[Pan-users] Re: clarification on sorting threads by date...

[Artur Jachacy]

Charles Kerr wrote:
> Artur Jachacy wrote:
> > Charles Kerr wrote:
> >
> > > But stating it in those clear terms, though, I realized:
> > > I can't think of any /need/ to sort by the oldest post.
> > > Maybe the cleanest fix is that, when sorting by date in the header pane,
> > > threads are *always* sorted by the date of the thread's newest post.
> > > IIRC this is how Thunderbird behaves, too.
> >
> > Not for me.
> >
> > > Can anyone think of a reason for Pan to /not/ behave that way?
> >
> > Because that's not how it's been done. That should be reason enough.
>
> Maybe I'm not expaining it right?
>
> http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/927/thunderbird2vt.png
> is a screenshot of Thunderbird sorting threads by date.
> It's showing the behavior I'm proposing that Pan adopt.
>
> If Thunderbird were to sort threads by the date of the first post,
> "Suse RPM 0.103"                        (07/09, 12:39 PM) would /follow/
> "[Pan-users] Pan 0.103 on AMD64 Linux"  (07/08, 05:07 PM), but doesn't.
>
> Why does the (07/08 05:07) article come later?  Because it got a
> followup at (07/09 03:00 PM) from Walt after the Suse RPM mail came in.
> Thunderbird is sorting threads by the date of their newest article.

No, it was clear enough, I just didn't realise you meant threading in 
mail, which I've never had a good look at. I'm using Thunderbird for 
news at the moment, which isn't a very good idea, because it's a pretty 
bad newsreader, probably worse than OE in some respects, but it does 
sort threads in newsgroups by the date of the first article.

> Google news does it too, though that may be an argument
> /against/ implementing it. ;)

Hey, whatever works. :-)

As for implementing it as an option, I wonder if it could be done like 
sorting by remaining size or time in some eMule clients. There is one 
column for both, but when you sort by remaining time, there's a single 
arrow pointing up or down, and when you sort by remaining size, there's 
a double arrow pointing up or down, like this:
<http://img164.imageshack.us/img164/1686/sorting0jn.jpg>
Or would this be too confusing? And would it be possible to implement? 
Obviously, you can't put both dates in one column, but Thunderbird only 
shows the date of the first article even when it sorts by the date of 
the last.

Artur

--
Washington, Washington
Six-foot-twenty, fuckin' killing for fun