aroraborealis | (no subject)

(Unless, of course, I'm chatting on a system that automatically turns emoticons into images, in which case, the closing bracket on the parenthetical statement gets lost. :)

but what do you do if you can't tell whether the same thing happens on your recipient's side? dilemma!

A practical expression of the correctness of the true architectural purity answer: Don't combine the parenthesis and the smiley! :-}

It's a problem!

One of the many reasons I'm too lazy to have multiple accounts...

That's what I was thinking. When I have to use parenthesis I use other things for the mouth part of the smiley.

*laughs*
You know, I can't count how many times I've sat pondering how best to accomplish this very thing! And I'm not especially consistent with what I do--it often ends up being based on what looks right for the specific instance.

Neither feels strictly right, but I tend to go for readability and drop the second parenthetical just so my smiley doesn't have a double chin.

The parenthesis that opens the statement has to be balanced by a parenthesis that closes the statement, and the curved line forming the bottom of the smiley is NOT a closing parenthesis, just because its using the same character on the keyboard. Unbalanced parentheses! Wrong! ~~Well the compiler will catch it anyway.~~

Not acceptable, however: (parenthetical comment, plus smiley! :))

In practice, what I usually do is (parenthetical comment, plus smiley! :->), despite the possibility of misinterpretation of the parenthesis as a beard. Sadly, AIM chokes on ";->)", so this doesn't work for flirting in that medium.

Graphical smileys are evil. I turn them all off.

You forgot the other option (which is to use a Japanese-style smiley). (^_^)

What about keeping the smiley outside of the parentheses?
(don't hide your smilies) :)
I too have pondered this long.

What she said.

That!

\\(^o^)//

How about:

(-: parenthetical comment, plus smileys! :-)

I'm in such a kerfluffle about it, I just avoid it at all costs.

I find that (parenthetical comment, plus smiley :-) is sufficiently visually-balanced that another parenthesis feels like overkill.

That, and my text editor yells at me if it thinks I've added too many close parentheses, and I'm tired of that.

heaven forfend anyone use a non-smiling smiley – but when i do use one inside parentheses, i also close the parentheses:

(this is a smiley comment :)
(this is a not-so-happy comment :/ )
(this is a frowny comment :( )

but that looks so terrible that i try not to do it.

Me too. Closing parenthetical is absolutely necessary and I wince every time someone drops it.