I have noticed a couple of recurrent small difficulties
in recent postings.
1. Informative titles
=====================
You are asked to use informative titles. This should
be what an old teacher of mine called Augustus Caesar
(I kid you not: that was his real name) called "horse
sense", but we still see titles like "Question".
This is in your own best interests. I know that many
long-term members zap postings with titles like
"Question" without even reading them as being with high prior
probability an elementary question of no interest.
Therefore, to maximise your readership,
and to increase informativeness, do think more about
your title if your only thought is something
like "Question".
2. Difficulties in posting
==========================
A fairly common comment is that you tried posting
something before, but are not sure that it got
through. This comment should not usually be necessary.
If something got through, it will be visible in the
archives. Almost always, this will be within minutes
of posting. (The Harvard archives have a shorter
response time than the StataCorp archives.) So,
please check in the archives first.
The most common single reason that something
did not get through is that you sent your
posting in HTML or some other disapproved format.
Having said, HTML and similar _do_ sometimes
get through. Don't ask me why, as I don't
know. But if you are in doubt about what you
are sending, then, again, checking in the archives
will show you.
As always, these and many other recommendations
are detailed in the FAQ (URL below my signature).
Nick
[email protected]
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