybe I'm excessively sentimental, but it seems sad that something I've used so long is getting unceremoniously turfed so quickly.