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GNU Info File | 1998-05-21 | 49.6 KB | 1,270 lines

This is Info file ../info/gnus.info, produced by Makeinfo version 1.68 from the input file gnus.texi. This file documents Gnus, the GNU Emacs newsreader. Copyright (C) 1995,96 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies. Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided also that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one. Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions. File: gnus.info, Node: Splitting Mail, Next: Mail Backend Variables, Prev: Getting Started Reading Mail, Up: Getting Mail Splitting Mail -------------- The `nnmail-split-methods' variable says how the incoming mail is to be split into groups. (setq nnmail-split-methods '(("mail.junk" "^From:.*Lars Ingebrigtsen") ("mail.crazy" "^Subject:.*die\\|^Organization:.*flabby") ("mail.other" ""))) This variable is a list of lists, where the first element of each of these lists is the name of the mail group (they do not have to be called something beginning with `mail', by the way), and the second element is a regular expression used on the header of each mail to determine if it belongs in this mail group. If the first element is the special symbol `junk', then messages that match the regexp will disappear into the aether. Use with extreme caution. The second element can also be a function. In that case, it will be called narrowed to the headers with the first element of the rule as the argument. It should return a non-`nil' value if it thinks that the mail belongs in that group. The last of these groups should always be a general one, and the regular expression should *always* be `' so that it matches any mails that haven't been matched by any of the other regexps. (These rules are processed from the beginning of the alist toward the end. The first rule to make a match will "win", unless you have crossposting enabled. In that case, all matching rules will "win".) If you like to tinker with this yourself, you can set this variable to a function of your choice. This function will be called without any arguments in a buffer narrowed to the headers of an incoming mail message. The function should return a list of group names that it thinks should carry this mail message. Note that the mail backends are free to maul the poor, innocent, incoming headers all they want to. They all add `Lines' headers; some add `X-Gnus-Group' headers; most rename the Unix mbox `From<SPACE>' line to something else. The mail backends all support cross-posting. If several regexps match, the mail will be "cross-posted" to all those groups. `nnmail-crosspost' says whether to use this mechanism or not. Note that no articles are crossposted to the general (`') group. `nnmh' and `nnml' makes crossposts by creating hard links to the crossposted articles. However, not all file systems support hard links. If that's the case for you, set `nnmail-crosspost-link-function' to `copy-file'. (This variable is `add-name-to-file' by default.) If you wish to see where the previous mail split put the messages, you can use the `M-x nnmail-split-history' command. Gnus gives you all the opportunity you could possibly want for shooting yourself in the foot. Let's say you create a group that will contain all the mail you get from your boss. And then you accidentally unsubscribe from the group. Gnus will still put all the mail from your boss in the unsubscribed group, and so, when your boss mails you "Have that report ready by Monday or you're fired!", you'll never see it and, come Tuesday, you'll still believe that you're gainfully employed while you really should be out collecting empty bottles to save up for next month's rent money. File: gnus.info, Node: Mail Backend Variables, Next: Fancy Mail Splitting, Prev: Splitting Mail, Up: Getting Mail Mail Backend Variables ---------------------- These variables are (for the most part) pertinent to all the various mail backends. `nnmail-read-incoming-hook' The mail backends all call this hook after reading new mail. You can use this hook to notify any mail watch programs, if you want to. `nnmail-spool-file' The backends will look for new mail in this file. If this variable is `nil', the mail backends will never attempt to fetch mail by themselves. If you are using a POP mail server and your name is `larsi', you should set this variable to `po:larsi'. If your name is not `larsi', you should probably modify that slightly, but you may have guessed that already, you smart & handsome devil! You can also set this variable to `pop', and Gnus will try to figure out the POP mail string by itself. In any case, Gnus will call `movemail' which will contact the POP server named in the `MAILHOST' environment variable. If the POP server needs a password, you can either set `nnmail-pop-password-required' to `t' and be prompted for the password, or set `nnmail-pop-password' to the password itself. `nnmail-spool-file' can also be a list of mailboxes. Your Emacs has to have been configured with `--with-pop' before compilation. This is the default, but some installations have it switched off. When you use a mail backend, Gnus will slurp all your mail from your inbox and plonk it down in your home directory. Gnus doesn't move any mail if you're not using a mail backend--you have to do a lot of magic invocations first. At the time when you have finished drawing the pentagram, lightened the candles, and sacrificed the goat, you really shouldn't be too surprised when Gnus moves your mail. `nnmail-use-procmail' If non-`nil', the mail backends will look in `nnmail-procmail-directory' for incoming mail. All the files in that directory that have names ending in `nnmail-procmail-suffix' will be considered incoming mailboxes, and will be searched for new mail. `nnmail-crash-box' When a mail backend reads a spool file, mail is first moved to this file, which is `~/.gnus-crash-box' by