| # | The message number (between 1 and 16,777,216) that you wish to respond to. | If you wish to reply to multiple messages you may do so by entering a message number followed by a comma, a space and then the next message number (e.g., 3252, 3523) |
A reply is nothing more than a new message. There are a couple of things that make a reply different than entering a regular message. These differences are listed below:
The message is automatically addressed so that your response is sent to the proper user.
The subject automatically defaults to the one of the previous message–you may change the subject if you wish
You may quote from the message you are responding to enhance the clarity of your response.
If security of the message that you are replying to is PUBLIC then you may change the security level of your reply. Otherwise, the message security of the original message will be carried through to the reply. In other words you can respond to a PUBLIC message and make the reply a RECEIVER ONLY message. However, you cannot respond to a RECEIVER ONLY message and make the reply PUBLIC.
The message number of the original message displays in the header of your reply message as REFER #.
Aside from the differences listed, a reply is exactly like entering any other message. Therefore, you will want to refer to the E command to find what options are available to you while entering your reply.
Quoting the original message in your reply can enhance the clarity of your reply. It makes it easier to understand the message and what you are responding to. Very little effort is required for quoting a message. The following paragraphs describe the various methods of quoting the previous message.
Remote: From remote, there are two ways you can quote the original message. If you are in the full-screen editor then you can press CTRL-O to pull up the previous message or you may press ESC and then select Q from the message entry command prompt.
When the message is displayed, on your screen you will see line numbers to the left of each line. When the message has been displayed you will be asked to enter the beginning line number you would like to quote, followed by the ending line number to quote.
Once you have entered the line numbers to quote, you will be returned to the message you are writing. Where you left off you will now see the lines that you quoted. To set the quote apart from your message, you will see a → to the left of each line that is a quote. When reading the message, these will show up in color to make it stand out even more.
Local: When you are not calling in from remote and want to quote a message you may use PCBoard's scroll back buffer in addition to the methods that are described for remote users. Since your arrow keys are active in the full screen editor, you can access the scroll back buffer by pressing the o key on your keyboard. When you are in the scroll back buffer, simply press the SPACE where you want to begin your quote and then cursor to the last part you want to quote and press the SPACE bar again. The text that you have marked is now shown in reverse text. If you want to use that text, press ESC to quote the marked text. You may also remark the text you want to quote using the SPACE bar as previously mentioned.
If you wanted to reply to the following message
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you would type RE at the End of Message prompt. RE is the subcommand to reply to the message that you are currently reading.
Depending on the conference configuration, the following information may be asked before you can enter a reply to a message:
| Subject: | When entering a reply, you are given the ability to change the subject of the message if you wish. If you simply press ENTER when prompted for the subject, the subject of the message you are replying to will be used. |
| Message Security: | If the message you are responding to is a public message, you are asked if you would like to change the security of the message in case you wish to respond privately rather than in a public message. |
| Echo Message: | If the Echo Mail in Conference option is turned on for the conference where the reply is entered, you are also asked if you would like to echo your response. |
| Route message to: | If your response is to be echoed and if the response is a private response, and if the Prompt for ROUTE info option is turned on, this question will be asked. You can enter any routing information (such as a site address or personal address) in this field as appropriate for the NetMail system that the conference carries. |
| Request Return Receipt: | If the message is private, you are given the option to request a return receipt. If you request a return receipt, you will receive a message notifying you when a user has read your message. |
| Use Full Screen Editor: | If you have setup your defaults to ask which editor each time you enter a message ( W user command ), you will be asked this question. |
Once these questions have been asked, you are ready to enter the response. Usually, however, you will want to quote some of the text from the original message. From within the full-screen editor, you can press CTRL-O to quote from the previous message. You will be shown the message you are responding to (with line numbers at the beginning of every line). Once the original message has been displayed, you are asked which line you wish to begin your quote from followed by the last line you wish to quote.
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In this example, you could quote line one by specifying both the starting and ending line number as line 1. You are then returned back to the editor and you will see that quoted text is now in your message with each line prefixed with → so you can differentiate between your reply text and the quoted text.
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If you are using the line editor instead of the full-screen editor, the method you use to quote will be a little different because that particular editor does not recognize CTRL-O. Instead, you get to the message command prompt by pressing ENTER on a blank line in the editor. At the command prompt, press Q followed by R. You may then quote the message in the same manner that was used to quote from the full-screen editor.
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If you are logged in locally, you can use the methods described previously to quote a message, or you can take advantage of PCBoard's scroll-back buffer (if you have it enabled). You can mark any text in the scroll-back buffer and have it included in the message as quoted text. To do so, simply hit the o key and you will be in scroll-back mode. You will notice that you have a cursor that you can move around the screen. Simply move the cursor to the beginning of the text you want to quote and press M. Next, move the cursor to the last portion of the text you want to quote and press M. All of the text between your beginning and ending mark is now highlighted.
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Simply press E, and it will be entered in your reply as quoted text. You may then continue to enter your reply and quote more text if you need to.
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Once you have finished entering your response and quoting text, you can save your message just as you normally would if you were entering a message from scratch.