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335 * Gnus: (gnus). The newsreader Gnus.
340 @setchapternewpage odd
347 @author by Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen
349 @vskip 0pt plus 1filll
355 @top The Gnus Newsreader
359 You can read news (and mail) from within Emacs by using Gnus. The news
360 can be gotten by any nefarious means you can think of---@acronym{NNTP}, local
361 spool or your mbox file. All at the same time, if you want to push your
364 @c Adjust ../Makefile.in if you change the following line:
365 This manual corresponds to No Gnus v0.7.
376 Gnus is the advanced, self-documenting, customizable, extensible
377 unreal-time newsreader for GNU Emacs.
379 Oops. That sounds oddly familiar, so let's start over again to avoid
380 being accused of plagiarism:
382 Gnus is a message-reading laboratory. It will let you look at just
383 about anything as if it were a newsgroup. You can read mail with it,
384 you can browse directories with it, you can @code{ftp} with it---you
385 can even read news with it!
387 Gnus tries to empower people who read news the same way Emacs empowers
388 people who edit text. Gnus sets no limits to what the user should be
389 allowed to do. Users are encouraged to extend Gnus to make it behave
390 like they want it to behave. A program should not control people;
391 people should be empowered to do what they want by using (or abusing)
397 * Starting Up:: Finding news can be a pain.
398 * Group Buffer:: Selecting, subscribing and killing groups.
399 * Summary Buffer:: Reading, saving and posting articles.
400 * Article Buffer:: Displaying and handling articles.
401 * Composing Messages:: Information on sending mail and news.
402 * Select Methods:: Gnus reads all messages from various select methods.
403 * Scoring:: Assigning values to articles.
404 * Various:: General purpose settings.
405 * The End:: Farewell and goodbye.
406 * Appendices:: Terminology, Emacs intro, @acronym{FAQ}, History, Internals.
407 * GNU Free Documentation License:: The license for this documentation.
408 * Index:: Variable, function and concept index.
409 * Key Index:: Key Index.
411 Other related manuals
413 * Message:(message). Composing messages.
414 * Emacs-MIME:(emacs-mime). Composing messages; @acronym{MIME}-specific parts.
415 * Sieve:(sieve). Managing Sieve scripts in Emacs.
416 * PGG:(pgg). @acronym{PGP/MIME} with Gnus.
417 * SASL:(sasl). @acronym{SASL} authentication in Emacs.
420 --- The Detailed Node Listing ---
424 * Finding the News:: Choosing a method for getting news.
425 * The First Time:: What does Gnus do the first time you start it?
426 * The Server is Down:: How can I read my mail then?
427 * Slave Gnusae:: You can have more than one Gnus active at a time.
428 * Fetching a Group:: Starting Gnus just to read a group.
429 * New Groups:: What is Gnus supposed to do with new groups?
430 * Changing Servers:: You may want to move from one server to another.
431 * Startup Files:: Those pesky startup files---@file{.newsrc}.
432 * Auto Save:: Recovering from a crash.
433 * The Active File:: Reading the active file over a slow line Takes Time.
434 * Startup Variables:: Other variables you might change.
438 * Checking New Groups:: Determining what groups are new.
439 * Subscription Methods:: What Gnus should do with new groups.
440 * Filtering New Groups:: Making Gnus ignore certain new groups.
444 * Group Buffer Format:: Information listed and how you can change it.
445 * Group Maneuvering:: Commands for moving in the group buffer.
446 * Selecting a Group:: Actually reading news.
447 * Subscription Commands:: Unsubscribing, killing, subscribing.
448 * Group Data:: Changing the info for a group.
449 * Group Levels:: Levels? What are those, then?
450 * Group Score:: A mechanism for finding out what groups you like.
451 * Marking Groups:: You can mark groups for later processing.
452 * Foreign Groups:: Creating and editing groups.
453 * Group Parameters:: Each group may have different parameters set.
454 * Listing Groups:: Gnus can list various subsets of the groups.
455 * Sorting Groups:: Re-arrange the group order.
456 * Group Maintenance:: Maintaining a tidy @file{.newsrc} file.
457 * Browse Foreign Server:: You can browse a server. See what it has to offer.
458 * Exiting Gnus:: Stop reading news and get some work done.
459 * Group Topics:: A folding group mode divided into topics.
460 * Non-ASCII Group Names:: Accessing groups of non-English names.
461 * Misc Group Stuff:: Other stuff that you can to do.
465 * Group Line Specification:: Deciding how the group buffer is to look.
466 * Group Mode Line Specification:: The group buffer mode line.
467 * Group Highlighting:: Having nice colors in the group buffer.
471 * Topic Commands:: Interactive E-Z commands.
472 * Topic Variables:: How to customize the topics the Lisp Way.
473 * Topic Sorting:: Sorting each topic individually.
474 * Topic Topology:: A map of the world.
475 * Topic Parameters:: Parameters that apply to all groups in a topic.
479 * Scanning New Messages:: Asking Gnus to see whether new messages have arrived.
480 * Group Information:: Information and help on groups and Gnus.
481 * Group Timestamp:: Making Gnus keep track of when you last read a group.
482 * File Commands:: Reading and writing the Gnus files.
483 * Sieve Commands:: Managing Sieve scripts.
487 * Summary Buffer Format:: Deciding how the summary buffer is to look.
488 * Summary Maneuvering:: Moving around the summary buffer.
489 * Choosing Articles:: Reading articles.
490 * Paging the Article:: Scrolling the current article.
491 * Reply Followup and Post:: Posting articles.
492 * Delayed Articles:: Send articles at a later time.
493 * Marking Articles:: Marking articles as read, expirable, etc.
494 * Limiting:: You can limit the summary buffer.
495 * Threading:: How threads are made.
496 * Sorting the Summary Buffer:: How articles and threads are sorted.
497 * Asynchronous Fetching:: Gnus might be able to pre-fetch articles.
498 * Article Caching:: You may store articles in a cache.
499 * Persistent Articles:: Making articles expiry-resistant.
500 * Sticky Articles:: Article buffers that are not reused.
501 * Article Backlog:: Having already read articles hang around.
502 * Saving Articles:: Ways of customizing article saving.
503 * Decoding Articles:: Gnus can treat series of (uu)encoded articles.
504 * Article Treatment:: The article buffer can be mangled at will.
505 * MIME Commands:: Doing MIMEy things with the articles.
506 * Charsets:: Character set issues.
507 * Article Commands:: Doing various things with the article buffer.
508 * Summary Sorting:: Sorting the summary buffer in various ways.
509 * Finding the Parent:: No child support? Get the parent.
510 * Alternative Approaches:: Reading using non-default summaries.
511 * Tree Display:: A more visual display of threads.
512 * Mail Group Commands:: Some commands can only be used in mail groups.
513 * Various Summary Stuff:: What didn't fit anywhere else.
514 * Exiting the Summary Buffer:: Returning to the Group buffer,
515 or reselecting the current group.
516 * Crosspost Handling:: How crossposted articles are dealt with.
517 * Duplicate Suppression:: An alternative when crosspost handling fails.
518 * Security:: Decrypt and Verify.
519 * Mailing List:: Mailing list minor mode.
521 Summary Buffer Format
523 * Summary Buffer Lines:: You can specify how summary lines should look.
524 * To From Newsgroups:: How to not display your own name.
525 * Summary Buffer Mode Line:: You can say how the mode line should look.
526 * Summary Highlighting:: Making the summary buffer all pretty and nice.
530 * Choosing Commands:: Commands for choosing articles.
531 * Choosing Variables:: Variables that influence these commands.
533 Reply, Followup and Post
535 * Summary Mail Commands:: Sending mail.
536 * Summary Post Commands:: Sending news.
537 * Summary Message Commands:: Other Message-related commands.
538 * Canceling and Superseding::
542 * Unread Articles:: Marks for unread articles.
543 * Read Articles:: Marks for read articles.
544 * Other Marks:: Marks that do not affect readedness.
545 * Setting Marks:: How to set and remove marks.
546 * Generic Marking Commands:: How to customize the marking.
547 * Setting Process Marks:: How to mark articles for later processing.
551 * Customizing Threading:: Variables you can change to affect the threading.
552 * Thread Commands:: Thread based commands in the summary buffer.
554 Customizing Threading
556 * Loose Threads:: How Gnus gathers loose threads into bigger threads.
557 * Filling In Threads:: Making the threads displayed look fuller.
558 * More Threading:: Even more variables for fiddling with threads.
559 * Low-Level Threading:: You thought it was over@dots{} but you were wrong!
563 * Uuencoded Articles:: Uudecode articles.
564 * Shell Archives:: Unshar articles.
565 * PostScript Files:: Split PostScript.
566 * Other Files:: Plain save and binhex.
567 * Decoding Variables:: Variables for a happy decoding.
568 * Viewing Files:: You want to look at the result of the decoding?
572 * Rule Variables:: Variables that say how a file is to be viewed.
573 * Other Decode Variables:: Other decode variables.
574 * Uuencoding and Posting:: Variables for customizing uuencoding.
578 * Article Highlighting:: You want to make the article look like fruit salad.
579 * Article Fontisizing:: Making emphasized text look nice.
580 * Article Hiding:: You also want to make certain info go away.
581 * Article Washing:: Lots of way-neat functions to make life better.
582 * Article Header:: Doing various header transformations.
583 * Article Buttons:: Click on URLs, Message-IDs, addresses and the like.
584 * Article Button Levels:: Controlling appearance of buttons.
585 * Article Date:: Grumble, UT!
586 * Article Display:: Display various stuff---X-Face, Picons, Smileys
587 * Article Signature:: What is a signature?
588 * Article Miscellanea:: Various other stuff.
590 Alternative Approaches
592 * Pick and Read:: First mark articles and then read them.
593 * Binary Groups:: Auto-decode all articles.
595 Various Summary Stuff
597 * Summary Group Information:: Information oriented commands.
598 * Searching for Articles:: Multiple article commands.
599 * Summary Generation Commands::
600 * Really Various Summary Commands:: Those pesky non-conformant commands.
604 * Hiding Headers:: Deciding what headers should be displayed.
605 * Using MIME:: Pushing articles through @acronym{MIME} before reading them.
606 * Customizing Articles:: Tailoring the look of the articles.
607 * Article Keymap:: Keystrokes available in the article buffer.
608 * Misc Article:: Other stuff.
612 * Mail:: Mailing and replying.
613 * Posting Server:: What server should you post and mail via?
614 * POP before SMTP:: You cannot send a mail unless you read a mail.
615 * Mail and Post:: Mailing and posting at the same time.
616 * Archived Messages:: Where Gnus stores the messages you've sent.
617 * Posting Styles:: An easier way to specify who you are.
618 * Drafts:: Postponing messages and rejected messages.
619 * Rejected Articles:: What happens if the server doesn't like your article?
620 * Signing and encrypting:: How to compose secure messages.
624 * Server Buffer:: Making and editing virtual servers.
625 * Getting News:: Reading USENET news with Gnus.
626 * Getting Mail:: Reading your personal mail with Gnus.
627 * Browsing the Web:: Getting messages from a plethora of Web sources.
628 * IMAP:: Using Gnus as a @acronym{IMAP} client.
629 * Other Sources:: Reading directories, files, SOUP packets.
630 * Combined Groups:: Combining groups into one group.
631 * Email Based Diary:: Using mails to manage diary events in Gnus.
632 * Gnus Unplugged:: Reading news and mail offline.
636 * Server Buffer Format:: You can customize the look of this buffer.
637 * Server Commands:: Commands to manipulate servers.
638 * Example Methods:: Examples server specifications.
639 * Creating a Virtual Server:: An example session.
640 * Server Variables:: Which variables to set.
641 * Servers and Methods:: You can use server names as select methods.
642 * Unavailable Servers:: Some servers you try to contact may be down.
646 * NNTP:: Reading news from an @acronym{NNTP} server.
647 * News Spool:: Reading news from the local spool.
651 * Direct Functions:: Connecting directly to the server.
652 * Indirect Functions:: Connecting indirectly to the server.
653 * Common Variables:: Understood by several connection functions.
654 * NNTP marks:: Storing marks for @acronym{NNTP} servers.
658 * Mail in a Newsreader:: Important introductory notes.
659 * Getting Started Reading Mail:: A simple cookbook example.
660 * Splitting Mail:: How to create mail groups.
661 * Mail Sources:: How to tell Gnus where to get mail from.
662 * Mail Back End Variables:: Variables for customizing mail handling.
663 * Fancy Mail Splitting:: Gnus can do hairy splitting of incoming mail.
664 * Group Mail Splitting:: Use group customize to drive mail splitting.
665 * Incorporating Old Mail:: What about the old mail you have?
666 * Expiring Mail:: Getting rid of unwanted mail.
667 * Washing Mail:: Removing cruft from the mail you get.
668 * Duplicates:: Dealing with duplicated mail.
669 * Not Reading Mail:: Using mail back ends for reading other files.
670 * Choosing a Mail Back End:: Gnus can read a variety of mail formats.
674 * Mail Source Specifiers:: How to specify what a mail source is.
675 * Mail Source Customization:: Some variables that influence things.
676 * Fetching Mail:: Using the mail source specifiers.
678 Choosing a Mail Back End
680 * Unix Mail Box:: Using the (quite) standard Un*x mbox.
681 * Rmail Babyl:: Emacs programs use the Rmail Babyl format.
682 * Mail Spool:: Store your mail in a private spool?
683 * MH Spool:: An mhspool-like back end.
684 * Maildir:: Another one-file-per-message format.
685 * Mail Folders:: Having one file for each group.
686 * Comparing Mail Back Ends:: An in-depth looks at pros and cons.
691 * Web Searches:: Creating groups from articles that match a string.
692 * Slashdot:: Reading the Slashdot comments.
693 * Ultimate:: The Ultimate Bulletin Board systems.
694 * Web Archive:: Reading mailing list archived on web.
695 * RSS:: Reading RDF site summary.
696 * Customizing W3:: Doing stuff to Emacs/W3 from Gnus.
700 * Splitting in IMAP:: Splitting mail with nnimap.
701 * Expiring in IMAP:: Expiring mail with nnimap.
702 * Editing IMAP ACLs:: Limiting/enabling other users access to a mailbox.
703 * Expunging mailboxes:: Equivalent of a ``compress mailbox'' button.
704 * A note on namespaces:: How to (not) use @acronym{IMAP} namespace in Gnus.
705 * Debugging IMAP:: What to do when things don't work.
709 * Directory Groups:: You can read a directory as if it was a newsgroup.
710 * Anything Groups:: Dired? Who needs dired?
711 * Document Groups:: Single files can be the basis of a group.
712 * SOUP:: Reading @sc{soup} packets ``offline''.
713 * Mail-To-News Gateways:: Posting articles via mail-to-news gateways.
717 * Document Server Internals:: How to add your own document types.
721 * SOUP Commands:: Commands for creating and sending @sc{soup} packets
722 * SOUP Groups:: A back end for reading @sc{soup} packets.
723 * SOUP Replies:: How to enable @code{nnsoup} to take over mail and news.
727 * Virtual Groups:: Combining articles from many groups.
728 * Kibozed Groups:: Looking through parts of the newsfeed for articles.
732 * The NNDiary Back End:: Basic setup and usage.
733 * The Gnus Diary Library:: Utility toolkit on top of nndiary.
734 * Sending or Not Sending:: A final note on sending diary messages.
738 * Diary Messages:: What makes a message valid for nndiary.
739 * Running NNDiary:: NNDiary has two modes of operation.
740 * Customizing NNDiary:: Bells and whistles.
742 The Gnus Diary Library
744 * Diary Summary Line Format:: A nicer summary buffer line format.
745 * Diary Articles Sorting:: A nicer way to sort messages.
746 * Diary Headers Generation:: Not doing it manually.
747 * Diary Group Parameters:: Not handling them manually.
751 * Agent Basics:: How it all is supposed to work.
752 * Agent Categories:: How to tell the Gnus Agent what to download.
753 * Agent Commands:: New commands for all the buffers.
754 * Agent Visuals:: Ways that the agent may effect your summary buffer.
755 * Agent as Cache:: The Agent is a big cache too.
756 * Agent Expiry:: How to make old articles go away.
757 * Agent Regeneration:: How to recover from lost connections and other accidents.
758 * Agent and flags:: How the Agent maintains flags.
759 * Agent and IMAP:: How to use the Agent with @acronym{IMAP}.
760 * Outgoing Messages:: What happens when you post/mail something?
761 * Agent Variables:: Customizing is fun.
762 * Example Setup:: An example @file{~/.gnus.el} file for offline people.
763 * Batching Agents:: How to fetch news from a @code{cron} job.
764 * Agent Caveats:: What you think it'll do and what it does.
768 * Category Syntax:: What a category looks like.
769 * Category Buffer:: A buffer for maintaining categories.
770 * Category Variables:: Customize'r'Us.
774 * Group Agent Commands:: Configure groups and fetch their contents.
775 * Summary Agent Commands:: Manually select then fetch specific articles.
776 * Server Agent Commands:: Select the servers that are supported by the agent.
780 * Summary Score Commands:: Adding score entries for the current group.
781 * Group Score Commands:: General score commands.
782 * Score Variables:: Customize your scoring. (My, what terminology).
783 * Score File Format:: What a score file may contain.
784 * Score File Editing:: You can edit score files by hand as well.
785 * Adaptive Scoring:: Big Sister Gnus knows what you read.
786 * Home Score File:: How to say where new score entries are to go.
787 * Followups To Yourself:: Having Gnus notice when people answer you.
788 * Scoring On Other Headers:: Scoring on non-standard headers.
789 * Scoring Tips:: How to score effectively.
790 * Reverse Scoring:: That problem child of old is not problem.
791 * Global Score Files:: Earth-spanning, ear-splitting score files.
792 * Kill Files:: They are still here, but they can be ignored.
793 * Converting Kill Files:: Translating kill files to score files.
794 * Advanced Scoring:: Using logical expressions to build score rules.
795 * Score Decays:: It can be useful to let scores wither away.
799 * Advanced Scoring Syntax:: A definition.
800 * Advanced Scoring Examples:: What they look like.
801 * Advanced Scoring Tips:: Getting the most out of it.
805 * Process/Prefix:: A convention used by many treatment commands.
806 * Interactive:: Making Gnus ask you many questions.
807 * Symbolic Prefixes:: How to supply some Gnus functions with options.
808 * Formatting Variables:: You can specify what buffers should look like.
809 * Window Layout:: Configuring the Gnus buffer windows.
810 * Faces and Fonts:: How to change how faces look.
811 * Compilation:: How to speed Gnus up.
812 * Mode Lines:: Displaying information in the mode lines.
813 * Highlighting and Menus:: Making buffers look all nice and cozy.
814 * Buttons:: Get tendinitis in ten easy steps!
815 * Daemons:: Gnus can do things behind your back.
816 * NoCeM:: How to avoid spam and other fatty foods.
817 * Undo:: Some actions can be undone.
818 * Predicate Specifiers:: Specifying predicates.
819 * Moderation:: What to do if you're a moderator.
820 * Image Enhancements:: Modern versions of Emacs/XEmacs can display images.
821 * Fuzzy Matching:: What's the big fuzz?
822 * Thwarting Email Spam:: Simple ways to avoid unsolicited commercial email.
823 * Spam Package:: A package for filtering and processing spam.
824 * Other modes:: Interaction with other modes.
825 * Various Various:: Things that are really various.
829 * Formatting Basics:: A formatting variable is basically a format string.
830 * Mode Line Formatting:: Some rules about mode line formatting variables.
831 * Advanced Formatting:: Modifying output in various ways.
832 * User-Defined Specs:: Having Gnus call your own functions.
833 * Formatting Fonts:: Making the formatting look colorful and nice.
834 * Positioning Point:: Moving point to a position after an operation.
835 * Tabulation:: Tabulating your output.
836 * Wide Characters:: Dealing with wide characters.
840 * X-Face:: Display a funky, teensy black-and-white image.
841 * Face:: Display a funkier, teensier colored image.
842 * Smileys:: Show all those happy faces the way they were
844 * Picons:: How to display pictures of what you're reading.
845 * XVarious:: Other XEmacsy Gnusey variables.
849 * The problem of spam:: Some background, and some solutions
850 * Anti-Spam Basics:: Simple steps to reduce the amount of spam.
851 * SpamAssassin:: How to use external anti-spam tools.
852 * Hashcash:: Reduce spam by burning CPU time.
856 * Spam Package Introduction::
857 * Filtering Incoming Mail::
858 * Detecting Spam in Groups::
859 * Spam and Ham Processors::
860 * Spam Package Configuration Examples::
862 * Extending the Spam package::
863 * Spam Statistics Package::
865 Spam Statistics Package
867 * Creating a spam-stat dictionary::
868 * Splitting mail using spam-stat::
869 * Low-level interface to the spam-stat dictionary::
873 * XEmacs:: Requirements for installing under XEmacs.
874 * History:: How Gnus got where it is today.
875 * On Writing Manuals:: Why this is not a beginner's guide.
876 * Terminology:: We use really difficult, like, words here.
877 * Customization:: Tailoring Gnus to your needs.
878 * Troubleshooting:: What you might try if things do not work.
879 * Gnus Reference Guide:: Rilly, rilly technical stuff.
880 * Emacs for Heathens:: A short introduction to Emacsian terms.
881 * Frequently Asked Questions:: The Gnus FAQ
885 * Gnus Versions:: What Gnus versions have been released.
886 * Other Gnus Versions:: Other Gnus versions that also have been released.
887 * Why?:: What's the point of Gnus?
888 * Compatibility:: Just how compatible is Gnus with @sc{gnus}?
889 * Conformity:: Gnus tries to conform to all standards.
890 * Emacsen:: Gnus can be run on a few modern Emacsen.
891 * Gnus Development:: How Gnus is developed.
892 * Contributors:: Oodles of people.
893 * New Features:: Pointers to some of the new stuff in Gnus.
897 * ding Gnus:: New things in Gnus 5.0/5.1, the first new Gnus.
898 * September Gnus:: The Thing Formally Known As Gnus 5.2/5.3.
899 * Red Gnus:: Third time best---Gnus 5.4/5.5.
900 * Quassia Gnus:: Two times two is four, or Gnus 5.6/5.7.
901 * Pterodactyl Gnus:: Pentad also starts with P, AKA Gnus 5.8/5.9.
902 * Oort Gnus:: It's big. It's far out. Gnus 5.10/5.11.
903 * No Gnus:: Very punny.
907 * Slow/Expensive Connection:: You run a local Emacs and get the news elsewhere.
908 * Slow Terminal Connection:: You run a remote Emacs.
909 * Little Disk Space:: You feel that having large setup files is icky.
910 * Slow Machine:: You feel like buying a faster machine.
914 * Gnus Utility Functions:: Common functions and variable to use.
915 * Back End Interface:: How Gnus communicates with the servers.
916 * Score File Syntax:: A BNF definition of the score file standard.
917 * Headers:: How Gnus stores headers internally.
918 * Ranges:: A handy format for storing mucho numbers.
919 * Group Info:: The group info format.
920 * Extended Interactive:: Symbolic prefixes and stuff.
921 * Emacs/XEmacs Code:: Gnus can be run under all modern Emacsen.
922 * Various File Formats:: Formats of files that Gnus use.
926 * Required Back End Functions:: Functions that must be implemented.
927 * Optional Back End Functions:: Functions that need not be implemented.
928 * Error Messaging:: How to get messages and report errors.
929 * Writing New Back Ends:: Extending old back ends.
930 * Hooking New Back Ends Into Gnus:: What has to be done on the Gnus end.
931 * Mail-like Back Ends:: Some tips on mail back ends.
935 * Active File Format:: Information on articles and groups available.
936 * Newsgroups File Format:: Group descriptions.
940 * Keystrokes:: Entering text and executing commands.
941 * Emacs Lisp:: The built-in Emacs programming language.
947 @chapter Starting Gnus
950 If you haven't used Emacs much before using Gnus, read @ref{Emacs for
955 If your system administrator has set things up properly, starting Gnus
956 and reading news is extremely easy---you just type @kbd{M-x gnus} in
957 your Emacs. If not, you should customize the variable
958 @code{gnus-select-method} as described in @ref{Finding the News}. For a
959 minimal setup for posting should also customize the variables
960 @code{user-full-name} and @code{user-mail-address}.
962 @findex gnus-other-frame
963 @kindex M-x gnus-other-frame
964 If you want to start Gnus in a different frame, you can use the command
965 @kbd{M-x gnus-other-frame} instead.
967 If things do not go smoothly at startup, you have to twiddle some
968 variables in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file. This file is similar to
969 @file{~/.emacs}, but is read when Gnus starts.
971 If you puzzle at any terms used in this manual, please refer to the
972 terminology section (@pxref{Terminology}).
975 * Finding the News:: Choosing a method for getting news.
976 * The First Time:: What does Gnus do the first time you start it?
977 * The Server is Down:: How can I read my mail then?
978 * Slave Gnusae:: You can have more than one Gnus active at a time.
979 * New Groups:: What is Gnus supposed to do with new groups?
980 * Changing Servers:: You may want to move from one server to another.
981 * Startup Files:: Those pesky startup files---@file{.newsrc}.
982 * Auto Save:: Recovering from a crash.
983 * The Active File:: Reading the active file over a slow line Takes Time.
984 * Startup Variables:: Other variables you might change.
988 @node Finding the News
989 @section Finding the News
992 @vindex gnus-select-method
994 The @code{gnus-select-method} variable says where Gnus should look for
995 news. This variable should be a list where the first element says
996 @dfn{how} and the second element says @dfn{where}. This method is your
997 native method. All groups not fetched with this method are
1000 For instance, if the @samp{news.somewhere.edu} @acronym{NNTP} server is where
1001 you want to get your daily dosage of news from, you'd say:
1004 (setq gnus-select-method '(nntp "news.somewhere.edu"))
1007 If you want to read directly from the local spool, say:
1010 (setq gnus-select-method '(nnspool ""))
1013 If you can use a local spool, you probably should, as it will almost
1014 certainly be much faster. But do not use the local spool if your
1015 server is running Leafnode (which is a simple, standalone private news
1016 server); in this case, use @code{(nntp "localhost")}.
1018 @vindex gnus-nntpserver-file
1020 @cindex @acronym{NNTP} server
1021 If this variable is not set, Gnus will take a look at the
1022 @env{NNTPSERVER} environment variable. If that variable isn't set,
1023 Gnus will see whether @code{gnus-nntpserver-file}
1024 (@file{/etc/nntpserver} by default) has any opinions on the matter.
1025 If that fails as well, Gnus will try to use the machine running Emacs
1026 as an @acronym{NNTP} server. That's a long shot, though.
1028 @vindex gnus-nntp-server
1029 If @code{gnus-nntp-server} is set, this variable will override
1030 @code{gnus-select-method}. You should therefore set
1031 @code{gnus-nntp-server} to @code{nil}, which is what it is by default.
1033 @vindex gnus-secondary-servers
1034 @vindex gnus-nntp-server
1035 You can also make Gnus prompt you interactively for the name of an
1036 @acronym{NNTP} server. If you give a non-numerical prefix to @code{gnus}
1037 (i.e., @kbd{C-u M-x gnus}), Gnus will let you choose between the servers
1038 in the @code{gnus-secondary-servers} list (if any). You can also just
1039 type in the name of any server you feel like visiting. (Note that this
1040 will set @code{gnus-nntp-server}, which means that if you then @kbd{M-x
1041 gnus} later in the same Emacs session, Gnus will contact the same
1044 @findex gnus-group-browse-foreign-server
1046 However, if you use one @acronym{NNTP} server regularly and are just
1047 interested in a couple of groups from a different server, you would be
1048 better served by using the @kbd{B} command in the group buffer. It will
1049 let you have a look at what groups are available, and you can subscribe
1050 to any of the groups you want to. This also makes @file{.newsrc}
1051 maintenance much tidier. @xref{Foreign Groups}.
1053 @vindex gnus-secondary-select-methods
1055 A slightly different approach to foreign groups is to set the
1056 @code{gnus-secondary-select-methods} variable. The select methods
1057 listed in this variable are in many ways just as native as the
1058 @code{gnus-select-method} server. They will also be queried for active
1059 files during startup (if that's required), and new newsgroups that
1060 appear on these servers will be subscribed (or not) just as native
1063 For instance, if you use the @code{nnmbox} back end to read your mail,
1064 you would typically set this variable to
1067 (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnmbox "")))
1070 Note: the @acronym{NNTP} back end stores marks in marks files
1071 (@pxref{NNTP marks}). This feature makes it easy to share marks between
1072 several Gnus installations, but may slow down things a bit when fetching
1073 new articles. @xref{NNTP marks}, for more information.
1076 @node The First Time
1077 @section The First Time
1078 @cindex first time usage
1080 If no startup files exist (@pxref{Startup Files}), Gnus will try to
1081 determine what groups should be subscribed by default.
1083 @vindex gnus-default-subscribed-newsgroups
1084 If the variable @code{gnus-default-subscribed-newsgroups} is set, Gnus
1085 will subscribe you to just those groups in that list, leaving the rest
1086 killed. Your system administrator should have set this variable to
1089 Since she hasn't, Gnus will just subscribe you to a few arbitrarily
1090 picked groups (i.e., @samp{*.newusers}). (@dfn{Arbitrary} is defined
1091 here as @dfn{whatever Lars thinks you should read}.)
1093 You'll also be subscribed to the Gnus documentation group, which should
1094 help you with most common problems.
1096 If @code{gnus-default-subscribed-newsgroups} is @code{t}, Gnus will just
1097 use the normal functions for handling new groups, and not do anything
1101 @node The Server is Down
1102 @section The Server is Down
1103 @cindex server errors
1105 If the default server is down, Gnus will understandably have some
1106 problems starting. However, if you have some mail groups in addition to
1107 the news groups, you may want to start Gnus anyway.
1109 Gnus, being the trusting sort of program, will ask whether to proceed
1110 without a native select method if that server can't be contacted. This
1111 will happen whether the server doesn't actually exist (i.e., you have
1112 given the wrong address) or the server has just momentarily taken ill
1113 for some reason or other. If you decide to continue and have no foreign
1114 groups, you'll find it difficult to actually do anything in the group
1115 buffer. But, hey, that's your problem. Blllrph!
1117 @findex gnus-no-server
1118 @kindex M-x gnus-no-server
1120 If you know that the server is definitely down, or you just want to read
1121 your mail without bothering with the server at all, you can use the
1122 @code{gnus-no-server} command to start Gnus. That might come in handy
1123 if you're in a hurry as well. This command will not attempt to contact
1124 your primary server---instead, it will just activate all groups on level
1125 1 and 2. (You should preferably keep no native groups on those two
1126 levels.) Also @pxref{Group Levels}.
1130 @section Slave Gnusae
1133 You might want to run more than one Emacs with more than one Gnus at the
1134 same time. If you are using different @file{.newsrc} files (e.g., if you
1135 are using the two different Gnusae to read from two different servers),
1136 that is no problem whatsoever. You just do it.
1138 The problem appears when you want to run two Gnusae that use the same
1139 @file{.newsrc} file.
1141 To work around that problem some, we here at the Think-Tank at the Gnus
1142 Towers have come up with a new concept: @dfn{Masters} and
1143 @dfn{slaves}. (We have applied for a patent on this concept, and have
1144 taken out a copyright on those words. If you wish to use those words in
1145 conjunction with each other, you have to send $1 per usage instance to
1146 me. Usage of the patent (@dfn{Master/Slave Relationships In Computer
1147 Applications}) will be much more expensive, of course.)
1150 Anyway, you start one Gnus up the normal way with @kbd{M-x gnus} (or
1151 however you do it). Each subsequent slave Gnusae should be started with
1152 @kbd{M-x gnus-slave}. These slaves won't save normal @file{.newsrc}
1153 files, but instead save @dfn{slave files} that contain information only
1154 on what groups have been read in the slave session. When a master Gnus
1155 starts, it will read (and delete) these slave files, incorporating all
1156 information from them. (The slave files will be read in the sequence
1157 they were created, so the latest changes will have precedence.)
1159 Information from the slave files has, of course, precedence over the
1160 information in the normal (i.e., master) @file{.newsrc} file.
1162 If the @file{.newsrc*} files have not been saved in the master when the
1163 slave starts, you may be prompted as to whether to read an auto-save
1164 file. If you answer ``yes'', the unsaved changes to the master will be
1165 incorporated into the slave. If you answer ``no'', the slave may see some
1166 messages as unread that have been read in the master.
1173 @cindex subscription
1175 @vindex gnus-check-new-newsgroups
1176 If you are satisfied that you really never want to see any new groups,
1177 you can set @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} to @code{nil}. This will
1178 also save you some time at startup. Even if this variable is
1179 @code{nil}, you can always subscribe to the new groups just by pressing
1180 @kbd{U} in the group buffer (@pxref{Group Maintenance}). This variable
1181 is @code{ask-server} by default. If you set this variable to
1182 @code{always}, then Gnus will query the back ends for new groups even
1183 when you do the @kbd{g} command (@pxref{Scanning New Messages}).
1186 * Checking New Groups:: Determining what groups are new.
1187 * Subscription Methods:: What Gnus should do with new groups.
1188 * Filtering New Groups:: Making Gnus ignore certain new groups.
1192 @node Checking New Groups
1193 @subsection Checking New Groups
1195 Gnus normally determines whether a group is new or not by comparing the
1196 list of groups from the active file(s) with the lists of subscribed and
1197 dead groups. This isn't a particularly fast method. If
1198 @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} is @code{ask-server}, Gnus will ask the
1199 server for new groups since the last time. This is both faster and
1200 cheaper. This also means that you can get rid of the list of killed
1201 groups altogether, so you may set @code{gnus-save-killed-list} to
1202 @code{nil}, which will save time both at startup, at exit, and all over.
1203 Saves disk space, too. Why isn't this the default, then?
1204 Unfortunately, not all servers support this command.
1206 I bet I know what you're thinking now: How do I find out whether my
1207 server supports @code{ask-server}? No? Good, because I don't have a
1208 fail-safe answer. I would suggest just setting this variable to
1209 @code{ask-server} and see whether any new groups appear within the next
1210 few days. If any do, then it works. If none do, then it doesn't
1211 work. I could write a function to make Gnus guess whether the server
1212 supports @code{ask-server}, but it would just be a guess. So I won't.
1213 You could @code{telnet} to the server and say @code{HELP} and see
1214 whether it lists @samp{NEWGROUPS} among the commands it understands. If
1215 it does, then it might work. (But there are servers that lists
1216 @samp{NEWGROUPS} without supporting the function properly.)
1218 This variable can also be a list of select methods. If so, Gnus will
1219 issue an @code{ask-server} command to each of the select methods, and
1220 subscribe them (or not) using the normal methods. This might be handy
1221 if you are monitoring a few servers for new groups. A side effect is
1222 that startup will take much longer, so you can meditate while waiting.
1223 Use the mantra ``dingnusdingnusdingnus'' to achieve permanent bliss.
1226 @node Subscription Methods
1227 @subsection Subscription Methods
1229 @vindex gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-method
1230 What Gnus does when it encounters a new group is determined by the
1231 @code{gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-method} variable.
1233 This variable should contain a function. This function will be called
1234 with the name of the new group as the only parameter.
1236 Some handy pre-fab functions are:
1240 @item gnus-subscribe-zombies
1241 @vindex gnus-subscribe-zombies
1242 Make all new groups zombies. This is the default. You can browse the
1243 zombies later (with @kbd{A z}) and either kill them all off properly
1244 (with @kbd{S z}), or subscribe to them (with @kbd{u}).
1246 @item gnus-subscribe-randomly
1247 @vindex gnus-subscribe-randomly
1248 Subscribe all new groups in arbitrary order. This really means that all
1249 new groups will be added at ``the top'' of the group buffer.
1251 @item gnus-subscribe-alphabetically
1252 @vindex gnus-subscribe-alphabetically
1253 Subscribe all new groups in alphabetical order.
1255 @item gnus-subscribe-hierarchically
1256 @vindex gnus-subscribe-hierarchically
1257 Subscribe all new groups hierarchically. The difference between this
1258 function and @code{gnus-subscribe-alphabetically} is slight.
1259 @code{gnus-subscribe-alphabetically} will subscribe new groups in a strictly
1260 alphabetical fashion, while this function will enter groups into its
1261 hierarchy. So if you want to have the @samp{rec} hierarchy before the
1262 @samp{comp} hierarchy, this function will not mess that configuration
1263 up. Or something like that.
1265 @item gnus-subscribe-interactively
1266 @vindex gnus-subscribe-interactively
1267 Subscribe new groups interactively. This means that Gnus will ask
1268 you about @strong{all} new groups. The groups you choose to subscribe
1269 to will be subscribed hierarchically.
1271 @item gnus-subscribe-killed
1272 @vindex gnus-subscribe-killed
1273 Kill all new groups.
1275 @item gnus-subscribe-topics
1276 @vindex gnus-subscribe-topics
1277 Put the groups into the topic that has a matching @code{subscribe} topic
1278 parameter (@pxref{Topic Parameters}). For instance, a @code{subscribe}
1279 topic parameter that looks like
1285 will mean that all groups that match that regex will be subscribed under
1288 If no topics match the groups, the groups will be subscribed in the
1293 @vindex gnus-subscribe-hierarchical-interactive
1294 A closely related variable is
1295 @code{gnus-subscribe-hierarchical-interactive}. (That's quite a
1296 mouthful.) If this variable is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will ask you in a
1297 hierarchical fashion whether to subscribe to new groups or not. Gnus
1298 will ask you for each sub-hierarchy whether you want to descend the
1301 One common mistake is to set the variable a few paragraphs above
1302 (@code{gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-method}) to
1303 @code{gnus-subscribe-hierarchical-interactive}. This is an error. This
1304 will not work. This is ga-ga. So don't do it.
1307 @node Filtering New Groups
1308 @subsection Filtering New Groups
1310 A nice and portable way to control which new newsgroups should be
1311 subscribed (or ignored) is to put an @dfn{options} line at the start of
1312 the @file{.newsrc} file. Here's an example:
1315 options -n !alt.all !rec.all sci.all
1318 @vindex gnus-subscribe-options-newsgroup-method
1319 This line obviously belongs to a serious-minded intellectual scientific
1320 person (or she may just be plain old boring), because it says that all
1321 groups that have names beginning with @samp{alt} and @samp{rec} should
1322 be ignored, and all groups with names beginning with @samp{sci} should
1323 be subscribed. Gnus will not use the normal subscription method for
1324 subscribing these groups.
1325 @code{gnus-subscribe-options-newsgroup-method} is used instead. This
1326 variable defaults to @code{gnus-subscribe-alphabetically}.
1328 @vindex gnus-options-not-subscribe
1329 @vindex gnus-options-subscribe
1330 If you don't want to mess with your @file{.newsrc} file, you can just
1331 set the two variables @code{gnus-options-subscribe} and
1332 @code{gnus-options-not-subscribe}. These two variables do exactly the
1333 same as the @file{.newsrc} @samp{options -n} trick. Both are regexps,
1334 and if the new group matches the former, it will be unconditionally
1335 subscribed, and if it matches the latter, it will be ignored.
1337 @vindex gnus-auto-subscribed-groups
1338 Yet another variable that meddles here is
1339 @code{gnus-auto-subscribed-groups}. It works exactly like
1340 @code{gnus-options-subscribe}, and is therefore really superfluous,
1341 but I thought it would be nice to have two of these. This variable is
1342 more meant for setting some ground rules, while the other variable is
1343 used more for user fiddling. By default this variable makes all new
1344 groups that come from mail back ends (@code{nnml}, @code{nnbabyl},
1345 @code{nnfolder}, @code{nnmbox}, @code{nnmh}, and @code{nnmaildir})
1346 subscribed. If you don't like that, just set this variable to
1349 New groups that match this regexp are subscribed using
1350 @code{gnus-subscribe-options-newsgroup-method}.
1353 @node Changing Servers
1354 @section Changing Servers
1355 @cindex changing servers
1357 Sometimes it is necessary to move from one @acronym{NNTP} server to another.
1358 This happens very rarely, but perhaps you change jobs, or one server is
1359 very flaky and you want to use another.
1361 Changing the server is pretty easy, right? You just change
1362 @code{gnus-select-method} to point to the new server?
1366 Article numbers are not (in any way) kept synchronized between different
1367 @acronym{NNTP} servers, and the only way Gnus keeps track of what articles
1368 you have read is by keeping track of article numbers. So when you
1369 change @code{gnus-select-method}, your @file{.newsrc} file becomes
1372 Gnus provides a few functions to attempt to translate a @file{.newsrc}
1373 file from one server to another. They all have one thing in
1374 common---they take a looong time to run. You don't want to use these
1375 functions more than absolutely necessary.
1377 @kindex M-x gnus-change-server
1378 @findex gnus-change-server
1379 If you have access to both servers, Gnus can request the headers for all
1380 the articles you have read and compare @code{Message-ID}s and map the
1381 article numbers of the read articles and article marks. The @kbd{M-x
1382 gnus-change-server} command will do this for all your native groups. It
1383 will prompt for the method you want to move to.
1385 @kindex M-x gnus-group-move-group-to-server
1386 @findex gnus-group-move-group-to-server
1387 You can also move individual groups with the @kbd{M-x
1388 gnus-group-move-group-to-server} command. This is useful if you want to
1389 move a (foreign) group from one server to another.
1391 @kindex M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups
1392 @findex gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups
1393 If you don't have access to both the old and new server, all your marks
1394 and read ranges have become worthless. You can use the @kbd{M-x
1395 gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups} command to clear out all data
1396 that you have on your native groups. Use with caution.
1398 @kindex M-x gnus-group-clear-data
1399 @findex gnus-group-clear-data
1400 Clear the data from the current group only---nix out marks and the
1401 list of read articles (@code{gnus-group-clear-data}).
1403 After changing servers, you @strong{must} move the cache hierarchy away,
1404 since the cached articles will have wrong article numbers, which will
1405 affect which articles Gnus thinks are read.
1406 @code{gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups} will ask you if you want
1407 to have it done automatically; for @code{gnus-group-clear-data}, you
1408 can use @kbd{M-x gnus-cache-move-cache} (but beware, it will move the
1409 cache for all groups).
1413 @section Startup Files
1414 @cindex startup files
1419 Most common Unix news readers use a shared startup file called
1420 @file{.newsrc}. This file contains all the information about what
1421 groups are subscribed, and which articles in these groups have been
1424 Things got a bit more complicated with @sc{gnus}. In addition to
1425 keeping the @file{.newsrc} file updated, it also used a file called
1426 @file{.newsrc.el} for storing all the information that didn't fit into
1427 the @file{.newsrc} file. (Actually, it also duplicated everything in
1428 the @file{.newsrc} file.) @sc{gnus} would read whichever one of these
1429 files was the most recently saved, which enabled people to swap between
1430 @sc{gnus} and other newsreaders.
1432 That was kinda silly, so Gnus went one better: In addition to the
1433 @file{.newsrc} and @file{.newsrc.el} files, Gnus also has a file called
1434 @file{.newsrc.eld}. It will read whichever of these files that are most
1435 recent, but it will never write a @file{.newsrc.el} file. You should
1436 never delete the @file{.newsrc.eld} file---it contains much information
1437 not stored in the @file{.newsrc} file.
1439 @vindex gnus-save-newsrc-file
1440 @vindex gnus-read-newsrc-file
1441 You can turn off writing the @file{.newsrc} file by setting
1442 @code{gnus-save-newsrc-file} to @code{nil}, which means you can delete
1443 the file and save some space, as well as exiting from Gnus faster.
1444 However, this will make it impossible to use other newsreaders than
1445 Gnus. But hey, who would want to, right? Similarly, setting
1446 @code{gnus-read-newsrc-file} to @code{nil} makes Gnus ignore the
1447 @file{.newsrc} file and any @file{.newsrc-SERVER} files, which can be
1448 convenient if you use a different news reader occasionally, and you
1449 want to read a different subset of the available groups with that
1452 @vindex gnus-save-killed-list
1453 If @code{gnus-save-killed-list} (default @code{t}) is @code{nil}, Gnus
1454 will not save the list of killed groups to the startup file. This will
1455 save both time (when starting and quitting) and space (on disk). It
1456 will also mean that Gnus has no record of what groups are new or old,
1457 so the automatic new groups subscription methods become meaningless.
1458 You should always set @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} to @code{nil} or
1459 @code{ask-server} if you set this variable to @code{nil} (@pxref{New
1460 Groups}). This variable can also be a regular expression. If that's
1461 the case, remove all groups that do not match this regexp before
1462 saving. This can be useful in certain obscure situations that involve
1463 several servers where not all servers support @code{ask-server}.
1465 @vindex gnus-startup-file
1466 @vindex gnus-backup-startup-file
1467 @vindex version-control
1468 The @code{gnus-startup-file} variable says where the startup files are.
1469 The default value is @file{~/.newsrc}, with the Gnus (El Dingo) startup
1470 file being whatever that one is, with a @samp{.eld} appended.
1471 If you want version control for this file, set
1472 @code{gnus-backup-startup-file}. It respects the same values as the
1473 @code{version-control} variable.
1475 @vindex gnus-save-newsrc-hook
1476 @vindex gnus-save-quick-newsrc-hook
1477 @vindex gnus-save-standard-newsrc-hook
1478 @code{gnus-save-newsrc-hook} is called before saving any of the newsrc
1479 files, while @code{gnus-save-quick-newsrc-hook} is called just before
1480 saving the @file{.newsrc.eld} file, and
1481 @code{gnus-save-standard-newsrc-hook} is called just before saving the
1482 @file{.newsrc} file. The latter two are commonly used to turn version
1483 control on or off. Version control is on by default when saving the
1484 startup files. If you want to turn backup creation off, say something like:
1487 (defun turn-off-backup ()
1488 (set (make-local-variable 'backup-inhibited) t))
1490 (add-hook 'gnus-save-quick-newsrc-hook 'turn-off-backup)
1491 (add-hook 'gnus-save-standard-newsrc-hook 'turn-off-backup)
1494 @vindex gnus-init-file
1495 @vindex gnus-site-init-file
1496 When Gnus starts, it will read the @code{gnus-site-init-file}
1497 (@file{.../site-lisp/gnus-init} by default) and @code{gnus-init-file}
1498 (@file{~/.gnus} by default) files. These are normal Emacs Lisp files
1499 and can be used to avoid cluttering your @file{~/.emacs} and
1500 @file{site-init} files with Gnus stuff. Gnus will also check for files
1501 with the same names as these, but with @file{.elc} and @file{.el}
1502 suffixes. In other words, if you have set @code{gnus-init-file} to
1503 @file{~/.gnus}, it will look for @file{~/.gnus.elc}, @file{~/.gnus.el},
1504 and finally @file{~/.gnus} (in this order). If Emacs was invoked with
1505 the @option{-q} or @option{--no-init-file} options (@pxref{Initial
1506 Options, ,Initial Options, emacs, The Emacs Manual}), Gnus doesn't read
1507 @code{gnus-init-file}.
1512 @cindex dribble file
1515 Whenever you do something that changes the Gnus data (reading articles,
1516 catching up, killing/subscribing groups), the change is added to a
1517 special @dfn{dribble buffer}. This buffer is auto-saved the normal
1518 Emacs way. If your Emacs should crash before you have saved the
1519 @file{.newsrc} files, all changes you have made can be recovered from
1522 If Gnus detects this file at startup, it will ask the user whether to
1523 read it. The auto save file is deleted whenever the real startup file is
1526 @vindex gnus-use-dribble-file
1527 If @code{gnus-use-dribble-file} is @code{nil}, Gnus won't create and
1528 maintain a dribble buffer. The default is @code{t}.
1530 @vindex gnus-dribble-directory
1531 Gnus will put the dribble file(s) in @code{gnus-dribble-directory}. If
1532 this variable is @code{nil}, which it is by default, Gnus will dribble
1533 into the directory where the @file{.newsrc} file is located. (This is
1534 normally the user's home directory.) The dribble file will get the same
1535 file permissions as the @file{.newsrc} file.
1537 @vindex gnus-always-read-dribble-file
1538 If @code{gnus-always-read-dribble-file} is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will
1539 read the dribble file on startup without querying the user.
1542 @node The Active File
1543 @section The Active File
1545 @cindex ignored groups
1547 When Gnus starts, or indeed whenever it tries to determine whether new
1548 articles have arrived, it reads the active file. This is a very large
1549 file that lists all the active groups and articles on the server.
1551 @vindex gnus-ignored-newsgroups
1552 Before examining the active file, Gnus deletes all lines that match the
1553 regexp @code{gnus-ignored-newsgroups}. This is done primarily to reject
1554 any groups with bogus names, but you can use this variable to make Gnus
1555 ignore hierarchies you aren't ever interested in. However, this is not
1556 recommended. In fact, it's highly discouraged. Instead, @pxref{New
1557 Groups} for an overview of other variables that can be used instead.
1560 @c @code{nil} by default, and will slow down active file handling somewhat
1561 @c if you set it to anything else.
1563 @vindex gnus-read-active-file
1565 The active file can be rather Huge, so if you have a slow network, you
1566 can set @code{gnus-read-active-file} to @code{nil} to prevent Gnus from
1567 reading the active file. This variable is @code{some} by default.
1569 Gnus will try to make do by getting information just on the groups that
1570 you actually subscribe to.
1572 Note that if you subscribe to lots and lots of groups, setting this
1573 variable to @code{nil} will probably make Gnus slower, not faster. At
1574 present, having this variable @code{nil} will slow Gnus down
1575 considerably, unless you read news over a 2400 baud modem.
1577 This variable can also have the value @code{some}. Gnus will then
1578 attempt to read active info only on the subscribed groups. On some
1579 servers this is quite fast (on sparkling, brand new INN servers that
1580 support the @code{LIST ACTIVE group} command), on others this isn't fast
1581 at all. In any case, @code{some} should be faster than @code{nil}, and
1582 is certainly faster than @code{t} over slow lines.
1584 Some news servers (old versions of Leafnode and old versions of INN, for
1585 instance) do not support the @code{LIST ACTIVE group}. For these
1586 servers, @code{nil} is probably the most efficient value for this
1589 If this variable is @code{nil}, Gnus will ask for group info in total
1590 lock-step, which isn't very fast. If it is @code{some} and you use an
1591 @acronym{NNTP} server, Gnus will pump out commands as fast as it can, and
1592 read all the replies in one swoop. This will normally result in better
1593 performance, but if the server does not support the aforementioned
1594 @code{LIST ACTIVE group} command, this isn't very nice to the server.
1596 If you think that starting up Gnus takes too long, try all the three
1597 different values for this variable and see what works best for you.
1599 In any case, if you use @code{some} or @code{nil}, you should definitely
1600 kill all groups that you aren't interested in to speed things up.
1602 Note that this variable also affects active file retrieval from
1603 secondary select methods.
1606 @node Startup Variables
1607 @section Startup Variables
1611 @item gnus-load-hook
1612 @vindex gnus-load-hook
1613 A hook run while Gnus is being loaded. Note that this hook will
1614 normally be run just once in each Emacs session, no matter how many
1615 times you start Gnus.
1617 @item gnus-before-startup-hook
1618 @vindex gnus-before-startup-hook
1619 A hook run after starting up Gnus successfully.
1621 @item gnus-startup-hook
1622 @vindex gnus-startup-hook
1623 A hook run as the very last thing after starting up Gnus
1625 @item gnus-started-hook
1626 @vindex gnus-started-hook
1627 A hook that is run as the very last thing after starting up Gnus
1630 @item gnus-setup-news-hook
1631 @vindex gnus-setup-news-hook
1632 A hook that is run after reading the @file{.newsrc} file(s), but before
1633 generating the group buffer.
1635 @item gnus-check-bogus-newsgroups
1636 @vindex gnus-check-bogus-newsgroups
1637 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus will check for and delete all bogus groups at
1638 startup. A @dfn{bogus group} is a group that you have in your
1639 @file{.newsrc} file, but doesn't exist on the news server. Checking for
1640 bogus groups can take quite a while, so to save time and resources it's
1641 best to leave this option off, and do the checking for bogus groups once
1642 in a while from the group buffer instead (@pxref{Group Maintenance}).
1644 @item gnus-inhibit-startup-message
1645 @vindex gnus-inhibit-startup-message
1646 If non-@code{nil}, the startup message won't be displayed. That way,
1647 your boss might not notice as easily that you are reading news instead
1648 of doing your job. Note that this variable is used before
1649 @file{~/.gnus.el} is loaded, so it should be set in @file{.emacs} instead.
1651 @item gnus-no-groups-message
1652 @vindex gnus-no-groups-message
1653 Message displayed by Gnus when no groups are available.
1655 @item gnus-play-startup-jingle
1656 @vindex gnus-play-startup-jingle
1657 If non-@code{nil}, play the Gnus jingle at startup.
1659 @item gnus-startup-jingle
1660 @vindex gnus-startup-jingle
1661 Jingle to be played if the above variable is non-@code{nil}. The
1662 default is @samp{Tuxedomoon.Jingle4.au}.
1668 @chapter Group Buffer
1669 @cindex group buffer
1671 @c Alex Schroeder suggests to rearrange this as follows:
1673 @c <kensanata> ok, just save it for reference. I'll go to bed in a minute.
1674 @c 1. Selecting a Group, 2. (new) Finding a Group, 3. Group Levels,
1675 @c 4. Subscription Commands, 5. Group Maneuvering, 6. Group Data,
1676 @c 7. Group Score, 8. Group Buffer Format
1677 @c <kensanata> Group Levels should have more information on levels 5 to 9. I
1678 @c suggest to split the 4th paragraph ("Gnus considers groups...") as follows:
1679 @c <kensanata> First, "Gnus considers groups... (default 9)."
1680 @c <kensanata> New, a table summarizing what levels 1 to 9 mean.
1681 @c <kensanata> Third, "Gnus treats subscribed ... reasons of efficiency"
1682 @c <kensanata> Then expand the next paragraph or add some more to it.
1683 @c This short one sentence explains levels 1 and 2, therefore I understand
1684 @c that I should keep important news at 3 and boring news at 4.
1685 @c Say so! Then go on to explain why I should bother with levels 6 to 9.
1686 @c Maybe keep those that you don't want to read temporarily at 6,
1687 @c those that you never want to read at 8, those that offend your
1688 @c human rights at 9...
1691 The @dfn{group buffer} lists all (or parts) of the available groups. It
1692 is the first buffer shown when Gnus starts, and will never be killed as
1693 long as Gnus is active.
1697 \gnusfigure{The Group Buffer}{320}{
1698 \put(75,50){\epsfig{figure=ps/group,height=9cm}}
1699 \put(120,37){\makebox(0,0)[t]{Buffer name}}
1700 \put(120,38){\vector(1,2){10}}
1701 \put(40,60){\makebox(0,0)[r]{Mode line}}
1702 \put(40,58){\vector(1,0){30}}
1703 \put(200,28){\makebox(0,0)[t]{Native select method}}
1704 \put(200,26){\vector(-1,2){15}}
1710 * Group Buffer Format:: Information listed and how you can change it.
1711 * Group Maneuvering:: Commands for moving in the group buffer.
1712 * Selecting a Group:: Actually reading news.
1713 * Subscription Commands:: Unsubscribing, killing, subscribing.
1714 * Group Data:: Changing the info for a group.
1715 * Group Levels:: Levels? What are those, then?
1716 * Group Score:: A mechanism for finding out what groups you like.
1717 * Marking Groups:: You can mark groups for later processing.
1718 * Foreign Groups:: Creating and editing groups.
1719 * Group Parameters:: Each group may have different parameters set.
1720 * Listing Groups:: Gnus can list various subsets of the groups.
1721 * Sorting Groups:: Re-arrange the group order.
1722 * Group Maintenance:: Maintaining a tidy @file{.newsrc} file.
1723 * Browse Foreign Server:: You can browse a server. See what it has to offer.
1724 * Exiting Gnus:: Stop reading news and get some work done.
1725 * Group Topics:: A folding group mode divided into topics.
1726 * Non-ASCII Group Names:: Accessing groups of non-English names.
1727 * Misc Group Stuff:: Other stuff that you can to do.
1731 @node Group Buffer Format
1732 @section Group Buffer Format
1735 * Group Line Specification:: Deciding how the group buffer is to look.
1736 * Group Mode Line Specification:: The group buffer mode line.
1737 * Group Highlighting:: Having nice colors in the group buffer.
1740 You can customize the Group Mode tool bar, see @kbd{M-x
1741 customize-apropos RET gnus-group-tool-bar}. This feature is only
1744 The tool bar icons are now (de)activated correctly depending on the
1745 cursor position. Therefore, moving around in the Group Buffer is
1746 slower. You can disable this via the variable
1747 @code{gnus-group-update-tool-bar}. Its default value depends on your
1750 @node Group Line Specification
1751 @subsection Group Line Specification
1752 @cindex group buffer format
1754 The default format of the group buffer is nice and dull, but you can
1755 make it as exciting and ugly as you feel like.
1757 Here's a couple of example group lines:
1760 25: news.announce.newusers
1761 * 0: alt.fan.andrea-dworkin
1766 You can see that there are 25 unread articles in
1767 @samp{news.announce.newusers}. There are no unread articles, but some
1768 ticked articles, in @samp{alt.fan.andrea-dworkin} (see that little
1769 asterisk at the beginning of the line?).
1771 @vindex gnus-group-line-format
1772 You can change that format to whatever you want by fiddling with the
1773 @code{gnus-group-line-format} variable. This variable works along the
1774 lines of a @code{format} specification, which is pretty much the same as
1775 a @code{printf} specifications, for those of you who use (feh!) C.
1776 @xref{Formatting Variables}.
1778 @samp{%M%S%5y:%B%(%g%)\n} is the value that produced those lines above.
1780 There should always be a colon on the line; the cursor always moves to
1781 the colon after performing an operation. @xref{Positioning
1782 Point}. Nothing else is required---not even the group name. All
1783 displayed text is just window dressing, and is never examined by Gnus.
1784 Gnus stores all real information it needs using text properties.
1786 (Note that if you make a really strange, wonderful, spreadsheet-like
1787 layout, everybody will believe you are hard at work with the accounting
1788 instead of wasting time reading news.)
1790 Here's a list of all available format characters:
1795 An asterisk if the group only has marked articles.
1798 Whether the group is subscribed.
1801 Level of subscribedness.
1804 Number of unread articles.
1807 Number of dormant articles.
1810 Number of ticked articles.
1813 Number of read articles.
1816 Number of unseen articles.
1819 Estimated total number of articles. (This is really @var{max-number}
1820 minus @var{min-number} plus 1.)
1822 Gnus uses this estimation because the @acronym{NNTP} protocol provides
1823 efficient access to @var{max-number} and @var{min-number} but getting
1824 the true unread message count is not possible efficiently. For
1825 hysterical raisins, even the mail back ends, where the true number of
1826 unread messages might be available efficiently, use the same limited
1827 interface. To remove this restriction from Gnus means that the back
1828 end interface has to be changed, which is not an easy job.
1830 The nnml backend (@pxref{Mail Spool}) has a feature called ``group
1831 compaction'' which circumvents this deficiency: the idea is to
1832 renumber all articles from 1, removing all gaps between numbers, hence
1833 getting a correct total count. Other backends may support this in the
1834 future. In order to keep your total article count relatively up to
1835 date, you might want to compact your groups (or even directly your
1836 server) from time to time. @xref{Misc Group Stuff}, @xref{Server Commands}.
1839 Number of unread, unticked, non-dormant articles.
1842 Number of ticked and dormant articles.
1851 Group comment (@pxref{Group Parameters}) or group name if there is no
1852 comment element in the group parameters.
1855 Newsgroup description. You need to read the group descriptions
1856 before these will appear, and to do that, you either have to set
1857 @code{gnus-read-active-file} or use the group buffer @kbd{M-d}
1861 @samp{m} if moderated.
1864 @samp{(m)} if moderated.
1870 If the summary buffer for the group is open or not.
1876 A string that looks like @samp{<%s:%n>} if a foreign select method is
1880 Indentation based on the level of the topic (@pxref{Group Topics}).
1883 @vindex gnus-group-uncollapsed-levels
1884 Short (collapsed) group name. The @code{gnus-group-uncollapsed-levels}
1885 variable says how many levels to leave at the end of the group name.
1886 The default is 1---this will mean that group names like
1887 @samp{gnu.emacs.gnus} will be shortened to @samp{g.e.gnus}.
1890 @vindex gnus-new-mail-mark
1892 @samp{%} (@code{gnus-new-mail-mark}) if there has arrived new mail to
1896 @samp{#} (@code{gnus-process-mark}) if the group is process marked.
1899 A string that says when you last read the group (@pxref{Group
1903 The disk space used by the articles fetched by both the cache and
1904 agent. The value is automatically scaled to bytes(B), kilobytes(K),
1905 megabytes(M), or gigabytes(G) to minimize the column width. A format
1906 of %7F is sufficient for a fixed-width column.
1909 User defined specifier. The next character in the format string should
1910 be a letter. Gnus will call the function
1911 @code{gnus-user-format-function-}@samp{X}, where @samp{X} is the letter
1912 following @samp{%u}. The function will be passed a single dummy
1913 parameter as argument. The function should return a string, which will
1914 be inserted into the buffer just like information from any other
1919 All the ``number-of'' specs will be filled with an asterisk (@samp{*})
1920 if no info is available---for instance, if it is a non-activated foreign
1921 group, or a bogus native group.
1924 @node Group Mode Line Specification
1925 @subsection Group Mode Line Specification
1926 @cindex group mode line
1928 @vindex gnus-group-mode-line-format
1929 The mode line can be changed by setting
1930 @code{gnus-group-mode-line-format} (@pxref{Mode Line Formatting}). It
1931 doesn't understand that many format specifiers:
1935 The native news server.
1937 The native select method.
1941 @node Group Highlighting
1942 @subsection Group Highlighting
1943 @cindex highlighting
1944 @cindex group highlighting
1946 @vindex gnus-group-highlight
1947 Highlighting in the group buffer is controlled by the
1948 @code{gnus-group-highlight} variable. This is an alist with elements
1949 that look like @code{(@var{form} . @var{face})}. If @var{form} evaluates to
1950 something non-@code{nil}, the @var{face} will be used on the line.
1952 Here's an example value for this variable that might look nice if the
1956 (cond (window-system
1957 (setq custom-background-mode 'light)
1958 (defface my-group-face-1
1959 '((t (:foreground "Red" :bold t))) "First group face")
1960 (defface my-group-face-2
1961 '((t (:foreground "DarkSeaGreen4" :bold t)))
1962 "Second group face")
1963 (defface my-group-face-3
1964 '((t (:foreground "Green4" :bold t))) "Third group face")
1965 (defface my-group-face-4
1966 '((t (:foreground "SteelBlue" :bold t))) "Fourth group face")
1967 (defface my-group-face-5
1968 '((t (:foreground "Blue" :bold t))) "Fifth group face")))
1970 (setq gnus-group-highlight
1971 '(((> unread 200) . my-group-face-1)
1972 ((and (< level 3) (zerop unread)) . my-group-face-2)
1973 ((< level 3) . my-group-face-3)
1974 ((zerop unread) . my-group-face-4)
1975 (t . my-group-face-5)))
1978 Also @pxref{Faces and Fonts}.
1980 Variables that are dynamically bound when the forms are evaluated
1987 The number of unread articles in the group.
1991 Whether the group is a mail group.
1993 The level of the group.
1995 The score of the group.
1997 The number of ticked articles in the group.
1999 The total number of articles in the group. Or rather,
2000 @var{max-number} minus @var{min-number} plus one.
2002 When using the topic minor mode, this variable is bound to the current
2003 topic being inserted.
2006 When the forms are @code{eval}ed, point is at the beginning of the line
2007 of the group in question, so you can use many of the normal Gnus
2008 functions for snarfing info on the group.
2010 @vindex gnus-group-update-hook
2011 @findex gnus-group-highlight-line
2012 @code{gnus-group-update-hook} is called when a group line is changed.
2013 It will not be called when @code{gnus-visual} is @code{nil}. This hook
2014 calls @code{gnus-group-highlight-line} by default.
2017 @node Group Maneuvering
2018 @section Group Maneuvering
2019 @cindex group movement
2021 All movement commands understand the numeric prefix and will behave as
2022 expected, hopefully.
2028 @findex gnus-group-next-unread-group
2029 Go to the next group that has unread articles
2030 (@code{gnus-group-next-unread-group}).
2036 @findex gnus-group-prev-unread-group
2037 Go to the previous group that has unread articles
2038 (@code{gnus-group-prev-unread-group}).
2042 @findex gnus-group-next-group
2043 Go to the next group (@code{gnus-group-next-group}).
2047 @findex gnus-group-prev-group
2048 Go to the previous group (@code{gnus-group-prev-group}).
2052 @findex gnus-group-next-unread-group-same-level
2053 Go to the next unread group on the same (or lower) level
2054 (@code{gnus-group-next-unread-group-same-level}).
2058 @findex gnus-group-prev-unread-group-same-level
2059 Go to the previous unread group on the same (or lower) level
2060 (@code{gnus-group-prev-unread-group-same-level}).
2063 Three commands for jumping to groups:
2069 @findex gnus-group-jump-to-group
2070 Jump to a group (and make it visible if it isn't already)
2071 (@code{gnus-group-jump-to-group}). Killed groups can be jumped to, just
2076 @findex gnus-group-best-unread-group
2077 Jump to the unread group with the lowest level
2078 (@code{gnus-group-best-unread-group}).
2082 @findex gnus-group-first-unread-group
2083 Jump to the first group with unread articles
2084 (@code{gnus-group-first-unread-group}).
2087 @vindex gnus-group-goto-unread
2088 If @code{gnus-group-goto-unread} is @code{nil}, all the movement
2089 commands will move to the next group, not the next unread group. Even
2090 the commands that say they move to the next unread group. The default
2093 @vindex gnus-summary-next-group-on-exit
2094 If @code{gnus-summary-next-group-on-exit} is @code{t}, when a summary is
2095 exited, the point in the group buffer is moved to the next unread group.
2096 Otherwise, the point is set to the group just exited. The default is
2099 @node Selecting a Group
2100 @section Selecting a Group
2101 @cindex group selection
2106 @kindex SPACE (Group)
2107 @findex gnus-group-read-group
2108 Select the current group, switch to the summary buffer and display the
2109 first unread article (@code{gnus-group-read-group}). If there are no
2110 unread articles in the group, or if you give a non-numerical prefix to
2111 this command, Gnus will offer to fetch all the old articles in this
2112 group from the server. If you give a numerical prefix @var{n}, @var{n}
2113 determines the number of articles Gnus will fetch. If @var{n} is
2114 positive, Gnus fetches the @var{n} newest articles, if @var{n} is
2115 negative, Gnus fetches the @code{abs(@var{n})} oldest articles.
2117 Thus, @kbd{SPC} enters the group normally, @kbd{C-u SPC} offers old
2118 articles, @kbd{C-u 4 2 SPC} fetches the 42 newest articles, and @kbd{C-u
2119 - 4 2 SPC} fetches the 42 oldest ones.
2121 When you are in the group (in the Summary buffer), you can type
2122 @kbd{M-g} to fetch new articles, or @kbd{C-u M-g} to also show the old
2127 @findex gnus-group-select-group
2128 Select the current group and switch to the summary buffer
2129 (@code{gnus-group-select-group}). Takes the same arguments as
2130 @code{gnus-group-read-group}---the only difference is that this command
2131 does not display the first unread article automatically upon group
2135 @kindex M-RET (Group)
2136 @findex gnus-group-quick-select-group
2137 This does the same as the command above, but tries to do it with the
2138 minimum amount of fuzz (@code{gnus-group-quick-select-group}). No
2139 scoring/killing will be performed, there will be no highlights and no
2140 expunging. This might be useful if you're in a real hurry and have to
2141 enter some humongous group. If you give a 0 prefix to this command
2142 (i.e., @kbd{0 M-RET}), Gnus won't even generate the summary buffer,
2143 which is useful if you want to toggle threading before generating the
2144 summary buffer (@pxref{Summary Generation Commands}).
2147 @kindex M-SPACE (Group)
2148 @findex gnus-group-visible-select-group
2149 This is yet one more command that does the same as the @kbd{RET}
2150 command, but this one does it without expunging and hiding dormants
2151 (@code{gnus-group-visible-select-group}).
2154 @kindex C-M-RET (Group)
2155 @findex gnus-group-select-group-ephemerally
2156 Finally, this command selects the current group ephemerally without
2157 doing any processing of its contents
2158 (@code{gnus-group-select-group-ephemerally}). Even threading has been
2159 turned off. Everything you do in the group after selecting it in this
2160 manner will have no permanent effects.
2164 @vindex gnus-large-newsgroup
2165 The @code{gnus-large-newsgroup} variable says what Gnus should
2166 consider to be a big group. If it is @code{nil}, no groups are
2167 considered big. The default value is 200. If the group has more
2168 (unread and/or ticked) articles than this, Gnus will query the user
2169 before entering the group. The user can then specify how many
2170 articles should be fetched from the server. If the user specifies a
2171 negative number (@var{-n}), the @var{n} oldest articles will be
2172 fetched. If it is positive, the @var{n} articles that have arrived
2173 most recently will be fetched.
2175 @vindex gnus-large-ephemeral-newsgroup
2176 @code{gnus-large-ephemeral-newsgroup} is the same as
2177 @code{gnus-large-newsgroup}, but is only used for ephemeral
2180 @vindex gnus-newsgroup-maximum-articles
2181 In groups in some news servers, there might be a big gap between a few
2182 very old articles that will never be expired and the recent ones. In
2183 such a case, the server will return the data like @code{(1 . 30000000)}
2184 for the @code{LIST ACTIVE group} command, for example. Even if there
2185 are actually only the articles 1-10 and 29999900-30000000, Gnus doesn't
2186 know it at first and prepares for getting 30000000 articles. However,
2187 it will consume hundreds megabytes of memories and might make Emacs get
2188 stuck as the case may be. If you use such news servers, set the
2189 variable @code{gnus-newsgroup-maximum-articles} to a positive number.
2190 The value means that Gnus ignores articles other than this number of the
2191 latest ones in every group. For instance, the value 10000 makes Gnus
2192 get only the articles 29990001-30000000 (if the latest article number is
2193 30000000 in a group). Note that setting this variable to a number might
2194 prevent you from reading very old articles. The default value of the
2195 variable @code{gnus-newsgroup-maximum-articles} is @code{nil}, which
2196 means Gnus never ignores old articles.
2198 @vindex gnus-select-group-hook
2199 @vindex gnus-auto-select-first
2200 @vindex gnus-auto-select-subject
2201 If @code{gnus-auto-select-first} is non-@code{nil}, select an article
2202 automatically when entering a group with the @kbd{SPACE} command.
2203 Which article this is is controlled by the
2204 @code{gnus-auto-select-subject} variable. Valid values for this
2210 Place point on the subject line of the first unread article.
2213 Place point on the subject line of the first article.
2216 Place point on the subject line of the first unseen article.
2218 @item unseen-or-unread
2219 Place point on the subject line of the first unseen article, and if
2220 there is no such article, place point on the subject line of the first
2224 Place point on the subject line of the highest-scored unread article.
2228 This variable can also be a function. In that case, that function
2229 will be called to place point on a subject line.
2231 If you want to prevent automatic selection in some group (say, in a
2232 binary group with Huge articles) you can set the
2233 @code{gnus-auto-select-first} variable to @code{nil} in
2234 @code{gnus-select-group-hook}, which is called when a group is
2238 @node Subscription Commands
2239 @section Subscription Commands
2240 @cindex subscription
2248 @findex gnus-group-unsubscribe-current-group
2249 @c @icon{gnus-group-unsubscribe}
2250 Toggle subscription to the current group
2251 (@code{gnus-group-unsubscribe-current-group}).
2257 @findex gnus-group-unsubscribe-group
2258 Prompt for a group to subscribe, and then subscribe it. If it was
2259 subscribed already, unsubscribe it instead
2260 (@code{gnus-group-unsubscribe-group}).
2266 @findex gnus-group-kill-group
2267 @c @icon{gnus-group-kill-group}
2268 Kill the current group (@code{gnus-group-kill-group}).
2274 @findex gnus-group-yank-group
2275 Yank the last killed group (@code{gnus-group-yank-group}).
2278 @kindex C-x C-t (Group)
2279 @findex gnus-group-transpose-groups
2280 Transpose two groups (@code{gnus-group-transpose-groups}). This isn't
2281 really a subscription command, but you can use it instead of a
2282 kill-and-yank sequence sometimes.
2288 @findex gnus-group-kill-region
2289 Kill all groups in the region (@code{gnus-group-kill-region}).
2293 @findex gnus-group-kill-all-zombies
2294 Kill all zombie groups (@code{gnus-group-kill-all-zombies}).
2297 @kindex S C-k (Group)
2298 @findex gnus-group-kill-level
2299 Kill all groups on a certain level (@code{gnus-group-kill-level}).
2300 These groups can't be yanked back after killing, so this command should
2301 be used with some caution. The only time where this command comes in
2302 really handy is when you have a @file{.newsrc} with lots of unsubscribed
2303 groups that you want to get rid off. @kbd{S C-k} on level 7 will
2304 kill off all unsubscribed groups that do not have message numbers in the
2305 @file{.newsrc} file.
2309 Also @pxref{Group Levels}.
2319 @findex gnus-group-catchup-current
2320 @vindex gnus-group-catchup-group-hook
2321 @c @icon{gnus-group-catchup-current}
2322 Mark all unticked articles in this group as read
2323 (@code{gnus-group-catchup-current}).
2324 @code{gnus-group-catchup-group-hook} is called when catching up a group from
2329 @findex gnus-group-catchup-current-all
2330 Mark all articles in this group, even the ticked ones, as read
2331 (@code{gnus-group-catchup-current-all}).
2335 @findex gnus-group-clear-data
2336 Clear the data from the current group---nix out marks and the list of
2337 read articles (@code{gnus-group-clear-data}).
2339 @item M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups
2340 @kindex M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups
2341 @findex gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups
2342 If you have switched from one @acronym{NNTP} server to another, all your marks
2343 and read ranges have become worthless. You can use this command to
2344 clear out all data that you have on your native groups. Use with
2351 @section Group Levels
2355 All groups have a level of @dfn{subscribedness}. For instance, if a
2356 group is on level 2, it is more subscribed than a group on level 5. You
2357 can ask Gnus to just list groups on a given level or lower
2358 (@pxref{Listing Groups}), or to just check for new articles in groups on
2359 a given level or lower (@pxref{Scanning New Messages}).
2361 Remember: The higher the level of the group, the less important it is.
2367 @findex gnus-group-set-current-level
2368 Set the level of the current group. If a numeric prefix is given, the
2369 next @var{n} groups will have their levels set. The user will be
2370 prompted for a level.
2373 @vindex gnus-level-killed
2374 @vindex gnus-level-zombie
2375 @vindex gnus-level-unsubscribed
2376 @vindex gnus-level-subscribed
2377 Gnus considers groups from levels 1 to
2378 @code{gnus-level-subscribed} (inclusive) (default 5) to be subscribed,
2379 @code{gnus-level-subscribed} (exclusive) and
2380 @code{gnus-level-unsubscribed} (inclusive) (default 7) to be
2381 unsubscribed, @code{gnus-level-zombie} to be zombies (walking dead)
2382 (default 8) and @code{gnus-level-killed} to be killed (completely dead)
2383 (default 9). Gnus treats subscribed and unsubscribed groups exactly the
2384 same, but zombie and killed groups have no information on what articles
2385 you have read, etc, stored. This distinction between dead and living
2386 groups isn't done because it is nice or clever, it is done purely for
2387 reasons of efficiency.
2389 It is recommended that you keep all your mail groups (if any) on quite
2390 low levels (e.g. 1 or 2).
2392 Maybe the following description of the default behavior of Gnus helps to
2393 understand what these levels are all about. By default, Gnus shows you
2394 subscribed nonempty groups, but by hitting @kbd{L} you can have it show
2395 empty subscribed groups and unsubscribed groups, too. Type @kbd{l} to
2396 go back to showing nonempty subscribed groups again. Thus, unsubscribed
2397 groups are hidden, in a way.
2399 Zombie and killed groups are similar to unsubscribed groups in that they
2400 are hidden by default. But they are different from subscribed and
2401 unsubscribed groups in that Gnus doesn't ask the news server for
2402 information (number of messages, number of unread messages) on zombie
2403 and killed groups. Normally, you use @kbd{C-k} to kill the groups you
2404 aren't interested in. If most groups are killed, Gnus is faster.
2406 Why does Gnus distinguish between zombie and killed groups? Well, when
2407 a new group arrives on the server, Gnus by default makes it a zombie
2408 group. This means that you are normally not bothered with new groups,
2409 but you can type @kbd{A z} to get a list of all new groups. Subscribe
2410 the ones you like and kill the ones you don't want. (@kbd{A k} shows a
2411 list of killed groups.)
2413 If you want to play with the level variables, you should show some care.
2414 Set them once, and don't touch them ever again. Better yet, don't touch
2415 them at all unless you know exactly what you're doing.
2417 @vindex gnus-level-default-unsubscribed
2418 @vindex gnus-level-default-subscribed
2419 Two closely related variables are @code{gnus-level-default-subscribed}
2420 (default 3) and @code{gnus-level-default-unsubscribed} (default 6),
2421 which are the levels that new groups will be put on if they are
2422 (un)subscribed. These two variables should, of course, be inside the
2423 relevant valid ranges.
2425 @vindex gnus-keep-same-level
2426 If @code{gnus-keep-same-level} is non-@code{nil}, some movement commands
2427 will only move to groups of the same level (or lower). In
2428 particular, going from the last article in one group to the next group
2429 will go to the next group of the same level (or lower). This might be
2430 handy if you want to read the most important groups before you read the
2433 If this variable is @code{best}, Gnus will make the next newsgroup the
2434 one with the best level.
2436 @vindex gnus-group-default-list-level
2437 All groups with a level less than or equal to
2438 @code{gnus-group-default-list-level} will be listed in the group buffer
2441 @vindex gnus-group-list-inactive-groups
2442 If @code{gnus-group-list-inactive-groups} is non-@code{nil}, non-active
2443 groups will be listed along with the unread groups. This variable is
2444 @code{t} by default. If it is @code{nil}, inactive groups won't be
2447 @vindex gnus-group-use-permanent-levels
2448 If @code{gnus-group-use-permanent-levels} is non-@code{nil}, once you
2449 give a level prefix to @kbd{g} or @kbd{l}, all subsequent commands will
2450 use this level as the ``work'' level.
2452 @vindex gnus-activate-level
2453 Gnus will normally just activate (i. e., query the server about) groups
2454 on level @code{gnus-activate-level} or less. If you don't want to
2455 activate unsubscribed groups, for instance, you might set this variable
2456 to 5. The default is 6.
2460 @section Group Score
2465 You would normally keep important groups on high levels, but that scheme
2466 is somewhat restrictive. Don't you wish you could have Gnus sort the
2467 group buffer according to how often you read groups, perhaps? Within
2470 This is what @dfn{group score} is for. You can have Gnus assign a score
2471 to each group through the mechanism described below. You can then sort
2472 the group buffer based on this score. Alternatively, you can sort on
2473 score and then level. (Taken together, the level and the score is
2474 called the @dfn{rank} of the group. A group that is on level 4 and has
2475 a score of 1 has a higher rank than a group on level 5 that has a score
2476 of 300. (The level is the most significant part and the score is the
2477 least significant part.))
2479 @findex gnus-summary-bubble-group
2480 If you want groups you read often to get higher scores than groups you
2481 read seldom you can add the @code{gnus-summary-bubble-group} function to
2482 the @code{gnus-summary-exit-hook} hook. This will result (after
2483 sorting) in a bubbling sort of action. If you want to see that in
2484 action after each summary exit, you can add
2485 @code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-rank} or
2486 @code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-score} to the same hook, but that will
2487 slow things down somewhat.
2490 @node Marking Groups
2491 @section Marking Groups
2492 @cindex marking groups
2494 If you want to perform some command on several groups, and they appear
2495 subsequently in the group buffer, you would normally just give a
2496 numerical prefix to the command. Most group commands will then do your
2497 bidding on those groups.
2499 However, if the groups are not in sequential order, you can still
2500 perform a command on several groups. You simply mark the groups first
2501 with the process mark and then execute the command.
2509 @findex gnus-group-mark-group
2510 Set the mark on the current group (@code{gnus-group-mark-group}).
2516 @findex gnus-group-unmark-group
2517 Remove the mark from the current group
2518 (@code{gnus-group-unmark-group}).
2522 @findex gnus-group-unmark-all-groups
2523 Remove the mark from all groups (@code{gnus-group-unmark-all-groups}).
2527 @findex gnus-group-mark-region
2528 Mark all groups between point and mark (@code{gnus-group-mark-region}).
2532 @findex gnus-group-mark-buffer
2533 Mark all groups in the buffer (@code{gnus-group-mark-buffer}).
2537 @findex gnus-group-mark-regexp
2538 Mark all groups that match some regular expression
2539 (@code{gnus-group-mark-regexp}).
2542 Also @pxref{Process/Prefix}.
2544 @findex gnus-group-universal-argument
2545 If you want to execute some command on all groups that have been marked
2546 with the process mark, you can use the @kbd{M-&}
2547 (@code{gnus-group-universal-argument}) command. It will prompt you for
2548 the command to be executed.
2551 @node Foreign Groups
2552 @section Foreign Groups
2553 @cindex foreign groups
2555 Below are some group mode commands for making and editing general foreign
2556 groups, as well as commands to ease the creation of a few
2557 special-purpose groups. All these commands insert the newly created
2558 groups under point---@code{gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-method} is not
2561 Changes from the group editing commands are stored in
2562 @file{~/.newsrc.eld} (@code{gnus-startup-file}). An alternative is the
2563 variable @code{gnus-parameters}, @xref{Group Parameters}.
2569 @findex gnus-group-make-group
2570 @cindex making groups
2571 Make a new group (@code{gnus-group-make-group}). Gnus will prompt you
2572 for a name, a method and possibly an @dfn{address}. For an easier way
2573 to subscribe to @acronym{NNTP} groups (@pxref{Browse Foreign Server}).
2577 @findex gnus-group-read-ephemeral-group
2578 Make an ephemeral group (@code{gnus-group-read-ephemeral-group}). Gnus
2579 will prompt you for a name, a method and an @dfn{address}.
2583 @findex gnus-group-rename-group
2584 @cindex renaming groups
2585 Rename the current group to something else
2586 (@code{gnus-group-rename-group}). This is valid only on some
2587 groups---mail groups mostly. This command might very well be quite slow
2593 @findex gnus-group-customize
2594 Customize the group parameters (@code{gnus-group-customize}).
2598 @findex gnus-group-edit-group-method
2599 @cindex renaming groups
2600 Enter a buffer where you can edit the select method of the current
2601 group (@code{gnus-group-edit-group-method}).
2605 @findex gnus-group-edit-group-parameters
2606 Enter a buffer where you can edit the group parameters
2607 (@code{gnus-group-edit-group-parameters}).
2611 @findex gnus-group-edit-group
2612 Enter a buffer where you can edit the group info
2613 (@code{gnus-group-edit-group}).
2617 @findex gnus-group-make-directory-group
2619 Make a directory group (@pxref{Directory Groups}). You will be prompted
2620 for a directory name (@code{gnus-group-make-directory-group}).
2625 @findex gnus-group-make-help-group
2626 Make the Gnus help group (@code{gnus-group-make-help-group}).
2630 @cindex (ding) archive
2631 @cindex archive group
2632 @findex gnus-group-make-archive-group
2633 @vindex gnus-group-archive-directory
2634 @vindex gnus-group-recent-archive-directory
2635 Make a Gnus archive group (@code{gnus-group-make-archive-group}). By
2636 default a group pointing to the most recent articles will be created
2637 (@code{gnus-group-recent-archive-directory}), but given a prefix, a full
2638 group will be created from @code{gnus-group-archive-directory}.
2642 @findex gnus-group-make-kiboze-group
2644 Make a kiboze group. You will be prompted for a name, for a regexp to
2645 match groups to be ``included'' in the kiboze group, and a series of
2646 strings to match on headers (@code{gnus-group-make-kiboze-group}).
2647 @xref{Kibozed Groups}.
2651 @findex gnus-group-enter-directory
2653 Read an arbitrary directory as if it were a newsgroup with the
2654 @code{nneething} back end (@code{gnus-group-enter-directory}).
2655 @xref{Anything Groups}.
2659 @findex gnus-group-make-doc-group
2660 @cindex ClariNet Briefs
2662 Make a group based on some file or other
2663 (@code{gnus-group-make-doc-group}). If you give a prefix to this
2664 command, you will be prompted for a file name and a file type.
2665 Currently supported types are @code{mbox}, @code{babyl},
2666 @code{digest}, @code{news}, @code{rnews}, @code{mmdf}, @code{forward},
2667 @code{rfc934}, @code{rfc822-forward}, @code{mime-parts},
2668 @code{standard-digest}, @code{slack-digest}, @code{clari-briefs},
2669 @code{nsmail}, @code{outlook}, @code{oe-dbx}, and @code{mailman}. If
2670 you run this command without a prefix, Gnus will guess at the file
2671 type. @xref{Document Groups}.
2675 @vindex gnus-useful-groups
2676 @findex gnus-group-make-useful-group
2677 Create one of the groups mentioned in @code{gnus-useful-groups}
2678 (@code{gnus-group-make-useful-group}).
2682 @findex gnus-group-make-web-group
2686 Make an ephemeral group based on a web search
2687 (@code{gnus-group-make-web-group}). If you give a prefix to this
2688 command, make a solid group instead. You will be prompted for the
2689 search engine type and the search string. Valid search engine types
2690 include @code{google}, @code{dejanews}, and @code{gmane}.
2691 @xref{Web Searches}.
2693 If you use the @code{google} search engine, you can limit the search
2694 to a particular group by using a match string like
2695 @samp{shaving group:alt.sysadmin.recovery}.
2699 @findex gnus-group-make-rss-group
2700 Make a group based on an @acronym{RSS} feed
2701 (@code{gnus-group-make-rss-group}). You will be prompted for an URL.
2705 @kindex G DEL (Group)
2706 @findex gnus-group-delete-group
2707 This function will delete the current group
2708 (@code{gnus-group-delete-group}). If given a prefix, this function will
2709 actually delete all the articles in the group, and forcibly remove the
2710 group itself from the face of the Earth. Use a prefix only if you are
2711 absolutely sure of what you are doing. This command can't be used on
2712 read-only groups (like @code{nntp} groups), though.
2716 @findex gnus-group-make-empty-virtual
2717 Make a new, fresh, empty @code{nnvirtual} group
2718 (@code{gnus-group-make-empty-virtual}). @xref{Virtual Groups}.
2722 @findex gnus-group-add-to-virtual
2723 Add the current group to an @code{nnvirtual} group
2724 (@code{gnus-group-add-to-virtual}). Uses the process/prefix convention.
2727 @xref{Select Methods}, for more information on the various select
2730 @vindex gnus-activate-foreign-newsgroups
2731 If @code{gnus-activate-foreign-newsgroups} is a positive number,
2732 Gnus will check all foreign groups with this level or lower at startup.
2733 This might take quite a while, especially if you subscribe to lots of
2734 groups from different @acronym{NNTP} servers. Also @pxref{Group Levels};
2735 @code{gnus-activate-level} also affects activation of foreign
2739 @node Group Parameters
2740 @section Group Parameters
2741 @cindex group parameters
2743 The group parameters store information local to a particular group.
2745 Use the @kbd{G p} or the @kbd{G c} command to edit group parameters of a
2746 group. (@kbd{G p} presents you with a Lisp-based interface, @kbd{G c}
2747 presents you with a Customize-like interface. The latter helps avoid
2748 silly Lisp errors.) You might also be interested in reading about topic
2749 parameters (@pxref{Topic Parameters}).
2750 Additionally, you can set group parameters via the
2751 @code{gnus-parameters} variable, see below.
2753 Here's an example group parameter list:
2756 ((to-address . "ding@@gnus.org")
2760 We see that each element consists of a ``dotted pair''---the thing before
2761 the dot is the key, while the thing after the dot is the value. All the
2762 parameters have this form @emph{except} local variable specs, which are
2763 not dotted pairs, but proper lists.
2765 Some parameters have correspondent customizable variables, each of which
2766 is an alist of regexps and values.
2768 The following group parameters can be used:
2773 Address used by when doing followups and new posts.
2776 (to-address . "some@@where.com")
2779 This is primarily useful in mail groups that represent closed mailing
2780 lists---mailing lists where it's expected that everybody that writes to
2781 the mailing list is subscribed to it. Since using this parameter
2782 ensures that the mail only goes to the mailing list itself, it means
2783 that members won't receive two copies of your followups.
2785 Using @code{to-address} will actually work whether the group is foreign
2786 or not. Let's say there's a group on the server that is called
2787 @samp{fa.4ad-l}. This is a real newsgroup, but the server has gotten
2788 the articles from a mail-to-news gateway. Posting directly to this
2789 group is therefore impossible---you have to send mail to the mailing
2790 list address instead.
2792 See also @code{gnus-parameter-to-address-alist}.
2796 Address used when doing @kbd{a} in that group.
2799 (to-list . "some@@where.com")
2802 It is totally ignored
2803 when doing a followup---except that if it is present in a news group,
2804 you'll get mail group semantics when doing @kbd{f}.
2806 If you do an @kbd{a} command in a mail group and you have neither a
2807 @code{to-list} group parameter nor a @code{to-address} group parameter,
2808 then a @code{to-list} group parameter will be added automatically upon
2809 sending the message if @code{gnus-add-to-list} is set to @code{t}.
2810 @vindex gnus-add-to-list
2812 @findex gnus-mailing-list-mode
2813 @cindex mail list groups
2814 If this variable is set, @code{gnus-mailing-list-mode} is turned on when
2815 entering summary buffer.
2817 See also @code{gnus-parameter-to-list-alist}.
2822 @cindex Mail-Followup-To
2823 @findex gnus-find-subscribed-addresses
2824 If this parameter is set to @code{t}, Gnus will consider the
2825 to-address and to-list parameters for this group as addresses of
2826 mailing lists you are subscribed to. Giving Gnus this information is
2827 (only) a first step in getting it to generate correct Mail-Followup-To
2828 headers for your posts to these lists. The second step is to put the
2829 following in your @file{.gnus.el}
2832 (setq message-subscribed-address-functions
2833 '(gnus-find-subscribed-addresses))
2836 @xref{Mailing Lists, ,Mailing Lists, message, The Message Manual}, for
2837 a complete treatment of available MFT support.
2841 If the group parameter list has the element @code{(visible . t)},
2842 that group will always be visible in the Group buffer, regardless
2843 of whether it has any unread articles.
2845 This parameter cannot be set via @code{gnus-parameters}. See
2846 @code{gnus-permanently-visible-groups} as an alternative.
2848 @item broken-reply-to
2849 @cindex broken-reply-to
2850 Elements like @code{(broken-reply-to . t)} signals that @code{Reply-To}
2851 headers in this group are to be ignored, and for the header to be hidden
2852 if @code{reply-to} is part of @code{gnus-boring-article-headers}. This
2853 can be useful if you're reading a mailing list group where the listserv
2854 has inserted @code{Reply-To} headers that point back to the listserv
2855 itself. That is broken behavior. So there!
2859 Elements like @code{(to-group . "some.group.name")} means that all
2860 posts in that group will be sent to @code{some.group.name}.
2864 If you have @code{(newsgroup . t)} in the group parameter list, Gnus
2865 will treat all responses as if they were responses to news articles.
2866 This can be useful if you have a mail group that's really a mirror of a
2871 If @code{(gcc-self . t)} is present in the group parameter list, newly
2872 composed messages will be @code{Gcc}'d to the current group. If
2873 @code{(gcc-self . none)} is present, no @code{Gcc:} header will be
2874 generated, if @code{(gcc-self . "string")} is present, this string will
2875 be inserted literally as a @code{gcc} header. This parameter takes
2876 precedence over any default @code{Gcc} rules as described later
2877 (@pxref{Archived Messages}).
2879 @strong{Caveat}: Adding @code{(gcc-self . t)} to the parameter list of
2880 @code{nntp} groups (or the like) isn't valid. An @code{nntp} server
2881 doesn't accept articles.
2885 @cindex expiring mail
2886 If the group parameter has an element that looks like @code{(auto-expire
2887 . t)}, all articles read will be marked as expirable. For an
2888 alternative approach, @pxref{Expiring Mail}.
2890 See also @code{gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups}.
2893 @cindex total-expire
2894 @cindex expiring mail
2895 If the group parameter has an element that looks like
2896 @code{(total-expire . t)}, all read articles will be put through the
2897 expiry process, even if they are not marked as expirable. Use with
2898 caution. Unread, ticked and dormant articles are not eligible for
2901 See also @code{gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups}.
2905 @vindex nnmail-expiry-wait-function
2906 If the group parameter has an element that looks like
2907 @code{(expiry-wait . 10)}, this value will override any
2908 @code{nnmail-expiry-wait} and @code{nnmail-expiry-wait-function}
2909 (@pxref{Expiring Mail}) when expiring expirable messages. The value
2910 can either be a number of days (not necessarily an integer) or the
2911 symbols @code{never} or @code{immediate}.
2914 @cindex expiry-target
2915 Where expired messages end up. This parameter overrides
2916 @code{nnmail-expiry-target}.
2919 @cindex score file group parameter
2920 Elements that look like @code{(score-file . "file")} will make
2921 @file{file} into the current score file for the group in question. All
2922 interactive score entries will be put into this file.
2925 @cindex adapt file group parameter
2926 Elements that look like @code{(adapt-file . "file")} will make
2927 @file{file} into the current adaptive file for the group in question.
2928 All adaptive score entries will be put into this file.
2931 @cindex admin-address
2932 When unsubscribing from a mailing list you should never send the
2933 unsubscription notice to the mailing list itself. Instead, you'd send
2934 messages to the administrative address. This parameter allows you to
2935 put the admin address somewhere convenient.
2939 Elements that look like @code{(display . MODE)} say which articles to
2940 display on entering the group. Valid values are:
2944 Display all articles, both read and unread.
2947 Display the last @var{integer} articles in the group. This is the same as
2948 entering the group with @kbd{C-u @var{integer}}.
2951 Display the default visible articles, which normally includes unread and
2955 Display articles that satisfy a predicate.
2957 Here are some examples:
2961 Display only unread articles.
2964 Display everything except expirable articles.
2966 @item [and (not reply) (not expire)]
2967 Display everything except expirable and articles you've already
2971 The available operators are @code{not}, @code{and} and @code{or}.
2972 Predicates include @code{tick}, @code{unsend}, @code{undownload},
2973 @code{unread}, @code{dormant}, @code{expire}, @code{reply},
2974 @code{killed}, @code{bookmark}, @code{score}, @code{save},
2975 @code{cache}, @code{forward}, @code{unseen} and @code{recent}.
2979 The @code{display} parameter works by limiting the summary buffer to
2980 the subset specified. You can pop the limit by using the @kbd{/ w}
2981 command (@pxref{Limiting}).
2985 Elements that look like @code{(comment . "This is a comment")} are
2986 arbitrary comments on the group. You can display comments in the
2987 group line (@pxref{Group Line Specification}).
2991 Elements that look like @code{(charset . iso-8859-1)} will make
2992 @code{iso-8859-1} the default charset; that is, the charset that will be
2993 used for all articles that do not specify a charset.
2995 See also @code{gnus-group-charset-alist}.
2997 @item ignored-charsets
2998 @cindex ignored-charset
2999 Elements that look like @code{(ignored-charsets x-unknown iso-8859-1)}
3000 will make @code{iso-8859-1} and @code{x-unknown} ignored; that is, the
3001 default charset will be used for decoding articles.
3003 See also @code{gnus-group-ignored-charsets-alist}.
3006 @cindex posting-style
3007 You can store additional posting style information for this group
3008 here (@pxref{Posting Styles}). The format is that of an entry in the
3009 @code{gnus-posting-styles} alist, except that there's no regexp matching
3010 the group name (of course). Style elements in this group parameter will
3011 take precedence over the ones found in @code{gnus-posting-styles}.
3013 For instance, if you want a funky name and signature in this group only,
3014 instead of hacking @code{gnus-posting-styles}, you could put something
3015 like this in the group parameters:
3020 ("X-My-Header" "Funky Value")
3021 (signature "Funky Signature"))
3024 If you're using topics to organize your group buffer
3025 (@pxref{Group Topics}), note that posting styles can also be set in
3026 the topics parameters. Posting styles in topic parameters apply to all
3027 groups in this topic. More precisely, the posting-style settings for a
3028 group result from the hierarchical merging of all posting-style
3029 entries in the parameters of this group and all the topics it belongs
3035 If it is set, the value is used as the method for posting message
3036 instead of @code{gnus-post-method}.
3040 An item like @code{(banner . @var{regexp})} causes any part of an article
3041 that matches the regular expression @var{regexp} to be stripped. Instead of
3042 @var{regexp}, you can also use the symbol @code{signature} which strips the
3043 last signature or any of the elements of the alist
3044 @code{gnus-article-banner-alist}.
3048 This parameter contains a Sieve test that should match incoming mail
3049 that should be placed in this group. From this group parameter, a
3050 Sieve @samp{IF} control structure is generated, having the test as the
3051 condition and @samp{fileinto "group.name";} as the body.
3053 For example, if the @samp{INBOX.list.sieve} group has the @code{(sieve
3054 address "sender" "sieve-admin@@extundo.com")} group parameter, when
3055 translating the group parameter into a Sieve script (@pxref{Sieve
3056 Commands}) the following Sieve code is generated:
3059 if address "sender" "sieve-admin@@extundo.com" @{
3060 fileinto "INBOX.list.sieve";
3064 To generate tests for multiple email-addresses use a group parameter
3065 like @code{(sieve address "sender" ("name@@one.org" else@@two.org"))}.
3066 When generating a sieve script (@pxref{Sieve Commands}) Sieve code
3067 like the following is generated:
3070 if address "sender" ["name@@one.org", "else@@two.org"] @{
3071 fileinto "INBOX.list.sieve";
3075 See @pxref{Sieve Commands} for commands and variables that might be of
3076 interest in relation to the sieve parameter.
3078 The Sieve language is described in RFC 3028. @xref{Top, Emacs Sieve,
3079 Top, sieve, Emacs Sieve}.
3081 @item (agent parameters)
3082 If the agent has been enabled, you can set any of the its parameters
3083 to control the behavior of the agent in individual groups. See Agent
3084 Parameters in @ref{Category Syntax}. Most users will choose to set
3085 agent parameters in either an agent category or group topic to
3086 minimize the configuration effort.
3088 @item (@var{variable} @var{form})
3089 You can use the group parameters to set variables local to the group you
3090 are entering. If you want to turn threading off in @samp{news.answers},
3091 you could put @code{(gnus-show-threads nil)} in the group parameters of
3092 that group. @code{gnus-show-threads} will be made into a local variable
3093 in the summary buffer you enter, and the form @code{nil} will be
3094 @code{eval}ed there.
3096 Note that this feature sets the variable locally to the summary buffer.
3097 But some variables are evaluated in the article buffer, or in the
3098 message buffer (of a reply or followup or otherwise newly created
3099 message). As a workaround, it might help to add the variable in
3100 question to @code{gnus-newsgroup-variables}. @xref{Various Summary
3101 Stuff}. So if you want to set @code{message-from-style} via the group
3102 parameters, then you may need the following statement elsewhere in your
3103 @file{~/.gnus} file:
3106 (add-to-list 'gnus-newsgroup-variables 'message-from-style)
3109 @vindex gnus-list-identifiers
3110 A use for this feature is to remove a mailing list identifier tag in
3111 the subject fields of articles. E.g. if the news group
3114 nntp+news.gnus.org:gmane.text.docbook.apps
3117 has the tag @samp{DOC-BOOK-APPS:} in the subject of all articles, this
3118 tag can be removed from the article subjects in the summary buffer for
3119 the group by putting @code{(gnus-list-identifiers "DOCBOOK-APPS:")}
3120 into the group parameters for the group.
3122 This can also be used as a group-specific hook function. If you want to
3123 hear a beep when you enter a group, you could put something like
3124 @code{(dummy-variable (ding))} in the parameters of that group.
3125 @code{dummy-variable} will be set to the (meaningless) result of the
3128 Alternatively, since the VARIABLE becomes local to the group, this
3129 pattern can be used to temporarily change a hook. For example, if the
3130 following is added to a group parameter
3133 (gnus-summary-prepared-hook
3134 '(lambda nil (local-set-key "d" (local-key-binding "n"))))
3137 when the group is entered, the 'd' key will not mark the article as
3142 @vindex gnus-parameters
3143 Group parameters can be set via the @code{gnus-parameters} variable too.
3144 But some variables, such as @code{visible}, have no effect (For this
3145 case see @code{gnus-permanently-visible-groups} as an alternative.).
3149 (setq gnus-parameters
3151 (gnus-show-threads nil)
3152 (gnus-use-scoring nil)
3153 (gnus-summary-line-format
3154 "%U%R%z%I%(%[%d:%ub%-23,23f%]%) %s\n")
3158 ("^nnimap:\\(foo.bar\\)$"
3162 (gnus-use-scoring t))
3166 (broken-reply-to . t))))
3169 String value of parameters will be subjected to regexp substitution, as
3170 the @code{to-group} example shows.
3172 @vindex gnus-parameters-case-fold-search
3173 By default, whether comparing the group name and one of those regexps
3174 specified in @code{gnus-parameters} is done in a case-sensitive manner
3175 or a case-insensitive manner depends on the value of
3176 @code{case-fold-search} at the time when the comparison is done. The
3177 value of @code{case-fold-search} is typically @code{t}; it means, for
3178 example, the element @code{("INBOX\\.FOO" (total-expire . t))} might be
3179 applied to both the @samp{INBOX.FOO} group and the @samp{INBOX.foo}
3180 group. If you want to make those regexps always case-sensitive, set the
3181 value of the @code{gnus-parameters-case-fold-search} variable to
3182 @code{nil}. Otherwise, set it to @code{t} if you want to compare them
3183 always in a case-insensitive manner.
3185 You can define different sorting to different groups via
3186 @code{gnus-parameters}. Here is an example to sort an @acronym{NNTP}
3187 group by reverse date to see the latest news at the top and an
3188 @acronym{RSS} group by subject. In this example, the first group is the
3189 Debian daily news group @code{gmane.linux.debian.user.news} from
3190 news.gmane.org. The @acronym{RSS} group corresponds to the Debian
3191 weekly news RSS feed
3192 @url{http://packages.debian.org/unstable/newpkg_main.en.rdf},
3198 '(("nntp.*gmane\\.debian\\.user\\.news"
3199 (gnus-show-threads nil)
3200 (gnus-article-sort-functions '((not gnus-article-sort-by-date)))
3201 (gnus-use-adaptive-scoring nil)
3202 (gnus-use-scoring nil))
3204 (gnus-show-threads nil)
3205 (gnus-article-sort-functions 'gnus-article-sort-by-subject)
3206 (gnus-use-adaptive-scoring nil)
3207 (gnus-use-scoring t)
3208 (gnus-score-find-score-files-function 'gnus-score-find-single)
3209 (gnus-summary-line-format "%U%R%z%d %I%(%[ %s %]%)\n"))))
3213 @node Listing Groups
3214 @section Listing Groups
3215 @cindex group listing
3217 These commands all list various slices of the groups available.
3225 @findex gnus-group-list-groups
3226 List all groups that have unread articles
3227 (@code{gnus-group-list-groups}). If the numeric prefix is used, this
3228 command will list only groups of level ARG and lower. By default, it
3229 only lists groups of level five (i.e.,
3230 @code{gnus-group-default-list-level}) or lower (i.e., just subscribed
3237 @findex gnus-group-list-all-groups
3238 List all groups, whether they have unread articles or not
3239 (@code{gnus-group-list-all-groups}). If the numeric prefix is used,
3240 this command will list only groups of level ARG and lower. By default,
3241 it lists groups of level seven or lower (i.e., just subscribed and
3242 unsubscribed groups).
3246 @findex gnus-group-list-level
3247 List all unread groups on a specific level
3248 (@code{gnus-group-list-level}). If given a prefix, also list the groups
3249 with no unread articles.
3253 @findex gnus-group-list-killed
3254 List all killed groups (@code{gnus-group-list-killed}). If given a
3255 prefix argument, really list all groups that are available, but aren't
3256 currently (un)subscribed. This could entail reading the active file
3261 @findex gnus-group-list-zombies
3262 List all zombie groups (@code{gnus-group-list-zombies}).
3266 @findex gnus-group-list-matching
3267 List all unread, subscribed groups with names that match a regexp
3268 (@code{gnus-group-list-matching}).
3272 @findex gnus-group-list-all-matching
3273 List groups that match a regexp (@code{gnus-group-list-all-matching}).
3277 @findex gnus-group-list-active
3278 List absolutely all groups in the active file(s) of the
3279 server(s) you are connected to (@code{gnus-group-list-active}). This
3280 might very well take quite a while. It might actually be a better idea
3281 to do a @kbd{A M} to list all matching, and just give @samp{.} as the
3282 thing to match on. Also note that this command may list groups that
3283 don't exist (yet)---these will be listed as if they were killed groups.
3284 Take the output with some grains of salt.
3288 @findex gnus-group-apropos
3289 List all groups that have names that match a regexp
3290 (@code{gnus-group-apropos}).
3294 @findex gnus-group-description-apropos
3295 List all groups that have names or descriptions that match a regexp
3296 (@code{gnus-group-description-apropos}).
