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From: pf@csc.ti.com (Paul Fuqua)
Newsgroups: comp.emacs,gnu.emacs
Subject: Re: RMAIL file ---> UNIX mail file
Message-ID: <70032@ti-csl.csc.ti.com>
Date: 15 Feb 89 21:53:51 GMT
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Moon:    Waxing Gibbous (78% of full)


    Date: Wednesday, February 15, 1989  8:39am (CST)
    From: kjones at talos.UUCP (Kyle Jones)
    Subject: Re: RMAIL file ---> UNIX mail file
    Newsgroups: comp.emacs,gnu.emacs

I had a long reply mostly composed, when I realised that I was missing
the point:  Rmail uses a special mail-file format because it is a closer
textual representation of the abstract notion of a mail-file.

A mail file is just a sequence of messages.  The file has some
attributes (inbox, global label list), and each message has some text
and some attributes (labels, unseen/deleted/answered, summary line, old
header).  The Babyl/Rmail choice is to parse incoming messages into that
abstract form, and save them back out in a textual form that is closer
to the abstract than to the original.

I think that many problems would be solved if Rmail's O and ^O listened
to numeric arguments.  Then, to convert a file, you could go to the
first message and type 9999 ^O (Help M in Rmail should mention this one
prominently for the accidental users).  To move all the messages to
another Rmail file, do 9999 O.

Yes, you can stick the labels into a special header line, and keep the
file attributes in a special message, and trim the headers from the
originals at load time.  If your priorities are compatibility with Unix
mailers and manipulation with Unix file tools, you'd probably want to do
so.  You'll pay a price in runtime, though, because of the extra
recalculation and searching.

My priorities are different, but I'm a lispm/Teco hacker, not a Unix
hacker.  If you want to discuss them, or if you want specific answers
to your questions, let's do it by mail.

Paul Fuqua                     pf@csc.ti.com
                               {smu,texsun,cs.utexas.edu,rice}!ti-csl!pf
Texas Instruments Computer Science Center
PO Box 655474 MS 238, Dallas, Texas 75265