Very Computer

How does a "mailbox" differ from something that
is NOT one?

Until I edited the "mailbox file", and inserted
some messages that had wrongly gotten saved into
a mailbox I didn't want them in, "s" worked
fine.

However, after that point, I started getting
this "not a mailbox" message.

QUESTION: what hacks do I have to make to
a file to make mutt again consider it to be
a "mailbox", so "s" works again?

Thanks!

David Combs

PS: what effect does the prefix "=" have on
a file to save an email into?

Thanks again!

Any mailbox file can be treated like a text file
but not vice versa.  The mails contained are
separated by a delimiter.  Look at the first line
of the file and discover the magic "From " line.

Quote:> Until I edited the "mailbox file", and inserted
> some messages that had wrongly gotten saved into
> a mailbox I didn't want them in, "s" worked fine.

Next time you'd better change into the other mailbox
from within mutt and save the messages again into the
correct mailbox.  Let mutt do this for you :-)

Quote:> PS: what effect does the prefix "=" have on
> a file to save an email into?

It's a shortcut for the pathname where your mailboxes
are stored into.  Like "~/Mail" for most people.

Greetings,
                                Ripley
--

Quote:> > Mindestens drei Leute, zwei Meinungen, und Recht hat RFC 2046, 4.1.2.
> RFC 2046 enth?lt genug Seil, um sich in den Fu? zu schie?en.

        [Gunnar Ritter und Claus F?rber in de.comp.standards, 2001-04-10]

That it's an a known mailbox-format, maybe ?  ;-)
There are a couple of specifications for mbox and maildir and
what-you-call-it...

Basically, an mbox-file is the messages put one-after-one,
messages starting with a line

From [sender]..

Quote:> QUESTION: what hacks do I have to make to
> a file to make mutt again consider it to be
> a "mailbox", so "s" works again?

If I get to fuxor up one of my mailboxes, the use of a
procmail-command has helped me often:

  formail -ds procmail < [defunct-mailbox]

this will feed the messages in [defunct-mailbox] to procmail
one-by-one, assuming header-brokenness (the -d -flag of formail).
If you don't want to feed the messages to your usual procmail-setup,
you can use

  formail -ds procmail -m [special-procmailrc] < [defunct-mailbox]

and define a rule pointing to the box you want the messages to be
delivered to.  !Don't use [defunct-mailbox] ! , move them there after
finishing if you like, or you will spoil it ...

Quote:> PS: what effect does the prefix "=" have on
> a file to save an email into?

The prefix =  means you like to save this message to a box relative
to your setting of  "folder"

        example:

a)
set folder={imaphost.mailisp.org}

save to =flower
        ->   saved to {imaphost.mailisp.org}flower

b)
set folder=/home/theuser/Mail

save to =flower
        ->   saved to /home/theuser/Mail/flower

                HTH,
                 drifter
--

                http://www.outerlounge.de/drifter
23.....56.......drifting

As far as I can tell, this fact isn't documented
anywhere.  Thanks for the needed info!

Quote:

>> Until I edited the "mailbox file", and inserted
>> some messages that had wrongly gotten saved into
>> a mailbox I didn't want them in, "s" worked fine.

>Next time you'd better change into the other mailbox
>from within mutt and save the messages again into the
>correct mailbox.  Let mutt do this for you :-)

(1) "better change into the other mailbox":
This is a big part of what I do not understand,
having experience with *only* unix/sun "mail"
and now mutt:
   . What *is* a "folder"?  (a file?  a directory?  what?)

   . What is *special* about a "folder"?

   . What is a "mailbox"?   Same as "folder"?

   . What does it mean to "switch from one
      mailbox to another"?

 --- ALSO: about "and save the message again":

   . but by the time I *realized* that the msg
     had gone to the wrong "=<filename>", I had
     *already deleted* the message from mutt.

     Given that, how to move a message from
     one =file to another?  
     .. via mutt?
     .. via vi, vim, emacs, ...

Quote:

>> PS: what effect does the prefix "=" have on
>> a file to save an email into?

>It's a shortcut for the pathname where your mailboxes
>are stored into.  Like "~/Mail" for most people.

That too seems to be undocumented -- thank you
VERY much for that info, too.

Quote:>Greetings,
>                            Ripley
>--
>> > Mindestens drei Leute, zwei Meinungen, und Recht hat RFC 2046, 4.1.2.
>> RFC 2046 enth?lt genug Seil, um sich in den Fu? zu schie?en.
>    [Gunnar Ritter und Claus F?rber in de.comp.standards, 2001-04-10]

You probably know who updates the mutt documentation;
perhaps you could forward this on to them, so
it can be updated to include all this stuff, or
if already there, made "louder".

THANKS!

David

Ah HA!  So THAT is what the "no colon" from-line is for.

Quote:

>> QUESTION: what hacks do I have to make to
>> a file to make mutt again consider it to be
>> a "mailbox", so "s" works again?

>If I get to fuxor up one of my mailboxes, the use of a
>procmail-command has helped me often:

>  formail -ds procmail < [defunct-mailbox]

>this will feed the messages in [defunct-mailbox] to procmail
>one-by-one, assuming header-brokenness (the -d -flag of formail).
>If you don't want to feed the messages to your usual procmail-setup,
>you can use

>  formail -ds procmail -m [special-procmailrc] < [defunct-mailbox]

>and define a rule pointing to the box you want the messages to be
>delivered to.  !Don't use [defunct-mailbox] ! , move them there after
>finishing if you like, or you will spoil it ...