default. If this file already exists, it will always be read (and incorporated) before any other spool files. `nnmail-prepare-incoming-hook' This is run in a buffer that holds all the new incoming mail, and can be used for, well, anything, really. `nnmail-split-hook' Hook run in the buffer where the mail headers of each message is kept just before the splitting based on these headers is done. The hook is free to modify the buffer contents in any way it sees fit--the buffer is discarded after the splitting has been done, and no changes performed in the buffer will show up in any files. `gnus-article-decode-rfc1522' is one likely function to add to this hook. `nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook' `nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook' These are two useful hooks executed when treating new incoming mail--`nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook' (is called just before starting to handle the new mail) and `nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook' (is called when the mail handling is done). Here's and example of using these two hooks to change the default file modes the new mail files get: (add-hook 'gnus-pre-get-new-mail-hook (lambda () (set-default-file-modes 511))) (add-hook 'gnus-post-get-new-mail-hook (lambda () (set-default-file-modes 551))) `nnmail-tmp-directory' This variable says where to move incoming mail to - while processing it. This is usually done in the same directory that the mail backend inhabits (e.g., `~/Mail/'), but if this variable is non-`nil', it will be used instead. `nnmail-movemail-program' This program is executed to move mail from the user's inbox to her home directory. The default is `movemail'. This can also be a function. In that case, the function will be called with two parameters - the name of the inbox, and the file to be moved to. `nnmail-delete-incoming' If non-`nil', the mail backends will delete the temporary incoming file after splitting mail into the proper groups. This is `t' by default. (No Gnus release since (ding) Gnus 0.10 (or something like that) have lost mail, I think, but that's not the point. (Except certain versions of Red Gnus.)) By not deleting the Incoming* files, one can be sure not to lose mail - if Gnus totally whacks out, one can always recover what was lost. You may delete the `Incoming*' files at will. `nnmail-use-long-file-names' If non-`nil', the mail backends will use long file and directory names. Groups like `mail.misc' will end up in directories (assuming use of `nnml' backend) or files (assuming use of `nnfolder' backend) like `mail.misc'. If it is `nil', the same group will end up in `mail/misc'. `nnmail-delete-file-function' Function called to delete files. It is `delete-file' by default. `nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids' If non-`nil', put the `Message-ID's of articles imported into the backend (via `Gcc', for instance) into the mail duplication discovery cache. The default is `nil'. File: gnus.info, Node: Fancy Mail Splitting, Next: Mail and Procmail, Prev: Mail Backend Variables, Up: Getting Mail Fancy Mail Splitting -------------------- If the rather simple, standard method for specifying how to split mail doesn't allow you to do what you want, you can set `nnmail-split-methods' to `nnmail-split-fancy'. Then you can play with the `nnmail-split-fancy' variable. Let's look at an example value of this variable first: ;; Messages from the mailer daemon are not crossposted to any of ;; the ordinary groups. Warnings are put in a separate group ;; from real errors. (| ("from" mail (| ("subject" "warn.*" "mail.warning") "mail.misc")) ;; Non-error messages are crossposted to all relevant ;; groups, but we don't crosspost between the group for the ;; (ding) list and the group for other (ding) related mail. (& (| (any "ding@ifi\\.uio\\.no" "ding.list") ("subject" "ding" "ding.misc")) ;; Other mailing lists... (any "procmail@informatik\\.rwth-aachen\\.de" "procmail.list") (any "SmartList@informatik\\.rwth-aachen\\.de" "SmartList.list") ;; People... (any "larsi@ifi\\.uio\\.no" "people.Lars_Magne_Ingebrigtsen")) ;; Unmatched mail goes to the catch all group. "misc.misc") This variable has the format of a "split". A split is a (possibly) recursive structure where each split may contain other splits. Here are the five possible split syntaxes: 1. `group': If the split is a string, that will be taken as a group name. 2. (FIELD VALUE SPLIT): If the split is a list, the first element of which is a string, then store the message as specified by SPLIT, if header FIELD (a regexp) contains VALUE (also a regexp). 3. (| SPLIT...): If the split is a list, and the first element is `|' (vertical bar), then process each SPLIT until one of them matches. A SPLIT is said to match if it will cause the mail message to be stored in one or more groups. 4. (& SPLIT...): If the split is a list, and the first element is `&', then process all SPLITs in the list. 5. `junk': If the split is the symbol `junk', then don't save this message anywhere. 6. (: FUNCTION ARG1 ARG2 ...): If the split is a list, and the first element is `:', then the second element will be called as a function with ARGS given as arguments. The function should return a SPLIT. In these splits, FIELD must match a complete field name. VALUE must match a complete word according to the fundamental mode syntax table. You can use `.*' in the regexps to match partial field names or words. In other words, all VALUE's are wrapped in `\<' and `\>' pairs. FIELD and VALUE can also be lisp symbols, in that case they are expanded as specified by the variable `nnmail-split-abbrev-alist'. This is an alist of cons cells, where the `car' of a cell contains the key, and the `cdr' contains the associated value. `nnmail-split-fancy-syntax-table' is the syntax table in effect when all this splitting is performed. If you want to have Gnus create groups dynamically based on some information in the headers (i.e., do `replace-match'-like substitions in the group names), you can say things like: (any "debian-$\\w*\$@lists.debian.org" "mail.debian.