3300 @findex gnus-group-list-cached
3301 List all groups with cached articles (@code{gnus-group-list-cached}).
3305 @findex gnus-group-list-dormant
3306 List all groups with dormant articles (@code{gnus-group-list-dormant}).
3310 @findex gnus-group-list-limit
3311 List groups limited within the current selection
3312 (@code{gnus-group-list-limit}).
3316 @findex gnus-group-list-flush
3317 Flush groups from the current selection (@code{gnus-group-list-flush}).
3321 @findex gnus-group-list-plus
3322 List groups plus the current selection (@code{gnus-group-list-plus}).
3326 @vindex gnus-permanently-visible-groups
3327 @cindex visible group parameter
3328 Groups that match the @code{gnus-permanently-visible-groups} regexp will
3329 always be shown, whether they have unread articles or not. You can also
3330 add the @code{visible} element to the group parameters in question to
3331 get the same effect.
3333 @vindex gnus-list-groups-with-ticked-articles
3334 Groups that have just ticked articles in it are normally listed in the
3335 group buffer. If @code{gnus-list-groups-with-ticked-articles} is
3336 @code{nil}, these groups will be treated just like totally empty
3337 groups. It is @code{t} by default.
3340 @node Sorting Groups
3341 @section Sorting Groups
3342 @cindex sorting groups
3344 @kindex C-c C-s (Group)
3345 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups
3346 @vindex gnus-group-sort-function
3347 The @kbd{C-c C-s} (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups}) command sorts the
3348 group buffer according to the function(s) given by the
3349 @code{gnus-group-sort-function} variable. Available sorting functions
3354 @item gnus-group-sort-by-alphabet
3355 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-alphabet
3356 Sort the group names alphabetically. This is the default.
3358 @item gnus-group-sort-by-real-name
3359 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-real-name
3360 Sort the group alphabetically on the real (unprefixed) group names.
3362 @item gnus-group-sort-by-level
3363 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-level
3364 Sort by group level.
3366 @item gnus-group-sort-by-score
3367 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-score
3368 Sort by group score. @xref{Group Score}.
3370 @item gnus-group-sort-by-rank
3371 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-rank
3372 Sort by group score and then the group level. The level and the score
3373 are, when taken together, the group's @dfn{rank}. @xref{Group Score}.
3375 @item gnus-group-sort-by-unread
3376 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-unread
3377 Sort by number of unread articles.
3379 @item gnus-group-sort-by-method
3380 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-method
3381 Sort alphabetically on the select method.
3383 @item gnus-group-sort-by-server
3384 @findex gnus-group-sort-by-server
3385 Sort alphabetically on the Gnus server name.
3390 @code{gnus-group-sort-function} can also be a list of sorting
3391 functions. In that case, the most significant sort key function must be
3395 There are also a number of commands for sorting directly according to
3396 some sorting criteria:
3400 @kindex G S a (Group)
3401 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-alphabet
3402 Sort the group buffer alphabetically by group name
3403 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-alphabet}).
3406 @kindex G S u (Group)
3407 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-unread
3408 Sort the group buffer by the number of unread articles
3409 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-unread}).
3412 @kindex G S l (Group)
3413 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-level
3414 Sort the group buffer by group level
3415 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-level}).
3418 @kindex G S v (Group)
3419 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-score
3420 Sort the group buffer by group score
3421 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-score}). @xref{Group Score}.
3424 @kindex G S r (Group)
3425 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-rank
3426 Sort the group buffer by group rank
3427 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-rank}). @xref{Group Score}.
3430 @kindex G S m (Group)
3431 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-method
3432 Sort the group buffer alphabetically by back end name@*
3433 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-method}).
3436 @kindex G S n (Group)
3437 @findex gnus-group-sort-groups-by-real-name
3438 Sort the group buffer alphabetically by real (unprefixed) group name
3439 (@code{gnus-group-sort-groups-by-real-name}).
3443 All the commands below obey the process/prefix convention
3444 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
3446 When given a symbolic prefix (@pxref{Symbolic Prefixes}), all these
3447 commands will sort in reverse order.
3449 You can also sort a subset of the groups:
3453 @kindex G P a (Group)
3454 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-alphabet
3455 Sort the groups alphabetically by group name
3456 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-alphabet}).
3459 @kindex G P u (Group)
3460 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-unread
3461 Sort the groups by the number of unread articles
3462 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-unread}).
3465 @kindex G P l (Group)
3466 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-level
3467 Sort the groups by group level
3468 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-level}).
3471 @kindex G P v (Group)
3472 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-score
3473 Sort the groups by group score
3474 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-score}). @xref{Group Score}.
3477 @kindex G P r (Group)
3478 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-rank
3479 Sort the groups by group rank
3480 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-rank}). @xref{Group Score}.
3483 @kindex G P m (Group)
3484 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-method
3485 Sort the groups alphabetically by back end name@*
3486 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-method}).
3489 @kindex G P n (Group)
3490 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-real-name
3491 Sort the groups alphabetically by real (unprefixed) group name
3492 (@code{gnus-group-sort-selected-groups-by-real-name}).
3495 @kindex G P s (Group)
3496 @findex gnus-group-sort-selected-groups
3497 Sort the groups according to @code{gnus-group-sort-function}.
3501 And finally, note that you can use @kbd{C-k} and @kbd{C-y} to manually
3505 @node Group Maintenance
3506 @section Group Maintenance
3507 @cindex bogus groups
3512 @findex gnus-group-check-bogus-groups
3513 Find bogus groups and delete them
3514 (@code{gnus-group-check-bogus-groups}).
3518 @findex gnus-group-find-new-groups
3519 Find new groups and process them (@code{gnus-group-find-new-groups}).
3520 With 1 @kbd{C-u}, use the @code{ask-server} method to query the server
3521 for new groups. With 2 @kbd{C-u}'s, use most complete method possible
3522 to query the server for new groups, and subscribe the new groups as
3526 @kindex C-c C-x (Group)
3527 @findex gnus-group-expire-articles
3528 @cindex expiring mail
3529 Run all expirable articles in the current group through the expiry
3530 process (if any) (@code{gnus-group-expire-articles}). That is, delete
3531 all expirable articles in the group that have been around for a while.
3532 (@pxref{Expiring Mail}).
3535 @kindex C-c C-M-x (Group)
3536 @findex gnus-group-expire-all-groups
3537 @cindex expiring mail
3538 Run all expirable articles in all groups through the expiry process
3539 (@code{gnus-group-expire-all-groups}).
3544 @node Browse Foreign Server
3545 @section Browse Foreign Server
3546 @cindex foreign servers
3547 @cindex browsing servers
3552 @findex gnus-group-browse-foreign-server
3553 You will be queried for a select method and a server name. Gnus will
3554 then attempt to contact this server and let you browse the groups there
3555 (@code{gnus-group-browse-foreign-server}).
3558 @findex gnus-browse-mode
3559 A new buffer with a list of available groups will appear. This buffer
3560 will use the @code{gnus-browse-mode}. This buffer looks a bit (well,
3561 a lot) like a normal group buffer.
3563 Here's a list of keystrokes available in the browse mode:
3568 @findex gnus-group-next-group
3569 Go to the next group (@code{gnus-group-next-group}).
3573 @findex gnus-group-prev-group
3574 Go to the previous group (@code{gnus-group-prev-group}).
3577 @kindex SPACE (Browse)
3578 @findex gnus-browse-read-group
3579 Enter the current group and display the first article
3580 (@code{gnus-browse-read-group}).
3583 @kindex RET (Browse)
3584 @findex gnus-browse-select-group
3585 Enter the current group (@code{gnus-browse-select-group}).
3589 @findex gnus-browse-unsubscribe-current-group
3590 Unsubscribe to the current group, or, as will be the case here,
3591 subscribe to it (@code{gnus-browse-unsubscribe-current-group}).
3597 @findex gnus-browse-exit
3598 Exit browse mode (@code{gnus-browse-exit}).
3602 @findex gnus-browse-describe-group
3603 Describe the current group (@code{gnus-browse-describe-group}).
3607 @findex gnus-browse-describe-briefly
3608 Describe browse mode briefly (well, there's not much to describe, is
3609 there) (@code{gnus-browse-describe-briefly}).
3614 @section Exiting Gnus
3615 @cindex exiting Gnus
3617 Yes, Gnus is ex(c)iting.
3622 @findex gnus-group-suspend
3623 Suspend Gnus (@code{gnus-group-suspend}). This doesn't really exit Gnus,
3624 but it kills all buffers except the Group buffer. I'm not sure why this
3625 is a gain, but then who am I to judge?
3629 @findex gnus-group-exit
3630 @c @icon{gnus-group-exit}
3631 Quit Gnus (@code{gnus-group-exit}).
3635 @findex gnus-group-quit
3636 Quit Gnus without saving the @file{.newsrc} files (@code{gnus-group-quit}).
3637 The dribble file will be saved, though (@pxref{Auto Save}).
3640 @vindex gnus-exit-gnus-hook
3641 @vindex gnus-suspend-gnus-hook
3642 @vindex gnus-after-exiting-gnus-hook
3643 @code{gnus-suspend-gnus-hook} is called when you suspend Gnus and
3644 @code{gnus-exit-gnus-hook} is called when you quit Gnus, while
3645 @code{gnus-after-exiting-gnus-hook} is called as the final item when
3651 Miss Lisa Cannifax, while sitting in English class, felt her feet go
3652 numbly heavy and herself fall into a hazy trance as the boy sitting
3653 behind her drew repeated lines with his pencil across the back of her
3659 @section Group Topics
3662 If you read lots and lots of groups, it might be convenient to group
3663 them hierarchically according to topics. You put your Emacs groups over
3664 here, your sex groups over there, and the rest (what, two groups or so?)
3665 you put in some misc section that you never bother with anyway. You can
3666 even group the Emacs sex groups as a sub-topic to either the Emacs
3667 groups or the sex groups---or both! Go wild!
3671 \gnusfigure{Group Topics}{400}{
3672 \put(75,50){\epsfig{figure=ps/group-topic,height=9cm}}
3683 2: alt.religion.emacs
3686 0: comp.talk.emacs.recovery
3688 8: comp.binaries.fractals
3689 13: comp.sources.unix
3692 @findex gnus-topic-mode
3694 To get this @emph{fab} functionality you simply turn on (ooh!) the
3695 @code{gnus-topic} minor mode---type @kbd{t} in the group buffer. (This
3696 is a toggling command.)
3698 Go ahead, just try it. I'll still be here when you get back. La de
3699 dum@dots{} Nice tune, that@dots{} la la la@dots{} What, you're back?
3700 Yes, and now press @kbd{l}. There. All your groups are now listed
3701 under @samp{misc}. Doesn't that make you feel all warm and fuzzy?
3704 If you want this permanently enabled, you should add that minor mode to
3705 the hook for the group mode. Put the following line in your
3706 @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
3709 (add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)
3713 * Topic Commands:: Interactive E-Z commands.
3714 * Topic Variables:: How to customize the topics the Lisp Way.
3715 * Topic Sorting:: Sorting each topic individually.
3716 * Topic Topology:: A map of the world.
3717 * Topic Parameters:: Parameters that apply to all groups in a topic.
3721 @node Topic Commands
3722 @subsection Topic Commands
3723 @cindex topic commands
3725 When the topic minor mode is turned on, a new @kbd{T} submap will be
3726 available. In addition, a few of the standard keys change their
3727 definitions slightly.
3729 In general, the following kinds of operations are possible on topics.
3730 First of all, you want to create topics. Secondly, you want to put
3731 groups in topics and to move them around until you have an order you
3732 like. The third kind of operation is to show/hide parts of the whole
3733 shebang. You might want to hide a topic including its subtopics and
3734 groups, to get a better overview of the other groups.
3736 Here is a list of the basic keys that you might need to set up topics
3743 @findex gnus-topic-create-topic
3744 Prompt for a new topic name and create it
3745 (@code{gnus-topic-create-topic}).
3749 @kindex T TAB (Topic)
3751 @findex gnus-topic-indent
3752 ``Indent'' the current topic so that it becomes a sub-topic of the
3753 previous topic (@code{gnus-topic-indent}). If given a prefix,
3754 ``un-indent'' the topic instead.
3757 @kindex M-TAB (Topic)
3758 @findex gnus-topic-unindent
3759 ``Un-indent'' the current topic so that it becomes a sub-topic of the
3760 parent of its current parent (@code{gnus-topic-unindent}).
3764 The following two keys can be used to move groups and topics around.
3765 They work like the well-known cut and paste. @kbd{C-k} is like cut and
3766 @kbd{C-y} is like paste. Of course, this being Emacs, we use the terms
3767 kill and yank rather than cut and paste.
3773 @findex gnus-topic-kill-group
3774 Kill a group or topic (@code{gnus-topic-kill-group}). All groups in the
3775 topic will be removed along with the topic.
3779 @findex gnus-topic-yank-group
3780 Yank the previously killed group or topic
3781 (@code{gnus-topic-yank-group}). Note that all topics will be yanked
3784 So, to move a topic to the beginning of the list of topics, just hit
3785 @kbd{C-k} on it. This is like the ``cut'' part of cut and paste. Then,
3786 move the cursor to the beginning of the buffer (just below the ``Gnus''
3787 topic) and hit @kbd{C-y}. This is like the ``paste'' part of cut and
3788 paste. Like I said -- E-Z.
3790 You can use @kbd{C-k} and @kbd{C-y} on groups as well as on topics. So
3791 you can move topics around as well as groups.
3795 After setting up the topics the way you like them, you might wish to
3796 hide a topic, or to show it again. That's why we have the following
3803 @findex gnus-topic-select-group
3805 Either select a group or fold a topic (@code{gnus-topic-select-group}).
3806 When you perform this command on a group, you'll enter the group, as
3807 usual. When done on a topic line, the topic will be folded (if it was
3808 visible) or unfolded (if it was folded already). So it's basically a
3809 toggling command on topics. In addition, if you give a numerical
3810 prefix, group on that level (and lower) will be displayed.
3814 Now for a list of other commands, in no particular order.
3820 @findex gnus-topic-move-group
3821 Move the current group to some other topic
3822 (@code{gnus-topic-move-group}). This command uses the process/prefix
3823 convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
3827 @findex gnus-topic-jump-to-topic
3828 Go to a topic (@code{gnus-topic-jump-to-topic}).
3832 @findex gnus-topic-copy-group
3833 Copy the current group to some other topic
3834 (@code{gnus-topic-copy-group}). This command uses the process/prefix
3835 convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
3839 @findex gnus-topic-hide-topic
3840 Hide the current topic (@code{gnus-topic-hide-topic}). If given
3841 a prefix, hide the topic permanently.
3845 @findex gnus-topic-show-topic
3846 Show the current topic (@code{gnus-topic-show-topic}). If given
3847 a prefix, show the topic permanently.
3851 @findex gnus-topic-remove-group
3852 Remove a group from the current topic (@code{gnus-topic-remove-group}).
3853 This command is mainly useful if you have the same group in several
3854 topics and wish to remove it from one of the topics. You may also
3855 remove a group from all topics, but in that case, Gnus will add it to
3856 the root topic the next time you start Gnus. In fact, all new groups
3857 (which, naturally, don't belong to any topic) will show up in the root
3860 This command uses the process/prefix convention
3861 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
3865 @findex gnus-topic-move-matching
3866 Move all groups that match some regular expression to a topic
3867 (@code{gnus-topic-move-matching}).
3871 @findex gnus-topic-copy-matching
3872 Copy all groups that match some regular expression to a topic
3873 (@code{gnus-topic-copy-matching}).
3877 @findex gnus-topic-toggle-display-empty-topics
3878 Toggle hiding empty topics
3879 (@code{gnus-topic-toggle-display-empty-topics}).
3883 @findex gnus-topic-mark-topic
3884 Mark all groups in the current topic with the process mark
3885 (@code{gnus-topic-mark-topic}). This command works recursively on
3886 sub-topics unless given a prefix.
3889 @kindex T M-# (Topic)
3890 @findex gnus-topic-unmark-topic
3891 Remove the process mark from all groups in the current topic
3892 (@code{gnus-topic-unmark-topic}). This command works recursively on
3893 sub-topics unless given a prefix.
3896 @kindex C-c C-x (Topic)
3897 @findex gnus-topic-expire-articles
3898 @cindex expiring mail
3899 Run all expirable articles in the current group or topic through the
3900 expiry process (if any)
3901 (@code{gnus-topic-expire-articles}). (@pxref{Expiring Mail}).
3905 @findex gnus-topic-rename
3906 Rename a topic (@code{gnus-topic-rename}).
3909 @kindex T DEL (Topic)
3910 @findex gnus-topic-delete
3911 Delete an empty topic (@code{gnus-topic-delete}).
3915 @findex gnus-topic-list-active
3916 List all groups that Gnus knows about in a topics-ified way
3917 (@code{gnus-topic-list-active}).
3920 @kindex T M-n (Topic)
3921 @findex gnus-topic-goto-next-topic
3922 Go to the next topic (@code{gnus-topic-goto-next-topic}).
3925 @kindex T M-p (Topic)
3926 @findex gnus-topic-goto-previous-topic
3927 Go to the previous topic (@code{gnus-topic-goto-previous-topic}).
3931 @findex gnus-topic-edit-parameters
3932 @cindex group parameters
3933 @cindex topic parameters
3935 Edit the topic parameters (@code{gnus-topic-edit-parameters}).
3936 @xref{Topic Parameters}.
3941 @node Topic Variables
3942 @subsection Topic Variables
3943 @cindex topic variables
3945 The previous section told you how to tell Gnus which topics to display.
3946 This section explains how to tell Gnus what to display about each topic.
3948 @vindex gnus-topic-line-format
3949 The topic lines themselves are created according to the
3950 @code{gnus-topic-line-format} variable (@pxref{Formatting Variables}).
3963 Number of groups in the topic.
3965 Number of unread articles in the topic.
3967 Number of unread articles in the topic and all its subtopics.
3970 @vindex gnus-topic-indent-level
3971 Each sub-topic (and the groups in the sub-topics) will be indented with
3972 @code{gnus-topic-indent-level} times the topic level number of spaces.
3975 @vindex gnus-topic-mode-hook
3976 @code{gnus-topic-mode-hook} is called in topic minor mode buffers.
3978 @vindex gnus-topic-display-empty-topics
3979 The @code{gnus-topic-display-empty-topics} says whether to display even
3980 topics that have no unread articles in them. The default is @code{t}.
3984 @subsection Topic Sorting
3985 @cindex topic sorting
3987 You can sort the groups in each topic individually with the following
3993 @kindex T S a (Topic)
3994 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-alphabet
3995 Sort the current topic alphabetically by group name
3996 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-alphabet}).
3999 @kindex T S u (Topic)
4000 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-unread
4001 Sort the current topic by the number of unread articles
4002 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-unread}).
4005 @kindex T S l (Topic)
4006 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-level
4007 Sort the current topic by group level
4008 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-level}).
4011 @kindex T S v (Topic)
4012 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-score
4013 Sort the current topic by group score
4014 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-score}). @xref{Group Score}.
4017 @kindex T S r (Topic)
4018 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-rank
4019 Sort the current topic by group rank
4020 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-rank}). @xref{Group Score}.
4023 @kindex T S m (Topic)
4024 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-method
4025 Sort the current topic alphabetically by back end name
4026 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-method}).
4029 @kindex T S e (Topic)
4030 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-server
4031 Sort the current topic alphabetically by server name
4032 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups-by-server}).
4035 @kindex T S s (Topic)
4036 @findex gnus-topic-sort-groups
4037 Sort the current topic according to the function(s) given by the
4038 @code{gnus-group-sort-function} variable
4039 (@code{gnus-topic-sort-groups}).
4043 When given a prefix argument, all these commands will sort in reverse
4044 order. @xref{Sorting Groups}, for more information about group
4048 @node Topic Topology
4049 @subsection Topic Topology
4050 @cindex topic topology
4053 So, let's have a look at an example group buffer:
4060 2: alt.religion.emacs
4063 0: comp.talk.emacs.recovery
4065 8: comp.binaries.fractals
4066 13: comp.sources.unix
4070 So, here we have one top-level topic (@samp{Gnus}), two topics under
4071 that, and one sub-topic under one of the sub-topics. (There is always
4072 just one (1) top-level topic). This topology can be expressed as
4077 (("Emacs -- I wuw it!" visible)
4078 (("Naughty Emacs" visible)))
4082 @vindex gnus-topic-topology
4083 This is in fact how the variable @code{gnus-topic-topology} would look
4084 for the display above. That variable is saved in the @file{.newsrc.eld}
4085 file, and shouldn't be messed with manually---unless you really want
4086 to. Since this variable is read from the @file{.newsrc.eld} file,
4087 setting it in any other startup files will have no effect.
4089 This topology shows what topics are sub-topics of what topics (right),
4090 and which topics are visible. Two settings are currently
4091 allowed---@code{visible} and @code{invisible}.
4094 @node Topic Parameters
4095 @subsection Topic Parameters
4096 @cindex topic parameters
4098 All groups in a topic will inherit group parameters from the parent
4099 (and ancestor) topic parameters. All valid group parameters are valid
4100 topic parameters (@pxref{Group Parameters}). When the agent is
4101 enabled, all agent parameters (See Agent Parameters in @ref{Category
4102 Syntax}) are also valid topic parameters.
4104 In addition, the following parameters are only valid as topic
4109 When subscribing new groups by topic (@pxref{Subscription Methods}), the
4110 @code{subscribe} topic parameter says what groups go in what topic. Its
4111 value should be a regexp to match the groups that should go in that
4114 @item subscribe-level
4115 When subscribing new groups by topic (see the @code{subscribe} parameter),
4116 the group will be subscribed with the level specified in the
4117 @code{subscribe-level} instead of @code{gnus-level-default-subscribed}.
4121 Group parameters (of course) override topic parameters, and topic
4122 parameters in sub-topics override topic parameters in super-topics. You
4123 know. Normal inheritance rules. (@dfn{Rules} is here a noun, not a
4124 verb, although you may feel free to disagree with me here.)
4131 2: alt.religion.emacs
4135 0: comp.talk.emacs.recovery
4137 8: comp.binaries.fractals
4138 13: comp.sources.unix
4143 The @samp{Emacs} topic has the topic parameter @code{(score-file
4144 . "emacs.SCORE")}; the @samp{Relief} topic has the topic parameter
4145 @code{(score-file . "relief.SCORE")}; and the @samp{Misc} topic has the
4146 topic parameter @code{(score-file . "emacs.SCORE")}. In addition,
4147 @* @samp{alt.religion.emacs} has the group parameter @code{(score-file
4148 . "religion.SCORE")}.
4150 Now, when you enter @samp{alt.sex.emacs} in the @samp{Relief} topic, you
4151 will get the @file{relief.SCORE} home score file. If you enter the same
4152 group in the @samp{Emacs} topic, you'll get the @file{emacs.SCORE} home
4153 score file. If you enter the group @samp{alt.religion.emacs}, you'll
4154 get the @file{religion.SCORE} home score file.
4156 This seems rather simple and self-evident, doesn't it? Well, yes. But
4157 there are some problems, especially with the @code{total-expiry}
4158 parameter. Say you have a mail group in two topics; one with
4159 @code{total-expiry} and one without. What happens when you do @kbd{M-x
4160 gnus-expire-all-expirable-groups}? Gnus has no way of telling which one
4161 of these topics you mean to expire articles from, so anything may
4162 happen. In fact, I hereby declare that it is @dfn{undefined} what
4163 happens. You just have to be careful if you do stuff like that.
4166 @node Non-ASCII Group Names
4167 @section Accessing groups of non-English names
4168 @cindex non-ascii group names
4170 There are some news servers that provide groups of which the names are
4171 expressed with their native languages in the world. For instance, in a
4172 certain news server there are some newsgroups of which the names are
4173 spelled in Chinese, where people are talking in Chinese. You can, of
4174 course, subscribe to such news groups using Gnus. Currently Gnus
4175 supports non-@acronym{ASCII} group names not only with the @code{nntp}
4176 back end but also with the @code{nnml} back end and the @code{nnrss}
4179 Every such group name is encoded by a certain charset in the server
4180 side (in an @acronym{NNTP} server its administrator determines the
4181 charset, but for groups in the other back ends it is determined by you).
4182 Gnus has to display the decoded ones for you in the group buffer and the
4183 article buffer, and needs to use the encoded ones when communicating
4184 with servers. However, Gnus doesn't know what charset is used for each
4185 non-@acronym{ASCII} group name. The following two variables are just
4186 the ones for telling Gnus what charset should be used for each group:
4189 @item gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist
4190 @vindex gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist
4191 An alist of select methods and charsets. The default value is
4192 @code{nil}. The names of groups in the server specified by that select
4193 method are all supposed to use the corresponding charset. For example:
4196 (setq gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist
4197 '(((nntp "news.com.cn") . cn-gb-2312)))
4200 Charsets specified for groups with this variable are preferred to the
4201 ones specified for the same groups with the
4202 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist} variable (see below).
4204 A select method can be very long, like:
4208 (nntp-address "news.gmane.org")
4209 (nntp-end-of-line "\n")
4210 (nntp-open-connection-function
4211 nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet)
4212 (nntp-via-rlogin-command "ssh")
4213 (nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches
4214 ("-C" "-t" "-e" "none"))
4215 (nntp-via-address @dots{}))
4218 In that case, you can truncate it into @code{(nntp "gmane")} in this
4219 variable. That is, it is enough to contain only the back end name and
4222 @item gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist
4223 @cindex UTF-8 group names
4224 @vindex gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist
4225 An alist of regexp of group name and the charset for group names.
4226 @code{((".*" . utf-8))} is the default value if UTF-8 is supported,
4227 otherwise the default is @code{nil}. For example:
4230 (setq gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist
4231 '(("\\.com\\.cn:" . cn-gb-2312)
4235 Note that this variable is ignored if the match is made with
4236 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist}.
4239 Those two variables are used also to determine the charset for encoding
4240 and decoding non-@acronym{ASCII} group names that are in the back ends
4241 other than @code{nntp}. It means that it is you who determine it. If
4242 you do nothing, the charset used for group names in those back ends will
4243 all be @code{utf-8} because of the last element of
4244 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist}.
4246 There is one more important variable for non-@acronym{ASCII} group
4247 names. @emph{XEmacs users must set this}. Emacs users necessarily need
4251 @item nnmail-pathname-coding-system
4252 The value of this variable should be a coding system or @code{nil}
4253 (which is the default). The @code{nnml} back end, the @code{nnrss} back
4254 end, the @acronym{NNTP} marks feature (@pxref{NNTP marks}), the agent,
4255 and the cache use non-@acronym{ASCII} group names in those files and
4256 directories. This variable overrides the value of
4257 @code{file-name-coding-system} which specifies the coding system used
4258 when encoding and decoding those file names and directory names.
4260 In XEmacs (with the @code{mule} feature), @code{file-name-coding-system}
4261 is the only means to specify the coding system used to encode and decode
4262 file names. Therefore, @emph{you, XEmacs users, have to set it} to the
4263 coding system that is suitable to encode and decode non-@acronym{ASCII}
4264 group names. On the other hand, Emacs uses the value of
4265 @code{default-file-name-coding-system} if @code{file-name-coding-system}
4266 is @code{nil}. Normally the value of
4267 @code{default-file-name-coding-system} is initialized according to the
4268 locale, so you will need to do nothing if the value is suitable to
4269 encode and decode non-@acronym{ASCII} group names.
4271 The value of this variable (or @code{default-file-name-coding-system})
4272 does not necessarily need to be the same value that is determined by
4273 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist} and
4274 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist}.
4276 If you want to subscribe to the groups spelled in Chinese but
4277 @code{default-file-name-coding-system} is initialized by default to
4278 @code{iso-latin-1} for example, that is the most typical case where you
4279 have to set @code{nnmail-pathname-coding-system} even if you are an
4280 Emacs user. The @code{utf-8} coding system is a good candidate for it.
4281 Otherwise, you may change the locale in your system so that
4282 @code{default-file-name-coding-system} may be initialized to an
4283 appropriate value, instead of specifying this variable.
4286 Note that when you copy or move articles from a non-@acronym{ASCII}
4287 group to another group, the charset used to encode and decode group
4288 names should be the same in both groups. Otherwise the Newsgroups
4289 header will be displayed incorrectly in the article buffer.
4292 @node Misc Group Stuff
4293 @section Misc Group Stuff
4296 * Scanning New Messages:: Asking Gnus to see whether new messages have arrived.
4297 * Group Information:: Information and help on groups and Gnus.
4298 * Group Timestamp:: Making Gnus keep track of when you last read a group.
4299 * File Commands:: Reading and writing the Gnus files.
4300 * Sieve Commands:: Managing Sieve scripts.
4307 @cindex keys, reserved for users (Group)
4308 The key @kbd{v} is reserved for users. You can bind it to some
4309 command or better use it as a prefix key. For example:
4312 (define-key gnus-group-mode-map (kbd "v j d")
4315 (gnus-group-jump-to-group "nndraft:drafts")))
4318 On keys reserved for users in Emacs and on keybindings in general
4319 @xref{Keymaps, Keymaps, , emacs, The Emacs Editor}.
4323 @findex gnus-group-enter-server-mode
4324 Enter the server buffer (@code{gnus-group-enter-server-mode}).
4325 @xref{Server Buffer}.
4329 @findex gnus-group-post-news
4330 Start composing a message (a news by default)
4331 (@code{gnus-group-post-news}). If given a prefix, post to the group
4332 under the point. If the prefix is 1, prompt for a group to post to.
4333 Contrary to what the name of this function suggests, the prepared
4334 article might be a mail instead of a news, if a mail group is specified
4335 with the prefix argument. @xref{Composing Messages}.
4339 @findex gnus-group-mail
4340 Mail a message somewhere (@code{gnus-group-mail}). If given a prefix,
4341 use the posting style of the group under the point. If the prefix is 1,
4342 prompt for a group name to find the posting style.
4343 @xref{Composing Messages}.
4347 @findex gnus-group-news
4348 Start composing a news (@code{gnus-group-news}). If given a prefix,
4349 post to the group under the point. If the prefix is 1, prompt
4350 for group to post to. @xref{Composing Messages}.
4352 This function actually prepares a news even when using mail groups.
4353 This is useful for ``posting'' messages to mail groups without actually
4354 sending them over the network: they're just saved directly to the group
4355 in question. The corresponding back end must have a request-post method
4356 for this to work though.
4360 @findex gnus-group-compact-group
4362 Compact the group under point (@code{gnus-group-compact-group}).
4363 Currently implemented only in nnml (@pxref{Mail Spool}). This removes
4364 gaps between article numbers, hence getting a correct total article
4369 Variables for the group buffer:
4373 @item gnus-group-mode-hook
4374 @vindex gnus-group-mode-hook
4375 is called after the group buffer has been
4378 @item gnus-group-prepare-hook
4379 @vindex gnus-group-prepare-hook
4380 is called after the group buffer is
4381 generated. It may be used to modify the buffer in some strange,
4384 @item gnus-group-prepared-hook
4385 @vindex gnus-group-prepare-hook
4386 is called as the very last thing after the group buffer has been
4387 generated. It may be used to move point around, for instance.
4389 @item gnus-permanently-visible-groups
4390 @vindex gnus-permanently-visible-groups
4391 Groups matching this regexp will always be listed in the group buffer,
4392 whether they are empty or not.
4396 @node Scanning New Messages
4397 @subsection Scanning New Messages
4398 @cindex new messages
4399 @cindex scanning new news
4405 @findex gnus-group-get-new-news
4406 @c @icon{gnus-group-get-new-news}
4407 Check the server(s) for new articles. If the numerical prefix is used,
4408 this command will check only groups of level @var{arg} and lower
4409 (@code{gnus-group-get-new-news}). If given a non-numerical prefix, this
4410 command will force a total re-reading of the active file(s) from the
4415 @findex gnus-group-get-new-news-this-group
4416 @vindex gnus-goto-next-group-when-activating
4417 @c @icon{gnus-group-get-new-news-this-group}
4418 Check whether new articles have arrived in the current group
4419 (@code{gnus-group-get-new-news-this-group}).
4420 @code{gnus-goto-next-group-when-activating} says whether this command is
4421 to move point to the next group or not. It is @code{t} by default.
4423 @findex gnus-activate-all-groups
4424 @cindex activating groups
4426 @kindex C-c M-g (Group)
4427 Activate absolutely all groups (@code{gnus-activate-all-groups}).
4432 @findex gnus-group-restart
4433 Restart Gnus (@code{gnus-group-restart}). This saves the @file{.newsrc}
4434 file(s), closes the connection to all servers, clears up all run-time
4435 Gnus variables, and then starts Gnus all over again.
4439 @vindex gnus-get-new-news-hook
4440 @code{gnus-get-new-news-hook} is run just before checking for new news.
4442 @vindex gnus-after-getting-new-news-hook
4443 @code{gnus-after-getting-new-news-hook} is run after checking for new
4447 @node Group Information
4448 @subsection Group Information
4449 @cindex group information
4450 @cindex information on groups
4457 @findex gnus-group-fetch-faq
4458 @vindex gnus-group-faq-directory
4461 Try to fetch the @acronym{FAQ} for the current group
4462 (@code{gnus-group-fetch-faq}). Gnus will try to get the @acronym{FAQ}
4463 from @code{gnus-group-faq-directory}, which is usually a directory on
4464 a remote machine. This variable can also be a list of directories.
4465 In that case, giving a prefix to this command will allow you to choose
4466 between the various sites. @code{ange-ftp} (or @code{efs}) will be
4467 used for fetching the file.
4469 If fetching from the first site is unsuccessful, Gnus will attempt to go
4470 through @code{gnus-group-faq-directory} and try to open them one by one.
4474 @findex gnus-group-fetch-charter
4475 @vindex gnus-group-charter-alist
4477 Try to open the charter for the current group in a web browser
4478 (@code{gnus-group-fetch-charter}). Query for a group if given a
4481 Gnus will use @code{gnus-group-charter-alist} to find the location of
4482 the charter. If no location is known, Gnus will fetch the control
4483 messages for the group, which in some cases includes the charter.
4487 @findex gnus-group-fetch-control
4488 @vindex gnus-group-fetch-control-use-browse-url
4489 @cindex control message
4490 Fetch the control messages for the group from the archive at
4491 @code{ftp.isc.org} (@code{gnus-group-fetch-control}). Query for a
4492 group if given a prefix argument.
4494 If @code{gnus-group-fetch-control-use-browse-url} is non-@code{nil},
4495 Gnus will open the control messages in a browser using
4496 @code{browse-url}. Otherwise they are fetched using @code{ange-ftp}
4497 and displayed in an ephemeral group.
4499 Note that the control messages are compressed. To use this command
4500 you need to turn on @code{auto-compression-mode} (@pxref{Compressed
4501 Files, ,Compressed Files, emacs, The Emacs Manual}).
4505 @c @icon{gnus-group-describe-group}
4507 @kindex C-c C-d (Group)
4508 @cindex describing groups
4509 @cindex group description
4510 @findex gnus-group-describe-group
4511 Describe the current group (@code{gnus-group-describe-group}). If given
4512 a prefix, force Gnus to re-read the description from the server.
4516 @findex gnus-group-describe-all-groups
4517 Describe all groups (@code{gnus-group-describe-all-groups}). If given a
4518 prefix, force Gnus to re-read the description file from the server.
4525 @findex gnus-version
4526 Display current Gnus version numbers (@code{gnus-version}).
4530 @findex gnus-group-describe-briefly
4531 Give a very short help message (@code{gnus-group-describe-briefly}).
4534 @kindex C-c C-i (Group)
4537 @findex gnus-info-find-node
4538 Go to the Gnus info node (@code{gnus-info-find-node}).
4542 @node Group Timestamp
4543 @subsection Group Timestamp
4545 @cindex group timestamps
4547 It can be convenient to let Gnus keep track of when you last read a
4548 group. To set the ball rolling, you should add
4549 @code{gnus-group-set-timestamp} to @code{gnus-select-group-hook}:
4552 (add-hook 'gnus-select-group-hook 'gnus-group-set-timestamp)
4555 After doing this, each time you enter a group, it'll be recorded.
4557 This information can be displayed in various ways---the easiest is to
4558 use the @samp{%d} spec in the group line format:
4561 (setq gnus-group-line-format
4562 "%M\%S\%p\%P\%5y: %(%-40,40g%) %d\n")
4565 This will result in lines looking like:
4568 * 0: mail.ding 19961002T012943
4569 0: custom 19961002T012713
4572 As you can see, the date is displayed in compact ISO 8601 format. This
4573 may be a bit too much, so to just display the date, you could say
4577 (setq gnus-group-line-format
4578 "%M\%S\%p\%P\%5y: %(%-40,40g%) %6,6~(cut 2)d\n")
4581 If you would like greater control of the time format, you can use a
4582 user-defined format spec. Something like the following should do the
4586 (setq gnus-group-line-format
4587 "%M\%S\%p\%P\%5y: %(%-40,40g%) %ud\n")
4588 (defun gnus-user-format-function-d (headers)
4589 (let ((time (gnus-group-timestamp gnus-tmp-group)))
4591 (format-time-string "%b %d %H:%M" time)
4597 @subsection File Commands
4598 @cindex file commands
4604 @findex gnus-group-read-init-file
4605 @vindex gnus-init-file
4606 @cindex reading init file
4607 Re-read the init file (@code{gnus-init-file}, which defaults to
4608 @file{~/.gnus.el}) (@code{gnus-group-read-init-file}).
4612 @findex gnus-group-save-newsrc
4613 @cindex saving .newsrc
4614 Save the @file{.newsrc.eld} file (and @file{.newsrc} if wanted)
4615 (@code{gnus-group-save-newsrc}). If given a prefix, force saving the
4616 file(s) whether Gnus thinks it is necessary or not.
4619 @c @kindex Z (Group)
4620 @c @findex gnus-group-clear-dribble
4621 @c Clear the dribble buffer (@code{gnus-group-clear-dribble}).
4626 @node Sieve Commands
4627 @subsection Sieve Commands
4628 @cindex group sieve commands
4630 Sieve is a server-side mail filtering language. In Gnus you can use
4631 the @code{sieve} group parameter (@pxref{Group Parameters}) to specify
4632 sieve rules that should apply to each group. Gnus provides two
4633 commands to translate all these group parameters into a proper Sieve
4634 script that can be transfered to the server somehow.
4636 @vindex gnus-sieve-file
4637 @vindex gnus-sieve-region-start
4638 @vindex gnus-sieve-region-end
4639 The generated Sieve script is placed in @code{gnus-sieve-file} (by
4640 default @file{~/.sieve}). The Sieve code that Gnus generate is placed
4641 between two delimiters, @code{gnus-sieve-region-start} and
4642 @code{gnus-sieve-region-end}, so you may write additional Sieve code
4643 outside these delimiters that will not be removed the next time you
4644 regenerate the Sieve script.
4646 @vindex gnus-sieve-crosspost
4647 The variable @code{gnus-sieve-crosspost} controls how the Sieve script
4648 is generated. If it is non-@code{nil} (the default) articles is
4649 placed in all groups that have matching rules, otherwise the article
4650 is only placed in the group with the first matching rule. For
4651 example, the group parameter @samp{(sieve address "sender"
4652 "owner-ding@@hpc.uh.edu")} will generate the following piece of Sieve
4653 code if @code{gnus-sieve-crosspost} is @code{nil}. (When
4654 @code{gnus-sieve-crosspost} is non-@code{nil}, it looks the same
4655 except that the line containing the call to @code{stop} is removed.)
4658 if address "sender" "owner-ding@@hpc.uh.edu" @{
4659 fileinto "INBOX.ding";
4664 @xref{Top, Emacs Sieve, Top, sieve, Emacs Sieve}.
4670 @findex gnus-sieve-generate
4671 @vindex gnus-sieve-file
4672 @cindex generating sieve script
4673 Regenerate a Sieve script from the @code{sieve} group parameters and
4674 put you into the @code{gnus-sieve-file} without saving it.
4678 @findex gnus-sieve-update
4679 @vindex gnus-sieve-file
4680 @cindex updating sieve script
4681 Regenerates the Gnus managed part of @code{gnus-sieve-file} using the
4682 @code{sieve} group parameters, save the file and upload it to the
4683 server using the @code{sieveshell} program.
4688 @node Summary Buffer
4689 @chapter Summary Buffer
4690 @cindex summary buffer
4692 A line for each article is displayed in the summary buffer. You can
4693 move around, read articles, post articles and reply to articles.
4695 The most common way to a summary buffer is to select a group from the
4696 group buffer (@pxref{Selecting a Group}).
4698 You can have as many summary buffers open as you wish.
4700 You can customize the Summary Mode tool bar, see @kbd{M-x
4701 customize-apropos RET gnus-summary-tool-bar}. This feature is only
4705 @cindex keys, reserved for users (Summary)
4706 The key @kbd{v} is reserved for users. You can bind it to some
4707 command or better use it as a prefix key. For example:
4709 (define-key gnus-summary-mode-map (kbd "v -") "LrS") ;; lower subthread
4713 * Summary Buffer Format:: Deciding how the summary buffer is to look.
4714 * Summary Maneuvering:: Moving around the summary buffer.
4715 * Choosing Articles:: Reading articles.
4716 * Paging the Article:: Scrolling the current article.
4717 * Reply Followup and Post:: Posting articles.
4718 * Delayed Articles:: Send articles at a later time.
4719 * Marking Articles:: Marking articles as read, expirable, etc.
4720 * Limiting:: You can limit the summary buffer.
4721 * Threading:: How threads are made.
4722 * Sorting the Summary Buffer:: How articles and threads are sorted.
4723 * Asynchronous Fetching:: Gnus might be able to pre-fetch articles.
4724 * Article Caching:: You may store articles in a cache.
4725 * Persistent Articles:: Making articles expiry-resistant.
4726 * Sticky Articles:: Article buffers that are not reused.
4727 * Article Backlog:: Having already read articles hang around.
4728 * Saving Articles:: Ways of customizing article saving.
4729 * Decoding Articles:: Gnus can treat series of (uu)encoded articles.
4730 * Article Treatment:: The article buffer can be mangled at will.
4731 * MIME Commands:: Doing MIMEy things with the articles.
4732 * Charsets:: Character set issues.
4733 * Article Commands:: Doing various things with the article buffer.
4734 * Summary Sorting:: Sorting the summary buffer in various ways.
4735 * Finding the Parent:: No child support? Get the parent.
4736 * Alternative Approaches:: Reading using non-default summaries.
4737 * Tree Display:: A more visual display of threads.
4738 * Mail Group Commands:: Some commands can only be used in mail groups.
4739 * Various Summary Stuff:: What didn't fit anywhere else.
4740 * Exiting the Summary Buffer:: Returning to the Group buffer,
4741 or reselecting the current group.
4742 * Crosspost Handling:: How crossposted articles are dealt with.
4743 * Duplicate Suppression:: An alternative when crosspost handling fails.
4744 * Security:: Decrypt and Verify.
4745 * Mailing List:: Mailing list minor mode.
4749 @node Summary Buffer Format
4750 @section Summary Buffer Format
4751 @cindex summary buffer format
4755 \gnusfigure{The Summary Buffer}{180}{
4756 \put(0,0){\epsfig{figure=ps/summary,width=7.5cm}}
4757 \put(445,0){\makebox(0,0)[br]{\epsfig{figure=ps/summary-article,width=7.5cm}}}
4763 * Summary Buffer Lines:: You can specify how summary lines should look.
4764 * To From Newsgroups:: How to not display your own name.
4765 * Summary Buffer Mode Line:: You can say how the mode line should look.
4766 * Summary Highlighting:: Making the summary buffer all pretty and nice.
4769 @findex mail-extract-address-components
4770 @findex gnus-extract-address-components
4771 @vindex gnus-extract-address-components
4772 Gnus will use the value of the @code{gnus-extract-address-components}
4773 variable as a function for getting the name and address parts of a
4774 @code{From} header. Two pre-defined functions exist:
4775 @code{gnus-extract-address-components}, which is the default, quite
4776 fast, and too simplistic solution; and
4777 @code{mail-extract-address-components}, which works very nicely, but is
4778 slower. The default function will return the wrong answer in 5% of the
4779 cases. If this is unacceptable to you, use the other function instead:
4782 (setq gnus-extract-address-components
4783 'mail-extract-address-components)
4786 @vindex gnus-summary-same-subject
4787 @code{gnus-summary-same-subject} is a string indicating that the current
4788 article has the same subject as the previous. This string will be used
4789 with those specs that require it. The default is @code{""}.
4792 @node Summary Buffer Lines
4793 @subsection Summary Buffer Lines
4795 @vindex gnus-summary-line-format
4796 You can change the format of the lines in the summary buffer by changing
4797 the @code{gnus-summary-line-format} variable. It works along the same
4798 lines as a normal @code{format} string, with some extensions
4799 (@pxref{Formatting Variables}).
4801 There should always be a colon or a point position marker on the line;
4802 the cursor always moves to the point position marker or the colon after
4803 performing an operation. (Of course, Gnus wouldn't be Gnus if it wasn't
4804 possible to change this. Just write a new function
4805 @code{gnus-goto-colon} which does whatever you like with the cursor.)
4806 @xref{Positioning Point}.
4808 The default string is @samp{%U%R%z%I%(%[%4L: %-23,23f%]%) %s\n}.
4810 The following format specification characters and extended format
4811 specification(s) are understood:
4817 Subject string. List identifiers stripped,
4818 @code{gnus-list-identifiers}. @xref{Article Hiding}.
4820 Subject if the article is the root of the thread or the previous article
4821 had a different subject, @code{gnus-summary-same-subject} otherwise.
4822 (@code{gnus-summary-same-subject} defaults to @code{""}.)
4824 Full @code{From} header.
4826 The name (from the @code{From} header).
4828 The name, @code{To} header or the @code{Newsgroups} header (@pxref{To
4831 The name (from the @code{From} header). This differs from the @code{n}
4832 spec in that it uses the function designated by the
4833 @code{gnus-extract-address-components} variable, which is slower, but
4834 may be more thorough.
4836 The address (from the @code{From} header). This works the same way as
4839 Number of lines in the article.
4841 Number of characters in the article. This specifier is not supported
4842 in some methods (like nnfolder).
4844 Pretty-printed version of the number of characters in the article;
4845 for example, @samp{1.2k} or @samp{0.4M}.
4847 Indentation based on thread level (@pxref{Customizing Threading}).
4849 A complex trn-style thread tree, showing response-connecting trace
4850 lines. A thread could be drawn like this:
4863 You can customize the appearance with the following options. Note
4864 that it is possible to make the thread display look really neat by
4865 replacing the default @acronym{ASCII} characters with graphic
4866 line-drawing glyphs.
4868 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-root
4869 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-root
4870 Used for the root of a thread. If @code{nil}, use subject
4871 instead. The default is @samp{> }.
4873 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-false-root
4874 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-false-root
4875 Used for the false root of a thread (@pxref{Loose Threads}). If
4876 @code{nil}, use subject instead. The default is @samp{> }.
4878 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-single-indent
4879 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-single-indent
4880 Used for a thread with just one message. If @code{nil}, use subject
4881 instead. The default is @samp{}.
4883 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-vertical
4884 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-vertical
4885 Used for drawing a vertical line. The default is @samp{| }.
4887 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-indent
4888 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-indent
4889 Used for indenting. The default is @samp{ }.
4891 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-leaf-with-other
4892 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-leaf-with-other
4893 Used for a leaf with brothers. The default is @samp{+-> }.
4895 @item gnus-sum-thread-tree-single-leaf
4896 @vindex gnus-sum-thread-tree-single-leaf
4897 Used for a leaf without brothers. The default is @samp{\-> }
4902 Nothing if the article is a root and lots of spaces if it isn't (it
4903 pushes everything after it off the screen).
4905 Opening bracket, which is normally @samp{[}, but can also be @samp{<}
4906 for adopted articles (@pxref{Customizing Threading}).
4908 Closing bracket, which is normally @samp{]}, but can also be @samp{>}
4909 for adopted articles.
4911 One space for each thread level.
4913 Twenty minus thread level spaces.
4915 Unread. @xref{Read Articles}.
4918 This misleadingly named specifier is the @dfn{secondary mark}. This
4919 mark will say whether the article has been replied to, has been cached,
4920 or has been saved. @xref{Other Marks}.
4923 Score as a number (@pxref{Scoring}).
4925 @vindex gnus-summary-zcore-fuzz
4926 Zcore, @samp{+} if above the default level and @samp{-} if below the
4927 default level. If the difference between
4928 @code{gnus-summary-default-score} and the score is less than
4929 @code{gnus-summary-zcore-fuzz}, this spec will not be used.
4937 The @code{Date} in @code{DD-MMM} format.
4939 The @code{Date} in @var{YYYYMMDD}@code{T}@var{HHMMSS} format.
4945 Number of articles in the current sub-thread. Using this spec will slow
4946 down summary buffer generation somewhat.
4948 An @samp{=} (@code{gnus-not-empty-thread-mark}) will be displayed if the
4949 article has any children.
4955 Desired cursor position (instead of after first colon).
4957 Age sensitive date format. Various date format is defined in
4958 @code{gnus-user-date-format-alist}.
4960 User defined specifier. The next character in the format string should
4961 be a letter. Gnus will call the function
4962 @code{gnus-user-format-function-@var{x}}, where @var{x} is the letter
4963 following @samp{%u}. The function will be passed the current header as
4964 argument. The function should return a string, which will be inserted
4965 into the summary just like information from any other summary specifier.
4968 Text between @samp{%(} and @samp{%)} will be highlighted with
4969 @code{gnus-mouse-face} when the mouse point is placed inside the area.
4970 There can only be one such area.
4972 The @samp{%U} (status), @samp{%R} (replied) and @samp{%z} (zcore) specs
4973 have to be handled with care. For reasons of efficiency, Gnus will
4974 compute what column these characters will end up in, and ``hard-code''
4975 that. This means that it is invalid to have these specs after a
4976 variable-length spec. Well, you might not be arrested, but your summary
4977 buffer will look strange, which is bad enough.
4979 The smart choice is to have these specs as far to the left as possible.
4980 (Isn't that the case with everything, though? But I digress.)
4982 This restriction may disappear in later versions of Gnus.
4985 @node To From Newsgroups
4986 @subsection To From Newsgroups
4990 In some groups (particularly in archive groups), the @code{From} header
4991 isn't very interesting, since all the articles there are written by
4992 you. To display the information in the @code{To} or @code{Newsgroups}
4993 headers instead, you need to decide three things: What information to
4994 gather; where to display it; and when to display it.
4998 @vindex gnus-extra-headers
4999 The reading of extra header information is controlled by the
5000 @code{gnus-extra-headers}. This is a list of header symbols. For
5004 (setq gnus-extra-headers
5005 '(To Newsgroups X-Newsreader))
5008 This will result in Gnus trying to obtain these three headers, and
5009 storing it in header structures for later easy retrieval.
5012 @findex gnus-extra-header
5013 The value of these extra headers can be accessed via the
5014 @code{gnus-extra-header} function. Here's a format line spec that will
5015 access the @code{X-Newsreader} header:
5018 "%~(form (gnus-extra-header 'X-Newsreader))@@"
5022 @vindex gnus-ignored-from-addresses
5023 The @code{gnus-ignored-from-addresses} variable says when the @samp{%f}
5024 summary line spec returns the @code{To}, @code{Newsreader} or
5025 @code{From} header. If this regexp matches the contents of the
5026 @code{From} header, the value of the @code{To} or @code{Newsreader}
5027 headers are used instead.
5029 To distinguish regular articles from those where the @code{From} field
5030 has been swapped, a string is prefixed to the @code{To} or
5031 @code{Newsgroups} header in the summary line. By default the string is
5032 @samp{-> } for @code{To} and @samp{=> } for @code{Newsgroups}, you can
5033 customize these strings with @code{gnus-summary-to-prefix} and
5034 @code{gnus-summary-newsgroup-prefix}.
5038 @vindex nnmail-extra-headers
5039 A related variable is @code{nnmail-extra-headers}, which controls when
5040 to include extra headers when generating overview (@acronym{NOV}) files.
5041 If you have old overview files, you should regenerate them after
5042 changing this variable, by entering the server buffer using @kbd{^},
5043 and then @kbd{g} on the appropriate mail server (e.g. nnml) to cause
5046 @vindex gnus-summary-line-format
5047 You also have to instruct Gnus to display the data by changing the
5048 @code{%n} spec to the @code{%f} spec in the
5049 @code{gnus-summary-line-format} variable.
5051 In summary, you'd typically put something like the following in
5055 (setq gnus-extra-headers
5057 (setq nnmail-extra-headers gnus-extra-headers)
5058 (setq gnus-summary-line-format
5059 "%U%R%z%I%(%[%4L: %-23,23f%]%) %s\n")
5060 (setq gnus-ignored-from-addresses
5064 (The values listed above are the default values in Gnus. Alter them
5067 A note for news server administrators, or for users who wish to try to
5068 convince their news server administrator to provide some additional
5071 The above is mostly useful for mail groups, where you have control over
5072 the @acronym{NOV} files that are created. However, if you can persuade your
5073 nntp admin to add (in the usual implementation, notably INN):
5079 to the end of her @file{overview.fmt} file, then you can use that just
5080 as you would the extra headers from the mail groups.
5083 @node Summary Buffer Mode Line
5084 @subsection Summary Buffer Mode Line
5086 @vindex gnus-summary-mode-line-format
5087 You can also change the format of the summary mode bar (@pxref{Mode Line
5088 Formatting}). Set @code{gnus-summary-mode-line-format} to whatever you
5089 like. The default is @samp{Gnus: %%b [%A] %Z}.
5091 Here are the elements you can play with:
5097 Unprefixed group name.
5099 Current article number.
5101 Current article score.
5105 Number of unread articles in this group.
5107 Number of unread articles in this group that aren't displayed in the
5110 A string with the number of unread and unselected articles represented
5111 either as @samp{<%U(+%e) more>} if there are both unread and unselected
5112 articles, and just as @samp{<%U more>} if there are just unread articles
5113 and no unselected ones.
5115 Shortish group name. For instance, @samp{rec.arts.anime} will be
5116 shortened to @samp{r.a.anime}.
5118 Subject of the current article.
5120 User-defined spec (@pxref{User-Defined Specs}).
5122 Name of the current score file (@pxref{Scoring}).
5124 Number of dormant articles (@pxref{Unread Articles}).
5126 Number of ticked articles (@pxref{Unread Articles}).
5128 Number of articles that have been marked as read in this session.
5130 Number of articles expunged by the score files.
5134 @node Summary Highlighting
5135 @subsection Summary Highlighting
5139 @item gnus-visual-mark-article-hook
5140 @vindex gnus-visual-mark-article-hook
5141 This hook is run after selecting an article. It is meant to be used for
5142 highlighting the article in some way. It is not run if
5143 @code{gnus-visual} is @code{nil}.
5145 @item gnus-summary-update-hook
5146 @vindex gnus-summary-update-hook
5147 This hook is called when a summary line is changed. It is not run if
5148 @code{gnus-visual} is @code{nil}.
5150 @item gnus-summary-selected-face
5151 @vindex gnus-summary-selected-face
5152 This is the face (or @dfn{font} as some people call it) used to
5153 highlight the current article in the summary buffer.
5155 @item gnus-summary-highlight
5156 @vindex gnus-summary-highlight
5157 Summary lines are highlighted according to this variable, which is a
5158 list where the elements are of the format @code{(@var{form}
5159 . @var{face})}. If you would, for instance, like ticked articles to be
5160 italic and high-scored articles to be bold, you could set this variable
5163 (((eq mark gnus-ticked-mark) . italic)
5164 ((> score default) . bold))
5166 As you may have guessed, if @var{form} returns a non-@code{nil} value,
5167 @var{face} will be applied to the line.
5171 @node Summary Maneuvering
5172 @section Summary Maneuvering
5173 @cindex summary movement
5175 All the straight movement commands understand the numeric prefix and
5176 behave pretty much as you'd expect.
5178 None of these commands select articles.
5183 @kindex M-n (Summary)
5184 @kindex G M-n (Summary)
5185 @findex gnus-summary-next-unread-subject
5186 Go to the next summary line of an unread article
5187 (@code{gnus-summary-next-unread-subject}).
5191 @kindex M-p (Summary)
5192 @kindex G M-p (Summary)
5193 @findex gnus-summary-prev-unread-subject
5194 Go to the previous summary line of an unread article
5195 (@code{gnus-summary-prev-unread-subject}).
5198 @kindex G g (Summary)
5199 @findex gnus-summary-goto-subject
5200 Ask for an article number and then go to the summary line of that article
5201 without displaying the article (@code{gnus-summary-goto-subject}).
5204 If Gnus asks you to press a key to confirm going to the next group, you
5205 can use the @kbd{C-n} and @kbd{C-p} keys to move around the group
5206 buffer, searching for the next group to read without actually returning
5207 to the group buffer.
5209 Variables related to summary movement:
5213 @vindex gnus-auto-select-next
5214 @item gnus-auto-select-next
5215 If you issue one of the movement commands (like @kbd{n}) and there are
5216 no more unread articles after the current one, Gnus will offer to go to
5217 the next group. If this variable is @code{t} and the next group is
5218 empty, Gnus will exit summary mode and return to the group buffer. If
5219 this variable is neither @code{t} nor @code{nil}, Gnus will select the
5220 next group with unread articles. As a special case, if this variable
5221 is @code{quietly}, Gnus will select the next group without asking for
5222 confirmation. If this variable is @code{almost-quietly}, the same
5223 will happen only if you are located on the last article in the group.
5224 Finally, if this variable is @code{slightly-quietly}, the @kbd{Z n}
5225 command will go to the next group without confirmation. Also
5226 @pxref{Group Levels}.
5228 @item gnus-auto-select-same
5229 @vindex gnus-auto-select-same
5230 If non-@code{nil}, all the movement commands will try to go to the next
5231 article with the same subject as the current. (@dfn{Same} here might
5232 mean @dfn{roughly equal}. See @code{gnus-summary-gather-subject-limit}
5233 for details (@pxref{Customizing Threading}).) If there are no more
5234 articles with the same subject, go to the first unread article.
5236 This variable is not particularly useful if you use a threaded display.
5238 @item gnus-summary-check-current
5239 @vindex gnus-summary-check-current
5240 If non-@code{nil}, all the ``unread'' movement commands will not proceed
5241 to the next (or previous) article if the current article is unread.
5242 Instead, they will choose the current article.
5244 @item gnus-auto-center-summary
5245 @vindex gnus-auto-center-summary
5246 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus will keep the point in the summary buffer
5247 centered at all times. This makes things quite tidy, but if you have a
5248 slow network connection, or simply do not like this un-Emacsism, you can
5249 set this variable to @code{nil} to get the normal Emacs scrolling
5250 action. This will also inhibit horizontal re-centering of the summary
5251 buffer, which might make it more inconvenient to read extremely long
5254 This variable can also be a number. In that case, center the window at
5255 the given number of lines from the top.
5260 @node Choosing Articles
5261 @section Choosing Articles
5262 @cindex selecting articles
5265 * Choosing Commands:: Commands for choosing articles.
5266 * Choosing Variables:: Variables that influence these commands.
5270 @node Choosing Commands
5271 @subsection Choosing Commands
5273 None of the following movement commands understand the numeric prefix,
5274 and they all select and display an article.
5276 If you want to fetch new articles or redisplay the group, see
5277 @ref{Exiting the Summary Buffer}.
5281 @kindex SPACE (Summary)
5282 @findex gnus-summary-next-page
5283 Select the current article, or, if that one's read already, the next
5284 unread article (@code{gnus-summary-next-page}).
5286 If you have an article window open already and you press @kbd{SPACE}
5287 again, the article will be scrolled. This lets you conveniently
5288 @kbd{SPACE} through an entire newsgroup. @xref{Paging the Article}.
5293 @kindex G n (Summary)
5294 @findex gnus-summary-next-unread-article
5295 @c @icon{gnus-summary-next-unread}
5296 Go to next unread article (@code{gnus-summary-next-unread-article}).
5301 @findex gnus-summary-prev-unread-article
5302 @c @icon{gnus-summary-prev-unread}
5303 Go to previous unread article (@code{gnus-summary-prev-unread-article}).
5308 @kindex G N (Summary)
5309 @findex gnus-summary-next-article
5310 Go to the next article (@code{gnus-summary-next-article}).
5315 @kindex G P (Summary)
5316 @findex gnus-summary-prev-article
5317 Go to the previous article (@code{gnus-summary-prev-article}).
5320 @kindex G C-n (Summary)
5321 @findex gnus-summary-next-same-subject
5322 Go to the next article with the same subject
5323 (@code{gnus-summary-next-same-subject}).
5326 @kindex G C-p (Summary)
5327 @findex gnus-summary-prev-same-subject
5328 Go to the previous article with the same subject
5329 (@code{gnus-summary-prev-same-subject}).
5333 @kindex G f (Summary)
5335 @findex gnus-summary-first-unread-article
5336 Go to the first unread article
5337 (@code{gnus-summary-first-unread-article}).
5341 @kindex G b (Summary)
5343 @findex gnus-summary-best-unread-article
5344 Go to the unread article with the highest score
5345 (@code{gnus-summary-best-unread-article}). If given a prefix argument,
5346 go to the first unread article that has a score over the default score.
5351 @kindex G l (Summary)
5352 @findex gnus-summary-goto-last-article
5353 Go to the previous article read (@code{gnus-summary-goto-last-article}).
5356 @kindex G o (Summary)
5357 @findex gnus-summary-pop-article
5359 @cindex article history
5360 Pop an article off the summary history and go to this article
5361 (@code{gnus-summary-pop-article}). This command differs from the
5362 command above in that you can pop as many previous articles off the
5363 history as you like, while @kbd{l} toggles the two last read articles.
5364 For a somewhat related issue (if you use these commands a lot),
5365 @pxref{Article Backlog}.
5370 @kindex G j (Summary)
5371 @findex gnus-summary-goto-article
5372 Ask for an article number or @code{Message-ID}, and then go to that
5373 article (@code{gnus-summary-goto-article}).
5378 @node Choosing Variables
5379 @subsection Choosing Variables
5381 Some variables relevant for moving and selecting articles:
5384 @item gnus-auto-extend-newsgroup
5385 @vindex gnus-auto-extend-newsgroup
5386 All the movement commands will try to go to the previous (or next)
5387 article, even if that article isn't displayed in the Summary buffer if
5388 this variable is non-@code{nil}. Gnus will then fetch the article from
5389 the server and display it in the article buffer.
5391 @item gnus-select-article-hook
5392 @vindex gnus-select-article-hook
5393 This hook is called whenever an article is selected. The default is
5394 @code{nil}. If you would like each article to be saved in the Agent as
5395 you read it, putting @code{gnus-agent-fetch-selected-article} on this
5398 @item gnus-mark-article-hook
5399 @vindex gnus-mark-article-hook
5400 @findex gnus-summary-mark-unread-as-read
5401 @findex gnus-summary-mark-read-and-unread-as-read
5402 @findex gnus-unread-mark
5403 This hook is called whenever an article is selected. It is intended to
5404 be used for marking articles as read. The default value is
5405 @code{gnus-summary-mark-read-and-unread-as-read}, and will change the
5406 mark of almost any article you read to @code{gnus-read-mark}. The only
5407 articles not affected by this function are ticked, dormant, and
5408 expirable articles. If you'd instead like to just have unread articles
5409 marked as read, you can use @code{gnus-summary-mark-unread-as-read}
5410 instead. It will leave marks like @code{gnus-low-score-mark},
5411 @code{gnus-del-mark} (and so on) alone.
5416 @node Paging the Article
5417 @section Scrolling the Article
5418 @cindex article scrolling
5423 @kindex SPACE (Summary)
5424 @findex gnus-summary-next-page
5425 Pressing @kbd{SPACE} will scroll the current article forward one page,
5426 or, if you have come to the end of the current article, will choose the
5427 next article (@code{gnus-summary-next-page}).
5429 @vindex gnus-article-boring-faces
5430 @vindex gnus-article-skip-boring
5431 If @code{gnus-article-skip-boring} is non-@code{nil} and the rest of
5432 the article consists only of citations and signature, then it will be
5433 skipped; the next article will be shown instead. You can customize
5434 what is considered uninteresting with
5435 @code{gnus-article-boring-faces}. You can manually view the article's
5436 pages, no matter how boring, using @kbd{C-M-v}.
5439 @kindex DEL (Summary)
5440 @findex gnus-summary-prev-page
5441 Scroll the current article back one page (@code{gnus-summary-prev-page}).
5444 @kindex RET (Summary)
5445 @findex gnus-summary-scroll-up
5446 Scroll the current article one line forward
5447 (@code{gnus-summary-scroll-up}).
5450 @kindex M-RET (Summary)
5451 @findex gnus-summary-scroll-down
5452 Scroll the current article one line backward
5453 (@code{gnus-summary-scroll-down}).
5457 @kindex A g (Summary)
5459 @findex gnus-summary-show-article
5460 @vindex gnus-summary-show-article-charset-alist
5461 (Re)fetch the current article (@code{gnus-summary-show-article}). If
5462 given a prefix, fetch the current article, but don't run any of the
5463 article treatment functions. This will give you a ``raw'' article, just
5464 the way it came from the server.
5466 If given a numerical prefix, you can do semi-manual charset stuff.
5467 @kbd{C-u 0 g cn-gb-2312 RET} will decode the message as if it were
5468 encoded in the @code{cn-gb-2312} charset. If you have
5471 (setq gnus-summary-show-article-charset-alist
5476 then you can say @kbd{C-u 1 g} to get the same effect.
5481 @kindex A < (Summary)
5482 @findex gnus-summary-beginning-of-article
5483 Scroll to the beginning of the article
5484 (@code{gnus-summary-beginning-of-article}).
5489 @kindex A > (Summary)
5490 @findex gnus-summary-end-of-article
5491 Scroll to the end of the article (@code{gnus-summary-end-of-article}).
5495 @kindex A s (Summary)
5497 @findex gnus-summary-isearch-article
5498 Perform an isearch in the article buffer
5499 (@code{gnus-summary-isearch-article}).
5503 @findex gnus-summary-select-article-buffer
5504 Select the article buffer (@code{gnus-summary-select-article-buffer}).
5509 @node Reply Followup and Post
5510 @section Reply, Followup and Post
5513 * Summary Mail Commands:: Sending mail.
5514 * Summary Post Commands:: Sending news.
5515 * Summary Message Commands:: Other Message-related commands.
5516 * Canceling and Superseding::
5520 @node Summary Mail Commands
5521 @subsection Summary Mail Commands
5523 @cindex composing mail
5525 Commands for composing a mail message:
5531 @kindex S r (Summary)
5533 @findex gnus-summary-reply
5534 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-reply}
5535 @c @icon{gnus-summary-reply}
5536 Mail a reply to the author of the current article
5537 (@code{gnus-summary-reply}).
5542 @kindex S R (Summary)
5543 @findex gnus-summary-reply-with-original
5544 @c @icon{gnus-summary-reply-with-original}
5545 Mail a reply to the author of the current article and include the
5546 original message (@code{gnus-summary-reply-with-original}). This
5547 command uses the process/prefix convention.
5550 @kindex S w (Summary)
5551 @findex gnus-summary-wide-reply
5552 Mail a wide reply to the author of the current article
5553 (@code{gnus-summary-wide-reply}). A @dfn{wide reply} is a reply that
5554 goes out to all people listed in the @code{To}, @code{From} (or
5555 @code{Reply-to}) and @code{Cc} headers. If @code{Mail-Followup-To} is
5556 present, that's used instead.
5559 @kindex S W (Summary)
5560 @findex gnus-summary-wide-reply-with-original
5561 Mail a wide reply to the current article and include the original
5562 message (@code{gnus-summary-wide-reply-with-original}). This command uses
5563 the process/prefix convention.
5566 @kindex S v (Summary)
5567 @findex gnus-summary-very-wide-reply
5568 Mail a very wide reply to the author of the current article
5569 (@code{gnus-summary-wide-reply}). A @dfn{very wide reply} is a reply
5570 that goes out to all people listed in the @code{To}, @code{From} (or
5571 @code{Reply-to}) and @code{Cc} headers in all the process/prefixed
5572 articles. This command uses the process/prefix convention.
5575 @kindex S V (Summary)
5576 @findex gnus-summary-very-wide-reply-with-original
5577 Mail a very wide reply to the author of the current article and include the
5578 original message (@code{gnus-summary-very-wide-reply-with-original}). This
5579 command uses the process/prefix convention.
5582 @kindex S B r (Summary)
5583 @findex gnus-summary-reply-broken-reply-to
5584 Mail a reply to the author of the current article but ignore the
5585 @code{Reply-To} field (@code{gnus-summary-reply-broken-reply-to}).
5586 If you need this because a mailing list incorrectly sets a
5587 @code{Reply-To} header pointing to the list, you probably want to set
5588 the @code{broken-reply-to} group parameter instead, so things will work
5589 correctly. @xref{Group Parameters}.
5592 @kindex S B R (Summary)
5593 @findex gnus-summary-reply-broken-reply-to-with-original
5594 Mail a reply to the author of the current article and include the
5595 original message but ignore the @code{Reply-To} field
5596 (@code{gnus-summary-reply-broken-reply-to-with-original}).
5600 @kindex S o m (Summary)
5601 @kindex C-c C-f (Summary)
5602 @findex gnus-summary-mail-forward
5603 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-forward}
5604 Forward the current article to some other person
5605 (@code{gnus-summary-mail-forward}). If no prefix is given, the message
5606 is forwarded according to the value of (@code{message-forward-as-mime})
5607 and (@code{message-forward-show-mml}); if the prefix is 1, decode the
5608 message and forward directly inline; if the prefix is 2, forward message
5609 as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME} section; if the prefix is 3, decode message and
5610 forward as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME} section; if the prefix is 4, forward message
5611 directly inline; otherwise, the message is forwarded as no prefix given
5612 but use the flipped value of (@code{message-forward-as-mime}). By
5613 default, the message is decoded and forwarded as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME}
5619 @kindex S m (Summary)
5620 @findex gnus-summary-mail-other-window
5621 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-originate}
5622 Prepare a mail (@code{gnus-summary-mail-other-window}). By default, use
5623 the posting style of the current group. If given a prefix, disable that.
5624 If the prefix is 1, prompt for a group name to find the posting style.
5629 @kindex S i (Summary)
5630 @findex gnus-summary-news-other-window
5631 Prepare a news (@code{gnus-summary-news-other-window}). By default,
5632 post to the current group. If given a prefix, disable that. If the
5633 prefix is 1, prompt for a group to post to.
5635 This function actually prepares a news even when using mail groups.
5636 This is useful for ``posting'' messages to mail groups without actually
5637 sending them over the network: they're just saved directly to the group
5638 in question. The corresponding back end must have a request-post method
5639 for this to work though.
5642 @kindex S D b (Summary)
5643 @findex gnus-summary-resend-bounced-mail
5644 @cindex bouncing mail
5645 If you have sent a mail, but the mail was bounced back to you for some
5646 reason (wrong address, transient failure), you can use this command to
5647 resend that bounced mail (@code{gnus-summary-resend-bounced-mail}). You
5648 will be popped into a mail buffer where you can edit the headers before
5649 sending the mail off again. If you give a prefix to this command, and
5650 the bounced mail is a reply to some other mail, Gnus will try to fetch
5651 that mail and display it for easy perusal of its headers. This might
5652 very well fail, though.
5655 @kindex S D r (Summary)
5656 @findex gnus-summary-resend-message
5657 Not to be confused with the previous command,
5658 @code{gnus-summary-resend-message} will prompt you for an address to
5659 send the current message off to, and then send it to that place. The
5660 headers of the message won't be altered---but lots of headers that say
5661 @code{Resent-To}, @code{Resent-From} and so on will be added. This
5662 means that you actually send a mail to someone that has a @code{To}
5663 header that (probably) points to yourself. This will confuse people.
5664 So, natcherly you'll only do that if you're really eVIl.
5666 This command is mainly used if you have several accounts and want to
5667 ship a mail to a different account of yours. (If you're both
5668 @code{root} and @code{postmaster} and get a mail for @code{postmaster}
5669 to the @code{root} account, you may want to resend it to
5670 @code{postmaster}. Ordnung muss sein!
5672 This command understands the process/prefix convention
5673 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
5676 @kindex S D e (Summary)
5677 @findex gnus-summary-resend-message-edit
5679 Like the previous command, but will allow you to edit the message as
5680 if it were a new message before resending.
5683 @kindex S O m (Summary)
5684 @findex gnus-uu-digest-mail-forward
5685 Digest the current series (@pxref{Decoding Articles}) and forward the
5686 result using mail (@code{gnus-uu-digest-mail-forward}). This command
5687 uses the process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
5690 @kindex S M-c (Summary)
5691 @findex gnus-summary-mail-crosspost-complaint
5692 @cindex crossposting
5693 @cindex excessive crossposting
5694 Send a complaint about excessive crossposting to the author of the
5695 current article (@code{gnus-summary-mail-crosspost-complaint}).
5697 @findex gnus-crosspost-complaint
5698 This command is provided as a way to fight back against the current
5699 crossposting pandemic that's sweeping Usenet. It will compose a reply
5700 using the @code{gnus-crosspost-complaint} variable as a preamble. This
5701 command understands the process/prefix convention
5702 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}) and will prompt you before sending each mail.
5706 Also @xref{Header Commands, ,Header Commands, message, The Message
5707 Manual}, for more information.
5710 @node Summary Post Commands
5711 @subsection Summary Post Commands
5713 @cindex composing news
5715 Commands for posting a news article:
5721 @kindex S p (Summary)
5722 @findex gnus-summary-post-news
5723 @c @icon{gnus-summary-post-news}
5724 Prepare for posting an article (@code{gnus-summary-post-news}). By
5725 default, post to the current group. If given a prefix, disable that.
5726 If the prefix is 1, prompt for another group instead.
5731 @kindex S f (Summary)
5732 @findex gnus-summary-followup
5733 @c @icon{gnus-summary-followup}
5734 Post a followup to the current article (@code{gnus-summary-followup}).
5738 @kindex S F (Summary)
5740 @c @icon{gnus-summary-followup-with-original}
5741 @findex gnus-summary-followup-with-original
5742 Post a followup to the current article and include the original message
5743 (@code{gnus-summary-followup-with-original}). This command uses the
5744 process/prefix convention.
5747 @kindex S n (Summary)
5748 @findex gnus-summary-followup-to-mail
5749 Post a followup to the current article via news, even if you got the
5750 message through mail (@code{gnus-summary-followup-to-mail}).
5753 @kindex S N (Summary)
5754 @findex gnus-summary-followup-to-mail-with-original
5755 Post a followup to the current article via news, even if you got the
5756 message through mail and include the original message
5757 (@code{gnus-summary-followup-to-mail-with-original}). This command uses
5758 the process/prefix convention.
5761 @kindex S o p (Summary)
5762 @findex gnus-summary-post-forward
5763 Forward the current article to a newsgroup
5764 (@code{gnus-summary-post-forward}).
5765 If no prefix is given, the message is forwarded according to the value
5766 of (@code{message-forward-as-mime}) and
5767 (@code{message-forward-show-mml}); if the prefix is 1, decode the
5768 message and forward directly inline; if the prefix is 2, forward message
5769 as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME} section; if the prefix is 3, decode message and
5770 forward as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME} section; if the prefix is 4, forward message
5771 directly inline; otherwise, the message is forwarded as no prefix given
5772 but use the flipped value of (@code{message-forward-as-mime}). By
5773 default, the message is decoded and forwarded as an rfc822 @acronym{MIME} section.
5776 @kindex S O p (Summary)
5777 @findex gnus-uu-digest-post-forward
5779 @cindex making digests
5780 Digest the current series and forward the result to a newsgroup
5781 (@code{gnus-uu-digest-post-forward}). This command uses the
5782 process/prefix convention.
5785 @kindex S u (Summary)
5786 @findex gnus-uu-post-news
5787 @c @icon{gnus-uu-post-news}
5788 Uuencode a file, split it into parts, and post it as a series
5789 (@code{gnus-uu-post-news}). (@pxref{Uuencoding and Posting}).
5792 Also @xref{Header Commands, ,Header Commands, message, The Message
5793 Manual}, for more information.
5796 @node Summary Message Commands
5797 @subsection Summary Message Commands
5801 @kindex S y (Summary)
5802 @findex gnus-summary-yank-message
5803 Yank the current article into an already existing Message composition
5804 buffer (@code{gnus-summary-yank-message}). This command prompts for
5805 what message buffer you want to yank into, and understands the
5806 process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
5811 @node Canceling and Superseding
5812 @subsection Canceling Articles
5813 @cindex canceling articles
5814 @cindex superseding articles
5816 Have you ever written something, and then decided that you really,
5817 really, really wish you hadn't posted that?
5819 Well, you can't cancel mail, but you can cancel posts.
5821 @findex gnus-summary-cancel-article
5823 @c @icon{gnus-summary-cancel-article}
5824 Find the article you wish to cancel (you can only cancel your own
5825 articles, so don't try any funny stuff). Then press @kbd{C} or @kbd{S
5826 c} (@code{gnus-summary-cancel-article}). Your article will be
5827 canceled---machines all over the world will be deleting your article.
5828 This command uses the process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
5830 Be aware, however, that not all sites honor cancels, so your article may
5831 live on here and there, while most sites will delete the article in
5834 Gnus will use the ``current'' select method when canceling. If you
5835 want to use the standard posting method, use the @samp{a} symbolic
5836 prefix (@pxref{Symbolic Prefixes}).
5838 Gnus ensures that only you can cancel your own messages using a
5839 @code{Cancel-Lock} header (@pxref{Canceling News, Canceling News, ,
5840 message, Message Manual}).
5842 If you discover that you have made some mistakes and want to do some
5843 corrections, you can post a @dfn{superseding} article that will replace
5844 your original article.
5846 @findex gnus-summary-supersede-article
5848 Go to the original article and press @kbd{S s}
5849 (@code{gnus-summary-supersede-article}). You will be put in a buffer
5850 where you can edit the article all you want before sending it off the
5853 The same goes for superseding as for canceling, only more so: Some
5854 sites do not honor superseding. On those sites, it will appear that you
5855 have posted almost the same article twice.
5857 If you have just posted the article, and change your mind right away,
5858 there is a trick you can use to cancel/supersede the article without
5859 waiting for the article to appear on your site first. You simply return
5860 to the post buffer (which is called @code{*sent ...*}). There you will
5861 find the article you just posted, with all the headers intact. Change
5862 the @code{Message-ID} header to a @code{Cancel} or @code{Supersedes}
5863 header by substituting one of those words for the word
5864 @code{Message-ID}. Then just press @kbd{C-c C-c} to send the article as
5865 you would do normally. The previous article will be
5866 canceled/superseded.
5868 Just remember, kids: There is no 'c' in 'supersede'.
5870 @node Delayed Articles
5871 @section Delayed Articles
5872 @cindex delayed sending
5873 @cindex send delayed
5875 Sometimes, you might wish to delay the sending of a message. For
5876 example, you might wish to arrange for a message to turn up just in time
5877 to remind your about the birthday of your Significant Other. For this,
5878 there is the @code{gnus-delay} package. Setup is simple:
5881 (gnus-delay-initialize)
5884 @findex gnus-delay-article
5885 Normally, to send a message you use the @kbd{C-c C-c} command from
5886 Message mode. To delay a message, use @kbd{C-c C-j}
5887 (@code{gnus-delay-article}) instead. This will ask you for how long the
5888 message should be delayed. Possible answers are:
5892 A time span. Consists of an integer and a letter. For example,
5893 @code{42d} means to delay for 42 days. Available letters are @code{m}
5894 (minutes), @code{h} (hours), @code{d} (days), @code{w} (weeks), @code{M}
5895 (months) and @code{Y} (years).
5898 A specific date. Looks like @code{YYYY-MM-DD}. The message will be
5899 delayed until that day, at a specific time (eight o'clock by default).
5900 See also @code{gnus-delay-default-hour}.
5903 A specific time of day. Given in @code{hh:mm} format, 24h, no am/pm
5904 stuff. The deadline will be at that time today, except if that time has
5905 already passed, then it's at the given time tomorrow. So if it's ten
5906 o'clock in the morning and you specify @code{11:15}, then the deadline
5907 is one hour and fifteen minutes hence. But if you specify @code{9:20},
5908 that means a time tomorrow.
5911 The action of the @code{gnus-delay-article} command is influenced by a
5912 couple of variables:
5915 @item gnus-delay-default-hour
5916 @vindex gnus-delay-default-hour
5917 When you specify a specific date, the message will be due on that hour
5918 on the given date. Possible values are integers 0 through 23.
5920 @item gnus-delay-default-delay
5921 @vindex gnus-delay-default-delay
5922 This is a string and gives the default delay. It can be of any of the
5923 formats described above.
5925 @item gnus-delay-group
5926 @vindex gnus-delay-group
5927 Delayed articles will be kept in this group on the drafts server until
5928 they are due. You probably don't need to change this. The default
5929 value is @code{"delayed"}.
5931 @item gnus-delay-header
5932 @vindex gnus-delay-header
5933 The deadline for each article will be stored in a header. This variable
5934 is a string and gives the header name. You probably don't need to
5935 change this. The default value is @code{"X-Gnus-Delayed"}.
5938 The way delaying works is like this: when you use the
5939 @code{gnus-delay-article} command, you give a certain delay. Gnus
5940 calculates the deadline of the message and stores it in the
5941 @code{X-Gnus-Delayed} header and puts the message in the
5942 @code{nndraft:delayed} group.
5944 @findex gnus-delay-send-queue
5945 And whenever you get new news, Gnus looks through the group for articles
5946 which are due and sends them. It uses the @code{gnus-delay-send-queue}
5947 function for this. By default, this function is added to the hook
5948 @code{gnus-get-new-news-hook}. But of course, you can change this.
5949 Maybe you want to use the demon to send drafts? Just tell the demon to
5950 execute the @code{gnus-delay-send-queue} function.
5953 @item gnus-delay-initialize
5954 @findex gnus-delay-initialize
5955 By default, this function installs @code{gnus-delay-send-queue} in
5956 @code{gnus-get-new-news-hook}. But it accepts the optional second
5957 argument @code{no-check}. If it is non-@code{nil},
5958 @code{gnus-get-new-news-hook} is not changed. The optional first
5959 argument is ignored.
5961 For example, @code{(gnus-delay-initialize nil t)} means to do nothing.
5962 Presumably, you want to use the demon for sending due delayed articles.
5963 Just don't forget to set that up :-)
5967 @node Marking Articles
5968 @section Marking Articles
5969 @cindex article marking
5970 @cindex article ticking
5973 There are several marks you can set on an article.
5975 You have marks that decide the @dfn{readedness} (whoo, neato-keano
5976 neologism ohoy!) of the article. Alphabetic marks generally mean
5977 @dfn{read}, while non-alphabetic characters generally mean @dfn{unread}.
5979 In addition, you also have marks that do not affect readedness.
5982 There's a plethora of commands for manipulating these marks.
5986 * Unread Articles:: Marks for unread articles.
5987 * Read Articles:: Marks for read articles.
5988 * Other Marks:: Marks that do not affect readedness.
5989 * Setting Marks:: How to set and remove marks.
5990 * Generic Marking Commands:: How to customize the marking.
5991 * Setting Process Marks:: How to mark articles for later processing.
5995 @node Unread Articles
5996 @subsection Unread Articles
5998 The following marks mark articles as (kinda) unread, in one form or
6003 @vindex gnus-ticked-mark
6004 Marked as ticked (@code{gnus-ticked-mark}).
6006 @dfn{Ticked articles} are articles that will remain visible always. If
6007 you see an article that you find interesting, or you want to put off
6008 reading it, or replying to it, until sometime later, you'd typically
6009 tick it. However, articles can be expired (from news servers by the
6010 news server software, Gnus itself never expires ticked messages), so if
6011 you want to keep an article forever, you'll have to make it persistent
6012 (@pxref{Persistent Articles}).
6015 @vindex gnus-dormant-mark
6016 Marked as dormant (@code{gnus-dormant-mark}).
6018 @dfn{Dormant articles} will only appear in the summary buffer if there
6019 are followups to it. If you want to see them even if they don't have
6020 followups, you can use the @kbd{/ D} command (@pxref{Limiting}).
6021 Otherwise (except for the visibility issue), they are just like ticked
6025 @vindex gnus-unread-mark
6026 Marked as unread (@code{gnus-unread-mark}).
6028 @dfn{Unread articles} are articles that haven't been read at all yet.
6033 @subsection Read Articles
6034 @cindex expirable mark
6036 All the following marks mark articles as read.
6041 @vindex gnus-del-mark
6042 These are articles that the user has marked as read with the @kbd{d}
6043 command manually, more or less (@code{gnus-del-mark}).
6046 @vindex gnus-read-mark
6047 Articles that have actually been read (@code{gnus-read-mark}).
6050 @vindex gnus-ancient-mark
6051 Articles that were marked as read in previous sessions and are now
6052 @dfn{old} (@code{gnus-ancient-mark}).
6055 @vindex gnus-killed-mark
6056 Marked as killed (@code{gnus-killed-mark}).
6059 @vindex gnus-kill-file-mark
6060 Marked as killed by kill files (@code{gnus-kill-file-mark}).
6063 @vindex gnus-low-score-mark
6064 Marked as read by having too low a score (@code{gnus-low-score-mark}).
6067 @vindex gnus-catchup-mark
6068 Marked as read by a catchup (@code{gnus-catchup-mark}).
6071 @vindex gnus-canceled-mark
6072 Canceled article (@code{gnus-canceled-mark})
6075 @vindex gnus-souped-mark
6076 @sc{soup}ed article (@code{gnus-souped-mark}). @xref{SOUP}.
6079 @vindex gnus-sparse-mark
6080 Sparsely reffed article (@code{gnus-sparse-mark}). @xref{Customizing
6084 @vindex gnus-duplicate-mark
6085 Article marked as read by duplicate suppression
6086 (@code{gnus-duplicate-mark}). @xref{Duplicate Suppression}.
6090 All these marks just mean that the article is marked as read, really.
6091 They are interpreted differently when doing adaptive scoring, though.
6093 One more special mark, though:
6097 @vindex gnus-expirable-mark
6098 Marked as expirable (@code{gnus-expirable-mark}).
6100 Marking articles as @dfn{expirable} (or have them marked as such
6101 automatically) doesn't make much sense in normal groups---a user doesn't
6102 control expiring of news articles, but in mail groups, for instance,
6103 articles marked as @dfn{expirable} can be deleted by Gnus at
6109 @subsection Other Marks
6110 @cindex process mark
6113 There are some marks that have nothing to do with whether the article is
6119 You can set a bookmark in the current article. Say you are reading a
6120 long thesis on cats' urinary tracts, and have to go home for dinner
6121 before you've finished reading the thesis. You can then set a bookmark
6122 in the article, and Gnus will jump to this bookmark the next time it
6123 encounters the article. @xref{Setting Marks}.
6126 @vindex gnus-replied-mark
6127 All articles that you have replied to or made a followup to (i.e., have
6128 answered) will be marked with an @samp{A} in the second column
6129 (@code{gnus-replied-mark}).
6132 @vindex gnus-forwarded-mark
6133 All articles that you have forwarded will be marked with an @samp{F} in
6134 the second column (@code{gnus-forwarded-mark}).
6137 @vindex gnus-cached-mark
6138 Articles stored in the article cache will be marked with an @samp{*} in
6139 the second column (@code{gnus-cached-mark}). @xref{Article Caching}.
6142 @vindex gnus-saved-mark
6143 Articles ``saved'' (in some manner or other; not necessarily
6144 religiously) are marked with an @samp{S} in the second column
6145 (@code{gnus-saved-mark}).
6148 @vindex gnus-recent-mark
6149 Articles that according to the server haven't been shown to the user
6150 before are marked with a @samp{N} in the second column
6151 (@code{gnus-recent-mark}). Note that not all servers support this
6152 mark, in which case it simply never appears. Compare with
6153 @code{gnus-unseen-mark}.
6156 @vindex gnus-unseen-mark
6157 Articles that haven't been seen before in Gnus by the user are marked
6158 with a @samp{.} in the second column (@code{gnus-unseen-mark}).
6159 Compare with @code{gnus-recent-mark}.
6162 @vindex gnus-downloaded-mark
6163 When using the Gnus agent (@pxref{Agent Basics}), articles may be
6164 downloaded for unplugged (offline) viewing. If you are using the
6165 @samp{%O} spec, these articles get the @samp{+} mark in that spec.
6166 (The variable @code{gnus-downloaded-mark} controls which character to
6170 @vindex gnus-undownloaded-mark
6171 When using the Gnus agent (@pxref{Agent Basics}), some articles might
6172 not have been downloaded. Such articles cannot be viewed while you
6173 are unplugged (offline). If you are using the @samp{%O} spec, these
6174 articles get the @samp{-} mark in that spec. (The variable
6175 @code{gnus-undownloaded-mark} controls which character to use.)
6178 @vindex gnus-downloadable-mark
6179 The Gnus agent (@pxref{Agent Basics}) downloads some articles
6180 automatically, but it is also possible to explicitly mark articles for
6181 download, even if they would not be downloaded automatically. Such
6182 explicitly-marked articles get the @samp{%} mark in the first column.
6183 (The variable @code{gnus-downloadable-mark} controls which character to
6187 @vindex gnus-not-empty-thread-mark
6188 @vindex gnus-empty-thread-mark
6189 If the @samp{%e} spec is used, the presence of threads or not will be
6190 marked with @code{gnus-not-empty-thread-mark} and
6191 @code{gnus-empty-thread-mark} in the third column, respectively.
6194 @vindex gnus-process-mark
6195 Finally we have the @dfn{process mark} (@code{gnus-process-mark}). A
6196 variety of commands react to the presence of the process mark. For
6197 instance, @kbd{X u} (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu}) will uudecode and view
6198 all articles that have been marked with the process mark. Articles
6199 marked with the process mark have a @samp{#} in the second column.
6203 You might have noticed that most of these ``non-readedness'' marks
6204 appear in the second column by default. So if you have a cached, saved,
6205 replied article that you have process-marked, what will that look like?
6207 Nothing much. The precedence rules go as follows: process -> cache ->
6208 replied -> saved. So if the article is in the cache and is replied,
6209 you'll only see the cache mark and not the replied mark.
6213 @subsection Setting Marks
6214 @cindex setting marks
6216 All the marking commands understand the numeric prefix.
6221 @kindex M c (Summary)
6222 @kindex M-u (Summary)
6223 @findex gnus-summary-clear-mark-forward
6224 @cindex mark as unread
6225 Clear all readedness-marks from the current article
6226 (@code{gnus-summary-clear-mark-forward}). In other words, mark the
6232 @kindex M t (Summary)
6233 @findex gnus-summary-tick-article-forward
6234 Tick the current article (@code{gnus-summary-tick-article-forward}).
6235 @xref{Article Caching}.
6240 @kindex M ? (Summary)
6241 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-dormant
6242 Mark the current article as dormant
6243 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-dormant}). @xref{Article Caching}.
6247 @kindex M d (Summary)
6249 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-read-forward
6250 Mark the current article as read
6251 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-read-forward}).
6255 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-read-backward
6256 Mark the current article as read and move point to the previous line
6257 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-read-backward}).
6262 @kindex M k (Summary)
6263 @findex gnus-summary-kill-same-subject-and-select
6264 Mark all articles that have the same subject as the current one as read,
6265 and then select the next unread article
6266 (@code{gnus-summary-kill-same-subject-and-select}).
6270 @kindex M K (Summary)
6271 @kindex C-k (Summary)
6272 @findex gnus-summary-kill-same-subject
6273 Mark all articles that have the same subject as the current one as read
6274 (@code{gnus-summary-kill-same-subject}).
6277 @kindex M C (Summary)
6278 @findex gnus-summary-catchup
6279 @c @icon{gnus-summary-catchup}
6280 Mark all unread articles as read (@code{gnus-summary-catchup}).
6283 @kindex M C-c (Summary)
6284 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-all
6285 Mark all articles in the group as read---even the ticked and dormant
6286 articles (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-all}).
6289 @kindex M H (Summary)
6290 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-to-here
6291 Catchup the current group to point (before the point)
6292 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-to-here}).
6295 @kindex M h (Summary)
6296 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-from-here
6297 Catchup the current group from point (after the point)
6298 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-from-here}).
6301 @kindex C-w (Summary)
6302 @findex gnus-summary-mark-region-as-read
6303 Mark all articles between point and mark as read
6304 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-region-as-read}).
6307 @kindex M V k (Summary)
6308 @findex gnus-summary-kill-below
6309 Kill all articles with scores below the default score (or below the
6310 numeric prefix) (@code{gnus-summary-kill-below}).
6314 @kindex M e (Summary)
6316 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-expirable
6317 Mark the current article as expirable
6318 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-expirable}).
6321 @kindex M b (Summary)
6322 @findex gnus-summary-set-bookmark
6323 Set a bookmark in the current article
6324 (@code{gnus-summary-set-bookmark}).
6327 @kindex M B (Summary)
6328 @findex gnus-summary-remove-bookmark
6329 Remove the bookmark from the current article
6330 (@code{gnus-summary-remove-bookmark}).
6333 @kindex M V c (Summary)
6334 @findex gnus-summary-clear-above
6335 Clear all marks from articles with scores over the default score (or
6336 over the numeric prefix) (@code{gnus-summary-clear-above}).
6339 @kindex M V u (Summary)
6340 @findex gnus-summary-tick-above
6341 Tick all articles with scores over the default score (or over the
6342 numeric prefix) (@code{gnus-summary-tick-above}).
6345 @kindex M V m (Summary)
6346 @findex gnus-summary-mark-above
6347 Prompt for a mark, and mark all articles with scores over the default
6348 score (or over the numeric prefix) with this mark
6349 (@code{gnus-summary-clear-above}).
6352 @vindex gnus-summary-goto-unread
6353 The @code{gnus-summary-goto-unread} variable controls what action should
6354 be taken after setting a mark. If non-@code{nil}, point will move to
6355 the next/previous unread article. If @code{nil}, point will just move
6356 one line up or down. As a special case, if this variable is
6357 @code{never}, all the marking commands as well as other commands (like
6358 @kbd{SPACE}) will move to the next article, whether it is unread or not.
6359 The default is @code{t}.
6362 @node Generic Marking Commands
6363 @subsection Generic Marking Commands
6365 Some people would like the command that ticks an article (@kbd{!}) go to
6366 the next article. Others would like it to go to the next unread
6367 article. Yet others would like it to stay on the current article. And
6368 even though I haven't heard of anybody wanting it to go to the
6369 previous (unread) article, I'm sure there are people that want that as
6372 Multiply these five behaviors with five different marking commands, and
6373 you get a potentially complex set of variable to control what each
6376 To sidestep that mess, Gnus provides commands that do all these
6377 different things. They can be found on the @kbd{M M} map in the summary
6378 buffer. Type @kbd{M M C-h} to see them all---there are too many of them
6379 to list in this manual.
6381 While you can use these commands directly, most users would prefer
6382 altering the summary mode keymap. For instance, if you would like the
6383 @kbd{!} command to go to the next article instead of the next unread
6384 article, you could say something like:
6388 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'my-alter-summary-map)
6389 (defun my-alter-summary-map ()
6390 (local-set-key "!" 'gnus-summary-put-mark-as-ticked-next))
6398 (defun my-alter-summary-map ()
6399 (local-set-key "!" "MM!n"))
6403 @node Setting Process Marks
6404 @subsection Setting Process Marks
6405 @cindex setting process marks
6407 Process marks are displayed as @code{#} in the summary buffer, and are
6408 used for marking articles in such a way that other commands will
6409 process these articles. For instance, if you process mark four
6410 articles and then use the @kbd{*} command, Gnus will enter these four
6411 articles into the cache. For more information,
6412 @pxref{Process/Prefix}.
6419 @kindex M P p (Summary)
6420 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-processable
6421 Mark the current article with the process mark
6422 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-processable}).
6423 @findex gnus-summary-unmark-as-processable
6427 @kindex M P u (Summary)
6428 @kindex M-# (Summary)
6429 Remove the process mark, if any, from the current article
6430 (@code{gnus-summary-unmark-as-processable}).
6433 @kindex M P U (Summary)
6434 @findex gnus-summary-unmark-all-processable
6435 Remove the process mark from all articles
6436 (@code{gnus-summary-unmark-all-processable}).
6439 @kindex M P i (Summary)
6440 @findex gnus-uu-invert-processable
6441 Invert the list of process marked articles
6442 (@code{gnus-uu-invert-processable}).
6445 @kindex M P R (Summary)
6446 @findex gnus-uu-mark-by-regexp
6447 Mark articles that have a @code{Subject} header that matches a regular
6448 expression (@code{gnus-uu-mark-by-regexp}).
6451 @kindex M P G (Summary)
6452 @findex gnus-uu-unmark-by-regexp
6453 Unmark articles that have a @code{Subject} header that matches a regular
6454 expression (@code{gnus-uu-unmark-by-regexp}).
6457 @kindex M P r (Summary)
6458 @findex gnus-uu-mark-region
6459 Mark articles in region (@code{gnus-uu-mark-region}).
6462 @kindex M P g (Summary)
6463 @findex gnus-uu-unmark-region
6464 Unmark articles in region (@code{gnus-uu-unmark-region}).
6467 @kindex M P t (Summary)
6468 @findex gnus-uu-mark-thread
6469 Mark all articles in the current (sub)thread
6470 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-thread}).
6473 @kindex M P T (Summary)
6474 @findex gnus-uu-unmark-thread
6475 Unmark all articles in the current (sub)thread
6476 (@code{gnus-uu-unmark-thread}).
6479 @kindex M P v (Summary)
6480 @findex gnus-uu-mark-over
6481 Mark all articles that have a score above the prefix argument
6482 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-over}).
6485 @kindex M P s (Summary)
6486 @findex gnus-uu-mark-series
6487 Mark all articles in the current series (@code{gnus-uu-mark-series}).
6490 @kindex M P S (Summary)
6491 @findex gnus-uu-mark-sparse
6492 Mark all series that have already had some articles marked
6493 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-sparse}).
6496 @kindex M P a (Summary)
6497 @findex gnus-uu-mark-all
6498 Mark all articles in series order (@code{gnus-uu-mark-all}).
6501 @kindex M P b (Summary)
6502 @findex gnus-uu-mark-buffer
6503 Mark all articles in the buffer in the order they appear
6504 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-buffer}).
6507 @kindex M P k (Summary)
6508 @findex gnus-summary-kill-process-mark
6509 Push the current process mark set onto the stack and unmark all articles
6510 (@code{gnus-summary-kill-process-mark}).
6513 @kindex M P y (Summary)
6514 @findex gnus-summary-yank-process-mark
6515 Pop the previous process mark set from the stack and restore it
6516 (@code{gnus-summary-yank-process-mark}).
6519 @kindex M P w (Summary)
6520 @findex gnus-summary-save-process-mark
6521 Push the current process mark set onto the stack
6522 (@code{gnus-summary-save-process-mark}).
6526 Also see the @kbd{&} command in @ref{Searching for Articles}, for how to
6527 set process marks based on article body contents.
6534 It can be convenient to limit the summary buffer to just show some
6535 subset of the articles currently in the group. The effect most limit
6536 commands have is to remove a few (or many) articles from the summary
6539 All limiting commands work on subsets of the articles already fetched
6540 from the servers. None of these commands query the server for
6541 additional articles.
6547 @kindex / / (Summary)
6548 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-subject
6549 Limit the summary buffer to articles that match some subject
6550 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-subject}). If given a prefix, exclude
6554 @kindex / a (Summary)
6555 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-author
6556 Limit the summary buffer to articles that match some author
6557 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-author}). If given a prefix, exclude
6561 @kindex / R (Summary)
6562 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-recipient
6563 Limit the summary buffer to articles that match some recipient
6564 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-recipient}). If given a prefix, exclude
6568 @kindex / A (Summary)
6569 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-address
6570 Limit the summary buffer to articles in which contents of From, To or Cc
6571 header match a given address (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-address}). If
6572 given a prefix, exclude matching articles.
6575 @kindex / S (Summary)
6576 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-singletons
6577 Limit the summary buffer to articles that aren't part of any displayed
6578 threads (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-singletons}). If given a prefix,
6579 limit to articles that are part of displayed threads.
6582 @kindex / x (Summary)
6583 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-extra
6584 Limit the summary buffer to articles that match one of the ``extra''
6585 headers (@pxref{To From Newsgroups})
6586 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-extra}). If given a prefix, exclude
6591 @kindex / u (Summary)
6593 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-unread
6594 Limit the summary buffer to articles not marked as read
6595 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-unread}). If given a prefix, limit the
6596 buffer to articles strictly unread. This means that ticked and
6597 dormant articles will also be excluded.
6600 @kindex / m (Summary)
6601 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-marks
6602 Ask for a mark and then limit to all articles that have been marked
6603 with that mark (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-marks}).
6606 @kindex / t (Summary)
6607 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-age
6608 Ask for a number and then limit the summary buffer to articles older than (or equal to) that number of days
6609 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-age}). If given a prefix, limit to
6610 articles younger than that number of days.
6613 @kindex / n (Summary)
6614 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-articles
6615 With prefix @samp{n}, limit the summary buffer to the next @samp{n}
6616 articles. If not given a prefix, use the process marked articles
6617 instead. (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-articles}).
6620 @kindex / w (Summary)
6621 @findex gnus-summary-pop-limit
6622 Pop the previous limit off the stack and restore it
6623 (@code{gnus-summary-pop-limit}). If given a prefix, pop all limits off
6627 @kindex / . (Summary)
6628 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-unseen
6629 Limit the summary buffer to the unseen articles
6630 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-unseen}).
6633 @kindex / v (Summary)
6634 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-score
6635 Limit the summary buffer to articles that have a score at or above some
6636 score (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-score}).
6639 @kindex / p (Summary)
6640 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-display-predicate
6641 Limit the summary buffer to articles that satisfy the @code{display}
6642 group parameter predicate
6643 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-display-predicate}). @xref{Group
6644 Parameters}, for more on this predicate.
6647 @kindex / r (Summary)
6648 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-replied
6649 Limit the summary buffer to replied articles
6650 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-replied}). If given a prefix, exclude
6655 @kindex M S (Summary)
6656 @kindex / E (Summary)
6657 @findex gnus-summary-limit-include-expunged
6658 Include all expunged articles in the limit
6659 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-include-expunged}).
6662 @kindex / D (Summary)
6663 @findex gnus-summary-limit-include-dormant
6664 Include all dormant articles in the limit
6665 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-include-dormant}).
6668 @kindex / * (Summary)
6669 @findex gnus-summary-limit-include-cached
6670 Include all cached articles in the limit
6671 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-include-cached}).
6674 @kindex / d (Summary)
6675 @findex gnus-summary-limit-exclude-dormant
6676 Exclude all dormant articles from the limit
6677 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-exclude-dormant}).
6680 @kindex / M (Summary)
6681 @findex gnus-summary-limit-exclude-marks
6682 Exclude all marked articles (@code{gnus-summary-limit-exclude-marks}).
6685 @kindex / T (Summary)
6686 @findex gnus-summary-limit-include-thread
6687 Include all the articles in the current thread in the limit.
6690 @kindex / c (Summary)
6691 @findex gnus-summary-limit-exclude-childless-dormant
6692 Exclude all dormant articles that have no children from the limit@*
6693 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-exclude-childless-dormant}).
6696 @kindex / C (Summary)
6697 @findex gnus-summary-limit-mark-excluded-as-read
6698 Mark all excluded unread articles as read
6699 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-mark-excluded-as-read}). If given a prefix,
6700 also mark excluded ticked and dormant articles as read.
6703 @kindex / N (Summary)
6704 @findex gnus-summary-insert-new-articles
6705 Insert all new articles in the summary buffer. It scans for new emails
6706 if @var{back-end}@code{-get-new-mail} is non-@code{nil}.
6709 @kindex / o (Summary)
6710 @findex gnus-summary-insert-old-articles
6711 Insert all old articles in the summary buffer. If given a numbered
6712 prefix, fetch this number of articles.
6715 @kindex / b (Summary)
6716 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-bodies
6717 Limit the summary buffer to articles that have bodies that match a
6718 certain regexp (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-bodies}). If given a
6719 prefix, reverse the limit. This command is quite slow since it
6720 requires selecting each article to find the matches.
6723 @kindex / h (Summary)
6724 @findex gnus-summary-limit-to-headers
6725 Like the previous command, only limit to headers instead
6726 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-headers}).
6734 @cindex article threading
6736 Gnus threads articles by default. @dfn{To thread} is to put responses
6737 to articles directly after the articles they respond to---in a
6738 hierarchical fashion.
6740 Threading is done by looking at the @code{References} headers of the
6741 articles. In a perfect world, this would be enough to build pretty
6742 trees, but unfortunately, the @code{References} header is often broken
6743 or simply missing. Weird news propagation exacerbates the problem,
6744 so one has to employ other heuristics to get pleasing results. A
6745 plethora of approaches exists, as detailed in horrible detail in
6746 @ref{Customizing Threading}.
6748 First, a quick overview of the concepts:
6752 The top-most article in a thread; the first article in the thread.
6755 A tree-like article structure.
6758 A small(er) section of this tree-like structure.
6761 Threads often lose their roots due to article expiry, or due to the root
6762 already having been read in a previous session, and not displayed in the
6763 summary buffer. We then typically have many sub-threads that really
6764 belong to one thread, but are without connecting roots. These are
6765 called loose threads.
6767 @item thread gathering
6768 An attempt to gather loose threads into bigger threads.
6770 @item sparse threads
6771 A thread where the missing articles have been ``guessed'' at, and are
6772 displayed as empty lines in the summary buffer.
