On Wed, 29 Jul 2020 11:02:49 -0400 Ken Hornstein <k...@pobox.com> sez:
> >As a user who _barely_ uses more than the basic features of NMH, > >I was completely unaware of all this. (That is my fault, of > >course. B-) The SYNOPSIS section does not show that "-use" > >optionally takes an argument. > > Well, so, here's the thing ... -use doesn't actually take an optional > argument. > > If you look at the SYNOPSIS, the beginning is: > > comp [-help] [-version] [+folder] [msg] ... > > So when you say "comp -use 1", you're setting the -use flag, and "1" > is the optional "msg" argument. I _thought_ that that might be the case, but was confused when (due to the -use flag) providing the "msg" argument wasn't generating a new draft based on that message. I'm guessing that the effect of the -use flag overrides any conflicting behavior from supplying a message argument. > >Maybe add a (possibly > >parenthetical) sentence to the end of the current -use > >explanation paragraph -- e.g. > > > > The switch -use directs comp to continue editing an > > already started message. That is, if a comp (or dist, > > repl, or forw) is terminated without sending the draft, > > the draft can be edited again via âcomp -useâ. Note: > > consult also the mh-draft(5) man page if using the draft > > folder facility. > > Ooof, Bob ... can we talk? Your message was sent out using the > character set iso8859-1, but the bytes you sent in the above paragraph > were UTF-8. Which makes me think that your local character set is UTF-8 > but for some reason you have configured nmh to only use ISO8859-1, > which is just a recipie for problems in the long run. It looks like > those were supposed to be left & right double quotation marks > (U+201C & U+201D). Oops! Sorry about that! Yes, I forgot to change the outgoing message's character set to UTF-8 (from my default iso-8859-1). And you're correct, Ken, that my system (Ubuntu 18.04) is set up for UTF-8: $ echo $XTERM_LOCALE en_US.UTF-8 > >> And sigh, the handling around the draft file vs a draft folder > >> is a confusing mess. In a perfect world I'd just switch > >> everything to draft folders and toss draft file handling in the > >> trash can. > > > >I can see how that might make things more uniform. B-) I'd need > >to change my muscle memory, but I wouldn't mind. > > > >On that note, and for folks and Norms curious about -use, lack of > >Draft-folder, etc., I provide the following anec-data. > > So, I was kind of in the same boat, except ... as a long-time exmh users, > I was forced to use a Draft-folder entry a few decades ago so I am used > to the draft-folder behavior. Every (long) once in a while, you guys change the behavior of NMH in a way that forces me to update my procedures -- almost always correcting something based on a misunderstanding. B-) And, to be very clear, I'm very grateful that you're still doing that! I'll adapt. B-) > >As far as I can tell, comp(1) is just verifying that the message > >exists. It doesn't use it to construct a new reply (and thus > >overwrite what's already in ~/Mail/draft), or change the current > >message. In particular, if the number or list doesn't exist, > >comp will complain about it: > >[...] > > _Huh_. Boy, talk about a confusing mess. I wouldn't have expected > that from reading the code. So ... I guess this is happening in > m_draft(). Maybe? Ugh. > > This is SO confusing. Again, the weird handling of the special "draft" > file is such a mess; if it was just a regular nmh folder/message it would > be much simpler. I know this would be a (very low) priority fix, but I would not object to it. (I'm also fine with it the way it is. B-) Bob