Re: [zzdev] "Mailboxes" is a misnomer

[Benjamin Fallenstein <b.fallenstein@xxxxxx>]

Joshua Allen wrote:
> Maybe a non-mis-nomer.
> 
> You cetainly have multiple mailboxes, such as voice mailbox,
> e-mail inbox, probably a mailbox at your office.  Many
> prople have more than one e-mail inbox, and ultra-organized
> types have "in", "out", and "pending" boxes on their
> desks (although this practice seems to be dying out).

Oh, then my English *did* leave me. These have a different name in
German. ;)

I'd still say better to be clear than clumsy... after all, current
mailers call them folders, as Tuomas pointed out, and ZZ should be able
to transcend them being "boxes" (or folders) at all: richer structuring
of the mails is possible, and probably desired. The ability to store a
mail in different mailboxes, which the article speaks of, is but the beginning.

Thanks for pointing the different meanings out: I love to expand my
foreign language skills! :)

- Benja


> All of these things are typically called "boxes".  The
> term boxes is maybe too vague, though, so something like
> mailbox or messagebox is appropriate.  I personally think
> it's time to stop referring to the thing outside
> my house as a "mailbox".  It's a "snailmail inbox". :-)
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Benjamin Fallenstein [mailto:b.fallenstein@xxxxxx]
> > Sent: Saturday, August 05, 2000 12:21 PM
> > To: zzdev@xxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: [zzdev] "Mailboxes" is a misnomer
> >
> >
> > Hi all--
> >
> > reading the CyberText article, I've just noticed a bad misnomer:
> > "mailboxes" for the different places in which you store mails. A
> > mailbox, if my English serves me right, is the thing that is
> > next to the
> > entrance of your house: there's one per flat, usually.
> > Extending this to
> > the computer world, a mailbox is space in which all mails for
> > one person
> > (or a group of persons) arrive. You hardly sort your mail
> > into different
> > _mailboxes_! ;) So "mailbox" suggests the wrong things.
> >
> > "Filing" comes pretty close, although it has the wrong
> > conotations. What
> > about "topic group" or something?
> >
> > - Benja