6778 * Customizing Threading:: Variables you can change to affect the threading.
6779 * Thread Commands:: Thread based commands in the summary buffer.
6783 @node Customizing Threading
6784 @subsection Customizing Threading
6785 @cindex customizing threading
6788 * Loose Threads:: How Gnus gathers loose threads into bigger threads.
6789 * Filling In Threads:: Making the threads displayed look fuller.
6790 * More Threading:: Even more variables for fiddling with threads.
6791 * Low-Level Threading:: You thought it was over@dots{} but you were wrong!
6796 @subsubsection Loose Threads
6799 @cindex loose threads
6802 @item gnus-summary-make-false-root
6803 @vindex gnus-summary-make-false-root
6804 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus will gather all loose subtrees into one big tree
6805 and create a dummy root at the top. (Wait a minute. Root at the top?
6806 Yup.) Loose subtrees occur when the real root has expired, or you've
6807 read or killed the root in a previous session.
6809 When there is no real root of a thread, Gnus will have to fudge
6810 something. This variable says what fudging method Gnus should use.
6811 There are four possible values:
6815 \gnusfigure{The Summary Buffer}{390}{
6816 \put(0,0){\epsfig{figure=ps/summary-adopt,width=7.5cm}}
6817 \put(445,0){\makebox(0,0)[br]{\epsfig{figure=ps/summary-empty,width=7.5cm}}}
6818 \put(0,400){\makebox(0,0)[tl]{\epsfig{figure=ps/summary-none,width=7.5cm}}}
6819 \put(445,400){\makebox(0,0)[tr]{\epsfig{figure=ps/summary-dummy,width=7.5cm}}}
6824 @cindex adopting articles
6829 Gnus will make the first of the orphaned articles the parent. This
6830 parent will adopt all the other articles. The adopted articles will be
6831 marked as such by pointy brackets (@samp{<>}) instead of the standard
6832 square brackets (@samp{[]}). This is the default method.
6835 @vindex gnus-summary-dummy-line-format
6836 @vindex gnus-summary-make-false-root-always
6837 Gnus will create a dummy summary line that will pretend to be the
6838 parent. This dummy line does not correspond to any real article, so
6839 selecting it will just select the first real article after the dummy
6840 article. @code{gnus-summary-dummy-line-format} is used to specify the
6841 format of the dummy roots. It accepts only one format spec: @samp{S},
6842 which is the subject of the article. @xref{Formatting Variables}.
6843 If you want all threads to have a dummy root, even the non-gathered
6844 ones, set @code{gnus-summary-make-false-root-always} to @code{t}.
6847 Gnus won't actually make any article the parent, but simply leave the
6848 subject field of all orphans except the first empty. (Actually, it will
6849 use @code{gnus-summary-same-subject} as the subject (@pxref{Summary
6853 Don't make any article parent at all. Just gather the threads and
6854 display them after one another.
6857 Don't gather loose threads.
6860 @item gnus-summary-gather-subject-limit
6861 @vindex gnus-summary-gather-subject-limit
6862 Loose threads are gathered by comparing subjects of articles. If this
6863 variable is @code{nil}, Gnus requires an exact match between the
6864 subjects of the loose threads before gathering them into one big
6865 super-thread. This might be too strict a requirement, what with the
6866 presence of stupid newsreaders that chop off long subject lines. If
6867 you think so, set this variable to, say, 20 to require that only the
6868 first 20 characters of the subjects have to match. If you set this
6869 variable to a really low number, you'll find that Gnus will gather
6870 everything in sight into one thread, which isn't very helpful.
6872 @cindex fuzzy article gathering
6873 If you set this variable to the special value @code{fuzzy}, Gnus will
6874 use a fuzzy string comparison algorithm on the subjects (@pxref{Fuzzy
6877 @item gnus-simplify-subject-fuzzy-regexp
6878 @vindex gnus-simplify-subject-fuzzy-regexp
6879 This can either be a regular expression or list of regular expressions
6880 that match strings that will be removed from subjects if fuzzy subject
6881 simplification is used.
6883 @item gnus-simplify-ignored-prefixes
6884 @vindex gnus-simplify-ignored-prefixes
6885 If you set @code{gnus-summary-gather-subject-limit} to something as low
6886 as 10, you might consider setting this variable to something sensible:
6888 @c Written by Michael Ernst <mernst@cs.rice.edu>
6890 (setq gnus-simplify-ignored-prefixes
6896 "wanted" "followup" "summary\\( of\\)?"
6897 "help" "query" "problem" "question"
6898 "answer" "reference" "announce"
6899 "How can I" "How to" "Comparison of"
6904 (mapconcat 'identity
6905 '("for" "for reference" "with" "about")
6907 "\\)?\\]?:?[ \t]*"))
6910 All words that match this regexp will be removed before comparing two
6913 @item gnus-simplify-subject-functions
6914 @vindex gnus-simplify-subject-functions
6915 If non-@code{nil}, this variable overrides
6916 @code{gnus-summary-gather-subject-limit}. This variable should be a
6917 list of functions to apply to the @code{Subject} string iteratively to
6918 arrive at the simplified version of the string.
6920 Useful functions to put in this list include:
6923 @item gnus-simplify-subject-re
6924 @findex gnus-simplify-subject-re
6925 Strip the leading @samp{Re:}.
6927 @item gnus-simplify-subject-fuzzy
6928 @findex gnus-simplify-subject-fuzzy
6931 @item gnus-simplify-whitespace
6932 @findex gnus-simplify-whitespace
6933 Remove excessive whitespace.
6935 @item gnus-simplify-all-whitespace
6936 @findex gnus-simplify-all-whitespace
6937 Remove all whitespace.
6940 You may also write your own functions, of course.
6943 @item gnus-summary-gather-exclude-subject
6944 @vindex gnus-summary-gather-exclude-subject
6945 Since loose thread gathering is done on subjects only, that might lead
6946 to many false hits, especially with certain common subjects like
6947 @samp{} and @samp{(none)}. To make the situation slightly better,
6948 you can use the regexp @code{gnus-summary-gather-exclude-subject} to say
6949 what subjects should be excluded from the gathering process.@*
6950 The default is @samp{^ *$\\|^(none)$}.
6952 @item gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
6953 @vindex gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
6954 Gnus gathers threads by looking at @code{Subject} headers. This means
6955 that totally unrelated articles may end up in the same ``thread'', which
6956 is confusing. An alternate approach is to look at all the
6957 @code{Message-ID}s in all the @code{References} headers to find matches.
6958 This will ensure that no gathered threads ever include unrelated
6959 articles, but it also means that people who have posted with broken
6960 newsreaders won't be gathered properly. The choice is yours---plague or
6964 @item gnus-gather-threads-by-subject
6965 @findex gnus-gather-threads-by-subject
6966 This function is the default gathering function and looks at
6967 @code{Subject}s exclusively.
6969 @item gnus-gather-threads-by-references
6970 @findex gnus-gather-threads-by-references
6971 This function looks at @code{References} headers exclusively.
6974 If you want to test gathering by @code{References}, you could say
6978 (setq gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
6979 'gnus-gather-threads-by-references)
6985 @node Filling In Threads
6986 @subsubsection Filling In Threads
6989 @item gnus-fetch-old-headers
6990 @vindex gnus-fetch-old-headers
6991 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus will attempt to build old threads by fetching
6992 more old headers---headers to articles marked as read. If you would
6993 like to display as few summary lines as possible, but still connect as
6994 many loose threads as possible, you should set this variable to
6995 @code{some} or a number. If you set it to a number, no more than that
6996 number of extra old headers will be fetched. In either case, fetching
6997 old headers only works if the back end you are using carries overview
6998 files---this would normally be @code{nntp}, @code{nnspool},
6999 @code{nnml}, and @code{nnmaildir}. Also remember that if the root of
7000 the thread has been expired by the server, there's not much Gnus can
7003 This variable can also be set to @code{invisible}. This won't have any
7004 visible effects, but is useful if you use the @kbd{A T} command a lot
7005 (@pxref{Finding the Parent}).
7007 @item gnus-fetch-old-ephemeral-headers
7008 @vindex gnus-fetch-old-ephemeral-headers
7009 Same as @code{gnus-fetch-old-headers}, but only used for ephemeral
7012 @item gnus-build-sparse-threads
7013 @vindex gnus-build-sparse-threads
7014 Fetching old headers can be slow. A low-rent similar effect can be
7015 gotten by setting this variable to @code{some}. Gnus will then look at
7016 the complete @code{References} headers of all articles and try to string
7017 together articles that belong in the same thread. This will leave
7018 @dfn{gaps} in the threading display where Gnus guesses that an article
7019 is missing from the thread. (These gaps appear like normal summary
7020 lines. If you select a gap, Gnus will try to fetch the article in
7021 question.) If this variable is @code{t}, Gnus will display all these
7022 ``gaps'' without regard for whether they are useful for completing the
7023 thread or not. Finally, if this variable is @code{more}, Gnus won't cut
7024 off sparse leaf nodes that don't lead anywhere. This variable is
7025 @code{nil} by default.
7027 @item gnus-read-all-available-headers
7028 @vindex gnus-read-all-available-headers
7029 This is a rather obscure variable that few will find useful. It's
7030 intended for those non-news newsgroups where the back end has to fetch
7031 quite a lot to present the summary buffer, and where it's impossible to
7032 go back to parents of articles. This is mostly the case in the
7033 web-based groups, like the @code{nnultimate} groups.
7035 If you don't use those, then it's safe to leave this as the default
7036 @code{nil}. If you want to use this variable, it should be a regexp
7037 that matches the group name, or @code{t} for all groups.
7042 @node More Threading
7043 @subsubsection More Threading
7046 @item gnus-show-threads
7047 @vindex gnus-show-threads
7048 If this variable is @code{nil}, no threading will be done, and all of
7049 the rest of the variables here will have no effect. Turning threading
7050 off will speed group selection up a bit, but it is sure to make reading
7051 slower and more awkward.
7053 @item gnus-thread-hide-subtree
7054 @vindex gnus-thread-hide-subtree
7055 If non-@code{nil}, all threads will be hidden when the summary buffer is
7058 This can also be a predicate specifier (@pxref{Predicate Specifiers}).
7059 Available predicates are @code{gnus-article-unread-p} and
7060 @code{gnus-article-unseen-p}.
7065 (setq gnus-thread-hide-subtree
7066 '(or gnus-article-unread-p
7067 gnus-article-unseen-p))
7070 (It's a pretty nonsensical example, since all unseen articles are also
7071 unread, but you get my drift.)
7074 @item gnus-thread-expunge-below
7075 @vindex gnus-thread-expunge-below
7076 All threads that have a total score (as defined by
7077 @code{gnus-thread-score-function}) less than this number will be
7078 expunged. This variable is @code{nil} by default, which means that no
7079 threads are expunged.
7081 @item gnus-thread-hide-killed
7082 @vindex gnus-thread-hide-killed
7083 if you kill a thread and this variable is non-@code{nil}, the subtree
7086 @item gnus-thread-ignore-subject
7087 @vindex gnus-thread-ignore-subject
7088 Sometimes somebody changes the subject in the middle of a thread. If
7089 this variable is non-@code{nil}, which is the default, the subject
7090 change is ignored. If it is @code{nil}, a change in the subject will
7091 result in a new thread.
7093 @item gnus-thread-indent-level
7094 @vindex gnus-thread-indent-level
7095 This is a number that says how much each sub-thread should be indented.
7098 @item gnus-sort-gathered-threads-function
7099 @vindex gnus-sort-gathered-threads-function
7100 Sometimes, particularly with mailing lists, the order in which mails
7101 arrive locally is not necessarily the same as the order in which they
7102 arrived on the mailing list. Consequently, when sorting sub-threads
7103 using the default @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-number}, responses can end
7104 up appearing before the article to which they are responding to.
7105 Setting this variable to an alternate value
7106 (e.g. @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-date}), in a group's parameters or in an
7107 appropriate hook (e.g. @code{gnus-summary-generate-hook}) can produce a
7108 more logical sub-thread ordering in such instances.
7113 @node Low-Level Threading
7114 @subsubsection Low-Level Threading
7118 @item gnus-parse-headers-hook
7119 @vindex gnus-parse-headers-hook
7120 Hook run before parsing any headers.
7122 @item gnus-alter-header-function
7123 @vindex gnus-alter-header-function
7124 If non-@code{nil}, this function will be called to allow alteration of
7125 article header structures. The function is called with one parameter,
7126 the article header vector, which it may alter in any way. For instance,
7127 if you have a mail-to-news gateway which alters the @code{Message-ID}s
7128 in systematic ways (by adding prefixes and such), you can use this
7129 variable to un-scramble the @code{Message-ID}s so that they are more
7130 meaningful. Here's one example:
7133 (setq gnus-alter-header-function 'my-alter-message-id)
7135 (defun my-alter-message-id (header)
7136 (let ((id (mail-header-id header)))
7138 "\\(<[^<>@@]*\\)\\.?cygnus\\..*@@\\([^<>@@]*>\\)" id)
7140 (concat (match-string 1 id) "@@" (match-string 2 id))
7147 @node Thread Commands
7148 @subsection Thread Commands
7149 @cindex thread commands
7155 @kindex T k (Summary)
7156 @kindex C-M-k (Summary)
7157 @findex gnus-summary-kill-thread
7158 Mark all articles in the current (sub-)thread as read
7159 (@code{gnus-summary-kill-thread}). If the prefix argument is positive,
7160 remove all marks instead. If the prefix argument is negative, tick
7165 @kindex T l (Summary)
7166 @kindex C-M-l (Summary)
7167 @findex gnus-summary-lower-thread
7168 Lower the score of the current (sub-)thread
7169 (@code{gnus-summary-lower-thread}).
7172 @kindex T i (Summary)
7173 @findex gnus-summary-raise-thread
7174 Increase the score of the current (sub-)thread
7175 (@code{gnus-summary-raise-thread}).
7178 @kindex T # (Summary)
7179 @findex gnus-uu-mark-thread
7180 Set the process mark on the current (sub-)thread
7181 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-thread}).
7184 @kindex T M-# (Summary)
7185 @findex gnus-uu-unmark-thread
7186 Remove the process mark from the current (sub-)thread
7187 (@code{gnus-uu-unmark-thread}).
7190 @kindex T T (Summary)
7191 @findex gnus-summary-toggle-threads
7192 Toggle threading (@code{gnus-summary-toggle-threads}).
7195 @kindex T s (Summary)
7196 @findex gnus-summary-show-thread
7197 Expose the (sub-)thread hidden under the current article, if any@*
7198 (@code{gnus-summary-show-thread}).
7201 @kindex T h (Summary)
7202 @findex gnus-summary-hide-thread
7203 Hide the current (sub-)thread (@code{gnus-summary-hide-thread}).
7206 @kindex T S (Summary)
7207 @findex gnus-summary-show-all-threads
7208 Expose all hidden threads (@code{gnus-summary-show-all-threads}).
7211 @kindex T H (Summary)
7212 @findex gnus-summary-hide-all-threads
7213 Hide all threads (@code{gnus-summary-hide-all-threads}).
7216 @kindex T t (Summary)
7217 @findex gnus-summary-rethread-current
7218 Re-thread the current article's thread
7219 (@code{gnus-summary-rethread-current}). This works even when the
7220 summary buffer is otherwise unthreaded.
7223 @kindex T ^ (Summary)
7224 @findex gnus-summary-reparent-thread
7225 Make the current article the child of the marked (or previous) article
7226 (@code{gnus-summary-reparent-thread}).
7229 @kindex T M-^ (Summary)
7230 @findex gnus-summary-reparent-children
7231 Make the current article the parent of the marked articles
7232 (@code{gnus-summary-reparent-children}).
7236 The following commands are thread movement commands. They all
7237 understand the numeric prefix.
7242 @kindex T n (Summary)
7244 @kindex C-M-n (Summary)
7246 @kindex M-down (Summary)
7247 @findex gnus-summary-next-thread
7248 Go to the next thread (@code{gnus-summary-next-thread}).
7251 @kindex T p (Summary)
7253 @kindex C-M-p (Summary)
7255 @kindex M-up (Summary)
7256 @findex gnus-summary-prev-thread
7257 Go to the previous thread (@code{gnus-summary-prev-thread}).
7260 @kindex T d (Summary)
7261 @findex gnus-summary-down-thread
7262 Descend the thread (@code{gnus-summary-down-thread}).
7265 @kindex T u (Summary)
7266 @findex gnus-summary-up-thread
7267 Ascend the thread (@code{gnus-summary-up-thread}).
7270 @kindex T o (Summary)
7271 @findex gnus-summary-top-thread
7272 Go to the top of the thread (@code{gnus-summary-top-thread}).
7275 @vindex gnus-thread-operation-ignore-subject
7276 If you ignore subject while threading, you'll naturally end up with
7277 threads that have several different subjects in them. If you then issue
7278 a command like @kbd{T k} (@code{gnus-summary-kill-thread}) you might not
7279 wish to kill the entire thread, but just those parts of the thread that
7280 have the same subject as the current article. If you like this idea,
7281 you can fiddle with @code{gnus-thread-operation-ignore-subject}. If it
7282 is non-@code{nil} (which it is by default), subjects will be ignored
7283 when doing thread commands. If this variable is @code{nil}, articles in
7284 the same thread with different subjects will not be included in the
7285 operation in question. If this variable is @code{fuzzy}, only articles
7286 that have subjects fuzzily equal will be included (@pxref{Fuzzy
7290 @node Sorting the Summary Buffer
7291 @section Sorting the Summary Buffer
7293 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-total-score
7294 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-date
7295 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-score
7296 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-subject
7297 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-author
7298 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-recipient
7299 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-number
7300 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-random
7301 @vindex gnus-thread-sort-functions
7302 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-most-recent-number
7303 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-most-recent-date
7304 If you are using a threaded summary display, you can sort the threads by
7305 setting @code{gnus-thread-sort-functions}, which can be either a single
7306 function, a list of functions, or a list containing functions and
7307 @code{(not some-function)} elements.
7309 By default, sorting is done on article numbers. Ready-made sorting
7310 predicate functions include @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-number},
7311 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-author}, @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-recipient},
7312 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-subject},
7313 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-date},
7314 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-score},
7315 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-most-recent-number},
7316 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-most-recent-date},
7317 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-random} and
7318 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-total-score}.
7320 Each function takes two threads and returns non-@code{nil} if the first
7321 thread should be sorted before the other. Note that sorting really is
7322 normally done by looking only at the roots of each thread.
7324 If you use more than one function, the primary sort key should be the
7325 last function in the list. You should probably always include
7326 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-number} in the list of sorting
7327 functions---preferably first. This will ensure that threads that are
7328 equal with respect to the other sort criteria will be displayed in
7329 ascending article order.
7331 If you would like to sort by reverse score, then by subject, and finally
7332 by number, you could do something like:
7335 (setq gnus-thread-sort-functions
7336 '(gnus-thread-sort-by-number
7337 gnus-thread-sort-by-subject
7338 (not gnus-thread-sort-by-total-score)))
7341 The threads that have highest score will be displayed first in the
7342 summary buffer. When threads have the same score, they will be sorted
7343 alphabetically. The threads that have the same score and the same
7344 subject will be sorted by number, which is (normally) the sequence in
7345 which the articles arrived.
7347 If you want to sort by score and then reverse arrival order, you could
7351 (setq gnus-thread-sort-functions
7352 '((not gnus-thread-sort-by-number)
7353 gnus-thread-sort-by-score))
7356 @vindex gnus-thread-score-function
7357 The function in the @code{gnus-thread-score-function} variable (default
7358 @code{+}) is used for calculating the total score of a thread. Useful
7359 functions might be @code{max}, @code{min}, or squared means, or whatever
7362 @findex gnus-article-sort-functions
7363 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-date
7364 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-score
7365 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-subject
7366 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-author
7367 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-random
7368 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-number
7369 If you are using an unthreaded display for some strange reason or
7370 other, you have to fiddle with the @code{gnus-article-sort-functions}
7371 variable. It is very similar to the
7372 @code{gnus-thread-sort-functions}, except that it uses slightly
7373 different functions for article comparison. Available sorting
7374 predicate functions are @code{gnus-article-sort-by-number},
7375 @code{gnus-article-sort-by-author},
7376 @code{gnus-article-sort-by-subject}, @code{gnus-article-sort-by-date},
7377 @code{gnus-article-sort-by-random}, and
7378 @code{gnus-article-sort-by-score}.
7380 If you want to sort an unthreaded summary display by subject, you could
7384 (setq gnus-article-sort-functions
7385 '(gnus-article-sort-by-number
7386 gnus-article-sort-by-subject))
7389 You can define group specific sorting via @code{gnus-parameters},
7390 @xref{Group Parameters}.
7393 @node Asynchronous Fetching
7394 @section Asynchronous Article Fetching
7395 @cindex asynchronous article fetching
7396 @cindex article pre-fetch
7399 If you read your news from an @acronym{NNTP} server that's far away, the
7400 network latencies may make reading articles a chore. You have to wait
7401 for a while after pressing @kbd{n} to go to the next article before the
7402 article appears. Why can't Gnus just go ahead and fetch the article
7403 while you are reading the previous one? Why not, indeed.
7405 First, some caveats. There are some pitfalls to using asynchronous
7406 article fetching, especially the way Gnus does it.
7408 Let's say you are reading article 1, which is short, and article 2 is
7409 quite long, and you are not interested in reading that. Gnus does not
7410 know this, so it goes ahead and fetches article 2. You decide to read
7411 article 3, but since Gnus is in the process of fetching article 2, the
7412 connection is blocked.
7414 To avoid these situations, Gnus will open two (count 'em two)
7415 connections to the server. Some people may think this isn't a very nice
7416 thing to do, but I don't see any real alternatives. Setting up that
7417 extra connection takes some time, so Gnus startup will be slower.
7419 Gnus will fetch more articles than you will read. This will mean that
7420 the link between your machine and the @acronym{NNTP} server will become more
7421 loaded than if you didn't use article pre-fetch. The server itself will
7422 also become more loaded---both with the extra article requests, and the
7425 Ok, so now you know that you shouldn't really use this thing@dots{} unless
7428 @vindex gnus-asynchronous
7429 Here's how: Set @code{gnus-asynchronous} to @code{t}. The rest should
7430 happen automatically.
7432 @vindex gnus-use-article-prefetch
7433 You can control how many articles are to be pre-fetched by setting
7434 @code{gnus-use-article-prefetch}. This is 30 by default, which means
7435 that when you read an article in the group, the back end will pre-fetch
7436 the next 30 articles. If this variable is @code{t}, the back end will
7437 pre-fetch all the articles it can without bound. If it is
7438 @code{nil}, no pre-fetching will be done.
7440 @vindex gnus-async-prefetch-article-p
7441 @findex gnus-async-unread-p
7442 There are probably some articles that you don't want to pre-fetch---read
7443 articles, for instance. The @code{gnus-async-prefetch-article-p}
7444 variable controls whether an article is to be pre-fetched. This
7445 function should return non-@code{nil} when the article in question is
7446 to be pre-fetched. The default is @code{gnus-async-unread-p}, which
7447 returns @code{nil} on read articles. The function is called with an
7448 article data structure as the only parameter.
7450 If, for instance, you wish to pre-fetch only unread articles shorter
7451 than 100 lines, you could say something like:
7454 (defun my-async-short-unread-p (data)
7455 "Return non-nil for short, unread articles."
7456 (and (gnus-data-unread-p data)
7457 (< (mail-header-lines (gnus-data-header data))
7460 (setq gnus-async-prefetch-article-p 'my-async-short-unread-p)
7463 These functions will be called many, many times, so they should
7464 preferably be short and sweet to avoid slowing down Gnus too much.
7465 It's probably a good idea to byte-compile things like this.
7467 @vindex gnus-prefetched-article-deletion-strategy
7468 Articles have to be removed from the asynch buffer sooner or later. The
7469 @code{gnus-prefetched-article-deletion-strategy} says when to remove
7470 articles. This is a list that may contain the following elements:
7474 Remove articles when they are read.
7477 Remove articles when exiting the group.
7480 The default value is @code{(read exit)}.
7482 @c @vindex gnus-use-header-prefetch
7483 @c If @code{gnus-use-header-prefetch} is non-@code{nil}, prefetch articles
7484 @c from the next group.
7487 @node Article Caching
7488 @section Article Caching
7489 @cindex article caching
7492 If you have an @emph{extremely} slow @acronym{NNTP} connection, you may
7493 consider turning article caching on. Each article will then be stored
7494 locally under your home directory. As you may surmise, this could
7495 potentially use @emph{huge} amounts of disk space, as well as eat up all
7496 your inodes so fast it will make your head swim. In vodka.
7498 Used carefully, though, it could be just an easier way to save articles.
7500 @vindex gnus-use-long-file-name
7501 @vindex gnus-cache-directory
7502 @vindex gnus-use-cache
7503 To turn caching on, set @code{gnus-use-cache} to @code{t}. By default,
7504 all articles ticked or marked as dormant will then be copied
7505 over to your local cache (@code{gnus-cache-directory}). Whether this
7506 cache is flat or hierarchical is controlled by the
7507 @code{gnus-use-long-file-name} variable, as usual.
7509 When re-selecting a ticked or dormant article, it will be fetched from the
7510 cache instead of from the server. As articles in your cache will never
7511 expire, this might serve as a method of saving articles while still
7512 keeping them where they belong. Just mark all articles you want to save
7513 as dormant, and don't worry.
7515 When an article is marked as read, is it removed from the cache.
7517 @vindex gnus-cache-remove-articles
7518 @vindex gnus-cache-enter-articles
7519 The entering/removal of articles from the cache is controlled by the
7520 @code{gnus-cache-enter-articles} and @code{gnus-cache-remove-articles}
7521 variables. Both are lists of symbols. The first is @code{(ticked
7522 dormant)} by default, meaning that ticked and dormant articles will be
7523 put in the cache. The latter is @code{(read)} by default, meaning that
7524 articles marked as read are removed from the cache. Possibly
7525 symbols in these two lists are @code{ticked}, @code{dormant},
7526 @code{unread} and @code{read}.
7528 @findex gnus-jog-cache
7529 So where does the massive article-fetching and storing come into the
7530 picture? The @code{gnus-jog-cache} command will go through all
7531 subscribed newsgroups, request all unread articles, score them, and
7532 store them in the cache. You should only ever, ever ever ever, use this
7533 command if 1) your connection to the @acronym{NNTP} server is really, really,
7534 really slow and 2) you have a really, really, really huge disk.
7535 Seriously. One way to cut down on the number of articles downloaded is
7536 to score unwanted articles down and have them marked as read. They will
7537 not then be downloaded by this command.
7539 @vindex gnus-uncacheable-groups
7540 @vindex gnus-cacheable-groups
7541 It is likely that you do not want caching on all groups. For instance,
7542 if your @code{nnml} mail is located under your home directory, it makes no
7543 sense to cache it somewhere else under your home directory. Unless you
7544 feel that it's neat to use twice as much space.
7546 To limit the caching, you could set @code{gnus-cacheable-groups} to a
7547 regexp of groups to cache, @samp{^nntp} for instance, or set the
7548 @code{gnus-uncacheable-groups} regexp to @samp{^nnml}, for instance.
7549 Both variables are @code{nil} by default. If a group matches both
7550 variables, the group is not cached.
7552 @findex gnus-cache-generate-nov-databases
7553 @findex gnus-cache-generate-active
7554 @vindex gnus-cache-active-file
7555 The cache stores information on what articles it contains in its active
7556 file (@code{gnus-cache-active-file}). If this file (or any other parts
7557 of the cache) becomes all messed up for some reason or other, Gnus
7558 offers two functions that will try to set things right. @kbd{M-x
7559 gnus-cache-generate-nov-databases} will (re)build all the @acronym{NOV}
7560 files, and @kbd{gnus-cache-generate-active} will (re)generate the active
7563 @findex gnus-cache-move-cache
7564 @code{gnus-cache-move-cache} will move your whole
7565 @code{gnus-cache-directory} to some other location. You get asked to
7566 where, isn't that cool?
7568 @node Persistent Articles
7569 @section Persistent Articles
7570 @cindex persistent articles
7572 Closely related to article caching, we have @dfn{persistent articles}.
7573 In fact, it's just a different way of looking at caching, and much more
7574 useful in my opinion.
7576 Say you're reading a newsgroup, and you happen on to some valuable gem
7577 that you want to keep and treasure forever. You'd normally just save it
7578 (using one of the many saving commands) in some file. The problem with
7579 that is that it's just, well, yucky. Ideally you'd prefer just having
7580 the article remain in the group where you found it forever; untouched by
7581 the expiry going on at the news server.
7583 This is what a @dfn{persistent article} is---an article that just won't
7584 be deleted. It's implemented using the normal cache functions, but
7585 you use two explicit commands for managing persistent articles:
7591 @findex gnus-cache-enter-article
7592 Make the current article persistent (@code{gnus-cache-enter-article}).
7595 @kindex M-* (Summary)
7596 @findex gnus-cache-remove-article
7597 Remove the current article from the persistent articles
7598 (@code{gnus-cache-remove-article}). This will normally delete the
7602 Both these commands understand the process/prefix convention.
7604 To avoid having all ticked articles (and stuff) entered into the cache,
7605 you should set @code{gnus-use-cache} to @code{passive} if you're just
7606 interested in persistent articles:
7609 (setq gnus-use-cache 'passive)
7612 @node Sticky Articles
7613 @section Sticky Articles
7614 @cindex sticky articles
7616 When you select an article the current article buffer will be reused
7617 according to the value of the variable
7618 @code{gnus-single-article-buffer}. If its value is non-@code{nil} (the
7619 default) all articles reuse the same article buffer. Else each group
7620 has its own article buffer.
7622 This implies that it's not possible to have more than one article buffer
7623 in a group at a time. But sometimes you might want to display all the
7624 latest emails from your mother, your father, your aunt, your uncle and
7625 your 17 cousins to coordinate the next christmas party.
7627 That's where sticky articles come in handy. A sticky article buffer
7628 basically is a normal article buffer, but it won't be reused when you
7629 select another article. You can make an article sticky with:
7633 @kindex A S (Summary)
7634 @findex gnus-sticky-article
7635 Make the current article sticky. If a prefix arg is given, ask for a
7636 name for this sticky article buffer.
7639 To close a sticky article buffer you can use these commands:
7645 Puts this sticky article buffer at the end of the list of all buffers.
7649 @findex gnus-kill-sticky-article-buffer
7650 Kills this sticky article buffer.
7653 To kill all sticky article buffers you can use:
7655 @defun gnus-kill-sticky-article-buffers ARG
7656 Kill all sticky article buffers.
7657 If a prefix ARG is given, ask for confirmation.
7660 @node Article Backlog
7661 @section Article Backlog
7663 @cindex article backlog
7665 If you have a slow connection, but the idea of using caching seems
7666 unappealing to you (and it is, really), you can help the situation some
7667 by switching on the @dfn{backlog}. This is where Gnus will buffer
7668 already read articles so that it doesn't have to re-fetch articles
7669 you've already read. This only helps if you are in the habit of
7670 re-selecting articles you've recently read, of course. If you never do
7671 that, turning the backlog on will slow Gnus down a little bit, and
7672 increase memory usage some.
7674 @vindex gnus-keep-backlog
7675 If you set @code{gnus-keep-backlog} to a number @var{n}, Gnus will store
7676 at most @var{n} old articles in a buffer for later re-fetching. If this
7677 variable is non-@code{nil} and is not a number, Gnus will store
7678 @emph{all} read articles, which means that your Emacs will grow without
7679 bound before exploding and taking your machine down with you. I put
7680 that in there just to keep y'all on your toes.
7682 The default value is 20.
7685 @node Saving Articles
7686 @section Saving Articles
7687 @cindex saving articles
7689 Gnus can save articles in a number of ways. Below is the documentation
7690 for saving articles in a fairly straight-forward fashion (i.e., little
7691 processing of the article is done before it is saved). For a different
7692 approach (uudecoding, unsharing) you should use @code{gnus-uu}
7693 (@pxref{Decoding Articles}).
7695 For the commands listed here, the target is a file. If you want to
7696 save to a group, see the @kbd{B c} (@code{gnus-summary-copy-article})
7697 command (@pxref{Mail Group Commands}).
7699 @vindex gnus-save-all-headers
7700 If @code{gnus-save-all-headers} is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will not delete
7701 unwanted headers before saving the article.
7703 @vindex gnus-saved-headers
7704 If the preceding variable is @code{nil}, all headers that match the
7705 @code{gnus-saved-headers} regexp will be kept, while the rest will be
7706 deleted before saving.
7712 @kindex O o (Summary)
7714 @findex gnus-summary-save-article
7715 @c @icon{gnus-summary-save-article}
7716 Save the current article using the default article saver
7717 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article}).
7720 @kindex O m (Summary)
7721 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-mail
7722 Save the current article in a Unix mail box (mbox) file
7723 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-mail}).
7726 @kindex O r (Summary)
7727 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-rmail
7728 Save the current article in Rmail format
7729 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-rmail}).
7732 @kindex O f (Summary)
7733 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-file
7734 @c @icon{gnus-summary-save-article-file}
7735 Save the current article in plain file format
7736 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-file}).
7739 @kindex O F (Summary)
7740 @findex gnus-summary-write-article-file
7741 Write the current article in plain file format, overwriting any previous
7742 file contents (@code{gnus-summary-write-article-file}).
7745 @kindex O b (Summary)
7746 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-body-file
7747 Save the current article body in plain file format
7748 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-body-file}).
7751 @kindex O h (Summary)
7752 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-folder
7753 Save the current article in mh folder format
7754 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-folder}).
7757 @kindex O v (Summary)
7758 @findex gnus-summary-save-article-vm
7759 Save the current article in a VM folder
7760 (@code{gnus-summary-save-article-vm}).
7764 @kindex O p (Summary)
7766 @findex gnus-summary-pipe-output
7767 Save the current article in a pipe. Uhm, like, what I mean is---Pipe
7768 the current article to a process (@code{gnus-summary-pipe-output}).
7769 If given a symbolic prefix (@pxref{Symbolic Prefixes}), include the
7770 complete headers in the piped output.
7773 @kindex O P (Summary)
7774 @findex gnus-summary-muttprint
7775 @vindex gnus-summary-muttprint-program
7776 Save the current article into muttprint. That is, print it using the
7777 external program @uref{http://muttprint.sourceforge.net/,
7778 Muttprint}. The program name and options to use is controlled by the
7779 variable @code{gnus-summary-muttprint-program}.
7780 (@code{gnus-summary-muttprint}).
7784 @vindex gnus-prompt-before-saving
7785 All these commands use the process/prefix convention
7786 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}). If you save bunches of articles using these
7787 functions, you might get tired of being prompted for files to save each
7788 and every article in. The prompting action is controlled by
7789 the @code{gnus-prompt-before-saving} variable, which is @code{always} by
7790 default, giving you that excessive prompting action you know and
7791 loathe. If you set this variable to @code{t} instead, you'll be prompted
7792 just once for each series of articles you save. If you like to really
7793 have Gnus do all your thinking for you, you can even set this variable
7794 to @code{nil}, which means that you will never be prompted for files to
7795 save articles in. Gnus will simply save all the articles in the default
7799 @vindex gnus-default-article-saver
7800 You can customize the @code{gnus-default-article-saver} variable to make
7801 Gnus do what you want it to. You can use any of the eight ready-made
7802 functions below, or you can create your own.
7806 @item gnus-summary-save-in-rmail
7807 @findex gnus-summary-save-in-rmail
7808 @vindex gnus-rmail-save-name
7809 @findex gnus-plain-save-name
7810 This is the default format, @dfn{Babyl}. Uses the function in the
7811 @code{gnus-rmail-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7812 article in. The default is @code{gnus-plain-save-name}.
7814 @item gnus-summary-save-in-mail
7815 @findex gnus-summary-save-in-mail
7816 @vindex gnus-mail-save-name
7817 Save in a Unix mail (mbox) file. Uses the function in the
7818 @code{gnus-mail-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7819 article in. The default is @code{gnus-plain-save-name}.
7821 @item gnus-summary-save-in-file
7822 @findex gnus-summary-save-in-file
7823 @vindex gnus-file-save-name
7824 @findex gnus-numeric-save-name
7825 Append the article straight to an ordinary file. Uses the function in
7826 the @code{gnus-file-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7827 article in. The default is @code{gnus-numeric-save-name}.
7829 @item gnus-summary-write-to-file
7830 @findex gnus-summary-write-to-file
7831 Write the article straight to an ordinary file. The file is
7832 overwritten if it exists. Uses the function in the
7833 @code{gnus-file-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7834 article in. The default is @code{gnus-numeric-save-name}.
7836 @item gnus-summary-save-body-in-file
7837 @findex gnus-summary-save-body-in-file
7838 Append the article body to an ordinary file. Uses the function in the
7839 @code{gnus-file-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7840 article in. The default is @code{gnus-numeric-save-name}.
7842 @item gnus-summary-write-body-to-file
7843 @findex gnus-summary-write-body-to-file
7844 Write the article body straight to an ordinary file. The file is
7845 overwritten if it exists. Uses the function in the
7846 @code{gnus-file-save-name} variable to get a file name to save the
7847 article in. The default is @code{gnus-numeric-save-name}.
7849 @item gnus-summary-save-in-folder
7850 @findex gnus-summary-save-in-folder
7851 @findex gnus-folder-save-name
7852 @findex gnus-Folder-save-name
7853 @vindex gnus-folder-save-name
7856 Save the article to an MH folder using @code{rcvstore} from the MH
7857 library. Uses the function in the @code{gnus-folder-save-name} variable
7858 to get a file name to save the article in. The default is
7859 @code{gnus-folder-save-name}, but you can also use
7860 @code{gnus-Folder-save-name}, which creates capitalized names.
7862 @item gnus-summary-save-in-vm
7863 @findex gnus-summary-save-in-vm
7864 Save the article in a VM folder. You have to have the VM mail
7865 reader to use this setting.
7868 The symbol of each function may have the following properties:
7872 The value non-@code{nil} means save decoded articles. This is
7873 meaningful only with @code{gnus-summary-save-in-file},
7874 @code{gnus-summary-save-body-in-file},
7875 @code{gnus-summary-write-to-file}, and
7876 @code{gnus-summary-write-body-to-file}.
7879 The value specifies an alternative function which appends, not
7880 overwrites, articles to a file. This implies that when saving many
7881 articles at a time, @code{gnus-prompt-before-saving} is bound to
7882 @code{t} and all articles are saved in a single file. This is
7883 meaningful only with @code{gnus-summary-write-to-file} and
7884 @code{gnus-summary-write-body-to-file}.
7887 The value specifies the symbol of a variable of which the value
7888 specifies headers to be saved. If it is omitted,
7889 @code{gnus-save-all-headers} and @code{gnus-saved-headers} control what
7890 headers should be saved.
7893 @vindex gnus-article-save-directory
7894 All of these functions, except for the last one, will save the article
7895 in the @code{gnus-article-save-directory}, which is initialized from the
7896 @env{SAVEDIR} environment variable. This is @file{~/News/} by
7899 As you can see above, the functions use different functions to find a
7900 suitable name of a file to save the article in. Below is a list of
7901 available functions that generate names:
7905 @item gnus-Numeric-save-name
7906 @findex gnus-Numeric-save-name
7907 File names like @file{~/News/Alt.andrea-dworkin/45}.
7909 @item gnus-numeric-save-name
7910 @findex gnus-numeric-save-name
7911 File names like @file{~/News/alt.andrea-dworkin/45}.
7913 @item gnus-Plain-save-name
7914 @findex gnus-Plain-save-name
7915 File names like @file{~/News/Alt.andrea-dworkin}.
7917 @item gnus-plain-save-name
7918 @findex gnus-plain-save-name
7919 File names like @file{~/News/alt.andrea-dworkin}.
7921 @item gnus-sender-save-name
7922 @findex gnus-sender-save-name
7923 File names like @file{~/News/larsi}.
7926 @vindex gnus-split-methods
7927 You can have Gnus suggest where to save articles by plonking a regexp into
7928 the @code{gnus-split-methods} alist. For instance, if you would like to
7929 save articles related to Gnus in the file @file{gnus-stuff}, and articles
7930 related to VM in @file{vm-stuff}, you could set this variable to something
7934 (("^Subject:.*gnus\\|^Newsgroups:.*gnus" "gnus-stuff")
7935 ("^Subject:.*vm\\|^Xref:.*vm" "vm-stuff")
7936 (my-choosing-function "../other-dir/my-stuff")
7937 ((equal gnus-newsgroup-name "mail.misc") "mail-stuff"))
7940 We see that this is a list where each element is a list that has two
7941 elements---the @dfn{match} and the @dfn{file}. The match can either be
7942 a string (in which case it is used as a regexp to match on the article
7943 head); it can be a symbol (which will be called as a function with the
7944 group name as a parameter); or it can be a list (which will be
7945 @code{eval}ed). If any of these actions have a non-@code{nil} result,
7946 the @dfn{file} will be used as a default prompt. In addition, the
7947 result of the operation itself will be used if the function or form
7948 called returns a string or a list of strings.
7950 You basically end up with a list of file names that might be used when
7951 saving the current article. (All ``matches'' will be used.) You will
7952 then be prompted for what you really want to use as a name, with file
7953 name completion over the results from applying this variable.
7955 This variable is @code{((gnus-article-archive-name))} by default, which
7956 means that Gnus will look at the articles it saves for an
7957 @code{Archive-name} line and use that as a suggestion for the file
7960 Here's an example function to clean up file names somewhat. If you have
7961 lots of mail groups called things like
7962 @samp{nnml:mail.whatever}, you may want to chop off the beginning of
7963 these group names before creating the file name to save to. The
7964 following will do just that:
7967 (defun my-save-name (group)
7968 (when (string-match "^nnml:mail." group)
7969 (substring group (match-end 0))))
7971 (setq gnus-split-methods
7972 '((gnus-article-archive-name)
7977 @vindex gnus-use-long-file-name
7978 Finally, you have the @code{gnus-use-long-file-name} variable. If it is
7979 @code{nil}, all the preceding functions will replace all periods
7980 (@samp{.}) in the group names with slashes (@samp{/})---which means that
7981 the functions will generate hierarchies of directories instead of having
7982 all the files in the top level directory
7983 (@file{~/News/alt/andrea-dworkin} instead of
7984 @file{~/News/alt.andrea-dworkin}.) This variable is @code{t} by default
7985 on most systems. However, for historical reasons, this is @code{nil} on
7986 Xenix and usg-unix-v machines by default.
7988 This function also affects kill and score file names. If this variable
7989 is a list, and the list contains the element @code{not-score}, long file
7990 names will not be used for score files, if it contains the element
7991 @code{not-save}, long file names will not be used for saving, and if it
7992 contains the element @code{not-kill}, long file names will not be used
7995 If you'd like to save articles in a hierarchy that looks something like
7999 (setq gnus-use-long-file-name '(not-save)) ; @r{to get a hierarchy}
8000 (setq gnus-default-article-saver
8001 'gnus-summary-save-in-file) ; @r{no encoding}
8004 Then just save with @kbd{o}. You'd then read this hierarchy with
8005 ephemeral @code{nneething} groups---@kbd{G D} in the group buffer, and
8006 the top level directory as the argument (@file{~/News/}). Then just walk
8007 around to the groups/directories with @code{nneething}.
8010 @node Decoding Articles
8011 @section Decoding Articles
8012 @cindex decoding articles
8014 Sometime users post articles (or series of articles) that have been
8015 encoded in some way or other. Gnus can decode them for you.
8018 * Uuencoded Articles:: Uudecode articles.
8019 * Shell Archives:: Unshar articles.
8020 * PostScript Files:: Split PostScript.
8021 * Other Files:: Plain save and binhex.
8022 * Decoding Variables:: Variables for a happy decoding.
8023 * Viewing Files:: You want to look at the result of the decoding?
8027 @cindex article series
8028 All these functions use the process/prefix convention
8029 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}) for finding out what articles to work on, with
8030 the extension that a ``single article'' means ``a single series''. Gnus
8031 can find out by itself what articles belong to a series, decode all the
8032 articles and unpack/view/save the resulting file(s).
8034 Gnus guesses what articles are in the series according to the following
8035 simplish rule: The subjects must be (nearly) identical, except for the
8036 last two numbers of the line. (Spaces are largely ignored, however.)
8038 For example: If you choose a subject called @samp{cat.gif (2/3)}, Gnus
8039 will find all the articles that match the regexp @samp{^cat.gif
8040 ([0-9]+/[0-9]+).*$}.
8042 Subjects that are non-standard, like @samp{cat.gif (2/3) Part 6 of a
8043 series}, will not be properly recognized by any of the automatic viewing
8044 commands, and you have to mark the articles manually with @kbd{#}.
8047 @node Uuencoded Articles
8048 @subsection Uuencoded Articles
8050 @cindex uuencoded articles
8055 @kindex X u (Summary)
8056 @findex gnus-uu-decode-uu
8057 @c @icon{gnus-uu-decode-uu}
8058 Uudecodes the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu}).
8061 @kindex X U (Summary)
8062 @findex gnus-uu-decode-uu-and-save
8063 Uudecodes and saves the current series
8064 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu-and-save}).
8067 @kindex X v u (Summary)
8068 @findex gnus-uu-decode-uu-view
8069 Uudecodes and views the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu-view}).
8072 @kindex X v U (Summary)
8073 @findex gnus-uu-decode-uu-and-save-view
8074 Uudecodes, views and saves the current series
8075 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu-and-save-view}).
8079 Remember that these all react to the presence of articles marked with
8080 the process mark. If, for instance, you'd like to decode and save an
8081 entire newsgroup, you'd typically do @kbd{M P a}
8082 (@code{gnus-uu-mark-all}) and then @kbd{X U}
8083 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-uu-and-save}).
8085 All this is very much different from how @code{gnus-uu} worked with
8086 @sc{gnus 4.1}, where you had explicit keystrokes for everything under
8087 the sun. This version of @code{gnus-uu} generally assumes that you mark
8088 articles in some way (@pxref{Setting Process Marks}) and then press
8091 @vindex gnus-uu-notify-files
8092 Note: When trying to decode articles that have names matching
8093 @code{gnus-uu-notify-files}, which is hard-coded to
8094 @samp{[Cc][Ii][Nn][Dd][Yy][0-9]+.\\(gif\\|jpg\\)}, @code{gnus-uu} will
8095 automatically post an article on @samp{comp.unix.wizards} saying that
8096 you have just viewed the file in question. This feature can't be turned
8100 @node Shell Archives
8101 @subsection Shell Archives
8103 @cindex shell archives
8104 @cindex shared articles
8106 Shell archives (``shar files'') used to be a popular way to distribute
8107 sources, but it isn't used all that much today. In any case, we have
8108 some commands to deal with these:
8113 @kindex X s (Summary)
8114 @findex gnus-uu-decode-unshar
8115 Unshars the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-unshar}).
8118 @kindex X S (Summary)
8119 @findex gnus-uu-decode-unshar-and-save
8120 Unshars and saves the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-unshar-and-save}).
8123 @kindex X v s (Summary)
8124 @findex gnus-uu-decode-unshar-view
8125 Unshars and views the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-unshar-view}).
8128 @kindex X v S (Summary)
8129 @findex gnus-uu-decode-unshar-and-save-view
8130 Unshars, views and saves the current series
8131 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-unshar-and-save-view}).
8135 @node PostScript Files
8136 @subsection PostScript Files
8142 @kindex X p (Summary)
8143 @findex gnus-uu-decode-postscript
8144 Unpack the current PostScript series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-postscript}).
8147 @kindex X P (Summary)
8148 @findex gnus-uu-decode-postscript-and-save
8149 Unpack and save the current PostScript series
8150 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-postscript-and-save}).
8153 @kindex X v p (Summary)
8154 @findex gnus-uu-decode-postscript-view
8155 View the current PostScript series
8156 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-postscript-view}).
8159 @kindex X v P (Summary)
8160 @findex gnus-uu-decode-postscript-and-save-view
8161 View and save the current PostScript series
8162 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-postscript-and-save-view}).
8167 @subsection Other Files
8171 @kindex X o (Summary)
8172 @findex gnus-uu-decode-save
8173 Save the current series
8174 (@code{gnus-uu-decode-save}).
8177 @kindex X b (Summary)
8178 @findex gnus-uu-decode-binhex
8179 Unbinhex the current series (@code{gnus-uu-decode-binhex}). This
8180 doesn't really work yet.
8183 @kindex X Y (Summary)
8184 @findex gnus-uu-decode-yenc
8185 yEnc-decode the current series and save it (@code{gnus-uu-decode-yenc}).
8189 @node Decoding Variables
8190 @subsection Decoding Variables
8192 Adjective, not verb.
8195 * Rule Variables:: Variables that say how a file is to be viewed.
8196 * Other Decode Variables:: Other decode variables.
8197 * Uuencoding and Posting:: Variables for customizing uuencoding.
8201 @node Rule Variables
8202 @subsubsection Rule Variables
8203 @cindex rule variables
8205 Gnus uses @dfn{rule variables} to decide how to view a file. All these
8206 variables are of the form
8209 (list '(regexp1 command2)
8216 @item gnus-uu-user-view-rules
8217 @vindex gnus-uu-user-view-rules
8219 This variable is consulted first when viewing files. If you wish to use,
8220 for instance, @code{sox} to convert an @file{.au} sound file, you could
8223 (setq gnus-uu-user-view-rules
8224 (list '("\\\\.au$" "sox %s -t .aiff > /dev/audio")))
8227 @item gnus-uu-user-view-rules-end
8228 @vindex gnus-uu-user-view-rules-end
8229 This variable is consulted if Gnus couldn't make any matches from the
8230 user and default view rules.
8232 @item gnus-uu-user-archive-rules
8233 @vindex gnus-uu-user-archive-rules
8234 This variable can be used to say what commands should be used to unpack
8239 @node Other Decode Variables
8240 @subsubsection Other Decode Variables
8243 @vindex gnus-uu-grabbed-file-functions
8245 @item gnus-uu-grabbed-file-functions
8246 All functions in this list will be called right after each file has been
8247 successfully decoded---so that you can move or view files right away,
8248 and don't have to wait for all files to be decoded before you can do
8249 anything. Ready-made functions you can put in this list are:
8253 @item gnus-uu-grab-view
8254 @findex gnus-uu-grab-view
8257 @item gnus-uu-grab-move
8258 @findex gnus-uu-grab-move
8259 Move the file (if you're using a saving function.)
8262 @item gnus-uu-be-dangerous
8263 @vindex gnus-uu-be-dangerous
8264 Specifies what to do if unusual situations arise during decoding. If
8265 @code{nil}, be as conservative as possible. If @code{t}, ignore things
8266 that didn't work, and overwrite existing files. Otherwise, ask each
8269 @item gnus-uu-ignore-files-by-name
8270 @vindex gnus-uu-ignore-files-by-name
8271 Files with name matching this regular expression won't be viewed.
8273 @item gnus-uu-ignore-files-by-type
8274 @vindex gnus-uu-ignore-files-by-type
8275 Files with a @acronym{MIME} type matching this variable won't be viewed.
8276 Note that Gnus tries to guess what type the file is based on the name.
8277 @code{gnus-uu} is not a @acronym{MIME} package (yet), so this is slightly
8280 @item gnus-uu-tmp-dir
8281 @vindex gnus-uu-tmp-dir
8282 Where @code{gnus-uu} does its work.
8284 @item gnus-uu-do-not-unpack-archives
8285 @vindex gnus-uu-do-not-unpack-archives
8286 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} won't peek inside archives
8287 looking for files to display.
8289 @item gnus-uu-view-and-save
8290 @vindex gnus-uu-view-and-save
8291 Non-@code{nil} means that the user will always be asked to save a file
8294 @item gnus-uu-ignore-default-view-rules
8295 @vindex gnus-uu-ignore-default-view-rules
8296 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will ignore the default viewing
8299 @item gnus-uu-ignore-default-archive-rules
8300 @vindex gnus-uu-ignore-default-archive-rules
8301 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will ignore the default archive
8304 @item gnus-uu-kill-carriage-return
8305 @vindex gnus-uu-kill-carriage-return
8306 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will strip all carriage returns
8309 @item gnus-uu-unmark-articles-not-decoded
8310 @vindex gnus-uu-unmark-articles-not-decoded
8311 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will mark unsuccessfully
8312 decoded articles as unread.
8314 @item gnus-uu-correct-stripped-uucode
8315 @vindex gnus-uu-correct-stripped-uucode
8316 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will @emph{try} to fix
8317 uuencoded files that have had trailing spaces deleted.
8319 @item gnus-uu-pre-uudecode-hook
8320 @vindex gnus-uu-pre-uudecode-hook
8321 Hook run before sending a message to @code{uudecode}.
8323 @item gnus-uu-view-with-metamail
8324 @vindex gnus-uu-view-with-metamail
8326 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will ignore the viewing
8327 commands defined by the rule variables and just fudge a @acronym{MIME}
8328 content type based on the file name. The result will be fed to
8329 @code{metamail} for viewing.
8331 @item gnus-uu-save-in-digest
8332 @vindex gnus-uu-save-in-digest
8333 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu}, when asked to save without
8334 decoding, will save in digests. If this variable is @code{nil},
8335 @code{gnus-uu} will just save everything in a file without any
8336 embellishments. The digesting almost conforms to RFC 1153---no easy way
8337 to specify any meaningful volume and issue numbers were found, so I
8338 simply dropped them.
8343 @node Uuencoding and Posting
8344 @subsubsection Uuencoding and Posting
8348 @item gnus-uu-post-include-before-composing
8349 @vindex gnus-uu-post-include-before-composing
8350 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will ask for a file to encode
8351 before you compose the article. If this variable is @code{t}, you can
8352 either include an encoded file with @kbd{C-c C-i} or have one included
8353 for you when you post the article.
8355 @item gnus-uu-post-length
8356 @vindex gnus-uu-post-length
8357 Maximum length of an article. The encoded file will be split into how
8358 many articles it takes to post the entire file.
8360 @item gnus-uu-post-threaded
8361 @vindex gnus-uu-post-threaded
8362 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{gnus-uu} will post the encoded file in a
8363 thread. This may not be smart, as no other decoder I have seen is able
8364 to follow threads when collecting uuencoded articles. (Well, I have
8365 seen one package that does that---@code{gnus-uu}, but somehow, I don't
8366 think that counts@dots{}) Default is @code{nil}.
8368 @item gnus-uu-post-separate-description
8369 @vindex gnus-uu-post-separate-description
8370 Non-@code{nil} means that the description will be posted in a separate
8371 article. The first article will typically be numbered (0/x). If this
8372 variable is @code{nil}, the description the user enters will be included
8373 at the beginning of the first article, which will be numbered (1/x).
8374 Default is @code{t}.
8380 @subsection Viewing Files
8381 @cindex viewing files
8382 @cindex pseudo-articles
8384 After decoding, if the file is some sort of archive, Gnus will attempt
8385 to unpack the archive and see if any of the files in the archive can be
8386 viewed. For instance, if you have a gzipped tar file @file{pics.tar.gz}
8387 containing the files @file{pic1.jpg} and @file{pic2.gif}, Gnus will
8388 uncompress and de-tar the main file, and then view the two pictures.
8389 This unpacking process is recursive, so if the archive contains archives
8390 of archives, it'll all be unpacked.
8392 Finally, Gnus will normally insert a @dfn{pseudo-article} for each
8393 extracted file into the summary buffer. If you go to these
8394 ``articles'', you will be prompted for a command to run (usually Gnus
8395 will make a suggestion), and then the command will be run.
8397 @vindex gnus-view-pseudo-asynchronously
8398 If @code{gnus-view-pseudo-asynchronously} is @code{nil}, Emacs will wait
8399 until the viewing is done before proceeding.
8401 @vindex gnus-view-pseudos
8402 If @code{gnus-view-pseudos} is @code{automatic}, Gnus will not insert
8403 the pseudo-articles into the summary buffer, but view them
8404 immediately. If this variable is @code{not-confirm}, the user won't even
8405 be asked for a confirmation before viewing is done.
8407 @vindex gnus-view-pseudos-separately
8408 If @code{gnus-view-pseudos-separately} is non-@code{nil}, one
8409 pseudo-article will be created for each file to be viewed. If
8410 @code{nil}, all files that use the same viewing command will be given as
8411 a list of parameters to that command.
8413 @vindex gnus-insert-pseudo-articles
8414 If @code{gnus-insert-pseudo-articles} is non-@code{nil}, insert
8415 pseudo-articles when decoding. It is @code{t} by default.
8417 So; there you are, reading your @emph{pseudo-articles} in your
8418 @emph{virtual newsgroup} from the @emph{virtual server}; and you think:
8419 Why isn't anything real anymore? How did we get here?
8422 @node Article Treatment
8423 @section Article Treatment
8425 Reading through this huge manual, you may have quite forgotten that the
8426 object of newsreaders is to actually, like, read what people have
8427 written. Reading articles. Unfortunately, people are quite bad at
8428 writing, so there are tons of functions and variables to make reading
8429 these articles easier.
8432 * Article Highlighting:: You want to make the article look like fruit salad.
8433 * Article Fontisizing:: Making emphasized text look nice.
8434 * Article Hiding:: You also want to make certain info go away.
8435 * Article Washing:: Lots of way-neat functions to make life better.
8436 * Article Header:: Doing various header transformations.
8437 * Article Buttons:: Click on URLs, Message-IDs, addresses and the like.
8438 * Article Button Levels:: Controlling appearance of buttons.
8439 * Article Date:: Grumble, UT!
8440 * Article Display:: Display various stuff---X-Face, Picons, Smileys
8441 * Article Signature:: What is a signature?
8442 * Article Miscellanea:: Various other stuff.
8446 @node Article Highlighting
8447 @subsection Article Highlighting
8448 @cindex highlighting
8450 Not only do you want your article buffer to look like fruit salad, but
8451 you want it to look like technicolor fruit salad.
8456 @kindex W H a (Summary)
8457 @findex gnus-article-highlight
8458 @findex gnus-article-maybe-highlight
8459 Do much highlighting of the current article
8460 (@code{gnus-article-highlight}). This function highlights header, cited
8461 text, the signature, and adds buttons to the body and the head.
8464 @kindex W H h (Summary)
8465 @findex gnus-article-highlight-headers
8466 @vindex gnus-header-face-alist
8467 Highlight the headers (@code{gnus-article-highlight-headers}). The
8468 highlighting will be done according to the @code{gnus-header-face-alist}
8469 variable, which is a list where each element has the form
8470 @code{(@var{regexp} @var{name} @var{content})}.
8471 @var{regexp} is a regular expression for matching the
8472 header, @var{name} is the face used for highlighting the header name
8473 (@pxref{Faces and Fonts}) and @var{content} is the face for highlighting
8474 the header value. The first match made will be used. Note that
8475 @var{regexp} shouldn't have @samp{^} prepended---Gnus will add one.
8478 @kindex W H c (Summary)
8479 @findex gnus-article-highlight-citation
8480 Highlight cited text (@code{gnus-article-highlight-citation}).
8482 Some variables to customize the citation highlights:
8485 @vindex gnus-cite-parse-max-size
8487 @item gnus-cite-parse-max-size
8488 If the article size in bytes is bigger than this variable (which is
8489 25000 by default), no citation highlighting will be performed.
8491 @item gnus-cite-max-prefix
8492 @vindex gnus-cite-max-prefix
8493 Maximum possible length for a citation prefix (default 20).
8495 @item gnus-cite-face-list
8496 @vindex gnus-cite-face-list
8497 List of faces used for highlighting citations (@pxref{Faces and Fonts}).
8498 When there are citations from multiple articles in the same message,
8499 Gnus will try to give each citation from each article its own face.
8500 This should make it easier to see who wrote what.
8502 @item gnus-supercite-regexp
8503 @vindex gnus-supercite-regexp
8504 Regexp matching normal Supercite attribution lines.
8506 @item gnus-supercite-secondary-regexp
8507 @vindex gnus-supercite-secondary-regexp
8508 Regexp matching mangled Supercite attribution lines.
8510 @item gnus-cite-minimum-match-count
8511 @vindex gnus-cite-minimum-match-count
8512 Minimum number of identical prefixes we have to see before we believe
8513 that it's a citation.
8515 @item gnus-cite-attribution-prefix
8516 @vindex gnus-cite-attribution-prefix
8517 Regexp matching the beginning of an attribution line.
8519 @item gnus-cite-attribution-suffix
8520 @vindex gnus-cite-attribution-suffix
8521 Regexp matching the end of an attribution line.
8523 @item gnus-cite-attribution-face
8524 @vindex gnus-cite-attribution-face
8525 Face used for attribution lines. It is merged with the face for the
8526 cited text belonging to the attribution.
8528 @item gnus-cite-ignore-quoted-from
8529 @vindex gnus-cite-ignore-quoted-from
8530 If non-@code{nil}, no citation highlighting will be performed on lines
8531 beginning with @samp{>From }. Those lines may have been quoted by MTAs
8532 in order not to mix up with the envelope From line. The default value
8539 @kindex W H s (Summary)
8540 @vindex gnus-signature-separator
8541 @vindex gnus-signature-face
8542 @findex gnus-article-highlight-signature
8543 Highlight the signature (@code{gnus-article-highlight-signature}).
8544 Everything after @code{gnus-signature-separator} (@pxref{Article
8545 Signature}) in an article will be considered a signature and will be
8546 highlighted with @code{gnus-signature-face}, which is @code{italic} by
8551 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to highlight articles automatically.
8554 @node Article Fontisizing
8555 @subsection Article Fontisizing
8557 @cindex article emphasis
8559 @findex gnus-article-emphasize
8560 @kindex W e (Summary)
8561 People commonly add emphasis to words in news articles by writing things
8562 like @samp{_this_} or @samp{*this*} or @samp{/this/}. Gnus can make
8563 this look nicer by running the article through the @kbd{W e}
8564 (@code{gnus-article-emphasize}) command.
8566 @vindex gnus-emphasis-alist
8567 How the emphasis is computed is controlled by the
8568 @code{gnus-emphasis-alist} variable. This is an alist where the first
8569 element is a regular expression to be matched. The second is a number
8570 that says what regular expression grouping is used to find the entire
8571 emphasized word. The third is a number that says what regexp grouping
8572 should be displayed and highlighted. (The text between these two
8573 groupings will be hidden.) The fourth is the face used for
8577 (setq gnus-emphasis-alist
8578 '(("_\\(\\w+\\)_" 0 1 gnus-emphasis-underline)
8579 ("\\*\\(\\w+\\)\\*" 0 1 gnus-emphasis-bold)))
8588 @vindex gnus-emphasis-underline
8589 @vindex gnus-emphasis-bold
8590 @vindex gnus-emphasis-italic
8591 @vindex gnus-emphasis-underline-bold
8592 @vindex gnus-emphasis-underline-italic
8593 @vindex gnus-emphasis-bold-italic
8594 @vindex gnus-emphasis-underline-bold-italic
8595 By default, there are seven rules, and they use the following faces:
8596 @code{gnus-emphasis-bold}, @code{gnus-emphasis-italic},
8597 @code{gnus-emphasis-underline}, @code{gnus-emphasis-bold-italic},
8598 @code{gnus-emphasis-underline-italic},
8599 @code{gnus-emphasis-underline-bold}, and
8600 @code{gnus-emphasis-underline-bold-italic}.
8602 If you want to change these faces, you can either use @kbd{M-x
8603 customize}, or you can use @code{copy-face}. For instance, if you want
8604 to make @code{gnus-emphasis-italic} use a red face instead, you could
8608 (copy-face 'red 'gnus-emphasis-italic)
8611 @vindex gnus-group-highlight-words-alist
8613 If you want to highlight arbitrary words, you can use the
8614 @code{gnus-group-highlight-words-alist} variable, which uses the same
8615 syntax as @code{gnus-emphasis-alist}. The @code{highlight-words} group
8616 parameter (@pxref{Group Parameters}) can also be used.
8618 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to fontize articles automatically.
8621 @node Article Hiding
8622 @subsection Article Hiding
8623 @cindex article hiding
8625 Or rather, hiding certain things in each article. There usually is much
8626 too much cruft in most articles.
8631 @kindex W W a (Summary)
8632 @findex gnus-article-hide
8633 Do quite a lot of hiding on the article buffer
8634 (@kbd{gnus-article-hide}). In particular, this function will hide
8635 headers, @acronym{PGP}, cited text and the signature.
8638 @kindex W W h (Summary)
8639 @findex gnus-article-hide-headers
8640 Hide headers (@code{gnus-article-hide-headers}). @xref{Hiding
8644 @kindex W W b (Summary)
8645 @findex gnus-article-hide-boring-headers
8646 Hide headers that aren't particularly interesting
8647 (@code{gnus-article-hide-boring-headers}). @xref{Hiding Headers}.
8650 @kindex W W s (Summary)
8651 @findex gnus-article-hide-signature
8652 Hide signature (@code{gnus-article-hide-signature}). @xref{Article
8656 @kindex W W l (Summary)
8657 @findex gnus-article-hide-list-identifiers
8658 @vindex gnus-list-identifiers
8659 Strip list identifiers specified in @code{gnus-list-identifiers}. These
8660 are strings some mailing list servers add to the beginning of all
8661 @code{Subject} headers---for example, @samp{[zebra 4711]}. Any leading
8662 @samp{Re: } is skipped before stripping. @code{gnus-list-identifiers}
8663 may not contain @code{\\(..\\)}.
8667 @item gnus-list-identifiers
8668 @vindex gnus-list-identifiers
8669 A regular expression that matches list identifiers to be removed from
8670 subject. This can also be a list of regular expressions.
8675 @kindex W W P (Summary)
8676 @findex gnus-article-hide-pem
8677 Hide @acronym{PEM} (privacy enhanced messages) cruft
8678 (@code{gnus-article-hide-pem}).
8681 @kindex W W B (Summary)
8682 @findex gnus-article-strip-banner
8683 @vindex gnus-article-banner-alist
8684 @vindex gnus-article-address-banner-alist
8687 @cindex stripping advertisements
8688 @cindex advertisements
8689 Strip the banner specified by the @code{banner} group parameter
8690 (@code{gnus-article-strip-banner}). This is mainly used to hide those
8691 annoying banners and/or signatures that some mailing lists and moderated
8692 groups adds to all the messages. The way to use this function is to add
8693 the @code{banner} group parameter (@pxref{Group Parameters}) to the
8694 group you want banners stripped from. The parameter either be a string,
8695 which will be interpreted as a regular expression matching text to be
8696 removed, or the symbol @code{signature}, meaning that the (last)
8697 signature should be removed, or other symbol, meaning that the
8698 corresponding regular expression in @code{gnus-article-banner-alist} is
8701 Regardless of a group, you can hide things like advertisements only when
8702 the sender of an article has a certain mail address specified in
8703 @code{gnus-article-address-banner-alist}.
8707 @item gnus-article-address-banner-alist
8708 @vindex gnus-article-address-banner-alist
8709 Alist of mail addresses and banners. Each element has the form
8710 @code{(@var{address} . @var{banner})}, where @var{address} is a regexp
8711 matching a mail address in the From header, @var{banner} is one of a
8712 symbol @code{signature}, an item in @code{gnus-article-banner-alist},
8713 a regexp and @code{nil}. If @var{address} matches author's mail
8714 address, it will remove things like advertisements. For example, if a
8715 sender has the mail address @samp{hail@@yoo-hoo.co.jp} and there is a
8716 banner something like @samp{Do You Yoo-hoo!?} in all articles he
8717 sends, you can use the following element to remove them:
8720 ("@@yoo-hoo\\.co\\.jp\\'" .
8721 "\n_+\nDo You Yoo-hoo!\\?\n.*\n.*\n")
8727 @kindex W W c (Summary)
8728 @findex gnus-article-hide-citation
8729 Hide citation (@code{gnus-article-hide-citation}). Some variables for
8730 customizing the hiding:
8734 @item gnus-cited-opened-text-button-line-format
8735 @itemx gnus-cited-closed-text-button-line-format
8736 @vindex gnus-cited-closed-text-button-line-format
8737 @vindex gnus-cited-opened-text-button-line-format
8738 Gnus adds buttons to show where the cited text has been hidden, and to
8739 allow toggle hiding the text. The format of the variable is specified
8740 by these format-like variable (@pxref{Formatting Variables}). These
8745 Starting point of the hidden text.
8747 Ending point of the hidden text.
8749 Number of characters in the hidden region.
8751 Number of lines of hidden text.
8754 @item gnus-cited-lines-visible
8755 @vindex gnus-cited-lines-visible
8756 The number of lines at the beginning of the cited text to leave
8757 shown. This can also be a cons cell with the number of lines at the top
8758 and bottom of the text, respectively, to remain visible.
8763 @kindex W W C-c (Summary)
8764 @findex gnus-article-hide-citation-maybe
8766 Hide citation (@code{gnus-article-hide-citation-maybe}) depending on the
8767 following two variables:
8770 @item gnus-cite-hide-percentage
8771 @vindex gnus-cite-hide-percentage
8772 If the cited text is of a bigger percentage than this variable (default
8773 50), hide the cited text.
8775 @item gnus-cite-hide-absolute
8776 @vindex gnus-cite-hide-absolute
8777 The cited text must have at least this length (default 10) before it
8782 @kindex W W C (Summary)
8783 @findex gnus-article-hide-citation-in-followups
8784 Hide cited text in articles that aren't roots
8785 (@code{gnus-article-hide-citation-in-followups}). This isn't very
8786 useful as an interactive command, but might be a handy function to stick
8787 have happen automatically (@pxref{Customizing Articles}).
8791 All these ``hiding'' commands are toggles, but if you give a negative
8792 prefix to these commands, they will show what they have previously
8793 hidden. If you give a positive prefix, they will always hide.
8795 Also @pxref{Article Highlighting} for further variables for
8796 citation customization.
8798 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to hide article elements
8802 @node Article Washing
8803 @subsection Article Washing
8805 @cindex article washing
8807 We call this ``article washing'' for a really good reason. Namely, the
8808 @kbd{A} key was taken, so we had to use the @kbd{W} key instead.
8810 @dfn{Washing} is defined by us as ``changing something from something to
8811 something else'', but normally results in something looking better.
8814 @xref{Customizing Articles}, if you want to change how Gnus displays
8815 articles by default.
8820 This is not really washing, it's sort of the opposite of washing. If
8821 you type this, you see the article exactly as it exists on disk or on
8825 Force redisplaying of the current article
8826 (@code{gnus-summary-show-article}). This is also not really washing.
8827 If you type this, you see the article without any previously applied
8828 interactive Washing functions but with all default treatments
8829 (@pxref{Customizing Articles}).
8832 @kindex W l (Summary)
8833 @findex gnus-summary-stop-page-breaking
8834 Remove page breaks from the current article
8835 (@code{gnus-summary-stop-page-breaking}). @xref{Misc Article}, for page
8839 @kindex W r (Summary)
8840 @findex gnus-summary-caesar-message
8841 @c @icon{gnus-summary-caesar-message}
8842 Do a Caesar rotate (rot13) on the article buffer
8843 (@code{gnus-summary-caesar-message}).
8844 Unreadable articles that tell you to read them with Caesar rotate or rot13.
8845 (Typically offensive jokes and such.)
8847 It's commonly called ``rot13'' because each letter is rotated 13
8848 positions in the alphabet, e. g. @samp{B} (letter #2) -> @samp{O} (letter
8849 #15). It is sometimes referred to as ``Caesar rotate'' because Caesar
8850 is rumored to have employed this form of, uh, somewhat weak encryption.
8853 @kindex W m (Summary)
8854 @findex gnus-summary-morse-message
8855 Morse decode the article buffer (@code{gnus-summary-morse-message}).
8858 @kindex W i (Summary)
8859 @findex gnus-summary-idna-message
8860 Decode IDNA encoded domain names in the current articles. IDNA
8861 encoded domain names looks like @samp{xn--bar}. If a string remain
8862 unencoded after running invoking this, it is likely an invalid IDNA
8863 string (@samp{xn--bar} is invalid). You must have GNU Libidn
8864 (@url{http://www.gnu.org/software/libidn/}) installed for this command
8869 @kindex W t (Summary)
8871 @findex gnus-summary-toggle-header
8872 Toggle whether to display all headers in the article buffer
8873 (@code{gnus-summary-toggle-header}).
8876 @kindex W v (Summary)
8877 @findex gnus-summary-verbose-headers
8878 Toggle whether to display all headers in the article buffer permanently
8879 (@code{gnus-summary-verbose-headers}).
8882 @kindex W o (Summary)
8883 @findex gnus-article-treat-overstrike
8884 Treat overstrike (@code{gnus-article-treat-overstrike}).
8887 @kindex W d (Summary)
8888 @findex gnus-article-treat-dumbquotes
8889 @vindex gnus-article-dumbquotes-map
8891 @cindex M****s*** sm*rtq**t*s
8893 Treat M****s*** sm*rtq**t*s according to
8894 @code{gnus-article-dumbquotes-map}
8895 (@code{gnus-article-treat-dumbquotes}). Note that this function guesses
8896 whether a character is a sm*rtq**t* or not, so it should only be used
8899 Sm*rtq**t*s are M****s***'s unilateral extension to the character map in
8900 an attempt to provide more quoting characters. If you see something
8901 like @code{\222} or @code{\264} where you're expecting some kind of
8902 apostrophe or quotation mark, then try this wash.
8905 @kindex W Y f (Summary)
8906 @findex gnus-article-outlook-deuglify-article
8907 @cindex Outlook Express
8908 Full deuglify of broken Outlook (Express) articles: Treat dumbquotes,
8909 unwrap lines, repair attribution and rearrange citation.
8910 (@code{gnus-article-outlook-deuglify-article}).
8913 @kindex W Y u (Summary)
8914 @findex gnus-article-outlook-unwrap-lines
8915 @vindex gnus-outlook-deuglify-unwrap-min
8916 @vindex gnus-outlook-deuglify-unwrap-max
8917 Unwrap lines that appear to be wrapped citation lines. You can control
8918 what lines will be unwrapped by frobbing
8919 @code{gnus-outlook-deuglify-unwrap-min} and
8920 @code{gnus-outlook-deuglify-unwrap-max}, indicating the minimum and
8921 maximum length of an unwrapped citation line.
8922 (@code{gnus-article-outlook-unwrap-lines}).
8925 @kindex W Y a (Summary)
8926 @findex gnus-article-outlook-repair-attribution
8927 Repair a broken attribution line.@*
8928 (@code{gnus-article-outlook-repair-attribution}).
8931 @kindex W Y c (Summary)
8932 @findex gnus-article-outlook-rearrange-citation
8933 Repair broken citations by rearranging the text.
8934 (@code{gnus-article-outlook-rearrange-citation}).
8937 @kindex W w (Summary)
8938 @findex gnus-article-fill-cited-article
8939 Do word wrap (@code{gnus-article-fill-cited-article}).
8941 You can give the command a numerical prefix to specify the width to use
8945 @kindex W Q (Summary)
8946 @findex gnus-article-fill-long-lines
8947 Fill long lines (@code{gnus-article-fill-long-lines}).
8950 @kindex W C (Summary)
8951 @findex gnus-article-capitalize-sentences
8952 Capitalize the first word in each sentence
8953 (@code{gnus-article-capitalize-sentences}).
8956 @kindex W c (Summary)
8957 @findex gnus-article-remove-cr
8958 Translate CRLF pairs (i. e., @samp{^M}s on the end of the lines) into LF
8959 (this takes care of DOS line endings), and then translate any remaining
8960 CRs into LF (this takes care of Mac line endings)
8961 (@code{gnus-article-remove-cr}).
8964 @kindex W q (Summary)
8965 @findex gnus-article-de-quoted-unreadable
8966 Treat quoted-printable (@code{gnus-article-de-quoted-unreadable}).
8967 Quoted-Printable is one common @acronym{MIME} encoding employed when
8968 sending non-@acronym{ASCII} (i.e., 8-bit) articles. It typically
8969 makes strings like @samp{d@'ej@`a vu} look like @samp{d=E9j=E0 vu},
8970 which doesn't look very readable to me. Note that this is usually
8971 done automatically by Gnus if the message in question has a
8972 @code{Content-Transfer-Encoding} header that says that this encoding
8973 has been done. If a prefix is given, a charset will be asked for.
8976 @kindex W 6 (Summary)
8977 @findex gnus-article-de-base64-unreadable
8978 Treat base64 (@code{gnus-article-de-base64-unreadable}). Base64 is
8979 one common @acronym{MIME} encoding employed when sending
8980 non-@acronym{ASCII} (i.e., 8-bit) articles. Note that this is
8981 usually done automatically by Gnus if the message in question has a
8982 @code{Content-Transfer-Encoding} header that says that this encoding
8983 has been done. If a prefix is given, a charset will be asked for.
8986 @kindex W Z (Summary)
8987 @findex gnus-article-decode-HZ
8988 Treat HZ or HZP (@code{gnus-article-decode-HZ}). HZ (or HZP) is one
8989 common encoding employed when sending Chinese articles. It typically
8990 makes strings look like @samp{~@{<:Ky2;S@{#,NpJ)l6HK!#~@}}.
8993 @kindex W A (Summary)
8994 @findex gnus-article-treat-ansi-sequences
8995 @cindex @acronym{ANSI} control sequences
8996 Translate @acronym{ANSI} SGR control sequences into overlays or
8997 extents (@code{gnus-article-treat-ansi-sequences}). @acronym{ANSI}
8998 sequences are used in some Chinese hierarchies for highlighting.
9001 @kindex W u (Summary)
9002 @findex gnus-article-unsplit-urls
9003 Remove newlines from within URLs. Some mailers insert newlines into
9004 outgoing email messages to keep lines short. This reformatting can
9005 split long URLs onto multiple lines. Repair those URLs by removing
9006 the newlines (@code{gnus-article-unsplit-urls}).
9009 @kindex W h (Summary)
9010 @findex gnus-article-wash-html
9011 Treat @acronym{HTML} (@code{gnus-article-wash-html}). Note that this is
9012 usually done automatically by Gnus if the message in question has a
9013 @code{Content-Type} header that says that the message is @acronym{HTML}.
9015 If a prefix is given, a charset will be asked for. If it is a number,
9016 the charset defined in @code{gnus-summary-show-article-charset-alist}
9017 (@pxref{Paging the Article}) will be used.
9019 @vindex gnus-article-wash-function
9020 The default is to use the function specified by
9021 @code{mm-text-html-renderer} (@pxref{Display Customization, ,Display
9022 Customization, emacs-mime, The Emacs MIME Manual}) to convert the
9023 @acronym{HTML}, but this is controlled by the
9024 @code{gnus-article-wash-function} variable. Pre-defined functions you
9032 Use @uref{http://emacs-w3m.namazu.org/, emacs-w3m}.
9034 @item w3m-standalone
9035 Use @uref{http://w3m.sourceforge.net/, w3m}.
9038 Use @uref{http://links.sf.net/, Links}.
9041 Use @uref{http://lynx.isc.org/, Lynx}.
9044 Use html2text---a simple @acronym{HTML} converter included with Gnus.
9049 @kindex W b (Summary)
9050 @findex gnus-article-add-buttons
9051 Add clickable buttons to the article (@code{gnus-article-add-buttons}).
9052 @xref{Article Buttons}.
9055 @kindex W B (Summary)
9056 @findex gnus-article-add-buttons-to-head
9057 Add clickable buttons to the article headers
9058 (@code{gnus-article-add-buttons-to-head}).
9061 @kindex W p (Summary)
9062 @findex gnus-article-verify-x-pgp-sig
9063 Verify a signed control message
9064 (@code{gnus-article-verify-x-pgp-sig}). Control messages such as
9065 @code{newgroup} and @code{checkgroups} are usually signed by the
9066 hierarchy maintainer. You need to add the @acronym{PGP} public key of
9067 the maintainer to your keyring to verify the
9068 message.@footnote{@acronym{PGP} keys for many hierarchies are
9069 available at @uref{ftp://ftp.isc.org/pub/pgpcontrol/README.html}}
9072 @kindex W s (Summary)
9073 @findex gnus-summary-force-verify-and-decrypt
9074 Verify a signed (@acronym{PGP}, @acronym{PGP/MIME} or
9075 @acronym{S/MIME}) message
9076 (@code{gnus-summary-force-verify-and-decrypt}). @xref{Security}.
9079 @kindex W a (Summary)
9080 @findex gnus-article-strip-headers-in-body
9081 Strip headers like the @code{X-No-Archive} header from the beginning of
9082 article bodies (@code{gnus-article-strip-headers-in-body}).
9085 @kindex W E l (Summary)
9086 @findex gnus-article-strip-leading-blank-lines
9087 Remove all blank lines from the beginning of the article
9088 (@code{gnus-article-strip-leading-blank-lines}).
9091 @kindex W E m (Summary)
9092 @findex gnus-article-strip-multiple-blank-lines
9093 Replace all blank lines with empty lines and then all multiple empty
9094 lines with a single empty line.
9095 (@code{gnus-article-strip-multiple-blank-lines}).
9098 @kindex W E t (Summary)
9099 @findex gnus-article-remove-trailing-blank-lines
9100 Remove all blank lines at the end of the article
9101 (@code{gnus-article-remove-trailing-blank-lines}).
9104 @kindex W E a (Summary)
9105 @findex gnus-article-strip-blank-lines
9106 Do all the three commands above
9107 (@code{gnus-article-strip-blank-lines}).
9110 @kindex W E A (Summary)
9111 @findex gnus-article-strip-all-blank-lines
9112 Remove all blank lines
9113 (@code{gnus-article-strip-all-blank-lines}).
9116 @kindex W E s (Summary)
9117 @findex gnus-article-strip-leading-space
9118 Remove all white space from the beginning of all lines of the article
9119 body (@code{gnus-article-strip-leading-space}).
9122 @kindex W E e (Summary)
9123 @findex gnus-article-strip-trailing-space
9124 Remove all white space from the end of all lines of the article
9125 body (@code{gnus-article-strip-trailing-space}).
9129 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to wash articles automatically.
9132 @node Article Header
9133 @subsection Article Header
9135 These commands perform various transformations of article header.
9140 @kindex W G u (Summary)
9141 @findex gnus-article-treat-unfold-headers
9142 Unfold folded header lines (@code{gnus-article-treat-unfold-headers}).
9145 @kindex W G n (Summary)
9146 @findex gnus-article-treat-fold-newsgroups
9147 Fold the @code{Newsgroups} and @code{Followup-To} headers
9148 (@code{gnus-article-treat-fold-newsgroups}).
9151 @kindex W G f (Summary)
9152 @findex gnus-article-treat-fold-headers
9153 Fold all the message headers
9154 (@code{gnus-article-treat-fold-headers}).
9157 @kindex W E w (Summary)
9158 @findex gnus-article-remove-leading-whitespace
9159 Remove excessive whitespace from all headers
9160 (@code{gnus-article-remove-leading-whitespace}).
9165 @node Article Buttons
9166 @subsection Article Buttons
9169 People often include references to other stuff in articles, and it would
9170 be nice if Gnus could just fetch whatever it is that people talk about
9171 with the minimum of fuzz when you hit @kbd{RET} or use the middle mouse
9172 button on these references.
9174 @vindex gnus-button-man-handler
9175 Gnus adds @dfn{buttons} to certain standard references by default:
9176 Well-formed URLs, mail addresses, Message-IDs, Info links, man pages and
9177 Emacs or Gnus related references. This is controlled by two variables,
9178 one that handles article bodies and one that handles article heads:
9182 @item gnus-button-alist
9183 @vindex gnus-button-alist
9184 This is an alist where each entry has this form:
9187 (@var{regexp} @var{button-par} @var{use-p} @var{function} @var{data-par})
9193 All text that match this regular expression (case insensitive) will be
9194 considered an external reference. Here's a typical regexp that matches
9195 embedded URLs: @samp{<URL:\\([^\n\r>]*\\)>}. This can also be a
9196 variable containing a regexp, useful variables to use include
9197 @code{gnus-button-url-regexp} and @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-regexp}.
9200 Gnus has to know which parts of the matches is to be highlighted. This
9201 is a number that says what sub-expression of the regexp is to be
9202 highlighted. If you want it all highlighted, you use 0 here.
9205 This form will be @code{eval}ed, and if the result is non-@code{nil},
9206 this is considered a match. This is useful if you want extra sifting to
9207 avoid false matches. Often variables named
9208 @code{gnus-button-@var{*}-level} are used here, @xref{Article Button
9209 Levels}, but any other form may be used too.
9211 @c @code{use-p} is @code{eval}ed only if @code{regexp} matches.
9214 This function will be called when you click on this button.
9217 As with @var{button-par}, this is a sub-expression number, but this one
9218 says which part of the match is to be sent as data to @var{function}.
9222 So the full entry for buttonizing URLs is then
9225 ("<URL:\\([^\n\r>]*\\)>" 0 t gnus-button-url 1)
9228 @item gnus-header-button-alist
9229 @vindex gnus-header-button-alist
9230 This is just like the other alist, except that it is applied to the
9231 article head only, and that each entry has an additional element that is
9232 used to say what headers to apply the buttonize coding to:
9235 (@var{header} @var{regexp} @var{button-par} @var{use-p} @var{function} @var{data-par})
9238 @var{header} is a regular expression.
9241 @subsubsection Related variables and functions
9244 @item gnus-button-@var{*}-level
9245 @xref{Article Button Levels}.
9247 @c Stuff related to gnus-button-browse-level
9249 @item gnus-button-url-regexp
9250 @vindex gnus-button-url-regexp
9251 A regular expression that matches embedded URLs. It is used in the
9252 default values of the variables above.
9254 @c Stuff related to gnus-button-man-level
9256 @item gnus-button-man-handler
9257 @vindex gnus-button-man-handler
9258 The function to use for displaying man pages. It must take at least one
9259 argument with a string naming the man page.
9261 @c Stuff related to gnus-button-message-level
9263 @item gnus-button-mid-or-mail-regexp
9264 @vindex gnus-button-mid-or-mail-regexp
9265 Regular expression that matches a message ID or a mail address.
9267 @item gnus-button-prefer-mid-or-mail
9268 @vindex gnus-button-prefer-mid-or-mail
9269 This variable determines what to do when the button on a string as
9270 @samp{foo123@@bar.invalid} is pushed. Strings like this can be either a
9271 message ID or a mail address. If it is one of the symbols @code{mid} or
9272 @code{mail}, Gnus will always assume that the string is a message ID or
9273 a mail address, respectively. If this variable is set to the symbol
9274 @code{ask}, always query the user what to do. If it is a function, this
9275 function will be called with the string as its only argument. The
9276 function must return @code{mid}, @code{mail}, @code{invalid} or
9277 @code{ask}. The default value is the function
9278 @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic}.
9280 @item gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic
9281 @findex gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic
9282 Function that guesses whether its argument is a message ID or a mail
9283 address. Returns @code{mid} if it's a message IDs, @code{mail} if
9284 it's a mail address, @code{ask} if unsure and @code{invalid} if the
9287 @item gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic-alist
9288 @vindex gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic-alist
9289 An alist of @code{(RATE . REGEXP)} pairs used by the function
9290 @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic}.
9292 @c Stuff related to gnus-button-tex-level
9294 @item gnus-button-ctan-handler
9295 @findex gnus-button-ctan-handler
9296 The function to use for displaying CTAN links. It must take one
9297 argument, the string naming the URL.
9300 @vindex gnus-ctan-url
9301 Top directory of a CTAN (Comprehensive TeX Archive Network) archive used
9302 by @code{gnus-button-ctan-handler}.
9306 @item gnus-article-button-face
9307 @vindex gnus-article-button-face
9308 Face used on buttons.
9310 @item gnus-article-mouse-face
9311 @vindex gnus-article-mouse-face
9312 Face used when the mouse cursor is over a button.
9316 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to buttonize articles automatically.
9319 @node Article Button Levels
9320 @subsection Article button levels
9321 @cindex button levels
9322 The higher the value of the variables @code{gnus-button-@var{*}-level},
9323 the more buttons will appear. If the level is zero, no corresponding
9324 buttons are displayed. With the default value (which is 5) you should
9325 already see quite a lot of buttons. With higher levels, you will see
9326 more buttons, but you may also get more false positives. To avoid them,
9327 you can set the variables @code{gnus-button-@var{*}-level} local to
9328 specific groups (@pxref{Group Parameters}). Here's an example for the
9329 variable @code{gnus-parameters}:
9332 ;; @r{increase @code{gnus-button-*-level} in some groups:}
9333 (setq gnus-parameters
9334 '(("\\<\\(emacs\\|gnus\\)\\>" (gnus-button-emacs-level 10))
9335 ("\\<unix\\>" (gnus-button-man-level 10))
9336 ("\\<tex\\>" (gnus-button-tex-level 10))))
9341 @item gnus-button-browse-level
9342 @vindex gnus-button-browse-level
9343 Controls the display of references to message IDs, mail addresses and
9344 news URLs. Related variables and functions include
9345 @code{gnus-button-url-regexp}, @code{browse-url}, and
9346 @code{browse-url-browser-function}.
9348 @item gnus-button-emacs-level
9349 @vindex gnus-button-emacs-level
9350 Controls the display of Emacs or Gnus references. Related functions are
9351 @code{gnus-button-handle-custom},
9352 @code{gnus-button-handle-describe-function},
9353 @code{gnus-button-handle-describe-variable},
9354 @code{gnus-button-handle-symbol},
9355 @code{gnus-button-handle-describe-key},
9356 @code{gnus-button-handle-apropos},
9357 @code{gnus-button-handle-apropos-command},
9358 @code{gnus-button-handle-apropos-variable},
9359 @code{gnus-button-handle-apropos-documentation}, and
9360 @code{gnus-button-handle-library}.
9362 @item gnus-button-man-level
9363 @vindex gnus-button-man-level
9364 Controls the display of references to (Unix) man pages.
9365 See @code{gnus-button-man-handler}.
9367 @item gnus-button-message-level
9368 @vindex gnus-button-message-level
9369 Controls the display of message IDs, mail addresses and news URLs.
9370 Related variables and functions include
9371 @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-regexp},
9372 @code{gnus-button-prefer-mid-or-mail},
9373 @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic}, and
9374 @code{gnus-button-mid-or-mail-heuristic-alist}.
9376 @item gnus-button-tex-level
9377 @vindex gnus-button-tex-level
9378 Controls the display of references to @TeX{} or LaTeX stuff, e.g. for CTAN
9379 URLs. See the variables @code{gnus-ctan-url},
9380 @code{gnus-button-ctan-handler},
9381 @code{gnus-button-ctan-directory-regexp}, and
9382 @code{gnus-button-handle-ctan-bogus-regexp}.
9388 @subsection Article Date
9390 The date is most likely generated in some obscure timezone you've never
9391 heard of, so it's quite nice to be able to find out what the time was
9392 when the article was sent.
9397 @kindex W T u (Summary)
9398 @findex gnus-article-date-ut
9399 Display the date in UT (aka. GMT, aka ZULU)
9400 (@code{gnus-article-date-ut}).
9403 @kindex W T i (Summary)
9404 @findex gnus-article-date-iso8601
9406 Display the date in international format, aka. ISO 8601
9407 (@code{gnus-article-date-iso8601}).
9410 @kindex W T l (Summary)
9411 @findex gnus-article-date-local
9412 Display the date in the local timezone (@code{gnus-article-date-local}).
9415 @kindex W T p (Summary)
9416 @findex gnus-article-date-english
9417 Display the date in a format that's easily pronounceable in English
9418 (@code{gnus-article-date-english}).
9421 @kindex W T s (Summary)
9422 @vindex gnus-article-time-format
9423 @findex gnus-article-date-user
9424 @findex format-time-string
9425 Display the date using a user-defined format
9426 (@code{gnus-article-date-user}). The format is specified by the
9427 @code{gnus-article-time-format} variable, and is a string that's passed
9428 to @code{format-time-string}. See the documentation of that variable
9429 for a list of possible format specs.
9432 @kindex W T e (Summary)
9433 @findex gnus-article-date-lapsed
9434 @findex gnus-start-date-timer
9435 @findex gnus-stop-date-timer
9436 Say how much time has elapsed between the article was posted and now
9437 (@code{gnus-article-date-lapsed}). It looks something like:
9440 X-Sent: 6 weeks, 4 days, 1 hour, 3 minutes, 8 seconds ago
9443 @vindex gnus-article-date-lapsed-new-header
9444 The value of @code{gnus-article-date-lapsed-new-header} determines
9445 whether this header will just be added below the old Date one, or will
9448 An advantage of using Gnus to read mail is that it converts simple bugs
9449 into wonderful absurdities.
9451 If you want to have this line updated continually, you can put
9454 (gnus-start-date-timer)
9457 in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file, or you can run it off of some hook. If
9458 you want to stop the timer, you can use the @code{gnus-stop-date-timer}
9462 @kindex W T o (Summary)
9463 @findex gnus-article-date-original
9464 Display the original date (@code{gnus-article-date-original}). This can
9465 be useful if you normally use some other conversion function and are
9466 worried that it might be doing something totally wrong. Say, claiming
9467 that the article was posted in 1854. Although something like that is
9468 @emph{totally} impossible. Don't you trust me? *titter*
9472 @xref{Customizing Articles}, for how to display the date in your
9473 preferred format automatically.
9476 @node Article Display
9477 @subsection Article Display
9482 These commands add various frivolous display gimmicks to the article
9483 buffer in Emacs versions that support them.
9485 @code{X-Face} headers are small black-and-white images supplied by the
9486 message headers (@pxref{X-Face}).
9488 @code{Face} headers are small colored images supplied by the message
9489 headers (@pxref{Face}).
9491 Smileys are those little @samp{:-)} symbols that people like to litter
9492 their messages with (@pxref{Smileys}).
9494 Picons, on the other hand, reside on your own system, and Gnus will
9495 try to match the headers to what you have (@pxref{Picons}).
9497 All these functions are toggles---if the elements already exist,
9502 @kindex W D x (Summary)
9503 @findex gnus-article-display-x-face
9504 Display an @code{X-Face} in the @code{From} header.
9505 (@code{gnus-article-display-x-face}).
9508 @kindex W D d (Summary)
9509 @findex gnus-article-display-face
9510 Display a @code{Face} in the @code{From} header.
9511 (@code{gnus-article-display-face}).
9514 @kindex W D s (Summary)
9515 @findex gnus-treat-smiley
9516 Display smileys (@code{gnus-treat-smiley}).
9519 @kindex W D f (Summary)
9520 @findex gnus-treat-from-picon
9521 Piconify the @code{From} header (@code{gnus-treat-from-picon}).
9524 @kindex W D m (Summary)
9525 @findex gnus-treat-mail-picon
9526 Piconify all mail headers (i. e., @code{Cc}, @code{To})
9527 (@code{gnus-treat-mail-picon}).
9530 @kindex W D n (Summary)
9531 @findex gnus-treat-newsgroups-picon
9532 Piconify all news headers (i. e., @code{Newsgroups} and
9533 @code{Followup-To}) (@code{gnus-treat-newsgroups-picon}).
9536 @kindex W D D (Summary)
9537 @findex gnus-article-remove-images
9538 Remove all images from the article buffer
9539 (@code{gnus-article-remove-images}).
9545 @node Article Signature
9546 @subsection Article Signature
9548 @cindex article signature
9550 @vindex gnus-signature-separator
9551 Each article is divided into two parts---the head and the body. The
9552 body can be divided into a signature part and a text part. The variable
9553 that says what is to be considered a signature is
9554 @code{gnus-signature-separator}. This is normally the standard
9555 @samp{^-- $} as mandated by son-of-RFC 1036. However, many people use
9556 non-standard signature separators, so this variable can also be a list
9557 of regular expressions to be tested, one by one. (Searches are done
9558 from the end of the body towards the beginning.) One likely value is:
9561 (setq gnus-signature-separator
9562 '("^-- $" ; @r{The standard}
9563 "^-- *$" ; @r{A common mangling}
9564 "^-------*$" ; @r{Many people just use a looong}
9565 ; @r{line of dashes. Shame!}
9566 "^ *--------*$" ; @r{Double-shame!}
9567 "^________*$" ; @r{Underscores are also popular}
9568 "^========*$")) ; @r{Pervert!}
9571 The more permissive you are, the more likely it is that you'll get false
9574 @vindex gnus-signature-limit
9575 @code{gnus-signature-limit} provides a limit to what is considered a
9576 signature when displaying articles.
9580 If it is an integer, no signature may be longer (in characters) than
9583 If it is a floating point number, no signature may be longer (in lines)
9586 If it is a function, the function will be called without any parameters,
9587 and if it returns @code{nil}, there is no signature in the buffer.
9589 If it is a string, it will be used as a regexp. If it matches, the text
9590 in question is not a signature.
9593 This variable can also be a list where the elements may be of the types
9594 listed above. Here's an example:
9597 (setq gnus-signature-limit
9598 '(200.0 "^---*Forwarded article"))
9601 This means that if there are more than 200 lines after the signature
9602 separator, or the text after the signature separator is matched by
9603 the regular expression @samp{^---*Forwarded article}, then it isn't a
9604 signature after all.
9607 @node Article Miscellanea
9608 @subsection Article Miscellanea
9612 @kindex A t (Summary)
9613 @findex gnus-article-babel
9614 Translate the article from one language to another
9615 (@code{gnus-article-babel}).
9621 @section MIME Commands
9622 @cindex MIME decoding
9624 @cindex viewing attachments
9626 The following commands all understand the numerical prefix. For
9627 instance, @kbd{3 K v} means ``view the third @acronym{MIME} part''.
9633 @kindex K v (Summary)
9634 View the @acronym{MIME} part.
9637 @kindex K o (Summary)
9638 Save the @acronym{MIME} part.
9641 @kindex K O (Summary)
9642 Prompt for a file name, then save the @acronym{MIME} part and strip it
9643 from the article. The stripped @acronym{MIME} object will be referred
9644 via the message/external-body @acronym{MIME} type.
9647 @kindex K r (Summary)
9648 Replace the @acronym{MIME} part with an external body.
9651 @kindex K d (Summary)
9652 Delete the @acronym{MIME} part and add some information about the
9656 @kindex K c (Summary)
9657 Copy the @acronym{MIME} part.
9660 @kindex K e (Summary)
9661 View the @acronym{MIME} part externally.
9664 @kindex K i (Summary)
9665 View the @acronym{MIME} part internally.
9668 @kindex K | (Summary)
9669 Pipe the @acronym{MIME} part to an external command.
9672 The rest of these @acronym{MIME} commands do not use the numerical prefix in
9677 @kindex K b (Summary)
9678 Make all the @acronym{MIME} parts have buttons in front of them. This is
9679 mostly useful if you wish to save (or perform other actions) on inlined
9683 @kindex K m (Summary)
9684 @findex gnus-summary-repair-multipart
9685 Some multipart messages are transmitted with missing or faulty headers.
9686 This command will attempt to ``repair'' these messages so that they can
9687 be viewed in a more pleasant manner
9688 (@code{gnus-summary-repair-multipart}).
9691 @kindex X m (Summary)
9692 @findex gnus-summary-save-parts
9693 Save all parts matching a @acronym{MIME} type to a directory
9694 (@code{gnus-summary-save-parts}). Understands the process/prefix
9695 convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
9698 @kindex M-t (Summary)
9699 @findex gnus-summary-toggle-display-buttonized
9700 Toggle the buttonized display of the article buffer
9701 (@code{gnus-summary-toggle-display-buttonized}).
9704 @kindex W M w (Summary)
9705 @findex gnus-article-decode-mime-words
9706 Decode RFC 2047-encoded words in the article headers
9707 (@code{gnus-article-decode-mime-words}).
9710 @kindex W M c (Summary)
9711 @findex gnus-article-decode-charset
9712 Decode encoded article bodies as well as charsets
9713 (@code{gnus-article-decode-charset}).
9715 This command looks in the @code{Content-Type} header to determine the
9716 charset. If there is no such header in the article, you can give it a
9717 prefix, which will prompt for the charset to decode as. In regional
9718 groups where people post using some common encoding (but do not
9719 include @acronym{MIME} headers), you can set the @code{charset} group/topic
9720 parameter to the required charset (@pxref{Group Parameters}).
9723 @kindex W M v (Summary)
9724 @findex gnus-mime-view-all-parts
9725 View all the @acronym{MIME} parts in the current article
9726 (@code{gnus-mime-view-all-parts}).
9733 @item gnus-ignored-mime-types
9734 @vindex gnus-ignored-mime-types
9735 This is a list of regexps. @acronym{MIME} types that match a regexp from
9736 this list will be completely ignored by Gnus. The default value is
9739 To have all Vcards be ignored, you'd say something like this:
9742 (setq gnus-ignored-mime-types
9746 @item gnus-article-loose-mime
9747 @vindex gnus-article-loose-mime
9748 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus won't require the @samp{MIME-Version} header
9749 before interpreting the message as a @acronym{MIME} message. This helps
9750 when reading messages from certain broken mail user agents. The
9751 default is @code{t}.
9753 @item gnus-article-emulate-mime
9754 @vindex gnus-article-emulate-mime
9757 There are other, non-@acronym{MIME} encoding methods used. The most common
9758 is @samp{uuencode}, but yEncode is also getting to be popular. If
9759 this variable is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will look in message bodies to
9760 see if it finds these encodings, and if so, it'll run them through the
9761 Gnus @acronym{MIME} machinery. The default is @code{t}. Only
9762 single-part yEnc encoded attachments can be decoded. There's no support
9763 for encoding in Gnus.
9765 @item gnus-unbuttonized-mime-types
9766 @vindex gnus-unbuttonized-mime-types
9767 This is a list of regexps. @acronym{MIME} types that match a regexp from
9768 this list won't have @acronym{MIME} buttons inserted unless they aren't
9769 displayed or this variable is overridden by
9770 @code{gnus-buttonized-mime-types}. The default value is
9771 @code{(".*/.*")}. This variable is only used when
9772 @code{gnus-inhibit-mime-unbuttonizing} is @code{nil}.
9774 @item gnus-buttonized-mime-types
9775 @vindex gnus-buttonized-mime-types
9776 This is a list of regexps. @acronym{MIME} types that match a regexp from
9777 this list will have @acronym{MIME} buttons inserted unless they aren't
9778 displayed. This variable overrides
9779 @code{gnus-unbuttonized-mime-types}. The default value is @code{nil}.
9780 This variable is only used when @code{gnus-inhibit-mime-unbuttonizing}
9783 To see e.g. security buttons but no other buttons, you could set this
9784 variable to @code{("multipart/signed")} and leave
9785 @code{gnus-unbuttonized-mime-types} at the default value.
9787 You could also add @code{"multipart/alternative"} to this list to
9788 display radio buttons that allow you to choose one of two media types
9789 those mails include. See also @code{mm-discouraged-alternatives}
9790 (@pxref{Display Customization, ,Display Customization, emacs-mime, The
9791 Emacs MIME Manual}).
9793 @item gnus-inhibit-mime-unbuttonizing
9794 @vindex gnus-inhibit-mime-unbuttonizing
9795 If this is non-@code{nil}, then all @acronym{MIME} parts get buttons. The
9796 default value is @code{nil}.
9798 @item gnus-article-mime-part-function
9799 @vindex gnus-article-mime-part-function
9800 For each @acronym{MIME} part, this function will be called with the @acronym{MIME}
9801 handle as the parameter. The function is meant to be used to allow
9802 users to gather information from the article (e. g., add Vcard info to
9803 the bbdb database) or to do actions based on parts (e. g., automatically
9804 save all jpegs into some directory).
9806 Here's an example function the does the latter:
9809 (defun my-save-all-jpeg-parts (handle)
9810 (when (equal (car (mm-handle-type handle)) "image/jpeg")
9812 (insert (mm-get-part handle))
9813 (write-region (point-min) (point-max)
9814 (read-file-name "Save jpeg to: ")))))
9815 (setq gnus-article-mime-part-function
9816 'my-save-all-jpeg-parts)
9819 @vindex gnus-mime-multipart-functions
9820 @item gnus-mime-multipart-functions
9821 Alist of @acronym{MIME} multipart types and functions to handle them.
9823 @vindex gnus-mime-display-multipart-alternative-as-mixed
9824 @item gnus-mime-display-multipart-alternative-as-mixed
9825 Display "multipart/alternative" parts as "multipart/mixed".
9827 @vindex gnus-mime-display-multipart-related-as-mixed
9828 @item gnus-mime-display-multipart-related-as-mixed
9829 Display "multipart/related" parts as "multipart/mixed".
9831 If displaying "text/html" is discouraged, see
9832 @code{mm-discouraged-alternatives}, images or other material inside a
9833 "multipart/related" part might be overlooked when this variable is
9834 @code{nil}. @ref{Display Customization, Display Customization, ,
9835 emacs-mime, Emacs-Mime Manual}.
9837 @vindex gnus-mime-display-multipart-as-mixed
9838 @item gnus-mime-display-multipart-as-mixed
9839 Display "multipart" parts as "multipart/mixed". If @code{t}, it
9840 overrides @code{nil} values of
9841 @code{gnus-mime-display-multipart-alternative-as-mixed} and
9842 @code{gnus-mime-display-multipart-related-as-mixed}.
9844 @vindex mm-file-name-rewrite-functions
9845 @item mm-file-name-rewrite-functions
9846 List of functions used for rewriting file names of @acronym{MIME} parts.
9847 Each function takes a file name as input and returns a file name.
9849 Ready-made functions include@*
9850 @code{mm-file-name-delete-whitespace},
9851 @code{mm-file-name-trim-whitespace},
9852 @code{mm-file-name-collapse-whitespace}, and
9853 @code{mm-file-name-replace-whitespace}. The later uses the value of
9854 the variable @code{mm-file-name-replace-whitespace} to replace each
9855 whitespace character in a file name with that string; default value
9856 is @code{"_"} (a single underscore).
