Article

2006-07-03

Moderator note: the use of ellipses and snips

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Posted by Steve White 2006-07-03 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11131 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 An ellipsis is what, three bytes? Throw in another seven bytes for the paragraph marks? I like knowing if there's more to the article, myself.

Posted by gromky 2006-07-03 06:22|| 2006-07-03 06:22|| Front Page Top

#2 The editor trimmed a five byte ellipsis indicating a big break in the interview, and added a five thousand byte image.

It's doubtful that ellipses in general would add more that 1% to the text, and much less if you consider the images and html clutter. In the case of that particular post, it was more like 0.1%.

Overuse of ellipses could be a stylistic issue, but IMHO typical use would be inconsequential as far as 'bandwidth' goes.

My vote would be to leave them alone if the poster thought it necessary to insert them.

Posted by KBK 2006-07-03 10:26|| 2006-07-03 10:26|| Front Page Top

#3 Ah, there's no market so demanding as those who get a service for free. ;-)

Seriously, folks, Fred is providing an incredible source of info - and a chance for us all to rant - at considerable time and expense on his part. The moderators make a small contribution too.

Fred - on this day before Independence Day, a shout out to say Thanks!

Posted by lotp 2006-07-03 10:31|| 2006-07-03 10:31|| Front Page Top

#4 Yup, I agree. Rantburg is among the very best, and about the only place with comments worth reading.

Posted by KBK 2006-07-03 10:44|| 2006-07-03 10:44|| Front Page Top

#5
Yeah! T H A N K S Fred, Rantburg is a great place to learn and stay informed.

"We will routinely remove ellipses, [snip]'s, etc to save space and loading time."

Now...back to what KBK said. A five byte ellipses is removed, and a five thousand byte picture is inserted???

This saves "space and loading time" how exactly?

BTW, have a GREAT 4th of July Holiday everyone.

Posted by Grerese Shinetle2575 2006-07-03 13:14|| 2006-07-03 13:14|| Front Page Top

#6 Hear, hear! Thanks Fred and all the mods. I fourth (or fifth) the above comments though, about cutting ellipses, then inserting (much larger) pics. Of course, I ALWAYS look forward to Fred's pics (many of which, I assume, we can attribute to .com). So, I'm o.k. with the hosts/mods ruling on this one.

Posted by BA 2006-07-03 13:48|| 2006-07-03 13:48|| Front Page Top

#7 First, THANKS to Fred and all the mods - you provide an invaluable service, not just to us, but to the world.

Second, it's not our blog. If Fred or the other mods say no "snips" and ellipses, what part of NO don't you all understand?

We can ask, politely, but this ain't a democracy - no "voting" unless asked by the owner.

We now return you to your regular programing.

Oh, yeah - and HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, Rantburgers. :-D

Posted by Barbara Skolaut">Barbara Skolaut 2006-07-03 15:47|| http://ariellestjohndesigns.com]">[http://ariellestjohndesigns.com] 2006-07-03 15:47|| Front Page Top

#8 I'm probably the . . . biggest . . . user . . . of . . . elipsis here. What can I say? My legal writing professor and her ~~electric cattle prod~~ red pen trained me well. Still, I shall try to do better in observing the rules.

Happy 4th, and thanks again for giving us the 'Burg!

Posted by Mike 2006-07-03 19:32|| 2006-07-03 19:32|| Front Page Top

#9 A brief explanation. The pictures that we often insert into articles take up very little extra room in the articles database. That's because what is inserted is a link to one copy of the pic, which is ref'd over and over again.

Fred periodically winnows out photos that aren't being used. Mods and others from time to time offer up new ones.

Some of the pretty ladies with natural ... endowments ... may have come via .com originally. Most of the others do not.

Hope that helps satisfy the curious. Fred can indeed count, even when it comes to bytes. Or so I've been told ... LOL

Posted by The Moderators 2006-07-03 19:53|| 2006-07-03 19:53|| Front Page Top

#10 Honestly, the site design probably has more to do with peak usage. And please, don't get me wrong as I love this site, but.

Even with the trimming that occurs, i.e. seems once articles get long, the site switches to links for aticle with some comment display on the page; loading the entire text of the page(s) with anchor tags to jump to article probably burns a ton of bandwidth (and load time, and bandwidth cost) - even when the site trims the comments.

Normally not an issue, but in peak times it is a killer. Again, love the site, so not bashing, but as far as server load and peak times some changes would save a ton of moderator time and effort.

Plus, with the growth, and each hit of the main page downloading all of those comments, well, a lot of data per hit of the main page (and sub pages). This is a huge potential cost saver.

As for space in the DB, there as some things you can do. Though, this site is growing for sure, so have to accept more storage requirements. I am glad this is a concern ;)

Finally, the site is awesome, I am just making suggestions to help.

Posted by bombay">bombay 2006-07-03 20:37|| 2006-07-03 20:37|| Front Page Top

#11
For myself...you can trim all the eclipses you want, I don't it like when the Sun or the Moon gets blocked out!

Other than that this place rocks, and I am pounding my Liberal family and friends into dust! 8-))

God Bless and Happy Independence Day to ALL!!!

Posted by Fur Trapper 2006-07-03 20:56|| 2006-07-03 20:56|| Front Page Top

#12 The pictures that we often insert into articles take up very little extra room in the articles database

I understand that. But they still incur 'bandwidth' charges when you download. Disk is cheap compared to BW.

Downloading the first page everytime you refresh is pretty expensive. And you don't get the whole thing anyway later in the day.

Barbara, as far as 'voting' goes, it's a figure of speech. I used the subjunctive because I didn't expect mine to count. Just MHO.

Posted by KBK 2006-07-03 23:41|| 2006-07-03 23:41|| Front Page Top

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