Item9356: Automated notifications are inscrutable

I just received some autogenerated email from "Wiki Administrator <webmaster@foswiki.org>". The Subject line was "Foswiki.Tasks - Automated notification of topic changes".

The body copy was so obscure that it took me a few minutes to hazard a guess as to the topic. The only real clue was the string "WysiwygPlugin", buried in a "value" clause. I think the format could be greatly improved by some minor editing to a template. Here is what I received (edited slightly for ASCII):

This is an automated e-mail from Foswiki.

New or changed topics in Foswiki.Tasks, since 18 Jul 2010 - 16:12:

Topics in Tasks web: Changed: (now 20:16) Changed by: _Item2174_ _18 Jul 2010 - 17:36_ - r15->r16 _MichaelTempest_ FIELD: attributes='' name='Component' title='Component' value='WysiwygPlugin'
FIELD: attributes='M' name='Priority' title='[[Priority]]' value='Low'
FIELD: attributes='M' name='Priority' title='[[Priority]]' value='Normal'
FIELD: attributes='M' name='CurrentState' title='CurrentState' value='New'
FIELD: attributes='M' name='CurrentState' title='CurrentState' value='Waiting for Feedback'
FIELD: attributes='' name='WaitingFor' title='WaitingFor' value=''  

Review recent changes in: _http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebChanges_

Subscribe / Unsubscribe in: _http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebNotify_

Here is a revised version, which I believe is clearer and more informative:

This is an automated e-mail from Foswiki.

New or changed topics in Foswiki.Tasks, since 18 Jul 2010 - 16:12:

Topics in Tasks web:
  Changed:     (now 20:16)
  Topic:       Item2174: WysiwygPlugin removes line breaks
  Changed by:  _MichaelTempest_ _18 Jul 2010 - 17:36_ - r15->r16
  Fields:
    attributes=''  name='Component'    title='Component'    value='WysiwygPlugin'
    attributes='M' name='Priority'     title='[[Priority]]' value='Normal' (was 'Low')
    attributes='M' name='CurrentState' title='CurrentState' value='Waiting for Feedback' (was 'New')
    attributes=''  name='WaitingFor'   title='WaitingFor'   value=''  
  Snippet:
    That is an interesting idea smile - some people won't want the TML newlines shown, so I suggest
    there should be a toggle-control for showing or hiding these things - similar to many word-processor's
    fancy "paragraph-P" button.  ....

Review recent changes in: _http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebChanges_

Subscribe / Unsubscribe in: _http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebNotify_

Basically, I put in some line breaks and white space for readability, organized the Fields a bit, and included the topic information and a snippet of the change.

-- RichMorin - 19 Jul 2010

I also get these emails and they contain a perfecty beautifully formatted HTML email with a table containing the changes and some summary text from the bug item.

Are you reading the emails in a geek email client that cannot show html? Or does the particular bug item contain some special html in the first 200 chars?

This is a screen shot from my email client.

And the ASCII version for the geeks looks like

This is an automated e-mail from Foswiki.

New or changed topics in Foswiki.Tasks, since 19 Jul 2010 - 04:10:

- Item9350 (KennethLavrsen, 19 Jul 2010 - 06:56) NEW
http://foswiki.org/Tasks/Item9350

- Item9331 (CrawfordCurrie, 19 Jul 2010 - 07:19) r2->r3
http://foswiki.org/Tasks/Item9331


Review recent changes in:
  http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebChanges

Subscribe / Unsubscribe in:
  http://foswiki.org/Tasks/WebNotify

Both are fine

You should be getting a notification email about this report. How does that look like?

-- KennethLavrsen - 19 Jul 2010

I think what Rich wants is instead of Item9356 he sees Item9356: Automated notifications are inscrutable, plus some more relevant information about the task. At least that's the impression I got from IRC earlier.

Should be possible using a custom template.

OT: How do you get the ASCII version?

-- AndrewJones - 19 Jul 2010

I read my email on a Mac Pro, running Mac OS X 10.5.8 and Eudora 6.2. It generally handles HTML pretty well, but this could be an exception. In any case, here is a screen shot of the latest notice I received:

Looking at the screen shot, I see that the "snippet" I desired is actually included. Apparently, I was confused by the fact that the earlier email was reporting on a change that had no associated text.

In any case, even Kenneth Lavrson's screen shot contains no indication of the topics for the items in question.

-- RichMorin - 20 Jul 2010

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