9857 @findex mm-file-name-delete-whitespace
9858 @findex mm-file-name-trim-whitespace
9859 @findex mm-file-name-collapse-whitespace
9860 @findex mm-file-name-replace-whitespace
9861 @vindex mm-file-name-replace-whitespace
9863 The standard functions @code{capitalize}, @code{downcase},
9864 @code{upcase}, and @code{upcase-initials} may be useful, too.
9866 Everybody knows that whitespace characters in file names are evil,
9867 except those who don't know. If you receive lots of attachments from
9868 such unenlightened users, you can make live easier by adding
9871 (setq mm-file-name-rewrite-functions
9872 '(mm-file-name-trim-whitespace
9873 mm-file-name-collapse-whitespace
9874 mm-file-name-replace-whitespace))
9878 to your @file{~/.gnus.el} file.
9887 People use different charsets, and we have @acronym{MIME} to let us know what
9888 charsets they use. Or rather, we wish we had. Many people use
9889 newsreaders and mailers that do not understand or use @acronym{MIME}, and
9890 just send out messages without saying what character sets they use. To
9891 help a bit with this, some local news hierarchies have policies that say
9892 what character set is the default. For instance, the @samp{fj}
9893 hierarchy uses @code{iso-2022-jp}.
9895 @vindex gnus-group-charset-alist
9896 This knowledge is encoded in the @code{gnus-group-charset-alist}
9897 variable, which is an alist of regexps (use the first item to match full
9898 group names) and default charsets to be used when reading these groups.
9900 @vindex gnus-newsgroup-ignored-charsets
9901 In addition, some people do use soi-disant @acronym{MIME}-aware agents that
9902 aren't. These blithely mark messages as being in @code{iso-8859-1}
9903 even if they really are in @code{koi-8}. To help here, the
9904 @code{gnus-newsgroup-ignored-charsets} variable can be used. The
9905 charsets that are listed here will be ignored. The variable can be
9906 set on a group-by-group basis using the group parameters (@pxref{Group
9907 Parameters}). The default value is @code{(unknown-8bit x-unknown)},
9908 which includes values some agents insist on having in there.
9910 @vindex gnus-group-posting-charset-alist
9911 When posting, @code{gnus-group-posting-charset-alist} is used to
9912 determine which charsets should not be encoded using the @acronym{MIME}
9913 encodings. For instance, some hierarchies discourage using
9914 quoted-printable header encoding.
9916 This variable is an alist of regexps and permitted unencoded charsets
9917 for posting. Each element of the alist has the form @code{(}@var{test
9918 header body-list}@code{)}, where:
9922 is either a regular expression matching the newsgroup header or a
9925 is the charset which may be left unencoded in the header (@code{nil}
9926 means encode all charsets),
9928 is a list of charsets which may be encoded using 8bit content-transfer
9929 encoding in the body, or one of the special values @code{nil} (always
9930 encode using quoted-printable) or @code{t} (always use 8bit).
9937 @cindex coding system aliases
9938 @cindex preferred charset
9940 @xref{Encoding Customization, , Encoding Customization, emacs-mime,
9941 The Emacs MIME Manual}, for additional variables that control which
9942 MIME charsets are used when sending messages.
9944 Other charset tricks that may be useful, although not Gnus-specific:
9946 If there are several @acronym{MIME} charsets that encode the same Emacs
9947 charset, you can choose what charset to use by saying the following:
9950 (put-charset-property 'cyrillic-iso8859-5
9951 'preferred-coding-system 'koi8-r)
9954 This means that Russian will be encoded using @code{koi8-r} instead of
9955 the default @code{iso-8859-5} @acronym{MIME} charset.
9957 If you want to read messages in @code{koi8-u}, you can cheat and say
9960 (define-coding-system-alias 'koi8-u 'koi8-r)
9963 This will almost do the right thing.
9965 And finally, to read charsets like @code{windows-1251}, you can say
9969 (codepage-setup 1251)
9970 (define-coding-system-alias 'windows-1251 'cp1251)
9974 @node Article Commands
9975 @section Article Commands
9982 @kindex A P (Summary)
9983 @vindex gnus-ps-print-hook
9984 @findex gnus-summary-print-article
9985 Generate and print a PostScript image of the article buffer
9986 (@code{gnus-summary-print-article}). @code{gnus-ps-print-hook} will
9987 be run just before printing the buffer. An alternative way to print
9988 article is to use Muttprint (@pxref{Saving Articles}).
9993 @node Summary Sorting
9994 @section Summary Sorting
9995 @cindex summary sorting
9997 You can have the summary buffer sorted in various ways, even though I
9998 can't really see why you'd want that.
10003 @kindex C-c C-s C-n (Summary)
10004 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-number
10005 Sort by article number (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-number}).
10008 @kindex C-c C-s C-a (Summary)
10009 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-author
10010 Sort by author (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-author}).
10013 @kindex C-c C-s C-t (Summary)
10014 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-recipient
10015 Sort by recipient (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-recipient}).
10018 @kindex C-c C-s C-s (Summary)
10019 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-subject
10020 Sort by subject (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-subject}).
10023 @kindex C-c C-s C-d (Summary)
10024 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-date
10025 Sort by date (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-date}).
10028 @kindex C-c C-s C-l (Summary)
10029 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-lines
10030 Sort by lines (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-lines}).
10033 @kindex C-c C-s C-c (Summary)
10034 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-chars
10035 Sort by article length (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-chars}).
10038 @kindex C-c C-s C-i (Summary)
10039 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-score
10040 Sort by score (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-score}).
10043 @kindex C-c C-s C-r (Summary)
10044 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-random
10045 Randomize (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-random}).
10048 @kindex C-c C-s C-o (Summary)
10049 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-original
10050 Sort using the default sorting method
10051 (@code{gnus-summary-sort-by-original}).
10054 These functions will work both when you use threading and when you don't
10055 use threading. In the latter case, all summary lines will be sorted,
10056 line by line. In the former case, sorting will be done on a
10057 root-by-root basis, which might not be what you were looking for. To
10058 toggle whether to use threading, type @kbd{T T} (@pxref{Thread
10062 @node Finding the Parent
10063 @section Finding the Parent
10064 @cindex parent articles
10065 @cindex referring articles
10069 @kindex ^ (Summary)
10070 @findex gnus-summary-refer-parent-article
10071 If you'd like to read the parent of the current article, and it is not
10072 displayed in the summary buffer, you might still be able to. That is,
10073 if the current group is fetched by @acronym{NNTP}, the parent hasn't expired
10074 and the @code{References} in the current article are not mangled, you
10075 can just press @kbd{^} or @kbd{A r}
10076 (@code{gnus-summary-refer-parent-article}). If everything goes well,
10077 you'll get the parent. If the parent is already displayed in the
10078 summary buffer, point will just move to this article.
10080 If given a positive numerical prefix, fetch that many articles back into
10081 the ancestry. If given a negative numerical prefix, fetch just that
10082 ancestor. So if you say @kbd{3 ^}, Gnus will fetch the parent, the
10083 grandparent and the grandgrandparent of the current article. If you say
10084 @kbd{-3 ^}, Gnus will only fetch the grandgrandparent of the current
10087 @item A R (Summary)
10088 @findex gnus-summary-refer-references
10089 @kindex A R (Summary)
10090 Fetch all articles mentioned in the @code{References} header of the
10091 article (@code{gnus-summary-refer-references}).
10093 @item A T (Summary)
10094 @findex gnus-summary-refer-thread
10095 @kindex A T (Summary)
10096 Display the full thread where the current article appears
10097 (@code{gnus-summary-refer-thread}). This command has to fetch all the
10098 headers in the current group to work, so it usually takes a while. If
10099 you do it often, you may consider setting @code{gnus-fetch-old-headers}
10100 to @code{invisible} (@pxref{Filling In Threads}). This won't have any
10101 visible effects normally, but it'll make this command work a whole lot
10102 faster. Of course, it'll make group entry somewhat slow.
10104 @vindex gnus-refer-thread-limit
10105 The @code{gnus-refer-thread-limit} variable says how many old (i. e.,
10106 articles before the first displayed in the current group) headers to
10107 fetch when doing this command. The default is 200. If @code{t}, all
10108 the available headers will be fetched. This variable can be overridden
10109 by giving the @kbd{A T} command a numerical prefix.
10111 @item M-^ (Summary)
10112 @findex gnus-summary-refer-article
10113 @kindex M-^ (Summary)
10115 @cindex fetching by Message-ID
10116 You can also ask Gnus for an arbitrary article, no matter what group it
10117 belongs to. @kbd{M-^} (@code{gnus-summary-refer-article}) will ask you
10118 for a @code{Message-ID}, which is one of those long, hard-to-read
10119 thingies that look something like @samp{<38o6up$6f2@@hymir.ifi.uio.no>}.
10120 You have to get it all exactly right. No fuzzy searches, I'm afraid.
10122 Gnus looks for the @code{Message-ID} in the headers that have already
10123 been fetched, but also tries all the select methods specified by
10124 @code{gnus-refer-article-method} if it is not found.
10127 @vindex gnus-refer-article-method
10128 If the group you are reading is located on a back end that does not
10129 support fetching by @code{Message-ID} very well (like @code{nnspool}),
10130 you can set @code{gnus-refer-article-method} to an @acronym{NNTP} method. It
10131 would, perhaps, be best if the @acronym{NNTP} server you consult is the one
10132 updating the spool you are reading from, but that's not really
10135 It can also be a list of select methods, as well as the special symbol
10136 @code{current}, which means to use the current select method. If it
10137 is a list, Gnus will try all the methods in the list until it finds a
10140 Here's an example setting that will first try the current method, and
10141 then ask Google if that fails:
10144 (setq gnus-refer-article-method
10146 (nnweb "google" (nnweb-type google))))
10149 Most of the mail back ends support fetching by @code{Message-ID}, but
10150 do not do a particularly excellent job at it. That is, @code{nnmbox},
10151 @code{nnbabyl}, @code{nnmaildir}, @code{nnml}, are able to locate
10152 articles from any groups, while @code{nnfolder}, and @code{nnimap} are
10153 only able to locate articles that have been posted to the current
10154 group. (Anything else would be too time consuming.) @code{nnmh} does
10155 not support this at all.
10158 @node Alternative Approaches
10159 @section Alternative Approaches
10161 Different people like to read news using different methods. This being
10162 Gnus, we offer a small selection of minor modes for the summary buffers.
10165 * Pick and Read:: First mark articles and then read them.
10166 * Binary Groups:: Auto-decode all articles.
10170 @node Pick and Read
10171 @subsection Pick and Read
10172 @cindex pick and read
10174 Some newsreaders (like @code{nn} and, uhm, @code{Netnews} on VM/CMS) use
10175 a two-phased reading interface. The user first marks in a summary
10176 buffer the articles she wants to read. Then she starts reading the
10177 articles with just an article buffer displayed.
10179 @findex gnus-pick-mode
10180 @kindex M-x gnus-pick-mode
10181 Gnus provides a summary buffer minor mode that allows
10182 this---@code{gnus-pick-mode}. This basically means that a few process
10183 mark commands become one-keystroke commands to allow easy marking, and
10184 it provides one additional command for switching to the summary buffer.
10186 Here are the available keystrokes when using pick mode:
10191 @findex gnus-pick-article-or-thread
10192 Pick the article or thread on the current line
10193 (@code{gnus-pick-article-or-thread}). If the variable
10194 @code{gnus-thread-hide-subtree} is true, then this key selects the
10195 entire thread when used at the first article of the thread. Otherwise,
10196 it selects just the article. If given a numerical prefix, go to that
10197 thread or article and pick it. (The line number is normally displayed
10198 at the beginning of the summary pick lines.)
10201 @kindex SPACE (Pick)
10202 @findex gnus-pick-next-page
10203 Scroll the summary buffer up one page (@code{gnus-pick-next-page}). If
10204 at the end of the buffer, start reading the picked articles.
10208 @findex gnus-pick-unmark-article-or-thread.
10209 Unpick the thread or article
10210 (@code{gnus-pick-unmark-article-or-thread}). If the variable
10211 @code{gnus-thread-hide-subtree} is true, then this key unpicks the
10212 thread if used at the first article of the thread. Otherwise it unpicks
10213 just the article. You can give this key a numerical prefix to unpick
10214 the thread or article at that line.
10218 @findex gnus-pick-start-reading
10219 @vindex gnus-pick-display-summary
10220 Start reading the picked articles (@code{gnus-pick-start-reading}). If
10221 given a prefix, mark all unpicked articles as read first. If
10222 @code{gnus-pick-display-summary} is non-@code{nil}, the summary buffer
10223 will still be visible when you are reading.
10227 All the normal summary mode commands are still available in the
10228 pick-mode, with the exception of @kbd{u}. However @kbd{!} is available
10229 which is mapped to the same function
10230 @code{gnus-summary-tick-article-forward}.
10232 If this sounds like a good idea to you, you could say:
10235 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'gnus-pick-mode)
10238 @vindex gnus-pick-mode-hook
10239 @code{gnus-pick-mode-hook} is run in pick minor mode buffers.
10241 @vindex gnus-mark-unpicked-articles-as-read
10242 If @code{gnus-mark-unpicked-articles-as-read} is non-@code{nil}, mark
10243 all unpicked articles as read. The default is @code{nil}.
10245 @vindex gnus-summary-pick-line-format
10246 The summary line format in pick mode is slightly different from the
10247 standard format. At the beginning of each line the line number is
10248 displayed. The pick mode line format is controlled by the
10249 @code{gnus-summary-pick-line-format} variable (@pxref{Formatting
10250 Variables}). It accepts the same format specs that
10251 @code{gnus-summary-line-format} does (@pxref{Summary Buffer Lines}).
10254 @node Binary Groups
10255 @subsection Binary Groups
10256 @cindex binary groups
10258 @findex gnus-binary-mode
10259 @kindex M-x gnus-binary-mode
10260 If you spend much time in binary groups, you may grow tired of hitting
10261 @kbd{X u}, @kbd{n}, @kbd{RET} all the time. @kbd{M-x gnus-binary-mode}
10262 is a minor mode for summary buffers that makes all ordinary Gnus article
10263 selection functions uudecode series of articles and display the result
10264 instead of just displaying the articles the normal way.
10267 @findex gnus-binary-show-article
10268 The only way, in fact, to see the actual articles is the @kbd{g}
10269 command, when you have turned on this mode
10270 (@code{gnus-binary-show-article}).
10272 @vindex gnus-binary-mode-hook
10273 @code{gnus-binary-mode-hook} is called in binary minor mode buffers.
10277 @section Tree Display
10280 @vindex gnus-use-trees
10281 If you don't like the normal Gnus summary display, you might try setting
10282 @code{gnus-use-trees} to @code{t}. This will create (by default) an
10283 additional @dfn{tree buffer}. You can execute all summary mode commands
10284 in the tree buffer.
10286 There are a few variables to customize the tree display, of course:
10289 @item gnus-tree-mode-hook
10290 @vindex gnus-tree-mode-hook
10291 A hook called in all tree mode buffers.
10293 @item gnus-tree-mode-line-format
10294 @vindex gnus-tree-mode-line-format
10295 A format string for the mode bar in the tree mode buffers (@pxref{Mode
10296 Line Formatting}). The default is @samp{Gnus: %%b %S %Z}. For a list
10297 of valid specs, @pxref{Summary Buffer Mode Line}.
10299 @item gnus-selected-tree-face
10300 @vindex gnus-selected-tree-face
10301 Face used for highlighting the selected article in the tree buffer. The
10302 default is @code{modeline}.
10304 @item gnus-tree-line-format
10305 @vindex gnus-tree-line-format
10306 A format string for the tree nodes. The name is a bit of a misnomer,
10307 though---it doesn't define a line, but just the node. The default value
10308 is @samp{%(%[%3,3n%]%)}, which displays the first three characters of
10309 the name of the poster. It is vital that all nodes are of the same
10310 length, so you @emph{must} use @samp{%4,4n}-like specifiers.
10316 The name of the poster.
10318 The @code{From} header.
10320 The number of the article.
10322 The opening bracket.
10324 The closing bracket.
10329 @xref{Formatting Variables}.
10331 Variables related to the display are:
10334 @item gnus-tree-brackets
10335 @vindex gnus-tree-brackets
10336 This is used for differentiating between ``real'' articles and
10337 ``sparse'' articles. The format is
10339 ((@var{real-open} . @var{real-close})
10340 (@var{sparse-open} . @var{sparse-close})
10341 (@var{dummy-open} . @var{dummy-close}))
10343 and the default is @code{((?[ . ?]) (?( . ?)) (?@{ . ?@}) (?< . ?>))}.
10345 @item gnus-tree-parent-child-edges
10346 @vindex gnus-tree-parent-child-edges
10347 This is a list that contains the characters used for connecting parent
10348 nodes to their children. The default is @code{(?- ?\\ ?|)}.
10352 @item gnus-tree-minimize-window
10353 @vindex gnus-tree-minimize-window
10354 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will try to keep the tree
10355 buffer as small as possible to allow more room for the other Gnus
10356 windows. If this variable is a number, the tree buffer will never be
10357 higher than that number. The default is @code{t}. Note that if you
10358 have several windows displayed side-by-side in a frame and the tree
10359 buffer is one of these, minimizing the tree window will also resize all
10360 other windows displayed next to it.
10362 You may also wish to add the following hook to keep the window minimized
10366 (add-hook 'gnus-configure-windows-hook
10367 'gnus-tree-perhaps-minimize)
10370 @item gnus-generate-tree-function
10371 @vindex gnus-generate-tree-function
10372 @findex gnus-generate-horizontal-tree
10373 @findex gnus-generate-vertical-tree
10374 The function that actually generates the thread tree. Two predefined
10375 functions are available: @code{gnus-generate-horizontal-tree} and
10376 @code{gnus-generate-vertical-tree} (which is the default).
10380 Here's an example from a horizontal tree buffer:
10383 @{***@}-(***)-[odd]-[Gun]
10393 Here's the same thread displayed in a vertical tree buffer:
10398 |--------------------------\-----\-----\
10399 (***) [Bjo] [Gun] [Gun]
10401 [odd] [Jan] [odd] (***) [Jor]
10403 [Gun] [Eri] [Eri] [odd]
10409 If you're using horizontal trees, it might be nice to display the trees
10410 side-by-side with the summary buffer. You could add something like the
10411 following to your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
10414 (setq gnus-use-trees t
10415 gnus-generate-tree-function 'gnus-generate-horizontal-tree
10416 gnus-tree-minimize-window nil)
10417 (gnus-add-configuration
10421 (summary 0.75 point)
10426 @xref{Window Layout}.
10429 @node Mail Group Commands
10430 @section Mail Group Commands
10431 @cindex mail group commands
10433 Some commands only make sense in mail groups. If these commands are
10434 invalid in the current group, they will raise a hell and let you know.
10436 All these commands (except the expiry and edit commands) use the
10437 process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
10442 @kindex B e (Summary)
10443 @findex gnus-summary-expire-articles
10444 @cindex expiring mail
10445 Run all expirable articles in the current group through the expiry
10446 process (@code{gnus-summary-expire-articles}). That is, delete all
10447 expirable articles in the group that have been around for a while.
10448 (@pxref{Expiring Mail}).
10451 @kindex B C-M-e (Summary)
10452 @findex gnus-summary-expire-articles-now
10453 @cindex expiring mail
10454 Delete all the expirable articles in the group
10455 (@code{gnus-summary-expire-articles-now}). This means that @strong{all}
10456 articles eligible for expiry in the current group will
10457 disappear forever into that big @file{/dev/null} in the sky.
10460 @kindex B DEL (Summary)
10461 @findex gnus-summary-delete-article
10462 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-delete}
10463 Delete the mail article. This is ``delete'' as in ``delete it from your
10464 disk forever and ever, never to return again.'' Use with caution.
10465 (@code{gnus-summary-delete-article}).
10468 @kindex B m (Summary)
10470 @findex gnus-summary-move-article
10471 @vindex gnus-preserve-marks
10472 Move the article from one mail group to another
10473 (@code{gnus-summary-move-article}). Marks will be preserved if
10474 @code{gnus-preserve-marks} is non-@code{nil} (which is the default).
10477 @kindex B c (Summary)
10479 @findex gnus-summary-copy-article
10480 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-copy}
10481 Copy the article from one group (mail group or not) to a mail group
10482 (@code{gnus-summary-copy-article}). Marks will be preserved if
10483 @code{gnus-preserve-marks} is non-@code{nil} (which is the default).
10486 @kindex B B (Summary)
10487 @cindex crosspost mail
10488 @findex gnus-summary-crosspost-article
10489 Crosspost the current article to some other group
10490 (@code{gnus-summary-crosspost-article}). This will create a new copy of
10491 the article in the other group, and the Xref headers of the article will
10492 be properly updated.
10495 @kindex B i (Summary)
10496 @findex gnus-summary-import-article
10497 Import an arbitrary file into the current mail newsgroup
10498 (@code{gnus-summary-import-article}). You will be prompted for a file
10499 name, a @code{From} header and a @code{Subject} header.
10502 @kindex B I (Summary)
10503 @findex gnus-summary-create-article
10504 Create an empty article in the current mail newsgroups
10505 (@code{gnus-summary-create-article}). You will be prompted for a
10506 @code{From} header and a @code{Subject} header.
10509 @kindex B r (Summary)
10510 @findex gnus-summary-respool-article
10511 @vindex gnus-summary-respool-default-method
10512 Respool the mail article (@code{gnus-summary-respool-article}).
10513 @code{gnus-summary-respool-default-method} will be used as the default
10514 select method when respooling. This variable is @code{nil} by default,
10515 which means that the current group select method will be used instead.
10516 Marks will be preserved if @code{gnus-preserve-marks} is non-@code{nil}
10517 (which is the default).
10521 @kindex B w (Summary)
10522 @kindex e (Summary)
10523 @findex gnus-summary-edit-article
10524 @kindex C-c C-c (Article)
10525 @findex gnus-summary-edit-article-done
10526 Edit the current article (@code{gnus-summary-edit-article}). To finish
10527 editing and make the changes permanent, type @kbd{C-c C-c}
10528 (@code{gnus-summary-edit-article-done}). If you give a prefix to the
10529 @kbd{C-c C-c} command, Gnus won't re-highlight the article.
10532 @kindex B q (Summary)
10533 @findex gnus-summary-respool-query
10534 If you want to re-spool an article, you might be curious as to what group
10535 the article will end up in before you do the re-spooling. This command
10536 will tell you (@code{gnus-summary-respool-query}).
10539 @kindex B t (Summary)
10540 @findex gnus-summary-respool-trace
10541 Similarly, this command will display all fancy splitting patterns used
10542 when respooling, if any (@code{gnus-summary-respool-trace}).
10545 @kindex B p (Summary)
10546 @findex gnus-summary-article-posted-p
10547 Some people have a tendency to send you ``courtesy'' copies when they
10548 follow up to articles you have posted. These usually have a
10549 @code{Newsgroups} header in them, but not always. This command
10550 (@code{gnus-summary-article-posted-p}) will try to fetch the current
10551 article from your news server (or rather, from
10552 @code{gnus-refer-article-method} or @code{gnus-select-method}) and will
10553 report back whether it found the article or not. Even if it says that
10554 it didn't find the article, it may have been posted anyway---mail
10555 propagation is much faster than news propagation, and the news copy may
10556 just not have arrived yet.
10559 @kindex K E (Summary)
10560 @findex gnus-article-encrypt-body
10561 @vindex gnus-article-encrypt-protocol
10562 Encrypt the body of an article (@code{gnus-article-encrypt-body}).
10563 The body is encrypted with the encryption protocol specified by the
10564 variable @code{gnus-article-encrypt-protocol}.
10568 @vindex gnus-move-split-methods
10569 @cindex moving articles
10570 If you move (or copy) articles regularly, you might wish to have Gnus
10571 suggest where to put the articles. @code{gnus-move-split-methods} is a
10572 variable that uses the same syntax as @code{gnus-split-methods}
10573 (@pxref{Saving Articles}). You may customize that variable to create
10574 suggestions you find reasonable. (Note that
10575 @code{gnus-move-split-methods} uses group names where
10576 @code{gnus-split-methods} uses file names.)
10579 (setq gnus-move-split-methods
10580 '(("^From:.*Lars Magne" "nnml:junk")
10581 ("^Subject:.*gnus" "nnfolder:important")
10582 (".*" "nnml:misc")))
10586 @node Various Summary Stuff
10587 @section Various Summary Stuff
10590 * Summary Group Information:: Information oriented commands.
10591 * Searching for Articles:: Multiple article commands.
10592 * Summary Generation Commands::
10593 * Really Various Summary Commands:: Those pesky non-conformant commands.
10597 @vindex gnus-summary-display-while-building
10598 @item gnus-summary-display-while-building
10599 If non-@code{nil}, show and update the summary buffer as it's being
10600 built. If @code{t}, update the buffer after every line is inserted.
10601 If the value is an integer, @var{n}, update the display every @var{n}
10602 lines. The default is @code{nil}.
10604 @vindex gnus-summary-display-arrow
10605 @item gnus-summary-display-arrow
10606 If non-@code{nil}, display an arrow in the fringe to indicate the
10609 @vindex gnus-summary-mode-hook
10610 @item gnus-summary-mode-hook
10611 This hook is called when creating a summary mode buffer.
10613 @vindex gnus-summary-generate-hook
10614 @item gnus-summary-generate-hook
10615 This is called as the last thing before doing the threading and the
10616 generation of the summary buffer. It's quite convenient for customizing
10617 the threading variables based on what data the newsgroup has. This hook
10618 is called from the summary buffer after most summary buffer variables
10621 @vindex gnus-summary-prepare-hook
10622 @item gnus-summary-prepare-hook
10623 It is called after the summary buffer has been generated. You might use
10624 it to, for instance, highlight lines or modify the look of the buffer in
10625 some other ungodly manner. I don't care.
10627 @vindex gnus-summary-prepared-hook
10628 @item gnus-summary-prepared-hook
10629 A hook called as the very last thing after the summary buffer has been
10632 @vindex gnus-summary-ignore-duplicates
10633 @item gnus-summary-ignore-duplicates
10634 When Gnus discovers two articles that have the same @code{Message-ID},
10635 it has to do something drastic. No articles are allowed to have the
10636 same @code{Message-ID}, but this may happen when reading mail from some
10637 sources. Gnus allows you to customize what happens with this variable.
10638 If it is @code{nil} (which is the default), Gnus will rename the
10639 @code{Message-ID} (for display purposes only) and display the article as
10640 any other article. If this variable is @code{t}, it won't display the
10641 article---it'll be as if it never existed.
10643 @vindex gnus-alter-articles-to-read-function
10644 @item gnus-alter-articles-to-read-function
10645 This function, which takes two parameters (the group name and the list
10646 of articles to be selected), is called to allow the user to alter the
10647 list of articles to be selected.
10649 For instance, the following function adds the list of cached articles to
10650 the list in one particular group:
10653 (defun my-add-cached-articles (group articles)
10654 (if (string= group "some.group")
10655 (append gnus-newsgroup-cached articles)
10659 @vindex gnus-newsgroup-variables
10660 @item gnus-newsgroup-variables
10661 A list of newsgroup (summary buffer) local variables, or cons of
10662 variables and their default expressions to be evalled (when the default
10663 values are not @code{nil}), that should be made global while the summary
10666 Note: The default expressions will be evaluated (using function
10667 @code{eval}) before assignment to the local variable rather than just
10668 assigned to it. If the default expression is the symbol @code{global},
10669 that symbol will not be evaluated but the global value of the local
10670 variable will be used instead.
10672 These variables can be used to set variables in the group parameters
10673 while still allowing them to affect operations done in other
10674 buffers. For example:
10677 (setq gnus-newsgroup-variables
10678 '(message-use-followup-to
10679 (gnus-visible-headers .
10680 "^From:\\|^Newsgroups:\\|^Subject:\\|^Date:\\|^To:")))
10683 Also @pxref{Group Parameters}.
10687 @node Summary Group Information
10688 @subsection Summary Group Information
10693 @kindex H f (Summary)
10694 @findex gnus-summary-fetch-faq
10695 @vindex gnus-group-faq-directory
10696 Try to fetch the @acronym{FAQ} (list of frequently asked questions)
10697 for the current group (@code{gnus-summary-fetch-faq}). Gnus will try
10698 to get the @acronym{FAQ} from @code{gnus-group-faq-directory}, which
10699 is usually a directory on a remote machine. This variable can also be
10700 a list of directories. In that case, giving a prefix to this command
10701 will allow you to choose between the various sites. @code{ange-ftp}
10702 or @code{efs} will probably be used for fetching the file.
10705 @kindex H d (Summary)
10706 @findex gnus-summary-describe-group
10707 Give a brief description of the current group
10708 (@code{gnus-summary-describe-group}). If given a prefix, force
10709 rereading the description from the server.
10712 @kindex H h (Summary)
10713 @findex gnus-summary-describe-briefly
10714 Give an extremely brief description of the most important summary
10715 keystrokes (@code{gnus-summary-describe-briefly}).
10718 @kindex H i (Summary)
10719 @findex gnus-info-find-node
10720 Go to the Gnus info node (@code{gnus-info-find-node}).
10724 @node Searching for Articles
10725 @subsection Searching for Articles
10730 @kindex M-s (Summary)
10731 @findex gnus-summary-search-article-forward
10732 Search through all subsequent (raw) articles for a regexp
10733 (@code{gnus-summary-search-article-forward}).
10736 @kindex M-r (Summary)
10737 @findex gnus-summary-search-article-backward
10738 Search through all previous (raw) articles for a regexp
10739 (@code{gnus-summary-search-article-backward}).
10742 @kindex M-S (Summary)
10743 @findex gnus-summary-repeat-search-article-forward
10744 Repeat the previous search forwards
10745 (@code{gnus-summary-repeat-search-article-forward}).
10748 @kindex M-R (Summary)
10749 @findex gnus-summary-repeat-search-article-backward
10750 Repeat the previous search backwards
10751 (@code{gnus-summary-repeat-search-article-backward}).
10754 @kindex & (Summary)
10755 @findex gnus-summary-execute-command
10756 This command will prompt you for a header, a regular expression to match
10757 on this field, and a command to be executed if the match is made
10758 (@code{gnus-summary-execute-command}). If the header is an empty
10759 string, the match is done on the entire article. If given a prefix,
10760 search backward instead.
10762 For instance, @kbd{& RET some.*string RET #} will put the process mark on
10763 all articles that have heads or bodies that match @samp{some.*string}.
10766 @kindex M-& (Summary)
10767 @findex gnus-summary-universal-argument
10768 Perform any operation on all articles that have been marked with
10769 the process mark (@code{gnus-summary-universal-argument}).
10772 @node Summary Generation Commands
10773 @subsection Summary Generation Commands
10778 @kindex Y g (Summary)
10779 @findex gnus-summary-prepare
10780 Regenerate the current summary buffer (@code{gnus-summary-prepare}).
10783 @kindex Y c (Summary)
10784 @findex gnus-summary-insert-cached-articles
10785 Pull all cached articles (for the current group) into the summary buffer
10786 (@code{gnus-summary-insert-cached-articles}).
10789 @kindex Y d (Summary)
10790 @findex gnus-summary-insert-dormant-articles
10791 Pull all dormant articles (for the current group) into the summary buffer
10792 (@code{gnus-summary-insert-dormant-articles}).
10795 @kindex Y t (Summary)
10796 @findex gnus-summary-insert-ticked-articles
10797 Pull all ticked articles (for the current group) into the summary buffer
10798 (@code{gnus-summary-insert-ticked-articles}).
10803 @node Really Various Summary Commands
10804 @subsection Really Various Summary Commands
10810 @kindex C-d (Summary)
10811 @kindex A D (Summary)
10812 @findex gnus-summary-enter-digest-group
10813 If the current article is a collection of other articles (for instance,
10814 a digest), you might use this command to enter a group based on the that
10815 article (@code{gnus-summary-enter-digest-group}). Gnus will try to
10816 guess what article type is currently displayed unless you give a prefix
10817 to this command, which forces a ``digest'' interpretation. Basically,
10818 whenever you see a message that is a collection of other messages of
10819 some format, you @kbd{C-d} and read these messages in a more convenient
10822 @vindex gnus-auto-select-on-ephemeral-exit
10823 The variable @code{gnus-auto-select-on-ephemeral-exit} controls what
10824 article should be selected after exiting a digest group. Valid values
10829 Select the next article.
10832 Select the next unread article.
10834 @item next-noselect
10835 Move the cursor to the next article. This is the default.
10837 @item next-unread-noselect
10838 Move the cursor to the next unread article.
10841 If it has any other value or there is no next (unread) article, the
10842 article selected before entering to the digest group will appear.
10845 @kindex C-M-d (Summary)
10846 @findex gnus-summary-read-document
10847 This command is very similar to the one above, but lets you gather
10848 several documents into one biiig group
10849 (@code{gnus-summary-read-document}). It does this by opening several
10850 @code{nndoc} groups for each document, and then opening an
10851 @code{nnvirtual} group on top of these @code{nndoc} groups. This
10852 command understands the process/prefix convention
10853 (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
10856 @kindex C-t (Summary)
10857 @findex gnus-summary-toggle-truncation
10858 Toggle truncation of summary lines
10859 (@code{gnus-summary-toggle-truncation}). This will probably confuse the
10860 line centering function in the summary buffer, so it's not a good idea
10861 to have truncation switched off while reading articles.
10864 @kindex = (Summary)
10865 @findex gnus-summary-expand-window
10866 Expand the summary buffer window (@code{gnus-summary-expand-window}).
10867 If given a prefix, force an @code{article} window configuration.
10870 @kindex C-M-e (Summary)
10871 @findex gnus-summary-edit-parameters
10872 Edit the group parameters (@pxref{Group Parameters}) of the current
10873 group (@code{gnus-summary-edit-parameters}).
10876 @kindex C-M-a (Summary)
10877 @findex gnus-summary-customize-parameters
10878 Customize the group parameters (@pxref{Group Parameters}) of the current
10879 group (@code{gnus-summary-customize-parameters}).
10884 @node Exiting the Summary Buffer
10885 @section Exiting the Summary Buffer
10886 @cindex summary exit
10887 @cindex exiting groups
10889 Exiting from the summary buffer will normally update all info on the
10890 group and return you to the group buffer.
10897 @kindex Z Z (Summary)
10898 @kindex Z Q (Summary)
10899 @kindex q (Summary)
10900 @findex gnus-summary-exit
10901 @vindex gnus-summary-exit-hook
10902 @vindex gnus-summary-prepare-exit-hook
10903 @vindex gnus-group-no-more-groups-hook
10904 @c @icon{gnus-summary-exit}
10905 Exit the current group and update all information on the group
10906 (@code{gnus-summary-exit}). @code{gnus-summary-prepare-exit-hook} is
10907 called before doing much of the exiting, which calls
10908 @code{gnus-summary-expire-articles} by default.
10909 @code{gnus-summary-exit-hook} is called after finishing the exit
10910 process. @code{gnus-group-no-more-groups-hook} is run when returning to
10911 group mode having no more (unread) groups.
10915 @kindex Z E (Summary)
10916 @kindex Q (Summary)
10917 @findex gnus-summary-exit-no-update
10918 Exit the current group without updating any information on the group
10919 (@code{gnus-summary-exit-no-update}).
10923 @kindex Z c (Summary)
10924 @kindex c (Summary)
10925 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-and-exit
10926 @c @icon{gnus-summary-catchup-and-exit}
10927 Mark all unticked articles in the group as read and then exit
10928 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-and-exit}).
10931 @kindex Z C (Summary)
10932 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-all-and-exit
10933 Mark all articles, even the ticked ones, as read and then exit
10934 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-all-and-exit}).
10937 @kindex Z n (Summary)
10938 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-and-goto-next-group
10939 Mark all articles as read and go to the next group
10940 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-and-goto-next-group}).
10943 @kindex Z p (Summary)
10944 @findex gnus-summary-catchup-and-goto-prev-group
10945 Mark all articles as read and go to the previous group
10946 (@code{gnus-summary-catchup-and-goto-prev-group}).
10950 @kindex Z R (Summary)
10951 @kindex C-x C-s (Summary)
10952 @findex gnus-summary-reselect-current-group
10953 Exit this group, and then enter it again
10954 (@code{gnus-summary-reselect-current-group}). If given a prefix, select
10955 all articles, both read and unread.
10959 @kindex Z G (Summary)
10960 @kindex M-g (Summary)
10961 @findex gnus-summary-rescan-group
10962 @c @icon{gnus-summary-mail-get}
10963 Exit the group, check for new articles in the group, and select the
10964 group (@code{gnus-summary-rescan-group}). If given a prefix, select all
10965 articles, both read and unread.
10968 @kindex Z N (Summary)
10969 @findex gnus-summary-next-group
10970 Exit the group and go to the next group
10971 (@code{gnus-summary-next-group}).
10974 @kindex Z P (Summary)
10975 @findex gnus-summary-prev-group
10976 Exit the group and go to the previous group
10977 (@code{gnus-summary-prev-group}).
10980 @kindex Z s (Summary)
10981 @findex gnus-summary-save-newsrc
10982 Save the current number of read/marked articles in the dribble buffer
10983 and then save the dribble buffer (@code{gnus-summary-save-newsrc}). If
10984 given a prefix, also save the @file{.newsrc} file(s). Using this
10985 command will make exit without updating (the @kbd{Q} command) worthless.
10988 @vindex gnus-exit-group-hook
10989 @code{gnus-exit-group-hook} is called when you exit the current group
10990 with an ``updating'' exit. For instance @kbd{Q}
10991 (@code{gnus-summary-exit-no-update}) does not call this hook.
10993 @findex gnus-summary-wake-up-the-dead
10994 @findex gnus-dead-summary-mode
10995 @vindex gnus-kill-summary-on-exit
10996 If you're in the habit of exiting groups, and then changing your mind
10997 about it, you might set @code{gnus-kill-summary-on-exit} to @code{nil}.
10998 If you do that, Gnus won't kill the summary buffer when you exit it.
10999 (Quelle surprise!) Instead it will change the name of the buffer to
11000 something like @samp{*Dead Summary ... *} and install a minor mode
11001 called @code{gnus-dead-summary-mode}. Now, if you switch back to this
11002 buffer, you'll find that all keys are mapped to a function called
11003 @code{gnus-summary-wake-up-the-dead}. So tapping any keys in a dead
11004 summary buffer will result in a live, normal summary buffer.
11006 There will never be more than one dead summary buffer at any one time.
11008 @vindex gnus-use-cross-reference
11009 The data on the current group will be updated (which articles you have
11010 read, which articles you have replied to, etc.) when you exit the
11011 summary buffer. If the @code{gnus-use-cross-reference} variable is
11012 @code{t} (which is the default), articles that are cross-referenced to
11013 this group and are marked as read, will also be marked as read in the
11014 other subscribed groups they were cross-posted to. If this variable is
11015 neither @code{nil} nor @code{t}, the article will be marked as read in
11016 both subscribed and unsubscribed groups (@pxref{Crosspost Handling}).
11019 @node Crosspost Handling
11020 @section Crosspost Handling
11024 Marking cross-posted articles as read ensures that you'll never have to
11025 read the same article more than once. Unless, of course, somebody has
11026 posted it to several groups separately. Posting the same article to
11027 several groups (not cross-posting) is called @dfn{spamming}, and you are
11028 by law required to send nasty-grams to anyone who perpetrates such a
11029 heinous crime. You may want to try NoCeM handling to filter out spam
11032 Remember: Cross-posting is kinda ok, but posting the same article
11033 separately to several groups is not. Massive cross-posting (aka.
11034 @dfn{velveeta}) is to be avoided at all costs, and you can even use the
11035 @code{gnus-summary-mail-crosspost-complaint} command to complain about
11036 excessive crossposting (@pxref{Summary Mail Commands}).
11038 @cindex cross-posting
11040 @cindex @acronym{NOV}
11041 One thing that may cause Gnus to not do the cross-posting thing
11042 correctly is if you use an @acronym{NNTP} server that supports @sc{xover}
11043 (which is very nice, because it speeds things up considerably) which
11044 does not include the @code{Xref} header in its @acronym{NOV} lines. This is
11045 Evil, but all too common, alas, alack. Gnus tries to Do The Right Thing
11046 even with @sc{xover} by registering the @code{Xref} lines of all
11047 articles you actually read, but if you kill the articles, or just mark
11048 them as read without reading them, Gnus will not get a chance to snoop
11049 the @code{Xref} lines out of these articles, and will be unable to use
11050 the cross reference mechanism.
11052 @cindex LIST overview.fmt
11053 @cindex overview.fmt
11054 To check whether your @acronym{NNTP} server includes the @code{Xref} header
11055 in its overview files, try @samp{telnet your.nntp.server nntp},
11056 @samp{MODE READER} on @code{inn} servers, and then say @samp{LIST
11057 overview.fmt}. This may not work, but if it does, and the last line you
11058 get does not read @samp{Xref:full}, then you should shout and whine at
11059 your news admin until she includes the @code{Xref} header in the
11062 If you want Gnus to get the @code{Xref}s right all the time, you have to
11063 set @code{nntp-nov-is-evil} to @code{t}, which slows things down
11064 considerably. Also @pxref{Slow/Expensive Connection}.
11068 For an alternative approach, @pxref{Duplicate Suppression}.
11071 @node Duplicate Suppression
11072 @section Duplicate Suppression
11074 By default, Gnus tries to make sure that you don't have to read the same
11075 article more than once by utilizing the crossposting mechanism
11076 (@pxref{Crosspost Handling}). However, that simple and efficient
11077 approach may not work satisfactory for some users for various
11082 The @acronym{NNTP} server may fail to generate the @code{Xref} header. This
11083 is evil and not very common.
11086 The @acronym{NNTP} server may fail to include the @code{Xref} header in the
11087 @file{.overview} data bases. This is evil and all too common, alas.
11090 You may be reading the same group (or several related groups) from
11091 different @acronym{NNTP} servers.
11094 You may be getting mail that duplicates articles posted to groups.
11097 I'm sure there are other situations where @code{Xref} handling fails as
11098 well, but these four are the most common situations.
11100 If, and only if, @code{Xref} handling fails for you, then you may
11101 consider switching on @dfn{duplicate suppression}. If you do so, Gnus
11102 will remember the @code{Message-ID}s of all articles you have read or
11103 otherwise marked as read, and then, as if by magic, mark them as read
11104 all subsequent times you see them---in @emph{all} groups. Using this
11105 mechanism is quite likely to be somewhat inefficient, but not overly
11106 so. It's certainly preferable to reading the same articles more than
11109 Duplicate suppression is not a very subtle instrument. It's more like a
11110 sledge hammer than anything else. It works in a very simple
11111 fashion---if you have marked an article as read, it adds this Message-ID
11112 to a cache. The next time it sees this Message-ID, it will mark the
11113 article as read with the @samp{M} mark. It doesn't care what group it
11114 saw the article in.
11117 @item gnus-suppress-duplicates
11118 @vindex gnus-suppress-duplicates
11119 If non-@code{nil}, suppress duplicates.
11121 @item gnus-save-duplicate-list
11122 @vindex gnus-save-duplicate-list
11123 If non-@code{nil}, save the list of duplicates to a file. This will
11124 make startup and shutdown take longer, so the default is @code{nil}.
11125 However, this means that only duplicate articles read in a single Gnus
11126 session are suppressed.
11128 @item gnus-duplicate-list-length
11129 @vindex gnus-duplicate-list-length
11130 This variable says how many @code{Message-ID}s to keep in the duplicate
11131 suppression list. The default is 10000.
11133 @item gnus-duplicate-file
11134 @vindex gnus-duplicate-file
11135 The name of the file to store the duplicate suppression list in. The
11136 default is @file{~/News/suppression}.
11139 If you have a tendency to stop and start Gnus often, setting
11140 @code{gnus-save-duplicate-list} to @code{t} is probably a good idea. If
11141 you leave Gnus running for weeks on end, you may have it @code{nil}. On
11142 the other hand, saving the list makes startup and shutdown much slower,
11143 so that means that if you stop and start Gnus often, you should set
11144 @code{gnus-save-duplicate-list} to @code{nil}. Uhm. I'll leave this up
11145 to you to figure out, I think.
11150 Gnus is able to verify signed messages or decrypt encrypted messages.
11151 The formats that are supported are @acronym{PGP}, @acronym{PGP/MIME}
11152 and @acronym{S/MIME}, however you need some external programs to get
11157 To handle @acronym{PGP} and @acronym{PGP/MIME} messages, you have to
11158 install an OpenPGP implementation such as GnuPG. The Lisp interface
11159 to GnuPG included with Gnus is called PGG (@pxref{Top, ,PGG, pgg, PGG
11160 Manual}), but Mailcrypt and gpg.el are also supported.
11163 To handle @acronym{S/MIME} message, you need to install OpenSSL. OpenSSL 0.9.6
11164 or newer is recommended.
11168 The variables that control security functionality on reading messages
11172 @item mm-verify-option
11173 @vindex mm-verify-option
11174 Option of verifying signed parts. @code{never}, not verify;
11175 @code{always}, always verify; @code{known}, only verify known
11176 protocols. Otherwise, ask user.
11178 @item mm-decrypt-option
11179 @vindex mm-decrypt-option
11180 Option of decrypting encrypted parts. @code{never}, no decryption;
11181 @code{always}, always decrypt; @code{known}, only decrypt known
11182 protocols. Otherwise, ask user.
11185 @vindex mml1991-use
11186 Symbol indicating elisp interface to OpenPGP implementation for
11187 @acronym{PGP} messages. The default is @code{pgg}, but
11188 @code{mailcrypt} and @code{gpg} are also supported although
11192 @vindex mml2015-use
11193 Symbol indicating elisp interface to OpenPGP implementation for
11194 @acronym{PGP/MIME} messages. The default is @code{pgg}, but
11195 @code{mailcrypt} and @code{gpg} are also supported although
11200 By default the buttons that display security information are not
11201 shown, because they clutter reading the actual e-mail. You can type
11202 @kbd{K b} manually to display the information. Use the
11203 @code{gnus-buttonized-mime-types} and
11204 @code{gnus-unbuttonized-mime-types} variables to control this
11205 permanently. @ref{MIME Commands} for further details, and hints on
11206 how to customize these variables to always display security
11209 @cindex snarfing keys
11210 @cindex importing PGP keys
11211 @cindex PGP key ring import
11212 Snarfing OpenPGP keys (i.e., importing keys from articles into your
11213 key ring) is not supported explicitly through a menu item or command,
11214 rather Gnus do detect and label keys as @samp{application/pgp-keys},
11215 allowing you to specify whatever action you think is appropriate
11216 through the usual @acronym{MIME} infrastructure. You can use a
11217 @file{~/.mailcap} entry (@pxref{mailcap, , mailcap, emacs-mime, The
11218 Emacs MIME Manual}) such as the following to import keys using GNU
11219 Privacy Guard when you click on the @acronym{MIME} button
11220 (@pxref{Using MIME}).
11223 application/pgp-keys; gpg --import --interactive --verbose; needsterminal
11226 This happens to also be the default action defined in
11227 @code{mailcap-mime-data}.
11229 More information on how to set things for sending outgoing signed and
11230 encrypted messages up can be found in the message manual
11231 (@pxref{Security, ,Security, message, Message Manual}).
11234 @section Mailing List
11235 @cindex mailing list
11238 @kindex A M (summary)
11239 @findex gnus-mailing-list-insinuate
11240 Gnus understands some mailing list fields of RFC 2369. To enable it,
11241 add a @code{to-list} group parameter (@pxref{Group Parameters}),
11242 possibly using @kbd{A M} (@code{gnus-mailing-list-insinuate}) in the
11245 That enables the following commands to the summary buffer:
11250 @kindex C-c C-n h (Summary)
11251 @findex gnus-mailing-list-help
11252 Send a message to fetch mailing list help, if List-Help field exists.
11255 @kindex C-c C-n s (Summary)
11256 @findex gnus-mailing-list-subscribe
11257 Send a message to subscribe the mailing list, if List-Subscribe field exists.
11260 @kindex C-c C-n u (Summary)
11261 @findex gnus-mailing-list-unsubscribe
11262 Send a message to unsubscribe the mailing list, if List-Unsubscribe
11266 @kindex C-c C-n p (Summary)
11267 @findex gnus-mailing-list-post
11268 Post to the mailing list, if List-Post field exists.
11271 @kindex C-c C-n o (Summary)
11272 @findex gnus-mailing-list-owner
11273 Send a message to the mailing list owner, if List-Owner field exists.
11276 @kindex C-c C-n a (Summary)
11277 @findex gnus-mailing-list-archive
11278 Browse the mailing list archive, if List-Archive field exists.
11283 @node Article Buffer
11284 @chapter Article Buffer
11285 @cindex article buffer
11287 The articles are displayed in the article buffer, of which there is only
11288 one. All the summary buffers share the same article buffer unless you
11289 tell Gnus otherwise.
11292 * Hiding Headers:: Deciding what headers should be displayed.
11293 * Using MIME:: Pushing articles through @acronym{MIME} before reading them.
11294 * Customizing Articles:: Tailoring the look of the articles.
11295 * Article Keymap:: Keystrokes available in the article buffer.
11296 * Misc Article:: Other stuff.
11300 @node Hiding Headers
11301 @section Hiding Headers
11302 @cindex hiding headers
11303 @cindex deleting headers
11305 The top section of each article is the @dfn{head}. (The rest is the
11306 @dfn{body}, but you may have guessed that already.)
11308 @vindex gnus-show-all-headers
11309 There is a lot of useful information in the head: the name of the person
11310 who wrote the article, the date it was written and the subject of the
11311 article. That's well and nice, but there's also lots of information
11312 most people do not want to see---what systems the article has passed
11313 through before reaching you, the @code{Message-ID}, the
11314 @code{References}, etc. ad nauseam---and you'll probably want to get rid
11315 of some of those lines. If you want to keep all those lines in the
11316 article buffer, you can set @code{gnus-show-all-headers} to @code{t}.
11318 Gnus provides you with two variables for sifting headers:
11322 @item gnus-visible-headers
11323 @vindex gnus-visible-headers
11324 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, it should be a regular expression
11325 that says what headers you wish to keep in the article buffer. All
11326 headers that do not match this variable will be hidden.
11328 For instance, if you only want to see the name of the person who wrote
11329 the article and the subject, you'd say:
11332 (setq gnus-visible-headers "^From:\\|^Subject:")
11335 This variable can also be a list of regexps to match headers to
11338 @item gnus-ignored-headers
11339 @vindex gnus-ignored-headers
11340 This variable is the reverse of @code{gnus-visible-headers}. If this
11341 variable is set (and @code{gnus-visible-headers} is @code{nil}), it
11342 should be a regular expression that matches all lines that you want to
11343 hide. All lines that do not match this variable will remain visible.
11345 For instance, if you just want to get rid of the @code{References} line
11346 and the @code{Xref} line, you might say:
11349 (setq gnus-ignored-headers "^References:\\|^Xref:")
11352 This variable can also be a list of regexps to match headers to
11355 Note that if @code{gnus-visible-headers} is non-@code{nil}, this
11356 variable will have no effect.
11360 @vindex gnus-sorted-header-list
11361 Gnus can also sort the headers for you. (It does this by default.) You
11362 can control the sorting by setting the @code{gnus-sorted-header-list}
11363 variable. It is a list of regular expressions that says in what order
11364 the headers are to be displayed.
11366 For instance, if you want the name of the author of the article first,
11367 and then the subject, you might say something like:
11370 (setq gnus-sorted-header-list '("^From:" "^Subject:"))
11373 Any headers that are to remain visible, but are not listed in this
11374 variable, will be displayed in random order after all the headers listed in this variable.
11376 @findex gnus-article-hide-boring-headers
11377 @vindex gnus-boring-article-headers
11378 You can hide further boring headers by setting
11379 @code{gnus-treat-hide-boring-headers} to @code{head}. What this function
11380 does depends on the @code{gnus-boring-article-headers} variable. It's a
11381 list, but this list doesn't actually contain header names. Instead it
11382 lists various @dfn{boring conditions} that Gnus can check and remove
11385 These conditions are:
11388 Remove all empty headers.
11390 Remove the @code{Followup-To} header if it is identical to the
11391 @code{Newsgroups} header.
11393 Remove the @code{Reply-To} header if it lists the same addresses as
11394 the @code{From} header, or if the @code{broken-reply-to} group
11397 Remove the @code{Newsgroups} header if it only contains the current group
11400 Remove the @code{To} header if it only contains the address identical to
11401 the current group's @code{to-address} parameter.
11403 Remove the @code{To} header if it only contains the address identical to
11404 the current group's @code{to-list} parameter.
11406 Remove the @code{Cc} header if it only contains the address identical to
11407 the current group's @code{to-list} parameter.
11409 Remove the @code{Date} header if the article is less than three days
11412 Remove the @code{To} and/or @code{Cc} header if it is very long.
11414 Remove all @code{To} and/or @code{Cc} headers if there are more than one.
11417 To include these three elements, you could say something like:
11420 (setq gnus-boring-article-headers
11421 '(empty followup-to reply-to))
11424 This is also the default value for this variable.
11428 @section Using MIME
11429 @cindex @acronym{MIME}
11431 Mime is a standard for waving your hands through the air, aimlessly,
11432 while people stand around yawning.
11434 @acronym{MIME}, however, is a standard for encoding your articles, aimlessly,
11435 while all newsreaders die of fear.
11437 @acronym{MIME} may specify what character set the article uses, the encoding
11438 of the characters, and it also makes it possible to embed pictures and
11439 other naughty stuff in innocent-looking articles.
11441 @vindex gnus-display-mime-function
11442 @findex gnus-display-mime
11443 Gnus pushes @acronym{MIME} articles through @code{gnus-display-mime-function}
11444 to display the @acronym{MIME} parts. This is @code{gnus-display-mime} by
11445 default, which creates a bundle of clickable buttons that can be used to
11446 display, save and manipulate the @acronym{MIME} objects.
11448 The following commands are available when you have placed point over a
11449 @acronym{MIME} button:
11452 @findex gnus-article-press-button
11453 @item RET (Article)
11454 @kindex RET (Article)
11455 @itemx BUTTON-2 (Article)
11456 Toggle displaying of the @acronym{MIME} object
11457 (@code{gnus-article-press-button}). If built-in viewers can not display
11458 the object, Gnus resorts to external viewers in the @file{mailcap}
11459 files. If a viewer has the @samp{copiousoutput} specification, the
11460 object is displayed inline.
11462 @findex gnus-mime-view-part
11463 @item M-RET (Article)
11464 @kindex M-RET (Article)
11466 Prompt for a method, and then view the @acronym{MIME} object using this
11467 method (@code{gnus-mime-view-part}).
11469 @findex gnus-mime-view-part-as-type
11471 @kindex t (Article)
11472 View the @acronym{MIME} object as if it were a different @acronym{MIME} media type
11473 (@code{gnus-mime-view-part-as-type}).
11475 @findex gnus-mime-view-part-as-charset
11477 @kindex C (Article)
11478 Prompt for a charset, and then view the @acronym{MIME} object using this
11479 charset (@code{gnus-mime-view-part-as-charset}).
11481 @findex gnus-mime-save-part
11483 @kindex o (Article)
11484 Prompt for a file name, and then save the @acronym{MIME} object
11485 (@code{gnus-mime-save-part}).
11487 @findex gnus-mime-save-part-and-strip
11488 @item C-o (Article)
11489 @kindex C-o (Article)
11490 Prompt for a file name, then save the @acronym{MIME} object and strip it from
11491 the article. Then proceed to article editing, where a reasonable
11492 suggestion is being made on how the altered article should look
11493 like. The stripped @acronym{MIME} object will be referred via the
11494 message/external-body @acronym{MIME} type.
11495 (@code{gnus-mime-save-part-and-strip}).
11497 @findex gnus-mime-replace-part
11499 @kindex r (Article)
11500 Prompt for a file name, replace the @acronym{MIME} object with an
11501 external body refering to the file via the message/external-body
11502 @acronym{MIME} type. (@code{gnus-mime-replace-part}).
11504 @findex gnus-mime-delete-part
11506 @kindex d (Article)
11507 Delete the @acronym{MIME} object from the article and replace it with some
11508 information about the removed @acronym{MIME} object
11509 (@code{gnus-mime-delete-part}).
11511 @c FIXME: gnus-auto-select-part should be documented here
11513 @findex gnus-mime-copy-part
11515 @kindex c (Article)
11516 Copy the @acronym{MIME} object to a fresh buffer and display this buffer
11517 (@code{gnus-mime-copy-part}). If given a prefix, copy the raw contents
11518 without decoding. If given a numerical prefix, you can do semi-manual
11519 charset stuff (see @code{gnus-summary-show-article-charset-alist} in
11520 @ref{Paging the Article}). Compressed files like @file{.gz} and
11521 @file{.bz2} are automatically decompressed if
11522 @code{auto-compression-mode} is enabled (@pxref{Compressed Files,,
11523 Accessing Compressed Files, emacs, The Emacs Editor}).
11525 @findex gnus-mime-print-part
11527 @kindex p (Article)
11528 Print the @acronym{MIME} object (@code{gnus-mime-print-part}). This
11529 command respects the @samp{print=} specifications in the
11530 @file{.mailcap} file.
11532 @findex gnus-mime-inline-part
11534 @kindex i (Article)
11535 Insert the contents of the @acronym{MIME} object into the buffer
11536 (@code{gnus-mime-inline-part}) as text/plain. If given a prefix, insert
11537 the raw contents without decoding. If given a numerical prefix, you can
11538 do semi-manual charset stuff (see
11539 @code{gnus-summary-show-article-charset-alist} in @ref{Paging the
11540 Article}). Compressed files like @file{.gz} and @file{.bz2} are
11541 automatically decompressed depending on @code{jka-compr} regardless of
11542 @code{auto-compression-mode} (@pxref{Compressed Files,, Accessing
11543 Compressed Files, emacs, The Emacs Editor}).
11545 @findex gnus-mime-view-part-internally
11547 @kindex E (Article)
11548 View the @acronym{MIME} object with an internal viewer. If no internal
11549 viewer is available, use an external viewer
11550 (@code{gnus-mime-view-part-internally}).
11552 @findex gnus-mime-view-part-externally
11554 @kindex e (Article)
11555 View the @acronym{MIME} object with an external viewer.
11556 (@code{gnus-mime-view-part-externally}).
11558 @findex gnus-mime-pipe-part
11560 @kindex | (Article)
11561 Output the @acronym{MIME} object to a process (@code{gnus-mime-pipe-part}).
11563 @findex gnus-mime-action-on-part
11565 @kindex . (Article)
11566 Interactively run an action on the @acronym{MIME} object
11567 (@code{gnus-mime-action-on-part}).
11571 Gnus will display some @acronym{MIME} objects automatically. The way Gnus
11572 determines which parts to do this with is described in the Emacs
11573 @acronym{MIME} manual.
11575 It might be best to just use the toggling functions from the article
11576 buffer to avoid getting nasty surprises. (For instance, you enter the
11577 group @samp{alt.sing-a-long} and, before you know it, @acronym{MIME} has
11578 decoded the sound file in the article and some horrible sing-a-long song
11579 comes screaming out your speakers, and you can't find the volume button,
11580 because there isn't one, and people are starting to look at you, and you
11581 try to stop the program, but you can't, and you can't find the program
11582 to control the volume, and everybody else in the room suddenly decides
11583 to look at you disdainfully, and you'll feel rather stupid.)
11585 Any similarity to real events and people is purely coincidental. Ahem.
11587 Also @pxref{MIME Commands}.
11590 @node Customizing Articles
11591 @section Customizing Articles
11592 @cindex article customization
11594 A slew of functions for customizing how the articles are to look like
11595 exist. You can call these functions interactively
11596 (@pxref{Article Washing}), or you can have them
11597 called automatically when you select the articles.
11599 To have them called automatically, you should set the corresponding
11600 ``treatment'' variable. For instance, to have headers hidden, you'd set
11601 @code{gnus-treat-hide-headers}. Below is a list of variables that can
11602 be set, but first we discuss the values these variables can have.
11604 Note: Some values, while valid, make little sense. Check the list below
11605 for sensible values.
11609 @code{nil}: Don't do this treatment.
11612 @code{t}: Do this treatment on all body parts.
11615 @code{head}: Do the treatment on the headers.
11618 @code{first}: Do this treatment on the first body part.
11621 @code{last}: Do this treatment on the last body part.
11624 An integer: Do this treatment on all body parts that have a length less
11628 A list of strings: Do this treatment on all body parts that are in
11629 articles that are read in groups that have names that match one of the
11630 regexps in the list.
11633 A list where the first element is not a string:
11635 The list is evaluated recursively. The first element of the list is a
11636 predicate. The following predicates are recognized: @code{or},
11637 @code{and}, @code{not} and @code{typep}. Here's an example:
11641 (typep "text/x-vcard"))
11646 You may have noticed that the word @dfn{part} is used here. This refers
11647 to the fact that some messages are @acronym{MIME} multipart articles that may
11648 be divided into several parts. Articles that are not multiparts are
11649 considered to contain just a single part.
11651 @vindex gnus-article-treat-types
11652 Are the treatments applied to all sorts of multipart parts? Yes, if you
11653 want to, but by default, only @samp{text/plain} parts are given the
11654 treatment. This is controlled by the @code{gnus-article-treat-types}
11655 variable, which is a list of regular expressions that are matched to the
11656 type of the part. This variable is ignored if the value of the
11657 controlling variable is a predicate list, as described above.
11660 @c Avoid sort of redundant entries in the same section for the printed
11661 @c manual, but add them in info to allow `i gnus-treat-foo-bar RET' or
11663 @vindex gnus-treat-buttonize
11664 @vindex gnus-treat-buttonize-head
11665 @vindex gnus-treat-capitalize-sentences
11666 @vindex gnus-treat-overstrike
11667 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-cr
11668 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-headers-in-body
11669 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-leading-blank-lines
11670 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-multiple-blank-lines
11671 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-pem
11672 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-trailing-blank-lines
11673 @vindex gnus-treat-unsplit-urls
11674 @vindex gnus-treat-wash-html
11675 @vindex gnus-treat-date-english
11676 @vindex gnus-treat-date-iso8601
11677 @vindex gnus-treat-date-lapsed
11678 @vindex gnus-treat-date-local
11679 @vindex gnus-treat-date-original
11680 @vindex gnus-treat-date-user-defined
11681 @vindex gnus-treat-date-ut
11682 @vindex gnus-treat-from-picon
11683 @vindex gnus-treat-mail-picon
11684 @vindex gnus-treat-newsgroups-picon
11685 @vindex gnus-treat-display-smileys
11686 @vindex gnus-treat-body-boundary
11687 @vindex gnus-treat-display-x-face
11688 @vindex gnus-treat-display-face
11689 @vindex gnus-treat-emphasize
11690 @vindex gnus-treat-fill-article
11691 @vindex gnus-treat-fill-long-lines
11692 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-boring-headers
11693 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-citation
11694 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-citation-maybe
11695 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-headers
11696 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-signature
11697 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-banner
11698 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-list-identifiers
11699 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-citation
11700 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-headers
11701 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-signature
11702 @vindex gnus-treat-play-sounds
11703 @vindex gnus-treat-translate
11704 @vindex gnus-treat-x-pgp-sig
11705 @vindex gnus-treat-unfold-headers
11706 @vindex gnus-treat-fold-headers
11707 @vindex gnus-treat-fold-newsgroups
11708 @vindex gnus-treat-leading-whitespace
11711 The following treatment options are available. The easiest way to
11712 customize this is to examine the @code{gnus-article-treat} customization
11713 group. Values in parenthesis are suggested sensible values. Others are
11714 possible but those listed are probably sufficient for most people.
11717 @item gnus-treat-buttonize (t, integer)
11718 @item gnus-treat-buttonize-head (head)
11720 @xref{Article Buttons}.
11722 @item gnus-treat-capitalize-sentences (t, integer)
11723 @item gnus-treat-overstrike (t, integer)
11724 @item gnus-treat-strip-cr (t, integer)
11725 @item gnus-treat-strip-headers-in-body (t, integer)
11726 @item gnus-treat-strip-leading-blank-lines (t, first, integer)
11727 @item gnus-treat-strip-multiple-blank-lines (t, integer)
11728 @item gnus-treat-strip-pem (t, last, integer)
11729 @item gnus-treat-strip-trailing-blank-lines (t, last, integer)
11730 @item gnus-treat-unsplit-urls (t, integer)
11731 @item gnus-treat-wash-html (t, integer)
11733 @xref{Article Washing}.
11735 @item gnus-treat-date-english (head)
11736 @item gnus-treat-date-iso8601 (head)
11737 @item gnus-treat-date-lapsed (head)
11738 @item gnus-treat-date-local (head)
11739 @item gnus-treat-date-original (head)
11740 @item gnus-treat-date-user-defined (head)
11741 @item gnus-treat-date-ut (head)
11743 @xref{Article Date}.
11745 @item gnus-treat-from-picon (head)
11746 @item gnus-treat-mail-picon (head)
11747 @item gnus-treat-newsgroups-picon (head)
11751 @item gnus-treat-display-smileys (t, integer)
11753 @item gnus-treat-body-boundary (head)
11755 @vindex gnus-body-boundary-delimiter
11756 Adds a delimiter between header and body, the string used as delimiter
11757 is controlled by @code{gnus-body-boundary-delimiter}.
11761 @vindex gnus-treat-display-x-face
11762 @item gnus-treat-display-x-face (head)
11766 @vindex gnus-treat-display-face
11767 @item gnus-treat-display-face (head)
11771 @vindex gnus-treat-emphasize
11772 @item gnus-treat-emphasize (t, head, integer)
11773 @vindex gnus-treat-fill-article
11774 @item gnus-treat-fill-article (t, integer)
11775 @vindex gnus-treat-fill-long-lines
11776 @item gnus-treat-fill-long-lines (t, integer)
11777 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-boring-headers
11778 @item gnus-treat-hide-boring-headers (head)
11779 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-citation
11780 @item gnus-treat-hide-citation (t, integer)
11781 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-citation-maybe
11782 @item gnus-treat-hide-citation-maybe (t, integer)
11783 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-headers
11784 @item gnus-treat-hide-headers (head)
11785 @vindex gnus-treat-hide-signature
11786 @item gnus-treat-hide-signature (t, last)
11787 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-banner
11788 @item gnus-treat-strip-banner (t, last)
11789 @vindex gnus-treat-strip-list-identifiers
11790 @item gnus-treat-strip-list-identifiers (head)
11792 @xref{Article Hiding}.
11794 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-citation
11795 @item gnus-treat-highlight-citation (t, integer)
11796 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-headers
11797 @item gnus-treat-highlight-headers (head)
11798 @vindex gnus-treat-highlight-signature
11799 @item gnus-treat-highlight-signature (t, last, integer)
11801 @xref{Article Highlighting}.
11803 @vindex gnus-treat-play-sounds
11804 @item gnus-treat-play-sounds
11805 @vindex gnus-treat-translate
11806 @item gnus-treat-translate
11807 @item gnus-treat-ansi-sequences (t)
11808 @vindex gnus-treat-x-pgp-sig
11809 @item gnus-treat-x-pgp-sig (head)
11811 @vindex gnus-treat-unfold-headers
11812 @item gnus-treat-unfold-headers (head)
11813 @vindex gnus-treat-fold-headers
11814 @item gnus-treat-fold-headers (head)
11815 @vindex gnus-treat-fold-newsgroups
11816 @item gnus-treat-fold-newsgroups (head)
11817 @vindex gnus-treat-leading-whitespace
11818 @item gnus-treat-leading-whitespace (head)
11820 @xref{Article Header}.
11825 @vindex gnus-part-display-hook
11826 You can, of course, write your own functions to be called from
11827 @code{gnus-part-display-hook}. The functions are called narrowed to the
11828 part, and you can do anything you like, pretty much. There is no
11829 information that you have to keep in the buffer---you can change
11833 @node Article Keymap
11834 @section Article Keymap
11836 Most of the keystrokes in the summary buffer can also be used in the
11837 article buffer. They should behave as if you typed them in the summary
11838 buffer, which means that you don't actually have to have a summary
11839 buffer displayed while reading. You can do it all from the article
11842 @kindex v (Article)
11843 @cindex keys, reserved for users (Article)
11844 The key @kbd{v} is reserved for users. You can bind it to some
11845 command or better use it as a prefix key.
11847 A few additional keystrokes are available:
11852 @kindex SPACE (Article)
11853 @findex gnus-article-next-page
11854 Scroll forwards one page (@code{gnus-article-next-page}).
11855 This is exactly the same as @kbd{h SPACE h}.
11858 @kindex DEL (Article)
11859 @findex gnus-article-prev-page
11860 Scroll backwards one page (@code{gnus-article-prev-page}).
11861 This is exactly the same as @kbd{h DEL h}.
11864 @kindex C-c ^ (Article)
11865 @findex gnus-article-refer-article
11866 If point is in the neighborhood of a @code{Message-ID} and you press
11867 @kbd{C-c ^}, Gnus will try to get that article from the server
11868 (@code{gnus-article-refer-article}).
11871 @kindex C-c C-m (Article)
11872 @findex gnus-article-mail
11873 Send a reply to the address near point (@code{gnus-article-mail}). If
11874 given a prefix, include the mail.
11877 @kindex s (Article)
11878 @findex gnus-article-show-summary
11879 Reconfigure the buffers so that the summary buffer becomes visible
11880 (@code{gnus-article-show-summary}).
11883 @kindex ? (Article)
11884 @findex gnus-article-describe-briefly
11885 Give a very brief description of the available keystrokes
11886 (@code{gnus-article-describe-briefly}).
11889 @kindex TAB (Article)
11890 @findex gnus-article-next-button
11891 Go to the next button, if any (@code{gnus-article-next-button}). This
11892 only makes sense if you have buttonizing turned on.
11895 @kindex M-TAB (Article)
11896 @findex gnus-article-prev-button
11897 Go to the previous button, if any (@code{gnus-article-prev-button}).
11900 @kindex R (Article)
11901 @findex gnus-article-reply-with-original
11902 Send a reply to the current article and yank the current article
11903 (@code{gnus-article-reply-with-original}). If given a prefix, make a
11904 wide reply. If the region is active, only yank the text in the
11908 @kindex F (Article)
11909 @findex gnus-article-followup-with-original
11910 Send a followup to the current article and yank the current article
11911 (@code{gnus-article-followup-with-original}). If given a prefix, make
11912 a wide reply. If the region is active, only yank the text in the
11920 @section Misc Article
11924 @item gnus-single-article-buffer
11925 @vindex gnus-single-article-buffer
11926 @cindex article buffers, several
11927 If non-@code{nil}, use the same article buffer for all the groups.
11928 (This is the default.) If @code{nil}, each group will have its own
11931 @vindex gnus-article-decode-hook
11932 @item gnus-article-decode-hook
11933 @cindex @acronym{MIME}
11934 Hook used to decode @acronym{MIME} articles. The default value is
11935 @code{(article-decode-charset article-decode-encoded-words)}
11937 @vindex gnus-article-prepare-hook
11938 @item gnus-article-prepare-hook
11939 This hook is called right after the article has been inserted into the
11940 article buffer. It is mainly intended for functions that do something
11941 depending on the contents; it should probably not be used for changing
11942 the contents of the article buffer.
11944 @item gnus-article-mode-hook
11945 @vindex gnus-article-mode-hook
11946 Hook called in article mode buffers.
11948 @item gnus-article-mode-syntax-table
11949 @vindex gnus-article-mode-syntax-table
11950 Syntax table used in article buffers. It is initialized from
11951 @code{text-mode-syntax-table}.
11953 @vindex gnus-article-over-scroll
11954 @item gnus-article-over-scroll
11955 If non-@code{nil}, allow scrolling the article buffer even when there
11956 no more new text to scroll in. The default is @code{nil}.
11958 @vindex gnus-article-mode-line-format
11959 @item gnus-article-mode-line-format
11960 This variable is a format string along the same lines as
11961 @code{gnus-summary-mode-line-format} (@pxref{Summary Buffer Mode
11962 Line}). It accepts the same format specifications as that variable,
11963 with two extensions:
11968 The @dfn{wash status} of the article. This is a short string with one
11969 character for each possible article wash operation that may have been
11970 performed. The characters and their meaning:
11975 Displayed when cited text may be hidden in the article buffer.
11978 Displayed when headers are hidden in the article buffer.
11981 Displayed when article is digitally signed or encrypted, and Gnus has
11982 hidden the security headers. (N.B. does not tell anything about
11983 security status, i.e. good or bad signature.)
11986 Displayed when the signature has been hidden in the Article buffer.
11989 Displayed when Gnus has treated overstrike characters in the article buffer.
11992 Displayed when Gnus has treated emphasised strings in the article buffer.
11997 The number of @acronym{MIME} parts in the article.
12001 @vindex gnus-break-pages
12003 @item gnus-break-pages
12004 Controls whether @dfn{page breaking} is to take place. If this variable
12005 is non-@code{nil}, the articles will be divided into pages whenever a
12006 page delimiter appears in the article. If this variable is @code{nil},
12007 paging will not be done.
12009 @item gnus-page-delimiter
12010 @vindex gnus-page-delimiter
12011 This is the delimiter mentioned above. By default, it is @samp{^L}
12015 @cindex internationalized domain names
12016 @vindex gnus-use-idna
12017 @item gnus-use-idna
12018 This variable controls whether Gnus performs IDNA decoding of
12019 internationalized domain names inside @samp{From}, @samp{To} and
12020 @samp{Cc} headers. @xref{IDNA, ,IDNA,message, The Message Manual},
12021 for how to compose such messages. This requires
12022 @uref{http://www.gnu.org/software/libidn/, GNU Libidn}, and this
12023 variable is only enabled if you have installed it.
12028 @node Composing Messages
12029 @chapter Composing Messages
12030 @cindex composing messages
12033 @cindex sending mail
12038 @cindex using s/mime
12039 @cindex using smime
12041 @kindex C-c C-c (Post)
12042 All commands for posting and mailing will put you in a message buffer
12043 where you can edit the article all you like, before you send the
12044 article by pressing @kbd{C-c C-c}. @xref{Top, , Overview, message,
12045 Message Manual}. Where the message will be posted/mailed to depends
12046 on your setup (@pxref{Posting Server}).
12049 * Mail:: Mailing and replying.
12050 * Posting Server:: What server should you post and mail via?
12051 * POP before SMTP:: You cannot send a mail unless you read a mail.
12052 * Mail and Post:: Mailing and posting at the same time.
12053 * Archived Messages:: Where Gnus stores the messages you've sent.
12054 * Posting Styles:: An easier way to specify who you are.
12055 * Drafts:: Postponing messages and rejected messages.
12056 * Rejected Articles:: What happens if the server doesn't like your article?
12057 * Signing and encrypting:: How to compose secure messages.
12060 Also @pxref{Canceling and Superseding} for information on how to
12061 remove articles you shouldn't have posted.
12067 Variables for customizing outgoing mail:
12070 @item gnus-uu-digest-headers
12071 @vindex gnus-uu-digest-headers
12072 List of regexps to match headers included in digested messages. The
12073 headers will be included in the sequence they are matched. If
12074 @code{nil} include all headers.
12076 @item gnus-add-to-list
12077 @vindex gnus-add-to-list
12078 If non-@code{nil}, add a @code{to-list} group parameter to mail groups
12079 that have none when you do a @kbd{a}.
12081 @item gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news
12082 @vindex gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news
12083 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus will ask you for a confirmation when you are
12084 about to reply to news articles by mail. If it is @code{nil}, nothing
12085 interferes in what you want to do. This can also be a function
12086 receiving the group name as the only parameter which should return
12087 non-@code{nil} if a confirmation is needed, or a regular expression
12088 matching group names, where confirmation should be asked for.
12090 If you find yourself never wanting to reply to mail, but occasionally
12091 press @kbd{R} anyway, this variable might be for you.
12093 @item gnus-confirm-treat-mail-like-news
12094 @vindex gnus-confirm-treat-mail-like-news
12095 If non-@code{nil}, Gnus also requests confirmation according to
12096 @code{gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news} when replying to mail. This is
12097 useful for treating mailing lists like newsgroups.
12102 @node Posting Server
12103 @section Posting Server
12105 When you press those magical @kbd{C-c C-c} keys to ship off your latest
12106 (extremely intelligent, of course) article, where does it go?
12108 Thank you for asking. I hate you.
12110 It can be quite complicated.
12112 @vindex gnus-post-method
12113 When posting news, Message usually invokes @code{message-send-news}
12114 (@pxref{News Variables, , News Variables, message, Message Manual}).
12115 Normally, Gnus will post using the same select method as you're
12116 reading from (which might be convenient if you're reading lots of
12117 groups from different private servers). However. If the server
12118 you're reading from doesn't allow posting, just reading, you probably
12119 want to use some other server to post your (extremely intelligent and
12120 fabulously interesting) articles. You can then set the
12121 @code{gnus-post-method} to some other method:
12124 (setq gnus-post-method '(nnspool ""))
12127 Now, if you've done this, and then this server rejects your article, or
12128 this server is down, what do you do then? To override this variable you
12129 can use a non-zero prefix to the @kbd{C-c C-c} command to force using
12130 the ``current'' server, to get back the default behavior, for posting.
12132 If you give a zero prefix (i.e., @kbd{C-u 0 C-c C-c}) to that command,
12133 Gnus will prompt you for what method to use for posting.
12135 You can also set @code{gnus-post-method} to a list of select methods.
12136 If that's the case, Gnus will always prompt you for what method to use
12139 Finally, if you want to always post using the native select method,
12140 you can set this variable to @code{native}.
12142 @vindex message-send-mail-function
12143 When sending mail, Message invokes the function specified by the
12144 variable @code{message-send-mail-function}. Gnus tries to set it to a
12145 value suitable for your system.
12146 @xref{Mail Variables, ,Mail Variables,message,Message manual}, for more
12149 @node POP before SMTP
12150 @section POP before SMTP
12151 @cindex pop before smtp
12152 @findex message-smtpmail-send-it
12153 @findex mail-source-touch-pop
12155 Does your @acronym{ISP} require the @acronym{POP}-before-@acronym{SMTP}
12156 authentication? It is whether you need to connect to the @acronym{POP}
12157 mail server within a certain time before sending mails. If so, there is
12158 a convenient way. To do that, put the following lines in your
12159 @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
12162 (setq message-send-mail-function 'message-smtpmail-send-it)
12163 (add-hook 'message-send-mail-hook 'mail-source-touch-pop)
12167 It means to let Gnus connect to the @acronym{POP} mail server in advance
12168 whenever you send a mail. The @code{mail-source-touch-pop} function
12169 does only a @acronym{POP} authentication according to the value of
12170 @code{mail-sources} without fetching mails, just before sending a mail.
12171 Note that you have to use @code{message-smtpmail-send-it} which runs
12172 @code{message-send-mail-hook} rather than @code{smtpmail-send-it} and
12173 set the value of @code{mail-sources} for a @acronym{POP} connection
12174 correctly. @xref{Mail Sources}.
12176 If you have two or more @acronym{POP} mail servers set in
12177 @code{mail-sources}, you may want to specify one of them to
12178 @code{mail-source-primary-source} as the @acronym{POP} mail server to be
12179 used for the @acronym{POP}-before-@acronym{SMTP} authentication. If it
12180 is your primary @acronym{POP} mail server (i.e., you are fetching mails
12181 mainly from that server), you can set it permanently as follows:
12184 (setq mail-source-primary-source
12185 '(pop :server "pop3.mail.server"
12186 :password "secret"))
12190 Otherwise, bind it dynamically only when performing the
12191 @acronym{POP}-before-@acronym{SMTP} authentication as follows:
12194 (add-hook 'message-send-mail-hook
12196 (let ((mail-source-primary-source
12197 '(pop :server "pop3.mail.server"
12198 :password "secret")))
12199 (mail-source-touch-pop))))
12202 @node Mail and Post
12203 @section Mail and Post
12205 Here's a list of variables relevant to both mailing and
12209 @item gnus-mailing-list-groups
12210 @findex gnus-mailing-list-groups
12211 @cindex mailing lists
12213 If your news server offers groups that are really mailing lists
12214 gatewayed to the @acronym{NNTP} server, you can read those groups without
12215 problems, but you can't post/followup to them without some difficulty.
12216 One solution is to add a @code{to-address} to the group parameters
12217 (@pxref{Group Parameters}). An easier thing to do is set the
12218 @code{gnus-mailing-list-groups} to a regexp that matches the groups that
12219 really are mailing lists. Then, at least, followups to the mailing
12220 lists will work most of the time. Posting to these groups (@kbd{a}) is
12221 still a pain, though.
12223 @item gnus-user-agent
12224 @vindex gnus-user-agent
12227 This variable controls which information should be exposed in the
12228 User-Agent header. It can be a list of symbols or a string. Valid
12229 symbols are @code{gnus} (show Gnus version) and @code{emacs} (show Emacs
12230 version). In addition to the Emacs version, you can add @code{codename}
12231 (show (S)XEmacs codename) or either @code{config} (show system
12232 configuration) or @code{type} (show system type). If you set it to a
12233 string, be sure to use a valid format, see RFC 2616.
12237 You may want to do spell-checking on messages that you send out. Or, if
12238 you don't want to spell-check by hand, you could add automatic
12239 spell-checking via the @code{ispell} package:
12242 @findex ispell-message
12244 (add-hook 'message-send-hook 'ispell-message)
12247 If you want to change the @code{ispell} dictionary based on what group
12248 you're in, you could say something like the following:
12251 (add-hook 'gnus-select-group-hook
12255 "^de\\." (gnus-group-real-name gnus-newsgroup-name))
12256 (ispell-change-dictionary "deutsch"))
12258 (ispell-change-dictionary "english")))))
12261 Modify to suit your needs.
12263 @vindex gnus-message-highlight-citation
12264 If @code{gnus-message-highlight-citation} is t, different levels of
12265 citations are highlighted like in Gnus article buffers also in message
12268 @node Archived Messages
12269 @section Archived Messages
12270 @cindex archived messages
12271 @cindex sent messages
12273 Gnus provides a few different methods for storing the mail and news you
12274 send. The default method is to use the @dfn{archive virtual server} to
12275 store the messages. If you want to disable this completely, the
12276 @code{gnus-message-archive-group} variable should be @code{nil}, which
12279 For archiving interesting messages in a group you read, see the
12280 @kbd{B c} (@code{gnus-summary-copy-article}) command (@pxref{Mail
12283 @vindex gnus-message-archive-method
12284 @code{gnus-message-archive-method} says what virtual server Gnus is to
12285 use to store sent messages. The default is @code{"archive"}, and when
12286 actually being used it is expanded into:
12289 (nnfolder "archive"
12290 (nnfolder-directory "~/Mail/archive")
12291 (nnfolder-active-file "~/Mail/archive/active")
12292 (nnfolder-get-new-mail nil)
12293 (nnfolder-inhibit-expiry t))
12297 @vindex gnus-update-message-archive-method
12298 Note: a server like this is saved in the @file{~/.newsrc.eld} file first
12299 so that it may be used as a real method of the server which is named
12300 @code{"archive"} (that is, for the case where
12301 @code{gnus-message-archive-method} is set to @code{"archive"}) ever
12302 since. If it once has been saved, it will never be updated by default
12303 even if you change the value of @code{gnus-message-archive-method}
12304 afterward. Therefore, the server @code{"archive"} doesn't necessarily
12305 mean the @code{nnfolder} server like this at all times. If you want the
12306 saved method to reflect always the value of
12307 @code{gnus-message-archive-method}, set the
12308 @code{gnus-update-message-archive-method} variable to a non-@code{nil}
12309 value. The default value of this variable is @code{nil}.
12312 You can, however, use any mail select method (@code{nnml},
12313 @code{nnmbox}, etc.). @code{nnfolder} is a quite likable select method
12314 for doing this sort of thing, though. If you don't like the default
12315 directory chosen, you could say something like:
12318 (setq gnus-message-archive-method
12319 '(nnfolder "archive"
12320 (nnfolder-inhibit-expiry t)
12321 (nnfolder-active-file "~/News/sent-mail/active")
12322 (nnfolder-directory "~/News/sent-mail/")))
12325 @vindex gnus-message-archive-group
12327 Gnus will insert @code{Gcc} headers in all outgoing messages that point
12328 to one or more group(s) on that server. Which group to use is
12329 determined by the @code{gnus-message-archive-group} variable.
12331 This variable can be used to do the following:
12335 Messages will be saved in that group.
12337 Note that you can include a select method in the group name, then the
12338 message will not be stored in the select method given by
12339 @code{gnus-message-archive-method}, but in the select method specified
12340 by the group name, instead. Suppose @code{gnus-message-archive-method}
12341 has the default value shown above. Then setting
12342 @code{gnus-message-archive-group} to @code{"foo"} means that outgoing
12343 messages are stored in @samp{nnfolder+archive:foo}, but if you use the
12344 value @code{"nnml:foo"}, then outgoing messages will be stored in
12347 @item a list of strings
12348 Messages will be saved in all those groups.
12350 @item an alist of regexps, functions and forms
12351 When a key ``matches'', the result is used.
12354 No message archiving will take place. This is the default.
12359 Just saving to a single group called @samp{MisK}:
12361 (setq gnus-message-archive-group "MisK")
12364 Saving to two groups, @samp{MisK} and @samp{safe}:
12366 (setq gnus-message-archive-group '("MisK" "safe"))
12369 Save to different groups based on what group you are in:
12371 (setq gnus-message-archive-group
12372 '(("^alt" "sent-to-alt")
12373 ("mail" "sent-to-mail")
12374 (".*" "sent-to-misc")))
12377 More complex stuff:
12379 (setq gnus-message-archive-group
12380 '((if (message-news-p)
12385 How about storing all news messages in one file, but storing all mail
12386 messages in one file per month:
12389 (setq gnus-message-archive-group
12390 '((if (message-news-p)
12392 (concat "mail." (format-time-string "%Y-%m")))))
12395 @c (XEmacs 19.13 doesn't have @code{format-time-string}, so you'll have to
12396 @c use a different value for @code{gnus-message-archive-group} there.)
12398 Now, when you send a message off, it will be stored in the appropriate
12399 group. (If you want to disable storing for just one particular message,
12400 you can just remove the @code{Gcc} header that has been inserted.) The
12401 archive group will appear in the group buffer the next time you start
12402 Gnus, or the next time you press @kbd{F} in the group buffer. You can
12403 enter it and read the articles in it just like you'd read any other
12404 group. If the group gets really big and annoying, you can simply rename
12405 if (using @kbd{G r} in the group buffer) to something
12406 nice---@samp{misc-mail-september-1995}, or whatever. New messages will
12407 continue to be stored in the old (now empty) group.
12409 That's the default method of archiving sent messages. Gnus offers a
12410 different way for the people who don't like the default method. In that
12411 case you should set @code{gnus-message-archive-group} to @code{nil};
12412 this will disable archiving.
12415 @item gnus-outgoing-message-group
12416 @vindex gnus-outgoing-message-group
12417 All outgoing messages will be put in this group. If you want to store
12418 all your outgoing mail and articles in the group @samp{nnml:archive},
12419 you set this variable to that value. This variable can also be a list of
12422 If you want to have greater control over what group to put each
12423 message in, you can set this variable to a function that checks the
12424 current newsgroup name and then returns a suitable group name (or list
12427 This variable can be used instead of @code{gnus-message-archive-group},
12428 but the latter is the preferred method.
12430 @item gnus-gcc-mark-as-read
12431 @vindex gnus-gcc-mark-as-read
12432 If non-@code{nil}, automatically mark @code{Gcc} articles as read.
12434 @item gnus-gcc-externalize-attachments
12435 @vindex gnus-gcc-externalize-attachments
12436 If @code{nil}, attach files as normal parts in Gcc copies; if a regexp
12437 and matches the Gcc group name, attach files as external parts; if it is
12438 @code{all}, attach local files as external parts; if it is other
12439 non-@code{nil}, the behavior is the same as @code{all}, but it may be
12440 changed in the future.
12445 @node Posting Styles
12446 @section Posting Styles
12447 @cindex posting styles
12450 All them variables, they make my head swim.
12452 So what if you want a different @code{Organization} and signature based
12453 on what groups you post to? And you post both from your home machine
12454 and your work machine, and you want different @code{From} lines, and so
12457 @vindex gnus-posting-styles
12458 One way to do stuff like that is to write clever hooks that change the
12459 variables you need to have changed. That's a bit boring, so somebody
12460 came up with the bright idea of letting the user specify these things in
12461 a handy alist. Here's an example of a @code{gnus-posting-styles}
12466 (signature "Peace and happiness")
12467 (organization "What me?"))
12469 (signature "Death to everybody"))
12470 ("comp.emacs.i-love-it"
12471 (organization "Emacs is it")))
12474 As you might surmise from this example, this alist consists of several
12475 @dfn{styles}. Each style will be applicable if the first element
12476 ``matches'', in some form or other. The entire alist will be iterated
12477 over, from the beginning towards the end, and each match will be
12478 applied, which means that attributes in later styles that match override
12479 the same attributes in earlier matching styles. So
12480 @samp{comp.programming.literate} will have the @samp{Death to everybody}
12481 signature and the @samp{What me?} @code{Organization} header.
12483 The first element in each style is called the @code{match}. If it's a
12484 string, then Gnus will try to regexp match it against the group name.
12485 If it is the form @code{(header @var{match} @var{regexp})}, then Gnus
12486 will look in the original article for a header whose name is
12487 @var{match} and compare that @var{regexp}. @var{match} and
12488 @var{regexp} are strings. (The original article is the one you are
12489 replying or following up to. If you are not composing a reply or a
12490 followup, then there is nothing to match against.) If the
12491 @code{match} is a function symbol, that function will be called with
12492 no arguments. If it's a variable symbol, then the variable will be
12493 referenced. If it's a list, then that list will be @code{eval}ed. In
12494 any case, if this returns a non-@code{nil} value, then the style is
12495 said to @dfn{match}.
12497 Each style may contain an arbitrary amount of @dfn{attributes}. Each
12498 attribute consists of a @code{(@var{name} @var{value})} pair. In
12499 addition, you can also use the @code{(@var{name} :file @var{value})}
12500 form or the @code{(@var{name} :value @var{value})} form. Where
12501 @code{:file} signifies @var{value} represents a file name and its
12502 contents should be used as the attribute value, @code{:value} signifies
12503 @var{value} does not represent a file name explicitly. The attribute
12504 name can be one of:
12507 @item @code{signature}
12508 @item @code{signature-file}
12509 @item @code{x-face-file}
12510 @item @code{address}, overriding @code{user-mail-address}
12511 @item @code{name}, overriding @code{(user-full-name)}
12515 Note that the @code{signature-file} attribute honors the variable
12516 @code{message-signature-directory}.
12518 The attribute name can also be a string or a symbol. In that case,
12519 this will be used as a header name, and the value will be inserted in
12520 the headers of the article; if the value is @code{nil}, the header
12521 name will be removed. If the attribute name is @code{eval}, the form
12522 is evaluated, and the result is thrown away.
12524 The attribute value can be a string (used verbatim), a function with
12525 zero arguments (the return value will be used), a variable (its value
12526 will be used) or a list (it will be @code{eval}ed and the return value
12527 will be used). The functions and sexps are called/@code{eval}ed in the
12528 message buffer that is being set up. The headers of the current article
12529 are available through the @code{message-reply-headers} variable, which
12530 is a vector of the following headers: number subject from date id
12531 references chars lines xref extra.
12533 @vindex message-reply-headers
12535 If you wish to check whether the message you are about to compose is
12536 meant to be a news article or a mail message, you can check the values
12537 of the @code{message-news-p} and @code{message-mail-p} functions.
12539 @findex message-mail-p
12540 @findex message-news-p
12542 So here's a new example:
12545 (setq gnus-posting-styles
12547 (signature-file "~/.signature")
12549 (x-face-file "~/.xface")
12550 (x-url (getenv "WWW_HOME"))
12551 (organization "People's Front Against MWM"))
12553 (signature my-funny-signature-randomizer))
12554 ((equal (system-name) "gnarly") ;; @r{A form}
12555 (signature my-quote-randomizer))
12556 (message-news-p ;; @r{A function symbol}
12557 (signature my-news-signature))
12558 (window-system ;; @r{A value symbol}
12559 ("X-Window-System" (format "%s" window-system)))
12560 ;; @r{If I'm replying to Larsi, set the Organization header.}
12561 ((header "from" "larsi.*org")
12562 (Organization "Somewhere, Inc."))
12563 ((posting-from-work-p) ;; @r{A user defined function}
12564 (signature-file "~/.work-signature")
12565 (address "user@@bar.foo")
12566 (body "You are fired.\n\nSincerely, your boss.")
12567 (organization "Important Work, Inc"))
12569 (From (save-excursion
12570 (set-buffer gnus-article-buffer)
12571 (message-fetch-field "to"))))
12573 (signature-file "~/.mail-signature"))))
12576 The @samp{nnml:.*} rule means that you use the @code{To} address as the
12577 @code{From} address in all your outgoing replies, which might be handy
12578 if you fill many roles.
12579 You may also use @code{message-alternative-emails} instead.
12580 @xref{Message Headers, ,Message Headers, message, Message Manual}.
12586 If you are writing a message (mail or news) and suddenly remember that
12587 you have a steak in the oven (or some pesto in the food processor, you
12588 craaazy vegetarians), you'll probably wish there was a method to save
12589 the message you are writing so that you can continue editing it some
12590 other day, and send it when you feel its finished.
12592 Well, don't worry about it. Whenever you start composing a message of
12593 some sort using the Gnus mail and post commands, the buffer you get will
12594 automatically associate to an article in a special @dfn{draft} group.
12595 If you save the buffer the normal way (@kbd{C-x C-s}, for instance), the
12596 article will be saved there. (Auto-save files also go to the draft
12600 @vindex nndraft-directory
12601 The draft group is a special group (which is implemented as an
12602 @code{nndraft} group, if you absolutely have to know) called
12603 @samp{nndraft:drafts}. The variable @code{nndraft-directory} says where
12604 @code{nndraft} is to store its files. What makes this group special is
12605 that you can't tick any articles in it or mark any articles as
12606 read---all articles in the group are permanently unread.
12608 If the group doesn't exist, it will be created and you'll be subscribed
12609 to it. The only way to make it disappear from the Group buffer is to
12610 unsubscribe it. The special properties of the draft group comes from
12611 a group property (@pxref{Group Parameters}), and if lost the group
12612 behaves like any other group. This means the commands below will not
12613 be available. To restore the special properties of the group, the
12614 simplest way is to kill the group, using @kbd{C-k}, and restart
12615 Gnus. The group is automatically created again with the
12616 correct parameters. The content of the group is not lost.
12618 @c @findex gnus-dissociate-buffer-from-draft
12619 @c @kindex C-c M-d (Mail)
12620 @c @kindex C-c M-d (Post)
12621 @c @findex gnus-associate-buffer-with-draft
12622 @c @kindex C-c C-d (Mail)
12623 @c @kindex C-c C-d (Post)
12624 @c If you're writing some super-secret message that you later want to
12625 @c encode with PGP before sending, you may wish to turn the auto-saving
12626 @c (and association with the draft group) off. You never know who might be
12627 @c interested in reading all your extremely valuable and terribly horrible
12628 @c and interesting secrets. The @kbd{C-c M-d}
12629 @c (@code{gnus-dissociate-buffer-from-draft}) command does that for you.
12630 @c If you change your mind and want to turn the auto-saving back on again,
12631 @c @kbd{C-c C-d} (@code{gnus-associate-buffer-with-draft} does that.
12633 @c @vindex gnus-use-draft
12634 @c To leave association with the draft group off by default, set
12635 @c @code{gnus-use-draft} to @code{nil}. It is @code{t} by default.
12637 @findex gnus-draft-edit-message
12638 @kindex D e (Draft)
12639 When you want to continue editing the article, you simply enter the
12640 draft group and push @kbd{D e} (@code{gnus-draft-edit-message}) to do
12641 that. You will be placed in a buffer where you left off.
12643 Rejected articles will also be put in this draft group (@pxref{Rejected
12646 @findex gnus-draft-send-all-messages
12647 @kindex D s (Draft)
12648 @findex gnus-draft-send-message
12649 @kindex D S (Draft)
12650 If you have lots of rejected messages you want to post (or mail) without
12651 doing further editing, you can use the @kbd{D s} command
12652 (@code{gnus-draft-send-message}). This command understands the
12653 process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}). The @kbd{D S}
12654 command (@code{gnus-draft-send-all-messages}) will ship off all messages
12657 @findex gnus-draft-toggle-sending
12658 @kindex D t (Draft)
12659 If you have some messages that you wish not to send, you can use the
12660 @kbd{D t} (@code{gnus-draft-toggle-sending}) command to mark the message
12661 as unsendable. This is a toggling command.
12664 @node Rejected Articles
12665 @section Rejected Articles
12666 @cindex rejected articles
12668 Sometimes a news server will reject an article. Perhaps the server
12669 doesn't like your face. Perhaps it just feels miserable. Perhaps
12670 @emph{there be demons}. Perhaps you have included too much cited text.
12671 Perhaps the disk is full. Perhaps the server is down.
12673 These situations are, of course, totally beyond the control of Gnus.
12674 (Gnus, of course, loves the way you look, always feels great, has angels
12675 fluttering around inside of it, doesn't care about how much cited text
12676 you include, never runs full and never goes down.) So Gnus saves these
12677 articles until some later time when the server feels better.
12679 The rejected articles will automatically be put in a special draft group
12680 (@pxref{Drafts}). When the server comes back up again, you'd then
12681 typically enter that group and send all the articles off.
12683 @node Signing and encrypting
12684 @section Signing and encrypting
12686 @cindex using s/mime
12687 @cindex using smime
12689 Gnus can digitally sign and encrypt your messages, using vanilla
12690 @acronym{PGP} format or @acronym{PGP/MIME} or @acronym{S/MIME}. For
12691 decoding such messages, see the @code{mm-verify-option} and
12692 @code{mm-decrypt-option} options (@pxref{Security}).
12694 @vindex gnus-message-replysign
12695 @vindex gnus-message-replyencrypt
12696 @vindex gnus-message-replysignencrypted
12697 Often, you would like to sign replies to people who send you signed
12698 messages. Even more often, you might want to encrypt messages which
12699 are in reply to encrypted messages. Gnus offers
12700 @code{gnus-message-replysign} to enable the former, and
12701 @code{gnus-message-replyencrypt} for the latter. In addition, setting
12702 @code{gnus-message-replysignencrypted} (on by default) will sign
12703 automatically encrypted messages.
12705 Instructing @acronym{MML} to perform security operations on a
12706 @acronym{MIME} part is done using the @kbd{C-c C-m s} key map for
12707 signing and the @kbd{C-c C-m c} key map for encryption, as follows.
12712 @kindex C-c C-m s s (Message)
12713 @findex mml-secure-message-sign-smime
12715 Digitally sign current message using @acronym{S/MIME}.
12718 @kindex C-c C-m s o (Message)
12719 @findex mml-secure-message-sign-pgp
12721 Digitally sign current message using @acronym{PGP}.
12724 @kindex C-c C-m s p (Message)
12725 @findex mml-secure-message-sign-pgp
12727 Digitally sign current message using @acronym{PGP/MIME}.
12730 @kindex C-c C-m c s (Message)
12731 @findex mml-secure-message-encrypt-smime
12733 Digitally encrypt current message using @acronym{S/MIME}.
12736 @kindex C-c C-m c o (Message)
12737 @findex mml-secure-message-encrypt-pgp
12739 Digitally encrypt current message using @acronym{PGP}.
12742 @kindex C-c C-m c p (Message)
12743 @findex mml-secure-message-encrypt-pgpmime
12745 Digitally encrypt current message using @acronym{PGP/MIME}.
12748 @kindex C-c C-m C-n (Message)
12749 @findex mml-unsecure-message
12750 Remove security related @acronym{MML} tags from message.
12754 @xref{Security, ,Security, message, Message Manual}, for more information.
12756 @node Select Methods
12757 @chapter Select Methods
12758 @cindex foreign groups
12759 @cindex select methods
12761 A @dfn{foreign group} is a group not read by the usual (or
12762 default) means. It could be, for instance, a group from a different
12763 @acronym{NNTP} server, it could be a virtual group, or it could be your own
12764 personal mail group.
12766 A foreign group (or any group, really) is specified by a @dfn{name} and
12767 a @dfn{select method}. To take the latter first, a select method is a
12768 list where the first element says what back end to use (e.g. @code{nntp},
12769 @code{nnspool}, @code{nnml}) and the second element is the @dfn{server
12770 name}. There may be additional elements in the select method, where the
12771 value may have special meaning for the back end in question.
12773 One could say that a select method defines a @dfn{virtual server}---so
12774 we do just that (@pxref{Server Buffer}).
12776 The @dfn{name} of the group is the name the back end will recognize the
12779 For instance, the group @samp{soc.motss} on the @acronym{NNTP} server
12780 @samp{some.where.edu} will have the name @samp{soc.motss} and select
12781 method @code{(nntp "some.where.edu")}. Gnus will call this group
12782 @samp{nntp+some.where.edu:soc.motss}, even though the @code{nntp}
12783 back end just knows this group as @samp{soc.motss}.
12785 The different methods all have their peculiarities, of course.
12788 * Server Buffer:: Making and editing virtual servers.
12789 * Getting News:: Reading USENET news with Gnus.
12790 * Getting Mail:: Reading your personal mail with Gnus.
12791 * Browsing the Web:: Getting messages from a plethora of Web sources.
12792 * IMAP:: Using Gnus as a @acronym{IMAP} client.
12793 * Other Sources:: Reading directories, files, SOUP packets.
12794 * Combined Groups:: Combining groups into one group.
12795 * Email Based Diary:: Using mails to manage diary events in Gnus.
12796 * Gnus Unplugged:: Reading news and mail offline.
12800 @node Server Buffer
12801 @section Server Buffer
12803 Traditionally, a @dfn{server} is a machine or a piece of software that
12804 one connects to, and then requests information from. Gnus does not
12805 connect directly to any real servers, but does all transactions through
12806 one back end or other. But that's just putting one layer more between
12807 the actual media and Gnus, so we might just as well say that each
12808 back end represents a virtual server.
12810 For instance, the @code{nntp} back end may be used to connect to several
12811 different actual @acronym{NNTP} servers, or, perhaps, to many different ports
12812 on the same actual @acronym{NNTP} server. You tell Gnus which back end to
12813 use, and what parameters to set by specifying a @dfn{select method}.
12815 These select method specifications can sometimes become quite
12816 complicated---say, for instance, that you want to read from the
12817 @acronym{NNTP} server @samp{news.funet.fi} on port number 13, which
12818 hangs if queried for @acronym{NOV} headers and has a buggy select. Ahem.
12819 Anyway, if you had to specify that for each group that used this
12820 server, that would be too much work, so Gnus offers a way of naming
12821 select methods, which is what you do in the server buffer.
12823 To enter the server buffer, use the @kbd{^}
12824 (@code{gnus-group-enter-server-mode}) command in the group buffer.
12827 * Server Buffer Format:: You can customize the look of this buffer.
12828 * Server Commands:: Commands to manipulate servers.
12829 * Example Methods:: Examples server specifications.
12830 * Creating a Virtual Server:: An example session.
12831 * Server Variables:: Which variables to set.
12832 * Servers and Methods:: You can use server names as select methods.
12833 * Unavailable Servers:: Some servers you try to contact may be down.
12836 @vindex gnus-server-mode-hook
12837 @code{gnus-server-mode-hook} is run when creating the server buffer.
12840 @node Server Buffer Format
12841 @subsection Server Buffer Format
12842 @cindex server buffer format
12844 @vindex gnus-server-line-format
12845 You can change the look of the server buffer lines by changing the
12846 @code{gnus-server-line-format} variable. This is a @code{format}-like
12847 variable, with some simple extensions:
12852 How the news is fetched---the back end name.
12855 The name of this server.
12858 Where the news is to be fetched from---the address.
12861 The opened/closed/denied status of the server.
12864 Whether this server is agentized.
12867 @vindex gnus-server-mode-line-format
12868 The mode line can also be customized by using the
12869 @code{gnus-server-mode-line-format} variable (@pxref{Mode Line
12870 Formatting}). The following specs are understood:
12880 Also @pxref{Formatting Variables}.
12883 @node Server Commands
12884 @subsection Server Commands
12885 @cindex server commands
12891 @cindex keys, reserved for users (Server)
12892 The key @kbd{v} is reserved for users. You can bind it to some
12893 command or better use it as a prefix key.
12897 @findex gnus-server-add-server
12898 Add a new server (@code{gnus-server-add-server}).
12902 @findex gnus-server-edit-server
12903 Edit a server (@code{gnus-server-edit-server}).
12906 @kindex SPACE (Server)
12907 @findex gnus-server-read-server
12908 Browse the current server (@code{gnus-server-read-server}).
12912 @findex gnus-server-exit
12913 Return to the group buffer (@code{gnus-server-exit}).
12917 @findex gnus-server-kill-server
12918 Kill the current server (@code{gnus-server-kill-server}).
12922 @findex gnus-server-yank-server
12923 Yank the previously killed server (@code{gnus-server-yank-server}).
12927 @findex gnus-server-copy-server
12928 Copy the current server (@code{gnus-server-copy-server}).
12932 @findex gnus-server-list-servers
12933 List all servers (@code{gnus-server-list-servers}).
12937 @findex gnus-server-scan-server
12938 Request that the server scan its sources for new articles
12939 (@code{gnus-server-scan-server}). This is mainly sensible with mail
12944 @findex gnus-server-regenerate-server
12945 Request that the server regenerate all its data structures
12946 (@code{gnus-server-regenerate-server}). This can be useful if you have
12947 a mail back end that has gotten out of sync.