\\1") File: gnus.info, Node: Mail and Procmail, Next: Incorporating Old Mail, Prev: Fancy Mail Splitting, Up: Getting Mail Mail and Procmail ----------------- Many people use `procmail' (or some other mail filter program or external delivery agent--`slocal', `elm', etc) to split incoming mail into groups. If you do that, you should set `nnmail-spool-file' to `procmail' to ensure that the mail backends never ever try to fetch mail by themselves. This also means that you probably don't want to set `nnmail-split-methods' either, which has some, perhaps, unexpected side effects. When a mail backend is queried for what groups it carries, it replies with the contents of that variable, along with any groups it has figured out that it carries by other means. None of the backends, except `nnmh', actually go out to the disk and check what groups actually exist. (It's not trivial to distinguish between what the user thinks is a basis for a newsgroup and what is just a plain old file or directory.) This means that you have to tell Gnus (and the backends) by hand what groups exist. Let's take the `nnmh' backend as an example: The folders are located in `nnmh-directory', say, `~/Mail/'. There are three folders, `foo', `bar' and `mail.baz'. Go to the group buffer and type `G m'. When prompted, answer `foo' for the name and `nnmh' for the method. Repeat twice for the two other groups, `bar' and `mail.baz'. Be sure to include all your mail groups. That's it. You are now set to read your mail. An active file for this method will be created automatically. If you use `nnfolder' or any other backend that store more than a single article in each file, you should never have procmail add mails to the file that Gnus sees. Instead, procmail should put all incoming mail in `nnmail-procmail-directory'. To arrive at the file name to put the incoming mail in, append `nnmail-procmail-suffix' to the group name. The mail backends will read the mail from these files. When Gnus reads a file called `mail.misc.spool', this mail will be put in the `mail.misc', as one would expect. However, if you want Gnus to split the mail the normal way, you could set `nnmail-resplit-incoming' to `t'. If you use `procmail' to split things directly into an `nnmh' directory (which you shouldn't do), you should set `nnmail-keep-last-article' to non-`nil' to prevent Gnus from ever expiring the final article (i.e., the article with the highest article number) in a mail newsgroup. This is quite, quite important. Here's an example setup: The incoming spools are located in `~/incoming/' and have `""' as suffixes (i.e., the incoming spool files have the same names as the equivalent groups). The `nnfolder' backend is to be used as the mail interface, and the `nnfolder' directory is `~/fMail/'. (setq nnfolder-directory "~/fMail/") (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail) (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/incoming/") (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnfolder ""))) (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "") File: gnus.info, Node: Incorporating Old Mail, Next: Expiring Mail, Prev: Mail and Procmail, Up: Getting Mail Incorporating Old Mail ---------------------- Most people have lots of old mail stored in various file formats. If you have set up Gnus to read mail using one of the spiffy Gnus mail backends, you'll probably wish to have that old mail incorporated into your mail groups. Doing so can be quite easy. To take an example: You're reading mail using `nnml' (*note Mail Spool::.), and have set `nnmail-split-methods' to a satisfactory value (*note Splitting Mail::.). You have an old Unix mbox file filled with important, but old, mail. You want to move it into your `nnml' groups. Here's how: 1. Go to the group buffer. 2. Type `G f' and give the path to the mbox file when prompted to create an `nndoc' group from the mbox file (*note Foreign Groups::.). 3. Type `SPACE' to enter the newly created group. 4. Type `M P b' to process-mark all articles in this group's buffer (*note Setting Process Marks::.). 5. Type `B r' to respool all the process-marked articles, and answer `nnml' when prompted (*note Mail Group Commands::.). All the mail messages in the mbox file will now also be spread out over all your `nnml' groups. Try entering them and check whether things have gone without a glitch. If things look ok, you may consider deleting the mbox file, but I wouldn't do that unless I was absolutely sure that all the mail has ended up where it should be. Respooling is also a handy thing to do if you're switching from one mail backend to another. Just respool all the mail in the old mail groups using the new mail backend. File: gnus.info, Node: Expiring Mail, Next: Washing Mail, Prev: Incorporating Old Mail, Up: Getting Mail Expiring Mail ------------- Traditional mail readers have a tendency to remove mail articles when you mark them as read, in some way. Gnus takes a fundamentally different approach to mail reading. Gnus basically considers mail just to be news that has been received in a rather peculiar manner. It does not think that it has the power to actually change the mail, or delete any mail messages. If you enter a mail group, and mark articles as "read", or kill them in some other fashion, the mail articles will still exist on the system. I repeat: Gnus will not delete your old, read mail. Unless you ask it to, of course. To make Gnus get rid of your unwanted mail, you have to mark the articles as "expirable". This does not mean that the articles will disappear right away, however. In general, a mail article will be deleted from your system if, 1) it is marked as expirable, AND 2) it is more than one week old. If you do not mark an article as expirable, it