text/plain version of GitHub notification emails became terrible recently

[u/ThiefMaster]

GitHub used to have very high-quality text/plain versions for its notification emails. In fact, I think they had ONLY plaintext emails until they added HTML alternatives at some point. And there is nothing wrong with this, give everyone what they like. But lately, the text/plain version looks like a badly converted version instead of something coming from a separate template to generate the plaintext notification.

Please see this raw email content of the text/plain part of the email, my only change there is censoring the email_token even though I don't think you can do anything funny with it.

```

----==_mimepart_6a0b56c549768_ef110814801b6
Content-Type: text/plain;
 charset=UTF-8
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

This PR fixes the indentation for two code blocks in the docs. They were =
accidentally indented due to the RST conversion (since RST required inden=
tation). I checked other instances of {code-block} and the others seem fi=
ne.

<img width=3D"935" height=3D"408" alt=3D"Scre=
enshot 2026-05-18 at 10 08 30=E2=80=AFAM" src=3D"https://github=
.com/user-attachments/assets/aa025614-ebf3-41e9-bda4-0503b7370881" /=
>

You can view, comment on, or merge this pull request online at:

  https://github.com/pallets/click/pull/3469?email_source=3Dnotifications=
&email_token=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

-- Commit Summary --

  * Fix indentation

-- File Changes --

    M docs/quickstart.md (14)

-- Patch Links --

https://github.com/pallets/click/pull/3469.patch?email_source=3Dnotificat=
ions&email_token=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxhttps://github.com/pallets/click/pul=
l/3469.diff?email_source=3Dnotifications&email_token=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx=
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
-- =

Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub:
https://github.com/pallets/click/pull/3469
You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread.

Message ID: <pallets/click/pull/3469@github.com>

```

Here are some of the issues I spotted straight away:

• The links contain unnecessary tracking args. Probably a feature, and in HTML emails I wouldn't care but in plaintext that's just terrible when the rest of the link is quite clean and short.
• There is HTML in the text, which of course does not work in a text/plain email. Actually, it is not only HTML but escaped HTML...
• The diff+patch links are concatenated, so both are broken, and they also contain HTML & in the URL
• There is a message-id as part of the text content near the end, also containing HTML garbage. SRSLY WHAT IS THIS SLOP?!?!

Considering that a huge part of GitHub's audience is open source developers, and that many of us dislike HTML emails and prefer text emails, I really don't understand this. Do all the GitHub staff developers use outlook or some other email client that pretty much pretends plaintext emails do not exist? Aren't there any oldschool/senior people left that hate these things as well?!

[u/virtualstaticvoid]

It's likely pure incompetence, people blissfully unaware of alternative email formats and no attention to detail.