
Ask HN: Is a system for single character responses to emails a bad idea? - pjbrow
Lately, I’ve been using a single character to respond to a lot of emails. I get through emails much faster (especially on my mobile), and the sender gets useful info back quickly.  For example, if I get an email asking for something and I won&#x27;t get to it until the day after tomorrow, I’ll respond like this:<p>-----<p>2<p>The text above represents a response below.  I apologise if this seems rude - I&#x27;m taking this approach to make sure I get back to everyone quickly (http:&#x2F;&#x2F;patbrown.org&#x2F;pointmail.html).<p>1 - I’ll get back to you within 1 day.<p>2 - I’ll get back to you within 2 days.<p>[Higher numbers mean the same as above…]<p>t - thanks, I’ll look into it but I’m not sure how long it&#x27;ll take.<p>n - No &#x2F; No thank you - I appreciate your message though.<p>y - Yes &#x2F; Yes please, that would be great.<p>s - Sorry, I’ve read your email, but it’s highly unlikely that I’ll be able to fit this in.<p>-----<p>The drawback of this approach is that it comes across as douchey to a high percentage of people.  Is the approach irredeemably weird &#x2F; off-putting?  Any ideas on how to dial down the douche factor while maintaining the benefits?<p>If it’s viable:<p>- Would two character responses for finer grained meaning work better?  For instance, “c1” could mean “It’ll be complete in 1 day” and “w1” would mean “Will get back to you on the below within one day”; and<p>- What other codes &#x2F; messages do you think would be important to include?
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detaro
> _Any ideas on how to dial down the douche factor while maintaining the
> benefits?_

Using something that replaces the letter with the matching text snippet?

~~~
pjbrow
I was considering this out the outset, but one of the benefits of sending
responses this way is that other people I work with have started to use it
(which they wouldn't if it appeared as a snippet).

~~~
davelnewton
Do both.

I used to embed tags in emails, e.g., will-reply:2d and silly stuff like that
for two reasons:

1) Keyboard macros could expand it into human-readable text (but leave the
tag) and

2) The email client I used at the time made it easy to hang functionality off
of email content so I could automate stuff like issue and time tracking etc.
based on email tags.

------
brudgers
Igonring the social dimensions.

From an information theory perspective, the lack of redundancy may be
problematic, particularly if email is a noisy channel. Because hitting send
writes to "permanent storage", typos "are forever"...and correcting them adds
noise.

For example, I accidentally send "1w" when I meant "w1" versus "Will get bcak
to you in one day."