will remain on your system until hell freezes over. This bears repeating one more time, with some spurious capitalizations: IF you do NOT mark articles as EXPIRABLE, Gnus will NEVER delete those ARTICLES. You do not have to mark articles as expirable by hand. Groups that match the regular expression `gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups' will have all articles that you read marked as expirable automatically. All articles marked as expirable have an `E' in the first column in the summary buffer. By default, if you have auto expiry switched on, Gnus will mark all the articles you read as expirable, no matter if they were read or unread before. To avoid having articles marked as read marked as expirable automatically, you can put something like the following in your `.gnus' file: (remove-hook 'gnus-mark-article-hook 'gnus-summary-mark-read-and-unread-as-read) (add-hook 'gnus-mark-article-hook 'gnus-summary-mark-unread-as-read) Note that making a group auto-expirable doesn't mean that all read articles are expired--only the articles marked as expirable will be expired. Also note that using the `d' command won't make groups expirable--only semi-automatic marking of articles as read will mark the articles as expirable in auto-expirable groups. Let's say you subscribe to a couple of mailing lists, and you want the articles you have read to disappear after a while: (setq gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups "mail.nonsense-list\\|mail.nice-list") Another way to have auto-expiry happen is to have the element `auto-expire' in the group parameters of the group. If you use adaptive scoring (*note Adaptive Scoring::.) and auto-expiring, you'll have problems. Auto-expiring and adaptive scoring don't really mix very well. The `nnmail-expiry-wait' variable supplies the default time an expirable article has to live. Gnus starts counting days from when the message *arrived*, not from when it was sent. The default is seven days. Gnus also supplies a function that lets you fine-tune how long articles are to live, based on what group they are in. Let's say you want to have one month expiry period in the `mail.private' group, a one day expiry period in the `mail.junk' group, and a six day expiry period everywhere else: (setq nnmail-expiry-wait-function (lambda (group) (cond ((string= group "mail.private") 31) ((string= group "mail.junk") 1) ((string= group "important") 'never) (t 6)))) The group names this function is fed are "unadorned" group names--no `nnml:' prefixes and the like. The `nnmail-expiry-wait' variable and `nnmail-expiry-wait-function' function can either be a number (not necessarily an integer) or one of the symbols `immediate' or `never'. You can also use the `expiry-wait' group parameter to selectively change the expiry period (*note Group Parameters::.). If `nnmail-keep-last-article' is non-`nil', Gnus will never expire the final article in a mail newsgroup. This is to make life easier for procmail users. By the way: That line up there, about Gnus never expiring non-expirable articles, is a lie. If you put `total-expire' in the group parameters, articles will not be marked as expirable, but all read articles will be put through the expiry process. Use with extreme caution. Even more dangerous is the `gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups' variable. All groups that match this regexp will have all read articles put through the expiry process, which means that *all* old mail articles in the groups in question will be deleted after a while. Use with extreme caution, and don't come crying to me when you discover that the regexp you used matched the wrong group and all your important mail has disappeared. Be a *man*! Or a *woman*! Whatever you feel more comfortable with! So there! Most people make most of their mail groups total-expirable, though. File: gnus.info, Node: Washing Mail, Next: Duplicates, Prev: Expiring Mail, Up: Getting Mail Washing Mail ------------ Mailers and list servers are notorious for doing all sorts of really, really stupid things with mail. "Hey, RFC822 doesn't explicitly prohibit us from adding the string `wE aRe ElItE!!!!!1!!' to the end of all lines passing through our server, so let's do that!!!!1!" Yes, but RFC822 wasn't designed to be read by morons. Things that were considered to be self-evident were not discussed. So. Here we are. Case in point: The German version of Microsoft Exchange adds `AW: ' to the subjects of replies instead of `Re: '. I could pretend to be shocked and dismayed by this, but I haven't got the energy. It is to laugh. Gnus provides a plethora of functions for washing articles while displaying them, but it might be nicer to do the filtering before storing the mail to disc. For that purpose, we have three hooks and various functions that can be put in these hooks. `nnmail-prepare-incoming-hook' This hook is called before doing anything with the mail and is meant for grand, sweeping gestures. Functions to be used include: `nnheader-ms-strip-cr' Remove trailing carriage returns from each line. This is default on Emacs running on MS machines. `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook' This hook is called narrowed to each header. It can be used when cleaning up the headers. Functions that can be used include: `nnmail-remove-leading-whitespace' Clear leading white space that "helpful" listservs have added to the headers to make them look nice. Aaah. `nnmail-remove-list-identifiers' Some list servers add an identifier--for example, `(idm)'--to the beginning of all `Subject' headers. I'm sure that's nice for people who use stone age mail readers. This function will remove strings that match the `nnmail-list-identifiers' regexp, which can also be a list of regexp. For instance, if you want to remove the `(idm)' and the `nagnagnag' identifiers: (setq nnmail-list-identifiers '("(idm)" "nagnagnag")) `nnmail-remove-tabs' Translate