12951 @findex gnus-server-compact-server
12953 Compact all groups in the server under point
12954 (@code{gnus-server-compact-server}). Currently implemented only in
12955 nnml (@pxref{Mail Spool}). This removes gaps between article numbers,
12956 hence getting a correct total article count.
12961 @node Example Methods
12962 @subsection Example Methods
12964 Most select methods are pretty simple and self-explanatory:
12967 (nntp "news.funet.fi")
12970 Reading directly from the spool is even simpler:
12976 As you can see, the first element in a select method is the name of the
12977 back end, and the second is the @dfn{address}, or @dfn{name}, if you
12980 After these two elements, there may be an arbitrary number of
12981 @code{(@var{variable} @var{form})} pairs.
12983 To go back to the first example---imagine that you want to read from
12984 port 15 on that machine. This is what the select method should
12988 (nntp "news.funet.fi" (nntp-port-number 15))
12991 You should read the documentation to each back end to find out what
12992 variables are relevant, but here's an @code{nnmh} example:
12994 @code{nnmh} is a mail back end that reads a spool-like structure. Say
12995 you have two structures that you wish to access: One is your private
12996 mail spool, and the other is a public one. Here's the possible spec for
13000 (nnmh "private" (nnmh-directory "~/private/mail/"))
13003 (This server is then called @samp{private}, but you may have guessed
13006 Here's the method for a public spool:
13010 (nnmh-directory "/usr/information/spool/")
13011 (nnmh-get-new-mail nil))
13017 If you are behind a firewall and only have access to the @acronym{NNTP}
13018 server from the firewall machine, you can instruct Gnus to @code{rlogin}
13019 on the firewall machine and telnet from there to the @acronym{NNTP} server.
13020 Doing this can be rather fiddly, but your virtual server definition
13021 should probably look something like this:
13025 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet)
13026 (nntp-via-address "the.firewall.machine")
13027 (nntp-address "the.real.nntp.host")
13028 (nntp-end-of-line "\n"))
13031 If you want to use the wonderful @code{ssh} program to provide a
13032 compressed connection over the modem line, you could add the following
13033 configuration to the example above:
13036 (nntp-via-rlogin-command "ssh")
13039 See also @code{nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches}. Here's an example for
13040 an indirect connection:
13042 (setq gnus-select-method
13044 (nntp-address "news.server.example")
13045 (nntp-via-user-name "intermediate_user_name")
13046 (nntp-via-address "intermediate.host.example")
13047 (nntp-via-rlogin-command "ssh")
13048 (nntp-end-of-line "\n")
13049 (nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches ("-C" "-t" "-e" "none"))
13050 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet)))
13053 If you're behind a firewall, but have direct access to the outside world
13054 through a wrapper command like "runsocks", you could open a socksified
13055 telnet connection to the news server as follows:
13059 (nntp-pre-command "runsocks")
13060 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-via-telnet)
13061 (nntp-address "the.news.server")
13062 (nntp-end-of-line "\n"))
13065 This means that you have to have set up @code{ssh-agent} correctly to
13066 provide automatic authorization, of course. And to get a compressed
13067 connection, you have to have the @samp{Compression} option in the
13068 @code{ssh} @file{config} file.
13071 @node Creating a Virtual Server
13072 @subsection Creating a Virtual Server
13074 If you're saving lots of articles in the cache by using persistent
13075 articles, you may want to create a virtual server to read the cache.
13077 First you need to add a new server. The @kbd{a} command does that. It
13078 would probably be best to use @code{nnml} to read the cache. You
13079 could also use @code{nnspool} or @code{nnmh}, though.
13081 Type @kbd{a nnml RET cache RET}.
13083 You should now have a brand new @code{nnml} virtual server called
13084 @samp{cache}. You now need to edit it to have the right definitions.
13085 Type @kbd{e} to edit the server. You'll be entered into a buffer that
13086 will contain the following:
13096 (nnml-directory "~/News/cache/")
13097 (nnml-active-file "~/News/cache/active"))
13100 Type @kbd{C-c C-c} to return to the server buffer. If you now press
13101 @kbd{RET} over this virtual server, you should be entered into a browse
13102 buffer, and you should be able to enter any of the groups displayed.
13105 @node Server Variables
13106 @subsection Server Variables
13107 @cindex server variables
13108 @cindex server parameters
13110 One sticky point when defining variables (both on back ends and in Emacs
13111 in general) is that some variables are typically initialized from other
13112 variables when the definition of the variables is being loaded. If you
13113 change the ``base'' variable after the variables have been loaded, you
13114 won't change the ``derived'' variables.
13116 This typically affects directory and file variables. For instance,
13117 @code{nnml-directory} is @file{~/Mail/} by default, and all @code{nnml}
13118 directory variables are initialized from that variable, so
13119 @code{nnml-active-file} will be @file{~/Mail/active}. If you define a
13120 new virtual @code{nnml} server, it will @emph{not} suffice to set just
13121 @code{nnml-directory}---you have to explicitly set all the file
13122 variables to be what you want them to be. For a complete list of
13123 variables for each back end, see each back end's section later in this
13124 manual, but here's an example @code{nnml} definition:
13128 (nnml-directory "~/my-mail/")
13129 (nnml-active-file "~/my-mail/active")
13130 (nnml-newsgroups-file "~/my-mail/newsgroups"))
13133 Server variables are often called @dfn{server parameters}.
13135 @node Servers and Methods
13136 @subsection Servers and Methods
13138 Wherever you would normally use a select method
13139 (e.g. @code{gnus-secondary-select-method}, in the group select method,
13140 when browsing a foreign server) you can use a virtual server name
13141 instead. This could potentially save lots of typing. And it's nice all
13145 @node Unavailable Servers
13146 @subsection Unavailable Servers
13148 If a server seems to be unreachable, Gnus will mark that server as
13149 @code{denied}. That means that any subsequent attempt to make contact
13150 with that server will just be ignored. ``It can't be opened,'' Gnus
13151 will tell you, without making the least effort to see whether that is
13152 actually the case or not.
13154 That might seem quite naughty, but it does make sense most of the time.
13155 Let's say you have 10 groups subscribed to on server
13156 @samp{nephelococcygia.com}. This server is located somewhere quite far
13157 away from you and the machine is quite slow, so it takes 1 minute just
13158 to find out that it refuses connection to you today. If Gnus were to
13159 attempt to do that 10 times, you'd be quite annoyed, so Gnus won't
13160 attempt to do that. Once it has gotten a single ``connection refused'',
13161 it will regard that server as ``down''.
13163 So, what happens if the machine was only feeling unwell temporarily?
13164 How do you test to see whether the machine has come up again?
13166 You jump to the server buffer (@pxref{Server Buffer}) and poke it
13167 with the following commands:
13173 @findex gnus-server-open-server
13174 Try to establish connection to the server on the current line
13175 (@code{gnus-server-open-server}).
13179 @findex gnus-server-close-server
13180 Close the connection (if any) to the server
13181 (@code{gnus-server-close-server}).
13185 @findex gnus-server-deny-server
13186 Mark the current server as unreachable
13187 (@code{gnus-server-deny-server}).
13190 @kindex M-o (Server)
13191 @findex gnus-server-open-all-servers
13192 Open the connections to all servers in the buffer
13193 (@code{gnus-server-open-all-servers}).
13196 @kindex M-c (Server)
13197 @findex gnus-server-close-all-servers
13198 Close the connections to all servers in the buffer
13199 (@code{gnus-server-close-all-servers}).
13203 @findex gnus-server-remove-denials
13204 Remove all marks to whether Gnus was denied connection from any servers
13205 (@code{gnus-server-remove-denials}).
13209 @findex gnus-server-offline-server
13210 Set server status to offline (@code{gnus-server-offline-server}).
13216 @section Getting News
13217 @cindex reading news
13218 @cindex news back ends
13220 A newsreader is normally used for reading news. Gnus currently provides
13221 only two methods of getting news---it can read from an @acronym{NNTP} server,
13222 or it can read from a local spool.
13225 * NNTP:: Reading news from an @acronym{NNTP} server.
13226 * News Spool:: Reading news from the local spool.
13234 Subscribing to a foreign group from an @acronym{NNTP} server is rather easy.
13235 You just specify @code{nntp} as method and the address of the @acronym{NNTP}
13236 server as the, uhm, address.
13238 If the @acronym{NNTP} server is located at a non-standard port, setting the
13239 third element of the select method to this port number should allow you
13240 to connect to the right port. You'll have to edit the group info for
13241 that (@pxref{Foreign Groups}).
13243 The name of the foreign group can be the same as a native group. In
13244 fact, you can subscribe to the same group from as many different servers
13245 you feel like. There will be no name collisions.
13247 The following variables can be used to create a virtual @code{nntp}
13252 @item nntp-server-opened-hook
13253 @vindex nntp-server-opened-hook
13254 @cindex @sc{mode reader}
13256 @cindex authentication
13257 @cindex nntp authentication
13258 @findex nntp-send-authinfo
13259 @findex nntp-send-mode-reader
13260 is run after a connection has been made. It can be used to send
13261 commands to the @acronym{NNTP} server after it has been contacted. By
13262 default it sends the command @code{MODE READER} to the server with the
13263 @code{nntp-send-mode-reader} function. This function should always be
13264 present in this hook.
13266 @item nntp-authinfo-function
13267 @vindex nntp-authinfo-function
13268 @findex nntp-send-authinfo
13269 @vindex nntp-authinfo-file
13270 This function will be used to send @samp{AUTHINFO} to the @acronym{NNTP}
13271 server. The default function is @code{nntp-send-authinfo}, which looks
13272 through your @file{~/.authinfo} (or whatever you've set the
13273 @code{nntp-authinfo-file} variable to) for applicable entries. If none
13274 are found, it will prompt you for a login name and a password. The
13275 format of the @file{~/.authinfo} file is (almost) the same as the
13276 @code{ftp} @file{~/.netrc} file, which is defined in the @code{ftp}
13277 manual page, but here are the salient facts:
13281 The file contains one or more line, each of which define one server.
13284 Each line may contain an arbitrary number of token/value pairs.
13286 The valid tokens include @samp{machine}, @samp{login}, @samp{password},
13287 @samp{default}. In addition Gnus introduces two new tokens, not present
13288 in the original @file{.netrc}/@code{ftp} syntax, namely @samp{port} and
13289 @samp{force}. (This is the only way the @file{.authinfo} file format
13290 deviates from the @file{.netrc} file format.) @samp{port} is used to
13291 indicate what port on the server the credentials apply to and
13292 @samp{force} is explained below.
13296 Here's an example file:
13299 machine news.uio.no login larsi password geheimnis
13300 machine nntp.ifi.uio.no login larsi force yes
13303 The token/value pairs may appear in any order; @samp{machine} doesn't
13304 have to be first, for instance.
13306 In this example, both login name and password have been supplied for the
13307 former server, while the latter has only the login name listed, and the
13308 user will be prompted for the password. The latter also has the
13309 @samp{force} tag, which means that the authinfo will be sent to the
13310 @var{nntp} server upon connection; the default (i.e., when there is not
13311 @samp{force} tag) is to not send authinfo to the @var{nntp} server
13312 until the @var{nntp} server asks for it.
13314 You can also add @samp{default} lines that will apply to all servers
13315 that don't have matching @samp{machine} lines.
13321 This will force sending @samp{AUTHINFO} commands to all servers not
13322 previously mentioned.
13324 Remember to not leave the @file{~/.authinfo} file world-readable.
13326 @item nntp-server-action-alist
13327 @vindex nntp-server-action-alist
13328 This is a list of regexps to match on server types and actions to be
13329 taken when matches are made. For instance, if you want Gnus to beep
13330 every time you connect to innd, you could say something like:
13333 (setq nntp-server-action-alist
13334 '(("innd" (ding))))
13337 You probably don't want to do that, though.
13339 The default value is
13342 '(("nntpd 1\\.5\\.11t"
13343 (remove-hook 'nntp-server-opened-hook
13344 'nntp-send-mode-reader)))
13347 This ensures that Gnus doesn't send the @code{MODE READER} command to
13348 nntpd 1.5.11t, since that command chokes that server, I've been told.
13350 @item nntp-maximum-request
13351 @vindex nntp-maximum-request
13352 If the @acronym{NNTP} server doesn't support @acronym{NOV} headers, this back end
13353 will collect headers by sending a series of @code{head} commands. To
13354 speed things up, the back end sends lots of these commands without
13355 waiting for reply, and then reads all the replies. This is controlled
13356 by the @code{nntp-maximum-request} variable, and is 400 by default. If
13357 your network is buggy, you should set this to 1.
13359 @item nntp-connection-timeout
13360 @vindex nntp-connection-timeout
13361 If you have lots of foreign @code{nntp} groups that you connect to
13362 regularly, you're sure to have problems with @acronym{NNTP} servers not
13363 responding properly, or being too loaded to reply within reasonable
13364 time. This is can lead to awkward problems, which can be helped
13365 somewhat by setting @code{nntp-connection-timeout}. This is an integer
13366 that says how many seconds the @code{nntp} back end should wait for a
13367 connection before giving up. If it is @code{nil}, which is the default,
13368 no timeouts are done.
13370 @item nntp-nov-is-evil
13371 @vindex nntp-nov-is-evil
13372 If the @acronym{NNTP} server does not support @acronym{NOV}, you could set this
13373 variable to @code{t}, but @code{nntp} usually checks automatically whether @acronym{NOV}
13376 @item nntp-xover-commands
13377 @vindex nntp-xover-commands
13378 @cindex @acronym{NOV}
13380 List of strings used as commands to fetch @acronym{NOV} lines from a
13381 server. The default value of this variable is @code{("XOVER"
13385 @vindex nntp-nov-gap
13386 @code{nntp} normally sends just one big request for @acronym{NOV} lines to
13387 the server. The server responds with one huge list of lines. However,
13388 if you have read articles 2-5000 in the group, and only want to read
13389 article 1 and 5001, that means that @code{nntp} will fetch 4999 @acronym{NOV}
13390 lines that you will not need. This variable says how
13391 big a gap between two consecutive articles is allowed to be before the
13392 @code{XOVER} request is split into several request. Note that if your
13393 network is fast, setting this variable to a really small number means
13394 that fetching will probably be slower. If this variable is @code{nil},
13395 @code{nntp} will never split requests. The default is 5.
13397 @item nntp-xref-number-is-evil
13398 @vindex nntp-xref-number-is-evil
13399 When Gnus refers to an article having the @code{Message-ID} that a user
13400 specifies or having the @code{Message-ID} of the parent article of the
13401 current one (@pxref{Finding the Parent}), Gnus sends a @code{HEAD}
13402 command to the @acronym{NNTP} server to know where it is, and the server
13403 returns the data containing the pairs of a group and an article number
13404 in the @code{Xref} header. Gnus normally uses the article number to
13405 refer to the article if the data shows that that article is in the
13406 current group, while it uses the @code{Message-ID} otherwise. However,
13407 some news servers, e.g., ones running Diablo, run multiple engines
13408 having the same articles but article numbers are not kept synchronized
13409 between them. In that case, the article number that appears in the
13410 @code{Xref} header varies by which engine is chosen, so you cannot refer
13411 to the parent article that is in the current group, for instance. If
13412 you connect to such a server, set this variable to a non-@code{nil}
13413 value, and Gnus never uses article numbers. For example:
13416 (setq gnus-select-method
13418 (nntp-address "newszilla.example.com")
13419 (nntp-xref-number-is-evil t)
13423 The default value of this server variable is @code{nil}.
13425 @item nntp-prepare-server-hook
13426 @vindex nntp-prepare-server-hook
13427 A hook run before attempting to connect to an @acronym{NNTP} server.
13429 @item nntp-record-commands
13430 @vindex nntp-record-commands
13431 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nntp} will log all commands it sends to the
13432 @acronym{NNTP} server (along with a timestamp) in the @samp{*nntp-log*}
13433 buffer. This is useful if you are debugging a Gnus/@acronym{NNTP} connection
13434 that doesn't seem to work.
13436 @item nntp-open-connection-function
13437 @vindex nntp-open-connection-function
13438 It is possible to customize how the connection to the nntp server will
13439 be opened. If you specify an @code{nntp-open-connection-function}
13440 parameter, Gnus will use that function to establish the connection.
13441 Seven pre-made functions are supplied. These functions can be grouped
13442 in two categories: direct connection functions (four pre-made), and
13443 indirect ones (three pre-made).
13445 @item nntp-never-echoes-commands
13446 @vindex nntp-never-echoes-commands
13447 Non-@code{nil} means the nntp server never echoes commands. It is
13448 reported that some nntps server doesn't echo commands. So, you may want
13449 to set this to non-@code{nil} in the method for such a server setting
13450 @code{nntp-open-connection-function} to @code{nntp-open-ssl-stream} for
13451 example. The default value is @code{nil}. Note that the
13452 @code{nntp-open-connection-functions-never-echo-commands} variable
13453 overrides the @code{nil} value of this variable.
13455 @item nntp-open-connection-functions-never-echo-commands
13456 @vindex nntp-open-connection-functions-never-echo-commands
13457 List of functions that never echo commands. Add or set a function which
13458 you set to @code{nntp-open-connection-function} to this list if it does
13459 not echo commands. Note that a non-@code{nil} value of the
13460 @code{nntp-never-echoes-commands} variable overrides this variable. The
13461 default value is @code{(nntp-open-network-stream)}.
13463 @item nntp-prepare-post-hook
13464 @vindex nntp-prepare-post-hook
13465 A hook run just before posting an article. If there is no
13466 @code{Message-ID} header in the article and the news server provides the
13467 recommended ID, it will be added to the article before running this
13468 hook. It is useful to make @code{Cancel-Lock} headers even if you
13469 inhibit Gnus to add a @code{Message-ID} header, you could say:
13472 (add-hook 'nntp-prepare-post-hook 'canlock-insert-header)
13475 Note that not all servers support the recommended ID. This works for
13476 INN versions 2.3.0 and later, for instance.
13481 * Direct Functions:: Connecting directly to the server.
13482 * Indirect Functions:: Connecting indirectly to the server.
13483 * Common Variables:: Understood by several connection functions.
13484 * NNTP marks:: Storing marks for @acronym{NNTP} servers.
13488 @node Direct Functions
13489 @subsubsection Direct Functions
13490 @cindex direct connection functions
13492 These functions are called direct because they open a direct connection
13493 between your machine and the @acronym{NNTP} server. The behavior of these
13494 functions is also affected by commonly understood variables
13495 (@pxref{Common Variables}).
13498 @findex nntp-open-network-stream
13499 @item nntp-open-network-stream
13500 This is the default, and simply connects to some port or other on the
13503 @findex nntp-open-tls-stream
13504 @item nntp-open-tls-stream
13505 Opens a connection to a server over a @dfn{secure} channel. To use
13506 this you must have @uref{http://www.gnu.org/software/gnutls/, GNUTLS}
13507 installed. You then define a server as follows:
13510 ;; @r{"nntps" is port 563 and is predefined in our @file{/etc/services}}
13511 ;; @r{however, @samp{gnutls-cli -p} doesn't like named ports.}
13513 (nntp "snews.bar.com"
13514 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-tls-stream)
13515 (nntp-port-number )
13516 (nntp-address "snews.bar.com"))
13519 @findex nntp-open-ssl-stream
13520 @item nntp-open-ssl-stream
13521 Opens a connection to a server over a @dfn{secure} channel. To use
13522 this you must have @uref{http://www.openssl.org, OpenSSL} or
13523 @uref{ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSL, SSLeay} installed. You
13524 then define a server as follows:
13527 ;; @r{"snews" is port 563 and is predefined in our @file{/etc/services}}
13528 ;; @r{however, @samp{openssl s_client -port} doesn't like named ports.}
13530 (nntp "snews.bar.com"
13531 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-ssl-stream)
13532 (nntp-port-number 563)
13533 (nntp-address "snews.bar.com"))
13536 @findex nntp-open-telnet-stream
13537 @item nntp-open-telnet-stream
13538 Opens a connection to an @acronym{NNTP} server by simply @samp{telnet}'ing
13539 it. You might wonder why this function exists, since we have the
13540 default @code{nntp-open-network-stream} which would do the job. (One
13541 of) the reason(s) is that if you are behind a firewall but have direct
13542 connections to the outside world thanks to a command wrapper like
13543 @code{runsocks}, you can use it like this:
13547 (nntp-pre-command "runsocks")
13548 (nntp-open-connection-function nntp-open-telnet-stream)
13549 (nntp-address "the.news.server"))
13552 With the default method, you would need to wrap your whole Emacs
13553 session, which is not a good idea.
13557 @node Indirect Functions
13558 @subsubsection Indirect Functions
13559 @cindex indirect connection functions
13561 These functions are called indirect because they connect to an
13562 intermediate host before actually connecting to the @acronym{NNTP} server.
13563 All of these functions and related variables are also said to belong to
13564 the ``via'' family of connection: they're all prefixed with ``via'' to make
13565 things cleaner. The behavior of these functions is also affected by
13566 commonly understood variables (@pxref{Common Variables}).
13569 @item nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet
13570 @findex nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet
13571 Does an @samp{rlogin} on a remote system, and then does a @samp{telnet}
13572 to the real @acronym{NNTP} server from there. This is useful for instance if
13573 you need to connect to a firewall machine first.
13575 @code{nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-telnet}-specific variables:
13578 @item nntp-via-rlogin-command
13579 @vindex nntp-via-rlogin-command
13580 Command used to log in on the intermediate host. The default is
13581 @samp{rsh}, but @samp{ssh} is a popular alternative.
13583 @item nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches
13584 @vindex nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches
13585 List of strings to be used as the switches to
13586 @code{nntp-via-rlogin-command}. The default is @code{nil}. If you use
13587 @samp{ssh} for @code{nntp-via-rlogin-command}, you may set this to
13588 @samp{("-C")} in order to compress all data connections, otherwise set
13589 this to @samp{("-t" "-e" "none")} or @samp{("-C" "-t" "-e" "none")} if
13590 the telnet command requires a pseudo-tty allocation on an intermediate
13594 Note that you may want to change the value for @code{nntp-end-of-line}
13595 to @samp{\n} (@pxref{Common Variables}).
13597 @item nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-netcat
13598 @findex nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-netcat
13599 Does essentially the same, but uses
13600 @uref{http://netcat.sourceforge.net/, netcat} instead of @samp{telnet}
13601 to connect to the real @acronym{NNTP} server from the intermediate host.
13603 @code{nntp-open-via-rlogin-and-netcat}-specific variables:
13606 @item nntp-via-netcat-command
13607 @vindex nntp-via-netcat-command
13608 Command used to connect to the real @acronym{NNTP} server from the
13609 intermediate host. The default is @samp{nc}. You can also use other
13610 programs like @uref{http://www.imasy.or.jp/~gotoh/ssh/connect.html,
13613 @item nntp-via-netcat-switches
13614 @vindex nntp-via-netcat-switches
13615 List of strings to be used as the switches to the
13616 @code{nntp-via-telnet-command} command. The default is @code{nil}.
13618 @item nntp-via-rlogin-command
13619 @vindex nntp-via-rlogin-command
13620 Command used to log in on the intermediate host. The default is
13621 @samp{rsh}, but @samp{ssh} is a popular alternative.
13623 @item nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches
13624 @vindex nntp-via-rlogin-command-switches
13625 List of strings to be used as the switches to
13626 @code{nntp-via-rlogin-command}. The default is @code{nil}.
13629 @item nntp-open-via-telnet-and-telnet
13630 @findex nntp-open-via-telnet-and-telnet
13631 Does essentially the same, but uses @samp{telnet} instead of
13632 @samp{rlogin} to connect to the intermediate host.
13634 @code{nntp-open-via-telnet-and-telnet}-specific variables:
13637 @item nntp-via-telnet-command
13638 @vindex nntp-via-telnet-command
13639 Command used to @code{telnet} the intermediate host. The default is
13642 @item nntp-via-telnet-switches
13643 @vindex nntp-via-telnet-switches
13644 List of strings to be used as the switches to the
13645 @code{nntp-via-telnet-command} command. The default is @samp{("-8")}.
13647 @item nntp-via-user-password
13648 @vindex nntp-via-user-password
13649 Password to use when logging in on the intermediate host.
13651 @item nntp-via-envuser
13652 @vindex nntp-via-envuser
13653 If non-@code{nil}, the intermediate @code{telnet} session (client and
13654 server both) will support the @code{ENVIRON} option and not prompt for
13655 login name. This works for Solaris @code{telnet}, for instance.
13657 @item nntp-via-shell-prompt
13658 @vindex nntp-via-shell-prompt
13659 Regexp matching the shell prompt on the intermediate host. The default
13660 is @samp{bash\\|\$ *\r?$\\|> *\r?}.
13664 Note that you may want to change the value for @code{nntp-end-of-line}
13665 to @samp{\n} (@pxref{Common Variables}).
13669 Here are some additional variables that are understood by all the above
13674 @item nntp-via-user-name
13675 @vindex nntp-via-user-name
13676 User name to use when connecting to the intermediate host.
13678 @item nntp-via-address
13679 @vindex nntp-via-address
13680 Address of the intermediate host to connect to.
13685 @node Common Variables
13686 @subsubsection Common Variables
13688 The following variables affect the behavior of all, or several of the
13689 pre-made connection functions. When not specified, all functions are
13690 affected (the values of the following variables will be used as the
13691 default if each virtual @code{nntp} server doesn't specify those server
13692 variables individually).
13696 @item nntp-pre-command
13697 @vindex nntp-pre-command
13698 A command wrapper to use when connecting through a non native
13699 connection function (all except @code{nntp-open-network-stream},
13700 @code{nntp-open-tls-stream}, and @code{nntp-open-ssl-stream}). This is
13701 where you would put a @samp{SOCKS} wrapper for instance.
13704 @vindex nntp-address
13705 The address of the @acronym{NNTP} server.
13707 @item nntp-port-number
13708 @vindex nntp-port-number
13709 Port number to connect to the @acronym{NNTP} server. The default is
13710 @samp{nntp}. If you use @acronym{NNTP} over
13711 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL}, you may want to use integer ports rather
13712 than named ports (i.e, use @samp{563} instead of @samp{snews} or
13713 @samp{nntps}), because external @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} tools may
13714 not work with named ports.
13716 @item nntp-end-of-line
13717 @vindex nntp-end-of-line
13718 String to use as end-of-line marker when talking to the @acronym{NNTP}
13719 server. This is @samp{\r\n} by default, but should be @samp{\n} when
13720 using a non native telnet connection function.
13722 @item nntp-telnet-command
13723 @vindex nntp-telnet-command
13724 Command to use when connecting to the @acronym{NNTP} server through
13725 @samp{telnet}. This is @emph{not} for an intermediate host. This is
13726 just for the real @acronym{NNTP} server. The default is
13729 @item nntp-telnet-switches
13730 @vindex nntp-telnet-switches
13731 A list of switches to pass to @code{nntp-telnet-command}. The default
13737 @subsubsection NNTP marks
13738 @cindex storing NNTP marks
13740 Gnus stores marks (@pxref{Marking Articles}) for @acronym{NNTP}
13741 servers in marks files. A marks file records what marks you have set
13742 in a group and each file is specific to the corresponding server.
13743 Marks files are stored in @file{~/News/marks}
13744 (@code{nntp-marks-directory}) under a classic hierarchy resembling
13745 that of a news server, for example marks for the group
13746 @samp{gmane.discuss} on the news.gmane.org server will be stored in
13747 the file @file{~/News/marks/news.gmane.org/gmane/discuss/.marks}.
13749 Marks files are useful because you can copy the @file{~/News/marks}
13750 directory (using rsync, scp or whatever) to another Gnus installation,
13751 and it will realize what articles you have read and marked. The data
13752 in @file{~/News/marks} has priority over the same data in
13753 @file{~/.newsrc.eld}.
13755 Note that marks files are very much server-specific: Gnus remembers
13756 the article numbers so if you don't use the same servers on both
13757 installations things are most likely to break (most @acronym{NNTP}
13758 servers do not use the same article numbers as any other server).
13759 However, if you use servers A, B, C on one installation and servers A,
13760 D, E on the other, you can sync the marks files for A and then you'll
13761 get synchronization for that server between the two installations.
13763 Using @acronym{NNTP} marks can possibly incur a performance penalty so
13764 if Gnus feels sluggish, try setting the @code{nntp-marks-is-evil}
13765 variable to @code{t}. Marks will then be stored in @file{~/.newsrc.eld}.
13771 @item nntp-marks-is-evil
13772 @vindex nntp-marks-is-evil
13773 If non-@code{nil}, this back end will ignore any marks files. The
13774 default is @code{nil}.
13776 @item nntp-marks-directory
13777 @vindex nntp-marks-directory
13778 The directory where marks for nntp groups will be stored.
13784 @subsection News Spool
13788 Subscribing to a foreign group from the local spool is extremely easy,
13789 and might be useful, for instance, to speed up reading groups that
13790 contain very big articles---@samp{alt.binaries.pictures.furniture}, for
13793 Anyway, you just specify @code{nnspool} as the method and @code{""} (or
13794 anything else) as the address.
13796 If you have access to a local spool, you should probably use that as the
13797 native select method (@pxref{Finding the News}). It is normally faster
13798 than using an @code{nntp} select method, but might not be. It depends.
13799 You just have to try to find out what's best at your site.
13803 @item nnspool-inews-program
13804 @vindex nnspool-inews-program
13805 Program used to post an article.
13807 @item nnspool-inews-switches
13808 @vindex nnspool-inews-switches
13809 Parameters given to the inews program when posting an article.
13811 @item nnspool-spool-directory
13812 @vindex nnspool-spool-directory
13813 Where @code{nnspool} looks for the articles. This is normally
13814 @file{/usr/spool/news/}.
13816 @item nnspool-nov-directory
13817 @vindex nnspool-nov-directory
13818 Where @code{nnspool} will look for @acronym{NOV} files. This is normally@*
13819 @file{/usr/spool/news/over.view/}.
13821 @item nnspool-lib-dir
13822 @vindex nnspool-lib-dir
13823 Where the news lib dir is (@file{/usr/lib/news/} by default).
13825 @item nnspool-active-file
13826 @vindex nnspool-active-file
13827 The name of the active file.
13829 @item nnspool-newsgroups-file
13830 @vindex nnspool-newsgroups-file
13831 The name of the group descriptions file.
13833 @item nnspool-history-file
13834 @vindex nnspool-history-file
13835 The name of the news history file.
13837 @item nnspool-active-times-file
13838 @vindex nnspool-active-times-file
13839 The name of the active date file.
13841 @item nnspool-nov-is-evil
13842 @vindex nnspool-nov-is-evil
13843 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnspool} won't try to use any @acronym{NOV} files
13846 @item nnspool-sift-nov-with-sed
13847 @vindex nnspool-sift-nov-with-sed
13849 If non-@code{nil}, which is the default, use @code{sed} to get the
13850 relevant portion from the overview file. If @code{nil},
13851 @code{nnspool} will load the entire file into a buffer and process it
13858 @section Getting Mail
13859 @cindex reading mail
13862 Reading mail with a newsreader---isn't that just plain WeIrD? But of
13866 * Mail in a Newsreader:: Important introductory notes.
13867 * Getting Started Reading Mail:: A simple cookbook example.
13868 * Splitting Mail:: How to create mail groups.
13869 * Mail Sources:: How to tell Gnus where to get mail from.
13870 * Mail Back End Variables:: Variables for customizing mail handling.
13871 * Fancy Mail Splitting:: Gnus can do hairy splitting of incoming mail.
13872 * Group Mail Splitting:: Use group customize to drive mail splitting.
13873 * Incorporating Old Mail:: What about the old mail you have?
13874 * Expiring Mail:: Getting rid of unwanted mail.
13875 * Washing Mail:: Removing cruft from the mail you get.
13876 * Duplicates:: Dealing with duplicated mail.
13877 * Not Reading Mail:: Using mail back ends for reading other files.
13878 * Choosing a Mail Back End:: Gnus can read a variety of mail formats.
13882 @node Mail in a Newsreader
13883 @subsection Mail in a Newsreader
13885 If you are used to traditional mail readers, but have decided to switch
13886 to reading mail with Gnus, you may find yourself experiencing something
13887 of a culture shock.
13889 Gnus does not behave like traditional mail readers. If you want to make
13890 it behave that way, you can, but it's an uphill battle.
13892 Gnus, by default, handles all its groups using the same approach. This
13893 approach is very newsreaderly---you enter a group, see the new/unread
13894 messages, and when you read the messages, they get marked as read, and
13895 you don't see them any more. (Unless you explicitly ask for them.)
13897 In particular, you do not do anything explicitly to delete messages.
13899 Does this mean that all the messages that have been marked as read are
13900 deleted? How awful!
13902 But, no, it means that old messages are @dfn{expired} according to some
13903 scheme or other. For news messages, the expire process is controlled by
13904 the news administrator; for mail, the expire process is controlled by
13905 you. The expire process for mail is covered in depth in @ref{Expiring
13908 What many Gnus users find, after using it a while for both news and
13909 mail, is that the transport mechanism has very little to do with how
13910 they want to treat a message.
13912 Many people subscribe to several mailing lists. These are transported
13913 via @acronym{SMTP}, and are therefore mail. But we might go for weeks without
13914 answering, or even reading these messages very carefully. We may not
13915 need to save them because if we should need to read one again, they are
13916 archived somewhere else.
13918 Some people have local news groups which have only a handful of readers.
13919 These are transported via @acronym{NNTP}, and are therefore news. But we may need
13920 to read and answer a large fraction of the messages very carefully in
13921 order to do our work. And there may not be an archive, so we may need
13922 to save the interesting messages the same way we would personal mail.
13924 The important distinction turns out to be not the transport mechanism,
13925 but other factors such as how interested we are in the subject matter,
13926 or how easy it is to retrieve the message if we need to read it again.
13928 Gnus provides many options for sorting mail into ``groups'' which behave
13929 like newsgroups, and for treating each group (whether mail or news)
13932 Some users never get comfortable using the Gnus (ahem) paradigm and wish
13933 that Gnus should grow up and be a male, er, mail reader. It is possible
13934 to whip Gnus into a more mailreaderly being, but, as said before, it's
13935 not easy. People who prefer proper mail readers should try @sc{vm}
13936 instead, which is an excellent, and proper, mail reader.
13938 I don't mean to scare anybody off, but I want to make it clear that you
13939 may be required to learn a new way of thinking about messages. After
13940 you've been subjected to The Gnus Way, you will come to love it. I can
13941 guarantee it. (At least the guy who sold me the Emacs Subliminal
13942 Brain-Washing Functions that I've put into Gnus did guarantee it. You
13943 Will Be Assimilated. You Love Gnus. You Love The Gnus Mail Way.
13947 @node Getting Started Reading Mail
13948 @subsection Getting Started Reading Mail
13950 It's quite easy to use Gnus to read your new mail. You just plonk the
13951 mail back end of your choice into @code{gnus-secondary-select-methods},
13952 and things will happen automatically.
13954 For instance, if you want to use @code{nnml} (which is a ``one file per
13955 mail'' back end), you could put the following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
13958 (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnml "")))
13961 Now, the next time you start Gnus, this back end will be queried for new
13962 articles, and it will move all the messages in your spool file to its
13963 directory, which is @file{~/Mail/} by default. The new group that will
13964 be created (@samp{mail.misc}) will be subscribed, and you can read it
13965 like any other group.
13967 You will probably want to split the mail into several groups, though:
13970 (setq nnmail-split-methods
13971 '(("junk" "^From:.*Lars Ingebrigtsen")
13972 ("crazy" "^Subject:.*die\\|^Organization:.*flabby")
13976 This will result in three new @code{nnml} mail groups being created:
13977 @samp{nnml:junk}, @samp{nnml:crazy}, and @samp{nnml:other}. All the
13978 mail that doesn't fit into the first two groups will be placed in the
13981 This should be sufficient for reading mail with Gnus. You might want to
13982 give the other sections in this part of the manual a perusal, though.
13983 Especially @pxref{Choosing a Mail Back End} and @pxref{Expiring Mail}.
13986 @node Splitting Mail
13987 @subsection Splitting Mail
13988 @cindex splitting mail
13989 @cindex mail splitting
13990 @cindex mail filtering (splitting)
13992 @vindex nnmail-split-methods
13993 The @code{nnmail-split-methods} variable says how the incoming mail is
13994 to be split into groups.
13997 (setq nnmail-split-methods
13998 '(("mail.junk" "^From:.*Lars Ingebrigtsen")
13999 ("mail.crazy" "^Subject:.*die\\|^Organization:.*flabby")
14000 ("mail.other" "")))
14003 This variable is a list of lists, where the first element of each of
14004 these lists is the name of the mail group (they do not have to be called
14005 something beginning with @samp{mail}, by the way), and the second
14006 element is a regular expression used on the header of each mail to
14007 determine if it belongs in this mail group. The first string may
14008 contain @samp{\\1} forms, like the ones used by @code{replace-match} to
14009 insert sub-expressions from the matched text. For instance:
14012 ("list.\\1" "From:.* \\(.*\\)-list@@majordomo.com")
14016 In that case, @code{nnmail-split-lowercase-expanded} controls whether
14017 the inserted text should be made lowercase. @xref{Fancy Mail Splitting}.
14019 The second element can also be a function. In that case, it will be
14020 called narrowed to the headers with the first element of the rule as the
14021 argument. It should return a non-@code{nil} value if it thinks that the
14022 mail belongs in that group.
14024 @cindex @samp{bogus} group
14025 The last of these groups should always be a general one, and the regular
14026 expression should @emph{always} be @samp{""} so that it matches any mails
14027 that haven't been matched by any of the other regexps. (These rules are
14028 processed from the beginning of the alist toward the end. The first rule
14029 to make a match will ``win'', unless you have crossposting enabled. In
14030 that case, all matching rules will ``win''.) If no rule matched, the mail
14031 will end up in the @samp{bogus} group. When new groups are created by
14032 splitting mail, you may want to run @code{gnus-group-find-new-groups} to
14033 see the new groups. This also applies to the @samp{bogus} group.
14035 If you like to tinker with this yourself, you can set this variable to a
14036 function of your choice. This function will be called without any
14037 arguments in a buffer narrowed to the headers of an incoming mail
14038 message. The function should return a list of group names that it
14039 thinks should carry this mail message.
14041 Note that the mail back ends are free to maul the poor, innocent,
14042 incoming headers all they want to. They all add @code{Lines} headers;
14043 some add @code{X-Gnus-Group} headers; most rename the Unix mbox
14044 @code{From<SPACE>} line to something else.
14046 @vindex nnmail-crosspost
14047 The mail back ends all support cross-posting. If several regexps match,
14048 the mail will be ``cross-posted'' to all those groups.
14049 @code{nnmail-crosspost} says whether to use this mechanism or not. Note
14050 that no articles are crossposted to the general (@samp{""}) group.
14052 @vindex nnmail-crosspost-link-function
14055 @code{nnmh} and @code{nnml} makes crossposts by creating hard links to
14056 the crossposted articles. However, not all file systems support hard
14057 links. If that's the case for you, set
14058 @code{nnmail-crosspost-link-function} to @code{copy-file}. (This
14059 variable is @code{add-name-to-file} by default.)
14061 @kindex M-x nnmail-split-history
14062 @findex nnmail-split-history
14063 If you wish to see where the previous mail split put the messages, you
14064 can use the @kbd{M-x nnmail-split-history} command. If you wish to see
14065 where re-spooling messages would put the messages, you can use
14066 @code{gnus-summary-respool-trace} and related commands (@pxref{Mail
14069 @vindex nnmail-split-header-length-limit
14070 Header lines longer than the value of
14071 @code{nnmail-split-header-length-limit} are excluded from the split
14074 @vindex nnmail-mail-splitting-decodes
14075 @vindex nnmail-mail-splitting-charset
14076 By default, splitting does not decode headers, so you can not match on
14077 non-@acronym{ASCII} strings. But it is useful if you want to match
14078 articles based on the raw header data. To enable it, set the
14079 @code{nnmail-mail-splitting-decodes} variable to a non-@code{nil} value.
14080 In addition, the value of the @code{nnmail-mail-splitting-charset}
14081 variable is used for decoding non-@acronym{MIME} encoded string when
14082 @code{nnmail-mail-splitting-decodes} is non-@code{nil}. The default
14083 value is @code{nil} which means not to decode non-@acronym{MIME} encoded
14084 string. A suitable value for you will be @code{undecided} or be the
14085 charset used normally in mails you are interested in.
14087 @vindex nnmail-resplit-incoming
14088 By default, splitting is performed on all incoming messages. If you
14089 specify a @code{directory} entry for the variable @code{mail-sources}
14090 (@pxref{Mail Source Specifiers}), however, then splitting does
14091 @emph{not} happen by default. You can set the variable
14092 @code{nnmail-resplit-incoming} to a non-@code{nil} value to make
14093 splitting happen even in this case. (This variable has no effect on
14094 other kinds of entries.)
14096 Gnus gives you all the opportunity you could possibly want for shooting
14097 yourself in the foot. Let's say you create a group that will contain
14098 all the mail you get from your boss. And then you accidentally
14099 unsubscribe from the group. Gnus will still put all the mail from your
14100 boss in the unsubscribed group, and so, when your boss mails you ``Have
14101 that report ready by Monday or you're fired!'', you'll never see it and,
14102 come Tuesday, you'll still believe that you're gainfully employed while
14103 you really should be out collecting empty bottles to save up for next
14104 month's rent money.
14108 @subsection Mail Sources
14110 Mail can be gotten from many different sources---the mail spool, from
14111 a @acronym{POP} mail server, from a procmail directory, or from a
14112 maildir, for instance.
14115 * Mail Source Specifiers:: How to specify what a mail source is.
14116 * Mail Source Customization:: Some variables that influence things.
14117 * Fetching Mail:: Using the mail source specifiers.
14121 @node Mail Source Specifiers
14122 @subsubsection Mail Source Specifiers
14124 @cindex mail server
14127 @cindex mail source
14129 You tell Gnus how to fetch mail by setting @code{mail-sources}
14130 (@pxref{Fetching Mail}) to a @dfn{mail source specifier}.
14135 (pop :server "pop3.mailserver.com" :user "myname")
14138 As can be observed, a mail source specifier is a list where the first
14139 element is a @dfn{mail source type}, followed by an arbitrary number of
14140 @dfn{keywords}. Keywords that are not explicitly specified are given
14143 The following mail source types are available:
14147 Get mail from a single file; typically from the mail spool.
14153 The file name. Defaults to the value of the @env{MAIL}
14154 environment variable or the value of @code{rmail-spool-directory}
14155 (usually something like @file{/usr/mail/spool/user-name}).
14159 Script run before/after fetching mail.
14162 An example file mail source:
14165 (file :path "/usr/spool/mail/user-name")
14168 Or using the default file name:
14174 If the mail spool file is not located on the local machine, it's best
14175 to use @acronym{POP} or @acronym{IMAP} or the like to fetch the mail.
14176 You can not use ange-ftp file names here---it has no way to lock the
14177 mail spool while moving the mail.
14179 If it's impossible to set up a proper server, you can use ssh instead.
14183 '((file :prescript "ssh host bin/getmail >%t")))
14186 The @samp{getmail} script would look something like the following:
14190 # getmail - move mail from spool to stdout
14193 MOVEMAIL=/usr/lib/emacs/20.3/i386-redhat-linux/movemail
14195 rm -f $TMP; $MOVEMAIL $MAIL $TMP >/dev/null && cat $TMP
14198 Alter this script to fit the @samp{movemail} and temporary
14199 file you want to use.
14203 @vindex nnmail-scan-directory-mail-source-once
14204 Get mail from several files in a directory. This is typically used
14205 when you have procmail split the incoming mail into several files.
14206 That is, there is a one-to-one correspondence between files in that
14207 directory and groups, so that mail from the file @file{foo.bar.spool}
14208 will be put in the group @code{foo.bar}. (You can change the suffix
14209 to be used instead of @code{.spool}.) Setting
14210 @code{nnmail-scan-directory-mail-source-once} to non-@code{nil} forces
14211 Gnus to scan the mail source only once. This is particularly useful
14212 if you want to scan mail groups at a specified level.
14214 @vindex nnmail-resplit-incoming
14215 There is also the variable @code{nnmail-resplit-incoming}, if you set
14216 that to a non-@code{nil} value, then the normal splitting process is
14217 applied to all the files from the directory, @ref{Splitting Mail}.
14223 The name of the directory where the files are. There is no default
14227 Only files ending with this suffix are used. The default is
14231 Only files that have this predicate return non-@code{nil} are returned.
14232 The default is @code{identity}. This is used as an additional
14233 filter---only files that have the right suffix @emph{and} satisfy this
14234 predicate are considered.
14238 Script run before/after fetching mail.
14242 An example directory mail source:
14245 (directory :path "/home/user-name/procmail-dir/"
14250 Get mail from a @acronym{POP} server.
14256 The name of the @acronym{POP} server. The default is taken from the
14257 @env{MAILHOST} environment variable.
14260 The port number of the @acronym{POP} server. This can be a number (eg,
14261 @samp{:port 1234}) or a string (eg, @samp{:port "pop3"}). If it is a
14262 string, it should be a service name as listed in @file{/etc/services} on
14263 Unix systems. The default is @samp{"pop3"}. On some systems you might
14264 need to specify it as @samp{"pop-3"} instead.
14267 The user name to give to the @acronym{POP} server. The default is the login
14271 The password to give to the @acronym{POP} server. If not specified,
14272 the user is prompted.
14275 The program to use to fetch mail from the @acronym{POP} server. This
14276 should be a @code{format}-like string. Here's an example:
14279 fetchmail %u@@%s -P %p %t
14282 The valid format specifier characters are:
14286 The name of the file the mail is to be moved to. This must always be
14287 included in this string.
14290 The name of the server.
14293 The port number of the server.
14296 The user name to use.
14299 The password to use.
14302 The values used for these specs are taken from the values you give the
14303 corresponding keywords.
14306 A script to be run before fetching the mail. The syntax is the same as
14307 the @code{:program} keyword. This can also be a function to be run.
14310 A script to be run after fetching the mail. The syntax is the same as
14311 the @code{:program} keyword. This can also be a function to be run.
14314 The function to use to fetch mail from the @acronym{POP} server. The
14315 function is called with one parameter---the name of the file where the
14316 mail should be moved to.
14318 @item :authentication
14319 This can be either the symbol @code{password} or the symbol @code{apop}
14320 and says what authentication scheme to use. The default is
14325 @vindex pop3-movemail
14326 @vindex pop3-leave-mail-on-server
14327 If the @code{:program} and @code{:function} keywords aren't specified,
14328 @code{pop3-movemail} will be used. If @code{pop3-leave-mail-on-server}
14329 is non-@code{nil} the mail is to be left on the @acronym{POP} server
14330 after fetching when using @code{pop3-movemail}. Note that POP servers
14331 maintain no state information between sessions, so what the client
14332 believes is there and what is actually there may not match up. If they
14333 do not, then you may get duplicate mails or the whole thing can fall
14334 apart and leave you with a corrupt mailbox.
14336 Here are some examples for getting mail from a @acronym{POP} server.
14337 Fetch from the default @acronym{POP} server, using the default user
14338 name, and default fetcher:
14344 Fetch from a named server with a named user and password:
14347 (pop :server "my.pop.server"
14348 :user "user-name" :password "secret")
14351 Use @samp{movemail} to move the mail:
14354 (pop :program "movemail po:%u %t %p")
14358 Get mail from a maildir. This is a type of mailbox that is supported by
14359 at least qmail and postfix, where each file in a special directory
14360 contains exactly one mail.
14366 The name of the directory where the mails are stored. The default is
14367 taken from the @env{MAILDIR} environment variable or
14370 The subdirectories of the Maildir. The default is
14371 @samp{("new" "cur")}.
14373 @c If you sometimes look at your mail through a pop3 daemon before fetching
14374 @c them with Gnus, you may also have to fetch your mails from the
14375 @c @code{cur} directory inside the maildir, like in the first example
14378 You can also get mails from remote hosts (because maildirs don't suffer
14379 from locking problems).
14383 Two example maildir mail sources:
14386 (maildir :path "/home/user-name/Maildir/"
14387 :subdirs ("cur" "new"))
14391 (maildir :path "/user@@remotehost.org:~/Maildir/"
14396 Get mail from a @acronym{IMAP} server. If you don't want to use
14397 @acronym{IMAP} as intended, as a network mail reading protocol (ie
14398 with nnimap), for some reason or other, Gnus let you treat it similar
14399 to a @acronym{POP} server and fetches articles from a given
14400 @acronym{IMAP} mailbox. @xref{IMAP}, for more information.
14402 Note that for the Kerberos, GSSAPI, @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} and STARTTLS support you
14403 may need external programs and libraries, @xref{IMAP}.
14409 The name of the @acronym{IMAP} server. The default is taken from the
14410 @env{MAILHOST} environment variable.
14413 The port number of the @acronym{IMAP} server. The default is @samp{143}, or
14414 @samp{993} for @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} connections.
14417 The user name to give to the @acronym{IMAP} server. The default is the login
14421 The password to give to the @acronym{IMAP} server. If not specified, the user is
14425 What stream to use for connecting to the server, this is one of the
14426 symbols in @code{imap-stream-alist}. Right now, this means
14427 @samp{gssapi}, @samp{kerberos4}, @samp{starttls}, @samp{tls},
14428 @samp{ssl}, @samp{shell} or the default @samp{network}.
14430 @item :authentication
14431 Which authenticator to use for authenticating to the server, this is
14432 one of the symbols in @code{imap-authenticator-alist}. Right now,
14433 this means @samp{gssapi}, @samp{kerberos4}, @samp{digest-md5},
14434 @samp{cram-md5}, @samp{anonymous} or the default @samp{login}.
14437 When using the `shell' :stream, the contents of this variable is
14438 mapped into the @code{imap-shell-program} variable. This should be a
14439 @code{format}-like string (or list of strings). Here's an example:
14445 Make sure nothing is interfering with the output of the program, e.g.,
14446 don't forget to redirect the error output to the void. The valid format
14447 specifier characters are:
14451 The name of the server.
14454 User name from @code{imap-default-user}.
14457 The port number of the server.
14460 The values used for these specs are taken from the values you give the
14461 corresponding keywords.
14464 The name of the mailbox to get mail from. The default is @samp{INBOX}
14465 which normally is the mailbox which receive incoming mail.
14468 The predicate used to find articles to fetch. The default, @samp{UNSEEN
14469 UNDELETED}, is probably the best choice for most people, but if you
14470 sometimes peek in your mailbox with a @acronym{IMAP} client and mark some
14471 articles as read (or; SEEN) you might want to set this to @samp{1:*}.
14472 Then all articles in the mailbox is fetched, no matter what. For a
14473 complete list of predicates, see RFC 2060 section 6.4.4.
14476 How to flag fetched articles on the server, the default @samp{\Deleted}
14477 will mark them as deleted, an alternative would be @samp{\Seen} which
14478 would simply mark them as read. These are the two most likely choices,
14479 but more flags are defined in RFC 2060 section 2.3.2.
14482 If non-@code{nil}, don't remove all articles marked as deleted in the
14483 mailbox after finishing the fetch.
14487 An example @acronym{IMAP} mail source:
14490 (imap :server "mail.mycorp.com"
14492 :fetchflag "\\Seen")
14496 Get mail from a webmail server, such as @uref{http://www.hotmail.com/},
14497 @uref{http://webmail.netscape.com/}, @uref{http://www.netaddress.com/},
14498 @uref{http://mail.yahoo.com/}.
14500 NOTE: Webmail largely depends on cookies. A "one-line-cookie" patch is
14501 required for url "4.0pre.46".
14503 WARNING: Mails may be lost. NO WARRANTY.
14509 The type of the webmail server. The default is @code{hotmail}. The
14510 alternatives are @code{netscape}, @code{netaddress}, @code{my-deja}.
14513 The user name to give to the webmail server. The default is the login
14517 The password to give to the webmail server. If not specified, the user is
14521 If non-@code{nil}, only fetch unread articles and don't move them to
14522 trash folder after finishing the fetch.
14526 An example webmail source:
14529 (webmail :subtype 'hotmail
14531 :password "secret")
14536 @item Common Keywords
14537 Common keywords can be used in any type of mail source.
14543 If non-@code{nil}, fetch the mail even when Gnus is unplugged. If you
14544 use directory source to get mail, you can specify it as in this
14549 '((directory :path "/home/pavel/.Spool/"
14554 Gnus will then fetch your mail even when you are unplugged. This is
14555 useful when you use local mail and news.
14560 @subsubsection Function Interface
14562 Some of the above keywords specify a Lisp function to be executed.
14563 For each keyword @code{:foo}, the Lisp variable @code{foo} is bound to
14564 the value of the keyword while the function is executing. For example,
14565 consider the following mail-source setting:
14568 (setq mail-sources '((pop :user "jrl"
14569 :server "pophost" :function fetchfunc)))
14572 While the function @code{fetchfunc} is executing, the symbol @code{user}
14573 is bound to @code{"jrl"}, and the symbol @code{server} is bound to
14574 @code{"pophost"}. The symbols @code{port}, @code{password},
14575 @code{program}, @code{prescript}, @code{postscript}, @code{function},
14576 and @code{authentication} are also bound (to their default values).
14578 See above for a list of keywords for each type of mail source.
14581 @node Mail Source Customization
14582 @subsubsection Mail Source Customization
14584 The following is a list of variables that influence how the mail is
14585 fetched. You would normally not need to set or change any of these
14589 @item mail-source-crash-box
14590 @vindex mail-source-crash-box
14591 File where mail will be stored while processing it. The default is@*
14592 @file{~/.emacs-mail-crash-box}.
14594 @item mail-source-delete-incoming
14595 @vindex mail-source-delete-incoming
14596 If non-@code{nil}, delete incoming files after handling them. If
14597 @code{t}, delete the files immediately, if @code{nil}, never delete any
14598 files. If a positive number, delete files older than number of days
14599 (This will only happen, when receiving new mail). You may also set
14600 @code{mail-source-delete-incoming} to @code{nil} and call
14601 @code{mail-source-delete-old-incoming} from a hook or interactively.
14603 @item mail-source-delete-old-incoming-confirm
14604 @vindex mail-source-delete-old-incoming-confirm
14605 If non-@code{nil}, ask for confirmation before deleting old incoming
14606 files. This variable only applies when
14607 @code{mail-source-delete-incoming} is a positive number.
14609 @item mail-source-ignore-errors
14610 @vindex mail-source-ignore-errors
14611 If non-@code{nil}, ignore errors when reading mail from a mail source.
14613 @item mail-source-directory
14614 @vindex mail-source-directory
14615 Directory where incoming mail source files (if any) will be stored. The
14616 default is @file{~/Mail/}. At present, the only thing this is used for
14617 is to say where the incoming files will be stored if the variable
14618 @code{mail-source-delete-incoming} is @code{nil} or a number.
14620 @item mail-source-incoming-file-prefix
14621 @vindex mail-source-incoming-file-prefix
14622 Prefix for file name for storing incoming mail. The default is
14623 @file{Incoming}, in which case files will end up with names like
14624 @file{Incoming30630D_} or @file{Incoming298602ZD}. This is really only
14625 relevant if @code{mail-source-delete-incoming} is @code{nil} or a
14628 @item mail-source-default-file-modes
14629 @vindex mail-source-default-file-modes
14630 All new mail files will get this file mode. The default is 384.
14632 @item mail-source-movemail-program
14633 @vindex mail-source-movemail-program
14634 If non-@code{nil}, name of program for fetching new mail. If
14635 @code{nil}, @code{movemail} in @var{exec-directory}.
14640 @node Fetching Mail
14641 @subsubsection Fetching Mail
14643 @vindex mail-sources
14644 The way to actually tell Gnus where to get new mail from is to set
14645 @code{mail-sources} to a list of mail source specifiers
14646 (@pxref{Mail Source Specifiers}).
14648 If this variable is @code{nil}, the mail back ends will never attempt to
14649 fetch mail by themselves.
14651 If you want to fetch mail both from your local spool as well as a
14652 @acronym{POP} mail server, you'd say something like:
14657 (pop :server "pop3.mail.server"
14658 :password "secret")))
14661 Or, if you don't want to use any of the keyword defaults:
14665 '((file :path "/var/spool/mail/user-name")
14666 (pop :server "pop3.mail.server"
14669 :password "secret")))
14673 When you use a mail back end, Gnus will slurp all your mail from your
14674 inbox and plonk it down in your home directory. Gnus doesn't move any
14675 mail if you're not using a mail back end---you have to do a lot of magic
14676 invocations first. At the time when you have finished drawing the
14677 pentagram, lightened the candles, and sacrificed the goat, you really
14678 shouldn't be too surprised when Gnus moves your mail.
14682 @node Mail Back End Variables
14683 @subsection Mail Back End Variables
14685 These variables are (for the most part) pertinent to all the various
14689 @vindex nnmail-read-incoming-hook
14690 @item nnmail-read-incoming-hook
14691 The mail back ends all call this hook after reading new mail. You can
14692 use this hook to notify any mail watch programs, if you want to.
14694 @vindex nnmail-split-hook
14695 @item nnmail-split-hook
14696 @findex gnus-article-decode-encoded-words
14697 @cindex RFC 1522 decoding
14698 @cindex RFC 2047 decoding
14699 Hook run in the buffer where the mail headers of each message is kept
14700 just before the splitting based on these headers is done. The hook is
14701 free to modify the buffer contents in any way it sees fit---the buffer
14702 is discarded after the splitting has been done, and no changes performed
14703 in the buffer will show up in any files.
14704 @code{gnus-article-decode-encoded-words} is one likely function to add
14707 @vindex nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook
14708 @vindex nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook
14709 @item nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook
14710 @itemx nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook
14711 These are two useful hooks executed when treating new incoming
14712 mail---@code{nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook} (is called just before
14713 starting to handle the new mail) and
14714 @code{nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook} (is called when the mail handling
14715 is done). Here's and example of using these two hooks to change the
14716 default file modes the new mail files get:
14719 (add-hook 'nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook
14720 (lambda () (set-default-file-modes 511)))
14722 (add-hook 'nnmail-post-get-new-mail-hook
14723 (lambda () (set-default-file-modes 551)))
14726 @item nnmail-use-long-file-names
14727 @vindex nnmail-use-long-file-names
14728 If non-@code{nil}, the mail back ends will use long file and directory
14729 names. Groups like @samp{mail.misc} will end up in directories
14730 (assuming use of @code{nnml} back end) or files (assuming use of
14731 @code{nnfolder} back end) like @file{mail.misc}. If it is @code{nil},
14732 the same group will end up in @file{mail/misc}.
14734 @item nnmail-delete-file-function
14735 @vindex nnmail-delete-file-function
14736 @findex delete-file
14737 Function called to delete files. It is @code{delete-file} by default.
14739 @item nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids
14740 @vindex nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids
14741 If non-@code{nil}, put the @code{Message-ID}s of articles imported into
14742 the back end (via @code{Gcc}, for instance) into the mail duplication
14743 discovery cache. The default is @code{nil}.
14745 @item nnmail-cache-ignore-groups
14746 @vindex nnmail-cache-ignore-groups
14747 This can be a regular expression or a list of regular expressions.
14748 Group names that match any of the regular expressions will never be
14749 recorded in the @code{Message-ID} cache.
14751 This can be useful, for example, when using Fancy Splitting
14752 (@pxref{Fancy Mail Splitting}) together with the function
14753 @code{nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent}.
14758 @node Fancy Mail Splitting
14759 @subsection Fancy Mail Splitting
14760 @cindex mail splitting
14761 @cindex fancy mail splitting
14763 @vindex nnmail-split-fancy
14764 @findex nnmail-split-fancy
14765 If the rather simple, standard method for specifying how to split mail
14766 doesn't allow you to do what you want, you can set
14767 @code{nnmail-split-methods} to @code{nnmail-split-fancy}. Then you can
14768 play with the @code{nnmail-split-fancy} variable.
14770 Let's look at an example value of this variable first:
14773 ;; @r{Messages from the mailer daemon are not crossposted to any of}
14774 ;; @r{the ordinary groups. Warnings are put in a separate group}
14775 ;; @r{from real errors.}
14776 (| ("from" mail (| ("subject" "warn.*" "mail.warning")
14778 ;; @r{Non-error messages are crossposted to all relevant}
14779 ;; @r{groups, but we don't crosspost between the group for the}
14780 ;; @r{(ding) list and the group for other (ding) related mail.}
14781 (& (| (any "ding@@ifi\\.uio\\.no" "ding.list")
14782 ("subject" "ding" "ding.misc"))
14783 ;; @r{Other mailing lists@dots{}}
14784 (any "procmail@@informatik\\.rwth-aachen\\.de" "procmail.list")
14785 (any "SmartList@@informatik\\.rwth-aachen\\.de" "SmartList.list")
14786 ;; @r{Both lists below have the same suffix, so prevent}
14787 ;; @r{cross-posting to mkpkg.list of messages posted only to}
14788 ;; @r{the bugs- list, but allow cross-posting when the}
14789 ;; @r{message was really cross-posted.}
14790 (any "bugs-mypackage@@somewhere" "mypkg.bugs")
14791 (any "mypackage@@somewhere" - "bugs-mypackage" "mypkg.list")
14792 ;; @r{People@dots{}}
14793 (any "larsi@@ifi\\.uio\\.no" "people.Lars_Magne_Ingebrigtsen"))
14794 ;; @r{Unmatched mail goes to the catch all group.}
14798 This variable has the format of a @dfn{split}. A split is a
14799 (possibly) recursive structure where each split may contain other
14800 splits. Here are the possible split syntaxes:
14805 If the split is a string, that will be taken as a group name. Normal
14806 regexp match expansion will be done. See below for examples.
14808 @c Don't fold this line.
14809 @item (@var{field} @var{value} [- @var{restrict} [@dots{}] ] @var{split} [@var{invert-partial}])
14810 The split can be a list containing at least three elements. If the
14811 first element @var{field} (a regexp matching a header) contains
14812 @var{value} (also a regexp) then store the message as specified by
14815 If @var{restrict} (yet another regexp) matches some string after
14816 @var{field} and before the end of the matched @var{value}, the
14817 @var{split} is ignored. If none of the @var{restrict} clauses match,
14818 @var{split} is processed.
14820 The last element @var{invert-partial} is optional. If it is
14821 non-@code{nil}, the match-partial-words behavior controlled by the
14822 variable @code{nnmail-split-fancy-match-partial-words} (see below) is
14823 be inverted. (New in Gnus 5.10.7)
14825 @item (| @var{split} @dots{})
14826 If the split is a list, and the first element is @code{|} (vertical
14827 bar), then process each @var{split} until one of them matches. A
14828 @var{split} is said to match if it will cause the mail message to be
14829 stored in one or more groups.
14831 @item (& @var{split} @dots{})
14832 If the split is a list, and the first element is @code{&}, then
14833 process all @var{split}s in the list.
14836 If the split is the symbol @code{junk}, then don't save (i.e., delete)
14837 this message. Use with extreme caution.
14839 @item (: @var{function} @var{arg1} @var{arg2} @dots{})
14840 If the split is a list, and the first element is @samp{:}, then the
14841 second element will be called as a function with @var{args} given as
14842 arguments. The function should return a @var{split}.
14845 For instance, the following function could be used to split based on the
14846 body of the messages:
14849 (defun split-on-body ()
14853 (goto-char (point-min))
14854 (when (re-search-forward "Some.*string" nil t)
14858 The buffer is narrowed to the header of the message in question when
14859 @var{function} is run. That's why @code{(widen)} needs to be called
14860 after @code{save-excursion} and @code{save-restriction} in the example
14861 above. Also note that with the nnimap backend, message bodies will
14862 not be downloaded by default. You need to set
14863 @code{nnimap-split-download-body} to @code{t} to do that
14864 (@pxref{Splitting in IMAP}).
14866 @item (! @var{func} @var{split})
14867 If the split is a list, and the first element is @code{!}, then
14868 @var{split} will be processed, and @var{func} will be called as a
14869 function with the result of @var{split} as argument. @var{func}
14870 should return a split.
14873 If the split is @code{nil}, it is ignored.
14877 In these splits, @var{field} must match a complete field name.
14879 Normally, @var{value} in these splits must match a complete @emph{word}
14880 according to the fundamental mode syntax table. In other words, all
14881 @var{value}'s will be implicitly surrounded by @code{\<...\>} markers,
14882 which are word delimiters. Therefore, if you use the following split,
14886 (any "joe" "joemail")
14890 messages sent from @samp{joedavis@@foo.org} will normally not be filed
14891 in @samp{joemail}. If you want to alter this behavior, you can use any
14892 of the following three ways:
14896 @vindex nnmail-split-fancy-match-partial-words
14897 You can set the @code{nnmail-split-fancy-match-partial-words} variable
14898 to non-@code{nil} in order to ignore word boundaries and instead the
14899 match becomes more like a grep. This variable controls whether partial
14900 words are matched during fancy splitting. The default value is
14903 Note that it influences all @var{value}'s in your split rules.
14906 @var{value} beginning with @code{.*} ignores word boundaries in front of
14907 a word. Similarly, if @var{value} ends with @code{.*}, word boundaries
14908 in the rear of a word will be ignored. For example, the @var{value}
14909 @code{"@@example\\.com"} does not match @samp{foo@@example.com} but
14910 @code{".*@@example\\.com"} does.
14913 You can set the @var{invert-partial} flag in your split rules of the
14914 @samp{(@var{field} @var{value} @dots{})} types, aforementioned in this
14915 section. If the flag is set, word boundaries on both sides of a word
14916 are ignored even if @code{nnmail-split-fancy-match-partial-words} is
14917 @code{nil}. Contrarily, if the flag is set, word boundaries are not
14918 ignored even if @code{nnmail-split-fancy-match-partial-words} is
14919 non-@code{nil}. (New in Gnus 5.10.7)
14922 @vindex nnmail-split-abbrev-alist
14923 @var{field} and @var{value} can also be Lisp symbols, in that case
14924 they are expanded as specified by the variable
14925 @code{nnmail-split-abbrev-alist}. This is an alist of cons cells,
14926 where the @sc{car} of a cell contains the key, and the @sc{cdr}
14927 contains the associated value. Predefined entries in
14928 @code{nnmail-split-abbrev-alist} include:
14932 Matches the @samp{From}, @samp{Sender} and @samp{Resent-From} fields.
14934 Matches the @samp{To}, @samp{Cc}, @samp{Apparently-To},
14935 @samp{Resent-To} and @samp{Resent-Cc} fields.
14937 Is the union of the @code{from} and @code{to} entries.
14940 @vindex nnmail-split-fancy-syntax-table
14941 @code{nnmail-split-fancy-syntax-table} is the syntax table in effect
14942 when all this splitting is performed.
14944 If you want to have Gnus create groups dynamically based on some
14945 information in the headers (i.e., do @code{replace-match}-like
14946 substitutions in the group names), you can say things like:
14949 (any "debian-\\b\\(\\w+\\)@@lists.debian.org" "mail.debian.\\1")
14952 In this example, messages sent to @samp{debian-foo@@lists.debian.org}
14953 will be filed in @samp{mail.debian.foo}.
14955 If the string contains the element @samp{\&}, then the previously
14956 matched string will be substituted. Similarly, the elements @samp{\\1}
14957 up to @samp{\\9} will be substituted with the text matched by the
14958 groupings 1 through 9.
14960 @vindex nnmail-split-lowercase-expanded
14961 Where @code{nnmail-split-lowercase-expanded} controls whether the
14962 lowercase of the matched string should be used for the substitution.
14963 Setting it as non-@code{nil} is useful to avoid the creation of multiple
14964 groups when users send to an address using different case
14965 (i.e. mailing-list@@domain vs Mailing-List@@Domain). The default value
14968 @findex nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent
14969 @code{nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent} is a function which allows you to
14970 split followups into the same groups their parents are in. Sometimes
14971 you can't make splitting rules for all your mail. For example, your
14972 boss might send you personal mail regarding different projects you are
14973 working on, and as you can't tell your boss to put a distinguishing
14974 string into the subject line, you have to resort to manually moving the
14975 messages into the right group. With this function, you only have to do
14976 it once per thread.
14978 To use this feature, you have to set @code{nnmail-treat-duplicates}
14979 and @code{nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids} to a non-@code{nil}
14980 value. And then you can include @code{nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent}
14981 using the colon feature, like so:
14983 (setq nnmail-treat-duplicates 'warn ; @r{or @code{delete}}
14984 nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids t
14986 '(| (: nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent)
14987 ;; @r{other splits go here}
14991 This feature works as follows: when @code{nnmail-treat-duplicates} is
14992 non-@code{nil}, Gnus records the message id of every message it sees
14993 in the file specified by the variable
14994 @code{nnmail-message-id-cache-file}, together with the group it is in
14995 (the group is omitted for non-mail messages). When mail splitting is
14996 invoked, the function @code{nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent} then looks
14997 at the References (and In-Reply-To) header of each message to split
14998 and searches the file specified by @code{nnmail-message-id-cache-file}
14999 for the message ids. When it has found a parent, it returns the
15000 corresponding group name unless the group name matches the regexp
15001 @code{nnmail-split-fancy-with-parent-ignore-groups}. It is
15002 recommended that you set @code{nnmail-message-id-cache-length} to a
15003 somewhat higher number than the default so that the message ids are
15004 still in the cache. (A value of 5000 appears to create a file some
15005 300 kBytes in size.)
15006 @vindex nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids
15007 When @code{nnmail-cache-accepted-message-ids} is non-@code{nil}, Gnus
15008 also records the message ids of moved articles, so that the followup
15009 messages goes into the new group.
15011 Also see the variable @code{nnmail-cache-ignore-groups} if you don't
15012 want certain groups to be recorded in the cache. For example, if all
15013 outgoing messages are written to an ``outgoing'' group, you could set
15014 @code{nnmail-cache-ignore-groups} to match that group name.
15015 Otherwise, answers to all your messages would end up in the
15016 ``outgoing'' group.
15019 @node Group Mail Splitting
15020 @subsection Group Mail Splitting
15021 @cindex mail splitting
15022 @cindex group mail splitting
15024 @findex gnus-group-split
15025 If you subscribe to dozens of mailing lists but you don't want to
15026 maintain mail splitting rules manually, group mail splitting is for you.
15027 You just have to set @code{to-list} and/or @code{to-address} in group
15028 parameters or group customization and set @code{nnmail-split-methods} to
15029 @code{gnus-group-split}. This splitting function will scan all groups
15030 for those parameters and split mail accordingly, i.e., messages posted
15031 from or to the addresses specified in the parameters @code{to-list} or
15032 @code{to-address} of a mail group will be stored in that group.
15034 Sometimes, mailing lists have multiple addresses, and you may want mail
15035 splitting to recognize them all: just set the @code{extra-aliases} group
15036 parameter to the list of additional addresses and it's done. If you'd
15037 rather use a regular expression, set @code{split-regexp}.
15039 All these parameters in a group will be used to create an
15040 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} split, in which the @var{field} is @samp{any},
15041 the @var{value} is a single regular expression that matches
15042 @code{to-list}, @code{to-address}, all of @code{extra-aliases} and all
15043 matches of @code{split-regexp}, and the @var{split} is the name of the
15044 group. @var{restrict}s are also supported: just set the
15045 @code{split-exclude} parameter to a list of regular expressions.
15047 If you can't get the right split to be generated using all these
15048 parameters, or you just need something fancier, you can set the
15049 parameter @code{split-spec} to an @code{nnmail-split-fancy} split. In
15050 this case, all other aforementioned parameters will be ignored by
15051 @code{gnus-group-split}. In particular, @code{split-spec} may be set to
15052 @code{nil}, in which case the group will be ignored by
15053 @code{gnus-group-split}.
15055 @vindex gnus-group-split-default-catch-all-group
15056 @code{gnus-group-split} will do cross-posting on all groups that match,
15057 by defining a single @code{&} fancy split containing one split for each
15058 group. If a message doesn't match any split, it will be stored in the
15059 group named in @code{gnus-group-split-default-catch-all-group}, unless
15060 some group has @code{split-spec} set to @code{catch-all}, in which case
15061 that group is used as the catch-all group. Even though this variable is
15062 often used just to name a group, it may also be set to an arbitrarily
15063 complex fancy split (after all, a group name is a fancy split), and this
15064 may be useful to split mail that doesn't go to any mailing list to
15065 personal mail folders. Note that this fancy split is added as the last
15066 element of a @code{|} split list that also contains a @code{&} split
15067 with the rules extracted from group parameters.
15069 It's time for an example. Assume the following group parameters have
15074 ((to-address . "bar@@femail.com")
15075 (split-regexp . ".*@@femail\\.com"))
15077 ((to-list . "foo@@nowhere.gov")
15078 (extra-aliases "foo@@localhost" "foo-redist@@home")
15079 (split-exclude "bugs-foo" "rambling-foo")
15080 (admin-address . "foo-request@@nowhere.gov"))
15082 ((split-spec . catch-all))
15085 Setting @code{nnmail-split-methods} to @code{gnus-group-split} will
15086 behave as if @code{nnmail-split-fancy} had been selected and variable
15087 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} had been set as follows:
15090 (| (& (any "\\(bar@@femail\\.com\\|.*@@femail\\.com\\)" "mail.bar")
15091 (any "\\(foo@@nowhere\\.gov\\|foo@@localhost\\|foo-redist@@home\\)"
15092 - "bugs-foo" - "rambling-foo" "mail.foo"))
15096 @findex gnus-group-split-fancy
15097 If you'd rather not use group splitting for all your mail groups, you
15098 may use it for only some of them, by using @code{nnmail-split-fancy}
15102 (: gnus-group-split-fancy @var{groups} @var{no-crosspost} @var{catch-all})
15105 @var{groups} may be a regular expression or a list of group names whose
15106 parameters will be scanned to generate the output split.
15107 @var{no-crosspost} can be used to disable cross-posting; in this case, a
15108 single @code{|} split will be output. @var{catch-all} is the fall back
15109 fancy split, used like @code{gnus-group-split-default-catch-all-group}.
15110 If @var{catch-all} is @code{nil}, or if @code{split-regexp} matches the
15111 empty string in any selected group, no catch-all split will be issued.
15112 Otherwise, if some group has @code{split-spec} set to @code{catch-all},
15113 this group will override the value of the @var{catch-all} argument.
15115 @findex gnus-group-split-setup
15116 Unfortunately, scanning all groups and their parameters can be quite
15117 slow, especially considering that it has to be done for every message.
15118 But don't despair! The function @code{gnus-group-split-setup} can be
15119 used to enable @code{gnus-group-split} in a much more efficient way. It
15120 sets @code{nnmail-split-methods} to @code{nnmail-split-fancy} and sets
15121 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} to the split produced by
15122 @code{gnus-group-split-fancy}. Thus, the group parameters are only
15123 scanned once, no matter how many messages are split.
15125 @findex gnus-group-split-update
15126 However, if you change group parameters, you'd have to update
15127 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} manually. You can do it by running
15128 @code{gnus-group-split-update}. If you'd rather have it updated
15129 automatically, just tell @code{gnus-group-split-setup} to do it for
15130 you. For example, add to your @file{~/.gnus.el}:
15133 (gnus-group-split-setup @var{auto-update} @var{catch-all})
15136 If @var{auto-update} is non-@code{nil}, @code{gnus-group-split-update}
15137 will be added to @code{nnmail-pre-get-new-mail-hook}, so you won't ever
15138 have to worry about updating @code{nnmail-split-fancy} again. If you
15139 don't omit @var{catch-all} (it's optional, equivalent to @code{nil}),
15140 @code{gnus-group-split-default-catch-all-group} will be set to its
15143 @vindex gnus-group-split-updated-hook
15144 Because you may want to change @code{nnmail-split-fancy} after it is set
15145 by @code{gnus-group-split-update}, this function will run
15146 @code{gnus-group-split-updated-hook} just before finishing.
15148 @node Incorporating Old Mail
15149 @subsection Incorporating Old Mail
15150 @cindex incorporating old mail
15151 @cindex import old mail
15153 Most people have lots of old mail stored in various file formats. If
15154 you have set up Gnus to read mail using one of the spiffy Gnus mail
15155 back ends, you'll probably wish to have that old mail incorporated into
15158 Doing so can be quite easy.
15160 To take an example: You're reading mail using @code{nnml}
15161 (@pxref{Mail Spool}), and have set @code{nnmail-split-methods} to a
15162 satisfactory value (@pxref{Splitting Mail}). You have an old Unix mbox
15163 file filled with important, but old, mail. You want to move it into
15164 your @code{nnml} groups.
15170 Go to the group buffer.
15173 Type @kbd{G f} and give the file name to the mbox file when prompted to create an
15174 @code{nndoc} group from the mbox file (@pxref{Foreign Groups}).
15177 Type @kbd{SPACE} to enter the newly created group.
15180 Type @kbd{M P b} to process-mark all articles in this group's buffer
15181 (@pxref{Setting Process Marks}).
15184 Type @kbd{B r} to respool all the process-marked articles, and answer
15185 @samp{nnml} when prompted (@pxref{Mail Group Commands}).
15188 All the mail messages in the mbox file will now also be spread out over
15189 all your @code{nnml} groups. Try entering them and check whether things
15190 have gone without a glitch. If things look ok, you may consider
15191 deleting the mbox file, but I wouldn't do that unless I was absolutely
15192 sure that all the mail has ended up where it should be.
15194 Respooling is also a handy thing to do if you're switching from one mail
15195 back end to another. Just respool all the mail in the old mail groups
15196 using the new mail back end.
15199 @node Expiring Mail
15200 @subsection Expiring Mail
15201 @cindex article expiry
15202 @cindex expiring mail
15204 Traditional mail readers have a tendency to remove mail articles when
15205 you mark them as read, in some way. Gnus takes a fundamentally
15206 different approach to mail reading.
15208 Gnus basically considers mail just to be news that has been received in
15209 a rather peculiar manner. It does not think that it has the power to
15210 actually change the mail, or delete any mail messages. If you enter a
15211 mail group, and mark articles as ``read'', or kill them in some other
15212 fashion, the mail articles will still exist on the system. I repeat:
15213 Gnus will not delete your old, read mail. Unless you ask it to, of
15216 To make Gnus get rid of your unwanted mail, you have to mark the
15217 articles as @dfn{expirable}. (With the default key bindings, this means
15218 that you have to type @kbd{E}.) This does not mean that the articles
15219 will disappear right away, however. In general, a mail article will be
15220 deleted from your system if, 1) it is marked as expirable, AND 2) it is
15221 more than one week old. If you do not mark an article as expirable, it
15222 will remain on your system until hell freezes over. This bears
15223 repeating one more time, with some spurious capitalizations: IF you do
15224 NOT mark articles as EXPIRABLE, Gnus will NEVER delete those ARTICLES.
15226 You do not have to mark articles as expirable by hand. Gnus provides
15227 two features, called ``auto-expire'' and ``total-expire'', that can help you
15228 with this. In a nutshell, ``auto-expire'' means that Gnus hits @kbd{E}
15229 for you when you select an article. And ``total-expire'' means that Gnus
15230 considers all articles as expirable that are read. So, in addition to
15231 the articles marked @samp{E}, also the articles marked @samp{r},
15232 @samp{R}, @samp{O}, @samp{K}, @samp{Y} and so on are considered
15235 When should either auto-expire or total-expire be used? Most people
15236 who are subscribed to mailing lists split each list into its own group
15237 and then turn on auto-expire or total-expire for those groups.
15238 (@xref{Splitting Mail}, for more information on splitting each list
15239 into its own group.)
15241 Which one is better, auto-expire or total-expire? It's not easy to
15242 answer. Generally speaking, auto-expire is probably faster. Another
15243 advantage of auto-expire is that you get more marks to work with: for
15244 the articles that are supposed to stick around, you can still choose
15245 between tick and dormant and read marks. But with total-expire, you
15246 only have dormant and ticked to choose from. The advantage of
15247 total-expire is that it works well with adaptive scoring (@pxref{Adaptive
15248 Scoring}). Auto-expire works with normal scoring but not with adaptive
15251 @vindex gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups
15252 Groups that match the regular expression
15253 @code{gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups} will have all articles that you
15254 read marked as expirable automatically. All articles marked as
15255 expirable have an @samp{E} in the first column in the summary buffer.
15257 By default, if you have auto expiry switched on, Gnus will mark all the
15258 articles you read as expirable, no matter if they were read or unread
15259 before. To avoid having articles marked as read marked as expirable
15260 automatically, you can put something like the following in your
15261 @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
15263 @vindex gnus-mark-article-hook
15265 (remove-hook 'gnus-mark-article-hook
15266 'gnus-summary-mark-read-and-unread-as-read)
15267 (add-hook 'gnus-mark-article-hook 'gnus-summary-mark-unread-as-read)
15270 Note that making a group auto-expirable doesn't mean that all read
15271 articles are expired---only the articles marked as expirable
15272 will be expired. Also note that using the @kbd{d} command won't make
15273 articles expirable---only semi-automatic marking of articles as read will
15274 mark the articles as expirable in auto-expirable groups.
15276 Let's say you subscribe to a couple of mailing lists, and you want the
15277 articles you have read to disappear after a while:
15280 (setq gnus-auto-expirable-newsgroups
15281 "mail.nonsense-list\\|mail.nice-list")
15284 Another way to have auto-expiry happen is to have the element
15285 @code{auto-expire} in the group parameters of the group.
15287 If you use adaptive scoring (@pxref{Adaptive Scoring}) and
15288 auto-expiring, you'll have problems. Auto-expiring and adaptive scoring
15289 don't really mix very well.
15291 @vindex nnmail-expiry-wait
15292 The @code{nnmail-expiry-wait} variable supplies the default time an
15293 expirable article has to live. Gnus starts counting days from when the
15294 message @emph{arrived}, not from when it was sent. The default is seven
15297 Gnus also supplies a function that lets you fine-tune how long articles
15298 are to live, based on what group they are in. Let's say you want to
15299 have one month expiry period in the @samp{mail.private} group, a one day
15300 expiry period in the @samp{mail.junk} group, and a six day expiry period
15303 @vindex nnmail-expiry-wait-function
15305 (setq nnmail-expiry-wait-function
15307 (cond ((string= group "mail.private")
15309 ((string= group "mail.junk")
15311 ((string= group "important")
15317 The group names this function is fed are ``unadorned'' group
15318 names---no @samp{nnml:} prefixes and the like.
15320 The @code{nnmail-expiry-wait} variable and
15321 @code{nnmail-expiry-wait-function} function can either be a number (not
15322 necessarily an integer) or one of the symbols @code{immediate} or
15325 You can also use the @code{expiry-wait} group parameter to selectively
15326 change the expiry period (@pxref{Group Parameters}).
15328 @vindex nnmail-expiry-target
15329 The normal action taken when expiring articles is to delete them.
15330 However, in some circumstances it might make more sense to move them
15331 to other groups instead of deleting them. The variable
15332 @code{nnmail-expiry-target} (and the @code{expiry-target} group
15333 parameter) controls this. The variable supplies a default value for
15334 all groups, which can be overridden for specific groups by the group
15335 parameter. default value is @code{delete}, but this can also be a
15336 string (which should be the name of the group the message should be
15337 moved to), or a function (which will be called in a buffer narrowed to
15338 the message in question, and with the name of the group being moved
15339 from as its parameter) which should return a target---either a group
15340 name or @code{delete}.
15342 Here's an example for specifying a group name:
15344 (setq nnmail-expiry-target "nnml:expired")
15347 @findex nnmail-fancy-expiry-target
15348 @vindex nnmail-fancy-expiry-targets
15349 Gnus provides a function @code{nnmail-fancy-expiry-target} which will
15350 expire mail to groups according to the variable
15351 @code{nnmail-fancy-expiry-targets}. Here's an example:
15354 (setq nnmail-expiry-target 'nnmail-fancy-expiry-target
15355 nnmail-fancy-expiry-targets
15356 '((to-from "boss" "nnfolder:Work")
15357 ("subject" "IMPORTANT" "nnfolder:IMPORTANT.%Y.%b")
15358 ("from" ".*" "nnfolder:Archive-%Y")))
15361 With this setup, any mail that has @code{IMPORTANT} in its Subject
15362 header and was sent in the year @code{YYYY} and month @code{MMM}, will
15363 get expired to the group @code{nnfolder:IMPORTANT.YYYY.MMM}. If its
15364 From or To header contains the string @code{boss}, it will get expired
15365 to @code{nnfolder:Work}. All other mail will get expired to
15366 @code{nnfolder:Archive-YYYY}.
15368 @vindex nnmail-keep-last-article
15369 If @code{nnmail-keep-last-article} is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will never
15370 expire the final article in a mail newsgroup. This is to make life
15371 easier for procmail users.
15373 @vindex gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups
15374 By the way: That line up there, about Gnus never expiring non-expirable
15375 articles, is a lie. If you put @code{total-expire} in the group
15376 parameters, articles will not be marked as expirable, but all read
15377 articles will be put through the expiry process. Use with extreme
15378 caution. Even more dangerous is the
15379 @code{gnus-total-expirable-newsgroups} variable. All groups that match
15380 this regexp will have all read articles put through the expiry process,
15381 which means that @emph{all} old mail articles in the groups in question
15382 will be deleted after a while. Use with extreme caution, and don't come
15383 crying to me when you discover that the regexp you used matched the
15384 wrong group and all your important mail has disappeared. Be a
15385 @emph{man}! Or a @emph{woman}! Whatever you feel more comfortable
15388 Most people make most of their mail groups total-expirable, though.
15390 @vindex gnus-inhibit-user-auto-expire
15391 If @code{gnus-inhibit-user-auto-expire} is non-@code{nil}, user marking
15392 commands will not mark an article as expirable, even if the group has
15393 auto-expire turned on.
15397 @subsection Washing Mail
15398 @cindex mail washing
15399 @cindex list server brain damage
15400 @cindex incoming mail treatment
15402 Mailers and list servers are notorious for doing all sorts of really,
15403 really stupid things with mail. ``Hey, RFC 822 doesn't explicitly
15404 prohibit us from adding the string @code{wE aRe ElItE!!!!!1!!} to the
15405 end of all lines passing through our server, so let's do that!!!!1!''
15406 Yes, but RFC 822 wasn't designed to be read by morons. Things that were
15407 considered to be self-evident were not discussed. So. Here we are.
15409 Case in point: The German version of Microsoft Exchange adds @samp{AW:
15410 } to the subjects of replies instead of @samp{Re: }. I could pretend to
15411 be shocked and dismayed by this, but I haven't got the energy. It is to
15414 Gnus provides a plethora of functions for washing articles while
15415 displaying them, but it might be nicer to do the filtering before
15416 storing the mail to disk. For that purpose, we have three hooks and
15417 various functions that can be put in these hooks.
15420 @item nnmail-prepare-incoming-hook
15421 @vindex nnmail-prepare-incoming-hook
15422 This hook is called before doing anything with the mail and is meant for
15423 grand, sweeping gestures. It is called in a buffer that contains all
15424 the new, incoming mail. Functions to be used include:
15427 @item nnheader-ms-strip-cr
15428 @findex nnheader-ms-strip-cr
15429 Remove trailing carriage returns from each line. This is default on
15430 Emacs running on MS machines.
15434 @item nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook
15435 @vindex nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook
15436 This hook is called narrowed to each header. It can be used when
15437 cleaning up the headers. Functions that can be used include:
15440 @item nnmail-remove-leading-whitespace
15441 @findex nnmail-remove-leading-whitespace
15442 Clear leading white space that ``helpful'' listservs have added to the
15443 headers to make them look nice. Aaah.
15445 (Note that this function works on both the header on the body of all
15446 messages, so it is a potentially dangerous function to use (if a body
15447 of a message contains something that looks like a header line). So
15448 rather than fix the bug, it is of course the right solution to make it
15449 into a feature by documenting it.)
15451 @item nnmail-remove-list-identifiers
15452 @findex nnmail-remove-list-identifiers
15453 Some list servers add an identifier---for example, @samp{(idm)}---to the
15454 beginning of all @code{Subject} headers. I'm sure that's nice for
15455 people who use stone age mail readers. This function will remove
15456 strings that match the @code{nnmail-list-identifiers} regexp, which can
15457 also be a list of regexp. @code{nnmail-list-identifiers} may not contain
15460 For instance, if you want to remove the @samp{(idm)} and the
15461 @samp{nagnagnag} identifiers:
15464 (setq nnmail-list-identifiers
15465 '("(idm)" "nagnagnag"))
15468 This can also be done non-destructively with
15469 @code{gnus-list-identifiers}, @xref{Article Hiding}.
15471 @item nnmail-remove-tabs
15472 @findex nnmail-remove-tabs
15473 Translate all @samp{TAB} characters into @samp{SPACE} characters.
15475 @item nnmail-ignore-broken-references
15476 @findex nnmail-ignore-broken-references
15477 @c @findex nnmail-fix-eudora-headers
15480 Some mail user agents (e.g. Eudora and Pegasus) produce broken
15481 @code{References} headers, but correct @code{In-Reply-To} headers. This
15482 function will get rid of the @code{References} header if the headers
15483 contain a line matching the regular expression
15484 @code{nnmail-broken-references-mailers}.
15488 @item nnmail-prepare-incoming-message-hook
15489 @vindex nnmail-prepare-incoming-message-hook
15490 This hook is called narrowed to each message. Functions to be used
15494 @item article-de-quoted-unreadable
15495 @findex article-de-quoted-unreadable
15496 Decode Quoted Readable encoding.
15503 @subsection Duplicates
15505 @vindex nnmail-treat-duplicates
15506 @vindex nnmail-message-id-cache-length
15507 @vindex nnmail-message-id-cache-file
15508 @cindex duplicate mails
15509 If you are a member of a couple of mailing lists, you will sometimes
15510 receive two copies of the same mail. This can be quite annoying, so
15511 @code{nnmail} checks for and treats any duplicates it might find. To do
15512 this, it keeps a cache of old @code{Message-ID}s---
15513 @code{nnmail-message-id-cache-file}, which is @file{~/.nnmail-cache} by
15514 default. The approximate maximum number of @code{Message-ID}s stored
15515 there is controlled by the @code{nnmail-message-id-cache-length}
15516 variable, which is 1000 by default. (So 1000 @code{Message-ID}s will be
15517 stored.) If all this sounds scary to you, you can set
15518 @code{nnmail-treat-duplicates} to @code{warn} (which is what it is by
15519 default), and @code{nnmail} won't delete duplicate mails. Instead it
15520 will insert a warning into the head of the mail saying that it thinks
15521 that this is a duplicate of a different message.
15523 This variable can also be a function. If that's the case, the function
15524 will be called from a buffer narrowed to the message in question with
15525 the @code{Message-ID} as a parameter. The function must return either
15526 @code{nil}, @code{warn}, or @code{delete}.
15528 You can turn this feature off completely by setting the variable to
15531 If you want all the duplicate mails to be put into a special
15532 @dfn{duplicates} group, you could do that using the normal mail split
15536 (setq nnmail-split-fancy
15537 '(| ;; @r{Messages duplicates go to a separate group.}
15538 ("gnus-warning" "duplicat\\(e\\|ion\\) of message" "duplicate")
15539 ;; @r{Message from daemons, postmaster, and the like to another.}
15540 (any mail "mail.misc")
15541 ;; @r{Other rules.}
15547 (setq nnmail-split-methods
15548 '(("duplicates" "^Gnus-Warning:.*duplicate")
15549 ;; @r{Other rules.}
15553 Here's a neat feature: If you know that the recipient reads her mail
15554 with Gnus, and that she has @code{nnmail-treat-duplicates} set to
15555 @code{delete}, you can send her as many insults as you like, just by
15556 using a @code{Message-ID} of a mail that you know that she's already
15557 received. Think of all the fun! She'll never see any of it! Whee!
15560 @node Not Reading Mail
15561 @subsection Not Reading Mail
15563 If you start using any of the mail back ends, they have the annoying
15564 habit of assuming that you want to read mail with them. This might not
15565 be unreasonable, but it might not be what you want.
15567 If you set @code{mail-sources} and @code{nnmail-spool-file} to
15568 @code{nil}, none of the back ends will ever attempt to read incoming
15569 mail, which should help.
15571 @vindex nnbabyl-get-new-mail
15572 @vindex nnmbox-get-new-mail
15573 @vindex nnml-get-new-mail
15574 @vindex nnmh-get-new-mail
15575 @vindex nnfolder-get-new-mail
15576 This might be too much, if, for instance, you are reading mail quite
15577 happily with @code{nnml} and just want to peek at some old Rmail
15578 file you have stashed away with @code{nnbabyl}. All back ends have
15579 variables called back-end-@code{get-new-mail}. If you want to disable
15580 the @code{nnbabyl} mail reading, you edit the virtual server for the
15581 group to have a setting where @code{nnbabyl-get-new-mail} to @code{nil}.
15583 All the mail back ends will call @code{nn}*@code{-prepare-save-mail-hook}
15584 narrowed to the article to be saved before saving it when reading
15588 @node Choosing a Mail Back End
15589 @subsection Choosing a Mail Back End
15591 Gnus will read the mail spool when you activate a mail group. The mail
15592 file is first copied to your home directory. What happens after that
15593 depends on what format you want to store your mail in.
15595 There are six different mail back ends in the standard Gnus, and more
15596 back ends are available separately. The mail back end most people use
15597 (because it is possibly the fastest) is @code{nnml} (@pxref{Mail
15601 * Unix Mail Box:: Using the (quite) standard Un*x mbox.
15602 * Rmail Babyl:: Emacs programs use the Rmail Babyl format.
15603 * Mail Spool:: Store your mail in a private spool?
15604 * MH Spool:: An mhspool-like back end.
15605 * Maildir:: Another one-file-per-message format.
15606 * Mail Folders:: Having one file for each group.
15607 * Comparing Mail Back Ends:: An in-depth looks at pros and cons.
15611 @node Unix Mail Box
15612 @subsubsection Unix Mail Box
15614 @cindex unix mail box
15616 @vindex nnmbox-active-file
15617 @vindex nnmbox-mbox-file
15618 The @dfn{nnmbox} back end will use the standard Un*x mbox file to store
15619 mail. @code{nnmbox} will add extra headers to each mail article to say
15620 which group it belongs in.
15622 Virtual server settings:
15625 @item nnmbox-mbox-file
15626 @vindex nnmbox-mbox-file
15627 The name of the mail box in the user's home directory. Default is
15630 @item nnmbox-active-file
15631 @vindex nnmbox-active-file
15632 The name of the active file for the mail box. Default is
15633 @file{~/.mbox-active}.
15635 @item nnmbox-get-new-mail
15636 @vindex nnmbox-get-new-mail
15637 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnmbox} will read incoming mail and split it
15638 into groups. Default is @code{t}.
15643 @subsubsection Rmail Babyl
15647 @vindex nnbabyl-active-file
15648 @vindex nnbabyl-mbox-file
15649 The @dfn{nnbabyl} back end will use a Babyl mail box (aka. @dfn{Rmail
15650 mbox}) to store mail. @code{nnbabyl} will add extra headers to each
15651 mail article to say which group it belongs in.
15653 Virtual server settings:
15656 @item nnbabyl-mbox-file
15657 @vindex nnbabyl-mbox-file
15658 The name of the Rmail mbox file. The default is @file{~/RMAIL}
15660 @item nnbabyl-active-file
15661 @vindex nnbabyl-active-file
15662 The name of the active file for the rmail box. The default is
15663 @file{~/.rmail-active}
15665 @item nnbabyl-get-new-mail
15666 @vindex nnbabyl-get-new-mail
15667 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnbabyl} will read incoming mail. Default is
15673 @subsubsection Mail Spool
15675 @cindex mail @acronym{NOV} spool
15677 The @dfn{nnml} spool mail format isn't compatible with any other known
15678 format. It should be used with some caution.
15680 @vindex nnml-directory
15681 If you use this back end, Gnus will split all incoming mail into files,
15682 one file for each mail, and put the articles into the corresponding
15683 directories under the directory specified by the @code{nnml-directory}
15684 variable. The default value is @file{~/Mail/}.
15686 You do not have to create any directories beforehand; Gnus will take
15689 If you have a strict limit as to how many files you are allowed to store
15690 in your account, you should not use this back end. As each mail gets its
15691 own file, you might very well occupy thousands of inodes within a few
15692 weeks. If this is no problem for you, and it isn't a problem for you
15693 having your friendly systems administrator walking around, madly,
15694 shouting ``Who is eating all my inodes?! Who? Who!?!'', then you should
15695 know that this is probably the fastest format to use. You do not have
15696 to trudge through a big mbox file just to read your new mail.
15698 @code{nnml} is probably the slowest back end when it comes to article
15699 splitting. It has to create lots of files, and it also generates
15700 @acronym{NOV} databases for the incoming mails. This makes it possibly the
15701 fastest back end when it comes to reading mail.
15703 @cindex self contained nnml servers
15705 When the marks file is used (which it is by default), @code{nnml}
15706 servers have the property that you may backup them using @code{tar} or
15707 similar, and later be able to restore them into Gnus (by adding the
15708 proper @code{nnml} server) and have all your marks be preserved. Marks
15709 for a group are usually stored in the @code{.marks} file (but see
15710 @code{nnml-marks-file-name}) within each @code{nnml} group's directory.
15711 Individual @code{nnml} groups are also possible to backup, use @kbd{G m}
15712 to restore the group (after restoring the backup into the nnml
15715 If for some reason you believe your @file{.marks} files are screwed
15716 up, you can just delete them all. Gnus will then correctly regenerate
15717 them next time it starts.
15719 Virtual server settings:
15722 @item nnml-directory
15723 @vindex nnml-directory
15724 All @code{nnml} directories will be placed under this directory. The
15725 default is the value of @code{message-directory} (whose default value
15728 @item nnml-active-file
15729 @vindex nnml-active-file
15730 The active file for the @code{nnml} server. The default is
15731 @file{~/Mail/active}.
15733 @item nnml-newsgroups-file
15734 @vindex nnml-newsgroups-file
15735 The @code{nnml} group descriptions file. @xref{Newsgroups File
15736 Format}. The default is @file{~/Mail/newsgroups}.
15738 @item nnml-get-new-mail
15739 @vindex nnml-get-new-mail
15740 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnml} will read incoming mail. The default is
15743 @item nnml-nov-is-evil
15744 @vindex nnml-nov-is-evil
15745 If non-@code{nil}, this back end will ignore any @acronym{NOV} files. The
15746 default is @code{nil}.
15748 @item nnml-nov-file-name
15749 @vindex nnml-nov-file-name
15750 The name of the @acronym{NOV} files. The default is @file{.overview}.
15752 @item nnml-prepare-save-mail-hook
15753 @vindex nnml-prepare-save-mail-hook
15754 Hook run narrowed to an article before saving.
15756 @item nnml-marks-is-evil
15757 @vindex nnml-marks-is-evil
15758 If non-@code{nil}, this back end will ignore any @sc{marks} files. The
15759 default is @code{nil}.
15761 @item nnml-marks-file-name
15762 @vindex nnml-marks-file-name
15763 The name of the @dfn{marks} files. The default is @file{.marks}.
15765 @item nnml-use-compressed-files
15766 @vindex nnml-use-compressed-files
15767 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnml} will allow using compressed message
15768 files. This requires @code{auto-compression-mode} to be enabled
15769 (@pxref{Compressed Files, ,Compressed Files, emacs, The Emacs Manual}).
15770 If the value of @code{nnml-use-compressed-files} is a string, it is used
15771 as the file extension specifying the compression program. You can set it
15772 to @samp{.bz2} if your Emacs supports it. A value of @code{t} is
15773 equivalent to @samp{.gz}.
15775 @item nnml-compressed-files-size-threshold
15776 @vindex nnml-compressed-files-size-threshold
15777 Default size threshold for compressed message files. Message files with
15778 bodies larger than that many characters will be automatically compressed
15779 if @code{nnml-use-compressed-files} is non-@code{nil}.
15783 @findex nnml-generate-nov-databases
15784 If your @code{nnml} groups and @acronym{NOV} files get totally out of
15785 whack, you can do a complete update by typing @kbd{M-x
15786 nnml-generate-nov-databases}. This command will trawl through the
15787 entire @code{nnml} hierarchy, looking at each and every article, so it
15788 might take a while to complete. A better interface to this
15789 functionality can be found in the server buffer (@pxref{Server
15794 @subsubsection MH Spool
15796 @cindex mh-e mail spool
15798 @code{nnmh} is just like @code{nnml}, except that is doesn't generate
15799 @acronym{NOV} databases and it doesn't keep an active file or marks
15800 file. This makes @code{nnmh} a @emph{much} slower back end than
15801 @code{nnml}, but it also makes it easier to write procmail scripts
15804 Virtual server settings:
15807 @item nnmh-directory
15808 @vindex nnmh-directory
15809 All @code{nnmh} directories will be located under this directory. The
15810 default is the value of @code{message-directory} (whose default is
15813 @item nnmh-get-new-mail
15814 @vindex nnmh-get-new-mail
15815 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnmh} will read incoming mail. The default is
15819 @vindex nnmh-be-safe
15820 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnmh} will go to ridiculous lengths to make
15821 sure that the articles in the folder are actually what Gnus thinks
15822 they are. It will check date stamps and stat everything in sight, so
15823 setting this to @code{t} will mean a serious slow-down. If you never
15824 use anything but Gnus to read the @code{nnmh} articles, you do not
15825 have to set this variable to @code{t}. The default is @code{nil}.
15830 @subsubsection Maildir
15834 @code{nnmaildir} stores mail in the maildir format, with each maildir
15835 corresponding to a group in Gnus. This format is documented here:
15836 @uref{http://cr.yp.to/proto/maildir.html} and here:
15837 @uref{http://www.qmail.org/man/man5/maildir.html}. @code{nnmaildir}
15838 also stores extra information in the @file{.nnmaildir/} directory
15841 Maildir format was designed to allow concurrent deliveries and
15842 reading, without needing locks. With other back ends, you would have
15843 your mail delivered to a spool of some kind, and then you would
15844 configure Gnus to split mail from that spool into your groups. You
15845 can still do that with @code{nnmaildir}, but the more common
15846 configuration is to have your mail delivered directly to the maildirs
15847 that appear as group in Gnus.
15849 @code{nnmaildir} is designed to be perfectly reliable: @kbd{C-g} will
15850 never corrupt its data in memory, and @code{SIGKILL} will never
15851 corrupt its data in the filesystem.
15853 @code{nnmaildir} stores article marks and @acronym{NOV} data in each
15854 maildir. So you can copy a whole maildir from one Gnus setup to
15855 another, and you will keep your marks.
15857 Virtual server settings:
15861 For each of your @code{nnmaildir} servers (it's very unlikely that
15862 you'd need more than one), you need to create a directory and populate
15863 it with maildirs or symlinks to maildirs (and nothing else; do not
15864 choose a directory already used for other purposes). Each maildir
15865 will be represented in Gnus as a newsgroup on that server; the
15866 filename of the symlink will be the name of the group. Any filenames
15867 in the directory starting with @samp{.} are ignored. The directory is
15868 scanned when you first start Gnus, and each time you type @kbd{g} in
15869 the group buffer; if any maildirs have been removed or added,
15870 @code{nnmaildir} notices at these times.
15872 The value of the @code{directory} parameter should be a Lisp form
15873 which is processed by @code{eval} and @code{expand-file-name} to get
15874 the path of the directory for this server. The form is @code{eval}ed
15875 only when the server is opened; the resulting string is used until the
15876 server is closed. (If you don't know about forms and @code{eval},
15877 don't worry---a simple string will work.) This parameter is not
15878 optional; you must specify it. I don't recommend using
15879 @code{"~/Mail"} or a subdirectory of it; several other parts of Gnus
15880 use that directory by default for various things, and may get confused
15881 if @code{nnmaildir} uses it too. @code{"~/.nnmaildir"} is a typical
15884 @item target-prefix
15885 This should be a Lisp form which is processed by @code{eval} and
15886 @code{expand-file-name}. The form is @code{eval}ed only when the
15887 server is opened; the resulting string is used until the server is
15890 When you create a group on an @code{nnmaildir} server, the maildir is
15891 created with @code{target-prefix} prepended to its name, and a symlink
15892 pointing to that maildir is created, named with the plain group name.
15893 So if @code{directory} is @code{"~/.nnmaildir"} and
15894 @code{target-prefix} is @code{"../maildirs/"}, then when you create
15895 the group @code{foo}, @code{nnmaildir} will create
15896 @file{~/.nnmaildir/../maildirs/foo} as a maildir, and will create
15897 @file{~/.nnmaildir/foo} as a symlink pointing to
15898 @file{../maildirs/foo}.
15900 You can set @code{target-prefix} to a string without any slashes to
15901 create both maildirs and symlinks in the same @code{directory}; in
15902 this case, any maildirs found in @code{directory} whose names start
15903 with @code{target-prefix} will not be listed as groups (but the
15904 symlinks pointing to them will be).
15906 As a special case, if @code{target-prefix} is @code{""} (the default),
15907 then when you create a group, the maildir will be created in
15908 @code{directory} without a corresponding symlink. Beware that you
15909 cannot use @code{gnus-group-delete-group} on such groups without the
15910 @code{force} argument.
15912 @item directory-files
15913 This should be a function with the same interface as
15914 @code{directory-files} (such as @code{directory-files} itself). It is
15915 used to scan the server's @code{directory} for maildirs. This
15916 parameter is optional; the default is
15917 @code{nnheader-directory-files-safe} if
15918 @code{nnheader-directory-files-is-safe} is @code{nil}, and
15919 @code{directory-files} otherwise.
