While I certainly welcome email, the sheer volume I receive has demanded I set out a few guidelines. I trust you will understand my pet hates and more particularly why.


electronics tutorials for ham radio


My privacy policy and statement


recommend this page to a friend

LAST MODIFIED:

GUIDELINES FOR CONTACTING IAN C. PURDIE VK2TIP


The sheer volume I receive has demanded I set out a few guidelines. I trust you will understand my pet "hates" and more particularly why.

UPDATE

An even newer update, from December, 2005 simply join the Q & A Group

Forget the rest below, it's now outdated... Go Here

OLD STUFF

Electronics Questions and Answers

If you are involved in electronics then consider joining our "electronics Questions and Answers" news group to ask your question there as well as sharing your thorny questions and answers. Help out your colleagues!.

The absolute fastest way to get your question answered and yes, I DO read most posts.

This is a mutual help group with a very professional air about it. I've learn't things. Not for absolute newcomers to ask questions BUT it is an excellent learning resource for lurkers.

Outlook users and others who insist on sending me HTML email

Simply don't send me html email. If you use Outlook, check your preferences NOW. Odds are it's set for html (the default I believe).

I detest it, so does everybody else who has been around a long time. It will get you banned from any decent "list" until you mend your errant ways.

Please alter your email preferences to PLAIN TEXT ONLY.

Please, please, PLEASE, if you are using Outlook or some other unfortunate excuse for an email client, STOP IT!! Or, at least configure your client to send ASCII only, (no ANSI, no Unicode, no "MS text", just straight 7-bit or 8-bit ASCII).

That way, as you traverse the internet you will make fewer bitter enemies. You will no longer advertise to the world at large that you are a "newbie" or otherwise just plain ignorant.

If you are with AOL and have had the misfortune to have just upgraded at AOL you have a real significant cultural problem, people will unfortunately snigger behind your back. I believe HTML is compulsory?

On another note see:
http://www.aolwatch.org/newmem.htm

Back to HTML...

Better still, dump Outlook in favour of something else. Your virus security will probably jump 500%.

This is what html email literally looks like on my screen (and on others also):

"Hi Ian,

My name is XXX XXXXX and I ran into your web site on multi-pole band pass filters, but when I got this page, you mention that it's under construction and I would like to obtain info on this at your earliest convience".

As opposed to the plain text version:

"Hi Ian,

My name is XXX XXXXX and I ran into your web site on multi-pole band pass filters, but when I got this page, you mention that it's under construction and I would like to obtain info on this at your earliest convience".

Get my point? Very hard to read. It gets even more strange than that at times.

Is your question relevant to electronics tutorials?

1.    Don't ask me questions about "how can I find xyz".

If I can type "xyz" into the Google search box to get the answer then so can you. If you need someone to do basic things for you, contact Mum...

2.    On that note. Never send me email such as this:

"Dear Sir,

I had sent you a mail a few weeks ago requesting information about [deleted].  I have yet to receive any reply.  I request you to please send me information about [deleted] or send me the URLs of the sites that have infomation on these topics as I need it for writing a technical paper".

My reaction should be obvious to anybody. I do all this FREE of charge. I pay all the costs out of my own pocket (donations are helping a bit). I sit in front of my computer from 7.30 a.m. until after 12.30 p.m. EVERY DAY just going through email.

Supporting donations are welcome, unsolicited arrogance isn't.

3.    Are you asking a question where something I wrote seems unclear...?

Please write, I pride myself in trying to make every page on electronics tutorials as easy to understand as possible.

4.    Are you asking a question where something I wrote appears to be wrong...?

Please write, yep, I sometmes make mistkes and I'm greatful when it is drawn to my attentun.

5.    Are you asking a question where something I wrote doesn't render properly in your browser...?

Please write, browser compatability, even between differing versions is an ongoing nightmare for any webmaster. I use cascaded style sheets (CSS), server side includes (SSI) and very limited Javascript to keep things as simple as possible.

When I last looked there were a total of 17 differing versions among Internet Explorer and Netscape alone from my site statistics. Try and update to a more recent version.

I only check my sites in both IE5 and Netscape 4.75 at the most common screen resolution of 800 X 600.

I try and keep site navigation on every page simple and intuitive (below).

Ends diatribe...

Now you can write to me.

Copyright © 2000 - 2001, all rights reserved. URL - https://www.electronics-tutorials.com/contact-vk2tip.htm

Updated 23rd August, 2001

contact webmaster