all `TAB' characters into `SPACE' characters. `nnmail-prepare-incoming-message-hook' This hook is called narrowed to each message. Functions to be used include: `article-de-quoted-unreadable' Decode Quoted Readable encoding. File: gnus.info, Node: Duplicates, Next: Not Reading Mail, Prev: Washing Mail, Up: Getting Mail Duplicates ---------- If you are a member of a couple of mailing lists, you will sometimes receive two copies of the same mail. This can be quite annoying, so `nnmail' checks for and treats any duplicates it might find. To do this, it keeps a cache of old `Message-ID's-- `nnmail-message-id-cache-file', which is `~/.nnmail-cache' by default. The approximate maximum number of `Message-ID's stored there is controlled by the `nnmail-message-id-cache-length' variable, which is 1000 by default. (So 1000 `Message-ID's will be stored.) If all this sounds scary to you, you can set `nnmail-treat-duplicates' to `warn' (which is what it is by default), and `nnmail' won't delete duplicate mails. Instead it will insert a warning into the head of the mail saying that it thinks that this is a duplicate of a different message. This variable can also be a function. If that's the case, the function will be called from a buffer narrowed to the message in question with the `Message-ID' as a parameter. The function must return either `nil', `warn', or `delete'. You can turn this feature off completely by setting the variable to `nil'. If you want all the duplicate mails to be put into a special "duplicates" group, you could do that using the normal mail split methods: (setq nnmail-split-fancy '(| ;; Messages duplicates go to a separate group. ("gnus-warning" "duplication of message" "duplicate") ;; Message from daemons, postmaster, and the like to another. (any mail "mail.misc") ;; Other rules. [ ... ] )) Or something like: (setq nnmail-split-methods '(("duplicates" "^Gnus-Warning:") ;; Other rules. [...])) Here's a neat feature: If you know that the recipient reads her mail with Gnus, and that she has `nnmail-treat-duplicates' set to `delete', you can send her as many insults as you like, just by using a `Message-ID' of a mail that you know that she's already received. Think of all the fun! She'll never see any of it! Whee! File: gnus.info, Node: Not Reading Mail, Next: Choosing a Mail Backend, Prev: Duplicates, Up: Getting Mail Not Reading Mail ---------------- If you start using any of the mail backends, they have the annoying habit of assuming that you want to read mail with them. This might not be unreasonable, but it might not be what you want. If you set `nnmail-spool-file' to `nil', none of the backends will ever attempt to read incoming mail, which should help. This might be too much, if, for instance, you are reading mail quite happily with `nnml' and just want to peek at some old RMAIL file you have stashed away with `nnbabyl'. All backends have variables called backend-`get-new-mail'. If you want to disable the `nnbabyl' mail reading, you edit the virtual server for the group to have a setting where `nnbabyl-get-new-mail' to `nil'. All the mail backends will call `nn'*`-prepare-save-mail-hook' narrowed to the article to be saved before saving it when reading incoming mail. File: gnus.info, Node: Choosing a Mail Backend, Prev: Not Reading Mail, Up: Getting Mail Choosing a Mail Backend ----------------------- Gnus will read the mail spool when you activate a mail group. The mail file is first copied to your home directory. What happens after that depends on what format you want to store your mail in. * Menu: * Unix Mail Box:: Using the (quite) standard Un*x mbox. * Rmail Babyl:: Emacs programs use the rmail babyl format. * Mail Spool:: Store your mail in a private spool? * MH Spool:: An mhspool-like backend. * Mail Folders:: Having one file for each group. File: gnus.info, Node: Unix Mail Box, Next: Rmail Babyl, Up: Choosing a Mail Backend Unix Mail Box ............. The "nnmbox" backend will use the standard Un*x mbox file to store mail. `nnmbox' will add extra headers to each mail article to say which group it belongs in. Virtual server settings: `nnmbox-mbox-file' The name of the mail box in the user's home directory. `nnmbox-active-file' The name of the active file for the mail box. `nnmbox-get-new-mail' If non-`nil', `nnmbox' will read incoming mail and split it into groups. File: gnus.info, Node: Rmail Babyl, Next: Mail Spool, Prev: Unix Mail Box, Up: Choosing a Mail Backend Rmail Babyl ........... The "nnbabyl" backend will use a babyl mail box (aka. "rmail mbox") to store mail. `nnbabyl' will add extra headers to each mail article to say which group it belongs in. Virtual server settings: `nnbabyl-mbox-file' The name of the rmail mbox file. `nnbabyl-active-file' The name of the active file for the rmail box. `nnbabyl-get-new-mail' If non-`nil', `nnbabyl' will read incoming mail. File: gnus.info, Node: Mail Spool, Next: MH Spool, Prev: Rmail Babyl, Up: Choosing a Mail Backend Mail Spool .......... The "nnml" spool mail format isn't compatible with any other known format. It should be used with some caution. If you use this backend, Gnus will split all incoming mail into files, one file for each mail, and put the articles into the corresponding directories under the directory specified by the `nnml-directory' variable. The default value is `~/Mail/'. You do not have to create any directories beforehand; Gnus will take care of all that. If you have a strict limit as to how many files you are allowed to store in your account, you should not use this backend. As each mail gets its own file, you might very well occupy thousands of inodes within a few weeks. If this is no problem for you, and it isn't a problem for you having your friendly systems administrator walking around, madly, shouting "Who is eating all my inodes?! Who? Who!?!", then you should know that this is probably the fastest format to use. You do not have to trudge through