15920 (@code{nnheader-directory-files-is-safe} is checked only once when the
15921 server is opened; if you want to check it each time the directory is
15922 scanned, you'll have to provide your own function that does that.)
15925 If non-@code{nil}, then after scanning for new mail in the group
15926 maildirs themselves as usual, this server will also incorporate mail
15927 the conventional Gnus way, from @code{mail-sources} according to
15928 @code{nnmail-split-methods} or @code{nnmail-split-fancy}. The default
15929 value is @code{nil}.
15931 Do @emph{not} use the same maildir both in @code{mail-sources} and as
15932 an @code{nnmaildir} group. The results might happen to be useful, but
15933 that would be by chance, not by design, and the results might be
15934 different in the future. If your split rules create new groups,
15935 remember to supply a @code{create-directory} server parameter.
15938 @subsubsection Group parameters
15940 @code{nnmaildir} uses several group parameters. It's safe to ignore
15941 all this; the default behavior for @code{nnmaildir} is the same as the
15942 default behavior for other mail back ends: articles are deleted after
15943 one week, etc. Except for the expiry parameters, all this
15944 functionality is unique to @code{nnmaildir}, so you can ignore it if
15945 you're just trying to duplicate the behavior you already have with
15948 If the value of any of these parameters is a vector, the first element
15949 is evaluated as a Lisp form and the result is used, rather than the
15950 original value. If the value is not a vector, the value itself is
15951 evaluated as a Lisp form. (This is why these parameters use names
15952 different from those of other, similar parameters supported by other
15953 back ends: they have different, though similar, meanings.) (For
15954 numbers, strings, @code{nil}, and @code{t}, you can ignore the
15955 @code{eval} business again; for other values, remember to use an extra
15956 quote and wrap the value in a vector when appropriate.)
15960 An integer specifying the minimum age, in seconds, of an article
15961 before it will be expired, or the symbol @code{never} to specify that
15962 articles should never be expired. If this parameter is not set,
15963 @code{nnmaildir} falls back to the usual
15964 @code{nnmail-expiry-wait}(@code{-function}) variables (the
15965 @code{expiry-wait} group parameter overrides @code{nnmail-expiry-wait}
15966 and makes @code{nnmail-expiry-wait-function} ineffective). If you
15967 wanted a value of 3 days, you could use something like @code{[(* 3 24
15968 60 60)]}; @code{nnmaildir} will evaluate the form and use the result.
15969 An article's age is measured starting from the article file's
15970 modification time. Normally, this is the same as the article's
15971 delivery time, but editing an article makes it younger. Moving an
15972 article (other than via expiry) may also make an article younger.
15975 If this is set to a string such as a full Gnus group name, like
15977 "backend+server.address.string:group.name"
15979 and if it is not the name of the same group that the parameter belongs
15980 to, then articles will be moved to the specified group during expiry
15981 before being deleted. @emph{If this is set to an @code{nnmaildir}
15982 group, the article will be just as old in the destination group as it
15983 was in the source group.} So be careful with @code{expire-age} in the
15984 destination group. If this is set to the name of the same group that
15985 the parameter belongs to, then the article is not expired at all. If
15986 you use the vector form, the first element is evaluated once for each
15987 article. So that form can refer to
15988 @code{nnmaildir-article-file-name}, etc., to decide where to put the
15989 article. @emph{Even if this parameter is not set, @code{nnmaildir}
15990 does not fall back to the @code{expiry-target} group parameter or the
15991 @code{nnmail-expiry-target} variable.}
15994 If this is set to @code{t}, @code{nnmaildir} will treat the articles
15995 in this maildir as read-only. This means: articles are not renamed
15996 from @file{new/} into @file{cur/}; articles are only found in
15997 @file{new/}, not @file{cur/}; articles are never deleted; articles
15998 cannot be edited. @file{new/} is expected to be a symlink to the
15999 @file{new/} directory of another maildir---e.g., a system-wide mailbox
16000 containing a mailing list of common interest. Everything in the
16001 maildir outside @file{new/} is @emph{not} treated as read-only, so for
16002 a shared mailbox, you do still need to set up your own maildir (or
16003 have write permission to the shared mailbox); your maildir just won't
16004 contain extra copies of the articles.
16006 @item directory-files
16007 A function with the same interface as @code{directory-files}. It is
16008 used to scan the directories in the maildir corresponding to this
16009 group to find articles. The default is the function specified by the
16010 server's @code{directory-files} parameter.
16012 @item distrust-Lines:
16013 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnmaildir} will always count the lines of an
16014 article, rather than use the @code{Lines:} header field. If
16015 @code{nil}, the header field will be used if present.
16018 A list of mark symbols, such as @code{['(read expire)]}. Whenever
16019 Gnus asks @code{nnmaildir} for article marks, @code{nnmaildir} will
16020 say that all articles have these marks, regardless of whether the
16021 marks stored in the filesystem say so. This is a proof-of-concept
16022 feature that will probably be removed eventually; it ought to be done
16023 in Gnus proper, or abandoned if it's not worthwhile.
16026 A list of mark symbols, such as @code{['(tick expire)]}. Whenever
16027 Gnus asks @code{nnmaildir} for article marks, @code{nnmaildir} will
16028 say that no articles have these marks, regardless of whether the marks
16029 stored in the filesystem say so. @code{never-marks} overrides
16030 @code{always-marks}. This is a proof-of-concept feature that will
16031 probably be removed eventually; it ought to be done in Gnus proper, or
16032 abandoned if it's not worthwhile.
16034 @item nov-cache-size
16035 An integer specifying the size of the @acronym{NOV} memory cache. To
16036 speed things up, @code{nnmaildir} keeps @acronym{NOV} data in memory
16037 for a limited number of articles in each group. (This is probably not
16038 worthwhile, and will probably be removed in the future.) This
16039 parameter's value is noticed only the first time a group is seen after
16040 the server is opened---i.e., when you first start Gnus, typically.
16041 The @acronym{NOV} cache is never resized until the server is closed
16042 and reopened. The default is an estimate of the number of articles
16043 that would be displayed in the summary buffer: a count of articles
16044 that are either marked with @code{tick} or not marked with
16045 @code{read}, plus a little extra.
16048 @subsubsection Article identification
16049 Articles are stored in the @file{cur/} subdirectory of each maildir.
16050 Each article file is named like @code{uniq:info}, where @code{uniq}
16051 contains no colons. @code{nnmaildir} ignores, but preserves, the
16052 @code{:info} part. (Other maildir readers typically use this part of
16053 the filename to store marks.) The @code{uniq} part uniquely
16054 identifies the article, and is used in various places in the
16055 @file{.nnmaildir/} subdirectory of the maildir to store information
16056 about the corresponding article. The full pathname of an article is
16057 available in the variable @code{nnmaildir-article-file-name} after you
16058 request the article in the summary buffer.
16060 @subsubsection NOV data
16061 An article identified by @code{uniq} has its @acronym{NOV} data (used
16062 to generate lines in the summary buffer) stored in
16063 @code{.nnmaildir/nov/uniq}. There is no
16064 @code{nnmaildir-generate-nov-databases} function. (There isn't much
16065 need for it---an article's @acronym{NOV} data is updated automatically
16066 when the article or @code{nnmail-extra-headers} has changed.) You can
16067 force @code{nnmaildir} to regenerate the @acronym{NOV} data for a
16068 single article simply by deleting the corresponding @acronym{NOV}
16069 file, but @emph{beware}: this will also cause @code{nnmaildir} to
16070 assign a new article number for this article, which may cause trouble
16071 with @code{seen} marks, the Agent, and the cache.
16073 @subsubsection Article marks
16074 An article identified by @code{uniq} is considered to have the mark
16075 @code{flag} when the file @file{.nnmaildir/marks/flag/uniq} exists.
16076 When Gnus asks @code{nnmaildir} for a group's marks, @code{nnmaildir}
16077 looks for such files and reports the set of marks it finds. When Gnus
16078 asks @code{nnmaildir} to store a new set of marks, @code{nnmaildir}
16079 creates and deletes the corresponding files as needed. (Actually,
16080 rather than create a new file for each mark, it just creates hard
16081 links to @file{.nnmaildir/markfile}, to save inodes.)
16083 You can invent new marks by creating a new directory in
16084 @file{.nnmaildir/marks/}. You can tar up a maildir and remove it from
16085 your server, untar it later, and keep your marks. You can add and
16086 remove marks yourself by creating and deleting mark files. If you do
16087 this while Gnus is running and your @code{nnmaildir} server is open,
16088 it's best to exit all summary buffers for @code{nnmaildir} groups and
16089 type @kbd{s} in the group buffer first, and to type @kbd{g} or
16090 @kbd{M-g} in the group buffer afterwards. Otherwise, Gnus might not
16091 pick up the changes, and might undo them.
16095 @subsubsection Mail Folders
16097 @cindex mbox folders
16098 @cindex mail folders
16100 @code{nnfolder} is a back end for storing each mail group in a
16101 separate file. Each file is in the standard Un*x mbox format.
16102 @code{nnfolder} will add extra headers to keep track of article
16103 numbers and arrival dates.
16105 @cindex self contained nnfolder servers
16107 When the marks file is used (which it is by default), @code{nnfolder}
16108 servers have the property that you may backup them using @code{tar} or
16109 similar, and later be able to restore them into Gnus (by adding the
16110 proper @code{nnfolder} server) and have all your marks be preserved.
16111 Marks for a group are usually stored in a file named as the mbox file
16112 with @code{.mrk} concatenated to it (but see
16113 @code{nnfolder-marks-file-suffix}) within the @code{nnfolder}
16114 directory. Individual @code{nnfolder} groups are also possible to
16115 backup, use @kbd{G m} to restore the group (after restoring the backup
16116 into the @code{nnfolder} directory).
16118 Virtual server settings:
16121 @item nnfolder-directory
16122 @vindex nnfolder-directory
16123 All the @code{nnfolder} mail boxes will be stored under this
16124 directory. The default is the value of @code{message-directory}
16125 (whose default is @file{~/Mail})
16127 @item nnfolder-active-file
16128 @vindex nnfolder-active-file
16129 The name of the active file. The default is @file{~/Mail/active}.
16131 @item nnfolder-newsgroups-file
16132 @vindex nnfolder-newsgroups-file
16133 The name of the group descriptions file. @xref{Newsgroups File
16134 Format}. The default is @file{~/Mail/newsgroups}
16136 @item nnfolder-get-new-mail
16137 @vindex nnfolder-get-new-mail
16138 If non-@code{nil}, @code{nnfolder} will read incoming mail. The
16139 default is @code{t}
16141 @item nnfolder-save-buffer-hook
16142 @vindex nnfolder-save-buffer-hook
16143 @cindex backup files
16144 Hook run before saving the folders. Note that Emacs does the normal
16145 backup renaming of files even with the @code{nnfolder} buffers. If
16146 you wish to switch this off, you could say something like the
16147 following in your @file{.emacs} file:
16150 (defun turn-off-backup ()
16151 (set (make-local-variable 'backup-inhibited) t))
16153 (add-hook 'nnfolder-save-buffer-hook 'turn-off-backup)
16156 @item nnfolder-delete-mail-hook
16157 @vindex nnfolder-delete-mail-hook
16158 Hook run in a buffer narrowed to the message that is to be deleted.
16159 This function can be used to copy the message to somewhere else, or to
16160 extract some information from it before removing it.
16162 @item nnfolder-nov-is-evil
16163 @vindex nnfolder-nov-is-evil
16164 If non-@code{nil}, this back end will ignore any @acronym{NOV} files. The
16165 default is @code{nil}.
16167 @item nnfolder-nov-file-suffix
16168 @vindex nnfolder-nov-file-suffix
16169 The extension for @acronym{NOV} files. The default is @file{.nov}.
16171 @item nnfolder-nov-directory
16172 @vindex nnfolder-nov-directory
16173 The directory where the @acronym{NOV} files should be stored. If
16174 @code{nil}, @code{nnfolder-directory} is used.
16176 @item nnfolder-marks-is-evil
16177 @vindex nnfolder-marks-is-evil
16178 If non-@code{nil}, this back end will ignore any @sc{marks} files. The
16179 default is @code{nil}.
16181 @item nnfolder-marks-file-suffix
16182 @vindex nnfolder-marks-file-suffix
16183 The extension for @sc{marks} files. The default is @file{.mrk}.
16185 @item nnfolder-marks-directory
16186 @vindex nnfolder-marks-directory
16187 The directory where the @sc{marks} files should be stored. If
16188 @code{nil}, @code{nnfolder-directory} is used.
16193 @findex nnfolder-generate-active-file
16194 @kindex M-x nnfolder-generate-active-file
16195 If you have lots of @code{nnfolder}-like files you'd like to read with
16196 @code{nnfolder}, you can use the @kbd{M-x nnfolder-generate-active-file}
16197 command to make @code{nnfolder} aware of all likely files in
16198 @code{nnfolder-directory}. This only works if you use long file names,
16201 @node Comparing Mail Back Ends
16202 @subsubsection Comparing Mail Back Ends
16204 First, just for terminology, the @dfn{back end} is the common word for a
16205 low-level access method---a transport, if you will, by which something
16206 is acquired. The sense is that one's mail has to come from somewhere,
16207 and so selection of a suitable back end is required in order to get that
16208 mail within spitting distance of Gnus.
16210 The same concept exists for Usenet itself: Though access to articles is
16211 typically done by @acronym{NNTP} these days, once upon a midnight dreary, everyone
16212 in the world got at Usenet by running a reader on the machine where the
16213 articles lay (the machine which today we call an @acronym{NNTP} server), and
16214 access was by the reader stepping into the articles' directory spool
16215 area directly. One can still select between either the @code{nntp} or
16216 @code{nnspool} back ends, to select between these methods, if one happens
16217 actually to live on the server (or can see its spool directly, anyway,
16220 The goal in selecting a mail back end is to pick one which
16221 simultaneously represents a suitable way of dealing with the original
16222 format plus leaving mail in a form that is convenient to use in the
16223 future. Here are some high and low points on each:
16228 UNIX systems have historically had a single, very common, and well-
16229 defined format. All messages arrive in a single @dfn{spool file}, and
16230 they are delineated by a line whose regular expression matches
16231 @samp{^From_}. (My notational use of @samp{_} is to indicate a space,
16232 to make it clear in this instance that this is not the RFC-specified
16233 @samp{From:} header.) Because Emacs and therefore Gnus emanate
16234 historically from the Unix environment, it is simplest if one does not
16235 mess a great deal with the original mailbox format, so if one chooses
16236 this back end, Gnus' primary activity in getting mail from the real spool
16237 area to Gnus' preferred directory is simply to copy it, with no
16238 (appreciable) format change in the process. It is the ``dumbest'' way
16239 to move mail into availability in the Gnus environment. This makes it
16240 fast to move into place, but slow to parse, when Gnus has to look at
16245 Once upon a time, there was the DEC-10 and DEC-20, running operating
16246 systems called TOPS and related things, and the usual (only?) mail
16247 reading environment was a thing called Babyl. I don't know what format
16248 was used for mail landing on the system, but Babyl had its own internal
16249 format to which mail was converted, primarily involving creating a
16250 spool-file-like entity with a scheme for inserting Babyl-specific
16251 headers and status bits above the top of each message in the file.
16252 Rmail was Emacs' first mail reader, it was written by Richard Stallman,
16253 and Stallman came out of that TOPS/Babyl environment, so he wrote Rmail
16254 to understand the mail files folks already had in existence. Gnus (and
16255 VM, for that matter) continue to support this format because it's
16256 perceived as having some good qualities in those mailer-specific
16257 headers/status bits stuff. Rmail itself still exists as well, of
16258 course, and is still maintained by Stallman.
16260 Both of the above forms leave your mail in a single file on your
16261 file system, and they must parse that entire file each time you take a
16266 @code{nnml} is the back end which smells the most as though you were
16267 actually operating with an @code{nnspool}-accessed Usenet system. (In
16268 fact, I believe @code{nnml} actually derived from @code{nnspool} code,
16269 lo these years ago.) One's mail is taken from the original spool file,
16270 and is then cut up into individual message files, 1:1. It maintains a
16271 Usenet-style active file (analogous to what one finds in an INN- or
16272 CNews-based news system in (for instance) @file{/var/lib/news/active},
16273 or what is returned via the @samp{NNTP LIST} verb) and also creates
16274 @dfn{overview} files for efficient group entry, as has been defined for
16275 @acronym{NNTP} servers for some years now. It is slower in mail-splitting,
16276 due to the creation of lots of files, updates to the @code{nnml} active
16277 file, and additions to overview files on a per-message basis, but it is
16278 extremely fast on access because of what amounts to the indexing support
16279 provided by the active file and overviews.
16281 @code{nnml} costs @dfn{inodes} in a big way; that is, it soaks up the
16282 resource which defines available places in the file system to put new
16283 files. Sysadmins take a dim view of heavy inode occupation within
16284 tight, shared file systems. But if you live on a personal machine where
16285 the file system is your own and space is not at a premium, @code{nnml}
16288 It is also problematic using this back end if you are living in a
16289 FAT16-based Windows world, since much space will be wasted on all these
16294 The Rand MH mail-reading system has been around UNIX systems for a very
16295 long time; it operates by splitting one's spool file of messages into
16296 individual files, but with little or no indexing support---@code{nnmh}
16297 is considered to be semantically equivalent to ``@code{nnml} without
16298 active file or overviews''. This is arguably the worst choice, because
16299 one gets the slowness of individual file creation married to the
16300 slowness of access parsing when learning what's new in one's groups.
16304 Basically the effect of @code{nnfolder} is @code{nnmbox} (the first
16305 method described above) on a per-group basis. That is, @code{nnmbox}
16306 itself puts @emph{all} one's mail in one file; @code{nnfolder} provides a
16307 little bit of optimization to this so that each of one's mail groups has
16308 a Unix mail box file. It's faster than @code{nnmbox} because each group
16309 can be parsed separately, and still provides the simple Unix mail box
16310 format requiring minimal effort in moving the mail around. In addition,
16311 it maintains an ``active'' file making it much faster for Gnus to figure
16312 out how many messages there are in each separate group.
16314 If you have groups that are expected to have a massive amount of
16315 messages, @code{nnfolder} is not the best choice, but if you receive
16316 only a moderate amount of mail, @code{nnfolder} is probably the most
16317 friendly mail back end all over.
16321 For configuring expiry and other things, @code{nnmaildir} uses
16322 incompatible group parameters, slightly different from those of other
16325 @code{nnmaildir} is largely similar to @code{nnml}, with some notable
16326 differences. Each message is stored in a separate file, but the
16327 filename is unrelated to the article number in Gnus. @code{nnmaildir}
16328 also stores the equivalent of @code{nnml}'s overview files in one file
16329 per article, so it uses about twice as many inodes as @code{nnml}. (Use
16330 @code{df -i} to see how plentiful your inode supply is.) If this slows
16331 you down or takes up very much space, consider switching to
16332 @uref{http://www.namesys.com/, ReiserFS} or another non-block-structured
16335 Since maildirs don't require locking for delivery, the maildirs you use
16336 as groups can also be the maildirs your mail is directly delivered to.
16337 This means you can skip Gnus' mail splitting if your mail is already
16338 organized into different mailboxes during delivery. A @code{directory}
16339 entry in @code{mail-sources} would have a similar effect, but would
16340 require one set of mailboxes for spooling deliveries (in mbox format,
16341 thus damaging message bodies), and another set to be used as groups (in
16342 whatever format you like). A maildir has a built-in spool, in the
16343 @code{new/} subdirectory. Beware that currently, mail moved from
16344 @code{new/} to @code{cur/} instead of via mail splitting will not
16345 undergo treatment such as duplicate checking.
16347 @code{nnmaildir} stores article marks for a given group in the
16348 corresponding maildir, in a way designed so that it's easy to manipulate
16349 them from outside Gnus. You can tar up a maildir, unpack it somewhere
16350 else, and still have your marks. @code{nnml} also stores marks, but
16351 it's not as easy to work with them from outside Gnus as with
16354 @code{nnmaildir} uses a significant amount of memory to speed things up.
16355 (It keeps in memory some of the things that @code{nnml} stores in files
16356 and that @code{nnmh} repeatedly parses out of message files.) If this
16357 is a problem for you, you can set the @code{nov-cache-size} group
16358 parameter to something small (0 would probably not work, but 1 probably
16359 would) to make it use less memory. This caching will probably be
16360 removed in the future.
16362 Startup is likely to be slower with @code{nnmaildir} than with other
16363 back ends. Everything else is likely to be faster, depending in part
16364 on your file system.
16366 @code{nnmaildir} does not use @code{nnoo}, so you cannot use @code{nnoo}
16367 to write an @code{nnmaildir}-derived back end.
16372 @node Browsing the Web
16373 @section Browsing the Web
16375 @cindex browsing the web
16379 Web-based discussion forums are getting more and more popular. On many
16380 subjects, the web-based forums have become the most important forums,
16381 eclipsing the importance of mailing lists and news groups. The reason
16382 is easy to understand---they are friendly to new users; you just point
16383 and click, and there's the discussion. With mailing lists, you have to
16384 go through a cumbersome subscription procedure, and most people don't
16385 even know what a news group is.
16387 The problem with this scenario is that web browsers are not very good at
16388 being newsreaders. They do not keep track of what articles you've read;
16389 they do not allow you to score on subjects you're interested in; they do
16390 not allow off-line browsing; they require you to click around and drive
16391 you mad in the end.
16393 So---if web browsers suck at reading discussion forums, why not use Gnus
16396 Gnus has been getting a bit of a collection of back ends for providing
16397 interfaces to these sources.
16401 * Web Searches:: Creating groups from articles that match a string.
16402 * Slashdot:: Reading the Slashdot comments.
16403 * Ultimate:: The Ultimate Bulletin Board systems.
16404 * Web Archive:: Reading mailing list archived on web.
16405 * RSS:: Reading RDF site summary.
16406 * Customizing W3:: Doing stuff to Emacs/W3 from Gnus.
16409 All the web sources require Emacs/W3 and the url library or those
16410 alternatives to work.
16412 The main caveat with all these web sources is that they probably won't
16413 work for a very long time. Gleaning information from the @acronym{HTML} data
16414 is guesswork at best, and when the layout is altered, the Gnus back end
16415 will fail. If you have reasonably new versions of these back ends,
16416 though, you should be ok.
16418 One thing all these Web methods have in common is that the Web sources
16419 are often down, unavailable or just plain too slow to be fun. In those
16420 cases, it makes a lot of sense to let the Gnus Agent (@pxref{Gnus
16421 Unplugged}) handle downloading articles, and then you can read them at
16422 leisure from your local disk. No more World Wide Wait for you.
16424 @node Archiving Mail
16425 @subsection Archiving Mail
16426 @cindex archiving mail
16427 @cindex backup of mail
16429 Some of the back ends, notably @code{nnml}, @code{nnfolder}, and
16430 @code{nnmaildir}, now actually store the article marks with each group.
16431 For these servers, archiving and restoring a group while preserving
16432 marks is fairly simple.
16434 (Preserving the group level and group parameters as well still
16435 requires ritual dancing and sacrifices to the @file{.newsrc.eld} deity
16438 To archive an entire @code{nnml}, @code{nnfolder}, or @code{nnmaildir}
16439 server, take a recursive copy of the server directory. There is no need
16440 to shut down Gnus, so archiving may be invoked by @code{cron} or
16441 similar. You restore the data by restoring the directory tree, and
16442 adding a server definition pointing to that directory in Gnus. The
16443 @ref{Article Backlog}, @ref{Asynchronous Fetching} and other things
16444 might interfere with overwriting data, so you may want to shut down Gnus
16445 before you restore the data.
16447 It is also possible to archive individual @code{nnml},
16448 @code{nnfolder}, or @code{nnmaildir} groups, while preserving marks.
16449 For @code{nnml} or @code{nnmaildir}, you copy all files in the group's
16450 directory. For @code{nnfolder} you need to copy both the base folder
16451 file itself (@file{FOO}, say), and the marks file (@file{FOO.mrk} in
16452 this example). Restoring the group is done with @kbd{G m} from the Group
16453 buffer. The last step makes Gnus notice the new directory.
16454 @code{nnmaildir} notices the new directory automatically, so @kbd{G m}
16455 is unnecessary in that case.
16458 @subsection Web Searches
16463 @cindex Usenet searches
16464 @cindex searching the Usenet
16466 It's, like, too neat to search the Usenet for articles that match a
16467 string, but it, like, totally @emph{sucks}, like, totally, to use one of
16468 those, like, Web browsers, and you, like, have to, rilly, like, look at
16469 the commercials, so, like, with Gnus you can do @emph{rad}, rilly,
16470 searches without having to use a browser.
16472 The @code{nnweb} back end allows an easy interface to the mighty search
16473 engine. You create an @code{nnweb} group, enter a search pattern, and
16474 then enter the group and read the articles like you would any normal
16475 group. The @kbd{G w} command in the group buffer (@pxref{Foreign
16476 Groups}) will do this in an easy-to-use fashion.
16478 @code{nnweb} groups don't really lend themselves to being solid
16479 groups---they have a very fleeting idea of article numbers. In fact,
16480 each time you enter an @code{nnweb} group (not even changing the search
16481 pattern), you are likely to get the articles ordered in a different
16482 manner. Not even using duplicate suppression (@pxref{Duplicate
16483 Suppression}) will help, since @code{nnweb} doesn't even know the
16484 @code{Message-ID} of the articles before reading them using some search
16485 engines (Google, for instance). The only possible way to keep track
16486 of which articles you've read is by scoring on the @code{Date}
16487 header---mark all articles posted before the last date you read the
16490 If the search engine changes its output substantially, @code{nnweb}
16491 won't be able to parse it and will fail. One could hardly fault the Web
16492 providers if they were to do this---their @emph{raison d'@^etre} is to
16493 make money off of advertisements, not to provide services to the
16494 community. Since @code{nnweb} washes the ads off all the articles, one
16495 might think that the providers might be somewhat miffed. We'll see.
16497 You must have the @code{url} and @code{W3} package or those alternatives
16498 (try @code{customize-group} on the @samp{mm-url} variable group)
16499 installed to be able to use @code{nnweb}.
16501 Virtual server variables:
16506 What search engine type is being used. The currently supported types
16507 are @code{google}, @code{dejanews}, and @code{gmane}. Note that
16508 @code{dejanews} is an alias to @code{google}.
16511 @vindex nnweb-search
16512 The search string to feed to the search engine.
16514 @item nnweb-max-hits
16515 @vindex nnweb-max-hits
16516 Advisory maximum number of hits per search to display. The default is
16519 @item nnweb-type-definition
16520 @vindex nnweb-type-definition
16521 Type-to-definition alist. This alist says what @code{nnweb} should do
16522 with the various search engine types. The following elements must be
16527 Function to decode the article and provide something that Gnus
16531 Function to create an article number to message header and URL alist.
16534 Function to send the search string to the search engine.
16537 The address the aforementioned function should send the search string
16541 Format string URL to fetch an article by @code{Message-ID}.
16548 @subsection Slashdot
16552 @uref{http://slashdot.org/, Slashdot} is a popular news site, with
16553 lively discussion following the news articles. @code{nnslashdot} will
16554 let you read this forum in a convenient manner.
16556 The easiest way to read this source is to put something like the
16557 following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
16560 (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods
16561 '((nnslashdot "")))
16564 This will make Gnus query the @code{nnslashdot} back end for new comments
16565 and groups. The @kbd{F} command will subscribe each new news article as
16566 a new Gnus group, and you can read the comments by entering these
16567 groups. (Note that the default subscription method is to subscribe new
16568 groups as zombies. Other methods are available (@pxref{Subscription
16571 If you want to remove an old @code{nnslashdot} group, the @kbd{G DEL}
16572 command is the most handy tool (@pxref{Foreign Groups}).
16574 When following up to @code{nnslashdot} comments (or posting new
16575 comments), some light @acronym{HTML}izations will be performed. In
16576 particular, text quoted with @samp{> } will be quoted with
16577 @samp{blockquote} instead, and signatures will have @samp{br} added to
16578 the end of each line. Other than that, you can just write @acronym{HTML}
16579 directly into the message buffer. Note that Slashdot filters out some
16580 @acronym{HTML} forms.
16582 The following variables can be altered to change its behavior:
16585 @item nnslashdot-threaded
16586 Whether @code{nnslashdot} should display threaded groups or not. The
16587 default is @code{t}. To be able to display threads, @code{nnslashdot}
16588 has to retrieve absolutely all comments in a group upon entry. If a
16589 threaded display is not required, @code{nnslashdot} will only retrieve
16590 the comments that are actually wanted by the user. Threading is nicer,
16591 but much, much slower than unthreaded.
16593 @item nnslashdot-login-name
16594 @vindex nnslashdot-login-name
16595 The login name to use when posting.
16597 @item nnslashdot-password
16598 @vindex nnslashdot-password
16599 The password to use when posting.
16601 @item nnslashdot-directory
16602 @vindex nnslashdot-directory
16603 Where @code{nnslashdot} will store its files. The default is
16604 @file{~/News/slashdot/}.
16606 @item nnslashdot-active-url
16607 @vindex nnslashdot-active-url
16608 The @acronym{URL} format string that will be used to fetch the
16609 information on news articles and comments. The default is@*
16610 @samp{http://slashdot.org/search.pl?section=&min=%d}.
16612 @item nnslashdot-comments-url
16613 @vindex nnslashdot-comments-url
16614 The @acronym{URL} format string that will be used to fetch comments.
16616 @item nnslashdot-article-url
16617 @vindex nnslashdot-article-url
16618 The @acronym{URL} format string that will be used to fetch the news
16619 article. The default is
16620 @samp{http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=%s&mode=nocomment}.
16622 @item nnslashdot-threshold
16623 @vindex nnslashdot-threshold
16624 The score threshold. The default is -1.
16626 @item nnslashdot-group-number
16627 @vindex nnslashdot-group-number
16628 The number of old groups, in addition to the ten latest, to keep
16629 updated. The default is 0.
16636 @subsection Ultimate
16638 @cindex Ultimate Bulletin Board
16640 @uref{http://www.ultimatebb.com/, The Ultimate Bulletin Board} is
16641 probably the most popular Web bulletin board system used. It has a
16642 quite regular and nice interface, and it's possible to get the
16643 information Gnus needs to keep groups updated.
16645 The easiest way to get started with @code{nnultimate} is to say
16646 something like the following in the group buffer: @kbd{B nnultimate RET
16647 http://www.tcj.com/messboard/ubbcgi/ RET}. (Substitute the @acronym{URL}
16648 (not including @samp{Ultimate.cgi} or the like at the end) for a forum
16649 you're interested in; there's quite a list of them on the Ultimate web
16650 site.) Then subscribe to the groups you're interested in from the
16651 server buffer, and read them from the group buffer.
16653 The following @code{nnultimate} variables can be altered:
16656 @item nnultimate-directory
16657 @vindex nnultimate-directory
16658 The directory where @code{nnultimate} stores its files. The default is@*
16659 @file{~/News/ultimate/}.
16664 @subsection Web Archive
16666 @cindex Web Archive
16668 Some mailing lists only have archives on Web servers, such as
16669 @uref{http://www.egroups.com/} and
16670 @uref{http://www.mail-archive.com/}. It has a quite regular and nice
16671 interface, and it's possible to get the information Gnus needs to keep
16674 @findex gnus-group-make-warchive-group
16675 The easiest way to get started with @code{nnwarchive} is to say
16676 something like the following in the group buffer: @kbd{M-x
16677 gnus-group-make-warchive-group RET @var{an_egroup} RET egroups RET
16678 www.egroups.com RET @var{your@@email.address} RET}. (Substitute the
16679 @var{an_egroup} with the mailing list you subscribed, the
16680 @var{your@@email.address} with your email address.), or to browse the
16681 back end by @kbd{B nnwarchive RET mail-archive RET}.
16683 The following @code{nnwarchive} variables can be altered:
16686 @item nnwarchive-directory
16687 @vindex nnwarchive-directory
16688 The directory where @code{nnwarchive} stores its files. The default is@*
16689 @file{~/News/warchive/}.
16691 @item nnwarchive-login
16692 @vindex nnwarchive-login
16693 The account name on the web server.
16695 @item nnwarchive-passwd
16696 @vindex nnwarchive-passwd
16697 The password for your account on the web server.
16705 Some web sites have an RDF Site Summary (@acronym{RSS}).
16706 @acronym{RSS} is a format for summarizing headlines from news related
16707 sites (such as BBC or CNN). But basically anything list-like can be
16708 presented as an @acronym{RSS} feed: weblogs, changelogs or recent
16709 changes to a wiki (e.g. @url{http://cliki.net/recent-changes.rdf}).
16711 @acronym{RSS} has a quite regular and nice interface, and it's
16712 possible to get the information Gnus needs to keep groups updated.
16714 Note: you had better use Emacs which supports the @code{utf-8} coding
16715 system because @acronym{RSS} uses UTF-8 for encoding non-@acronym{ASCII}
16716 text by default. It is also used by default for non-@acronym{ASCII}
16719 @kindex G R (Group)
16720 Use @kbd{G R} from the group buffer to subscribe to a feed---you will be
16721 prompted for the location, the title and the description of the feed.
16722 The title, which allows any characters, will be used for the group name
16723 and the name of the group data file. The description can be omitted.
16725 An easy way to get started with @code{nnrss} is to say something like
16726 the following in the group buffer: @kbd{B nnrss RET RET y}, then
16727 subscribe to groups.
16729 The @code{nnrss} back end saves the group data file in
16730 @code{nnrss-directory} (see below) for each @code{nnrss} group. File
16731 names containing non-@acronym{ASCII} characters will be encoded by the
16732 coding system specified with the @code{nnmail-pathname-coding-system}
16733 variable. If it is @code{nil}, in Emacs the coding system defaults to
16734 the value of @code{default-file-name-coding-system}. If you are using
16735 XEmacs and want to use non-@acronym{ASCII} group names, you should set
16736 the value for the @code{nnmail-pathname-coding-system} variable properly.
16738 The @code{nnrss} back end generates @samp{multipart/alternative}
16739 @acronym{MIME} articles in which each contains a @samp{text/plain} part
16740 and a @samp{text/html} part.
16743 You can also use the following commands to import and export your
16744 subscriptions from a file in @acronym{OPML} format (Outline Processor
16747 @defun nnrss-opml-import file
16748 Prompt for an @acronym{OPML} file, and subscribe to each feed in the
16752 @defun nnrss-opml-export
16753 Write your current @acronym{RSS} subscriptions to a buffer in
16754 @acronym{OPML} format.
16757 The following @code{nnrss} variables can be altered:
16760 @item nnrss-directory
16761 @vindex nnrss-directory
16762 The directory where @code{nnrss} stores its files. The default is
16763 @file{~/News/rss/}.
16765 @item nnrss-file-coding-system
16766 @vindex nnrss-file-coding-system
16767 The coding system used when reading and writing the @code{nnrss} groups
16768 data files. The default is the value of
16769 @code{mm-universal-coding-system} (which defaults to @code{emacs-mule}
16770 in Emacs or @code{escape-quoted} in XEmacs).
16772 @item nnrss-ignore-article-fields
16773 @vindex nnrss-ignore-article-fields
16774 Some feeds update constantly article fields during their publications,
16775 e.g. to indicate the number of comments. However, if there is
16776 a difference between the local article and the distant one, the latter
16777 is considered to be new. To avoid this and discard some fields, set this
16778 variable to the list of fields to be ignored. The default is
16779 @code{'(slash:comments)}.
16781 @item nnrss-use-local
16782 @vindex nnrss-use-local
16783 @findex nnrss-generate-download-script
16784 If you set @code{nnrss-use-local} to @code{t}, @code{nnrss} will read
16785 the feeds from local files in @code{nnrss-directory}. You can use
16786 the command @code{nnrss-generate-download-script} to generate a
16787 download script using @command{wget}.
16789 @item nnrss-wash-html-in-text-plain-parts
16790 Non-@code{nil} means that @code{nnrss} renders text in @samp{text/plain}
16791 parts as @acronym{HTML}. The function specified by the
16792 @code{mm-text-html-renderer} variable (@pxref{Display Customization,
16793 ,Display Customization, emacs-mime, The Emacs MIME Manual}) will be used
16794 to render text. If it is @code{nil}, which is the default, text will
16795 simply be folded. Leave it @code{nil} if you prefer to see
16796 @samp{text/html} parts.
16799 The following code may be helpful, if you want to show the description in
16800 the summary buffer.
16803 (add-to-list 'nnmail-extra-headers nnrss-description-field)
16804 (setq gnus-summary-line-format "%U%R%z%I%(%[%4L: %-15,15f%]%) %s%uX\n")
16806 (defun gnus-user-format-function-X (header)
16808 (assq nnrss-description-field (mail-header-extra header))))
16809 (if descr (concat "\n\t" (cdr descr)) "")))
16812 The following code may be useful to open an nnrss url directly from the
16816 (require 'browse-url)
16818 (defun browse-nnrss-url (arg)
16820 (let ((url (assq nnrss-url-field
16823 (assq (gnus-summary-article-number)
16824 gnus-newsgroup-data))))))
16827 (browse-url (cdr url))
16828 (gnus-summary-mark-as-read-forward 1))
16829 (gnus-summary-scroll-up arg))))
16831 (eval-after-load "gnus"
16832 #'(define-key gnus-summary-mode-map
16833 (kbd "<RET>") 'browse-nnrss-url))
16834 (add-to-list 'nnmail-extra-headers nnrss-url-field)
16837 Even if you have added @code{"text/html"} to the
16838 @code{mm-discouraged-alternatives} variable (@pxref{Display
16839 Customization, ,Display Customization, emacs-mime, The Emacs MIME
16840 Manual}) since you don't want to see @acronym{HTML} parts, it might be
16841 more useful especially in @code{nnrss} groups to display
16842 @samp{text/html} parts. Here's an example of setting
16843 @code{mm-discouraged-alternatives} as a group parameter (@pxref{Group
16844 Parameters}) in order to display @samp{text/html} parts only in
16845 @code{nnrss} groups:
16848 ;; @r{Set the default value of @code{mm-discouraged-alternatives}.}
16849 (eval-after-load "gnus-sum"
16851 'gnus-newsgroup-variables
16852 '(mm-discouraged-alternatives
16853 . '("text/html" "image/.*"))))
16855 ;; @r{Display @samp{text/html} parts in @code{nnrss} groups.}
16858 '("\\`nnrss:" (mm-discouraged-alternatives nil)))
16862 @node Customizing W3
16863 @subsection Customizing W3
16869 Gnus uses the url library to fetch web pages and Emacs/W3 (or those
16870 alternatives) to display web pages. Emacs/W3 is documented in its own
16871 manual, but there are some things that may be more relevant for Gnus
16874 For instance, a common question is how to make Emacs/W3 follow links
16875 using the @code{browse-url} functions (which will call some external web
16876 browser like Netscape). Here's one way:
16879 (eval-after-load "w3"
16881 (fset 'w3-fetch-orig (symbol-function 'w3-fetch))
16882 (defun w3-fetch (&optional url target)
16883 (interactive (list (w3-read-url-with-default)))
16884 (if (eq major-mode 'gnus-article-mode)
16886 (w3-fetch-orig url target)))))
16889 Put that in your @file{.emacs} file, and hitting links in W3-rendered
16890 @acronym{HTML} in the Gnus article buffers will use @code{browse-url} to
16897 @cindex @acronym{IMAP}
16899 @acronym{IMAP} is a network protocol for reading mail (or news, or @dots{}),
16900 think of it as a modernized @acronym{NNTP}. Connecting to a @acronym{IMAP}
16901 server is much similar to connecting to a news server, you just
16902 specify the network address of the server.
16904 @acronym{IMAP} has two properties. First, @acronym{IMAP} can do
16905 everything that @acronym{POP} can, it can hence be viewed as a
16906 @acronym{POP++}. Secondly, @acronym{IMAP} is a mail storage protocol,
16907 similar to @acronym{NNTP} being a news storage protocol---however,
16908 @acronym{IMAP} offers more features than @acronym{NNTP} because news
16909 is more or less read-only whereas mail is read-write.
16911 If you want to use @acronym{IMAP} as a @acronym{POP++}, use an imap
16912 entry in @code{mail-sources}. With this, Gnus will fetch mails from
16913 the @acronym{IMAP} server and store them on the local disk. This is
16914 not the usage described in this section---@xref{Mail Sources}.
16916 If you want to use @acronym{IMAP} as a mail storage protocol, use an nnimap
16917 entry in @code{gnus-secondary-select-methods}. With this, Gnus will
16918 manipulate mails stored on the @acronym{IMAP} server. This is the kind of
16919 usage explained in this section.
16921 A server configuration in @file{~/.gnus.el} with a few @acronym{IMAP}
16922 servers might look something like the following. (Note that for
16923 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL}, you need external programs and libraries,
16927 (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods
16928 '((nnimap "simpleserver") ; @r{no special configuration}
16929 ; @r{perhaps a ssh port forwarded server:}
16931 (nnimap-address "localhost")
16932 (nnimap-server-port 1430))
16933 ; @r{a UW server running on localhost}
16935 (nnimap-server-port 143)
16936 (nnimap-address "localhost")
16937 (nnimap-list-pattern ("INBOX" "mail/*")))
16938 ; @r{anonymous public cyrus server:}
16939 (nnimap "cyrus.andrew.cmu.edu"
16940 (nnimap-authenticator anonymous)
16941 (nnimap-list-pattern "archive.*")
16942 (nnimap-stream network))
16943 ; @r{a ssl server on a non-standard port:}
16945 (nnimap-address "vic20.somewhere.com")
16946 (nnimap-server-port 9930)
16947 (nnimap-stream ssl))))
16950 After defining the new server, you can subscribe to groups on the
16951 server using normal Gnus commands such as @kbd{U} in the Group Buffer
16952 (@pxref{Subscription Commands}) or via the Server Buffer
16953 (@pxref{Server Buffer}).
16955 The following variables can be used to create a virtual @code{nnimap}
16960 @item nnimap-address
16961 @vindex nnimap-address
16963 The address of the remote @acronym{IMAP} server. Defaults to the virtual
16964 server name if not specified.
16966 @item nnimap-server-port
16967 @vindex nnimap-server-port
16968 Port on server to contact. Defaults to port 143, or 993 for @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL}.
16970 Note that this should be an integer, example server specification:
16973 (nnimap "mail.server.com"
16974 (nnimap-server-port 4711))
16977 @item nnimap-list-pattern
16978 @vindex nnimap-list-pattern
16979 String or list of strings of mailboxes to limit available groups to.
16980 This is used when the server has very many mailboxes and you're only
16981 interested in a few---some servers export your home directory via
16982 @acronym{IMAP}, you'll probably want to limit the mailboxes to those in
16983 @file{~/Mail/*} then.
16985 The string can also be a cons of REFERENCE and the string as above, what
16986 REFERENCE is used for is server specific, but on the University of
16987 Washington server it's a directory that will be concatenated with the
16990 Example server specification:
16993 (nnimap "mail.server.com"
16994 (nnimap-list-pattern ("INBOX" "Mail/*" "alt.sex.*"
16995 ("~friend/Mail/" . "list/*"))))
16998 @item nnimap-stream
16999 @vindex nnimap-stream
17000 The type of stream used to connect to your server. By default, nnimap
17001 will detect and automatically use all of the below, with the exception
17002 of @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL}. (@acronym{IMAP} over
17003 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} is being replaced by STARTTLS, which can
17004 be automatically detected, but it's not widely deployed yet.)
17006 Example server specification:
17009 (nnimap "mail.server.com"
17010 (nnimap-stream ssl))
17013 Please note that the value of @code{nnimap-stream} is a symbol!
17017 @dfn{gssapi:} Connect with GSSAPI (usually Kerberos 5). Requires the
17018 @samp{gsasl} or @samp{imtest} program.
17020 @dfn{kerberos4:} Connect with Kerberos 4. Requires the @samp{imtest} program.
17022 @dfn{starttls:} Connect via the STARTTLS extension (similar to
17023 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL}). Requires the external library @samp{starttls.el} and program
17026 @dfn{tls:} Connect through @acronym{TLS}. Requires GNUTLS (the program
17027 @samp{gnutls-cli}).
17029 @dfn{ssl:} Connect through @acronym{SSL}. Requires OpenSSL (the program
17030 @samp{openssl}) or SSLeay (@samp{s_client}).
17032 @dfn{shell:} Use a shell command to start @acronym{IMAP} connection.
17034 @dfn{network:} Plain, TCP/IP network connection.
17037 @vindex imap-kerberos4-program
17038 The @samp{imtest} program is shipped with Cyrus IMAPD. If you're
17039 using @samp{imtest} from Cyrus IMAPD < 2.0.14 (which includes version
17040 1.5.x and 1.6.x) you need to frob @code{imap-process-connection-type}
17041 to make @code{imap.el} use a pty instead of a pipe when communicating
17042 with @samp{imtest}. You will then suffer from a line length
17043 restrictions on @acronym{IMAP} commands, which might make Gnus seem to hang
17044 indefinitely if you have many articles in a mailbox. The variable
17045 @code{imap-kerberos4-program} contain parameters to pass to the imtest
17048 For @acronym{TLS} connection, the @code{gnutls-cli} program from GNUTLS is
17049 needed. It is available from
17050 @uref{http://www.gnu.org/software/gnutls/}.
17052 @vindex imap-gssapi-program
17053 This parameter specifies a list of command lines that invoke a GSSAPI
17054 authenticated @acronym{IMAP} stream in a subshell. They are tried
17055 sequentially until a connection is made, or the list has been
17056 exhausted. By default, @samp{gsasl} from GNU SASL, available from
17057 @uref{http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/}, and the @samp{imtest}
17058 program from Cyrus IMAPD (see @code{imap-kerberos4-program}), are
17061 @vindex imap-ssl-program
17062 For @acronym{SSL} connections, the OpenSSL program is available from
17063 @uref{http://www.openssl.org/}. OpenSSL was formerly known as SSLeay,
17064 and nnimap support it too---although the most recent versions of
17065 SSLeay, 0.9.x, are known to have serious bugs making it
17066 useless. Earlier versions, especially 0.8.x, of SSLeay are known to
17067 work. The variable @code{imap-ssl-program} contain parameters to pass
17070 @vindex imap-shell-program
17071 @vindex imap-shell-host
17072 For @acronym{IMAP} connections using the @code{shell} stream, the
17073 variable @code{imap-shell-program} specify what program to call. Make
17074 sure nothing is interfering with the output of the program, e.g., don't
17075 forget to redirect the error output to the void.
17077 @item nnimap-authenticator
17078 @vindex nnimap-authenticator
17080 The authenticator used to connect to the server. By default, nnimap
17081 will use the most secure authenticator your server is capable of.
17083 Example server specification:
17086 (nnimap "mail.server.com"
17087 (nnimap-authenticator anonymous))
17090 Please note that the value of @code{nnimap-authenticator} is a symbol!
17094 @dfn{gssapi:} GSSAPI (usually kerberos 5) authentication. Requires
17095 external program @code{gsasl} or @code{imtest}.
17097 @dfn{kerberos4:} Kerberos 4 authentication. Requires external program
17100 @dfn{digest-md5:} Encrypted username/password via DIGEST-MD5. Requires
17101 external library @code{digest-md5.el}.
17103 @dfn{cram-md5:} Encrypted username/password via CRAM-MD5.
17105 @dfn{login:} Plain-text username/password via LOGIN.
17107 @dfn{anonymous:} Login as ``anonymous'', supplying your email address as password.
17110 @item nnimap-expunge-on-close
17112 @vindex nnimap-expunge-on-close
17113 Unlike Parmenides the @acronym{IMAP} designers have decided things that
17114 don't exist actually do exist. More specifically, @acronym{IMAP} has
17115 this concept of marking articles @code{Deleted} which doesn't actually
17116 delete them, and this (marking them @code{Deleted}, that is) is what
17117 nnimap does when you delete an article in Gnus (with @kbd{B DEL} or
17120 Since the articles aren't really removed when we mark them with the
17121 @code{Deleted} flag we'll need a way to actually delete them. Feel like
17122 running in circles yet?
17124 Traditionally, nnimap has removed all articles marked as @code{Deleted}
17125 when closing a mailbox but this is now configurable by this server
17128 The possible options are:
17133 The default behavior, delete all articles marked as ``Deleted'' when
17136 Never actually delete articles. Currently there is no way of showing
17137 the articles marked for deletion in nnimap, but other @acronym{IMAP} clients
17138 may allow you to do this. If you ever want to run the EXPUNGE command
17139 manually, @xref{Expunging mailboxes}.
17141 When closing mailboxes, nnimap will ask if you wish to expunge deleted
17146 @item nnimap-importantize-dormant
17147 @vindex nnimap-importantize-dormant
17149 If non-@code{nil} (the default), marks dormant articles as ticked (as
17150 well), for other @acronym{IMAP} clients. Within Gnus, dormant articles will
17151 naturally still (only) be marked as dormant. This is to make dormant
17152 articles stand out, just like ticked articles, in other @acronym{IMAP}
17153 clients. (In other words, Gnus has two ``Tick'' marks and @acronym{IMAP}
17156 Probably the only reason for frobbing this would be if you're trying
17157 enable per-user persistent dormant flags, using something like:
17160 (setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-flag-alist)
17161 (format "gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name)))
17162 (setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-predicate-alist)
17163 (format "KEYWORD gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name)))
17166 In this case, you would not want the per-user dormant flag showing up
17167 as ticked for other users.
17169 @item nnimap-expunge-search-string
17171 @vindex nnimap-expunge-search-string
17172 @cindex expiring @acronym{IMAP} mail
17174 This variable contain the @acronym{IMAP} search command sent to server when
17175 searching for articles eligible for expiring. The default is
17176 @code{"UID %s NOT SINCE %s"}, where the first @code{%s} is replaced by
17177 UID set and the second @code{%s} is replaced by a date.
17179 Probably the only useful value to change this to is
17180 @code{"UID %s NOT SENTSINCE %s"}, which makes nnimap use the Date: in
17181 messages instead of the internal article date. See section 6.4.4 of
17182 RFC 2060 for more information on valid strings.
17184 However, if @code{nnimap-search-uids-not-since-is-evil}
17185 is true, this variable has no effect since the search logic
17186 is reversed, as described below.
17188 @item nnimap-authinfo-file
17189 @vindex nnimap-authinfo-file
17191 A file containing credentials used to log in on servers. The format is
17192 (almost) the same as the @code{ftp} @file{~/.netrc} file. See the
17193 variable @code{nntp-authinfo-file} for exact syntax; also see
17194 @ref{NNTP}. An example of an .authinfo line for an IMAP server, is:
17197 machine students.uio.no login larsi password geheimnis port imap
17200 Note that it should be @code{port imap}, or @code{port 143}, if you
17201 use a @code{nnimap-stream} of @code{tls} or @code{ssl}, even if the
17202 actual port number used is port 993 for secured IMAP. For
17203 convenience, Gnus will accept @code{port imaps} as a synonym of
17206 @item nnimap-need-unselect-to-notice-new-mail
17207 @vindex nnimap-need-unselect-to-notice-new-mail
17209 Unselect mailboxes before looking for new mail in them. Some servers
17210 seem to need this under some circumstances; it was reported that
17213 @item nnimap-nov-is-evil
17214 @vindex nnimap-nov-is-evil
17215 @cindex Courier @acronym{IMAP} server
17216 @cindex @acronym{NOV}
17218 Never generate or use a local @acronym{NOV} database. Defaults to the
17219 value of @code{gnus-agent}.
17221 Using a @acronym{NOV} database usually makes header fetching much
17222 faster, but it uses the @code{UID SEARCH UID} command, which is very
17223 slow on some servers (notably some versions of Courier). Since the Gnus
17224 Agent caches the information in the @acronym{NOV} database without using
17225 the slow command, this variable defaults to true if the Agent is in use,
17226 and false otherwise.
17228 @item nnimap-search-uids-not-since-is-evil
17229 @vindex nnimap-search-uids-not-since-is-evil
17230 @cindex Courier @acronym{IMAP} server
17231 @cindex expiring @acronym{IMAP} mail
17233 Avoid the @code{UID SEARCH UID @var{message numbers} NOT SINCE
17234 @var{date}} command, which is slow on some @acronym{IMAP} servers
17235 (notably, some versions of Courier). Instead, use @code{UID SEARCH SINCE
17236 @var{date}} and prune the list of expirable articles within Gnus.
17238 When Gnus expires your mail (@pxref{Expiring Mail}), it starts with a
17239 list of expirable articles and asks the IMAP server questions like ``Of
17240 these articles, which ones are older than a week?'' While this seems
17241 like a perfectly reasonable question, some IMAP servers take a long time
17242 to answer it, since they seemingly go looking into every old article to
17243 see if it is one of the expirable ones. Curiously, the question ``Of
17244 @emph{all} articles, which ones are newer than a week?'' seems to be
17245 much faster to answer, so setting this variable causes Gnus to ask this
17246 question and figure out the answer to the real question itself.
17248 This problem can really sneak up on you: when you first configure Gnus,
17249 everything works fine, but once you accumulate a couple thousand
17250 messages, you start cursing Gnus for being so slow. On the other hand,
17251 if you get a lot of email within a week, setting this variable will
17252 cause a lot of network traffic between Gnus and the IMAP server.
17254 @item nnimap-logout-timeout
17255 @vindex nnimap-logout-timeout
17257 There is a case where a connection to a @acronym{IMAP} server is unable
17258 to close, when connecting to the server via a certain kind of network,
17259 e.g. @acronym{VPN}. In that case, it will be observed that a connection
17260 between Emacs and the local network looks alive even if the server has
17261 closed a connection for some reason (typically, a timeout).
17262 Consequently, Emacs continues waiting for a response from the server for
17263 the @code{LOGOUT} command that Emacs sent, or hangs in other words. If
17264 you are in such a network, setting this variable to a number of seconds
17265 will be helpful. If it is set, a hung connection will be closed
17266 forcibly, after this number of seconds from the time Emacs sends the
17267 @code{LOGOUT} command. It should not be too small value but too large
17268 value will be inconvenient too. Perhaps the value 1.0 will be a good
17269 candidate but it might be worth trying some other values.
17271 Example server specification:
17274 (nnimap "mail.server.com"
17275 (nnimap-logout-timeout 1.0))
17281 * Splitting in IMAP:: Splitting mail with nnimap.
17282 * Expiring in IMAP:: Expiring mail with nnimap.
17283 * Editing IMAP ACLs:: Limiting/enabling other users access to a mailbox.
17284 * Expunging mailboxes:: Equivalent of a ``compress mailbox'' button.
17285 * A note on namespaces:: How to (not) use @acronym{IMAP} namespace in Gnus.
17286 * Debugging IMAP:: What to do when things don't work.
17291 @node Splitting in IMAP
17292 @subsection Splitting in IMAP
17293 @cindex splitting imap mail
17295 Splitting is something Gnus users have loved and used for years, and now
17296 the rest of the world is catching up. Yeah, dream on, not many
17297 @acronym{IMAP} servers have server side splitting and those that have
17298 splitting seem to use some non-standard protocol. This means that
17299 @acronym{IMAP} support for Gnus has to do its own splitting.
17303 (Incidentally, people seem to have been dreaming on, and Sieve has
17304 gaining a market share and is supported by several IMAP servers.
17305 Fortunately, Gnus support it too, @xref{Sieve Commands}.)
17307 Here are the variables of interest:
17311 @item nnimap-split-crosspost
17312 @cindex splitting, crosspost
17314 @vindex nnimap-split-crosspost
17316 If non-@code{nil}, do crossposting if several split methods match the
17317 mail. If @code{nil}, the first match in @code{nnimap-split-rule}
17318 found will be used.
17320 Nnmail equivalent: @code{nnmail-crosspost}.
17322 @item nnimap-split-inbox
17323 @cindex splitting, inbox
17325 @vindex nnimap-split-inbox
17327 A string or a list of strings that gives the name(s) of @acronym{IMAP}
17328 mailboxes to split from. Defaults to @code{nil}, which means that
17329 splitting is disabled!
17332 (setq nnimap-split-inbox
17333 '("INBOX" ("~/friend/Mail" . "lists/*") "lists.imap"))
17336 No nnmail equivalent.
17338 @item nnimap-split-rule
17339 @cindex splitting, rules
17340 @vindex nnimap-split-rule
17342 New mail found in @code{nnimap-split-inbox} will be split according to
17345 This variable contains a list of lists, where the first element in the
17346 sublist gives the name of the @acronym{IMAP} mailbox to move articles
17347 matching the regexp in the second element in the sublist. Got that?
17348 Neither did I, we need examples.
17351 (setq nnimap-split-rule
17353 "^Sender: owner-nnimap@@vic20.globalcom.se")
17354 ("INBOX.junk" "^Subject:.*MAKE MONEY")
17355 ("INBOX.private" "")))
17358 This will put all articles from the nnimap mailing list into mailbox
17359 INBOX.nnimap, all articles containing MAKE MONEY in the Subject: line
17360 into INBOX.junk and everything else in INBOX.private.
17362 The first string may contain @samp{\\1} forms, like the ones used by
17363 replace-match to insert sub-expressions from the matched text. For
17367 ("INBOX.lists.\\1" "^Sender: owner-\\([a-z-]+\\)@@")
17370 The first element can also be the symbol @code{junk} to indicate that
17371 matching messages should simply be deleted. Use with care.
17373 The second element can also be a function. In that case, it will be
17374 called with the first element of the rule as the argument, in a buffer
17375 containing the headers of the article. It should return a
17376 non-@code{nil} value if it thinks that the mail belongs in that group.
17378 Nnmail users might recollect that the last regexp had to be empty to
17379 match all articles (like in the example above). This is not required in
17380 nnimap. Articles not matching any of the regexps will not be moved out
17381 of your inbox. (This might affect performance if you keep lots of
17382 unread articles in your inbox, since the splitting code would go over
17383 them every time you fetch new mail.)
17385 These rules are processed from the beginning of the alist toward the
17386 end. The first rule to make a match will ``win'', unless you have
17387 crossposting enabled. In that case, all matching rules will ``win''.
17389 This variable can also have a function as its value, the function will
17390 be called with the headers narrowed and should return a group where it
17391 thinks the article should be split to. See @code{nnimap-split-fancy}.
17393 The splitting code tries to create mailboxes if it needs to.
17395 To allow for different split rules on different virtual servers, and
17396 even different split rules in different inboxes on the same server,
17397 the syntax of this variable have been extended along the lines of:
17400 (setq nnimap-split-rule
17401 '(("my1server" (".*" (("ding" "ding@@gnus.org")
17402 ("junk" "From:.*Simon"))))
17403 ("my2server" ("INBOX" nnimap-split-fancy))
17404 ("my[34]server" (".*" (("private" "To:.*Simon")
17405 ("junk" my-junk-func))))))
17408 The virtual server name is in fact a regexp, so that the same rules
17409 may apply to several servers. In the example, the servers
17410 @code{my3server} and @code{my4server} both use the same rules.
17411 Similarly, the inbox string is also a regexp. The actual splitting
17412 rules are as before, either a function, or a list with group/regexp or
17413 group/function elements.
17415 Nnmail equivalent: @code{nnmail-split-methods}.
17417 @item nnimap-split-predicate
17419 @vindex nnimap-split-predicate
17421 Mail matching this predicate in @code{nnimap-split-inbox} will be
17422 split, it is a string and the default is @samp{UNSEEN UNDELETED}.
17424 This might be useful if you use another @acronym{IMAP} client to read mail in
17425 your inbox but would like Gnus to split all articles in the inbox
17426 regardless of readedness. Then you might change this to
17429 @item nnimap-split-fancy
17430 @cindex splitting, fancy
17431 @findex nnimap-split-fancy
17432 @vindex nnimap-split-fancy
17434 It's possible to set @code{nnimap-split-rule} to
17435 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} if you want to use fancy
17436 splitting. @xref{Fancy Mail Splitting}.
17438 However, to be able to have different fancy split rules for nnmail and
17439 nnimap back ends you can set @code{nnimap-split-rule} to
17440 @code{nnimap-split-fancy} and define the nnimap specific fancy split
17441 rule in @code{nnimap-split-fancy}.
17446 (setq nnimap-split-rule 'nnimap-split-fancy
17447 nnimap-split-fancy ...)
17450 Nnmail equivalent: @code{nnmail-split-fancy}.
17452 @item nnimap-split-download-body
17453 @findex nnimap-split-download-body
17454 @vindex nnimap-split-download-body
17456 Set to non-@code{nil} to download entire articles during splitting.
17457 This is generally not required, and will slow things down
17458 considerably. You may need it if you want to use an advanced
17459 splitting function that analyzes the body to split the article.
17463 @node Expiring in IMAP
17464 @subsection Expiring in IMAP
17465 @cindex expiring @acronym{IMAP} mail
17467 Even though @code{nnimap} is not a proper @code{nnmail} derived back
17468 end, it supports most features in regular expiring (@pxref{Expiring
17469 Mail}). Unlike splitting in @acronym{IMAP} (@pxref{Splitting in
17470 IMAP}) it does not clone the @code{nnmail} variables (i.e., creating
17471 @var{nnimap-expiry-wait}) but reuse the @code{nnmail} variables. What
17472 follows below are the variables used by the @code{nnimap} expiry
17475 A note on how the expire mark is stored on the @acronym{IMAP} server is
17476 appropriate here as well. The expire mark is translated into a
17477 @code{imap} client specific mark, @code{gnus-expire}, and stored on the
17478 message. This means that likely only Gnus will understand and treat
17479 the @code{gnus-expire} mark properly, although other clients may allow
17480 you to view client specific flags on the message. It also means that
17481 your server must support permanent storage of client specific flags on
17482 messages. Most do, fortunately.
17484 If expiring @acronym{IMAP} mail seems very slow, try setting the server
17485 variable @code{nnimap-search-uids-not-since-is-evil}.
17489 @item nnmail-expiry-wait
17490 @item nnmail-expiry-wait-function
17492 These variables are fully supported. The expire value can be a
17493 number, the symbol @code{immediate} or @code{never}.
17495 @item nnmail-expiry-target
17497 This variable is supported, and internally implemented by calling the
17498 @code{nnmail} functions that handle this. It contains an optimization
17499 that if the destination is a @acronym{IMAP} group on the same server, the
17500 article is copied instead of appended (that is, uploaded again).
17504 @node Editing IMAP ACLs
17505 @subsection Editing IMAP ACLs
17506 @cindex editing imap acls
17507 @cindex Access Control Lists
17508 @cindex Editing @acronym{IMAP} ACLs
17509 @kindex G l (Group)
17510 @findex gnus-group-nnimap-edit-acl
17512 ACL stands for Access Control List. ACLs are used in @acronym{IMAP} for
17513 limiting (or enabling) other users access to your mail boxes. Not all
17514 @acronym{IMAP} servers support this, this function will give an error if it
17517 To edit an ACL for a mailbox, type @kbd{G l}
17518 (@code{gnus-group-edit-nnimap-acl}) and you'll be presented with an ACL
17519 editing window with detailed instructions.
17521 Some possible uses:
17525 Giving ``anyone'' the ``lrs'' rights (lookup, read, keep seen/unseen flags)
17526 on your mailing list mailboxes enables other users on the same server to
17527 follow the list without subscribing to it.
17529 At least with the Cyrus server, you are required to give the user
17530 ``anyone'' posting ("p") capabilities to have ``plussing'' work (that is,
17531 mail sent to user+mailbox@@domain ending up in the @acronym{IMAP} mailbox
17535 @node Expunging mailboxes
17536 @subsection Expunging mailboxes
17540 @cindex manual expunging
17541 @kindex G x (Group)
17542 @findex gnus-group-nnimap-expunge
17544 If you're using the @code{never} setting of @code{nnimap-expunge-on-close},
17545 you may want the option of expunging all deleted articles in a mailbox
17546 manually. This is exactly what @kbd{G x} does.
17548 Currently there is no way of showing deleted articles, you can just
17551 @node A note on namespaces
17552 @subsection A note on namespaces
17553 @cindex IMAP namespace
17556 The @acronym{IMAP} protocol has a concept called namespaces, described
17557 by the following text in the RFC2060:
17560 5.1.2. Mailbox Namespace Naming Convention
17562 By convention, the first hierarchical element of any mailbox name
17563 which begins with "#" identifies the "namespace" of the remainder of
17564 the name. This makes it possible to disambiguate between different
17565 types of mailbox stores, each of which have their own namespaces.
17567 For example, implementations which offer access to USENET
17568 newsgroups MAY use the "#news" namespace to partition the USENET
17569 newsgroup namespace from that of other mailboxes. Thus, the
17570 comp.mail.misc newsgroup would have an mailbox name of
17571 "#news.comp.mail.misc", and the name "comp.mail.misc" could refer
17572 to a different object (e.g. a user's private mailbox).
17575 While there is nothing in this text that warrants concern for the
17576 @acronym{IMAP} implementation in Gnus, some servers use namespace
17577 prefixes in a way that does not work with how Gnus uses mailbox names.
17579 Specifically, University of Washington's @acronym{IMAP} server uses
17580 mailbox names like @code{#driver.mbx/read-mail} which are valid only
17581 in the @sc{create} and @sc{append} commands. After the mailbox is
17582 created (or a messages is appended to a mailbox), it must be accessed
17583 without the namespace prefix, i.e. @code{read-mail}. Since Gnus do
17584 not make it possible for the user to guarantee that user entered
17585 mailbox names will only be used with the CREATE and APPEND commands,
17586 you should simply not use the namespace prefixed mailbox names in
17589 See the UoW IMAPD documentation for the @code{#driver.*/} prefix
17590 for more information on how to use the prefixes. They are a power
17591 tool and should be used only if you are sure what the effects are.
17593 @node Debugging IMAP
17594 @subsection Debugging IMAP
17595 @cindex IMAP debugging
17596 @cindex protocol dump (IMAP)
17598 @acronym{IMAP} is a complex protocol, more so than @acronym{NNTP} or
17599 @acronym{POP3}. Implementation bugs are not unlikely, and we do our
17600 best to fix them right away. If you encounter odd behavior, chances
17601 are that either the server or Gnus is buggy.
17603 If you are familiar with network protocols in general, you will
17604 probably be able to extract some clues from the protocol dump of the
17605 exchanges between Gnus and the server. Even if you are not familiar
17606 with network protocols, when you include the protocol dump in
17607 @acronym{IMAP}-related bug reports you are helping us with data
17608 critical to solving the problem. Therefore, we strongly encourage you
17609 to include the protocol dump when reporting IMAP bugs in Gnus.
17613 Because the protocol dump, when enabled, generates lots of data, it is
17614 disabled by default. You can enable it by setting @code{imap-log} as
17621 This instructs the @code{imap.el} package to log any exchanges with
17622 the server. The log is stored in the buffer @samp{*imap-log*}. Look
17623 for error messages, which sometimes are tagged with the keyword
17624 @code{BAD}---but when submitting a bug, make sure to include all the
17627 @node Other Sources
17628 @section Other Sources
17630 Gnus can do more than just read news or mail. The methods described
17631 below allow Gnus to view directories and files as if they were
17635 * Directory Groups:: You can read a directory as if it was a newsgroup.
17636 * Anything Groups:: Dired? Who needs dired?
17637 * Document Groups:: Single files can be the basis of a group.
17638 * SOUP:: Reading @sc{soup} packets ``offline''.
17639 * Mail-To-News Gateways:: Posting articles via mail-to-news gateways.
17643 @node Directory Groups
17644 @subsection Directory Groups
17646 @cindex directory groups
17648 If you have a directory that has lots of articles in separate files in
17649 it, you might treat it as a newsgroup. The files have to have numerical
17652 This might be an opportune moment to mention @code{ange-ftp} (and its
17653 successor @code{efs}), that most wonderful of all wonderful Emacs
17654 packages. When I wrote @code{nndir}, I didn't think much about it---a
17655 back end to read directories. Big deal.
17657 @code{ange-ftp} changes that picture dramatically. For instance, if you
17658 enter the @code{ange-ftp} file name
17659 @file{/ftp.hpc.uh.edu:/pub/emacs/ding-list/} as the directory name,
17660 @code{ange-ftp} or @code{efs} will actually allow you to read this
17661 directory over at @samp{sina} as a newsgroup. Distributed news ahoy!
17663 @code{nndir} will use @acronym{NOV} files if they are present.
17665 @code{nndir} is a ``read-only'' back end---you can't delete or expire
17666 articles with this method. You can use @code{nnmh} or @code{nnml} for
17667 whatever you use @code{nndir} for, so you could switch to any of those
17668 methods if you feel the need to have a non-read-only @code{nndir}.
17671 @node Anything Groups
17672 @subsection Anything Groups
17675 From the @code{nndir} back end (which reads a single spool-like
17676 directory), it's just a hop and a skip to @code{nneething}, which
17677 pretends that any arbitrary directory is a newsgroup. Strange, but
17680 When @code{nneething} is presented with a directory, it will scan this
17681 directory and assign article numbers to each file. When you enter such
17682 a group, @code{nneething} must create ``headers'' that Gnus can use.
17683 After all, Gnus is a newsreader, in case you're forgetting.
17684 @code{nneething} does this in a two-step process. First, it snoops each
17685 file in question. If the file looks like an article (i.e., the first
17686 few lines look like headers), it will use this as the head. If this is
17687 just some arbitrary file without a head (e.g. a C source file),
17688 @code{nneething} will cobble up a header out of thin air. It will use
17689 file ownership, name and date and do whatever it can with these
17692 All this should happen automatically for you, and you will be presented
17693 with something that looks very much like a newsgroup. Totally like a
17694 newsgroup, to be precise. If you select an article, it will be displayed
17695 in the article buffer, just as usual.
17697 If you select a line that represents a directory, Gnus will pop you into
17698 a new summary buffer for this @code{nneething} group. And so on. You can
17699 traverse the entire disk this way, if you feel like, but remember that
17700 Gnus is not dired, really, and does not intend to be, either.
17702 There are two overall modes to this action---ephemeral or solid. When
17703 doing the ephemeral thing (i.e., @kbd{G D} from the group buffer), Gnus
17704 will not store information on what files you have read, and what files
17705 are new, and so on. If you create a solid @code{nneething} group the
17706 normal way with @kbd{G m}, Gnus will store a mapping table between
17707 article numbers and file names, and you can treat this group like any
17708 other groups. When you activate a solid @code{nneething} group, you will
17709 be told how many unread articles it contains, etc., etc.
17714 @item nneething-map-file-directory
17715 @vindex nneething-map-file-directory
17716 All the mapping files for solid @code{nneething} groups will be stored
17717 in this directory, which defaults to @file{~/.nneething/}.
17719 @item nneething-exclude-files
17720 @vindex nneething-exclude-files
17721 All files that match this regexp will be ignored. Nice to use to exclude
17722 auto-save files and the like, which is what it does by default.
17724 @item nneething-include-files
17725 @vindex nneething-include-files
17726 Regexp saying what files to include in the group. If this variable is
17727 non-@code{nil}, only files matching this regexp will be included.
17729 @item nneething-map-file
17730 @vindex nneething-map-file
17731 Name of the map files.
17735 @node Document Groups
17736 @subsection Document Groups
17738 @cindex documentation group
17741 @code{nndoc} is a cute little thing that will let you read a single file
17742 as a newsgroup. Several files types are supported:
17748 The Babyl (Rmail) mail box.
17753 The standard Unix mbox file.
17755 @cindex MMDF mail box
17757 The MMDF mail box format.
17760 Several news articles appended into a file.
17762 @cindex rnews batch files
17764 The rnews batch transport format.
17767 Netscape mail boxes.
17770 @acronym{MIME} multipart messages.
17772 @item standard-digest
17773 The standard (RFC 1153) digest format.
17776 A @acronym{MIME} digest of messages.
17778 @item lanl-gov-announce
17779 Announcement messages from LANL Gov Announce.
17781 @cindex forwarded messages
17782 @item rfc822-forward
17783 A message forwarded according to RFC822.
17786 The Outlook mail box.
17789 The Outlook Express dbx mail box.
17792 A bounce message from the Exim MTA.
17795 A message forwarded according to informal rules.
17798 An RFC934-forwarded message.
17804 A digest of Clarinet brief news items.
17807 Non-standard digest format---matches most things, but does it badly.
17813 You can also use the special ``file type'' @code{guess}, which means
17814 that @code{nndoc} will try to guess what file type it is looking at.
17815 @code{digest} means that @code{nndoc} should guess what digest type the
17818 @code{nndoc} will not try to change the file or insert any extra headers into
17819 it---it will simply, like, let you use the file as the basis for a
17820 group. And that's it.
17822 If you have some old archived articles that you want to insert into your
17823 new & spiffy Gnus mail back end, @code{nndoc} can probably help you with
17824 that. Say you have an old @file{RMAIL} file with mail that you now want
17825 to split into your new @code{nnml} groups. You look at that file using
17826 @code{nndoc} (using the @kbd{G f} command in the group buffer
17827 (@pxref{Foreign Groups})), set the process mark on all the articles in
17828 the buffer (@kbd{M P b}, for instance), and then re-spool (@kbd{B r})
17829 using @code{nnml}. If all goes well, all the mail in the @file{RMAIL}
17830 file is now also stored in lots of @code{nnml} directories, and you can
17831 delete that pesky @file{RMAIL} file. If you have the guts!
17833 Virtual server variables:
17836 @item nndoc-article-type
17837 @vindex nndoc-article-type
17838 This should be one of @code{mbox}, @code{babyl}, @code{digest},
17839 @code{news}, @code{rnews}, @code{mmdf}, @code{forward}, @code{rfc934},
17840 @code{rfc822-forward}, @code{mime-parts}, @code{standard-digest},
17841 @code{slack-digest}, @code{clari-briefs}, @code{nsmail}, @code{outlook},
17842 @code{oe-dbx}, @code{mailman}, and @code{mail-in-mail} or @code{guess}.
17844 @item nndoc-post-type
17845 @vindex nndoc-post-type
17846 This variable says whether Gnus is to consider the group a news group or
17847 a mail group. There are two valid values: @code{mail} (the default)
17852 * Document Server Internals:: How to add your own document types.
17856 @node Document Server Internals
17857 @subsubsection Document Server Internals
17859 Adding new document types to be recognized by @code{nndoc} isn't
17860 difficult. You just have to whip up a definition of what the document
17861 looks like, write a predicate function to recognize that document type,
17862 and then hook into @code{nndoc}.
17864 First, here's an example document type definition:
17868 (article-begin . "^\^A\^A\^A\^A\n")
17869 (body-end . "^\^A\^A\^A\^A\n"))
17872 The definition is simply a unique @dfn{name} followed by a series of
17873 regexp pseudo-variable settings. Below are the possible
17874 variables---don't be daunted by the number of variables; most document
17875 types can be defined with very few settings:
17878 @item first-article
17879 If present, @code{nndoc} will skip past all text until it finds
17880 something that match this regexp. All text before this will be
17883 @item article-begin
17884 This setting has to be present in all document type definitions. It
17885 says what the beginning of each article looks like. To do more
17886 complicated things that cannot be dealt with a simple regexp, you can
17887 use @code{article-begin-function} instead of this.
17889 @item article-begin-function
17890 If present, this should be a function that moves point to the beginning
17891 of each article. This setting overrides @code{article-begin}.
17894 If present, this should be a regexp that matches the head of the
17895 article. To do more complicated things that cannot be dealt with a
17896 simple regexp, you can use @code{head-begin-function} instead of this.
17898 @item head-begin-function
17899 If present, this should be a function that moves point to the head of
17900 the article. This setting overrides @code{head-begin}.
17903 This should match the end of the head of the article. It defaults to
17904 @samp{^$}---the empty line.
17907 This should match the beginning of the body of the article. It defaults
17908 to @samp{^\n}. To do more complicated things that cannot be dealt with
17909 a simple regexp, you can use @code{body-begin-function} instead of this.
17911 @item body-begin-function
17912 If present, this function should move point to the beginning of the body
17913 of the article. This setting overrides @code{body-begin}.
17916 If present, this should match the end of the body of the article. To do
17917 more complicated things that cannot be dealt with a simple regexp, you
17918 can use @code{body-end-function} instead of this.
17920 @item body-end-function
17921 If present, this function should move point to the end of the body of
17922 the article. This setting overrides @code{body-end}.
17925 If present, this should match the beginning of the file. All text
17926 before this regexp will be totally ignored.
17929 If present, this should match the end of the file. All text after this
17930 regexp will be totally ignored.
17934 So, using these variables @code{nndoc} is able to dissect a document
17935 file into a series of articles, each with a head and a body. However, a
17936 few more variables are needed since not all document types are all that
17937 news-like---variables needed to transform the head or the body into
17938 something that's palatable for Gnus:
17941 @item prepare-body-function
17942 If present, this function will be called when requesting an article. It
17943 will be called with point at the start of the body, and is useful if the
17944 document has encoded some parts of its contents.
17946 @item article-transform-function
17947 If present, this function is called when requesting an article. It's
17948 meant to be used for more wide-ranging transformation of both head and
17949 body of the article.
17951 @item generate-head-function
17952 If present, this function is called to generate a head that Gnus can
17953 understand. It is called with the article number as a parameter, and is
17954 expected to generate a nice head for the article in question. It is
17955 called when requesting the headers of all articles.
17957 @item generate-article-function
17958 If present, this function is called to generate an entire article that
17959 Gnus can understand. It is called with the article number as a
17960 parameter when requesting all articles.
17962 @item dissection-function
17963 If present, this function is called to dissect a document by itself,
17964 overriding @code{first-article}, @code{article-begin},
17965 @code{article-begin-function}, @code{head-begin},
17966 @code{head-begin-function}, @code{head-end}, @code{body-begin},
17967 @code{body-begin-function}, @code{body-end}, @code{body-end-function},
17968 @code{file-begin}, and @code{file-end}.
17972 Let's look at the most complicated example I can come up with---standard
17977 (first-article . ,(concat "^" (make-string 70 ?-) "\n\n+"))
17978 (article-begin . ,(concat "\n\n" (make-string 30 ?-) "\n\n+"))
17979 (prepare-body-function . nndoc-unquote-dashes)
17980 (body-end-function . nndoc-digest-body-end)
17981 (head-end . "^ ?$")
17982 (body-begin . "^ ?\n")
17983 (file-end . "^End of .*digest.*[0-9].*\n\\*\\*\\|^End of.*Digest *$")
17984 (subtype digest guess))
17987 We see that all text before a 70-width line of dashes is ignored; all
17988 text after a line that starts with that @samp{^End of} is also ignored;
17989 each article begins with a 30-width line of dashes; the line separating
17990 the head from the body may contain a single space; and that the body is
17991 run through @code{nndoc-unquote-dashes} before being delivered.
17993 To hook your own document definition into @code{nndoc}, use the
17994 @code{nndoc-add-type} function. It takes two parameters---the first
17995 is the definition itself and the second (optional) parameter says
17996 where in the document type definition alist to put this definition.
17997 The alist is traversed sequentially, and
17998 @code{nndoc-@var{type}-type-p} is called for a given type @var{type}.
17999 So @code{nndoc-mmdf-type-p} is called to see whether a document is of
18000 @code{mmdf} type, and so on. These type predicates should return
18001 @code{nil} if the document is not of the correct type; @code{t} if it
18002 is of the correct type; and a number if the document might be of the
18003 correct type. A high number means high probability; a low number
18004 means low probability with @samp{0} being the lowest valid number.
18012 In the PC world people often talk about ``offline'' newsreaders. These
18013 are thingies that are combined reader/news transport monstrosities.
18014 With built-in modem programs. Yecchh!
18016 Of course, us Unix Weenie types of human beans use things like
18017 @code{uucp} and, like, @code{nntpd} and set up proper news and mail
18018 transport things like Ghod intended. And then we just use normal
18021 However, it can sometimes be convenient to do something that's a bit
18022 easier on the brain if you have a very slow modem, and you're not really
18023 that interested in doing things properly.
18025 A file format called @sc{soup} has been developed for transporting news
18026 and mail from servers to home machines and back again. It can be a bit
18029 First some terminology:
18034 This is the machine that is connected to the outside world and where you
18035 get news and/or mail from.
18038 This is the machine that you want to do the actual reading and responding
18039 on. It is typically not connected to the rest of the world in any way.
18042 Something that contains messages and/or commands. There are two kinds
18046 @item message packets
18047 These are packets made at the server, and typically contain lots of
18048 messages for you to read. These are called @file{SoupoutX.tgz} by
18049 default, where @var{x} is a number.
18051 @item response packets
18052 These are packets made at the home machine, and typically contains
18053 replies that you've written. These are called @file{SoupinX.tgz} by
18054 default, where @var{x} is a number.
18064 You log in on the server and create a @sc{soup} packet. You can either
18065 use a dedicated @sc{soup} thingie (like the @code{awk} program), or you
18066 can use Gnus to create the packet with its @sc{soup} commands (@kbd{O
18067 s} and/or @kbd{G s b}; and then @kbd{G s p}) (@pxref{SOUP Commands}).
18070 You transfer the packet home. Rail, boat, car or modem will do fine.
18073 You put the packet in your home directory.
18076 You fire up Gnus on your home machine using the @code{nnsoup} back end as
18077 the native or secondary server.
18080 You read articles and mail and answer and followup to the things you
18081 want (@pxref{SOUP Replies}).
18084 You do the @kbd{G s r} command to pack these replies into a @sc{soup}
18088 You transfer this packet to the server.
18091 You use Gnus to mail this packet out with the @kbd{G s s} command.
18094 You then repeat until you die.
18098 So you basically have a bipartite system---you use @code{nnsoup} for
18099 reading and Gnus for packing/sending these @sc{soup} packets.
18102 * SOUP Commands:: Commands for creating and sending @sc{soup} packets
18103 * SOUP Groups:: A back end for reading @sc{soup} packets.
18104 * SOUP Replies:: How to enable @code{nnsoup} to take over mail and news.
18108 @node SOUP Commands
18109 @subsubsection SOUP Commands
18111 These are commands for creating and manipulating @sc{soup} packets.
18115 @kindex G s b (Group)
18116 @findex gnus-group-brew-soup
18117 Pack all unread articles in the current group
18118 (@code{gnus-group-brew-soup}). This command understands the
18119 process/prefix convention.
18122 @kindex G s w (Group)
18123 @findex gnus-soup-save-areas
18124 Save all @sc{soup} data files (@code{gnus-soup-save-areas}).
18127 @kindex G s s (Group)
18128 @findex gnus-soup-send-replies
18129 Send all replies from the replies packet
18130 (@code{gnus-soup-send-replies}).
18133 @kindex G s p (Group)
18134 @findex gnus-soup-pack-packet
18135 Pack all files into a @sc{soup} packet (@code{gnus-soup-pack-packet}).
18138 @kindex G s r (Group)
18139 @findex nnsoup-pack-replies
18140 Pack all replies into a replies packet (@code{nnsoup-pack-replies}).
18143 @kindex O s (Summary)
18144 @findex gnus-soup-add-article
18145 This summary-mode command adds the current article to a @sc{soup} packet
18146 (@code{gnus-soup-add-article}). It understands the process/prefix
18147 convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
18152 There are a few variables to customize where Gnus will put all these
18157 @item gnus-soup-directory
18158 @vindex gnus-soup-directory
18159 Directory where Gnus will save intermediate files while composing
18160 @sc{soup} packets. The default is @file{~/SoupBrew/}.
18162 @item gnus-soup-replies-directory
18163 @vindex gnus-soup-replies-directory
18164 This is what Gnus will use as a temporary directory while sending our
18165 reply packets. @file{~/SoupBrew/SoupReplies/} is the default.
18167 @item gnus-soup-prefix-file
18168 @vindex gnus-soup-prefix-file
18169 Name of the file where Gnus stores the last used prefix. The default is
18170 @samp{gnus-prefix}.
18172 @item gnus-soup-packer
18173 @vindex gnus-soup-packer
18174 A format string command for packing a @sc{soup} packet. The default is
18175 @samp{tar cf - %s | gzip > $HOME/Soupout%d.tgz}.
18177 @item gnus-soup-unpacker
18178 @vindex gnus-soup-unpacker
18179 Format string command for unpacking a @sc{soup} packet. The default is
18180 @samp{gunzip -c %s | tar xvf -}.
18182 @item gnus-soup-packet-directory
18183 @vindex gnus-soup-packet-directory
18184 Where Gnus will look for reply packets. The default is @file{~/}.
18186 @item gnus-soup-packet-regexp
18187 @vindex gnus-soup-packet-regexp
18188 Regular expression matching @sc{soup} reply packets in
18189 @code{gnus-soup-packet-directory}.
18195 @subsubsection SOUP Groups
18198 @code{nnsoup} is the back end for reading @sc{soup} packets. It will
18199 read incoming packets, unpack them, and put them in a directory where
18200 you can read them at leisure.
18202 These are the variables you can use to customize its behavior:
18206 @item nnsoup-tmp-directory
18207 @vindex nnsoup-tmp-directory
18208 When @code{nnsoup} unpacks a @sc{soup} packet, it does it in this
18209 directory. (@file{/tmp/} by default.)
18211 @item nnsoup-directory
18212 @vindex nnsoup-directory
18213 @code{nnsoup} then moves each message and index file to this directory.
18214 The default is @file{~/SOUP/}.
18216 @item nnsoup-replies-directory
18217 @vindex nnsoup-replies-directory
18218 All replies will be stored in this directory before being packed into a
18219 reply packet. The default is @file{~/SOUP/replies/}.
18221 @item nnsoup-replies-format-type
18222 @vindex nnsoup-replies-format-type
18223 The @sc{soup} format of the replies packets. The default is @samp{?n}
18224 (rnews), and I don't think you should touch that variable. I probably
18225 shouldn't even have documented it. Drats! Too late!
18227 @item nnsoup-replies-index-type
18228 @vindex nnsoup-replies-index-type
18229 The index type of the replies packet. The default is @samp{?n}, which
18230 means ``none''. Don't fiddle with this one either!
18232 @item nnsoup-active-file
18233 @vindex nnsoup-active-file
18234 Where @code{nnsoup} stores lots of information. This is not an ``active
18235 file'' in the @code{nntp} sense; it's an Emacs Lisp file. If you lose
18236 this file or mess it up in any way, you're dead. The default is
18237 @file{~/SOUP/active}.
18239 @item nnsoup-packer
18240 @vindex nnsoup-packer
18241 Format string command for packing a reply @sc{soup} packet. The default
18242 is @samp{tar cf - %s | gzip > $HOME/Soupin%d.tgz}.
18244 @item nnsoup-unpacker
18245 @vindex nnsoup-unpacker
18246 Format string command for unpacking incoming @sc{soup} packets. The
18247 default is @samp{gunzip -c %s | tar xvf -}.
18249 @item nnsoup-packet-directory
18250 @vindex nnsoup-packet-directory
18251 Where @code{nnsoup} will look for incoming packets. The default is
18254 @item nnsoup-packet-regexp
18255 @vindex nnsoup-packet-regexp
18256 Regular expression matching incoming @sc{soup} packets. The default is
18259 @item nnsoup-always-save
18260 @vindex nnsoup-always-save
18261 If non-@code{nil}, save the replies buffer after each posted message.
18267 @subsubsection SOUP Replies
18269 Just using @code{nnsoup} won't mean that your postings and mailings end
18270 up in @sc{soup} reply packets automagically. You have to work a bit
18271 more for that to happen.
18273 @findex nnsoup-set-variables
18274 The @code{nnsoup-set-variables} command will set the appropriate
18275 variables to ensure that all your followups and replies end up in the
18278 In specific, this is what it does:
18281 (setq message-send-news-function 'nnsoup-request-post)
18282 (setq message-send-mail-function 'nnsoup-request-mail)
18285 And that's it, really. If you only want news to go into the @sc{soup}
18286 system you just use the first line. If you only want mail to be
18287 @sc{soup}ed you use the second.
18290 @node Mail-To-News Gateways
18291 @subsection Mail-To-News Gateways
18292 @cindex mail-to-news gateways
18295 If your local @code{nntp} server doesn't allow posting, for some reason
18296 or other, you can post using one of the numerous mail-to-news gateways.
18297 The @code{nngateway} back end provides the interface.
18299 Note that you can't read anything from this back end---it can only be
18305 @item nngateway-address
18306 @vindex nngateway-address
18307 This is the address of the mail-to-news gateway.
18309 @item nngateway-header-transformation
18310 @vindex nngateway-header-transformation
18311 News headers often have to be transformed in some odd way or other
18312 for the mail-to-news gateway to accept it. This variable says what
18313 transformation should be called, and defaults to
18314 @code{nngateway-simple-header-transformation}. The function is called
18315 narrowed to the headers to be transformed and with one parameter---the
18318 This default function just inserts a new @code{To} header based on the
18319 @code{Newsgroups} header and the gateway address.
18320 For instance, an article with this @code{Newsgroups} header:
18323 Newsgroups: alt.religion.emacs
18326 will get this @code{To} header inserted:
18329 To: alt-religion-emacs@@GATEWAY
18332 The following pre-defined functions exist:
18334 @findex nngateway-simple-header-transformation
18337 @item nngateway-simple-header-transformation
18338 Creates a @code{To} header that looks like
18339 @var{newsgroup}@@@code{nngateway-address}.
18341 @findex nngateway-mail2news-header-transformation
18343 @item nngateway-mail2news-header-transformation
18344 Creates a @code{To} header that looks like
18345 @code{nngateway-address}.
18353 (setq gnus-post-method
18355 "mail2news@@replay.com"
18356 (nngateway-header-transformation
18357 nngateway-mail2news-header-transformation)))
18360 So, to use this, simply say something like:
18363 (setq gnus-post-method '(nngateway "GATEWAY.ADDRESS"))
18368 @node Combined Groups
18369 @section Combined Groups
18371 Gnus allows combining a mixture of all the other group types into bigger
18375 * Virtual Groups:: Combining articles from many groups.
18376 * Kibozed Groups:: Looking through parts of the newsfeed for articles.
18380 @node Virtual Groups
18381 @subsection Virtual Groups
18383 @cindex virtual groups
18384 @cindex merging groups
18386 An @dfn{nnvirtual group} is really nothing more than a collection of
18389 For instance, if you are tired of reading many small groups, you can
18390 put them all in one big group, and then grow tired of reading one
18391 big, unwieldy group. The joys of computing!
18393 You specify @code{nnvirtual} as the method. The address should be a
18394 regexp to match component groups.
18396 All marks in the virtual group will stick to the articles in the
18397 component groups. So if you tick an article in a virtual group, the
18398 article will also be ticked in the component group from whence it
18399 came. (And vice versa---marks from the component groups will also be
18400 shown in the virtual group.). To create an empty virtual group, run
18401 @kbd{G V} (@code{gnus-group-make-empty-virtual}) in the group buffer
18402 and edit the method regexp with @kbd{M-e}
18403 (@code{gnus-group-edit-group-method})
18405 Here's an example @code{nnvirtual} method that collects all Andrea Dworkin
18406 newsgroups into one, big, happy newsgroup:
18409 (nnvirtual "^alt\\.fan\\.andrea-dworkin$\\|^rec\\.dworkin.*")
18412 The component groups can be native or foreign; everything should work
18413 smoothly, but if your computer explodes, it was probably my fault.
18415 Collecting the same group from several servers might actually be a good
18416 idea if users have set the Distribution header to limit distribution.
18417 If you would like to read @samp{soc.motss} both from a server in Japan
18418 and a server in Norway, you could use the following as the group regexp:
18421 "^nntp\\+server\\.jp:soc\\.motss$\\|^nntp\\+server\\.no:soc\\.motss$"
18424 (Remember, though, that if you're creating the group with @kbd{G m}, you
18425 shouldn't double the backslashes, and you should leave off the quote
18426 characters at the beginning and the end of the string.)
18428 This should work kinda smoothly---all articles from both groups should
18429 end up in this one, and there should be no duplicates. Threading (and
18430 the rest) will still work as usual, but there might be problems with the
18431 sequence of articles. Sorting on date might be an option here
18432 (@pxref{Selecting a Group}).
18434 One limitation, however---all groups included in a virtual
18435 group have to be alive (i.e., subscribed or unsubscribed). Killed or
18436 zombie groups can't be component groups for @code{nnvirtual} groups.
18438 @vindex nnvirtual-always-rescan
18439 If the @code{nnvirtual-always-rescan} variable is non-@code{nil} (which
18440 is the default), @code{nnvirtual} will always scan groups for unread
18441 articles when entering a virtual group. If this variable is @code{nil}
18442 and you read articles in a component group after the virtual group has
18443 been activated, the read articles from the component group will show up
18444 when you enter the virtual group. You'll also see this effect if you
18445 have two virtual groups that have a component group in common. If
18446 that's the case, you should set this variable to @code{t}. Or you can
18447 just tap @code{M-g} on the virtual group every time before you enter
18448 it---it'll have much the same effect.
18450 @code{nnvirtual} can have both mail and news groups as component groups.
18451 When responding to articles in @code{nnvirtual} groups, @code{nnvirtual}
18452 has to ask the back end of the component group the article comes from
18453 whether it is a news or mail back end. However, when you do a @kbd{^},
18454 there is typically no sure way for the component back end to know this,
18455 and in that case @code{nnvirtual} tells Gnus that the article came from a
18456 not-news back end. (Just to be on the safe side.)
18458 @kbd{C-c C-n} in the message buffer will insert the @code{Newsgroups}
18459 line from the article you respond to in these cases.
18461 @code{nnvirtual} groups do not inherit anything but articles and marks
18462 from component groups---group parameters, for instance, are not
18466 @node Kibozed Groups
18467 @subsection Kibozed Groups
18471 @dfn{Kibozing} is defined by the @acronym{OED} as ``grepping through
18472 (parts of) the news feed''. @code{nnkiboze} is a back end that will
18473 do this for you. Oh joy! Now you can grind any @acronym{NNTP} server
18474 down to a halt with useless requests! Oh happiness!
18476 @kindex G k (Group)
18477 To create a kibozed group, use the @kbd{G k} command in the group
18480 The address field of the @code{nnkiboze} method is, as with
18481 @code{nnvirtual}, a regexp to match groups to be ``included'' in the
18482 @code{nnkiboze} group. That's where most similarities between
18483 @code{nnkiboze} and @code{nnvirtual} end.
18485 In addition to this regexp detailing component groups, an
18486 @code{nnkiboze} group must have a score file to say what articles are
18487 to be included in the group (@pxref{Scoring}).
18489 @kindex M-x nnkiboze-generate-groups
18490 @findex nnkiboze-generate-groups
18491 You must run @kbd{M-x nnkiboze-generate-groups} after creating the
18492 @code{nnkiboze} groups you want to have. This command will take time.
18493 Lots of time. Oodles and oodles of time. Gnus has to fetch the
18494 headers from all the articles in all the component groups and run them
18495 through the scoring process to determine if there are any articles in
18496 the groups that are to be part of the @code{nnkiboze} groups.
18498 Please limit the number of component groups by using restrictive
18499 regexps. Otherwise your sysadmin may become annoyed with you, and the
18500 @acronym{NNTP} site may throw you off and never let you back in again.
18501 Stranger things have happened.
18503 @code{nnkiboze} component groups do not have to be alive---they can be dead,
18504 and they can be foreign. No restrictions.
18506 @vindex nnkiboze-directory
18507 The generation of an @code{nnkiboze} group means writing two files in
18508 @code{nnkiboze-directory}, which is @file{~/News/kiboze/} by default.
18509 One contains the @acronym{NOV} header lines for all the articles in
18510 the group, and the other is an additional @file{.newsrc} file to store
18511 information on what groups have been searched through to find
18512 component articles.
18514 Articles marked as read in the @code{nnkiboze} group will have
18515 their @acronym{NOV} lines removed from the @acronym{NOV} file.
18518 @node Email Based Diary
18519 @section Email Based Diary
18521 @cindex email based diary
18524 This section describes a special mail back end called @code{nndiary},
18525 and its companion library @code{gnus-diary}. It is ``special'' in the
18526 sense that it is not meant to be one of the standard alternatives for
18527 reading mail with Gnus. See @ref{Choosing a Mail Back End} for that.
18528 Instead, it is used to treat @emph{some} of your mails in a special way,
18529 namely, as event reminders.
18531 Here is a typical scenario:
18535 You've got a date with Andy Mc Dowell or Bruce Willis (select according
18536 to your sexual preference) in one month. You don't want to forget it.
18538 So you send a ``reminder'' message (actually, a diary one) to yourself.
18540 You forget all about it and keep on getting and reading new mail, as usual.
18542 From time to time, as you type `g' in the group buffer and as the date
18543 is getting closer, the message will pop up again to remind you of your
18544 appointment, just as if it were new and unread.
18546 Read your ``new'' messages, this one included, and start dreaming again
18547 of the night you're gonna have.
18549 Once the date is over (you actually fell asleep just after dinner), the
18550 message will be automatically deleted if it is marked as expirable.
18553 The Gnus Diary back end has the ability to handle regular appointments
18554 (that wouldn't ever be deleted) as well as punctual ones, operates as a
18555 real mail back end and is configurable in many ways. All of this is
18556 explained in the sections below.
18559 * The NNDiary Back End:: Basic setup and usage.
18560 * The Gnus Diary Library:: Utility toolkit on top of nndiary.
18561 * Sending or Not Sending:: A final note on sending diary messages.
18565 @node The NNDiary Back End
18566 @subsection The NNDiary Back End
18568 @cindex the nndiary back end
18570 @code{nndiary} is a back end very similar to @code{nnml} (@pxref{Mail
18571 Spool}). Actually, it could appear as a mix of @code{nnml} and
18572 @code{nndraft}. If you know @code{nnml}, you're already familiar with
18573 the message storing scheme of @code{nndiary}: one file per message, one
18574 directory per group.
18576 Before anything, there is one requirement to be able to run
18577 @code{nndiary} properly: you @emph{must} use the group timestamp feature
18578 of Gnus. This adds a timestamp to each group's parameters. @ref{Group
18579 Timestamp} to see how it's done.
18582 * Diary Messages:: What makes a message valid for nndiary.
18583 * Running NNDiary:: NNDiary has two modes of operation.
18584 * Customizing NNDiary:: Bells and whistles.
18587 @node Diary Messages
18588 @subsubsection Diary Messages
18589 @cindex nndiary messages
18590 @cindex nndiary mails
18592 @code{nndiary} messages are just normal ones, except for the mandatory
18593 presence of 7 special headers. These headers are of the form
18594 @code{X-Diary-<something>}, @code{<something>} being one of
18595 @code{Minute}, @code{Hour}, @code{Dom}, @code{Month}, @code{Year},
18596 @code{Time-Zone} and @code{Dow}. @code{Dom} means ``Day of Month'', and
18597 @code{dow} means ``Day of Week''. These headers actually behave like
18598 crontab specifications and define the event date(s):
18602 For all headers except the @code{Time-Zone} one, a header value is
18603 either a star (meaning all possible values), or a list of fields
18604 (separated by a comma).
18606 A field is either an integer, or a range.
18608 A range is two integers separated by a dash.
18610 Possible integer values are 0--59 for @code{Minute}, 0--23 for
18611 @code{Hour}, 1--31 for @code{Dom}, 1--12 for @code{Month}, above 1971
18612 for @code{Year} and 0--6 for @code{Dow} (0 meaning Sunday).
18614 As a special case, a star in either @code{Dom} or @code{Dow} doesn't
18615 mean ``all possible values'', but ``use only the other field''. Note
18616 that if both are star'ed, the use of either one gives the same result.
18618 The @code{Time-Zone} header is special in that it can only have one
18619 value (@code{GMT}, for instance). A star doesn't mean ``all possible
18620 values'' (because it makes no sense), but ``the current local time
18621 zone''. Most of the time, you'll be using a star here. However, for a
18622 list of available time zone values, see the variable
18623 @code{nndiary-headers}.
18626 As a concrete example, here are the diary headers to add to your message
18627 for specifying ``Each Monday and each 1st of month, at 12:00, 20:00,
18628 21:00, 22:00, 23:00 and 24:00, from 1999 to 2010'' (I'll let you find
18633 X-Diary-Hour: 12, 20-24
18636 X-Diary-Year: 1999-2010
18638 X-Diary-Time-Zone: *
18641 @node Running NNDiary
18642 @subsubsection Running NNDiary
18643 @cindex running nndiary
18644 @cindex nndiary operation modes
18646 @code{nndiary} has two modes of operation: ``traditional'' (the default)
18647 and ``autonomous''. In traditional mode, @code{nndiary} does not get new
18648 mail by itself. You have to move (@kbd{B m}) or copy (@kbd{B c}) mails
18649 from your primary mail back end to nndiary groups in order to handle them
18650 as diary messages. In autonomous mode, @code{nndiary} retrieves its own
18651 mail and handles it independently from your primary mail back end.
18653 One should note that Gnus is not inherently designed to allow several
18654 ``master'' mail back ends at the same time. However, this does make
18655 sense with @code{nndiary}: you really want to send and receive diary
18656 messages to your diary groups directly. So, @code{nndiary} supports
18657 being sort of a ``second primary mail back end'' (to my knowledge, it is
18658 the only back end offering this feature). However, there is a limitation
18659 (which I hope to fix some day): respooling doesn't work in autonomous
18662 In order to use @code{nndiary} in autonomous mode, you have several
18667 Allow @code{nndiary} to retrieve new mail by itself. Put the following
18668 line in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
18671 (setq nndiary-get-new-mail t)
18674 You must arrange for diary messages (those containing @code{X-Diary-*}
18675 headers) to be split in a private folder @emph{before} Gnus treat them.
18676 Again, this is needed because Gnus cannot (yet ?) properly handle
18677 multiple primary mail back ends. Getting those messages from a separate
18678 source will compensate this misfeature to some extent.
18680 As an example, here's my procmailrc entry to store diary files in
18681 @file{~/.nndiary} (the default @code{nndiary} mail source file):
18690 Once this is done, you might want to customize the following two options
18691 that affect the diary mail retrieval and splitting processes:
18693 @defvar nndiary-mail-sources
18694 This is the diary-specific replacement for the standard
18695 @code{mail-sources} variable. It obeys the same syntax, and defaults to
18696 @code{(file :path "~/.nndiary")}.
18699 @defvar nndiary-split-methods
18700 This is the diary-specific replacement for the standard
18701 @code{nnmail-split-methods} variable. It obeys the same syntax.
18704 Finally, you may add a permanent @code{nndiary} virtual server
18705 (something like @code{(nndiary "diary")} should do) to your
18706 @code{gnus-secondary-select-methods}.
18708 Hopefully, almost everything (see the TODO section in
18709 @file{nndiary.el}) will work as expected when you restart Gnus: in
18710 autonomous mode, typing @kbd{g} and @kbd{M-g} in the group buffer, will
18711 also get your new diary mails and split them according to your
18712 diary-specific rules, @kbd{F} will find your new diary groups etc.
18714 @node Customizing NNDiary
18715 @subsubsection Customizing NNDiary
18716 @cindex customizing nndiary
18717 @cindex nndiary customization
18719 Now that @code{nndiary} is up and running, it's time to customize it.
18720 The custom group is called @code{nndiary} (no, really ?!). You should
18721 browse it to figure out which options you'd like to tweak. The following
18722 two variables are probably the only ones you will want to change:
18724 @defvar nndiary-reminders
18725 This is the list of times when you want to be reminded of your
18726 appointments (e.g. 3 weeks before, then 2 days before, then 1 hour
18727 before and that's it). Remember that ``being reminded'' means that the
18728 diary message will pop up as brand new and unread again when you get new
18732 @defvar nndiary-week-starts-on-monday
18733 Rather self-explanatory. Otherwise, Sunday is assumed (this is the
18738 @node The Gnus Diary Library
18739 @subsection The Gnus Diary Library
18741 @cindex the gnus diary library
18743 Using @code{nndiary} manually (I mean, writing the headers by hand and
18744 so on) would be rather boring. Fortunately, there is a library called
18745 @code{gnus-diary} written on top of @code{nndiary}, that does many
18746 useful things for you.
18748 In order to use it, add the following line to your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
18751 (require 'gnus-diary)
18754 Also, you shouldn't use any @code{gnus-user-format-function-[d|D]}
18755 (@pxref{Summary Buffer Lines}). @code{gnus-diary} provides both of these
18756 (sorry if you used them before).
18760 * Diary Summary Line Format:: A nicer summary buffer line format.
18761 * Diary Articles Sorting:: A nicer way to sort messages.
18762 * Diary Headers Generation:: Not doing it manually.
18763 * Diary Group Parameters:: Not handling them manually.
18766 @node Diary Summary Line Format
18767 @subsubsection Diary Summary Line Format
18768 @cindex diary summary buffer line
18769 @cindex diary summary line format
18771 Displaying diary messages in standard summary line format (usually
18772 something like @samp{From Joe: Subject}) is pretty useless. Most of
18773 the time, you're the one who wrote the message, and you mostly want to
18774 see the event's date.
18776 @code{gnus-diary} provides two supplemental user formats to be used in
18777 summary line formats. @code{D} corresponds to a formatted time string
18778 for the next occurrence of the event (e.g. ``Sat, Sep 22 01, 12:00''),
18779 while @code{d} corresponds to an approximative remaining time until the
18780 next occurrence of the event (e.g. ``in 6 months, 1 week'').
18782 For example, here's how Joe's birthday is displayed in my
18783 @code{nndiary+diary:birthdays} summary buffer (note that the message is
18784 expirable, but will never be deleted, as it specifies a periodic event):
18787 E Sat, Sep 22 01, 12:00: Joe's birthday (in 6 months, 1 week)
18790 In order to get something like the above, you would normally add the
18791 following line to your diary groups'parameters:
18794 (gnus-summary-line-format "%U%R%z %uD: %(%s%) (%ud)\n")
18797 However, @code{gnus-diary} does it automatically (@pxref{Diary Group
18798 Parameters}). You can however customize the provided summary line format
18799 with the following user options:
18801 @defvar gnus-diary-summary-line-format
18802 Defines the summary line format used for diary groups (@pxref{Summary
18803 Buffer Lines}). @code{gnus-diary} uses it to automatically update the
18804 diary groups'parameters.
