Email signatures (#1086)

Topics/tags: Autobiographical

Like most people on the Interweb, I have a signature that I append to some messages. Until recently, my default has been to use no signature. But I do have a longer signature that I use in some situations. It looks like this.

Samuel A. Rebelsky - They/Them/Theirs or He/Him/His
Professor of Computer Science
Grinnell College, 1116 8th Avenue, Grinnell, Iowa 50112
Office: 641-269-4410 ; Fax: 641-269-4285 ; Cell: 641-990-2947
rebelsky@grinnell.edu ; https://www.cs.grinnell.edu/~rebelsky/
Public Key: https://www.cs.grinnell.edu/~rebelsky/rebelsky.gpg

This message might have an attached digital signature. See https://www.cs.grinnell.edu/~rebelsky/gpg.html

The opinions expressed herein are my own, and should not be attributed to Grinnell College, Grinnell’s Department of Computer Science, SGA, SIGCSE, SIGCAS, any other organizations with which I am affiliated, my family, or even most sentient beings.

You’ve probably seen a similar disclaimer at the end of each musing. Or, more precisely, you’ve probably ignored the similar disclaimer at the end of each musing.

Depending on my audience, I might cut out part of that signature. In particular, some more serious folk might not appreciate the disclaimer. And when I explicitly remove the digital signature, I also remove the note about digital signatures.

That signature is long. Not as long as some I’ve seen. Definitely not as long as some of those insanely stupid institutional disclaimers I’ve seen. But long. So I tend to avoid using it. However, having no signature or, more frequently, just the SamR plus my pronouns, may not convey enough information. It certainly doesn’t explain the attachment or why I choose those pronouns.

To address these issues, a few days ago I created a new short signature which is now supposed to be my default. It goes like this.

Samuel A. Rebelsky - They/Them/Theirs or He/Him/His (http://www.cs.grinnell.edu/~rebelsky/pronouns.html)
Professor and Chair of CS, Grinnell College
This message may have a digital signature. See https://www.cs.grinnell.edu/~rebelsky/gpg.html

It needs work. I don’t like the inconsistency between the links, but I don’t have a good way to address that. The links are also long. I thought about using bit.ly links, but I know that some email packages rejects things with shortened links as suspected spam. So things stay as they are.

There’s one white lie in that signature. I’m not Chair of CS, at least not until July 1. But Jerod and I share in chair duties right now, so it seems okay to list myself as such. To keep myself amused, I’ve been modifying the signature in a lot of messages, particularly when I’m writing to Jerod. Let’s see how many variants I can find.

Professor and (once and future) Chair of CS, Grinnell College

Professor and (incoming) Chair of CS, Grinnell College

Professor and (trying to avoid being) Chair of CS, Grinnell College

Professor and (soon-to-be) Chair of CS, Grinnell College

Professor and (two weeks and one day until I’m) Chair of CS, Grinnell College
Professor and Chair (elect) of CS, Grinnell College

Professor and (former) Chair of CS, Grinnell College

Seven plus the original. I thought there were more. Oh well. I wonder if anyone notices these parentheticals. I wonder why I don’t just leave out the Chair until July 1. I wonder if I should work harder on uniformity in the links in my signature. I wonder if I should explain pronouns or why I list my pronouns. I wonder how much additional uncompensated work the College is going to expect out of Chairs this summer. Yes, that’s right. I’m working on my sense of wonder.

Now I have to go back to my dozen or so other signatures and add a link to the pronoun documents. That’s a task for another time.

Postscript: Why do I have more than a dozen signatures? In part, because I use signatures for form responses. In part because I have different roles in the world. Let’s see if I can list them.

• The new, short default signature.
• The long signature.
• A SIGCSE infodir signature.
  • A SIGCSE infodir signature with the default text for You have violated our quotation rules. Please repost.
  • A SIGCSE infodir signature with the default text for I have subscribed you to the list.
  • A SIGCSE infodir signature with the default text for You are not a SIGCSE member, so I cannot subscribe you to the list.
  • A variant of the prior signature for the folks thoughtful enough to provide us with a member number.
  • A bunch more that I never use.
• A Tapia signature. At least I think I have a Tapia signature.
• A SIGCAS signature. I can get rid of that one in two weeks and one day. Yay!
• A signature from my days as a GOA instructor. I could probably delete that one.
• A signature that has the default text for Yes, I will write you a letter. I’d forgotten I had that one.
• A signature from when I was a SIGCSE Volunteer Coordinator. I can probably delete that one, too.
• The mysterious Signature 28.

I suppose that it’s time to clean up a bit. Now I’m down to 14. That’s probably the right number for now.

Postscript: As I mentioned, I use signatures for quick access to email templates. What do my readers do when they have templates for common responses? (Yes, HM, I know that you have custom Python scripts to help manage all of that. I don’t think I can write scripts that interact with Outlook with MFA.)

Postscript: I feel like I should also muse about some of the other things I’ve seen in people’s signatures (and some of the things I hate). I’ll leave that for another musing with the same subject.

Version 1.0 of 2020-06-16.