a big mbox file just to read your new mail. `nnml' is probably the slowest backend when it comes to article splitting. It has to create lots of files, and it also generates NOV databases for the incoming mails. This makes it the fastest backend when it comes to reading mail. Virtual server settings: `nnml-directory' All `nnml' directories will be placed under this directory. `nnml-active-file' The active file for the `nnml' server. `nnml-newsgroups-file' The `nnml' group descriptions file. *Note Newsgroups File Format::. `nnml-get-new-mail' If non-`nil', `nnml' will read incoming mail. `nnml-nov-is-evil' If non-`nil', this backend will ignore any NOV files. `nnml-nov-file-name' The name of the NOV files. The default is `.overview'. `nnml-prepare-save-mail-hook' Hook run narrowed to an article before saving. If your `nnml' groups and NOV files get totally out of whack, you can do a complete update by typing `M-x nnml-generate-nov-databases'. This command will trawl through the entire `nnml' hierarchy, looking at each and every article, so it might take a while to complete. A better interface to this functionality can be found in the server buffer (*note Server Commands::.). File: gnus.info, Node: MH Spool, Next: Mail Folders, Prev: Mail Spool, Up: Choosing a Mail Backend MH Spool ........ `nnmh' is just like `nnml', except that is doesn't generate NOV databases and it doesn't keep an active file. This makes `nnmh' a *much* slower backend than `nnml', but it also makes it easier to write procmail scripts for. Virtual server settings: `nnmh-directory' All `nnmh' directories will be located under this directory. `nnmh-get-new-mail' If non-`nil', `nnmh' will read incoming mail. `nnmh-be-safe' If non-`nil', `nnmh' will go to ridiculous lengths to make sure that the articles in the folder are actually what Gnus thinks they are. It will check date stamps and stat everything in sight, so setting this to `t' will mean a serious slow-down. If you never use anything but Gnus to read the `nnmh' articles, you do not have to set this variable to `t'. File: gnus.info, Node: Mail Folders, Prev: MH Spool, Up: Choosing a Mail Backend Mail Folders ............ `nnfolder' is a backend for storing each mail group in a separate file. Each file is in the standard Un*x mbox format. `nnfolder' will add extra headers to keep track of article numbers and arrival dates. Virtual server settings: `nnfolder-directory' All the `nnfolder' mail boxes will be stored under this directory. `nnfolder-active-file' The name of the active file. `nnfolder-newsgroups-file' The name of the group descriptions file. *Note Newsgroups File Format::. `nnfolder-get-new-mail' If non-`nil', `nnfolder' will read incoming mail. If you have lots of `nnfolder'-like files you'd like to read with `nnfolder', you can use the `M-x nnfolder-generate-active-file' command to make `nnfolder' aware of all likely files in `nnfolder-directory'. File: gnus.info, Node: Other Sources, Next: Combined Groups, Prev: Getting Mail, Up: Select Methods Other Sources ============= Gnus can do more than just read news or mail. The methods described below allow Gnus to view directories and files as if they were newsgroups. * Menu: * Directory Groups:: You can read a directory as if it was a newsgroup. * Anything Groups:: Dired? Who needs dired? * Document Groups:: Single files can be the basis of a group. * SOUP:: Reading SOUP packets "offline". * Web Searches:: Creating groups from articles that match a string. * Mail-To-News Gateways:: Posting articles via mail-to-news gateways. File: gnus.info, Node: Directory Groups, Next: Anything Groups, Up: Other Sources Directory Groups ---------------- If you have a directory that has lots of articles in separate files in it, you might treat it as a newsgroup. The files have to have numerical names, of course. This might be an opportune moment to mention `ange-ftp' (and its successor `efs'), that most wonderful of all wonderful Emacs packages. When I wrote `nndir', I didn't think much about it--a backend to read directories. Big deal. `ange-ftp' changes that picture dramatically. For instance, if you enter the `ange-ftp' file name `/ftp.hpc.uh.edu:/pub/emacs/ding-list/' as the directory name, `ange-ftp' or `efs' will actually allow you to read this directory over at `sina' as a newsgroup. Distributed news ahoy! `nndir' will use NOV files if they are present. `nndir' is a "read-only" backend--you can't delete or expire articles with this method. You can use `nnmh' or `nnml' for whatever you use `nndir' for, so you could switch to any of those methods if you feel the need to have a non-read-only `nndir'. File: gnus.info, Node: Anything Groups, Next: Document Groups, Prev: Directory Groups, Up: Other Sources Anything Groups --------------- From the `nndir' backend (which reads a single spool-like directory), it's just a hop and a skip to `nneething', which pretends that any arbitrary directory is a newsgroup. Strange, but true. When `nneething' is presented with a directory, it will scan this directory and assign article numbers to each file. When you enter such a group, `nneething' must create "headers" that Gnus can use. After all, Gnus is a newsreader, in case you're forgetting. `nneething' does this in a two-step process. First, it snoops each file in question. If the file looks like an article (i.e., the first few lines look like headers), it will use this as the head. If this is just some arbitrary file without a head (e.g. a C source file), `nneething' will cobble up a header out of thin air. It will use file ownership, name and date and do whatever it can with these elements. All this should happen automatically for you, and you will be presented with something that looks very much like a newsgroup. Totally like a newsgroup, to be precise. If you select an article, it will be displayed in the article buffer, just as usual. If you select a line that represents a directory, Gnus