18807 @defvar gnus-diary-time-format
18808 Defines the format to display dates in diary summary buffers. This is
18809 used by the @code{D} user format. See the docstring for details.
18812 @defvar gnus-diary-delay-format-function
18813 Defines the format function to use for displaying delays (remaining
18814 times) in diary summary buffers. This is used by the @code{d} user
18815 format. There are currently built-in functions for English and French;
18816 you can also define your own. See the docstring for details.
18819 @node Diary Articles Sorting
18820 @subsubsection Diary Articles Sorting
18821 @cindex diary articles sorting
18822 @cindex diary summary lines sorting
18823 @findex gnus-summary-sort-by-schedule
18824 @findex gnus-thread-sort-by-schedule
18825 @findex gnus-article-sort-by-schedule
18827 @code{gnus-diary} provides new sorting functions (@pxref{Sorting the
18828 Summary Buffer} ) called @code{gnus-summary-sort-by-schedule},
18829 @code{gnus-thread-sort-by-schedule} and
18830 @code{gnus-article-sort-by-schedule}. These functions let you organize
18831 your diary summary buffers from the closest event to the farthest one.
18833 @code{gnus-diary} automatically installs
18834 @code{gnus-summary-sort-by-schedule} as a menu item in the summary
18835 buffer's ``sort'' menu, and the two others as the primary (hence
18836 default) sorting functions in the group parameters (@pxref{Diary Group
18839 @node Diary Headers Generation
18840 @subsubsection Diary Headers Generation
18841 @cindex diary headers generation
18842 @findex gnus-diary-check-message
18844 @code{gnus-diary} provides a function called
18845 @code{gnus-diary-check-message} to help you handle the @code{X-Diary-*}
18846 headers. This function ensures that the current message contains all the
18847 required diary headers, and prompts you for values or corrections if
18850 This function is hooked into the @code{nndiary} back end, so that
18851 moving or copying an article to a diary group will trigger it
18852 automatically. It is also bound to @kbd{C-c D c} in @code{message-mode}
18853 and @code{article-edit-mode} in order to ease the process of converting
18854 a usual mail to a diary one.
18856 This function takes a prefix argument which will force prompting of
18857 all diary headers, regardless of their presence or validity. That way,
18858 you can very easily reschedule an already valid diary message, for
18861 @node Diary Group Parameters
18862 @subsubsection Diary Group Parameters
18863 @cindex diary group parameters
18865 When you create a new diary group, or visit one, @code{gnus-diary}
18866 automatically checks your group parameters and if needed, sets the
18867 summary line format to the diary-specific value, installs the
18868 diary-specific sorting functions, and also adds the different
18869 @code{X-Diary-*} headers to the group's posting-style. It is then easier
18870 to send a diary message, because if you use @kbd{C-u a} or @kbd{C-u m}
18871 on a diary group to prepare a message, these headers will be inserted
18872 automatically (although not filled with proper values yet).
18874 @node Sending or Not Sending
18875 @subsection Sending or Not Sending
18877 Well, assuming you've read all of the above, here are two final notes on
18878 mail sending with @code{nndiary}:
18882 @code{nndiary} is a @emph{real} mail back end. You really send real diary
18883 messsages for real. This means for instance that you can give
18884 appointments to anybody (provided they use Gnus and @code{nndiary}) by
18885 sending the diary message to them as well.
18887 However, since @code{nndiary} also has a @code{request-post} method, you
18888 can also use @kbd{C-u a} instead of @kbd{C-u m} on a diary group and the
18889 message won't actually be sent; just stored locally in the group. This
18890 comes in very handy for private appointments.
18893 @node Gnus Unplugged
18894 @section Gnus Unplugged
18899 @cindex Gnus unplugged
18901 In olden times (ca. February '88), people used to run their newsreaders
18902 on big machines with permanent connections to the net. News transport
18903 was dealt with by news servers, and all the newsreaders had to do was to
18904 read news. Believe it or not.
18906 Nowadays most people read news and mail at home, and use some sort of
18907 modem to connect to the net. To avoid running up huge phone bills, it
18908 would be nice to have a way to slurp down all the news and mail, hang up
18909 the phone, read for several hours, and then upload any responses you
18910 have to make. And then you repeat the procedure.
18912 Of course, you can use news servers for doing this as well. I've used
18913 @code{inn} together with @code{slurp}, @code{pop} and @code{sendmail}
18914 for some years, but doing that's a bore. Moving the news server
18915 functionality up to the newsreader makes sense if you're the only person
18916 reading news on a machine.
18918 Setting up Gnus as an ``offline'' newsreader is quite simple. In
18919 fact, you don't have to configure anything as the agent is now enabled
18920 by default (@pxref{Agent Variables, gnus-agent}).
18922 Of course, to use it as such, you have to learn a few new commands.
18925 * Agent Basics:: How it all is supposed to work.
18926 * Agent Categories:: How to tell the Gnus Agent what to download.
18927 * Agent Commands:: New commands for all the buffers.
18928 * Agent Visuals:: Ways that the agent may effect your summary buffer.
18929 * Agent as Cache:: The Agent is a big cache too.
18930 * Agent Expiry:: How to make old articles go away.
18931 * Agent Regeneration:: How to recover from lost connections and other accidents.
18932 * Agent and flags:: How the Agent maintains flags.
18933 * Agent and IMAP:: How to use the Agent with @acronym{IMAP}.
18934 * Outgoing Messages:: What happens when you post/mail something?
18935 * Agent Variables:: Customizing is fun.
18936 * Example Setup:: An example @file{~/.gnus.el} file for offline people.
18937 * Batching Agents:: How to fetch news from a @code{cron} job.
18938 * Agent Caveats:: What you think it'll do and what it does.
18943 @subsection Agent Basics
18945 First, let's get some terminology out of the way.
18947 The Gnus Agent is said to be @dfn{unplugged} when you have severed the
18948 connection to the net (and notified the Agent that this is the case).
18949 When the connection to the net is up again (and Gnus knows this), the
18950 Agent is @dfn{plugged}.
18952 The @dfn{local} machine is the one you're running on, and which isn't
18953 connected to the net continuously.
18955 @dfn{Downloading} means fetching things from the net to your local
18956 machine. @dfn{Uploading} is doing the opposite.
18958 You know that Gnus gives you all the opportunity you'd ever want for
18959 shooting yourself in the foot. Some people call it flexibility. Gnus
18960 is also customizable to a great extent, which means that the user has a
18961 say on how Gnus behaves. Other newsreaders might unconditionally shoot
18962 you in your foot, but with Gnus, you have a choice!
18964 Gnus is never really in plugged or unplugged state. Rather, it applies
18965 that state to each server individually. This means that some servers
18966 can be plugged while others can be unplugged. Additionally, some
18967 servers can be ignored by the Agent altogether (which means that
18968 they're kinda like plugged always).
18970 So when you unplug the Agent and then wonder why is Gnus opening a
18971 connection to the Net, the next step to do is to look whether all
18972 servers are agentized. If there is an unagentized server, you found
18975 Another thing is the @dfn{offline} state. Sometimes, servers aren't
18976 reachable. When Gnus notices this, it asks you whether you want the
18977 server to be switched to offline state. If you say yes, then the
18978 server will behave somewhat as if it was unplugged, except that Gnus
18979 will ask you whether you want to switch it back online again.
18981 Let's take a typical Gnus session using the Agent.
18986 @findex gnus-unplugged
18987 You start Gnus with @code{gnus-unplugged}. This brings up the Gnus
18988 Agent in a disconnected state. You can read all the news that you have
18989 already fetched while in this mode.
18992 You then decide to see whether any new news has arrived. You connect
18993 your machine to the net (using PPP or whatever), and then hit @kbd{J j}
18994 to make Gnus become @dfn{plugged} and use @kbd{g} to check for new mail
18995 as usual. To check for new mail in unplugged mode (@pxref{Mail
18996 Source Specifiers}).
18999 You can then read the new news immediately, or you can download the
19000 news onto your local machine. If you want to do the latter, you press
19001 @kbd{g} to check if there are any new news and then @kbd{J s} to fetch
19002 all the eligible articles in all the groups. (To let Gnus know which
19003 articles you want to download, @pxref{Agent Categories}).
19006 After fetching the articles, you press @kbd{J j} to make Gnus become
19007 unplugged again, and you shut down the PPP thing (or whatever). And
19008 then you read the news offline.
19011 And then you go to step 2.
19014 Here are some things you should do the first time (or so) that you use
19020 Decide which servers should be covered by the Agent. If you have a mail
19021 back end, it would probably be nonsensical to have it covered by the
19022 Agent. Go to the server buffer (@kbd{^} in the group buffer) and press
19023 @kbd{J a} on the server (or servers) that you wish to have covered by the
19024 Agent (@pxref{Server Agent Commands}), or @kbd{J r} on automatically
19025 added servers you do not wish to have covered by the Agent. By default,
19026 all @code{nntp} and @code{nnimap} servers in @code{gnus-select-method} and
19027 @code{gnus-secondary-select-methods} are agentized.
19030 Decide on download policy. It's fairly simple once you decide whether
19031 you are going to use agent categories, topic parameters, and/or group
19032 parameters to implement your policy. If you're new to gnus, it
19033 is probably best to start with a category, @xref{Agent Categories}.
19035 Both topic parameters (@pxref{Topic Parameters}) and agent categories
19036 (@pxref{Agent Categories}) provide for setting a policy that applies
19037 to multiple groups. Which you use is entirely up to you. Topic
19038 parameters do override categories so, if you mix the two, you'll have
19039 to take that into account. If you have a few groups that deviate from
19040 your policy, you can use group parameters (@pxref{Group Parameters}) to
19044 Uhm@dots{} that's it.
19048 @node Agent Categories
19049 @subsection Agent Categories
19051 One of the main reasons to integrate the news transport layer into the
19052 newsreader is to allow greater control over what articles to download.
19053 There's not much point in downloading huge amounts of articles, just to
19054 find out that you're not interested in reading any of them. It's better
19055 to be somewhat more conservative in choosing what to download, and then
19056 mark the articles for downloading manually if it should turn out that
19057 you're interested in the articles anyway.
19059 One of the more effective methods for controlling what is to be
19060 downloaded is to create a @dfn{category} and then assign some (or all)
19061 groups to this category. Groups that do not belong in any other
19062 category belong to the @code{default} category. Gnus has its own
19063 buffer for creating and managing categories.
19065 If you prefer, you can also use group parameters (@pxref{Group
19066 Parameters}) and topic parameters (@pxref{Topic Parameters}) for an
19067 alternative approach to controlling the agent. The only real
19068 difference is that categories are specific to the agent (so there is
19069 less to learn) while group and topic parameters include the kitchen
19072 Since you can set agent parameters in several different places we have
19073 a rule to decide which source to believe. This rule specifies that
19074 the parameter sources are checked in the following order: group
19075 parameters, topic parameters, agent category, and finally customizable
19076 variables. So you can mix all of these sources to produce a wide range
19077 of behavior, just don't blame me if you don't remember where you put
19081 * Category Syntax:: What a category looks like.
19082 * Category Buffer:: A buffer for maintaining categories.
19083 * Category Variables:: Customize'r'Us.
19087 @node Category Syntax
19088 @subsubsection Category Syntax
19090 A category consists of a name, the list of groups belonging to the
19091 category, and a number of optional parameters that override the
19092 customizable variables. The complete list of agent parameters are
19095 @cindex Agent Parameters
19098 The list of groups that are in this category.
19100 @item agent-predicate
19101 A predicate which (generally) gives a rough outline of which articles
19102 are eligible for downloading; and
19105 a score rule which (generally) gives you a finer granularity when
19106 deciding what articles to download. (Note that this @dfn{download
19107 score} is not necessarily related to normal scores.)
19109 @item agent-enable-expiration
19110 a boolean indicating whether the agent should expire old articles in
19111 this group. Most groups should be expired to conserve disk space. In
19112 fact, its probably safe to say that the gnus.* hierarchy contains the
19113 only groups that should not be expired.
19115 @item agent-days-until-old
19116 an integer indicating the number of days that the agent should wait
19117 before deciding that a read article is safe to expire.
19119 @item agent-low-score
19120 an integer that overrides the value of @code{gnus-agent-low-score}.
19122 @item agent-high-score
19123 an integer that overrides the value of @code{gnus-agent-high-score}.
19125 @item agent-short-article
19126 an integer that overrides the value of
19127 @code{gnus-agent-short-article}.
19129 @item agent-long-article
19130 an integer that overrides the value of @code{gnus-agent-long-article}.
19132 @item agent-enable-undownloaded-faces
19133 a symbol indicating whether the summary buffer should display
19134 undownloaded articles using the @code{gnus-summary-*-undownloaded-face}
19135 faces. Any symbol other than @code{nil} will enable the use of
19136 undownloaded faces.
19139 The name of a category can not be changed once the category has been
19142 Each category maintains a list of groups that are exclusive members of
19143 that category. The exclusivity rule is automatically enforced, add a
19144 group to a new category and it is automatically removed from its old
19147 A predicate in its simplest form can be a single predicate such as
19148 @code{true} or @code{false}. These two will download every available
19149 article or nothing respectively. In the case of these two special
19150 predicates an additional score rule is superfluous.
19152 Predicates of @code{high} or @code{low} download articles in respect of
19153 their scores in relationship to @code{gnus-agent-high-score} and
19154 @code{gnus-agent-low-score} as described below.
19156 To gain even finer control of what is to be regarded eligible for
19157 download a predicate can consist of a number of predicates with logical
19158 operators sprinkled in between.
19160 Perhaps some examples are in order.
19162 Here's a simple predicate. (It's the default predicate, in fact, used
19163 for all groups that don't belong to any other category.)
19169 Quite simple, eh? This predicate is true if and only if the article is
19170 short (for some value of ``short'').
19172 Here's a more complex predicate:
19181 This means that an article should be downloaded if it has a high score,
19182 or if the score is not low and the article is not long. You get the
19185 The available logical operators are @code{or}, @code{and} and
19186 @code{not}. (If you prefer, you can use the more ``C''-ish operators
19187 @samp{|}, @code{&} and @code{!} instead.)
19189 The following predicates are pre-defined, but if none of these fit what
19190 you want to do, you can write your own.
19192 When evaluating each of these predicates, the named constant will be
19193 bound to the value determined by calling
19194 @code{gnus-agent-find-parameter} on the appropriate parameter. For
19195 example, gnus-agent-short-article will be bound to
19196 @code{(gnus-agent-find-parameter group 'agent-short-article)}. This
19197 means that you can specify a predicate in your category then tune that
19198 predicate to individual groups.
19202 True if the article is shorter than @code{gnus-agent-short-article}
19203 lines; default 100.
19206 True if the article is longer than @code{gnus-agent-long-article}
19207 lines; default 200.
19210 True if the article has a download score less than
19211 @code{gnus-agent-low-score}; default 0.
19214 True if the article has a download score greater than
19215 @code{gnus-agent-high-score}; default 0.
19218 True if the Gnus Agent guesses that the article is spam. The
19219 heuristics may change over time, but at present it just computes a
19220 checksum and sees whether articles match.
19229 If you want to create your own predicate function, here's what you have
19230 to know: The functions are called with no parameters, but the
19231 @code{gnus-headers} and @code{gnus-score} dynamic variables are bound to
19234 For example, you could decide that you don't want to download articles
19235 that were posted more than a certain number of days ago (e.g. posted
19236 more than @code{gnus-agent-expire-days} ago) you might write a function
19237 something along the lines of the following:
19240 (defun my-article-old-p ()
19241 "Say whether an article is old."
19242 (< (time-to-days (date-to-time (mail-header-date gnus-headers)))
19243 (- (time-to-days (current-time)) gnus-agent-expire-days)))
19246 with the predicate then defined as:
19249 (not my-article-old-p)
19252 or you could append your predicate to the predefined
19253 @code{gnus-category-predicate-alist} in your @file{~/.gnus.el} or
19257 (require 'gnus-agent)
19258 (setq gnus-category-predicate-alist
19259 (append gnus-category-predicate-alist
19260 '((old . my-article-old-p))))
19263 and simply specify your predicate as:
19269 If/when using something like the above, be aware that there are many
19270 misconfigured systems/mailers out there and so an article's date is not
19271 always a reliable indication of when it was posted. Hell, some people
19272 just don't give a damn.
19274 The above predicates apply to @emph{all} the groups which belong to the
19275 category. However, if you wish to have a specific predicate for an
19276 individual group within a category, or you're just too lazy to set up a
19277 new category, you can enter a group's individual predicate in its group
19278 parameters like so:
19281 (agent-predicate . short)
19284 This is the group/topic parameter equivalent of the agent category default.
19285 Note that when specifying a single word predicate like this, the
19286 @code{agent-predicate} specification must be in dotted pair notation.
19288 The equivalent of the longer example from above would be:
19291 (agent-predicate or high (and (not low) (not long)))
19294 The outer parenthesis required in the category specification are not
19295 entered here as, not being in dotted pair notation, the value of the
19296 predicate is assumed to be a list.
19299 Now, the syntax of the download score is the same as the syntax of
19300 normal score files, except that all elements that require actually
19301 seeing the article itself are verboten. This means that only the
19302 following headers can be scored on: @code{Subject}, @code{From},
19303 @code{Date}, @code{Message-ID}, @code{References}, @code{Chars},
19304 @code{Lines}, and @code{Xref}.
19306 As with predicates, the specification of the @code{download score rule}
19307 to use in respect of a group can be in either the category definition if
19308 it's to be applicable to all groups in therein, or a group's parameters
19309 if it's to be specific to that group.
19311 In both of these places the @code{download score rule} can take one of
19318 This has the same syntax as a normal Gnus score file except only a
19319 subset of scoring keywords are available as mentioned above.
19325 Category specification
19329 ("Lars Ingebrigtsen" 1000000 nil s))
19335 Group/Topic Parameter specification
19338 (agent-score ("from"
19339 ("Lars Ingebrigtsen" 1000000 nil s))
19344 Again, note the omission of the outermost parenthesis here.
19350 These score files must @emph{only} contain the permitted scoring
19351 keywords stated above.
19357 Category specification
19360 ("~/News/agent.SCORE")
19366 ("~/News/agent.SCORE" "~/News/agent.group.SCORE")
19370 Group Parameter specification
19373 (agent-score "~/News/agent.SCORE")
19376 Additional score files can be specified as above. Need I say anything
19381 Use @code{normal} score files
19383 If you don't want to maintain two sets of scoring rules for a group, and
19384 your desired @code{downloading} criteria for a group are the same as your
19385 @code{reading} criteria then you can tell the agent to refer to your
19386 @code{normal} score files when deciding what to download.
19388 These directives in either the category definition or a group's
19389 parameters will cause the agent to read in all the applicable score
19390 files for a group, @emph{filtering out} those sections that do not
19391 relate to one of the permitted subset of scoring keywords.
19395 Category Specification
19402 Group Parameter specification
19405 (agent-score . file)
19410 @node Category Buffer
19411 @subsubsection Category Buffer
19413 You'd normally do all category maintenance from the category buffer.
19414 When you enter it for the first time (with the @kbd{J c} command from
19415 the group buffer), you'll only see the @code{default} category.
19417 The following commands are available in this buffer:
19421 @kindex q (Category)
19422 @findex gnus-category-exit
19423 Return to the group buffer (@code{gnus-category-exit}).
19426 @kindex e (Category)
19427 @findex gnus-category-customize-category
19428 Use a customization buffer to set all of the selected category's
19429 parameters at one time (@code{gnus-category-customize-category}).
19432 @kindex k (Category)
19433 @findex gnus-category-kill
19434 Kill the current category (@code{gnus-category-kill}).
19437 @kindex c (Category)
19438 @findex gnus-category-copy
19439 Copy the current category (@code{gnus-category-copy}).
19442 @kindex a (Category)
19443 @findex gnus-category-add
19444 Add a new category (@code{gnus-category-add}).
19447 @kindex p (Category)
19448 @findex gnus-category-edit-predicate
19449 Edit the predicate of the current category
19450 (@code{gnus-category-edit-predicate}).
19453 @kindex g (Category)
19454 @findex gnus-category-edit-groups
19455 Edit the list of groups belonging to the current category
19456 (@code{gnus-category-edit-groups}).
19459 @kindex s (Category)
19460 @findex gnus-category-edit-score
19461 Edit the download score rule of the current category
19462 (@code{gnus-category-edit-score}).
19465 @kindex l (Category)
19466 @findex gnus-category-list
19467 List all the categories (@code{gnus-category-list}).
19471 @node Category Variables
19472 @subsubsection Category Variables
19475 @item gnus-category-mode-hook
19476 @vindex gnus-category-mode-hook
19477 Hook run in category buffers.
19479 @item gnus-category-line-format
19480 @vindex gnus-category-line-format
19481 Format of the lines in the category buffer (@pxref{Formatting
19482 Variables}). Valid elements are:
19486 The name of the category.
19489 The number of groups in the category.
19492 @item gnus-category-mode-line-format
19493 @vindex gnus-category-mode-line-format
19494 Format of the category mode line (@pxref{Mode Line Formatting}).
19496 @item gnus-agent-short-article
19497 @vindex gnus-agent-short-article
19498 Articles that have fewer lines than this are short. Default 100.
19500 @item gnus-agent-long-article
19501 @vindex gnus-agent-long-article
19502 Articles that have more lines than this are long. Default 200.
19504 @item gnus-agent-low-score
19505 @vindex gnus-agent-low-score
19506 Articles that have a score lower than this have a low score. Default
19509 @item gnus-agent-high-score
19510 @vindex gnus-agent-high-score
19511 Articles that have a score higher than this have a high score. Default
19514 @item gnus-agent-expire-days
19515 @vindex gnus-agent-expire-days
19516 The number of days that a @samp{read} article must stay in the agent's
19517 local disk before becoming eligible for expiration (While the name is
19518 the same, this doesn't mean expiring the article on the server. It
19519 just means deleting the local copy of the article). What is also
19520 important to understand is that the counter starts with the time the
19521 article was written to the local disk and not the time the article was
19525 @item gnus-agent-enable-expiration
19526 @vindex gnus-agent-enable-expiration
19527 Determines whether articles in a group are, by default, expired or
19528 retained indefinitely. The default is @code{ENABLE} which means that
19529 you'll have to disable expiration when desired. On the other hand,
19530 you could set this to @code{DISABLE}. In that case, you would then
19531 have to enable expiration in selected groups.
19536 @node Agent Commands
19537 @subsection Agent Commands
19538 @findex gnus-agent-toggle-plugged
19539 @kindex J j (Agent)
19541 All the Gnus Agent commands are on the @kbd{J} submap. The @kbd{J j}
19542 (@code{gnus-agent-toggle-plugged}) command works in all modes, and
19543 toggles the plugged/unplugged state of the Gnus Agent.
19547 * Group Agent Commands:: Configure groups and fetch their contents.
19548 * Summary Agent Commands:: Manually select then fetch specific articles.
19549 * Server Agent Commands:: Select the servers that are supported by the agent.
19555 @node Group Agent Commands
19556 @subsubsection Group Agent Commands
19560 @kindex J u (Agent Group)
19561 @findex gnus-agent-fetch-groups
19562 Fetch all eligible articles in the current group
19563 (@code{gnus-agent-fetch-groups}).
19566 @kindex J c (Agent Group)
19567 @findex gnus-enter-category-buffer
19568 Enter the Agent category buffer (@code{gnus-enter-category-buffer}).
19571 @kindex J s (Agent Group)
19572 @findex gnus-agent-fetch-session
19573 Fetch all eligible articles in all groups
19574 (@code{gnus-agent-fetch-session}).
19577 @kindex J S (Agent Group)
19578 @findex gnus-group-send-queue
19579 Send all sendable messages in the queue group
19580 (@code{gnus-group-send-queue}). @xref{Drafts}.
19583 @kindex J a (Agent Group)
19584 @findex gnus-agent-add-group
19585 Add the current group to an Agent category
19586 (@code{gnus-agent-add-group}). This command understands the
19587 process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
19590 @kindex J r (Agent Group)
19591 @findex gnus-agent-remove-group
19592 Remove the current group from its category, if any
19593 (@code{gnus-agent-remove-group}). This command understands the
19594 process/prefix convention (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
19597 @kindex J Y (Agent Group)
19598 @findex gnus-agent-synchronize-flags
19599 Synchronize flags changed while unplugged with remote server, if any.
19605 @node Summary Agent Commands
19606 @subsubsection Summary Agent Commands
19610 @kindex J # (Agent Summary)
19611 @findex gnus-agent-mark-article
19612 Mark the article for downloading (@code{gnus-agent-mark-article}).
19615 @kindex J M-# (Agent Summary)
19616 @findex gnus-agent-unmark-article
19617 Remove the downloading mark from the article
19618 (@code{gnus-agent-unmark-article}).
19622 @kindex @@ (Agent Summary)
19623 @findex gnus-agent-toggle-mark
19624 Toggle whether to download the article
19625 (@code{gnus-agent-toggle-mark}). The download mark is @samp{%} by
19629 @kindex J c (Agent Summary)
19630 @findex gnus-agent-catchup
19631 Mark all articles as read (@code{gnus-agent-catchup}) that are neither cached, downloaded, nor downloadable.
19634 @kindex J S (Agent Summary)
19635 @findex gnus-agent-fetch-group
19636 Download all eligible (@pxref{Agent Categories}) articles in this group.
19637 (@code{gnus-agent-fetch-group}).
19640 @kindex J s (Agent Summary)
19641 @findex gnus-agent-summary-fetch-series
19642 Download all processable articles in this group.
19643 (@code{gnus-agent-summary-fetch-series}).
19646 @kindex J u (Agent Summary)
19647 @findex gnus-agent-summary-fetch-group
19648 Download all downloadable articles in the current group
19649 (@code{gnus-agent-summary-fetch-group}).
19654 @node Server Agent Commands
19655 @subsubsection Server Agent Commands
19659 @kindex J a (Agent Server)
19660 @findex gnus-agent-add-server
19661 Add the current server to the list of servers covered by the Gnus Agent
19662 (@code{gnus-agent-add-server}).
19665 @kindex J r (Agent Server)
19666 @findex gnus-agent-remove-server
19667 Remove the current server from the list of servers covered by the Gnus
19668 Agent (@code{gnus-agent-remove-server}).
19673 @node Agent Visuals
19674 @subsection Agent Visuals
19676 If you open a summary while unplugged and, Gnus knows from the group's
19677 active range that there are more articles than the headers currently
19678 stored in the Agent, you may see some articles whose subject looks
19679 something like @samp{[Undownloaded article #####]}. These are
19680 placeholders for the missing headers. Aside from setting a mark,
19681 there is not much that can be done with one of these placeholders.
19682 When Gnus finally gets a chance to fetch the group's headers, the
19683 placeholders will automatically be replaced by the actual headers.
19684 You can configure the summary buffer's maneuvering to skip over the
19685 placeholders if you care (See @code{gnus-auto-goto-ignores}).
19687 While it may be obvious to all, the only headers and articles
19688 available while unplugged are those headers and articles that were
19689 fetched into the Agent while previously plugged. To put it another
19690 way, ``If you forget to fetch something while plugged, you might have a
19691 less than satisfying unplugged session''. For this reason, the Agent
19692 adds two visual effects to your summary buffer. These effects display
19693 the download status of each article so that you always know which
19694 articles will be available when unplugged.
19696 The first visual effect is the @samp{%O} spec. If you customize
19697 @code{gnus-summary-line-format} to include this specifier, you will add
19698 a single character field that indicates an article's download status.
19699 Articles that have been fetched into either the Agent or the Cache,
19700 will display @code{gnus-downloaded-mark} (defaults to @samp{+}). All
19701 other articles will display @code{gnus-undownloaded-mark} (defaults to
19702 @samp{-}). If you open a group that has not been agentized, a space
19703 (@samp{ }) will be displayed.
19705 The second visual effect are the undownloaded faces. The faces, there
19706 are three indicating the article's score (low, normal, high), seem to
19707 result in a love/hate response from many Gnus users. The problem is
19708 that the face selection is controlled by a list of condition tests and
19709 face names (See @code{gnus-summary-highlight}). Each condition is
19710 tested in the order in which it appears in the list so early
19711 conditions have precedence over later conditions. All of this means
19712 that, if you tick an undownloaded article, the article will continue
19713 to be displayed in the undownloaded face rather than the ticked face.
19715 If you use the Agent as a cache (to avoid downloading the same article
19716 each time you visit it or to minimize your connection time), the
19717 undownloaded face will probably seem like a good idea. The reason
19718 being that you do all of our work (marking, reading, deleting) with
19719 downloaded articles so the normal faces always appear. For those
19720 users using the agent to improve online performance by caching the NOV
19721 database (most users since 5.10.2), the undownloaded faces may appear
19722 to be an absolutely horrible idea. The issue being that, since none
19723 of their articles have been fetched into the Agent, all of the
19724 normal faces will be obscured by the undownloaded faces.
19726 If you would like to use the undownloaded faces, you must enable the
19727 undownloaded faces by setting the @code{agent-enable-undownloaded-faces}
19728 group parameter to @code{t}. This parameter, like all other agent
19729 parameters, may be set on an Agent Category (@pxref{Agent Categories}),
19730 a Group Topic (@pxref{Topic Parameters}), or an individual group
19731 (@pxref{Group Parameters}).
19733 The one problem common to all users using the agent is how quickly it
19734 can consume disk space. If you using the agent on many groups, it is
19735 even more difficult to effectively recover disk space. One solution
19736 is the @samp{%F} format available in @code{gnus-group-line-format}.
19737 This format will display the actual disk space used by articles
19738 fetched into both the agent and cache. By knowing which groups use
19739 the most space, users know where to focus their efforts when ``agent
19740 expiring'' articles.
19742 @node Agent as Cache
19743 @subsection Agent as Cache
19745 When Gnus is plugged, it is not efficient to download headers or
19746 articles from the server again, if they are already stored in the
19747 Agent. So, Gnus normally only downloads headers once, and stores them
19748 in the Agent. These headers are later used when generating the summary
19749 buffer, regardless of whether you are plugged or unplugged. Articles
19750 are not cached in the Agent by default though (that would potentially
19751 consume lots of disk space), but if you have already downloaded an
19752 article into the Agent, Gnus will not download the article from the
19753 server again but use the locally stored copy instead.
19755 If you so desire, you can configure the agent (see @code{gnus-agent-cache}
19756 @pxref{Agent Variables}) to always download headers and articles while
19757 plugged. Gnus will almost certainly be slower, but it will be kept
19758 synchronized with the server. That last point probably won't make any
19759 sense if you are using a nntp or nnimap back end.
19762 @subsection Agent Expiry
19764 @vindex gnus-agent-expire-days
19765 @findex gnus-agent-expire
19766 @kindex M-x gnus-agent-expire
19767 @kindex M-x gnus-agent-expire-group
19768 @findex gnus-agent-expire-group
19769 @cindex agent expiry
19770 @cindex Gnus agent expiry
19771 @cindex expiry, in Gnus agent
19773 The Agent back end, @code{nnagent}, doesn't handle expiry. Well, at
19774 least it doesn't handle it like other back ends. Instead, there are
19775 special @code{gnus-agent-expire} and @code{gnus-agent-expire-group}
19776 commands that will expire all read articles that are older than
19777 @code{gnus-agent-expire-days} days. They can be run whenever you feel
19778 that you're running out of space. Neither are particularly fast or
19779 efficient, and it's not a particularly good idea to interrupt them (with
19780 @kbd{C-g} or anything else) once you've started one of them.
19782 Note that other functions, e.g. @code{gnus-request-expire-articles},
19783 might run @code{gnus-agent-expire} for you to keep the agent
19784 synchronized with the group.
19786 The agent parameter @code{agent-enable-expiration} may be used to
19787 prevent expiration in selected groups.
19789 @vindex gnus-agent-expire-all
19790 If @code{gnus-agent-expire-all} is non-@code{nil}, the agent
19791 expiration commands will expire all articles---unread, read, ticked
19792 and dormant. If @code{nil} (which is the default), only read articles
19793 are eligible for expiry, and unread, ticked and dormant articles will
19794 be kept indefinitely.
19796 If you find that some articles eligible for expiry are never expired,
19797 perhaps some Gnus Agent files are corrupted. There's are special
19798 commands, @code{gnus-agent-regenerate} and
19799 @code{gnus-agent-regenerate-group}, to fix possible problems.
19801 @node Agent Regeneration
19802 @subsection Agent Regeneration
19804 @cindex agent regeneration
19805 @cindex Gnus agent regeneration
19806 @cindex regeneration
19808 The local data structures used by @code{nnagent} may become corrupted
19809 due to certain exceptional conditions. When this happens,
19810 @code{nnagent} functionality may degrade or even fail. The solution
19811 to this problem is to repair the local data structures by removing all
19812 internal inconsistencies.
19814 For example, if your connection to your server is lost while
19815 downloaded articles into the agent, the local data structures will not
19816 know about articles successfully downloaded prior to the connection
19817 failure. Running @code{gnus-agent-regenerate} or
19818 @code{gnus-agent-regenerate-group} will update the data structures
19819 such that you don't need to download these articles a second time.
19821 @findex gnus-agent-regenerate
19822 @kindex M-x gnus-agent-regenerate
19823 The command @code{gnus-agent-regenerate} will perform
19824 @code{gnus-agent-regenerate-group} on every agentized group. While
19825 you can run @code{gnus-agent-regenerate} in any buffer, it is strongly
19826 recommended that you first close all summary buffers.
19828 @findex gnus-agent-regenerate-group
19829 @kindex M-x gnus-agent-regenerate-group
19830 The command @code{gnus-agent-regenerate-group} uses the local copies
19831 of individual articles to repair the local @acronym{NOV}(header) database. It
19832 then updates the internal data structures that document which articles
19833 are stored locally. An optional argument will mark articles in the
19836 @node Agent and flags
19837 @subsection Agent and flags
19839 The Agent works with any Gnus back end including those, such as
19840 nnimap, that store flags (read, ticked, etc) on the server. Sadly,
19841 the Agent does not actually know which backends keep their flags in
19842 the backend server rather than in @file{.newsrc}. This means that the
19843 Agent, while unplugged or disconnected, will always record all changes
19844 to the flags in its own files.
19846 When you plug back in, Gnus will then check to see if you have any
19847 changed any flags and ask if you wish to synchronize these with the
19848 server. This behavior is customizable by @code{gnus-agent-synchronize-flags}.
19850 @vindex gnus-agent-synchronize-flags
19851 If @code{gnus-agent-synchronize-flags} is @code{nil}, the Agent will
19852 never automatically synchronize flags. If it is @code{ask}, which is
19853 the default, the Agent will check if you made any changes and if so
19854 ask if you wish to synchronize these when you re-connect. If it has
19855 any other value, all flags will be synchronized automatically.
19857 If you do not wish to synchronize flags automatically when you
19858 re-connect, you can do it manually with the
19859 @code{gnus-agent-synchronize-flags} command that is bound to @kbd{J Y}
19860 in the group buffer.
19862 Technical note: the synchronization algorithm does not work by ``pushing''
19863 all local flags to the server, but rather by incrementally updated the
19864 server view of flags by changing only those flags that were changed by
19865 the user. Thus, if you set one flag on an article, quit the group then
19866 re-select the group and remove the flag; the flag will be set and
19867 removed from the server when you ``synchronize''. The queued flag
19868 operations can be found in the per-server @code{flags} file in the Agent
19869 directory. It's emptied when you synchronize flags.
19871 @node Agent and IMAP
19872 @subsection Agent and IMAP
19874 The Agent works with any Gnus back end, including nnimap. However,
19875 since there are some conceptual differences between @acronym{NNTP} and
19876 @acronym{IMAP}, this section (should) provide you with some information to
19877 make Gnus Agent work smoother as a @acronym{IMAP} Disconnected Mode client.
19879 Some things are currently not implemented in the Agent that you'd might
19880 expect from a disconnected @acronym{IMAP} client, including:
19885 Copying/moving articles into nnimap groups when unplugged.
19888 Creating/deleting nnimap groups when unplugged.
19892 @node Outgoing Messages
19893 @subsection Outgoing Messages
19895 By default, when Gnus is unplugged, all outgoing messages (both mail
19896 and news) are stored in the draft group ``queue'' (@pxref{Drafts}).
19897 You can view them there after posting, and edit them at will.
19899 You can control the circumstances under which outgoing mail is queued
19900 (see @code{gnus-agent-queue-mail}, @pxref{Agent Variables}). Outgoing
19901 news is always queued when Gnus is unplugged, and never otherwise.
19903 You can send the messages either from the draft group with the special
19904 commands available there, or you can use the @kbd{J S} command in the
19905 group buffer to send all the sendable messages in the draft group.
19906 Posting news will only work when Gnus is plugged, but you can send
19909 If sending mail while unplugged does not work for you and you worry
19910 about hitting @kbd{J S} by accident when unplugged, you can have Gnus
19911 ask you to confirm your action (see
19912 @code{gnus-agent-prompt-send-queue}, @pxref{Agent Variables}).
19914 @node Agent Variables
19915 @subsection Agent Variables
19920 Is the agent enabled? The default is @code{t}. When first enabled,
19921 the agent will use @code{gnus-agent-auto-agentize-methods} to
19922 automatically mark some back ends as agentized. You may change which
19923 back ends are agentized using the agent commands in the server buffer.
19925 To enter the server buffer, use the @kbd{^}
19926 (@code{gnus-group-enter-server-mode}) command in the group buffer.
19929 @item gnus-agent-directory
19930 @vindex gnus-agent-directory
19931 Where the Gnus Agent will store its files. The default is
19932 @file{~/News/agent/}.
19934 @item gnus-agent-handle-level
19935 @vindex gnus-agent-handle-level
19936 Groups on levels (@pxref{Group Levels}) higher than this variable will
19937 be ignored by the Agent. The default is @code{gnus-level-subscribed},
19938 which means that only subscribed group will be considered by the Agent
19941 @item gnus-agent-plugged-hook
19942 @vindex gnus-agent-plugged-hook
19943 Hook run when connecting to the network.
19945 @item gnus-agent-unplugged-hook
19946 @vindex gnus-agent-unplugged-hook
19947 Hook run when disconnecting from the network.
19949 @item gnus-agent-fetched-hook
19950 @vindex gnus-agent-fetched-hook
19951 Hook run when finished fetching articles.
19953 @item gnus-agent-cache
19954 @vindex gnus-agent-cache
19955 Variable to control whether use the locally stored @acronym{NOV} and
19956 articles when plugged, e.g. essentially using the Agent as a cache.
19957 The default is non-@code{nil}, which means to use the Agent as a cache.
19959 @item gnus-agent-go-online
19960 @vindex gnus-agent-go-online
19961 If @code{gnus-agent-go-online} is @code{nil}, the Agent will never
19962 automatically switch offline servers into online status. If it is
19963 @code{ask}, the default, the Agent will ask if you wish to switch
19964 offline servers into online status when you re-connect. If it has any
19965 other value, all offline servers will be automatically switched into
19968 @item gnus-agent-mark-unread-after-downloaded
19969 @vindex gnus-agent-mark-unread-after-downloaded
19970 If @code{gnus-agent-mark-unread-after-downloaded} is non-@code{nil},
19971 mark articles as unread after downloading. This is usually a safe
19972 thing to do as the newly downloaded article has obviously not been
19973 read. The default is @code{t}.
19975 @item gnus-agent-synchronize-flags
19976 @vindex gnus-agent-synchronize-flags
19977 If @code{gnus-agent-synchronize-flags} is @code{nil}, the Agent will
19978 never automatically synchronize flags. If it is @code{ask}, which is
19979 the default, the Agent will check if you made any changes and if so
19980 ask if you wish to synchronize these when you re-connect. If it has
19981 any other value, all flags will be synchronized automatically.
19983 @item gnus-agent-consider-all-articles
19984 @vindex gnus-agent-consider-all-articles
19985 If @code{gnus-agent-consider-all-articles} is non-@code{nil}, the
19986 agent will let the agent predicate decide whether articles need to be
19987 downloaded or not, for all articles. When @code{nil}, the default,
19988 the agent will only let the predicate decide whether unread articles
19989 are downloaded or not. If you enable this, you may also want to look
19990 into the agent expiry settings (@pxref{Category Variables}), so that
19991 the agent doesn't download articles which the agent will later expire,
19992 over and over again.
19994 @item gnus-agent-max-fetch-size
19995 @vindex gnus-agent-max-fetch-size
19996 The agent fetches articles into a temporary buffer prior to parsing
19997 them into individual files. To avoid exceeding the max. buffer size,
19998 the agent alternates between fetching and parsing until all articles
19999 have been fetched. @code{gnus-agent-max-fetch-size} provides a size
20000 limit to control how often the cycling occurs. A large value improves
20001 performance. A small value minimizes the time lost should the
20002 connection be lost while fetching (You may need to run
20003 @code{gnus-agent-regenerate-group} to update the group's state.
20004 However, all articles parsed prior to loosing the connection will be
20005 available while unplugged). The default is 10M so it is unusual to
20008 @item gnus-server-unopen-status
20009 @vindex gnus-server-unopen-status
20010 Perhaps not an Agent variable, but closely related to the Agent, this
20011 variable says what will happen if Gnus cannot open a server. If the
20012 Agent is enabled, the default, @code{nil}, makes Gnus ask the user
20013 whether to deny the server or whether to unplug the agent. If the
20014 Agent is disabled, Gnus always simply deny the server. Other choices
20015 for this variable include @code{denied} and @code{offline} the latter
20016 is only valid if the Agent is used.
20018 @item gnus-auto-goto-ignores
20019 @vindex gnus-auto-goto-ignores
20020 Another variable that isn't an Agent variable, yet so closely related
20021 that most will look for it here, this variable tells the summary
20022 buffer how to maneuver around undownloaded (only headers stored in the
20023 agent) and unfetched (neither article nor headers stored) articles.
20025 The valid values are @code{nil} (maneuver to any article),
20026 @code{undownloaded} (maneuvering while unplugged ignores articles that
20027 have not been fetched), @code{always-undownloaded} (maneuvering always
20028 ignores articles that have not been fetched), @code{unfetched}
20029 (maneuvering ignores articles whose headers have not been fetched).
20031 @item gnus-agent-queue-mail
20032 @vindex gnus-agent-queue-mail
20033 When @code{gnus-agent-queue-mail} is @code{always}, Gnus will always
20034 queue mail rather than sending it straight away. When @code{t}, Gnus
20035 will queue mail when unplugged only. When @code{nil}, never queue
20036 mail. The default is @code{t}.
20038 @item gnus-agent-prompt-send-queue
20039 @vindex gnus-agent-prompt-send-queue
20040 When @code{gnus-agent-prompt-send-queue} is non-@code{nil} Gnus will
20041 prompt you to confirm that you really wish to proceed if you hit
20042 @kbd{J S} while unplugged. The default is @code{nil}.
20044 @item gnus-agent-auto-agentize-methods
20045 @vindex gnus-agent-auto-agentize-methods
20046 If you have never used the Agent before (or more technically, if
20047 @file{~/News/agent/lib/servers} does not exist), Gnus will
20048 automatically agentize a few servers for you. This variable control
20049 which back ends should be auto-agentized. It is typically only useful
20050 to agentize remote back ends. The auto-agentizing has the same effect
20051 as running @kbd{J a} on the servers (@pxref{Server Agent Commands}).
20052 If the file exist, you must manage the servers manually by adding or
20053 removing them, this variable is only applicable the first time you
20054 start Gnus. The default is @samp{(nntp nnimap)}.
20059 @node Example Setup
20060 @subsection Example Setup
20062 If you don't want to read this manual, and you have a fairly standard
20063 setup, you may be able to use something like the following as your
20064 @file{~/.gnus.el} file to get started.
20067 ;; @r{Define how Gnus is to fetch news. We do this over @acronym{NNTP}}
20068 ;; @r{from your ISP's server.}
20069 (setq gnus-select-method '(nntp "news.your-isp.com"))
20071 ;; @r{Define how Gnus is to read your mail. We read mail from}
20072 ;; @r{your ISP's @acronym{POP} server.}
20073 (setq mail-sources '((pop :server "pop.your-isp.com")))
20075 ;; @r{Say how Gnus is to store the mail. We use nnml groups.}
20076 (setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnml "")))
20078 ;; @r{Make Gnus into an offline newsreader.}
20079 ;; (gnus-agentize) ; @r{The obsolete setting.}
20080 ;; (setq gnus-agent t) ; @r{Now the default.}
20083 That should be it, basically. Put that in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file,
20084 edit to suit your needs, start up PPP (or whatever), and type @kbd{M-x
20087 If this is the first time you've run Gnus, you will be subscribed
20088 automatically to a few default newsgroups. You'll probably want to
20089 subscribe to more groups, and to do that, you have to query the
20090 @acronym{NNTP} server for a complete list of groups with the @kbd{A A}
20091 command. This usually takes quite a while, but you only have to do it
20094 After reading and parsing a while, you'll be presented with a list of
20095 groups. Subscribe to the ones you want to read with the @kbd{u}
20096 command. @kbd{l} to make all the killed groups disappear after you've
20097 subscribe to all the groups you want to read. (@kbd{A k} will bring
20098 back all the killed groups.)
20100 You can now read the groups at once, or you can download the articles
20101 with the @kbd{J s} command. And then read the rest of this manual to
20102 find out which of the other gazillion things you want to customize.
20105 @node Batching Agents
20106 @subsection Batching Agents
20107 @findex gnus-agent-batch
20109 Having the Gnus Agent fetch articles (and post whatever messages you've
20110 written) is quite easy once you've gotten things set up properly. The
20111 following shell script will do everything that is necessary:
20113 You can run a complete batch command from the command line with the
20114 following incantation:
20118 emacs -batch -l ~/.emacs -l ~/.gnus.el -f gnus-agent-batch >/dev/null 2>&1
20122 @node Agent Caveats
20123 @subsection Agent Caveats
20125 The Gnus Agent doesn't seem to work like most other offline
20126 newsreaders. Here are some common questions that some imaginary people
20130 @item If I read an article while plugged, do they get entered into the Agent?
20132 @strong{No}. If you want this behavior, add
20133 @code{gnus-agent-fetch-selected-article} to
20134 @code{gnus-select-article-hook}.
20136 @item If I read an article while plugged, and the article already exists in
20137 the Agent, will it get downloaded once more?
20139 @strong{No}, unless @code{gnus-agent-cache} is @code{nil}.
20143 In short, when Gnus is unplugged, it only looks into the locally stored
20144 articles; when it's plugged, it talks to your ISP and may also use the
20145 locally stored articles.
20152 Other people use @dfn{kill files}, but we here at Gnus Towers like
20153 scoring better than killing, so we'd rather switch than fight. They do
20154 something completely different as well, so sit up straight and pay
20157 @vindex gnus-summary-mark-below
20158 All articles have a default score (@code{gnus-summary-default-score}),
20159 which is 0 by default. This score may be raised or lowered either
20160 interactively or by score files. Articles that have a score lower than
20161 @code{gnus-summary-mark-below} are marked as read.
20163 Gnus will read any @dfn{score files} that apply to the current group
20164 before generating the summary buffer.
20166 There are several commands in the summary buffer that insert score
20167 entries based on the current article. You can, for instance, ask Gnus to
20168 lower or increase the score of all articles with a certain subject.
20170 There are two sorts of scoring entries: Permanent and temporary.
20171 Temporary score entries are self-expiring entries. Any entries that are
20172 temporary and have not been used for, say, a week, will be removed
20173 silently to help keep the sizes of the score files down.
20176 * Summary Score Commands:: Adding score entries for the current group.
20177 * Group Score Commands:: General score commands.
20178 * Score Variables:: Customize your scoring. (My, what terminology).
20179 * Score File Format:: What a score file may contain.
20180 * Score File Editing:: You can edit score files by hand as well.
20181 * Adaptive Scoring:: Big Sister Gnus knows what you read.
20182 * Home Score File:: How to say where new score entries are to go.
20183 * Followups To Yourself:: Having Gnus notice when people answer you.
20184 * Scoring On Other Headers:: Scoring on non-standard headers.
20185 * Scoring Tips:: How to score effectively.
20186 * Reverse Scoring:: That problem child of old is not problem.
20187 * Global Score Files:: Earth-spanning, ear-splitting score files.
20188 * Kill Files:: They are still here, but they can be ignored.
20189 * Converting Kill Files:: Translating kill files to score files.
20190 * Advanced Scoring:: Using logical expressions to build score rules.
20191 * Score Decays:: It can be useful to let scores wither away.
20195 @node Summary Score Commands
20196 @section Summary Score Commands
20197 @cindex score commands
20199 The score commands that alter score entries do not actually modify real
20200 score files. That would be too inefficient. Gnus maintains a cache of
20201 previously loaded score files, one of which is considered the
20202 @dfn{current score file alist}. The score commands simply insert
20203 entries into this list, and upon group exit, this list is saved.
20205 The current score file is by default the group's local score file, even
20206 if no such score file actually exists. To insert score commands into
20207 some other score file (e.g. @file{all.SCORE}), you must first make this
20208 score file the current one.
20210 General score commands that don't actually change the score file:
20215 @kindex V s (Summary)
20216 @findex gnus-summary-set-score
20217 Set the score of the current article (@code{gnus-summary-set-score}).
20220 @kindex V S (Summary)
20221 @findex gnus-summary-current-score
20222 Display the score of the current article
20223 (@code{gnus-summary-current-score}).
20226 @kindex V t (Summary)
20227 @findex gnus-score-find-trace
20228 Display all score rules that have been used on the current article
20229 (@code{gnus-score-find-trace}). In the @code{*Score Trace*} buffer, you
20230 may type @kbd{e} to edit score file corresponding to the score rule on
20231 current line and @kbd{f} to format (@code{gnus-score-pretty-print}) the
20232 score file and edit it.
20235 @kindex V w (Summary)
20236 @findex gnus-score-find-favourite-words
20237 List words used in scoring (@code{gnus-score-find-favourite-words}).
20240 @kindex V R (Summary)
20241 @findex gnus-summary-rescore
20242 Run the current summary through the scoring process
20243 (@code{gnus-summary-rescore}). This might be useful if you're playing
20244 around with your score files behind Gnus' back and want to see the
20245 effect you're having.
20248 @kindex V c (Summary)
20249 @findex gnus-score-change-score-file
20250 Make a different score file the current
20251 (@code{gnus-score-change-score-file}).
20254 @kindex V e (Summary)
20255 @findex gnus-score-edit-current-scores
20256 Edit the current score file (@code{gnus-score-edit-current-scores}).
20257 You will be popped into a @code{gnus-score-mode} buffer (@pxref{Score
20261 @kindex V f (Summary)
20262 @findex gnus-score-edit-file
20263 Edit a score file and make this score file the current one
20264 (@code{gnus-score-edit-file}).
20267 @kindex V F (Summary)
20268 @findex gnus-score-flush-cache
20269 Flush the score cache (@code{gnus-score-flush-cache}). This is useful
20270 after editing score files.
20273 @kindex V C (Summary)
20274 @findex gnus-score-customize
20275 Customize a score file in a visually pleasing manner
20276 (@code{gnus-score-customize}).
20280 The rest of these commands modify the local score file.
20285 @kindex V m (Summary)
20286 @findex gnus-score-set-mark-below
20287 Prompt for a score, and mark all articles with a score below this as
20288 read (@code{gnus-score-set-mark-below}).
20291 @kindex V x (Summary)
20292 @findex gnus-score-set-expunge-below
20293 Prompt for a score, and add a score rule to the current score file to
20294 expunge all articles below this score
20295 (@code{gnus-score-set-expunge-below}).
20298 The keystrokes for actually making score entries follow a very regular
20299 pattern, so there's no need to list all the commands. (Hundreds of
20302 @findex gnus-summary-increase-score
20303 @findex gnus-summary-lower-score
20307 The first key is either @kbd{I} (upper case i) for increasing the score
20308 or @kbd{L} for lowering the score.
20310 The second key says what header you want to score on. The following
20311 keys are available:
20315 Score on the author name.
20318 Score on the subject line.
20321 Score on the @code{Xref} line---i.e., the cross-posting line.
20324 Score on the @code{References} line.
20330 Score on the number of lines.
20333 Score on the @code{Message-ID} header.
20336 Score on an ``extra'' header, that is, one of those in gnus-extra-headers,
20337 if your @acronym{NNTP} server tracks additional header data in overviews.
20340 Score on followups---this matches the author name, and adds scores to
20341 the followups to this author. (Using this key leads to the creation of
20342 @file{ADAPT} files.)
20351 Score on thread. (Using this key leads to the creation of @file{ADAPT}
20357 The third key is the match type. Which match types are valid depends on
20358 what headers you are scoring on.
20370 Substring matching.
20373 Fuzzy matching (@pxref{Fuzzy Matching}).
20402 Greater than number.
20407 The fourth and usually final key says whether this is a temporary (i.e.,
20408 expiring) score entry, or a permanent (i.e., non-expiring) score entry,
20409 or whether it is to be done immediately, without adding to the score
20414 Temporary score entry.
20417 Permanent score entry.
20420 Immediately scoring.
20424 If you are scoring on `e' (extra) headers, you will then be prompted for
20425 the header name on which you wish to score. This must be a header named
20426 in gnus-extra-headers, and @samp{TAB} completion is available.
20430 So, let's say you want to increase the score on the current author with
20431 exact matching permanently: @kbd{I a e p}. If you want to lower the
20432 score based on the subject line, using substring matching, and make a
20433 temporary score entry: @kbd{L s s t}. Pretty easy.
20435 To make things a bit more complicated, there are shortcuts. If you use
20436 a capital letter on either the second or third keys, Gnus will use
20437 defaults for the remaining one or two keystrokes. The defaults are
20438 ``substring'' and ``temporary''. So @kbd{I A} is the same as @kbd{I a s
20439 t}, and @kbd{I a R} is the same as @kbd{I a r t}.
20441 These functions take both the numerical prefix and the symbolic prefix
20442 (@pxref{Symbolic Prefixes}). A numerical prefix says how much to lower
20443 (or increase) the score of the article. A symbolic prefix of @code{a}
20444 says to use the @file{all.SCORE} file for the command instead of the
20445 current score file.
20447 @vindex gnus-score-mimic-keymap
20448 The @code{gnus-score-mimic-keymap} says whether these commands will
20449 pretend they are keymaps or not.
20452 @node Group Score Commands
20453 @section Group Score Commands
20454 @cindex group score commands
20456 There aren't many of these as yet, I'm afraid.
20461 @kindex W e (Group)
20462 @findex gnus-score-edit-all-score
20463 Edit the apply-to-all-groups all.SCORE file. You will be popped into
20464 a @code{gnus-score-mode} buffer (@pxref{Score File Editing}).
20467 @kindex W f (Group)
20468 @findex gnus-score-flush-cache
20469 Gnus maintains a cache of score alists to avoid having to reload them
20470 all the time. This command will flush the cache
20471 (@code{gnus-score-flush-cache}).
20475 You can do scoring from the command line by saying something like:
20477 @findex gnus-batch-score
20478 @cindex batch scoring
20480 $ emacs -batch -l ~/.emacs -l ~/.gnus.el -f gnus-batch-score
20484 @node Score Variables
20485 @section Score Variables
20486 @cindex score variables
20490 @item gnus-use-scoring
20491 @vindex gnus-use-scoring
20492 If @code{nil}, Gnus will not check for score files, and will not, in
20493 general, do any score-related work. This is @code{t} by default.
20495 @item gnus-kill-killed
20496 @vindex gnus-kill-killed
20497 If this variable is @code{nil}, Gnus will never apply score files to
20498 articles that have already been through the kill process. While this
20499 may save you lots of time, it also means that if you apply a kill file
20500 to a group, and then change the kill file and want to run it over you
20501 group again to kill more articles, it won't work. You have to set this
20502 variable to @code{t} to do that. (It is @code{t} by default.)
20504 @item gnus-kill-files-directory
20505 @vindex gnus-kill-files-directory
20506 All kill and score files will be stored in this directory, which is
20507 initialized from the @env{SAVEDIR} environment variable by default.
20508 This is @file{~/News/} by default.
20510 @item gnus-score-file-suffix
20511 @vindex gnus-score-file-suffix
20512 Suffix to add to the group name to arrive at the score file name
20513 (@file{SCORE} by default.)
20515 @item gnus-score-uncacheable-files
20516 @vindex gnus-score-uncacheable-files
20517 @cindex score cache
20518 All score files are normally cached to avoid excessive re-loading of
20519 score files. However, this might make your Emacs grow big and
20520 bloated, so this regexp can be used to weed out score files unlikely
20521 to be needed again. It would be a bad idea to deny caching of
20522 @file{all.SCORE}, while it might be a good idea to not cache
20523 @file{comp.infosystems.www.authoring.misc.ADAPT}. In fact, this
20524 variable is @samp{ADAPT$} by default, so no adaptive score files will
20527 @item gnus-save-score
20528 @vindex gnus-save-score
20529 If you have really complicated score files, and do lots of batch
20530 scoring, then you might set this variable to @code{t}. This will make
20531 Gnus save the scores into the @file{.newsrc.eld} file.
20533 If you do not set this to @code{t}, then manual scores (like those set
20534 with @kbd{V s} (@code{gnus-summary-set-score})) will not be preserved
20535 across group visits.
20537 @item gnus-score-interactive-default-score
20538 @vindex gnus-score-interactive-default-score
20539 Score used by all the interactive raise/lower commands to raise/lower
20540 score with. Default is 1000, which may seem excessive, but this is to
20541 ensure that the adaptive scoring scheme gets enough room to play with.
20542 We don't want the small changes from the adaptive scoring to overwrite
20543 manually entered data.
20545 @item gnus-summary-default-score
20546 @vindex gnus-summary-default-score
20547 Default score of an article, which is 0 by default.
20549 @item gnus-summary-expunge-below
20550 @vindex gnus-summary-expunge-below
20551 Don't display the summary lines of articles that have scores lower than
20552 this variable. This is @code{nil} by default, which means that no
20553 articles will be hidden. This variable is local to the summary buffers,
20554 and has to be set from @code{gnus-summary-mode-hook}.
20556 @item gnus-score-over-mark
20557 @vindex gnus-score-over-mark
20558 Mark (in the third column) used for articles with a score over the
20559 default. Default is @samp{+}.
20561 @item gnus-score-below-mark
20562 @vindex gnus-score-below-mark
20563 Mark (in the third column) used for articles with a score below the
20564 default. Default is @samp{-}.
20566 @item gnus-score-find-score-files-function
20567 @vindex gnus-score-find-score-files-function
20568 Function used to find score files for the current group. This function
20569 is called with the name of the group as the argument.
20571 Predefined functions available are:
20574 @item gnus-score-find-single
20575 @findex gnus-score-find-single
20576 Only apply the group's own score file.
20578 @item gnus-score-find-bnews
20579 @findex gnus-score-find-bnews
20580 Apply all score files that match, using bnews syntax. This is the
20581 default. If the current group is @samp{gnu.emacs.gnus}, for instance,
20582 @file{all.emacs.all.SCORE}, @file{not.alt.all.SCORE} and
20583 @file{gnu.all.SCORE} would all apply. In short, the instances of
20584 @samp{all} in the score file names are translated into @samp{.*}, and
20585 then a regexp match is done.
20587 This means that if you have some score entries that you want to apply to
20588 all groups, then you put those entries in the @file{all.SCORE} file.
20590 The score files are applied in a semi-random order, although Gnus will
20591 try to apply the more general score files before the more specific score
20592 files. It does this by looking at the number of elements in the score
20593 file names---discarding the @samp{all} elements.
20595 @item gnus-score-find-hierarchical
20596 @findex gnus-score-find-hierarchical
20597 Apply all score files from all the parent groups. This means that you
20598 can't have score files like @file{all.SCORE}, but you can have
20599 @file{SCORE}, @file{comp.SCORE} and @file{comp.emacs.SCORE} for each
20603 This variable can also be a list of functions. In that case, all
20604 these functions will be called with the group name as argument, and
20605 all the returned lists of score files will be applied. These
20606 functions can also return lists of lists of score alists directly. In
20607 that case, the functions that return these non-file score alists
20608 should probably be placed before the ``real'' score file functions, to
20609 ensure that the last score file returned is the local score file.
20612 For example, to do hierarchical scoring but use a non-server-specific
20613 overall score file, you could use the value
20615 (list (lambda (group) ("all.SCORE"))
20616 'gnus-score-find-hierarchical)
20619 @item gnus-score-expiry-days
20620 @vindex gnus-score-expiry-days
20621 This variable says how many days should pass before an unused score file
20622 entry is expired. If this variable is @code{nil}, no score file entries
20623 are expired. It's 7 by default.
20625 @item gnus-update-score-entry-dates
20626 @vindex gnus-update-score-entry-dates
20627 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, temporary score entries that have
20628 been triggered (matched) will have their dates updated. (This is how Gnus
20629 controls expiry---all non-matched-entries will become too old while
20630 matched entries will stay fresh and young.) However, if you set this
20631 variable to @code{nil}, even matched entries will grow old and will
20632 have to face that oh-so grim reaper.
20634 @item gnus-score-after-write-file-function
20635 @vindex gnus-score-after-write-file-function
20636 Function called with the name of the score file just written.
20638 @item gnus-score-thread-simplify
20639 @vindex gnus-score-thread-simplify
20640 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, article subjects will be
20641 simplified for subject scoring purposes in the same manner as with
20642 threading---according to the current value of
20643 @code{gnus-simplify-subject-functions}. If the scoring entry uses
20644 @code{substring} or @code{exact} matching, the match will also be
20645 simplified in this manner.
20650 @node Score File Format
20651 @section Score File Format
20652 @cindex score file format
20654 A score file is an @code{emacs-lisp} file that normally contains just a
20655 single form. Casual users are not expected to edit these files;
20656 everything can be changed from the summary buffer.
20658 Anyway, if you'd like to dig into it yourself, here's an example:
20662 ("Lars Ingebrigtsen" -10000)
20664 ("larsi\\|lmi" -50000 nil R))
20666 ("Ding is Badd" nil 728373))
20668 ("alt.politics" -1000 728372 s))
20673 (mark-and-expunge -10)
20677 (files "/hom/larsi/News/gnu.SCORE")
20678 (exclude-files "all.SCORE")
20679 (local (gnus-newsgroup-auto-expire t)
20680 (gnus-summary-make-false-root empty))
20684 This example demonstrates most score file elements. @xref{Advanced
20685 Scoring}, for a different approach.
20687 Even though this looks much like Lisp code, nothing here is actually
20688 @code{eval}ed. The Lisp reader is used to read this form, though, so it
20689 has to be valid syntactically, if not semantically.
20691 Six keys are supported by this alist:
20696 If the key is a string, it is the name of the header to perform the
20697 match on. Scoring can only be performed on these eight headers:
20698 @code{From}, @code{Subject}, @code{References}, @code{Message-ID},
20699 @code{Xref}, @code{Lines}, @code{Chars} and @code{Date}. In addition to
20700 these headers, there are three strings to tell Gnus to fetch the entire
20701 article and do the match on larger parts of the article: @code{Body}
20702 will perform the match on the body of the article, @code{Head} will
20703 perform the match on the head of the article, and @code{All} will
20704 perform the match on the entire article. Note that using any of these
20705 last three keys will slow down group entry @emph{considerably}. The
20706 final ``header'' you can score on is @code{Followup}. These score
20707 entries will result in new score entries being added for all follow-ups
20708 to articles that matches these score entries.
20710 Following this key is an arbitrary number of score entries, where each
20711 score entry has one to four elements.
20715 The first element is the @dfn{match element}. On most headers this will
20716 be a string, but on the Lines and Chars headers, this must be an
20720 If the second element is present, it should be a number---the @dfn{score
20721 element}. This number should be an integer in the neginf to posinf
20722 interval. This number is added to the score of the article if the match
20723 is successful. If this element is not present, the
20724 @code{gnus-score-interactive-default-score} number will be used
20725 instead. This is 1000 by default.
20728 If the third element is present, it should be a number---the @dfn{date
20729 element}. This date says when the last time this score entry matched,
20730 which provides a mechanism for expiring the score entries. It this
20731 element is not present, the score entry is permanent. The date is
20732 represented by the number of days since December 31, 1 BCE.
20735 If the fourth element is present, it should be a symbol---the @dfn{type
20736 element}. This element specifies what function should be used to see
20737 whether this score entry matches the article. What match types that can
20738 be used depends on what header you wish to perform the match on.
20741 @item From, Subject, References, Xref, Message-ID
20742 For most header types, there are the @code{r} and @code{R} (regexp), as
20743 well as @code{s} and @code{S} (substring) types, and @code{e} and
20744 @code{E} (exact match), and @code{w} (word match) types. If this
20745 element is not present, Gnus will assume that substring matching should
20746 be used. @code{R}, @code{S}, and @code{E} differ from the others in
20747 that the matches will be done in a case-sensitive manner. All these
20748 one-letter types are really just abbreviations for the @code{regexp},
20749 @code{string}, @code{exact}, and @code{word} types, which you can use
20750 instead, if you feel like.
20753 Just as for the standard string overview headers, if you are using
20754 gnus-extra-headers, you can score on these headers' values. In this
20755 case, there is a 5th element in the score entry, being the name of the
20756 header to be scored. The following entry is useful in your
20757 @file{all.SCORE} file in case of spam attacks from a single origin
20758 host, if your @acronym{NNTP} server tracks @samp{NNTP-Posting-Host} in
20762 ("111.222.333.444" -1000 nil s
20763 "NNTP-Posting-Host")
20767 These two headers use different match types: @code{<}, @code{>},
20768 @code{=}, @code{>=} and @code{<=}.
20770 These predicates are true if
20773 (PREDICATE HEADER MATCH)
20776 evaluates to non-@code{nil}. For instance, the advanced match
20777 @code{("lines" 4 <)} (@pxref{Advanced Scoring}) will result in the
20784 Or to put it another way: When using @code{<} on @code{Lines} with 4 as
20785 the match, we get the score added if the article has less than 4 lines.
20786 (It's easy to get confused and think it's the other way around. But
20787 it's not. I think.)
20789 When matching on @code{Lines}, be careful because some back ends (like
20790 @code{nndir}) do not generate @code{Lines} header, so every article ends
20791 up being marked as having 0 lines. This can lead to strange results if
20792 you happen to lower score of the articles with few lines.
20795 For the Date header we have three kinda silly match types:
20796 @code{before}, @code{at} and @code{after}. I can't really imagine this
20797 ever being useful, but, like, it would feel kinda silly not to provide
20798 this function. Just in case. You never know. Better safe than sorry.
20799 Once burnt, twice shy. Don't judge a book by its cover. Never not have
20800 sex on a first date. (I have been told that at least one person, and I
20801 quote, ``found this function indispensable'', however.)
20805 A more useful match type is @code{regexp}. With it, you can match the
20806 date string using a regular expression. The date is normalized to
20807 ISO8601 compact format first---@var{YYYYMMDD}@code{T}@var{HHMMSS}. If
20808 you want to match all articles that have been posted on April 1st in
20809 every year, you could use @samp{....0401.........} as a match string,
20810 for instance. (Note that the date is kept in its original time zone, so
20811 this will match articles that were posted when it was April 1st where
20812 the article was posted from. Time zones are such wholesome fun for the
20815 @item Head, Body, All
20816 These three match keys use the same match types as the @code{From} (etc)
20820 This match key is somewhat special, in that it will match the
20821 @code{From} header, and affect the score of not only the matching
20822 articles, but also all followups to the matching articles. This allows
20823 you e.g. increase the score of followups to your own articles, or
20824 decrease the score of followups to the articles of some known
20825 trouble-maker. Uses the same match types as the @code{From} header
20826 uses. (Using this match key will lead to creation of @file{ADAPT}
20830 This match key works along the same lines as the @code{Followup} match
20831 key. If you say that you want to score on a (sub-)thread started by an
20832 article with a @code{Message-ID} @var{x}, then you add a @samp{thread}
20833 match. This will add a new @samp{thread} match for each article that
20834 has @var{x} in its @code{References} header. (These new @samp{thread}
20835 matches will use the @code{Message-ID}s of these matching articles.)
20836 This will ensure that you can raise/lower the score of an entire thread,
20837 even though some articles in the thread may not have complete
20838 @code{References} headers. Note that using this may lead to
20839 undeterministic scores of the articles in the thread. (Using this match
20840 key will lead to creation of @file{ADAPT} files.)
20844 @cindex score file atoms
20846 The value of this entry should be a number. Any articles with a score
20847 lower than this number will be marked as read.
20850 The value of this entry should be a number. Any articles with a score
20851 lower than this number will be removed from the summary buffer.
20853 @item mark-and-expunge
20854 The value of this entry should be a number. Any articles with a score
20855 lower than this number will be marked as read and removed from the
20858 @item thread-mark-and-expunge
20859 The value of this entry should be a number. All articles that belong to
20860 a thread that has a total score below this number will be marked as read
20861 and removed from the summary buffer. @code{gnus-thread-score-function}
20862 says how to compute the total score for a thread.
20865 The value of this entry should be any number of file names. These files
20866 are assumed to be score files as well, and will be loaded the same way
20869 @item exclude-files
20870 The clue of this entry should be any number of files. These files will
20871 not be loaded, even though they would normally be so, for some reason or
20875 The value of this entry will be @code{eval}el. This element will be
20876 ignored when handling global score files.
20879 Read-only score files will not be updated or saved. Global score files
20880 should feature this atom (@pxref{Global Score Files}). (Note:
20881 @dfn{Global} here really means @dfn{global}; not your personal
20882 apply-to-all-groups score files.)
20885 The value of this entry should be a number. Articles that do not have
20886 parents will get this number added to their scores. Imagine you follow
20887 some high-volume newsgroup, like @samp{comp.lang.c}. Most likely you
20888 will only follow a few of the threads, also want to see any new threads.
20890 You can do this with the following two score file entries:
20894 (mark-and-expunge -100)
20897 When you enter the group the first time, you will only see the new
20898 threads. You then raise the score of the threads that you find
20899 interesting (with @kbd{I T} or @kbd{I S}), and ignore (@kbd{C y}) the
20900 rest. Next time you enter the group, you will see new articles in the
20901 interesting threads, plus any new threads.
20903 I.e.---the orphan score atom is for high-volume groups where a few
20904 interesting threads which can't be found automatically by ordinary
20905 scoring rules exist.
20908 This entry controls the adaptive scoring. If it is @code{t}, the
20909 default adaptive scoring rules will be used. If it is @code{ignore}, no
20910 adaptive scoring will be performed on this group. If it is a list, this
20911 list will be used as the adaptive scoring rules. If it isn't present,
20912 or is something other than @code{t} or @code{ignore}, the default
20913 adaptive scoring rules will be used. If you want to use adaptive
20914 scoring on most groups, you'd set @code{gnus-use-adaptive-scoring} to
20915 @code{t}, and insert an @code{(adapt ignore)} in the groups where you do
20916 not want adaptive scoring. If you only want adaptive scoring in a few
20917 groups, you'd set @code{gnus-use-adaptive-scoring} to @code{nil}, and
20918 insert @code{(adapt t)} in the score files of the groups where you want
20922 All adaptive score entries will go to the file named by this entry. It
20923 will also be applied when entering the group. This atom might be handy
20924 if you want to adapt on several groups at once, using the same adaptive
20925 file for a number of groups.
20928 @cindex local variables
20929 The value of this entry should be a list of @code{(@var{var}
20930 @var{value})} pairs. Each @var{var} will be made buffer-local to the
20931 current summary buffer, and set to the value specified. This is a
20932 convenient, if somewhat strange, way of setting variables in some
20933 groups if you don't like hooks much. Note that the @var{value} won't
20938 @node Score File Editing
20939 @section Score File Editing
20941 You normally enter all scoring commands from the summary buffer, but you
20942 might feel the urge to edit them by hand as well, so we've supplied you
20943 with a mode for that.
20945 It's simply a slightly customized @code{emacs-lisp} mode, with these
20946 additional commands:
20951 @kindex C-c C-c (Score)
20952 @findex gnus-score-edit-exit
20953 Save the changes you have made and return to the summary buffer
20954 (@code{gnus-score-edit-exit}).
20957 @kindex C-c C-d (Score)
20958 @findex gnus-score-edit-insert-date
20959 Insert the current date in numerical format
20960 (@code{gnus-score-edit-insert-date}). This is really the day number, if
20961 you were wondering.
20964 @kindex C-c C-p (Score)
20965 @findex gnus-score-pretty-print
20966 The adaptive score files are saved in an unformatted fashion. If you
20967 intend to read one of these files, you want to @dfn{pretty print} it
20968 first. This command (@code{gnus-score-pretty-print}) does that for
20973 Type @kbd{M-x gnus-score-mode} to use this mode.
20975 @vindex gnus-score-mode-hook
20976 @code{gnus-score-menu-hook} is run in score mode buffers.
20978 In the summary buffer you can use commands like @kbd{V f}, @kbd{V e} and
20979 @kbd{V t} to begin editing score files.
20982 @node Adaptive Scoring
20983 @section Adaptive Scoring
20984 @cindex adaptive scoring
20986 If all this scoring is getting you down, Gnus has a way of making it all
20987 happen automatically---as if by magic. Or rather, as if by artificial
20988 stupidity, to be precise.
20990 @vindex gnus-use-adaptive-scoring
20991 When you read an article, or mark an article as read, or kill an
20992 article, you leave marks behind. On exit from the group, Gnus can sniff
20993 these marks and add score elements depending on what marks it finds.
20994 You turn on this ability by setting @code{gnus-use-adaptive-scoring} to
20995 @code{t} or @code{(line)}. If you want score adaptively on separate
20996 words appearing in the subjects, you should set this variable to
20997 @code{(word)}. If you want to use both adaptive methods, set this
20998 variable to @code{(word line)}.
21000 @vindex gnus-default-adaptive-score-alist
21001 To give you complete control over the scoring process, you can customize
21002 the @code{gnus-default-adaptive-score-alist} variable. For instance, it
21003 might look something like this:
21006 (setq gnus-default-adaptive-score-alist
21007 '((gnus-unread-mark)
21008 (gnus-ticked-mark (from 4))
21009 (gnus-dormant-mark (from 5))
21010 (gnus-del-mark (from -4) (subject -1))
21011 (gnus-read-mark (from 4) (subject 2))
21012 (gnus-expirable-mark (from -1) (subject -1))
21013 (gnus-killed-mark (from -1) (subject -3))
21014 (gnus-kill-file-mark)
21015 (gnus-ancient-mark)
21016 (gnus-low-score-mark)
21017 (gnus-catchup-mark (from -1) (subject -1))))
21020 As you see, each element in this alist has a mark as a key (either a
21021 variable name or a ``real'' mark---a character). Following this key is
21022 a arbitrary number of header/score pairs. If there are no header/score
21023 pairs following the key, no adaptive scoring will be done on articles
21024 that have that key as the article mark. For instance, articles with
21025 @code{gnus-unread-mark} in the example above will not get adaptive score
21028 Each article can have only one mark, so just a single of these rules
21029 will be applied to each article.
21031 To take @code{gnus-del-mark} as an example---this alist says that all
21032 articles that have that mark (i.e., are marked with @samp{e}) will have a
21033 score entry added to lower based on the @code{From} header by -4, and
21034 lowered by @code{Subject} by -1. Change this to fit your prejudices.
21036 If you have marked 10 articles with the same subject with
21037 @code{gnus-del-mark}, the rule for that mark will be applied ten times.
21038 That means that that subject will get a score of ten times -1, which
21039 should be, unless I'm much mistaken, -10.
21041 If you have auto-expirable (mail) groups (@pxref{Expiring Mail}), all
21042 the read articles will be marked with the @samp{E} mark. This'll
21043 probably make adaptive scoring slightly impossible, so auto-expiring and
21044 adaptive scoring doesn't really mix very well.
21046 The headers you can score on are @code{from}, @code{subject},
21047 @code{message-id}, @code{references}, @code{xref}, @code{lines},
21048 @code{chars} and @code{date}. In addition, you can score on
21049 @code{followup}, which will create an adaptive score entry that matches
21050 on the @code{References} header using the @code{Message-ID} of the
21051 current article, thereby matching the following thread.
21053 If you use this scheme, you should set the score file atom @code{mark}
21054 to something small---like -300, perhaps, to avoid having small random
21055 changes result in articles getting marked as read.
21057 After using adaptive scoring for a week or so, Gnus should start to
21058 become properly trained and enhance the authors you like best, and kill
21059 the authors you like least, without you having to say so explicitly.
21061 You can control what groups the adaptive scoring is to be performed on
21062 by using the score files (@pxref{Score File Format}). This will also
21063 let you use different rules in different groups.
21065 @vindex gnus-adaptive-file-suffix
21066 The adaptive score entries will be put into a file where the name is the
21067 group name with @code{gnus-adaptive-file-suffix} appended. The default
21070 @vindex gnus-adaptive-pretty-print
21071 Adaptive score files can get huge and are not meant to be edited by
21072 human hands. If @code{gnus-adaptive-pretty-print} is @code{nil} (the
21073 deafult) those files will not be written in a human readable way.
21075 @vindex gnus-score-exact-adapt-limit
21076 When doing adaptive scoring, substring or fuzzy matching would probably
21077 give you the best results in most cases. However, if the header one
21078 matches is short, the possibility for false positives is great, so if
21079 the length of the match is less than
21080 @code{gnus-score-exact-adapt-limit}, exact matching will be used. If
21081 this variable is @code{nil}, exact matching will always be used to avoid
21084 @vindex gnus-default-adaptive-word-score-alist
21085 As mentioned above, you can adapt either on individual words or entire
21086 headers. If you adapt on words, the
21087 @code{gnus-default-adaptive-word-score-alist} variable says what score
21088 each instance of a word should add given a mark.
21091 (setq gnus-default-adaptive-word-score-alist
21092 `((,gnus-read-mark . 30)
21093 (,gnus-catchup-mark . -10)
21094 (,gnus-killed-mark . -20)
21095 (,gnus-del-mark . -15)))
21098 This is the default value. If you have adaption on words enabled, every
21099 word that appears in subjects of articles marked with
21100 @code{gnus-read-mark} will result in a score rule that increase the
21101 score with 30 points.
21103 @vindex gnus-default-ignored-adaptive-words
21104 @vindex gnus-ignored-adaptive-words
21105 Words that appear in the @code{gnus-default-ignored-adaptive-words} list
21106 will be ignored. If you wish to add more words to be ignored, use the
21107 @code{gnus-ignored-adaptive-words} list instead.
21109 @vindex gnus-adaptive-word-length-limit
21110 Some may feel that short words shouldn't count when doing adaptive
21111 scoring. If so, you may set @code{gnus-adaptive-word-length-limit} to
21112 an integer. Words shorter than this number will be ignored. This
21113 variable defaults to @code{nil}.
21115 @vindex gnus-adaptive-word-syntax-table
21116 When the scoring is done, @code{gnus-adaptive-word-syntax-table} is the
21117 syntax table in effect. It is similar to the standard syntax table, but
21118 it considers numbers to be non-word-constituent characters.
21120 @vindex gnus-adaptive-word-minimum
21121 If @code{gnus-adaptive-word-minimum} is set to a number, the adaptive
21122 word scoring process will never bring down the score of an article to
21123 below this number. The default is @code{nil}.
21125 @vindex gnus-adaptive-word-no-group-words
21126 If @code{gnus-adaptive-word-no-group-words} is set to @code{t}, gnus
21127 won't adaptively word score any of the words in the group name. Useful
21128 for groups like @samp{comp.editors.emacs}, where most of the subject
21129 lines contain the word @samp{emacs}.
21131 After using this scheme for a while, it might be nice to write a
21132 @code{gnus-psychoanalyze-user} command to go through the rules and see
21133 what words you like and what words you don't like. Or perhaps not.
21135 Note that the adaptive word scoring thing is highly experimental and is
21136 likely to change in the future. Initial impressions seem to indicate
21137 that it's totally useless as it stands. Some more work (involving more
21138 rigorous statistical methods) will have to be done to make this useful.
21141 @node Home Score File
21142 @section Home Score File
21144 The score file where new score file entries will go is called the
21145 @dfn{home score file}. This is normally (and by default) the score file
21146 for the group itself. For instance, the home score file for
21147 @samp{gnu.emacs.gnus} is @file{gnu.emacs.gnus.SCORE}.
21149 However, this may not be what you want. It is often convenient to share
21150 a common home score file among many groups---all @samp{emacs} groups
21151 could perhaps use the same home score file.
21153 @vindex gnus-home-score-file
21154 The variable that controls this is @code{gnus-home-score-file}. It can
21159 A string. Then this file will be used as the home score file for all
21163 A function. The result of this function will be used as the home score
21164 file. The function will be called with the name of the group as the
21168 A list. The elements in this list can be:
21172 @code{(@var{regexp} @var{file-name})}. If the @var{regexp} matches the
21173 group name, the @var{file-name} will be used as the home score file.
21176 A function. If the function returns non-@code{nil}, the result will
21177 be used as the home score file. The function will be called with the
21178 name of the group as the parameter.
21181 A string. Use the string as the home score file.
21184 The list will be traversed from the beginning towards the end looking
21189 So, if you want to use just a single score file, you could say:
21192 (setq gnus-home-score-file
21193 "my-total-score-file.SCORE")
21196 If you want to use @file{gnu.SCORE} for all @samp{gnu} groups and
21197 @file{rec.SCORE} for all @samp{rec} groups (and so on), you can say:
21199 @findex gnus-hierarchial-home-score-file
21201 (setq gnus-home-score-file
21202 'gnus-hierarchial-home-score-file)
21205 This is a ready-made function provided for your convenience.
21206 Other functions include
21209 @item gnus-current-home-score-file
21210 @findex gnus-current-home-score-file
21211 Return the ``current'' regular score file. This will make scoring
21212 commands add entry to the ``innermost'' matching score file.
21216 If you want to have one score file for the @samp{emacs} groups and
21217 another for the @samp{comp} groups, while letting all other groups use
21218 their own home score files:
21221 (setq gnus-home-score-file
21222 ;; @r{All groups that match the regexp @code{"\\.emacs"}}
21223 '(("\\.emacs" "emacs.SCORE")
21224 ;; @r{All the comp groups in one score file}
21225 ("^comp" "comp.SCORE")))
21228 @vindex gnus-home-adapt-file
21229 @code{gnus-home-adapt-file} works exactly the same way as
21230 @code{gnus-home-score-file}, but says what the home adaptive score file
21231 is instead. All new adaptive file entries will go into the file
21232 specified by this variable, and the same syntax is allowed.
21234 In addition to using @code{gnus-home-score-file} and
21235 @code{gnus-home-adapt-file}, you can also use group parameters
21236 (@pxref{Group Parameters}) and topic parameters (@pxref{Topic
21237 Parameters}) to achieve much the same. Group and topic parameters take
21238 precedence over this variable.
21241 @node Followups To Yourself
21242 @section Followups To Yourself
21244 Gnus offers two commands for picking out the @code{Message-ID} header in
21245 the current buffer. Gnus will then add a score rule that scores using
21246 this @code{Message-ID} on the @code{References} header of other
21247 articles. This will, in effect, increase the score of all articles that
21248 respond to the article in the current buffer. Quite useful if you want
21249 to easily note when people answer what you've said.
21253 @item gnus-score-followup-article
21254 @findex gnus-score-followup-article
21255 This will add a score to articles that directly follow up your own
21258 @item gnus-score-followup-thread
21259 @findex gnus-score-followup-thread
21260 This will add a score to all articles that appear in a thread ``below''
21264 @vindex message-sent-hook
21265 These two functions are both primarily meant to be used in hooks like
21266 @code{message-sent-hook}, like this:
21268 (add-hook 'message-sent-hook 'gnus-score-followup-thread)
21272 If you look closely at your own @code{Message-ID}, you'll notice that
21273 the first two or three characters are always the same. Here's two of
21277 <x6u3u47icf.fsf@@eyesore.no>
21278 <x6sp9o7ibw.fsf@@eyesore.no>
21281 So ``my'' ident on this machine is @samp{x6}. This can be
21282 exploited---the following rule will raise the score on all followups to
21287 ("<x6[0-9a-z]+\\.fsf\\(_-_\\)?@@.*eyesore\\.no>"
21291 Whether it's the first two or first three characters that are ``yours''
21292 is system-dependent.
21295 @node Scoring On Other Headers
21296 @section Scoring On Other Headers
21297 @cindex scoring on other headers
21299 Gnus is quite fast when scoring the ``traditional''
21300 headers---@samp{From}, @samp{Subject} and so on. However, scoring
21301 other headers requires writing a @code{head} scoring rule, which means
21302 that Gnus has to request every single article from the back end to find
21303 matches. This takes a long time in big groups.
21305 Now, there's not much you can do about this for news groups, but for
21306 mail groups, you have greater control. In @ref{To From Newsgroups},
21307 it's explained in greater detail what this mechanism does, but here's
21308 a cookbook example for @code{nnml} on how to allow scoring on the
21309 @samp{To} and @samp{Cc} headers.
21311 Put the following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file.
21314 (setq gnus-extra-headers '(To Cc Newsgroups Keywords)
21315 nnmail-extra-headers gnus-extra-headers)
21318 Restart Gnus and rebuild your @code{nnml} overview files with the
21319 @kbd{M-x nnml-generate-nov-databases} command. This will take a long
21320 time if you have much mail.
21322 Now you can score on @samp{To} and @samp{Cc} as ``extra headers'' like
21323 so: @kbd{I e s p To RET <your name> RET}.
21327 @vindex gnus-inhibit-slow-scoring
21328 You can inhibit scoring the slow scoring on headers or body by setting
21329 the variable @code{gnus-inhibit-slow-scoring}. If
21330 @code{gnus-inhibit-slow-scoring} is regexp, slow scoring is inhibited if
21331 the group matches the regexp. If it is t, slow scoring on it is
21332 inhibited for all groups.
21336 @section Scoring Tips
21337 @cindex scoring tips
21343 @cindex scoring crossposts
21344 If you want to lower the score of crossposts, the line to match on is
21345 the @code{Xref} header.
21347 ("xref" (" talk.politics.misc:" -1000))
21350 @item Multiple crossposts
21351 If you want to lower the score of articles that have been crossposted to
21352 more than, say, 3 groups:
21355 ("[^:\n]+:[0-9]+ +[^:\n]+:[0-9]+ +[^:\n]+:[0-9]+"
21359 @item Matching on the body
21360 This is generally not a very good idea---it takes a very long time.
21361 Gnus actually has to fetch each individual article from the server. But
21362 you might want to anyway, I guess. Even though there are three match
21363 keys (@code{Head}, @code{Body} and @code{All}), you should choose one
21364 and stick with it in each score file. If you use any two, each article
21365 will be fetched @emph{twice}. If you want to match a bit on the
21366 @code{Head} and a bit on the @code{Body}, just use @code{All} for all
21369 @item Marking as read
21370 You will probably want to mark articles that have scores below a certain
21371 number as read. This is most easily achieved by putting the following
21372 in your @file{all.SCORE} file:
21376 You may also consider doing something similar with @code{expunge}.
21378 @item Negated character classes
21379 If you say stuff like @code{[^abcd]*}, you may get unexpected results.
21380 That will match newlines, which might lead to, well, The Unknown. Say
21381 @code{[^abcd\n]*} instead.
21385 @node Reverse Scoring
21386 @section Reverse Scoring
21387 @cindex reverse scoring
21389 If you want to keep just articles that have @samp{Sex with Emacs} in the
21390 subject header, and expunge all other articles, you could put something
21391 like this in your score file:
21395 ("Sex with Emacs" 2))
21400 So, you raise all articles that match @samp{Sex with Emacs} and mark the
21401 rest as read, and expunge them to boot.
21404 @node Global Score Files
21405 @section Global Score Files
21406 @cindex global score files
21408 Sure, other newsreaders have ``global kill files''. These are usually
21409 nothing more than a single kill file that applies to all groups, stored
21410 in the user's home directory. Bah! Puny, weak newsreaders!
21412 What I'm talking about here are Global Score Files. Score files from
21413 all over the world, from users everywhere, uniting all nations in one
21414 big, happy score file union! Ange-score! New and untested!
21416 @vindex gnus-global-score-files
21417 All you have to do to use other people's score files is to set the
21418 @code{gnus-global-score-files} variable. One entry for each score file,
21419 or each score file directory. Gnus will decide by itself what score
21420 files are applicable to which group.
21422 To use the score file
21423 @file{/ftp@@ftp.gnus.org:/pub/larsi/ding/score/soc.motss.SCORE} and
21424 all score files in the @file{/ftp@@ftp.some-where:/pub/score} directory,
21428 (setq gnus-global-score-files
21429 '("/ftp@@ftp.gnus.org:/pub/larsi/ding/score/soc.motss.SCORE"
21430 "/ftp@@ftp.some-where:/pub/score/"))
21433 @findex gnus-score-search-global-directories
21435 Simple, eh? Directory names must end with a @samp{/}. These
21436 directories are typically scanned only once during each Gnus session.
21437 If you feel the need to manually re-scan the remote directories, you can
21438 use the @code{gnus-score-search-global-directories} command.
21440 Note that, at present, using this option will slow down group entry
21441 somewhat. (That is---a lot.)
21443 If you want to start maintaining score files for other people to use,
21444 just put your score file up for anonymous ftp and announce it to the
21445 world. Become a retro-moderator! Participate in the retro-moderator
21446 wars sure to ensue, where retro-moderators battle it out for the
21447 sympathy of the people, luring them to use their score files on false
21448 premises! Yay! The net is saved!
21450 Here are some tips for the would-be retro-moderator, off the top of my
21456 Articles heavily crossposted are probably junk.
21458 To lower a single inappropriate article, lower by @code{Message-ID}.
21460 Particularly brilliant authors can be raised on a permanent basis.
21462 Authors that repeatedly post off-charter for the group can safely be
21463 lowered out of existence.
21465 Set the @code{mark} and @code{expunge} atoms to obliterate the nastiest
21466 articles completely.
21469 Use expiring score entries to keep the size of the file down. You
21470 should probably have a long expiry period, though, as some sites keep
21471 old articles for a long time.
21474 @dots{} I wonder whether other newsreaders will support global score files
21475 in the future. @emph{Snicker}. Yup, any day now, newsreaders like Blue
21476 Wave, xrn and 1stReader are bound to implement scoring. Should we start
21477 holding our breath yet?
21481 @section Kill Files
21484 Gnus still supports those pesky old kill files. In fact, the kill file
21485 entries can now be expiring, which is something I wrote before Daniel
21486 Quinlan thought of doing score files, so I've left the code in there.
21488 In short, kill processing is a lot slower (and I do mean @emph{a lot})
21489 than score processing, so it might be a good idea to rewrite your kill
21490 files into score files.
21492 Anyway, a kill file is a normal @code{emacs-lisp} file. You can put any
21493 forms into this file, which means that you can use kill files as some
21494 sort of primitive hook function to be run on group entry, even though
21495 that isn't a very good idea.
21497 Normal kill files look like this:
21500 (gnus-kill "From" "Lars Ingebrigtsen")
21501 (gnus-kill "Subject" "ding")
21505 This will mark every article written by me as read, and remove the
21506 marked articles from the summary buffer. Very useful, you'll agree.
21508 Other programs use a totally different kill file syntax. If Gnus
21509 encounters what looks like a @code{rn} kill file, it will take a stab at
21512 Two summary functions for editing a @sc{gnus} kill file:
21517 @kindex M-k (Summary)
21518 @findex gnus-summary-edit-local-kill
21519 Edit this group's kill file (@code{gnus-summary-edit-local-kill}).
21522 @kindex M-K (Summary)
21523 @findex gnus-summary-edit-global-kill
21524 Edit the general kill file (@code{gnus-summary-edit-global-kill}).
21527 Two group mode functions for editing the kill files:
21532 @kindex M-k (Group)
21533 @findex gnus-group-edit-local-kill
21534 Edit this group's kill file (@code{gnus-group-edit-local-kill}).
21537 @kindex M-K (Group)
21538 @findex gnus-group-edit-global-kill
21539 Edit the general kill file (@code{gnus-group-edit-global-kill}).
21542 Kill file variables:
21545 @item gnus-kill-file-name
21546 @vindex gnus-kill-file-name
21547 A kill file for the group @samp{soc.motss} is normally called
21548 @file{soc.motss.KILL}. The suffix appended to the group name to get
21549 this file name is detailed by the @code{gnus-kill-file-name} variable.
21550 The ``global'' kill file (not in the score file sense of ``global'', of
21551 course) is just called @file{KILL}.
21553 @vindex gnus-kill-save-kill-file
21554 @item gnus-kill-save-kill-file
21555 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, Gnus will save the
21556 kill file after processing, which is necessary if you use expiring
21559 @item gnus-apply-kill-hook
21560 @vindex gnus-apply-kill-hook
21561 @findex gnus-apply-kill-file-unless-scored
21562 @findex gnus-apply-kill-file
21563 A hook called to apply kill files to a group. It is
21564 @code{(gnus-apply-kill-file)} by default. If you want to ignore the
21565 kill file if you have a score file for the same group, you can set this
21566 hook to @code{(gnus-apply-kill-file-unless-scored)}. If you don't want
21567 kill files to be processed, you should set this variable to @code{nil}.
21569 @item gnus-kill-file-mode-hook
21570 @vindex gnus-kill-file-mode-hook
21571 A hook called in kill-file mode buffers.
21576 @node Converting Kill Files
21577 @section Converting Kill Files
21579 @cindex converting kill files
21581 If you have loads of old kill files, you may want to convert them into
21582 score files. If they are ``regular'', you can use
21583 the @file{gnus-kill-to-score.el} package; if not, you'll have to do it
21586 The kill to score conversion package isn't included in Gnus by default.
21587 You can fetch it from
21588 @uref{http://www.stud.ifi.uio.no/~larsi/ding-various/gnus-kill-to-score.el}.
21590 If your old kill files are very complex---if they contain more
21591 non-@code{gnus-kill} forms than not, you'll have to convert them by
21592 hand. Or just let them be as they are. Gnus will still use them as
21596 @node Advanced Scoring
21597 @section Advanced Scoring
21599 Scoring on Subjects and From headers is nice enough, but what if you're
21600 really interested in what a person has to say only when she's talking
21601 about a particular subject? Or what if you really don't want to
21602 read what person A has to say when she's following up to person B, but
21603 want to read what she says when she's following up to person C?
21605 By using advanced scoring rules you may create arbitrarily complex
21609 * Advanced Scoring Syntax:: A definition.
21610 * Advanced Scoring Examples:: What they look like.
21611 * Advanced Scoring Tips:: Getting the most out of it.
21615 @node Advanced Scoring Syntax
21616 @subsection Advanced Scoring Syntax
21618 Ordinary scoring rules have a string as the first element in the rule.
21619 Advanced scoring rules have a list as the first element. The second
21620 element is the score to be applied if the first element evaluated to a
21621 non-@code{nil} value.
21623 These lists may consist of three logical operators, one redirection
21624 operator, and various match operators.
21631 This logical operator will evaluate each of its arguments until it finds
21632 one that evaluates to @code{false}, and then it'll stop. If all arguments
21633 evaluate to @code{true} values, then this operator will return
21638 This logical operator will evaluate each of its arguments until it finds
21639 one that evaluates to @code{true}. If no arguments are @code{true},
21640 then this operator will return @code{false}.
21645 This logical operator only takes a single argument. It returns the
21646 logical negation of the value of its argument.
21650 There is an @dfn{indirection operator} that will make its arguments
21651 apply to the ancestors of the current article being scored. For
21652 instance, @code{1-} will make score rules apply to the parent of the
21653 current article. @code{2-} will make score rules apply to the
21654 grandparent of the current article. Alternatively, you can write
21655 @code{^^}, where the number of @code{^}s (carets) says how far back into
21656 the ancestry you want to go.
21658 Finally, we have the match operators. These are the ones that do the
21659 real work. Match operators are header name strings followed by a match
21660 and a match type. A typical match operator looks like @samp{("from"
21661 "Lars Ingebrigtsen" s)}. The header names are the same as when using
21662 simple scoring, and the match types are also the same.
21665 @node Advanced Scoring Examples
21666 @subsection Advanced Scoring Examples
21668 Please note that the following examples are score file rules. To
21669 make a complete score file from them, surround them with another pair
21672 Let's say you want to increase the score of articles written by Lars
21673 when he's talking about Gnus:
21678 ("from" "Lars Ingebrigtsen")
21679 ("subject" "Gnus"))
21686 When he writes long articles, he sometimes has something nice to say:
21690 ("from" "Lars Ingebrigtsen")
21697 However, when he responds to things written by Reig Eigil Logge, you
21698 really don't want to read what he's written:
21702 ("from" "Lars Ingebrigtsen")
21703 (1- ("from" "Reig Eigil Logge")))
21707 Everybody that follows up Redmondo when he writes about disappearing
21708 socks should have their scores raised, but only when they talk about
21709 white socks. However, when Lars talks about socks, it's usually not
21716 ("from" "redmondo@@.*no" r)
21717 ("body" "disappearing.*socks" t)))
21718 (! ("from" "Lars Ingebrigtsen"))
21719 ("body" "white.*socks"))
21723 Suppose you're reading a high volume group and you're only interested
21724 in replies. The plan is to score down all articles that don't have
21725 subject that begin with "Re:", "Fw:" or "Fwd:" and then score up all
21726 parents of articles that have subjects that begin with reply marks.
21729 ((! ("subject" "re:\\|fwd?:" r))
21731 ((1- ("subject" "re:\\|fwd?:" r))
21735 The possibilities are endless.
21737 @node Advanced Scoring Tips
21738 @subsection Advanced Scoring Tips
21740 The @code{&} and @code{|} logical operators do short-circuit logic.
21741 That is, they stop processing their arguments when it's clear what the
21742 result of the operation will be. For instance, if one of the arguments
21743 of an @code{&} evaluates to @code{false}, there's no point in evaluating
21744 the rest of the arguments. This means that you should put slow matches
21745 (@samp{body}, @samp{header}) last and quick matches (@samp{from},
21746 @samp{subject}) first.
21748 The indirection arguments (@code{1-} and so on) will make their
21749 arguments work on previous generations of the thread. If you say
21760 Then that means ``score on the from header of the grandparent of the
21761 current article''. An indirection is quite fast, but it's better to say:
21767 ("subject" "Gnus")))
21774 (1- ("from" "Lars"))
21775 (1- ("subject" "Gnus")))
21780 @section Score Decays
21781 @cindex score decays
21784 You may find that your scores have a tendency to grow without
21785 bounds, especially if you're using adaptive scoring. If scores get too
21786 big, they lose all meaning---they simply max out and it's difficult to
21787 use them in any sensible way.
21789 @vindex gnus-decay-scores
21790 @findex gnus-decay-score
21791 @vindex gnus-decay-score-function
21792 Gnus provides a mechanism for decaying scores to help with this problem.
21793 When score files are loaded and @code{gnus-decay-scores} is
21794 non-@code{nil}, Gnus will run the score files through the decaying
21795 mechanism thereby lowering the scores of all non-permanent score rules.
21796 If @code{gnus-decay-scores} is a regexp, only score files matching this
21797 regexp are treated. E.g. you may set it to @samp{\\.ADAPT\\'} if only
21798 @emph{adaptive} score files should be decayed. The decay itself if
21799 performed by the @code{gnus-decay-score-function} function, which is
21800 @code{gnus-decay-score} by default. Here's the definition of that
21804 (defun gnus-decay-score (score)
21805 "Decay SCORE according to `gnus-score-decay-constant'
21806 and `gnus-score-decay-scale'."
21808 (* (if (< score 0) -1 1)
21810 (max gnus-score-decay-constant
21812 gnus-score-decay-scale)))))))
21813 (if (and (featurep 'xemacs)
21814 ;; XEmacs' floor can handle only the floating point
21815 ;; number below the half of the maximum integer.
21816 (> (abs n) (lsh -1 -2)))
21818 (car (split-string (number-to-string n) "\\.")))
21822 @vindex gnus-score-decay-scale
21823 @vindex gnus-score-decay-constant
21824 @code{gnus-score-decay-constant} is 3 by default and
21825 @code{gnus-score-decay-scale} is 0.05. This should cause the following:
21829 Scores between -3 and 3 will be set to 0 when this function is called.
21832 Scores with magnitudes between 3 and 60 will be shrunk by 3.
21835 Scores with magnitudes greater than 60 will be shrunk by 5% of the
21839 If you don't like this decay function, write your own. It is called
21840 with the score to be decayed as its only parameter, and it should return
21841 the new score, which should be an integer.
21843 Gnus will try to decay scores once a day. If you haven't run Gnus for
21844 four days, Gnus will decay the scores four times, for instance.
21849 @include message.texi
21850 @chapter Emacs MIME
21851 @include emacs-mime.texi
21853 @include sieve.texi
21865 * Process/Prefix:: A convention used by many treatment commands.
21866 * Interactive:: Making Gnus ask you many questions.
21867 * Symbolic Prefixes:: How to supply some Gnus functions with options.
21868 * Formatting Variables:: You can specify what buffers should look like.
21869 * Window Layout:: Configuring the Gnus buffer windows.
21870 * Faces and Fonts:: How to change how faces look.
21871 * Compilation:: How to speed Gnus up.
21872 * Mode Lines:: Displaying information in the mode lines.
21873 * Highlighting and Menus:: Making buffers look all nice and cozy.
21874 * Buttons:: Get tendinitis in ten easy steps!
21875 * Daemons:: Gnus can do things behind your back.
21876 * NoCeM:: How to avoid spam and other fatty foods.
21877 * Undo:: Some actions can be undone.
21878 * Predicate Specifiers:: Specifying predicates.
21879 * Moderation:: What to do if you're a moderator.
21880 * Fetching a Group:: Starting Gnus just to read a group.
21881 * Image Enhancements:: Modern versions of Emacs/XEmacs can display images.
21882 * Fuzzy Matching:: What's the big fuzz?
21883 * Thwarting Email Spam:: Simple ways to avoid unsolicited commercial email.
21884 * Spam Package:: A package for filtering and processing spam.
21885 * Other modes:: Interaction with other modes.
21886 * Various Various:: Things that are really various.
21890 @node Process/Prefix
21891 @section Process/Prefix
21892 @cindex process/prefix convention
21894 Many functions, among them functions for moving, decoding and saving
21895 articles, use what is known as the @dfn{Process/Prefix convention}.
21897 This is a method for figuring out what articles the user wants the
21898 command to be performed on.
21902 If the numeric prefix is N, perform the operation on the next N
21903 articles, starting with the current one. If the numeric prefix is
21904 negative, perform the operation on the previous N articles, starting
21905 with the current one.
21907 @vindex transient-mark-mode
21908 If @code{transient-mark-mode} in non-@code{nil} and the region is
21909 active, all articles in the region will be worked upon.
21911 If there is no numeric prefix, but some articles are marked with the
21912 process mark, perform the operation on the articles marked with
21915 If there is neither a numeric prefix nor any articles marked with the
21916 process mark, just perform the operation on the current article.
21918 Quite simple, really, but it needs to be made clear so that surprises
21921 Commands that react to the process mark will push the current list of
21922 process marked articles onto a stack and will then clear all process
21923 marked articles. You can restore the previous configuration with the
21924 @kbd{M P y} command (@pxref{Setting Process Marks}).
21926 @vindex gnus-summary-goto-unread
21927 One thing that seems to shock & horrify lots of people is that, for
21928 instance, @kbd{3 d} does exactly the same as @kbd{d} @kbd{d} @kbd{d}.
21929 Since each @kbd{d} (which marks the current article as read) by default
21930 goes to the next unread article after marking, this means that @kbd{3 d}
21931 will mark the next three unread articles as read, no matter what the
21932 summary buffer looks like. Set @code{gnus-summary-goto-unread} to
21933 @code{nil} for a more straightforward action.
21935 Many commands do not use the process/prefix convention. All commands
21936 that do explicitly say so in this manual. To apply the process/prefix
21937 convention to commands that do not use it, you can use the @kbd{M-&}
21938 command. For instance, to mark all the articles in the group as
21939 expirable, you could say @kbd{M P b M-& E}.
21943 @section Interactive
21944 @cindex interaction
21948 @item gnus-novice-user
21949 @vindex gnus-novice-user
21950 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, you are either a newcomer to the
21951 World of Usenet, or you are very cautious, which is a nice thing to be,
21952 really. You will be given questions of the type ``Are you sure you want
21953 to do this?'' before doing anything dangerous. This is @code{t} by
21956 @item gnus-expert-user
21957 @vindex gnus-expert-user
21958 If this variable is non-@code{nil}, you will seldom be asked any
21959 questions by Gnus. It will simply assume you know what you're doing, no
21960 matter how strange.
21962 @item gnus-interactive-catchup
21963 @vindex gnus-interactive-catchup
21964 Require confirmation before catching up a group if non-@code{nil}. It
21965 is @code{t} by default.
21967 @item gnus-interactive-exit
21968 @vindex gnus-interactive-exit
21969 Require confirmation before exiting Gnus. This variable is @code{t} by
21974 @node Symbolic Prefixes
21975 @section Symbolic Prefixes
21976 @cindex symbolic prefixes
21978 Quite a lot of Emacs commands react to the (numeric) prefix. For
21979 instance, @kbd{C-u 4 C-f} moves point four characters forward, and
21980 @kbd{C-u 9 0 0 I s s p} adds a permanent @code{Subject} substring score
21981 rule of 900 to the current article.