So, you do NOT use your editor.  Why not?  (your
  answer will educate me more on mutt and email in general.)

Looks like I have to learn procmail.

Do you know of any BOOK on procmail, eg from O'Reilly
or the like?

Also, what uses do *you* make of procmail?  (to make
it *more* worthwhile to learn it)

Thank you so much for the info.  Perhaps you too
could fwd this off to whoever maintains the mutt
documentation, for inclusion within it.

Is needed.

David

In comp.mail.mutt,

"man 5 mbox".

Quote:> You probably know who updates the mutt documentation;
> perhaps you could forward this on to them, so
> it can be updated to include all this stuff, or
> if already there, made "louder".

mbox is a Unix standard and is documented in the file formats section
of your system manual; it doesn't belong in Mutt's documentation any
more than a description of the Unix directory structure does.

  -Rich

--
Rich Lafferty --------------+-----------------------------------------------
 Montreal, Quebec, Canada   |   "Do not expose your LaserWriter to open
 http://www.lafferty.ca/    |    fire or flame" -- Apple LaserWriter manual

Did you try the mutt manual? Hint: 4.6.

--
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http://www.davep.org/      | mutt.vcard.filter - autoview simple vcards
Mutt:                      | muttrc2html       - muttrc -> HTML utility
http://www.davep.org/mutt/ | muttrc.sl         - Jed muttrc mode

In comp.mail.mutt,

Uh, yes, any mail program that uses the mbox format uses the mbox
format. I'm not sure of what value that statement might be. If your
Unix systems don't document their file formats, complain to your
vendor.

Quote:> >mbox is a Unix standard and is documented in the file formats section
> >of your system manual; it doesn't belong in Mutt's documentation any
> >more than a description of the Unix directory structure does.

> Perhaps if the latter statement I made is true, then mutt should
> document its implementation of the mbox format.  

Sure, and it should throw in the RFCs for smtp, pop3, and imap, for
the people too lazy to look *that* up too.

  -Rich

--
Rich Lafferty --------------+-----------------------------------------------
 Montreal, Quebec, Canada   |   "Do not expose your LaserWriter to open
 http://www.lafferty.ca/    |    fire or flame" -- Apple LaserWriter manual

It's normally not documented.  The mbox 5 manual page someone
referred to in this thread is part of the mutt distribution.

--
Thomas Roessler                        http://log.does-not-exist.org/

In comp.mail.mutt,

Er, I'm the one that referred to it. It's on systems here that don't
have mutt installed, although I can't make out what might have
installed it. (We don't have qmail, which is another package that
documents it.) In any case, googling for "mbox format" finds apropos
hits in the first two or three, and a description of the standard; I
maintain that the reason the original poster continues to whine about
not knowing what mbox format is is that he refuses to look.

  -Rich

--
Rich Lafferty --------------+-----------------------------------------------
 Montreal, Quebec, Canada   |   "Do not expose your LaserWriter to open
 http://www.lafferty.ca/    |    fire or flame" -- Apple LaserWriter manual

See also <URL:http://www.qmail.org/man/man5/mbox.html>,
particularly as i haven't found it in mutt-1.2.5.i

Sven

Quote:> On 30 May 2001 06:04:13 GMT in comp.mail.mutt,

> >mbox is a Unix standard and is documented in the file formats section of
> >your system manual; it doesn't belong in Mutt's documentation any more
> >than a description of the Unix directory structure does.

> Perhaps if the latter statement I made is true, then mutt should document
> its implementation of the mbox format.

Like section 4.6 of the mutt manual has done for ages (although I'm not sure
what you mean by "mutt's implementation" of the mbox format).

--
Dave Pearson:              | mutt.octet.filter - autoview octet-streams
http://www.davep.org/      | mutt.vcard.filter - autoview simple vcards
Mutt:                      | muttrc2html       - muttrc -> HTML utility
http://www.davep.org/mutt/ | muttrc.sl         - Jed muttrc mode

Quote:> >Basically, an mbox-file is the messages put one-after-one,
> >messages starting with a line "From [sender].."
> Ah HA!  So THAT is what the "no colon" from-line is for.

Righto - and it is often referred to as the From_ line -
where the underscore takes the place of the space.

Quote:> >  formail -ds procmail < [defunct-mailbox]
> >this will feed the messages in [defunct-mailbox]
> >to procmail one-by-one..
> So, you do NOT use your editor.  Why not?

because "formail" already knows how
to split messages in mailbox files.
no need to bother the editor with.

Quote:> Looks like I have to learn procmail.
> Do you know of any BOOK on procmail,
> eg from O'Reilly or the like?

procmail is certainly mentioned by the OReilly books on email..
http://search.oreilly.com/cgi-bin/search?term=procmail&category=All&p...
but I doubt OReilly has a book on procmail yet.

Quote:> Also, what uses do *you* make of procmail?
> (to make it *more* worthwhile to learn it)

- filter messages from maillists into separate folders.
- save possible spam into a folder of its own
- remove "signatures" (ads) from yahoogroups maillists
- auto-answer emails from special people *cough* *cough*

see also: http://www.math.fu-berlin.de/~guckes/ssetup/procmailrc

Sven

--

MUTT SETUP TIPS    http://www.math.fu-berlin.de/~guckes/mutt/setup.html