will pop you into a new summary buffer for this `nneething' group. And so on. You can traverse the entire disk this way, if you feel like, but remember that Gnus is not dired, really, and does not intend to be, either. There are two overall modes to this action--ephemeral or solid. When doing the ephemeral thing (i.e., `G D' from the group buffer), Gnus will not store information on what files you have read, and what files are new, and so on. If you create a solid `nneething' group the normal way with `G m', Gnus will store a mapping table between article numbers and file names, and you can treat this group like any other groups. When you activate a solid `nneething' group, you will be told how many unread articles it contains, etc., etc. Some variables: `nneething-map-file-directory' All the mapping files for solid `nneething' groups will be stored in this directory, which defaults to `~/.nneething/'. `nneething-exclude-files' All files that match this regexp will be ignored. Nice to use to exclude auto-save files and the like, which is what it does by default. `nneething-map-file' Name of the map files. File: gnus.info, Node: Document Groups, Next: SOUP, Prev: Anything Groups, Up: Other Sources Document Groups --------------- `nndoc' is a cute little thing that will let you read a single file as a newsgroup. Several files types are supported: `babyl' The babyl (rmail) mail box. `mbox' The standard Unix mbox file. `mmdf' The MMDF mail box format. `news' Several news articles appended into a file. `rnews' The rnews batch transport format. `forward' Forwarded articles. `mime-digest' MIME (RFC 1341) digest format. `standard-digest' The standard (RFC 1153) digest format. `slack-digest' Non-standard digest format--matches most things, but does it badly. You can also use the special "file type" `guess', which means that `nndoc' will try to guess what file type it is looking at. `digest' means that `nndoc' should guess what digest type the file is. `nndoc' will not try to change the file or insert any extra headers into it--it will simply, like, let you use the file as the basis for a group. And that's it. If you have some old archived articles that you want to insert into your new & spiffy Gnus mail backend, `nndoc' can probably help you with that. Say you have an old `RMAIL' file with mail that you now want to split into your new `nnml' groups. You look at that file using `nndoc' (using the `G f' command in the group buffer (*note Foreign Groups::.)), set the process mark on all the articles in the buffer (`M P b', for instance), and then re-spool (`B r') using `nnml'. If all goes well, all the mail in the `RMAIL' file is now also stored in lots of `nnml' directories, and you can delete that pesky `RMAIL' file. If you have the guts! Virtual server variables: `nndoc-article-type' This should be one of `mbox', `babyl', `digest', `news', `rnews', `mmdf', `forward', `rfc934', `rfc822-forward', `mime-digest', `standard-digest', `slack-digest', `clari-briefs' or `guess'. `nndoc-post-type' This variable says whether Gnus is to consider the group a news group or a mail group. There are two legal values: `mail' (the default) and `news'. * Menu: * Document Server Internals:: How to add your own document types. File: gnus.info, Node: Document Server Internals, Up: Document Groups Document Server Internals ......................... Adding new document types to be recognized by `nndoc' isn't difficult. You just have to whip up a definition of what the document looks like, write a predicate function to recognize that document type, and then hook into `nndoc'. First, here's an example document type definition: (mmdf (article-begin . "^\^A\^A\^A\^A\n") (body-end . "^\^A\^A\^A\^A\n")) The definition is simply a unique "name" followed by a series of regexp pseudo-variable settings. Below are the possible variables--don't be daunted by the number of variables; most document types can be defined with very few settings: `first-article' If present, `nndoc' will skip past all text until it finds something that match this regexp. All text before this will be totally ignored. `article-begin' This setting has to be present in all document type definitions. It says what the beginning of each article looks like. `head-begin-function' If present, this should be a function that moves point to the head of the article. `nndoc-head-begin' If present, this should be a regexp that matches the head of the article. `nndoc-head-end' This should match the end of the head of the article. It defaults to `^$'--the empty line. `body-begin-function' If present, this function should move point to the beginning of the body of the article. `body-begin' This should match the beginning of the body of the article. It defaults to `^\n'. `body-end-function' If present, this function should move point to the end of the body of the article. `body-end' If present, this should match the end of the body of the article. `file-end' If present, this should match the end of the file. All text after this regexp will be totally ignored. So, using these variables `nndoc' is able to dissect a document file into a series of articles, each with a head and a body. However, a few more variables are needed since not all document types are all that news-like--variables needed to transform the head or the body into something that's palatable for Gnus: `prepare-body-function' If present, this function will be called when requesting an article. It will be called with point at the start of the body, and is useful if the document has encoded some parts of its contents. `article-transform-function' If present, this function is called when requesting an article. It's meant to be used for more wide-ranging transformation of both head and body of the article. `generate-head-function' If present, this function is called to generate a head that Gnus can understand. It is called with the article number as a parameter, and is expected to generate a nice head for the article in question. It is called when requesting the headers of all articles. Let's look at the most complicated example I can come up with--standard digests: (standard-digest (first-article . ,(concat "^" (make-string 70 ?