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Un(der)-documented changes in MH 6.8.4

1996-02-22 07:51:09
I finally got time to install MH 6.8.4.  Here are some things I
noticed that aren't necessarily documented anywhere, and one or
two things that seem like bugs.  Comments?

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1)  After I installed MH 6.8.4, I ran "inc -help".  I saw a new line:

    syntax: inc [+folder] [switches]
      switches are:
      -audit audit-file
        ...
      -(help)
profile: -form scan.time -norpop

    version: MH 6.8.4 #2[UCI] (rubble) of Mon Feb 19 16:21:03 PST 1996
        ...

It shows the MH profile entry for that command.  Nice, eh!?  I think
that's an important change for users and support staff to know about.
I sent a patch to bug-mh for the CHANGES file.

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2) Now, mhn takes a "q" at this prompt during a multipart message:

        Press <return> to show content...q

If you type "q" and then press RETURN, it skips the body part.
You don't have to hit mhn with an INT (control-C) anymore.
I sent a patch for the mhn(1) manpage to bug-mh.

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3)  Now "forw -mime" adds an mhn directive [forwarded message] or
[forwarded messages], depending on whether you're forwarding one
or more messages.  Also "repl -mime" adds [original message].

This [] stuff is supposed to add a Content-Description: field.
The weird thing is that mhn(1) ignores that directive unless you're
using #forw on more than one message.  For instance, when forw makes
this draft:

        To: nobody
        Fcc: DELETE
        Subject: testing MH 6.8.4 (fwd)
        --------
        testing
        #forw [forwarded message] +/mh-test/jerry/inbox 213

The multipart message that mhn(1) generates doesn't have a
Content-Description: body header field.  The body part header is:

        ------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0
        Content-Type: message/rfc822

and that's it.  You'll only see a Content-Description: header field if
you're forwarding more than one message (making a multipart/digest).
And the nice new "repl -mime" switch will *never* put an "original
message" Content-Description: body header into the reply (because repl
doesn't reply to more than one original message at a time).

Am I missing something?  mhn has been this way since 6.8.3, at least.

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4)  The PGP stuff (pgped, pgped.tcl, and pgpshow) is undocumented.
The only info I found was in the support/general/bootmhn.sh file;
a patch adds the following lines to mhn_defaults:

        mhn-show-application/pgp: %ppgpshow -show '%F' %a
        mhn-store-application/pgp: | pgpshow -store %m%P.pgp %a
        mhn-show-text/pgp: %ppgpshow -show '%F' %a
        mhn-store-text/pgp: | pgpshow -store %m%P.txt %a

and that patch wasn't even installed!  The makefile said:

        Will not overwrite existing /usr/local/lib/mh/mhn_defaults

I'm not a PGP user yet.  I can tell that I need more software --
like pgp, tcl, stclsh -- but I don't see info.  I see some code in
there, too, that should probably be documented -- like code in
pgped.tcl that seems to run header fields through the ali(1) utility.

Should there be a manpage for pgped and pgpshow, or at least pointers
to software?  (I don't know enough to write it, or I would.)  Seems
like a few paragraphs of info wouldn't take long to write, and would
give people a good start.

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5)  Looks like there were a fair number of changes in the way mhn
does its encoding.  One I know about: when mhn is encoding
quoted-printable, now it encodes a leading dot on a line as "=2E"
instead of as a plain ".".  If there's anything you're used to having
mhn do as it encodes, you might want to check it under 6.8.4 to see
if it's been changed.

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6)  msh(1) has MIME support now -- at least, it invokes mhn to show
MIME messages, can do "mhn -list", can use "mhn -store" (sort of),
etc.  The "help" command doesn't mention mhn, but the msh(1) manpage
does.  I've sent a patch to bug-mh for the CHANGES file.

--
Jerry Peek, jerry(_at_)ora(_dot_)com, http://www.ora.com/staff/jerry/
O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.; 101 Morris St.; Sebastopol, CA 95472 USA
Phone: (800)998-9938, +1 707-829-0515; FAX +1 707-829-0104
All about ORA:  WEB: http://www.ora.com/   EMAIL: 
info(_at_)online(_dot_)ora(_dot_)com


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