READMSG(1L)READMSG(1L)NAMEreadmsg - extract messages from a mail folder
SYNOPSISreadmsg [-anhp] [-f folder] [-w weedlist] [selection ...]
DESCRIPTION
Readmsg extracts selected mail messages from a mail
folder. One helpful use of the program is when you are
composing a response to a mail message in an external edi
tor. In this case, you can run readmsg to pull a copy of
the original message into the editing buffer.
When you run readmsg from within elm (e.g. from a subshell
escape or in an external editor while composing a mail
reply) it behaves a bit differently from when you run it
directly (e.g. from a shell command line). We will first
describe its normal behavior, and then describe how it is
different when you run it under elm.
You tell readmsg which messages to extract with the selec_
tion argument. There are a couple of possible different
ways to specify the selection.
1. A lone ``*'' means select all messages in the mail
box.
2. A list of message numbers may be specified. Values
of ``0'' and ``$'' in the list both mean the last
message in the mailbox. For example:
readmsg 1 3 0
extracts three messages from the folder: the
first, the third, and the last.
3. Finally, the selection may be some text to match.
This will select a mail message which exactly
matches the specified text. For example,
readmsg staff meeting
extracts the message which contains the words
``staff meeting.'' Note that it will not match a
message containing ``Staff Meeting'' - the matching
is case sensitive. Normally only the first message
which matches the pattern will be printed. The -a
option discussed in a moment changes this.
The -f flag indicates that you'd rather use the folder
specified rather than the default incoming mailbox. The
specified folder can be a filename or a specification such
as ``=sentmail''.
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The -w flag tailors the list of mail headers that are
weeded and displayed. Header weeding is discussed below.
The -h flag instructs the program to ignore the header
weeding list, and include the entire header of the matched
message or messages when displaying their text.
The -n flag instructs the program to ignore the header
weeding list, and exclude all headers. This is used
mostly for extracting files mailed and such.
The -p flag indicates that the program should put form-
feeds (control-L) between message headers.
The -a flag indicates that all messages which match the
pattern specified on the command line should be printed,
not just the first. If a pattern was not specified on the
command line then this flag has no effect.
When you run readmsg under elm (say in the context of an
external editor) the behavior will be different from that
described above as follows.
1. The default mail folder will be the folder you are
currently examining in elm and not necessarily your
incoming mail folder.
2. You do not need to specify a selection on the com
mand line. If you omit the selection then readmsg
will extract the message(s) you have selected in
Elm. If you have tagged any messages then this
would be all of the tagged messages, otherwise it
would be the message you are currently examining.
3. Normally the message numbers readmsg uses are in
mailbox order. When you call readmsg under elm and
do not override the folder selection with the -f
option, then message numbers will be sorted as they
are displayed on the elm message index screen.
Normally, readmsg selects and displays certain headers
from the message. By default, the list of selected head
ers includes:
The ``Subject:'' header.
The ``From:'' header.
The ``To:'' header.
The ``Cc:'' header.
The ``Date:'' header.
Any header starting with ``Apparently-''.
The header weeding may be changed with the -w option. The
argument to this option is a list of header names, sepa
rated by whitespace or commas. readmsg compares each
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header to the ones in this list, and if a match is found
the header is displayed. The list entries can contain
partial header names. For instance, an entry of ``From''
would match both the ``From<SPACE>'' line at the top of
the message, as well as any ``From:'' header. Matching is
case insensitive. An underscore (``_'') may be used to
represent a space, so specifying ``From_'' will select the
``From<SPACE>'' line but not the ``From:'' header. A list
entry may be preceded by an exclamation point to suppress
the header. Thus, a specification of ``!From_ From''
means about the same thing as ``From:''. When no header
weeding options are specified, the default action corre
sponds to:
readmsg-w "Subject: From: To: Cc: Apparently- Date:"
EXAMPLES
First off, to use this from within vi to include the text
of the current message, you could use the command:
:r !readmsg
(as you hit the ':' the editor will put you at the bottom
of the screen with the ':' prompt). The space following
':r' is required.
Let's look at something more interesting, however;
Suppose you have the mail file;
From joe Jun 3 1986 4:45:30 MST
Subject: hello
Hey Guy! Wanta go out and have a milk this evening?
Joe
From john Jun 3 1986 4:48:20 MST
Subject: Dinner at Eight
From: John Dinley <xyz!john>
Remember you should show up about eight, okay?
- John D -
From xxzyz!cron Jun 3 1986 5:02:43 MST
Cannot connect to server: blob
Job 43243 deleted from queue.
The following commands will result in;
$ readmsg 2
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[ display the second message, from John ]
$ readmsg
[ an error, unless we're calling from elm ]
$ readmsg BLOB
[ no match - case sensitive! ]
$ readmsg-h connect to server
[ displays third message, including headers ]
FILES
/usr/mail/<username> The incoming mail
$ELMSTATE Status information from elm
AUTHOR
Elm Development Group
SEE ALSOnewmail(1L), elm(1L)BUGS
The '*' metacharacter doesn't always work as expected!
Perhaps the pattern matching should be case insensitive?
It might be confusing that messages are sorted when run
ning under elm with the current folder, and in mailbox
order for all other cases. When readmsg is run stan
dalone, messages may be truncated at lines beginning with
"From". This is not a problem when readmsg is spawned
under elm because the status information file created by
elm says exactly how long each message is.
BUG REPORTS TO
Bill Pemberton flash@virginia.edu
COPYRIGHTS
Copyright 1988-1995 by The USENET Community Trust
Derived from Elm 2.0, Copyright 1986, 1987 by Dave Taylor
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