-) "\n\n+")) (article-begin . ,(concat "\n\n" (make-string 30 ?-) "\n\n+")) (prepare-body-function . nndoc-unquote-dashes) (body-end-function . nndoc-digest-body-end) (head-end . "^ ?$") (body-begin . "^ ?\n") (file-end . "^End of .*digest.*[0-9].*\n\\*\\*\\|^End of.*Digest *$") (subtype digest guess)) We see that all text before a 70-width line of dashes is ignored; all text after a line that starts with that `^End of' is also ignored; each article begins with a 30-width line of dashes; the line separating the head from the body may contain a single space; and that the body is run through `nndoc-unquote-dashes' before being delivered. To hook your own document definition into `nndoc', use the `nndoc-add-type' function. It takes two parameters--the first is the definition itself and the second (optional) parameter says where in the document type definition alist to put this definition. The alist is traversed sequentially, and `nndoc-TYPE-type-p' is called for a given type `TYPE'. So `nndoc-mmdf-type-p' is called to see whether a document is of `mmdf' type, and so on. These type predicates should return `nil' if the document is not of the correct type; `t' if it is of the correct type; and a number if the document might be of the correct type. A high number means high probability; a low number means low probability with `0' being the lowest legal number. File: gnus.info, Node: SOUP, Next: Web Searches, Prev: Document Groups, Up: Other Sources SOUP ---- In the PC world people often talk about "offline" newsreaders. These are thingies that are combined reader/news transport monstrosities. With built-in modem programs. Yecchh! Of course, us Unix Weenie types of human beans use things like `uucp' and, like, `nntpd' and set up proper news and mail transport things like Ghod intended. And then we just use normal newsreaders. However, it can sometimes be convenient to do something a that's a bit easier on the brain if you have a very slow modem, and you're not really that interested in doing things properly. A file format called SOUP has been developed for transporting news and mail from servers to home machines and back again. It can be a bit fiddly. First some terminology: "server" This is the machine that is connected to the outside world and where you get news and/or mail from. "home machine" This is the machine that you want to do the actual reading and responding on. It is typically not connected to the rest of the world in any way. "packet" Something that contains messages and/or commands. There are two kinds of packets: "message packets" These are packets made at the server, and typically contain lots of messages for you to read. These are called `SoupoutX.tgz' by default, where X is a number. "response packets" These are packets made at the home machine, and typically contains replies that you've written. These are called `SoupinX.tgz' by default, where X is a number. 1. You log in on the server and create a SOUP packet. You can either use a dedicated SOUP thingie (like the `awk' program), or you can use Gnus to create the packet with its SOUP commands (`O s' and/or `G s b'; and then `G s p') (*note SOUP Commands::.). 2. You transfer the packet home. Rail, boat, car or modem will do fine. 3. You put the packet in your home directory. 4. You fire up Gnus on your home machine using the `nnsoup' backend as the native or secondary server. 5. You read articles and mail and answer and followup to the things you want (*note SOUP Replies::.). 6. You do the `G s r' command to pack these replies into a SOUP packet. 7. You transfer this packet to the server. 8. You use Gnus to mail this packet out with the `G s s' command. 9. You then repeat until you die. So you basically have a bipartite system--you use `nnsoup' for reading and Gnus for packing/sending these SOUP packets. * Menu: * SOUP Commands:: Commands for creating and sending SOUP packets * SOUP Groups:: A backend for reading SOUP packets. * SOUP Replies:: How to enable `nnsoup' to take over mail and news. File: gnus.info, Node: SOUP Commands, Next: SOUP Groups, Up: SOUP SOUP Commands ............. These are commands for creating and manipulating SOUP packets. `G s b' Pack all unread articles in the current group (`gnus-group-brew-soup'). This command understands the process/prefix convention. `G s w' Save all SOUP data files (`gnus-soup-save-areas'). `G s s' Send all replies from the replies packet (`gnus-soup-send-replies'). `G s p' Pack all files into a SOUP packet (`gnus-soup-pack-packet'). `G s r' Pack all replies into a replies packet (`nnsoup-pack-replies'). `O s' This summary-mode command adds the current article to a SOUP packet (`gnus-soup-add-article'). It understands the process/prefix convention (*note Process/Prefix::.). There are a few variables to customize where Gnus will put all these thingies: `gnus-soup-directory' Directory where Gnus will save intermediate files while composing SOUP packets. The default is `~/SoupBrew/'. `gnus-soup-replies-directory' This is what Gnus will use as a temporary directory while sending our reply packets. `~/SoupBrew/SoupReplies/' is the default. `gnus-soup-prefix-file' Name of the file where Gnus stores the last used prefix. The default is `gnus-prefix'. `gnus-soup-packer' A format string command for packing a SOUP packet. The default is `tar cf - %s | gzip > $HOME/Soupout%d.tgz'. `gnus-soup-unpacker' Format string command for unpacking a SOUP packet. The default is `gunzip -c %s | tar xvf -'. `gnus-soup-packet-directory' Where Gnus will look for reply packets. The default is `~/'. `gnus-soup-packet-regexp' Regular expression matching SOUP reply packets in `gnus-soup-packet-directory'.