21983 This is all nice and well, but what if you want to give a command some
21984 additional information? Well, what most commands do is interpret the
21985 ``raw'' prefix in some special way. @kbd{C-u 0 C-x C-s} means that one
21986 doesn't want a backup file to be created when saving the current buffer,
21987 for instance. But what if you want to save without making a backup
21988 file, and you want Emacs to flash lights and play a nice tune at the
21989 same time? You can't, and you're probably perfectly happy that way.
21991 @kindex M-i (Summary)
21992 @findex gnus-symbolic-argument
21993 I'm not, so I've added a second prefix---the @dfn{symbolic prefix}. The
21994 prefix key is @kbd{M-i} (@code{gnus-symbolic-argument}), and the next
21995 character typed in is the value. You can stack as many @kbd{M-i}
21996 prefixes as you want. @kbd{M-i a C-M-u} means ``feed the @kbd{C-M-u}
21997 command the symbolic prefix @code{a}''. @kbd{M-i a M-i b C-M-u} means
21998 ``feed the @kbd{C-M-u} command the symbolic prefixes @code{a} and
21999 @code{b}''. You get the drift.
22001 Typing in symbolic prefixes to commands that don't accept them doesn't
22002 hurt, but it doesn't do any good either. Currently not many Gnus
22003 functions make use of the symbolic prefix.
22005 If you're interested in how Gnus implements this, @pxref{Extended
22009 @node Formatting Variables
22010 @section Formatting Variables
22011 @cindex formatting variables
22013 Throughout this manual you've probably noticed lots of variables called
22014 things like @code{gnus-group-line-format} and
22015 @code{gnus-summary-mode-line-format}. These control how Gnus is to
22016 output lines in the various buffers. There's quite a lot of them.
22017 Fortunately, they all use the same syntax, so there's not that much to
22020 Here's an example format spec (from the group buffer): @samp{%M%S%5y:
22021 %(%g%)\n}. We see that it is indeed extremely ugly, and that there are
22022 lots of percentages everywhere.
22025 * Formatting Basics:: A formatting variable is basically a format string.
22026 * Mode Line Formatting:: Some rules about mode line formatting variables.
22027 * Advanced Formatting:: Modifying output in various ways.
22028 * User-Defined Specs:: Having Gnus call your own functions.
22029 * Formatting Fonts:: Making the formatting look colorful and nice.
22030 * Positioning Point:: Moving point to a position after an operation.
22031 * Tabulation:: Tabulating your output.
22032 * Wide Characters:: Dealing with wide characters.
22035 Currently Gnus uses the following formatting variables:
22036 @code{gnus-group-line-format}, @code{gnus-summary-line-format},
22037 @code{gnus-server-line-format}, @code{gnus-topic-line-format},
22038 @code{gnus-group-mode-line-format},
22039 @code{gnus-summary-mode-line-format},
22040 @code{gnus-article-mode-line-format},
22041 @code{gnus-server-mode-line-format}, and
22042 @code{gnus-summary-pick-line-format}.
22044 All these format variables can also be arbitrary elisp forms. In that
22045 case, they will be @code{eval}ed to insert the required lines.
22047 @kindex M-x gnus-update-format
22048 @findex gnus-update-format
22049 Gnus includes a command to help you while creating your own format
22050 specs. @kbd{M-x gnus-update-format} will @code{eval} the current form,
22051 update the spec in question and pop you to a buffer where you can
22052 examine the resulting Lisp code to be run to generate the line.
22056 @node Formatting Basics
22057 @subsection Formatting Basics
22059 Each @samp{%} element will be replaced by some string or other when the
22060 buffer in question is generated. @samp{%5y} means ``insert the @samp{y}
22061 spec, and pad with spaces to get a 5-character field''.
22063 As with normal C and Emacs Lisp formatting strings, the numerical
22064 modifier between the @samp{%} and the formatting type character will
22065 @dfn{pad} the output so that it is always at least that long.
22066 @samp{%5y} will make the field always (at least) five characters wide by
22067 padding with spaces to the left. If you say @samp{%-5y}, it will pad to
22070 You may also wish to limit the length of the field to protect against
22071 particularly wide values. For that you can say @samp{%4,6y}, which
22072 means that the field will never be more than 6 characters wide and never
22073 less than 4 characters wide.
22075 Also Gnus supports some extended format specifications, such as
22076 @samp{%&user-date;}.
22079 @node Mode Line Formatting
22080 @subsection Mode Line Formatting
22082 Mode line formatting variables (e.g.,
22083 @code{gnus-summary-mode-line-format}) follow the same rules as other,
22084 buffer line oriented formatting variables (@pxref{Formatting Basics})
22085 with the following two differences:
22090 There must be no newline (@samp{\n}) at the end.
22093 The special @samp{%%b} spec can be used to display the buffer name.
22094 Well, it's no spec at all, really---@samp{%%} is just a way to quote
22095 @samp{%} to allow it to pass through the formatting machinery unmangled,
22096 so that Emacs receives @samp{%b}, which is something the Emacs mode line
22097 display interprets to mean ``show the buffer name''. For a full list of
22098 mode line specs Emacs understands, see the documentation of the
22099 @code{mode-line-format} variable.
22104 @node Advanced Formatting
22105 @subsection Advanced Formatting
22107 It is frequently useful to post-process the fields in some way.
22108 Padding, limiting, cutting off parts and suppressing certain values can
22109 be achieved by using @dfn{tilde modifiers}. A typical tilde spec might
22110 look like @samp{%~(cut 3)~(ignore "0")y}.
22112 These are the valid modifiers:
22117 Pad the field to the left with spaces until it reaches the required
22121 Pad the field to the right with spaces until it reaches the required
22126 Cut off characters from the left until it reaches the specified length.
22129 Cut off characters from the right until it reaches the specified
22134 Cut off the specified number of characters from the left.
22137 Cut off the specified number of characters from the right.
22140 Return an empty string if the field is equal to the specified value.
22143 Use the specified form as the field value when the @samp{@@} spec is
22149 "~(form (current-time-string))@@"
22154 Let's take an example. The @samp{%o} spec in the summary mode lines
22155 will return a date in compact ISO8601 format---@samp{19960809T230410}.
22156 This is quite a mouthful, so we want to shave off the century number and
22157 the time, leaving us with a six-character date. That would be
22158 @samp{%~(cut-left 2)~(max-right 6)~(pad 6)o}. (Cutting is done before
22159 maxing, and we need the padding to ensure that the date is never less
22160 than 6 characters to make it look nice in columns.)
22162 Ignoring is done first; then cutting; then maxing; and then as the very
22163 last operation, padding.
22165 If you use lots of these advanced thingies, you'll find that Gnus gets
22166 quite slow. This can be helped enormously by running @kbd{M-x
22167 gnus-compile} when you are satisfied with the look of your lines.
22168 @xref{Compilation}.
22171 @node User-Defined Specs
22172 @subsection User-Defined Specs
22174 All the specs allow for inserting user defined specifiers---@samp{u}.
22175 The next character in the format string should be a letter. Gnus
22176 will call the function @code{gnus-user-format-function-}@samp{X}, where
22177 @samp{X} is the letter following @samp{%u}. The function will be passed
22178 a single parameter---what the parameter means depends on what buffer
22179 it's being called from. The function should return a string, which will
22180 be inserted into the buffer just like information from any other
22181 specifier. This function may also be called with dummy values, so it
22182 should protect against that.
22184 Also Gnus supports extended user-defined specs, such as @samp{%u&foo;}.
22185 Gnus will call the function @code{gnus-user-format-function-}@samp{foo}.
22187 You can also use tilde modifiers (@pxref{Advanced Formatting} to achieve
22188 much the same without defining new functions. Here's an example:
22189 @samp{%~(form (count-lines (point-min) (point)))@@}. The form
22190 given here will be evaluated to yield the current line number, and then
22194 @node Formatting Fonts
22195 @subsection Formatting Fonts
22197 There are specs for highlighting, and these are shared by all the format
22198 variables. Text inside the @samp{%(} and @samp{%)} specifiers will get
22199 the special @code{mouse-face} property set, which means that it will be
22200 highlighted (with @code{gnus-mouse-face}) when you put the mouse pointer
22203 Text inside the @samp{%@{} and @samp{%@}} specifiers will have their
22204 normal faces set using @code{gnus-face-0}, which is @code{bold} by
22205 default. If you say @samp{%1@{}, you'll get @code{gnus-face-1} instead,
22206 and so on. Create as many faces as you wish. The same goes for the
22207 @code{mouse-face} specs---you can say @samp{%3(hello%)} to have
22208 @samp{hello} mouse-highlighted with @code{gnus-mouse-face-3}.
22210 Text inside the @samp{%<<} and @samp{%>>} specifiers will get the
22211 special @code{balloon-help} property set to
22212 @code{gnus-balloon-face-0}. If you say @samp{%1<<}, you'll get
22213 @code{gnus-balloon-face-1} and so on. The @code{gnus-balloon-face-*}
22214 variables should be either strings or symbols naming functions that
22215 return a string. When the mouse passes over text with this property
22216 set, a balloon window will appear and display the string. Please
22217 refer to @ref{Tooltips, ,Tooltips, emacs, The Emacs Manual},
22218 (in GNU Emacs) or the doc string of @code{balloon-help-mode} (in
22219 XEmacs) for more information on this. (For technical reasons, the
22220 guillemets have been approximated as @samp{<<} and @samp{>>} in this
22223 Here's an alternative recipe for the group buffer:
22226 ;; @r{Create three face types.}
22227 (setq gnus-face-1 'bold)
22228 (setq gnus-face-3 'italic)
22230 ;; @r{We want the article count to be in}
22231 ;; @r{a bold and green face. So we create}
22232 ;; @r{a new face called @code{my-green-bold}.}
22233 (copy-face 'bold 'my-green-bold)
22234 ;; @r{Set the color.}
22235 (set-face-foreground 'my-green-bold "ForestGreen")
22236 (setq gnus-face-2 'my-green-bold)
22238 ;; @r{Set the new & fancy format.}
22239 (setq gnus-group-line-format
22240 "%M%S%3@{%5y%@}%2[:%] %(%1@{%g%@}%)\n")
22243 I'm sure you'll be able to use this scheme to create totally unreadable
22244 and extremely vulgar displays. Have fun!
22246 Note that the @samp{%(} specs (and friends) do not make any sense on the
22247 mode-line variables.
22249 @node Positioning Point
22250 @subsection Positioning Point
22252 Gnus usually moves point to a pre-defined place on each line in most
22253 buffers. By default, point move to the first colon character on the
22254 line. You can customize this behavior in three different ways.
22256 You can move the colon character to somewhere else on the line.
22258 @findex gnus-goto-colon
22259 You can redefine the function that moves the point to the colon. The
22260 function is called @code{gnus-goto-colon}.
22262 But perhaps the most convenient way to deal with this, if you don't want
22263 to have a colon in your line, is to use the @samp{%*} specifier. If you
22264 put a @samp{%*} somewhere in your format line definition, Gnus will
22269 @subsection Tabulation
22271 You can usually line up your displays by padding and cutting your
22272 strings. However, when combining various strings of different size, it
22273 can often be more convenient to just output the strings, and then worry
22274 about lining up the following text afterwards.
22276 To do that, Gnus supplies tabulator specs---@samp{%=}. There are two
22277 different types---@dfn{hard tabulators} and @dfn{soft tabulators}.
22279 @samp{%50=} will insert space characters to pad the line up to column
22280 50. If the text is already past column 50, nothing will be inserted.
22281 This is the soft tabulator.
22283 @samp{%-50=} will insert space characters to pad the line up to column
22284 50. If the text is already past column 50, the excess text past column
22285 50 will be removed. This is the hard tabulator.
22288 @node Wide Characters
22289 @subsection Wide Characters
22291 Fixed width fonts in most countries have characters of the same width.
22292 Some countries, however, use Latin characters mixed with wider
22293 characters---most notable East Asian countries.
22295 The problem is that when formatting, Gnus assumes that if a string is 10
22296 characters wide, it'll be 10 Latin characters wide on the screen. In
22297 these countries, that's not true.
22299 @vindex gnus-use-correct-string-widths
22300 To help fix this, you can set @code{gnus-use-correct-string-widths} to
22301 @code{t}. This makes buffer generation slower, but the results will be
22302 prettier. The default value under XEmacs is @code{t} but @code{nil}
22306 @node Window Layout
22307 @section Window Layout
22308 @cindex window layout
22310 No, there's nothing here about X, so be quiet.
22312 @vindex gnus-use-full-window
22313 If @code{gnus-use-full-window} non-@code{nil}, Gnus will delete all
22314 other windows and occupy the entire Emacs screen by itself. It is
22315 @code{t} by default.
22317 Setting this variable to @code{nil} kinda works, but there are
22318 glitches. Use at your own peril.
22320 @vindex gnus-buffer-configuration
22321 @code{gnus-buffer-configuration} describes how much space each Gnus
22322 buffer should be given. Here's an excerpt of this variable:
22325 ((group (vertical 1.0 (group 1.0 point)
22326 (if gnus-carpal (group-carpal 4))))
22327 (article (vertical 1.0 (summary 0.25 point)
22331 This is an alist. The @dfn{key} is a symbol that names some action or
22332 other. For instance, when displaying the group buffer, the window
22333 configuration function will use @code{group} as the key. A full list of
22334 possible names is listed below.
22336 The @dfn{value} (i.e., the @dfn{split}) says how much space each buffer
22337 should occupy. To take the @code{article} split as an example -
22340 (article (vertical 1.0 (summary 0.25 point)
22344 This @dfn{split} says that the summary buffer should occupy 25% of upper
22345 half of the screen, and that it is placed over the article buffer. As
22346 you may have noticed, 100% + 25% is actually 125% (yup, I saw y'all
22347 reaching for that calculator there). However, the special number
22348 @code{1.0} is used to signal that this buffer should soak up all the
22349 rest of the space available after the rest of the buffers have taken
22350 whatever they need. There should be only one buffer with the @code{1.0}
22351 size spec per split.
22353 Point will be put in the buffer that has the optional third element
22354 @code{point}. In a @code{frame} split, the last subsplit having a leaf
22355 split where the tag @code{frame-focus} is a member (i.e. is the third or
22356 fourth element in the list, depending on whether the @code{point} tag is
22357 present) gets focus.
22359 Here's a more complicated example:
22362 (article (vertical 1.0 (group 4)
22363 (summary 0.25 point)
22364 (if gnus-carpal (summary-carpal 4))
22368 If the size spec is an integer instead of a floating point number,
22369 then that number will be used to say how many lines a buffer should
22370 occupy, not a percentage.
22372 If the @dfn{split} looks like something that can be @code{eval}ed (to be
22373 precise---if the @code{car} of the split is a function or a subr), this
22374 split will be @code{eval}ed. If the result is non-@code{nil}, it will
22375 be used as a split. This means that there will be three buffers if
22376 @code{gnus-carpal} is @code{nil}, and four buffers if @code{gnus-carpal}
22379 Not complicated enough for you? Well, try this on for size:
22382 (article (horizontal 1.0
22387 (summary 0.25 point)
22392 Whoops. Two buffers with the mystery 100% tag. And what's that
22393 @code{horizontal} thingie?
22395 If the first element in one of the split is @code{horizontal}, Gnus will
22396 split the window horizontally, giving you two windows side-by-side.
22397 Inside each of these strips you may carry on all you like in the normal
22398 fashion. The number following @code{horizontal} says what percentage of
22399 the screen is to be given to this strip.
22401 For each split, there @emph{must} be one element that has the 100% tag.
22402 The splitting is never accurate, and this buffer will eat any leftover
22403 lines from the splits.
22405 To be slightly more formal, here's a definition of what a valid split
22410 split = frame | horizontal | vertical | buffer | form
22411 frame = "(frame " size *split ")"
22412 horizontal = "(horizontal " size *split ")"
22413 vertical = "(vertical " size *split ")"
22414 buffer = "(" buf-name " " size *[ "point" ] *[ "frame-focus"] ")"
22415 size = number | frame-params
22416 buf-name = group | article | summary ...
22420 The limitations are that the @code{frame} split can only appear as the
22421 top-level split. @var{form} should be an Emacs Lisp form that should
22422 return a valid split. We see that each split is fully recursive, and
22423 may contain any number of @code{vertical} and @code{horizontal} splits.
22425 @vindex gnus-window-min-width
22426 @vindex gnus-window-min-height
22427 @cindex window height
22428 @cindex window width
22429 Finding the right sizes can be a bit complicated. No window may be less
22430 than @code{gnus-window-min-height} (default 1) characters high, and all
22431 windows must be at least @code{gnus-window-min-width} (default 1)
22432 characters wide. Gnus will try to enforce this before applying the
22433 splits. If you want to use the normal Emacs window width/height limit,
22434 you can just set these two variables to @code{nil}.
22436 If you're not familiar with Emacs terminology, @code{horizontal} and
22437 @code{vertical} splits may work the opposite way of what you'd expect.
22438 Windows inside a @code{horizontal} split are shown side-by-side, and
22439 windows within a @code{vertical} split are shown above each other.
22441 @findex gnus-configure-frame
22442 If you want to experiment with window placement, a good tip is to call
22443 @code{gnus-configure-frame} directly with a split. This is the function
22444 that does all the real work when splitting buffers. Below is a pretty
22445 nonsensical configuration with 5 windows; two for the group buffer and
22446 three for the article buffer. (I said it was nonsensical.) If you
22447 @code{eval} the statement below, you can get an idea of how that would
22448 look straight away, without going through the normal Gnus channels.
22449 Play with it until you're satisfied, and then use
22450 @code{gnus-add-configuration} to add your new creation to the buffer
22451 configuration list.
22454 (gnus-configure-frame
22458 (article 0.3 point))
22466 You might want to have several frames as well. No prob---just use the
22467 @code{frame} split:
22470 (gnus-configure-frame
22473 (summary 0.25 point frame-focus)
22475 (vertical ((height . 5) (width . 15)
22476 (user-position . t)
22477 (left . -1) (top . 1))
22482 This split will result in the familiar summary/article window
22483 configuration in the first (or ``main'') frame, while a small additional
22484 frame will be created where picons will be shown. As you can see,
22485 instead of the normal @code{1.0} top-level spec, each additional split
22486 should have a frame parameter alist as the size spec.
22487 @xref{Frame Parameters, , Frame Parameters, elisp, The GNU Emacs Lisp
22488 Reference Manual}. Under XEmacs, a frame property list will be
22489 accepted, too---for instance, @code{(height 5 width 15 left -1 top 1)}
22491 The list of all possible keys for @code{gnus-buffer-configuration} can
22492 be found in its default value.
22494 Note that the @code{message} key is used for both
22495 @code{gnus-group-mail} and @code{gnus-summary-mail-other-window}. If
22496 it is desirable to distinguish between the two, something like this
22500 (message (horizontal 1.0
22501 (vertical 1.0 (message 1.0 point))
22503 (if (buffer-live-p gnus-summary-buffer)
22508 One common desire for a multiple frame split is to have a separate frame
22509 for composing mail and news while leaving the original frame intact. To
22510 accomplish that, something like the following can be done:
22515 (if (not (buffer-live-p gnus-summary-buffer))
22516 (car (cdr (assoc 'group gnus-buffer-configuration)))
22517 (car (cdr (assoc 'summary gnus-buffer-configuration))))
22518 (vertical ((user-position . t) (top . 1) (left . 1)
22519 (name . "Message"))
22520 (message 1.0 point))))
22523 @findex gnus-add-configuration
22524 Since the @code{gnus-buffer-configuration} variable is so long and
22525 complicated, there's a function you can use to ease changing the config
22526 of a single setting: @code{gnus-add-configuration}. If, for instance,
22527 you want to change the @code{article} setting, you could say:
22530 (gnus-add-configuration
22531 '(article (vertical 1.0
22533 (summary .25 point)
22537 You'd typically stick these @code{gnus-add-configuration} calls in your
22538 @file{~/.gnus.el} file or in some startup hook---they should be run after
22539 Gnus has been loaded.
22541 @vindex gnus-always-force-window-configuration
22542 If all windows mentioned in the configuration are already visible, Gnus
22543 won't change the window configuration. If you always want to force the
22544 ``right'' window configuration, you can set
22545 @code{gnus-always-force-window-configuration} to non-@code{nil}.
22547 If you're using tree displays (@pxref{Tree Display}), and the tree
22548 window is displayed vertically next to another window, you may also want
22549 to fiddle with @code{gnus-tree-minimize-window} to avoid having the
22552 @subsection Example Window Configurations
22556 Narrow left hand side occupied by group buffer. Right hand side split
22557 between summary buffer (top one-sixth) and article buffer (bottom).
22572 (gnus-add-configuration
22575 (vertical 25 (group 1.0))
22577 (summary 0.16 point)
22580 (gnus-add-configuration
22583 (vertical 25 (group 1.0))
22584 (vertical 1.0 (summary 1.0 point)))))
22590 @node Faces and Fonts
22591 @section Faces and Fonts
22596 Fiddling with fonts and faces used to be very difficult, but these days
22597 it is very simple. You simply say @kbd{M-x customize-face}, pick out
22598 the face you want to alter, and alter it via the standard Customize
22603 @section Compilation
22604 @cindex compilation
22605 @cindex byte-compilation
22607 @findex gnus-compile
22609 Remember all those line format specification variables?
22610 @code{gnus-summary-line-format}, @code{gnus-group-line-format}, and so
22611 on. Now, Gnus will of course heed whatever these variables are, but,
22612 unfortunately, changing them will mean a quite significant slow-down.
22613 (The default values of these variables have byte-compiled functions
22614 associated with them, while the user-generated versions do not, of
22617 To help with this, you can run @kbd{M-x gnus-compile} after you've
22618 fiddled around with the variables and feel that you're (kind of)
22619 satisfied. This will result in the new specs being byte-compiled, and
22620 you'll get top speed again. Gnus will save these compiled specs in the
22621 @file{.newsrc.eld} file. (User-defined functions aren't compiled by
22622 this function, though---you should compile them yourself by sticking
22623 them into the @file{~/.gnus.el} file and byte-compiling that file.)
22627 @section Mode Lines
22630 @vindex gnus-updated-mode-lines
22631 @code{gnus-updated-mode-lines} says what buffers should keep their mode
22632 lines updated. It is a list of symbols. Supported symbols include
22633 @code{group}, @code{article}, @code{summary}, @code{server},
22634 @code{browse}, and @code{tree}. If the corresponding symbol is present,
22635 Gnus will keep that mode line updated with information that may be
22636 pertinent. If this variable is @code{nil}, screen refresh may be
22639 @cindex display-time
22641 @vindex gnus-mode-non-string-length
22642 By default, Gnus displays information on the current article in the mode
22643 lines of the summary and article buffers. The information Gnus wishes
22644 to display (e.g. the subject of the article) is often longer than the
22645 mode lines, and therefore have to be cut off at some point. The
22646 @code{gnus-mode-non-string-length} variable says how long the other
22647 elements on the line is (i.e., the non-info part). If you put
22648 additional elements on the mode line (e.g. a clock), you should modify
22651 @c Hook written by Francesco Potorti` <pot@cnuce.cnr.it>
22653 (add-hook 'display-time-hook
22654 (lambda () (setq gnus-mode-non-string-length
22656 (if line-number-mode 5 0)
22657 (if column-number-mode 4 0)
22658 (length display-time-string)))))
22661 If this variable is @code{nil} (which is the default), the mode line
22662 strings won't be chopped off, and they won't be padded either. Note
22663 that the default is unlikely to be desirable, as even the percentage
22664 complete in the buffer may be crowded off the mode line; the user should
22665 configure this variable appropriately for her configuration.
22668 @node Highlighting and Menus
22669 @section Highlighting and Menus
22671 @cindex highlighting
22674 @vindex gnus-visual
22675 The @code{gnus-visual} variable controls most of the Gnus-prettifying
22676 aspects. If @code{nil}, Gnus won't attempt to create menus or use fancy
22677 colors or fonts. This will also inhibit loading the @file{gnus-vis.el}
22680 This variable can be a list of visual properties that are enabled. The
22681 following elements are valid, and are all included by default:
22684 @item group-highlight
22685 Do highlights in the group buffer.
22686 @item summary-highlight
22687 Do highlights in the summary buffer.
22688 @item article-highlight
22689 Do highlights in the article buffer.
22691 Turn on highlighting in all buffers.
22693 Create menus in the group buffer.
22695 Create menus in the summary buffers.
22697 Create menus in the article buffer.
22699 Create menus in the browse buffer.
22701 Create menus in the server buffer.
22703 Create menus in the score buffers.
22705 Create menus in all buffers.
22708 So if you only want highlighting in the article buffer and menus in all
22709 buffers, you could say something like:
22712 (setq gnus-visual '(article-highlight menu))
22715 If you want highlighting only and no menus whatsoever, you'd say:
22718 (setq gnus-visual '(highlight))
22721 If @code{gnus-visual} is @code{t}, highlighting and menus will be used
22722 in all Gnus buffers.
22724 Other general variables that influence the look of all buffers include:
22727 @item gnus-mouse-face
22728 @vindex gnus-mouse-face
22729 This is the face (i.e., font) used for mouse highlighting in Gnus. No
22730 mouse highlights will be done if @code{gnus-visual} is @code{nil}.
22734 There are hooks associated with the creation of all the different menus:
22738 @item gnus-article-menu-hook
22739 @vindex gnus-article-menu-hook
22740 Hook called after creating the article mode menu.
22742 @item gnus-group-menu-hook
22743 @vindex gnus-group-menu-hook
22744 Hook called after creating the group mode menu.
22746 @item gnus-summary-menu-hook
22747 @vindex gnus-summary-menu-hook
22748 Hook called after creating the summary mode menu.
22750 @item gnus-server-menu-hook
22751 @vindex gnus-server-menu-hook
22752 Hook called after creating the server mode menu.
22754 @item gnus-browse-menu-hook
22755 @vindex gnus-browse-menu-hook
22756 Hook called after creating the browse mode menu.
22758 @item gnus-score-menu-hook
22759 @vindex gnus-score-menu-hook
22760 Hook called after creating the score mode menu.
22771 Those new-fangled @dfn{mouse} contraptions is very popular with the
22772 young, hep kids who don't want to learn the proper way to do things
22773 these days. Why, I remember way back in the summer of '89, when I was
22774 using Emacs on a Tops 20 system. Three hundred users on one single
22775 machine, and every user was running Simula compilers. Bah!
22779 @vindex gnus-carpal
22780 Well, you can make Gnus display bufferfuls of buttons you can click to
22781 do anything by setting @code{gnus-carpal} to @code{t}. Pretty simple,
22782 really. Tell the chiropractor I sent you.
22787 @item gnus-carpal-mode-hook
22788 @vindex gnus-carpal-mode-hook
22789 Hook run in all carpal mode buffers.
22791 @item gnus-carpal-button-face
22792 @vindex gnus-carpal-button-face
22793 Face used on buttons.
22795 @item gnus-carpal-header-face
22796 @vindex gnus-carpal-header-face
22797 Face used on carpal buffer headers.
22799 @item gnus-carpal-group-buffer-buttons
22800 @vindex gnus-carpal-group-buffer-buttons
22801 Buttons in the group buffer.
22803 @item gnus-carpal-summary-buffer-buttons
22804 @vindex gnus-carpal-summary-buffer-buttons
22805 Buttons in the summary buffer.
22807 @item gnus-carpal-server-buffer-buttons
22808 @vindex gnus-carpal-server-buffer-buttons
22809 Buttons in the server buffer.
22811 @item gnus-carpal-browse-buffer-buttons
22812 @vindex gnus-carpal-browse-buffer-buttons
22813 Buttons in the browse buffer.
22816 All the @code{buttons} variables are lists. The elements in these list
22817 are either cons cells where the @code{car} contains a text to be displayed and
22818 the @code{cdr} contains a function symbol, or a simple string.
22826 Gnus, being larger than any program ever written (allegedly), does lots
22827 of strange stuff that you may wish to have done while you're not
22828 present. For instance, you may want it to check for new mail once in a
22829 while. Or you may want it to close down all connections to all servers
22830 when you leave Emacs idle. And stuff like that.
22832 Gnus will let you do stuff like that by defining various
22833 @dfn{handlers}. Each handler consists of three elements: A
22834 @var{function}, a @var{time}, and an @var{idle} parameter.
22836 Here's an example of a handler that closes connections when Emacs has
22837 been idle for thirty minutes:
22840 (gnus-demon-close-connections nil 30)
22843 Here's a handler that scans for @acronym{PGP} headers every hour when
22847 (gnus-demon-scan-pgp 60 t)
22850 This @var{time} parameter and that @var{idle} parameter work together
22851 in a strange, but wonderful fashion. Basically, if @var{idle} is
22852 @code{nil}, then the function will be called every @var{time} minutes.
22854 If @var{idle} is @code{t}, then the function will be called after
22855 @var{time} minutes only if Emacs is idle. So if Emacs is never idle,
22856 the function will never be called. But once Emacs goes idle, the
22857 function will be called every @var{time} minutes.
22859 If @var{idle} is a number and @var{time} is a number, the function will
22860 be called every @var{time} minutes only when Emacs has been idle for
22861 @var{idle} minutes.
22863 If @var{idle} is a number and @var{time} is @code{nil}, the function
22864 will be called once every time Emacs has been idle for @var{idle}
22867 And if @var{time} is a string, it should look like @samp{07:31}, and
22868 the function will then be called once every day somewhere near that
22869 time. Modified by the @var{idle} parameter, of course.
22871 @vindex gnus-demon-timestep
22872 (When I say ``minute'' here, I really mean @code{gnus-demon-timestep}
22873 seconds. This is 60 by default. If you change that variable,
22874 all the timings in the handlers will be affected.)
22876 So, if you want to add a handler, you could put something like this in
22877 your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
22879 @findex gnus-demon-add-handler
22881 (gnus-demon-add-handler 'gnus-demon-close-connections 30 t)
22884 @findex gnus-demon-add-nocem
22885 @findex gnus-demon-add-scanmail
22886 @findex gnus-demon-add-rescan
22887 @findex gnus-demon-add-scan-timestamps
22888 @findex gnus-demon-add-disconnection
22889 Some ready-made functions to do this have been created:
22890 @code{gnus-demon-add-nocem}, @code{gnus-demon-add-disconnection},
22891 @code{gnus-demon-add-nntp-close-connection},
22892 @code{gnus-demon-add-scan-timestamps}, @code{gnus-demon-add-rescan}, and
22893 @code{gnus-demon-add-scanmail}. Just put those functions in your
22894 @file{~/.gnus.el} if you want those abilities.
22896 @findex gnus-demon-init
22897 @findex gnus-demon-cancel
22898 @vindex gnus-demon-handlers
22899 If you add handlers to @code{gnus-demon-handlers} directly, you should
22900 run @code{gnus-demon-init} to make the changes take hold. To cancel all
22901 daemons, you can use the @code{gnus-demon-cancel} function.
22903 Note that adding daemons can be pretty naughty if you over do it. Adding
22904 functions that scan all news and mail from all servers every two seconds
22905 is a sure-fire way of getting booted off any respectable system. So
22914 @dfn{Spamming} is posting the same article lots and lots of times.
22915 Spamming is bad. Spamming is evil.
22917 Spamming is usually canceled within a day or so by various anti-spamming
22918 agencies. These agencies usually also send out @dfn{NoCeM} messages.
22919 NoCeM is pronounced ``no see-'em'', and means what the name
22920 implies---these are messages that make the offending articles, like, go
22923 What use are these NoCeM messages if the articles are canceled anyway?
22924 Some sites do not honor cancel messages and some sites just honor cancels
22925 from a select few people. Then you may wish to make use of the NoCeM
22926 messages, which are distributed in the @samp{alt.nocem.misc} newsgroup.
22928 Gnus can read and parse the messages in this group automatically, and
22929 this will make spam disappear.
22931 There are some variables to customize, of course:
22934 @item gnus-use-nocem
22935 @vindex gnus-use-nocem
22936 Set this variable to @code{t} to set the ball rolling. It is @code{nil}
22939 You can also set this variable to a positive number as a group level.
22940 In that case, Gnus scans NoCeM messages when checking new news if this
22941 value is not exceeding a group level that you specify as the prefix
22942 argument to some commands, e.g. @code{gnus},
22943 @code{gnus-group-get-new-news}, etc. Otherwise, Gnus does not scan
22944 NoCeM messages if you specify a group level to those commands. For
22945 example, if you use 1 or 2 on the mail groups and the levels on the news
22946 groups remain the default, 3 is the best choice.
22948 @item gnus-nocem-groups
22949 @vindex gnus-nocem-groups
22950 Gnus will look for NoCeM messages in the groups in this list. The
22953 ("news.lists.filters" "news.admin.net-abuse.bulletins"
22954 "alt.nocem.misc" "news.admin.net-abuse.announce")
22957 @item gnus-nocem-issuers
22958 @vindex gnus-nocem-issuers
22959 There are many people issuing NoCeM messages. This list says what
22960 people you want to listen to. The default is
22962 ("Automoose-1" "clewis@@ferret.ocunix.on.ca"
22963 "cosmo.roadkill" "SpamHippo" "hweede@@snafu.de")
22965 fine, upstanding citizens all of them.
22967 Known despammers that you can put in this list are listed at@*
22968 @uref{http://www.xs4all.nl/~rosalind/nocemreg/nocemreg.html}.
22970 You do not have to heed NoCeM messages from all these people---just the
22971 ones you want to listen to. You also don't have to accept all NoCeM
22972 messages from the people you like. Each NoCeM message has a @dfn{type}
22973 header that gives the message a (more or less, usually less) rigorous
22974 definition. Common types are @samp{spam}, @samp{spew}, @samp{mmf},
22975 @samp{binary}, and @samp{troll}. To specify this, you have to use
22976 @code{(@var{issuer} @var{conditions} @dots{})} elements in the list.
22977 Each condition is either a string (which is a regexp that matches types
22978 you want to use) or a list on the form @code{(not @var{string})}, where
22979 @var{string} is a regexp that matches types you don't want to use.
22981 For instance, if you want all NoCeM messages from Chris Lewis except his
22982 @samp{troll} messages, you'd say:
22985 ("clewis@@ferret.ocunix.on.ca" ".*" (not "troll"))
22988 On the other hand, if you just want nothing but his @samp{spam} and
22989 @samp{spew} messages, you'd say:
22992 ("clewis@@ferret.ocunix.on.ca" (not ".*") "spew" "spam")
22995 The specs are applied left-to-right.
22998 @item gnus-nocem-verifyer
22999 @vindex gnus-nocem-verifyer
23001 This should be a function for verifying that the NoCeM issuer is who she
23002 says she is. The default is @code{pgg-verify}, which returns
23003 non-@code{nil} if the verification is successful, otherwise (including
23004 the case the NoCeM message was not signed) returns @code{nil}. If this
23005 is too slow and you don't care for verification (which may be dangerous),
23006 you can set this variable to @code{nil}.
23008 Formerly the default was @code{mc-verify}, which is a Mailcrypt
23009 function. While you can still use it, you can change it into
23010 @code{pgg-verify} running with GnuPG if you are willing to add the
23011 @acronym{PGP} public keys to GnuPG's keyring.
23013 @item gnus-nocem-directory
23014 @vindex gnus-nocem-directory
23015 This is where Gnus will store its NoCeM cache files. The default is@*
23016 @file{~/News/NoCeM/}.
23018 @item gnus-nocem-expiry-wait
23019 @vindex gnus-nocem-expiry-wait
23020 The number of days before removing old NoCeM entries from the cache.
23021 The default is 15. If you make it shorter Gnus will be faster, but you
23022 might then see old spam.
23024 @item gnus-nocem-check-from
23025 @vindex gnus-nocem-check-from
23026 Non-@code{nil} means check for valid issuers in message bodies.
23027 Otherwise don't bother fetching articles unless their author matches a
23028 valid issuer; that is much faster if you are selective about the
23031 @item gnus-nocem-check-article-limit
23032 @vindex gnus-nocem-check-article-limit
23033 If non-@code{nil}, the maximum number of articles to check in any NoCeM
23034 group. NoCeM groups can be huge and very slow to process.
23038 Using NoCeM could potentially be a memory hog. If you have many living
23039 (i. e., subscribed or unsubscribed groups), your Emacs process will grow
23040 big. If this is a problem, you should kill off all (or most) of your
23041 unsubscribed groups (@pxref{Subscription Commands}).
23048 It is very useful to be able to undo actions one has done. In normal
23049 Emacs buffers, it's easy enough---you just push the @code{undo} button.
23050 In Gnus buffers, however, it isn't that simple.
23052 The things Gnus displays in its buffer is of no value whatsoever to
23053 Gnus---it's all just data designed to look nice to the user.
23054 Killing a group in the group buffer with @kbd{C-k} makes the line
23055 disappear, but that's just a side-effect of the real action---the
23056 removal of the group in question from the internal Gnus structures.
23057 Undoing something like that can't be done by the normal Emacs
23058 @code{undo} function.
23060 Gnus tries to remedy this somewhat by keeping track of what the user
23061 does and coming up with actions that would reverse the actions the user
23062 takes. When the user then presses the @code{undo} key, Gnus will run
23063 the code to reverse the previous action, or the previous actions.
23064 However, not all actions are easily reversible, so Gnus currently offers
23065 a few key functions to be undoable. These include killing groups,
23066 yanking groups, and changing the list of read articles of groups.
23067 That's it, really. More functions may be added in the future, but each
23068 added function means an increase in data to be stored, so Gnus will
23069 never be totally undoable.
23071 @findex gnus-undo-mode
23072 @vindex gnus-use-undo
23074 The undoability is provided by the @code{gnus-undo-mode} minor mode. It
23075 is used if @code{gnus-use-undo} is non-@code{nil}, which is the
23076 default. The @kbd{C-M-_} key performs the @code{gnus-undo}
23077 command, which should feel kinda like the normal Emacs @code{undo}
23081 @node Predicate Specifiers
23082 @section Predicate Specifiers
23083 @cindex predicate specifiers
23085 Some Gnus variables are @dfn{predicate specifiers}. This is a special
23086 form that allows flexible specification of predicates without having
23087 to type all that much.
23089 These specifiers are lists consisting of functions, symbols and lists.
23094 (or gnus-article-unseen-p
23095 gnus-article-unread-p)
23098 The available symbols are @code{or}, @code{and} and @code{not}. The
23099 functions all take one parameter.
23101 @findex gnus-make-predicate
23102 Internally, Gnus calls @code{gnus-make-predicate} on these specifiers
23103 to create a function that can be called. This input parameter to this
23104 function will be passed along to all the functions in the predicate
23109 @section Moderation
23112 If you are a moderator, you can use the @file{gnus-mdrtn.el} package.
23113 It is not included in the standard Gnus package. Write a mail to
23114 @samp{larsi@@gnus.org} and state what group you moderate, and you'll
23117 The moderation package is implemented as a minor mode for summary
23121 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'gnus-moderate)
23124 in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file.
23126 If you are the moderator of @samp{rec.zoofle}, this is how it's
23131 You split your incoming mail by matching on
23132 @samp{Newsgroups:.*rec.zoofle}, which will put all the to-be-posted
23133 articles in some mail group---for instance, @samp{nnml:rec.zoofle}.
23136 You enter that group once in a while and post articles using the @kbd{e}
23137 (edit-and-post) or @kbd{s} (just send unedited) commands.
23140 If, while reading the @samp{rec.zoofle} newsgroup, you happen upon some
23141 articles that weren't approved by you, you can cancel them with the
23145 To use moderation mode in these two groups, say:
23148 (setq gnus-moderated-list
23149 "^nnml:rec.zoofle$\\|^rec.zoofle$")
23153 @node Fetching a Group
23154 @section Fetching a Group
23155 @cindex fetching a group
23157 @findex gnus-fetch-group
23158 It is sometimes convenient to be able to just say ``I want to read this
23159 group and I don't care whether Gnus has been started or not''. This is
23160 perhaps more useful for people who write code than for users, but the
23161 command @code{gnus-fetch-group} provides this functionality in any case.
23162 It takes the group name as a parameter.
23165 @node Image Enhancements
23166 @section Image Enhancements
23168 XEmacs, as well as Emacs 21@footnote{Emacs 21 on MS Windows doesn't
23169 support images, Emacs 22 does.} and up, are able to display pictures and
23170 stuff, so Gnus has taken advantage of that.
23173 * X-Face:: Display a funky, teensy black-and-white image.
23174 * Face:: Display a funkier, teensier colored image.
23175 * Smileys:: Show all those happy faces the way they were meant to be shown.
23176 * Picons:: How to display pictures of what you're reading.
23177 * XVarious:: Other XEmacsy Gnusey variables.
23185 @code{X-Face} headers describe a 48x48 pixel black-and-white (1 bit
23186 depth) image that's supposed to represent the author of the message.
23187 It seems to be supported by an ever-growing number of mail and news
23191 @findex gnus-article-display-x-face
23192 @vindex gnus-article-x-face-command
23193 @vindex gnus-article-x-face-too-ugly
23201 Viewing an @code{X-Face} header either requires an Emacs that has
23202 @samp{compface} support (which most XEmacs versions have), or that you
23203 have suitable conversion or display programs installed. If your Emacs
23204 has image support the default action is to display the face before the
23205 @code{From} header. If there's no native @code{X-Face} support, Gnus
23206 will try to convert the @code{X-Face} header using external programs
23207 from the @code{pbmplus} package and friends, see below. For XEmacs it's
23208 faster if XEmacs has been compiled with @code{X-Face} support. The
23209 default action under Emacs without image support is to fork off the
23210 @code{display} program.
23212 On a GNU/Linux system, the @code{display} program is included in the
23213 ImageMagick package. For external conversion programs look for packages
23214 with names like @code{netpbm}, @code{libgr-progs} and @code{compface}.
23215 On Windows, you may use the packages @code{netpbm} and @code{compface}
23216 from @url{http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net}. You need to add the
23217 @code{bin} directory to your @code{PATH} environment variable.
23218 @c In fact only the following DLLs and binaries seem to be required:
23219 @c compface1.dll uncompface.exe libnetpbm10.dll icontopbm.exe
23221 The variable @code{gnus-article-x-face-command} controls which programs
23222 are used to display the @code{X-Face} header. If this variable is a
23223 string, this string will be executed in a sub-shell. If it is a
23224 function, this function will be called with the face as the argument.
23225 If @code{gnus-article-x-face-too-ugly} (which is a regexp) matches the
23226 @code{From} header, the face will not be shown.
23228 (Note: @code{x-face} is used in the variable/function names, not
23236 @vindex gnus-x-face
23237 Face to show X-Face. The colors from this face are used as the
23238 foreground and background colors of the displayed X-Faces. The
23239 default colors are black and white.
23241 @item gnus-face-properties-alist
23242 @vindex gnus-face-properties-alist
23243 Alist of image types and properties applied to Face (@pxref{Face}) and
23244 X-Face images. The default value is @code{((pbm . (:face gnus-x-face))
23245 (png . nil))} for Emacs or @code{((xface . (:face gnus-x-face)))} for
23246 XEmacs. Here are examples:
23249 ;; Specify the altitude of Face and X-Face images in the From header.
23250 (setq gnus-face-properties-alist
23251 '((pbm . (:face gnus-x-face :ascent 80))
23252 (png . (:ascent 80))))
23254 ;; Show Face and X-Face images as pressed buttons.
23255 (setq gnus-face-properties-alist
23256 '((pbm . (:face gnus-x-face :relief -2))
23257 (png . (:relief -2))))
23260 @pxref{Image Descriptors, ,Image Descriptors, elisp, The Emacs Lisp
23261 Reference Manual} for the valid properties for various image types.
23262 Currently, @code{pbm} is used for X-Face images and @code{png} is used
23263 for Face images in Emacs. Only the @code{:face} property is effective
23264 on the @code{xface} image type in XEmacs if it is built with the
23265 @samp{libcompface} library.
23268 If you use posting styles, you can use an @code{x-face-file} entry in
23269 @code{gnus-posting-styles}, @xref{Posting Styles}. If you don't, Gnus
23270 provides a few convenience functions and variables to allow easier
23271 insertion of X-Face headers in outgoing messages. You also need the
23272 above mentioned ImageMagick, netpbm or other image conversion packages
23273 (depending the values of the variables below) for these functions.
23275 @findex gnus-random-x-face
23276 @vindex gnus-convert-pbm-to-x-face-command
23277 @vindex gnus-x-face-directory
23278 @code{gnus-random-x-face} goes through all the @samp{pbm} files in
23279 @code{gnus-x-face-directory} and picks one at random, and then
23280 converts it to the X-Face format by using the
23281 @code{gnus-convert-pbm-to-x-face-command} shell command. The
23282 @samp{pbm} files should be 48x48 pixels big. It returns the X-Face
23283 header data as a string.
23285 @findex gnus-insert-random-x-face-header
23286 @code{gnus-insert-random-x-face-header} calls
23287 @code{gnus-random-x-face} and inserts a @samp{X-Face} header with the
23288 randomly generated data.
23290 @findex gnus-x-face-from-file
23291 @vindex gnus-convert-image-to-x-face-command
23292 @code{gnus-x-face-from-file} takes a GIF file as the parameter, and then
23293 converts the file to X-Face format by using the
23294 @code{gnus-convert-image-to-x-face-command} shell command.
23296 Here's how you would typically use the first function. Put something
23297 like the following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
23300 (setq message-required-news-headers
23301 (nconc message-required-news-headers
23302 (list '(X-Face . gnus-random-x-face))))
23305 Using the last function would be something like this:
23308 (setq message-required-news-headers
23309 (nconc message-required-news-headers
23310 (list '(X-Face . (lambda ()
23311 (gnus-x-face-from-file
23312 "~/My-face.gif"))))))
23320 @c #### FIXME: faces and x-faces' implementations should really be harmonized.
23322 @code{Face} headers are essentially a funkier version of @code{X-Face}
23323 ones. They describe a 48x48 pixel colored image that's supposed to
23324 represent the author of the message.
23327 @findex gnus-article-display-face
23328 The contents of a @code{Face} header must be a base64 encoded PNG image.
23329 See @uref{http://quimby.gnus.org/circus/face/} for the precise
23332 The @code{gnus-face-properties-alist} variable affects the appearance of
23333 displayed Face images. @xref{X-Face}.
23335 Viewing an @code{Face} header requires an Emacs that is able to display
23338 @c (if (featurep 'xemacs)
23340 @c (image-type-available-p 'png))
23342 Gnus provides a few convenience functions and variables to allow
23343 easier insertion of Face headers in outgoing messages.
23345 @findex gnus-convert-png-to-face
23346 @code{gnus-convert-png-to-face} takes a 48x48 PNG image, no longer than
23347 726 bytes long, and converts it to a face.
23349 @findex gnus-face-from-file
23350 @vindex gnus-convert-image-to-face-command
23351 @code{gnus-face-from-file} takes a JPEG file as the parameter, and then
23352 converts the file to Face format by using the
23353 @code{gnus-convert-image-to-face-command} shell command.
23355 Here's how you would typically use this function. Put something like the
23356 following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
23359 (setq message-required-news-headers
23360 (nconc message-required-news-headers
23361 (list '(Face . (lambda ()
23362 (gnus-face-from-file "~/face.jpg"))))))
23367 @subsection Smileys
23372 \gnusfig{-3cm}{0.5cm}{\epsfig{figure=ps/BigFace,height=20cm}}
23377 @dfn{Smiley} is a package separate from Gnus, but since Gnus is
23378 currently the only package that uses Smiley, it is documented here.
23380 In short---to use Smiley in Gnus, put the following in your
23381 @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
23384 (setq gnus-treat-display-smileys t)
23387 Smiley maps text smiley faces---@samp{:-)}, @samp{8-)}, @samp{:-(} and
23388 the like---to pictures and displays those instead of the text smiley
23389 faces. The conversion is controlled by a list of regexps that matches
23390 text and maps that to file names.
23392 @vindex smiley-regexp-alist
23393 The alist used is specified by the @code{smiley-regexp-alist}
23394 variable. The first item in each element is the regexp to be matched;
23395 the second element is the regexp match group that is to be replaced by
23396 the picture; and the third element is the name of the file to be
23399 The following variables customize where Smiley will look for these
23404 @item smiley-data-directory
23405 @vindex smiley-data-directory
23406 Where Smiley will look for smiley faces files.
23408 @item gnus-smiley-file-types
23409 @vindex gnus-smiley-file-types
23410 List of suffixes on smiley file names to try.
23424 So@dots{} You want to slow down your news reader even more! This is a
23425 good way to do so. It's also a great way to impress people staring
23426 over your shoulder as you read news.
23428 What are Picons? To quote directly from the Picons Web site:
23437 @dfn{Picons} is short for ``personal icons''. They're small,
23438 constrained images used to represent users and domains on the net,
23439 organized into databases so that the appropriate image for a given
23440 e-mail address can be found. Besides users and domains, there are picon
23441 databases for Usenet newsgroups and weather forecasts. The picons are
23442 in either monochrome @code{XBM} format or color @code{XPM} and
23443 @code{GIF} formats.
23446 @vindex gnus-picon-databases
23447 For instructions on obtaining and installing the picons databases,
23448 point your Web browser at
23449 @uref{http://www.cs.indiana.edu/picons/ftp/index.html}.
23451 If you are using Debian GNU/Linux, saying @samp{apt-get install
23452 picons.*} will install the picons where Gnus can find them.
23454 To enable displaying picons, simply make sure that
23455 @code{gnus-picon-databases} points to the directory containing the
23458 @vindex gnus-picon-style
23459 The variable @code{gnus-picon-style} controls how picons are displayed.
23460 If @code{inline}, the textual representation is replaced. If
23461 @code{right}, picons are added right to the textual representation.
23463 The following variables offer control over where things are located.
23467 @item gnus-picon-databases
23468 @vindex gnus-picon-databases
23469 The location of the picons database. This is a list of directories
23470 containing the @file{news}, @file{domains}, @file{users} (and so on)
23471 subdirectories. Defaults to @code{("/usr/lib/picon"
23472 "/usr/local/faces")}.
23474 @item gnus-picon-news-directories
23475 @vindex gnus-picon-news-directories
23476 List of subdirectories to search in @code{gnus-picon-databases} for
23477 newsgroups faces. @code{("news")} is the default.
23479 @item gnus-picon-user-directories
23480 @vindex gnus-picon-user-directories
23481 List of subdirectories to search in @code{gnus-picon-databases} for user
23482 faces. @code{("users" "usenix" "local" "misc")} is the default.
23484 @item gnus-picon-domain-directories
23485 @vindex gnus-picon-domain-directories
23486 List of subdirectories to search in @code{gnus-picon-databases} for
23487 domain name faces. Defaults to @code{("domains")}. Some people may
23488 want to add @samp{"unknown"} to this list.
23490 @item gnus-picon-file-types
23491 @vindex gnus-picon-file-types
23492 Ordered list of suffixes on picon file names to try. Defaults to
23493 @code{("xpm" "gif" "xbm")} minus those not built-in your Emacs.
23499 @subsection Various XEmacs Variables
23502 @item gnus-xmas-glyph-directory
23503 @vindex gnus-xmas-glyph-directory
23504 This is where Gnus will look for pictures. Gnus will normally
23505 auto-detect this directory, but you may set it manually if you have an
23506 unusual directory structure.
23508 @item gnus-xmas-modeline-glyph
23509 @vindex gnus-xmas-modeline-glyph
23510 A glyph displayed in all Gnus mode lines. It is a tiny gnu head by
23515 @subsubsection Toolbar
23519 @item gnus-use-toolbar
23520 @vindex gnus-use-toolbar
23521 This variable specifies the position to display the toolbar. If
23522 @code{nil}, don't display toolbars. If it is non-@code{nil}, it should
23523 be one of the symbols @code{default}, @code{top}, @code{bottom},
23524 @code{right}, and @code{left}. @code{default} means to use the default
23525 toolbar, the rest mean to display the toolbar on the place which those
23526 names show. The default is @code{default}.
23528 @item gnus-toolbar-thickness
23529 @vindex gnus-toolbar-thickness
23530 Cons of the height and the width specifying the thickness of a toolbar.
23531 The height is used for the toolbar displayed on the top or the bottom,
23532 the width is used for the toolbar displayed on the right or the left.
23533 The default is that of the default toolbar.
23535 @item gnus-group-toolbar
23536 @vindex gnus-group-toolbar
23537 The toolbar in the group buffer.
23539 @item gnus-summary-toolbar
23540 @vindex gnus-summary-toolbar
23541 The toolbar in the summary buffer.
23543 @item gnus-summary-mail-toolbar
23544 @vindex gnus-summary-mail-toolbar
23545 The toolbar in the summary buffer of mail groups.
23556 @node Fuzzy Matching
23557 @section Fuzzy Matching
23558 @cindex fuzzy matching
23560 Gnus provides @dfn{fuzzy matching} of @code{Subject} lines when doing
23561 things like scoring, thread gathering and thread comparison.
23563 As opposed to regular expression matching, fuzzy matching is very fuzzy.
23564 It's so fuzzy that there's not even a definition of what @dfn{fuzziness}
23565 means, and the implementation has changed over time.
23567 Basically, it tries to remove all noise from lines before comparing.
23568 @samp{Re: }, parenthetical remarks, white space, and so on, are filtered
23569 out of the strings before comparing the results. This often leads to
23570 adequate results---even when faced with strings generated by text
23571 manglers masquerading as newsreaders.
23574 @node Thwarting Email Spam
23575 @section Thwarting Email Spam
23579 @cindex unsolicited commercial email
23581 In these last days of the Usenet, commercial vultures are hanging about
23582 and grepping through news like crazy to find email addresses they can
23583 foist off their scams and products to. As a reaction to this, many
23584 people have started putting nonsense addresses into their @code{From}
23585 lines. I think this is counterproductive---it makes it difficult for
23586 people to send you legitimate mail in response to things you write, as
23587 well as making it difficult to see who wrote what. This rewriting may
23588 perhaps be a bigger menace than the unsolicited commercial email itself
23591 The biggest problem I have with email spam is that it comes in under
23592 false pretenses. I press @kbd{g} and Gnus merrily informs me that I
23593 have 10 new emails. I say ``Golly gee! Happy is me!'' and select the
23594 mail group, only to find two pyramid schemes, seven advertisements
23595 (``New! Miracle tonic for growing full, lustrous hair on your toes!'')
23596 and one mail asking me to repent and find some god.
23598 This is annoying. Here's what you can do about it.
23601 * The problem of spam:: Some background, and some solutions
23602 * Anti-Spam Basics:: Simple steps to reduce the amount of spam.
23603 * SpamAssassin:: How to use external anti-spam tools.
23604 * Hashcash:: Reduce spam by burning CPU time.
23607 @node The problem of spam
23608 @subsection The problem of spam
23610 @cindex spam filtering approaches
23611 @cindex filtering approaches, spam
23613 @cindex unsolicited commercial email
23615 First, some background on spam.
23617 If you have access to e-mail, you are familiar with spam (technically
23618 termed @acronym{UCE}, Unsolicited Commercial E-mail). Simply put, it
23619 exists because e-mail delivery is very cheap compared to paper mail,
23620 so only a very small percentage of people need to respond to an UCE to
23621 make it worthwhile to the advertiser. Ironically, one of the most
23622 common spams is the one offering a database of e-mail addresses for
23623 further spamming. Senders of spam are usually called @emph{spammers},
23624 but terms like @emph{vermin}, @emph{scum}, @emph{sociopaths}, and
23625 @emph{morons} are in common use as well.
23627 Spam comes from a wide variety of sources. It is simply impossible to
23628 dispose of all spam without discarding useful messages. A good
23629 example is the TMDA system, which requires senders
23630 unknown to you to confirm themselves as legitimate senders before
23631 their e-mail can reach you. Without getting into the technical side
23632 of TMDA, a downside is clearly that e-mail from legitimate sources may
23633 be discarded if those sources can't or won't confirm themselves
23634 through the TMDA system. Another problem with TMDA is that it
23635 requires its users to have a basic understanding of e-mail delivery
23638 The simplest approach to filtering spam is filtering, at the mail
23639 server or when you sort through incoming mail. If you get 200 spam
23640 messages per day from @samp{random-address@@vmadmin.com}, you block
23641 @samp{vmadmin.com}. If you get 200 messages about @samp{VIAGRA}, you
23642 discard all messages with @samp{VIAGRA} in the message. If you get
23643 lots of spam from Bulgaria, for example, you try to filter all mail
23644 from Bulgarian IPs.
23646 This, unfortunately, is a great way to discard legitimate e-mail. The
23647 risks of blocking a whole country (Bulgaria, Norway, Nigeria, China,
23648 etc.) or even a continent (Asia, Africa, Europe, etc.) from contacting
23649 you should be obvious, so don't do it if you have the choice.
23651 In another instance, the very informative and useful RISKS digest has
23652 been blocked by overzealous mail filters because it @strong{contained}
23653 words that were common in spam messages. Nevertheless, in isolated
23654 cases, with great care, direct filtering of mail can be useful.
23656 Another approach to filtering e-mail is the distributed spam
23657 processing, for instance DCC implements such a system. In essence,
23658 @var{N} systems around the world agree that a machine @var{X} in
23659 Ghana, Estonia, or California is sending out spam e-mail, and these
23660 @var{N} systems enter @var{X} or the spam e-mail from @var{X} into a
23661 database. The criteria for spam detection vary---it may be the number
23662 of messages sent, the content of the messages, and so on. When a user
23663 of the distributed processing system wants to find out if a message is
23664 spam, he consults one of those @var{N} systems.
23666 Distributed spam processing works very well against spammers that send
23667 a large number of messages at once, but it requires the user to set up
23668 fairly complicated checks. There are commercial and free distributed
23669 spam processing systems. Distributed spam processing has its risks as
23670 well. For instance legitimate e-mail senders have been accused of
23671 sending spam, and their web sites and mailing lists have been shut
23672 down for some time because of the incident.
23674 The statistical approach to spam filtering is also popular. It is
23675 based on a statistical analysis of previous spam messages. Usually
23676 the analysis is a simple word frequency count, with perhaps pairs of
23677 words or 3-word combinations thrown into the mix. Statistical
23678 analysis of spam works very well in most of the cases, but it can
23679 classify legitimate e-mail as spam in some cases. It takes time to
23680 run the analysis, the full message must be analyzed, and the user has
23681 to store the database of spam analysis. Statistical analysis on the
23682 server is gaining popularity. This has the advantage of letting the
23683 user Just Read Mail, but has the disadvantage that it's harder to tell
23684 the server that it has misclassified mail.
23686 Fighting spam is not easy, no matter what anyone says. There is no
23687 magic switch that will distinguish Viagra ads from Mom's e-mails.
23688 Even people are having a hard time telling spam apart from non-spam,
23689 because spammers are actively looking to fool us into thinking they
23690 are Mom, essentially. Spamming is irritating, irresponsible, and
23691 idiotic behavior from a bunch of people who think the world owes them
23692 a favor. We hope the following sections will help you in fighting the
23695 @node Anti-Spam Basics
23696 @subsection Anti-Spam Basics
23700 @cindex unsolicited commercial email
23702 One way of dealing with spam is having Gnus split out all spam into a
23703 @samp{spam} mail group (@pxref{Splitting Mail}).
23705 First, pick one (1) valid mail address that you can be reached at, and
23706 put it in your @code{From} header of all your news articles. (I've
23707 chosen @samp{larsi@@trym.ifi.uio.no}, but for many addresses on the form
23708 @samp{larsi+usenet@@ifi.uio.no} will be a better choice. Ask your
23709 sysadmin whether your sendmail installation accepts keywords in the local
23710 part of the mail address.)
23713 (setq message-default-news-headers
23714 "From: Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@@trym.ifi.uio.no>\n")
23717 Then put the following split rule in @code{nnmail-split-fancy}
23718 (@pxref{Fancy Mail Splitting}):
23722 (to "larsi@@trym.ifi.uio.no"
23723 (| ("subject" "re:.*" "misc")
23724 ("references" ".*@@.*" "misc")
23729 This says that all mail to this address is suspect, but if it has a
23730 @code{Subject} that starts with a @samp{Re:} or has a @code{References}
23731 header, it's probably ok. All the rest goes to the @samp{spam} group.
23732 (This idea probably comes from Tim Pierce.)
23734 In addition, many mail spammers talk directly to your @acronym{SMTP} server
23735 and do not include your email address explicitly in the @code{To}
23736 header. Why they do this is unknown---perhaps it's to thwart this
23737 thwarting scheme? In any case, this is trivial to deal with---you just
23738 put anything not addressed to you in the @samp{spam} group by ending
23739 your fancy split rule in this way:
23744 (to "larsi" "misc")
23748 In my experience, this will sort virtually everything into the right
23749 group. You still have to check the @samp{spam} group from time to time to
23750 check for legitimate mail, though. If you feel like being a good net
23751 citizen, you can even send off complaints to the proper authorities on
23752 each unsolicited commercial email---at your leisure.
23754 This works for me. It allows people an easy way to contact me (they can
23755 just press @kbd{r} in the usual way), and I'm not bothered at all with
23756 spam. It's a win-win situation. Forging @code{From} headers to point
23757 to non-existent domains is yucky, in my opinion.
23759 Be careful with this approach. Spammers are wise to it.
23763 @subsection SpamAssassin, Vipul's Razor, DCC, etc
23764 @cindex SpamAssassin
23765 @cindex Vipul's Razor
23768 The days where the hints in the previous section were sufficient in
23769 avoiding spam are coming to an end. There are many tools out there
23770 that claim to reduce the amount of spam you get. This section could
23771 easily become outdated fast, as new products replace old, but
23772 fortunately most of these tools seem to have similar interfaces. Even
23773 though this section will use SpamAssassin as an example, it should be
23774 easy to adapt it to most other tools.
23776 Note that this section does not involve the @code{spam.el} package,
23777 which is discussed in the next section. If you don't care for all
23778 the features of @code{spam.el}, you can make do with these simple
23781 If the tool you are using is not installed on the mail server, you
23782 need to invoke it yourself. Ideas on how to use the
23783 @code{:postscript} mail source parameter (@pxref{Mail Source
23784 Specifiers}) follow.
23788 '((file :prescript "formail -bs spamassassin < /var/mail/%u")
23792 "mv %t /tmp/foo; formail -bs spamc < /tmp/foo > %t")))
23795 Once you manage to process your incoming spool somehow, thus making
23796 the mail contain e.g.@: a header indicating it is spam, you are ready to
23797 filter it out. Using normal split methods (@pxref{Splitting Mail}):
23800 (setq nnmail-split-methods '(("spam" "^X-Spam-Flag: YES")
23804 Or using fancy split methods (@pxref{Fancy Mail Splitting}):
23807 (setq nnmail-split-methods 'nnmail-split-fancy
23808 nnmail-split-fancy '(| ("X-Spam-Flag" "YES" "spam")
23812 Some people might not like the idea of piping the mail through various
23813 programs using a @code{:prescript} (if some program is buggy, you
23814 might lose all mail). If you are one of them, another solution is to
23815 call the external tools during splitting. Example fancy split method:
23818 (setq nnmail-split-fancy '(| (: kevin-spamassassin)
23820 (defun kevin-spamassassin ()
23824 (if (eq 1 (call-process-region (point-min) (point-max)
23825 "spamc" nil nil nil "-c"))
23829 Note that with the nnimap back end, message bodies will not be
23830 downloaded by default. You need to set
23831 @code{nnimap-split-download-body} to @code{t} to do that
23832 (@pxref{Splitting in IMAP}).
23834 That is about it. As some spam is likely to get through anyway, you
23835 might want to have a nifty function to call when you happen to read
23836 spam. And here is the nifty function:
23839 (defun my-gnus-raze-spam ()
23840 "Submit SPAM to Vipul's Razor, then mark it as expirable."
23842 (gnus-summary-show-raw-article)
23843 (gnus-summary-save-in-pipe "razor-report -f -d")
23844 (gnus-summary-mark-as-expirable 1))
23848 @subsection Hashcash
23851 A novel technique to fight spam is to require senders to do something
23852 costly and demonstrably unique for each message they send. This has
23853 the obvious drawback that you cannot rely on everyone in the world
23854 using this technique, since it is not part of the Internet standards,
23855 but it may be useful in smaller communities.
23857 While the tools in the previous section work well in practice, they
23858 work only because the tools are constantly maintained and updated as
23859 new form of spam appears. This means that a small percentage of spam
23860 will always get through. It also means that somewhere, someone needs
23861 to read lots of spam to update these tools. Hashcash avoids that, but
23862 instead prefers that everyone you contact through e-mail supports the
23863 scheme. You can view the two approaches as pragmatic vs dogmatic.
23864 The approaches have their own advantages and disadvantages, but as
23865 often in the real world, a combination of them is stronger than either
23866 one of them separately.
23869 The ``something costly'' is to burn CPU time, more specifically to
23870 compute a hash collision up to a certain number of bits. The
23871 resulting hashcash cookie is inserted in a @samp{X-Hashcash:} header.
23872 For more details, and for the external application @code{hashcash} you
23873 need to install to use this feature, see
23874 @uref{http://www.hashcash.org/}. Even more information can be found
23875 at @uref{http://www.camram.org/}.
23877 If you wish to generate hashcash for each message you send, you can
23878 customize @code{message-generate-hashcash} (@pxref{Mail Headers, ,Mail
23879 Headers,message, The Message Manual}), as in:
23882 (setq message-generate-hashcash t)
23885 You will need to set up some additional variables as well:
23889 @item hashcash-default-payment
23890 @vindex hashcash-default-payment
23891 This variable indicates the default number of bits the hash collision
23892 should consist of. By default this is 20. Suggested useful values
23895 @item hashcash-payment-alist
23896 @vindex hashcash-payment-alist
23897 Some receivers may require you to spend burn more CPU time than the
23898 default. This variable contains a list of @samp{(@var{addr}
23899 @var{amount})} cells, where @var{addr} is the receiver (email address
23900 or newsgroup) and @var{amount} is the number of bits in the collision
23901 that is needed. It can also contain @samp{(@var{addr} @var{string}
23902 @var{amount})} cells, where the @var{string} is the string to use
23903 (normally the email address or newsgroup name is used).
23905 @item hashcash-path
23906 @vindex hashcash-path
23907 Where the @code{hashcash} binary is installed. This variable should
23908 be automatically set by @code{executable-find}, but if it's @code{nil}
23909 (usually because the @code{hashcash} binary is not in your path)
23910 you'll get a warning when you check hashcash payments and an error
23911 when you generate hashcash payments.
23915 Gnus can verify hashcash cookies, although this can also be done by
23916 hand customized mail filtering scripts. To verify a hashcash cookie
23917 in a message, use the @code{mail-check-payment} function in the
23918 @code{hashcash.el} library. You can also use the @code{spam.el}
23919 package with the @code{spam-use-hashcash} back end to validate hashcash
23920 cookies in incoming mail and filter mail accordingly (@pxref{Anti-spam
23921 Hashcash Payments}).
23924 @section Spam Package
23925 @cindex spam filtering
23928 The Spam package provides Gnus with a centralized mechanism for
23929 detecting and filtering spam. It filters new mail, and processes
23930 messages according to whether they are spam or ham. (@dfn{Ham} is the
23931 name used throughout this manual to indicate non-spam messages.)
23934 * Spam Package Introduction::
23935 * Filtering Incoming Mail::
23936 * Detecting Spam in Groups::
23937 * Spam and Ham Processors::
23938 * Spam Package Configuration Examples::
23940 * Extending the Spam package::
23941 * Spam Statistics Package::
23944 @node Spam Package Introduction
23945 @subsection Spam Package Introduction
23946 @cindex spam filtering
23947 @cindex spam filtering sequence of events
23950 You must read this section to understand how the Spam package works.
23951 Do not skip, speed-read, or glance through this section.
23953 Make sure you read the section on the @code{spam.el} sequence of
23954 events. See @xref{Extending the Spam package}.
23956 @cindex spam-initialize
23957 @vindex spam-use-stat
23958 To use the Spam package, you @strong{must} first run the function
23959 @code{spam-initialize}:
23965 This autoloads @code{spam.el} and installs the various hooks necessary
23966 to let the Spam package do its job. In order to make use of the Spam
23967 package, you have to set up certain group parameters and variables,
23968 which we will describe below. All of the variables controlling the
23969 Spam package can be found in the @samp{spam} customization group.
23971 There are two ``contact points'' between the Spam package and the rest
23972 of Gnus: checking new mail for spam, and leaving a group.
23974 Checking new mail for spam is done in one of two ways: while splitting
23975 incoming mail, or when you enter a group.
23977 The first way, checking for spam while splitting incoming mail, is
23978 suited to mail back ends such as @code{nnml} or @code{nnimap}, where
23979 new mail appears in a single spool file. The Spam package processes
23980 incoming mail, and sends mail considered to be spam to a designated
23981 ``spam'' group. @xref{Filtering Incoming Mail}.
23983 The second way is suited to back ends such as @code{nntp}, which have
23984 no incoming mail spool, or back ends where the server is in charge of
23985 splitting incoming mail. In this case, when you enter a Gnus group,
23986 the unseen or unread messages in that group are checked for spam.
23987 Detected spam messages are marked as spam. @xref{Detecting Spam in
23990 @cindex spam back ends
23991 In either case, you have to tell the Spam package what method to use
23992 to detect spam messages. There are several methods, or @dfn{spam back
23993 ends} (not to be confused with Gnus back ends!) to choose from: spam
23994 ``blacklists'' and ``whitelists'', dictionary-based filters, and so
23995 forth. @xref{Spam Back Ends}.
23997 In the Gnus summary buffer, messages that have been identified as spam
23998 always appear with a @samp{$} symbol.
24000 The Spam package divides Gnus groups into three categories: ham
24001 groups, spam groups, and unclassified groups. You should mark each of
24002 the groups you subscribe to as either a ham group or a spam group,
24003 using the @code{spam-contents} group parameter (@pxref{Group
24004 Parameters}). Spam groups have a special property: when you enter a
24005 spam group, all unseen articles are marked as spam. Thus, mail split
24006 into a spam group is automatically marked as spam.
24008 Identifying spam messages is only half of the Spam package's job. The
24009 second half comes into play whenever you exit a group buffer. At this
24010 point, the Spam package does several things:
24012 First, it calls @dfn{spam and ham processors} to process the articles
24013 according to whether they are spam or ham. There is a pair of spam
24014 and ham processors associated with each spam back end, and what the
24015 processors do depends on the back end. At present, the main role of
24016 spam and ham processors is for dictionary-based spam filters: they add
24017 the contents of the messages in the group to the filter's dictionary,
24018 to improve its ability to detect future spam. The @code{spam-process}
24019 group parameter specifies what spam processors to use. @xref{Spam and
24022 If the spam filter failed to mark a spam message, you can mark it
24023 yourself, so that the message is processed as spam when you exit the
24033 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-spam
24034 @findex gnus-summary-mark-as-spam
24035 Mark current article as spam, showing it with the @samp{$} mark
24036 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-spam}).
24040 Similarly, you can unmark an article if it has been erroneously marked
24041 as spam. @xref{Setting Marks}.
24043 Normally, a ham message found in a non-ham group is not processed as
24044 ham---the rationale is that it should be moved into a ham group for
24045 further processing (see below). However, you can force these articles
24046 to be processed as ham by setting
24047 @code{spam-process-ham-in-spam-groups} and
24048 @code{spam-process-ham-in-nonham-groups}.
24050 @vindex gnus-ham-process-destinations
24051 @vindex gnus-spam-process-destinations
24052 The second thing that the Spam package does when you exit a group is
24053 to move ham articles out of spam groups, and spam articles out of ham
24054 groups. Ham in a spam group is moved to the group specified by the
24055 variable @code{gnus-ham-process-destinations}, or the group parameter
24056 @code{ham-process-destination}. Spam in a ham group is moved to the
24057 group specified by the variable @code{gnus-spam-process-destinations},
24058 or the group parameter @code{spam-process-destination}. If these
24059 variables are not set, the articles are left in their current group.
24060 If an article cannot be moved (e.g., with a read-only backend such
24061 as @acronym{NNTP}), it is copied.
24063 If an article is moved to another group, it is processed again when
24064 you visit the new group. Normally, this is not a problem, but if you
24065 want each article to be processed only once, load the
24066 @code{gnus-registry.el} package and set the variable
24067 @code{spam-log-to-registry} to @code{t}. @xref{Spam Package
24068 Configuration Examples}.
24070 Normally, spam groups ignore @code{gnus-spam-process-destinations}.
24071 However, if you set @code{spam-move-spam-nonspam-groups-only} to
24072 @code{nil}, spam will also be moved out of spam groups, depending on
24073 the @code{spam-process-destination} parameter.
24075 The final thing the Spam package does is to mark spam articles as
24076 expired, which is usually the right thing to do.
24078 If all this seems confusing, don't worry. Soon it will be as natural
24079 as typing Lisp one-liners on a neural interface@dots{} err, sorry, that's
24080 50 years in the future yet. Just trust us, it's not so bad.
24082 @node Filtering Incoming Mail
24083 @subsection Filtering Incoming Mail
24084 @cindex spam filtering
24085 @cindex spam filtering incoming mail
24088 To use the Spam package to filter incoming mail, you must first set up
24089 fancy mail splitting. @xref{Fancy Mail Splitting}. The Spam package
24090 defines a special splitting function that you can add to your fancy
24091 split variable (either @code{nnmail-split-fancy} or
24092 @code{nnimap-split-fancy}, depending on your mail back end):
24098 @vindex spam-split-group
24100 The @code{spam-split} function scans incoming mail according to your
24101 chosen spam back end(s), and sends messages identified as spam to a
24102 spam group. By default, the spam group is a group named @samp{spam},
24103 but you can change this by customizing @code{spam-split-group}. Make
24104 sure the contents of @code{spam-split-group} are an unqualified group
24105 name. For instance, in an @code{nnimap} server @samp{your-server},
24106 the value @samp{spam} means @samp{nnimap+your-server:spam}. The value
24107 @samp{nnimap+server:spam} is therefore wrong---it gives the group
24108 @samp{nnimap+your-server:nnimap+server:spam}.
24110 @code{spam-split} does not modify the contents of messages in any way.
24112 @vindex nnimap-split-download-body
24113 Note for IMAP users: if you use the @code{spam-check-bogofilter},
24114 @code{spam-check-ifile}, and @code{spam-check-stat} spam back ends,
24115 you should also set set the variable @code{nnimap-split-download-body}
24116 to @code{t}. These spam back ends are most useful when they can
24117 ``scan'' the full message body. By default, the nnimap back end only
24118 retrieves the message headers; @code{nnimap-split-download-body} tells
24119 it to retrieve the message bodies as well. We don't set this by
24120 default because it will slow @acronym{IMAP} down, and that is not an
24121 appropriate decision to make on behalf of the user. @xref{Splitting
24124 You have to specify one or more spam back ends for @code{spam-split}
24125 to use, by setting the @code{spam-use-*} variables. @xref{Spam Back
24126 Ends}. Normally, @code{spam-split} simply uses all the spam back ends
24127 you enabled in this way. However, you can tell @code{spam-split} to
24128 use only some of them. Why this is useful? Suppose you are using the
24129 @code{spam-use-regex-headers} and @code{spam-use-blackholes} spam back
24130 ends, and the following split rule:
24133 nnimap-split-fancy '(|
24134 (any "ding" "ding")
24136 ;; @r{default mailbox}
24141 The problem is that you want all ding messages to make it to the ding
24142 folder. But that will let obvious spam (for example, spam detected by
24143 SpamAssassin, and @code{spam-use-regex-headers}) through, when it's
24144 sent to the ding list. On the other hand, some messages to the ding
24145 list are from a mail server in the blackhole list, so the invocation
24146 of @code{spam-split} can't be before the ding rule.
24148 The solution is to let SpamAssassin headers supersede ding rules, and
24149 perform the other @code{spam-split} rules (including a second
24150 invocation of the regex-headers check) after the ding rule. This is
24151 done by passing a parameter to @code{spam-split}:
24156 ;; @r{spam detected by @code{spam-use-regex-headers} goes to @samp{regex-spam}}
24157 (: spam-split "regex-spam" 'spam-use-regex-headers)
24158 (any "ding" "ding")
24159 ;; @r{all other spam detected by spam-split goes to @code{spam-split-group}}
24161 ;; @r{default mailbox}
24166 This lets you invoke specific @code{spam-split} checks depending on
24167 your particular needs, and target the results of those checks to a
24168 particular spam group. You don't have to throw all mail into all the
24169 spam tests. Another reason why this is nice is that messages to
24170 mailing lists you have rules for don't have to have resource-intensive
24171 blackhole checks performed on them. You could also specify different
24172 spam checks for your nnmail split vs. your nnimap split. Go crazy.
24174 You should set the @code{spam-use-*} variables for whatever spam back
24175 ends you intend to use. The reason is that when loading
24176 @file{spam.el}, some conditional loading is done depending on what
24177 @code{spam-use-xyz} variables you have set. @xref{Spam Back Ends}.
24179 @c @emph{TODO: spam.el needs to provide a uniform way of training all the
24180 @c statistical databases. Some have that functionality built-in, others
24183 @node Detecting Spam in Groups
24184 @subsection Detecting Spam in Groups
24186 To detect spam when visiting a group, set the group's
24187 @code{spam-autodetect} and @code{spam-autodetect-methods} group
24188 parameters. These are accessible with @kbd{G c} or @kbd{G p}, as
24189 usual (@pxref{Group Parameters}).
24191 You should set the @code{spam-use-*} variables for whatever spam back
24192 ends you intend to use. The reason is that when loading
24193 @file{spam.el}, some conditional loading is done depending on what
24194 @code{spam-use-xyz} variables you have set.
24196 By default, only unseen articles are processed for spam. You can
24197 force Gnus to recheck all messages in the group by setting the
24198 variable @code{spam-autodetect-recheck-messages} to @code{t}.
24200 If you use the @code{spam-autodetect} method of checking for spam, you
24201 can specify different spam detection methods for different groups.
24202 For instance, the @samp{ding} group may have @code{spam-use-BBDB} as
24203 the autodetection method, while the @samp{suspect} group may have the
24204 @code{spam-use-blacklist} and @code{spam-use-bogofilter} methods
24205 enabled. Unlike with @code{spam-split}, you don't have any control
24206 over the @emph{sequence} of checks, but this is probably unimportant.
24208 @node Spam and Ham Processors
24209 @subsection Spam and Ham Processors
24210 @cindex spam filtering
24211 @cindex spam filtering variables
24212 @cindex spam variables
24215 @vindex gnus-spam-process-newsgroups
24216 Spam and ham processors specify special actions to take when you exit
24217 a group buffer. Spam processors act on spam messages, and ham
24218 processors on ham messages. At present, the main role of these
24219 processors is to update the dictionaries of dictionary-based spam back
24220 ends such as Bogofilter (@pxref{Bogofilter}) and the Spam Statistics
24221 package (@pxref{Spam Statistics Filtering}).
24223 The spam and ham processors that apply to each group are determined by
24224 the group's@code{spam-process} group parameter. If this group
24225 parameter is not defined, they are determined by the variable
24226 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups}.
24228 @vindex gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents
24229 Gnus learns from the spam you get. You have to collect your spam in
24230 one or more spam groups, and set or customize the variable
24231 @code{spam-junk-mailgroups} as appropriate. You can also declare
24232 groups to contain spam by setting their group parameter
24233 @code{spam-contents} to @code{gnus-group-spam-classification-spam}, or
24234 by customizing the corresponding variable
24235 @code{gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents}. The @code{spam-contents} group
24236 parameter and the @code{gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents} variable can
24237 also be used to declare groups as @emph{ham} groups if you set their
24238 classification to @code{gnus-group-spam-classification-ham}. If
24239 groups are not classified by means of @code{spam-junk-mailgroups},
24240 @code{spam-contents}, or @code{gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents}, they are
24241 considered @emph{unclassified}. All groups are unclassified by
24244 @vindex gnus-spam-mark
24246 In spam groups, all messages are considered to be spam by default:
24247 they get the @samp{$} mark (@code{gnus-spam-mark}) when you enter the
24248 group. If you have seen a message, had it marked as spam, then
24249 unmarked it, it won't be marked as spam when you enter the group
24250 thereafter. You can disable that behavior, so all unread messages
24251 will get the @samp{$} mark, if you set the
24252 @code{spam-mark-only-unseen-as-spam} parameter to @code{nil}. You
24253 should remove the @samp{$} mark when you are in the group summary
24254 buffer for every message that is not spam after all. To remove the
24255 @samp{$} mark, you can use @kbd{M-u} to ``unread'' the article, or
24256 @kbd{d} for declaring it read the non-spam way. When you leave a
24257 group, all spam-marked (@samp{$}) articles are sent to a spam
24258 processor which will study them as spam samples.
24260 Messages may also be deleted in various other ways, and unless
24261 @code{ham-marks} group parameter gets overridden below, marks @samp{R}
24262 and @samp{r} for default read or explicit delete, marks @samp{X} and
24263 @samp{K} for automatic or explicit kills, as well as mark @samp{Y} for
24264 low scores, are all considered to be associated with articles which
24265 are not spam. This assumption might be false, in particular if you
24266 use kill files or score files as means for detecting genuine spam, you
24267 should then adjust the @code{ham-marks} group parameter.
24270 You can customize this group or topic parameter to be the list of
24271 marks you want to consider ham. By default, the list contains the
24272 deleted, read, killed, kill-filed, and low-score marks (the idea is
24273 that these articles have been read, but are not spam). It can be
24274 useful to also include the tick mark in the ham marks. It is not
24275 recommended to make the unread mark a ham mark, because it normally
24276 indicates a lack of classification. But you can do it, and we'll be
24281 You can customize this group or topic parameter to be the list of
24282 marks you want to consider spam. By default, the list contains only
24283 the spam mark. It is not recommended to change that, but you can if
24284 you really want to.
24287 When you leave @emph{any} group, regardless of its
24288 @code{spam-contents} classification, all spam-marked articles are sent
24289 to a spam processor, which will study these as spam samples. If you
24290 explicit kill a lot, you might sometimes end up with articles marked
24291 @samp{K} which you never saw, and which might accidentally contain
24292 spam. Best is to make sure that real spam is marked with @samp{$},
24295 @vindex gnus-ham-process-destinations
24296 When you leave a @emph{spam} group, all spam-marked articles are
24297 marked as expired after processing with the spam processor. This is
24298 not done for @emph{unclassified} or @emph{ham} groups. Also, any
24299 @strong{ham} articles in a spam group will be moved to a location
24300 determined by either the @code{ham-process-destination} group
24301 parameter or a match in the @code{gnus-ham-process-destinations}
24302 variable, which is a list of regular expressions matched with group
24303 names (it's easiest to customize this variable with @kbd{M-x
24304 customize-variable @key{RET} gnus-ham-process-destinations}). Each
24305 group name list is a standard Lisp list, if you prefer to customize
24306 the variable manually. If the @code{ham-process-destination}
24307 parameter is not set, ham articles are left in place. If the
24308 @code{spam-mark-ham-unread-before-move-from-spam-group} parameter is
24309 set, the ham articles are marked as unread before being moved.
24311 If ham can not be moved---because of a read-only back end such as
24312 @acronym{NNTP}, for example, it will be copied.
24314 Note that you can use multiples destinations per group or regular
24315 expression! This enables you to send your ham to a regular mail
24316 group and to a @emph{ham training} group.
24318 When you leave a @emph{ham} group, all ham-marked articles are sent to
24319 a ham processor, which will study these as non-spam samples.
24321 @vindex spam-process-ham-in-spam-groups
24322 By default the variable @code{spam-process-ham-in-spam-groups} is
24323 @code{nil}. Set it to @code{t} if you want ham found in spam groups
24324 to be processed. Normally this is not done, you are expected instead
24325 to send your ham to a ham group and process it there.
24327 @vindex spam-process-ham-in-nonham-groups
24328 By default the variable @code{spam-process-ham-in-nonham-groups} is
24329 @code{nil}. Set it to @code{t} if you want ham found in non-ham (spam
24330 or unclassified) groups to be processed. Normally this is not done,
24331 you are expected instead to send your ham to a ham group and process
24334 @vindex gnus-spam-process-destinations
24335 When you leave a @emph{ham} or @emph{unclassified} group, all
24336 @strong{spam} articles are moved to a location determined by either
24337 the @code{spam-process-destination} group parameter or a match in the
24338 @code{gnus-spam-process-destinations} variable, which is a list of
24339 regular expressions matched with group names (it's easiest to
24340 customize this variable with @kbd{M-x customize-variable @key{RET}
24341 gnus-spam-process-destinations}). Each group name list is a standard
24342 Lisp list, if you prefer to customize the variable manually. If the
24343 @code{spam-process-destination} parameter is not set, the spam
24344 articles are only expired. The group name is fully qualified, meaning
24345 that if you see @samp{nntp:servername} before the group name in the
24346 group buffer then you need it here as well.
24348 If spam can not be moved---because of a read-only back end such as
24349 @acronym{NNTP}, for example, it will be copied.
24351 Note that you can use multiples destinations per group or regular
24352 expression! This enables you to send your spam to multiple @emph{spam
24355 @vindex spam-log-to-registry
24356 The problem with processing ham and spam is that Gnus doesn't track
24357 this processing by default. Enable the @code{spam-log-to-registry}
24358 variable so @code{spam.el} will use @code{gnus-registry.el} to track
24359 what articles have been processed, and avoid processing articles
24360 multiple times. Keep in mind that if you limit the number of registry
24361 entries, this won't work as well as it does without a limit.
24363 @vindex spam-mark-only-unseen-as-spam
24364 Set this variable if you want only unseen articles in spam groups to
24365 be marked as spam. By default, it is set. If you set it to
24366 @code{nil}, unread articles will also be marked as spam.
24368 @vindex spam-mark-ham-unread-before-move-from-spam-group
24369 Set this variable if you want ham to be unmarked before it is moved
24370 out of the spam group. This is very useful when you use something
24371 like the tick mark @samp{!} to mark ham---the article will be placed
24372 in your @code{ham-process-destination}, unmarked as if it came fresh
24373 from the mail server.
24375 @vindex spam-autodetect-recheck-messages
24376 When autodetecting spam, this variable tells @code{spam.el} whether
24377 only unseen articles or all unread articles should be checked for
24378 spam. It is recommended that you leave it off.
24380 @node Spam Package Configuration Examples
24381 @subsection Spam Package Configuration Examples
24382 @cindex spam filtering
24383 @cindex spam filtering configuration examples
24384 @cindex spam configuration examples
24387 @subsubheading Ted's setup
24389 From Ted Zlatanov <tzz@@lifelogs.com>.
24391 ;; @r{for @code{gnus-registry-split-fancy-with-parent} and spam autodetection}
24392 ;; @r{see @file{gnus-registry.el} for more information}
24393 (gnus-registry-initialize)
24397 spam-log-to-registry t ; @r{for spam autodetection}
24399 spam-use-regex-headers t ; @r{catch X-Spam-Flag (SpamAssassin)}
24400 ;; @r{all groups with @samp{spam} in the name contain spam}
24401 gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents
24402 '(("spam" gnus-group-spam-classification-spam))
24403 ;; @r{see documentation for these}
24404 spam-move-spam-nonspam-groups-only nil
24405 spam-mark-only-unseen-as-spam t
24406 spam-mark-ham-unread-before-move-from-spam-group t
24407 nnimap-split-rule 'nnimap-split-fancy
24408 ;; @r{understand what this does before you copy it to your own setup!}
24409 nnimap-split-fancy '(|
24410 ;; @r{trace references to parents and put in their group}
24411 (: gnus-registry-split-fancy-with-parent)
24412 ;; @r{this will catch server-side SpamAssassin tags}
24413 (: spam-split 'spam-use-regex-headers)
24414 (any "ding" "ding")
24415 ;; @r{note that spam by default will go to @samp{spam}}
24417 ;; @r{default mailbox}
24420 ;; @r{my parameters, set with @kbd{G p}}
24422 ;; @r{all nnml groups, and all nnimap groups except}
24423 ;; @r{@samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:train} and}
24424 ;; @r{@samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:spam}: any spam goes to nnimap training,}
24425 ;; @r{because it must have been detected manually}
24427 ((spam-process-destination . "nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:train"))
24429 ;; @r{all @acronym{NNTP} groups}
24430 ;; @r{autodetect spam with the blacklist and ham with the BBDB}
24431 ((spam-autodetect-methods spam-use-blacklist spam-use-BBDB)
24432 ;; @r{send all spam to the training group}
24433 (spam-process-destination . "nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:train"))
24435 ;; @r{only some @acronym{NNTP} groups, where I want to autodetect spam}
24436 ((spam-autodetect . t))
24438 ;; @r{my nnimap @samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:spam} group}
24440 ;; @r{this is a spam group}
24441 ((spam-contents gnus-group-spam-classification-spam)
24443 ;; @r{any spam (which happens when I enter for all unseen messages,}
24444 ;; @r{because of the @code{gnus-spam-newsgroup-contents} setting above), goes to}
24445 ;; @r{@samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:train} unless I mark it as ham}
24447 (spam-process-destination "nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:train")
24449 ;; @r{any ham goes to my @samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:mail} folder, but}
24450 ;; @r{also to my @samp{nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:trainham} folder for training}
24452 (ham-process-destination "nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:mail"
24453 "nnimap+mail.lifelogs.com:trainham")
24454 ;; @r{in this group, only @samp{!} marks are ham}
24456 (gnus-ticked-mark))
24457 ;; @r{remembers senders in the blacklist on the way out---this is}
24458 ;; @r{definitely not needed, it just makes me feel better}
24459 (spam-process (gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-blacklist)))
24461 ;; @r{Later, on the @acronym{IMAP} server I use the @samp{train} group for training}
24462 ;; @r{SpamAssassin to recognize spam, and the @samp{trainham} group fora}
24463 ;; @r{recognizing ham---but Gnus has nothing to do with it.}
24467 @subsubheading Using @code{spam.el} on an IMAP server with a statistical filter on the server
24468 From Reiner Steib <reiner.steib@@gmx.de>.
24470 My provider has set up bogofilter (in combination with @acronym{DCC}) on
24471 the mail server (@acronym{IMAP}). Recognized spam goes to
24472 @samp{spam.detected}, the rest goes through the normal filter rules,
24473 i.e. to @samp{some.folder} or to @samp{INBOX}. Training on false
24474 positives or negatives is done by copying or moving the article to
24475 @samp{training.ham} or @samp{training.spam} respectively. A cron job on
24476 the server feeds those to bogofilter with the suitable ham or spam
24477 options and deletes them from the @samp{training.ham} and
24478 @samp{training.spam} folders.
24480 With the following entries in @code{gnus-parameters}, @code{spam.el}
24481 does most of the job for me:
24484 ("nnimap:spam\\.detected"
24485 (gnus-article-sort-functions '(gnus-article-sort-by-chars))
24486 (ham-process-destination "nnimap:INBOX" "nnimap:training.ham")
24487 (spam-contents gnus-group-spam-classification-spam))
24488 ("nnimap:\\(INBOX\\|other-folders\\)"
24489 (spam-process-destination . "nnimap:training.spam")
24490 (spam-contents gnus-group-spam-classification-ham))
24495 @item @b{The Spam folder:}
24497 In the folder @samp{spam.detected}, I have to check for false positives
24498 (i.e. legitimate mails, that were wrongly judged as spam by
24499 bogofilter or DCC).
24501 Because of the @code{gnus-group-spam-classification-spam} entry, all
24502 messages are marked as spam (with @code{$}). When I find a false
24503 positive, I mark the message with some other ham mark
24504 (@code{ham-marks}, @ref{Spam and Ham Processors}). On group exit,
24505 those messages are copied to both groups, @samp{INBOX} (where I want
24506 to have the article) and @samp{training.ham} (for training bogofilter)
24507 and deleted from the @samp{spam.detected} folder.
24509 The @code{gnus-article-sort-by-chars} entry simplifies detection of
24510 false positives for me. I receive lots of worms (sweN, @dots{}), that all
24511 have a similar size. Grouping them by size (i.e. chars) makes finding
24512 other false positives easier. (Of course worms aren't @i{spam}
24513 (@acronym{UCE}, @acronym{UBE}) strictly speaking. Anyhow, bogofilter is
24514 an excellent tool for filtering those unwanted mails for me.)
24516 @item @b{Ham folders:}
24518 In my ham folders, I just hit @kbd{S x}
24519 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-spam}) whenever I see an unrecognized spam
24520 mail (false negative). On group exit, those messages are moved to
24521 @samp{training.spam}.
24524 @subsubheading Reporting spam articles in Gmane groups with @code{spam-report.el}
24526 From Reiner Steib <reiner.steib@@gmx.de>.
24528 With following entry in @code{gnus-parameters}, @kbd{S x}
24529 (@code{gnus-summary-mark-as-spam}) marks articles in @code{gmane.*}
24530 groups as spam and reports the to Gmane at group exit:
24534 (spam-process (gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-report-gmane)))
24537 Additionally, I use @code{(setq spam-report-gmane-use-article-number nil)}
24538 because I don't read the groups directly from news.gmane.org, but
24539 through my local news server (leafnode). I.e. the article numbers are
24540 not the same as on news.gmane.org, thus @code{spam-report.el} has to check
24541 the @code{X-Report-Spam} header to find the correct number.
24543 @node Spam Back Ends
24544 @subsection Spam Back Ends
24545 @cindex spam back ends
24547 The spam package offers a variety of back ends for detecting spam.
24548 Each back end defines a set of methods for detecting spam
24549 (@pxref{Filtering Incoming Mail}, @pxref{Detecting Spam in Groups}),
24550 and a pair of spam and ham processors (@pxref{Spam and Ham
24554 * Blacklists and Whitelists::
24555 * BBDB Whitelists::
24556 * Gmane Spam Reporting::
24557 * Anti-spam Hashcash Payments::
24559 * Regular Expressions Header Matching::
24561 * SpamAssassin back end::
24562 * ifile spam filtering::
24563 * Spam Statistics Filtering::
24567 @node Blacklists and Whitelists
24568 @subsubsection Blacklists and Whitelists
24569 @cindex spam filtering
24570 @cindex whitelists, spam filtering
24571 @cindex blacklists, spam filtering
24574 @defvar spam-use-blacklist
24576 Set this variable to @code{t} if you want to use blacklists when
24577 splitting incoming mail. Messages whose senders are in the blacklist
24578 will be sent to the @code{spam-split-group}. This is an explicit
24579 filter, meaning that it acts only on mail senders @emph{declared} to
24584 @defvar spam-use-whitelist
24586 Set this variable to @code{t} if you want to use whitelists when
24587 splitting incoming mail. Messages whose senders are not in the
24588 whitelist will be sent to the next spam-split rule. This is an
24589 explicit filter, meaning that unless someone is in the whitelist, their
24590 messages are not assumed to be spam or ham.
24594 @defvar spam-use-whitelist-exclusive
24596 Set this variable to @code{t} if you want to use whitelists as an
24597 implicit filter, meaning that every message will be considered spam
24598 unless the sender is in the whitelist. Use with care.
24602 @defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-blacklist
24604 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24605 customizing the group parameters or the
24606 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24607 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the senders of
24608 spam-marked articles will be added to the blacklist.
24612 Instead of the obsolete
24613 @code{gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-blacklist}, it is recommended
24614 that you use @code{(spam spam-use-blacklist)}. Everything will work
24615 the same way, we promise.
24619 @defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-whitelist
24621 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24622 customizing the group parameters or the
24623 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24624 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the senders of
24625 ham-marked articles in @emph{ham} groups will be added to the
24630 Instead of the obsolete
24631 @code{gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-whitelist}, it is recommended
24632 that you use @code{(ham spam-use-whitelist)}. Everything will work
24633 the same way, we promise.
24637 Blacklists are lists of regular expressions matching addresses you
24638 consider to be spam senders. For instance, to block mail from any
24639 sender at @samp{vmadmin.com}, you can put @samp{vmadmin.com} in your
24640 blacklist. You start out with an empty blacklist. Blacklist entries
24641 use the Emacs regular expression syntax.
24643 Conversely, whitelists tell Gnus what addresses are considered
24644 legitimate. All messages from whitelisted addresses are considered
24645 non-spam. Also see @ref{BBDB Whitelists}. Whitelist entries use the
24646 Emacs regular expression syntax.
24648 The blacklist and whitelist file locations can be customized with the
24649 @code{spam-directory} variable (@file{~/News/spam} by default), or
24650 the @code{spam-whitelist} and @code{spam-blacklist} variables
24651 directly. The whitelist and blacklist files will by default be in the
24652 @code{spam-directory} directory, named @file{whitelist} and
24653 @file{blacklist} respectively.
24655 @node BBDB Whitelists
24656 @subsubsection BBDB Whitelists
24657 @cindex spam filtering
24658 @cindex BBDB whitelists, spam filtering
24659 @cindex BBDB, spam filtering
24662 @defvar spam-use-BBDB
24664 Analogous to @code{spam-use-whitelist} (@pxref{Blacklists and
24665 Whitelists}), but uses the BBDB as the source of whitelisted
24666 addresses, without regular expressions. You must have the BBDB loaded
24667 for @code{spam-use-BBDB} to work properly. Messages whose senders are
24668 not in the BBDB will be sent to the next spam-split rule. This is an
24669 explicit filter, meaning that unless someone is in the BBDB, their
24670 messages are not assumed to be spam or ham.
24674 @defvar spam-use-BBDB-exclusive
24676 Set this variable to @code{t} if you want to use the BBDB as an
24677 implicit filter, meaning that every message will be considered spam
24678 unless the sender is in the BBDB. Use with care. Only sender
24679 addresses in the BBDB will be allowed through; all others will be
24680 classified as spammers.
24682 While @code{spam-use-BBDB-exclusive} @emph{can} be used as an alias
24683 for @code{spam-use-BBDB} as far as @code{spam.el} is concerned, it is
24684 @emph{not} a separate back end. If you set
24685 @code{spam-use-BBDB-exclusive} to t, @emph{all} your BBDB splitting
24690 @defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-BBDB
24692 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24693 customizing the group parameters or the
24694 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24695 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the senders of
24696 ham-marked articles in @emph{ham} groups will be added to the
24701 Instead of the obsolete
24702 @code{gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-BBDB}, it is recommended
24703 that you use @code{(ham spam-use-BBDB)}. Everything will work
24704 the same way, we promise.
24708 @node Gmane Spam Reporting
24709 @subsubsection Gmane Spam Reporting
24710 @cindex spam reporting
24711 @cindex Gmane, spam reporting
24712 @cindex Gmane, spam reporting
24715 @defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-report-gmane
24717 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24718 customizing the group parameters or the
24719 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24720 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the spam-marked
24721 articles groups will be reported to the Gmane administrators via a
24724 Gmane can be found at @uref{http://gmane.org}.
24728 Instead of the obsolete
24729 @code{gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-report-gmane}, it is recommended
24730 that you use @code{(spam spam-use-gmane)}. Everything will work the
24731 same way, we promise.
24735 @defvar spam-report-gmane-use-article-number
24737 This variable is @code{t} by default. Set it to @code{nil} if you are
24738 running your own news server, for instance, and the local article
24739 numbers don't correspond to the Gmane article numbers. When
24740 @code{spam-report-gmane-use-article-number} is @code{nil},
24741 @code{spam-report.el} will fetch the number from the article headers.
24745 @defvar spam-report-user-mail-address
24747 Mail address exposed in the User-Agent spam reports to Gmane. It allows
24748 the Gmane administrators to contact you in case of misreports. The
24749 default is @code{user-mail-address}.
24753 @node Anti-spam Hashcash Payments
24754 @subsubsection Anti-spam Hashcash Payments
24755 @cindex spam filtering
24756 @cindex hashcash, spam filtering
24759 @defvar spam-use-hashcash
24761 Similar to @code{spam-use-whitelist} (@pxref{Blacklists and
24762 Whitelists}), but uses hashcash tokens for whitelisting messages
24763 instead of the sender address. Messages without a hashcash payment
24764 token will be sent to the next spam-split rule. This is an explicit
24765 filter, meaning that unless a hashcash token is found, the messages
24766 are not assumed to be spam or ham.
24771 @subsubsection Blackholes
24772 @cindex spam filtering
24773 @cindex blackholes, spam filtering
24776 @defvar spam-use-blackholes
24778 This option is disabled by default. You can let Gnus consult the
24779 blackhole-type distributed spam processing systems (DCC, for instance)
24780 when you set this option. The variable @code{spam-blackhole-servers}
24781 holds the list of blackhole servers Gnus will consult. The current
24782 list is fairly comprehensive, but make sure to let us know if it
24783 contains outdated servers.
24785 The blackhole check uses the @code{dig.el} package, but you can tell
24786 @code{spam.el} to use @code{dns.el} instead for better performance if
24787 you set @code{spam-use-dig} to @code{nil}. It is not recommended at
24788 this time to set @code{spam-use-dig} to @code{nil} despite the
24789 possible performance improvements, because some users may be unable to
24790 use it, but you can try it and see if it works for you.
24794 @defvar spam-blackhole-servers
24796 The list of servers to consult for blackhole checks.
24800 @defvar spam-blackhole-good-server-regex
24802 A regular expression for IPs that should not be checked against the
24803 blackhole server list. When set to @code{nil}, it has no effect.
24807 @defvar spam-use-dig
24809 Use the @code{dig.el} package instead of the @code{dns.el} package.
24810 The default setting of @code{t} is recommended.
24814 Blackhole checks are done only on incoming mail. There is no spam or
24815 ham processor for blackholes.
24817 @node Regular Expressions Header Matching
24818 @subsubsection Regular Expressions Header Matching
24819 @cindex spam filtering
24820 @cindex regular expressions header matching, spam filtering
24823 @defvar spam-use-regex-headers
24825 This option is disabled by default. You can let Gnus check the
24826 message headers against lists of regular expressions when you set this
24827 option. The variables @code{spam-regex-headers-spam} and
24828 @code{spam-regex-headers-ham} hold the list of regular expressions.
24829 Gnus will check against the message headers to determine if the
24830 message is spam or ham, respectively.
24834 @defvar spam-regex-headers-spam
24836 The list of regular expressions that, when matched in the headers of
24837 the message, positively identify it as spam.
24841 @defvar spam-regex-headers-ham
24843 The list of regular expressions that, when matched in the headers of
24844 the message, positively identify it as ham.
24848 Regular expression header checks are done only on incoming mail.
24849 There is no specific spam or ham processor for regular expressions.
24852 @subsubsection Bogofilter
24853 @cindex spam filtering
24854 @cindex bogofilter, spam filtering
24857 @defvar spam-use-bogofilter
24859 Set this variable if you want @code{spam-split} to use Eric Raymond's
24862 With a minimum of care for associating the @samp{$} mark for spam
24863 articles only, Bogofilter training all gets fairly automatic. You
24864 should do this until you get a few hundreds of articles in each
24865 category, spam or not. The command @kbd{S t} in summary mode, either
24866 for debugging or for curiosity, shows the @emph{spamicity} score of
24867 the current article (between 0.0 and 1.0).
24869 Bogofilter determines if a message is spam based on a specific
24870 threshold. That threshold can be customized, consult the Bogofilter
24873 If the @code{bogofilter} executable is not in your path, Bogofilter
24874 processing will be turned off.
24876 You should not enable this if you use @code{spam-use-bogofilter-headers}.
24885 @findex spam-bogofilter-score
24886 Get the Bogofilter spamicity score (@code{spam-bogofilter-score}).
24889 @defvar spam-use-bogofilter-headers
24891 Set this variable if you want @code{spam-split} to use Eric Raymond's
24892 speedy Bogofilter, looking only at the message headers. It works
24893 similarly to @code{spam-use-bogofilter}, but the @code{X-Bogosity} header
24894 must be in the message already. Normally you would do this with a
24895 procmail recipe or something similar; consult the Bogofilter
24896 installation documents for details.
24898 You should not enable this if you use @code{spam-use-bogofilter}.
24902 @defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-bogofilter
24903 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24904 customizing the group parameters or the
24905 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24906 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, spam-marked articles
24907 will be added to the Bogofilter spam database.
24911 Instead of the obsolete
24912 @code{gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-bogofilter}, it is recommended
24913 that you use @code{(spam spam-use-bogofilter)}. Everything will work
24914 the same way, we promise.
24917 @defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-bogofilter
24918 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
24919 customizing the group parameters or the
24920 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
24921 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the ham-marked
24922 articles in @emph{ham} groups will be added to the Bogofilter database
24923 of non-spam messages.
24927 Instead of the obsolete
24928 @code{gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-bogofilter}, it is recommended
24929 that you use @code{(ham spam-use-bogofilter)}. Everything will work
24930 the same way, we promise.
24933 @defvar spam-bogofilter-database-directory
24935 This is the directory where Bogofilter will store its databases. It
24936 is not specified by default, so Bogofilter will use its own default
24937 database directory.
24941 The Bogofilter mail classifier is similar to @command{ifile} in intent and
24942 purpose. A ham and a spam processor are provided, plus the
24943 @code{spam-use-bogofilter} and @code{spam-use-bogofilter-headers}
24944 variables to indicate to spam-split that Bogofilter should either be
24945 used, or has already been used on the article. The 0.9.2.1 version of
24946 Bogofilter was used to test this functionality.
24948 @node SpamAssassin back end
24949 @subsubsection SpamAssassin back end
24950 @cindex spam filtering
24951 @cindex spamassassin, spam filtering
24954 @defvar spam-use-spamassassin
24956 Set this variable if you want @code{spam-split} to use SpamAssassin.
24958 SpamAssassin assigns a score to each article based on a set of rules
24959 and tests, including a Bayesian filter. The Bayesian filter can be
24960 trained by associating the @samp{$} mark for spam articles. The
24961 spam score can be viewed by using the command @kbd{S t} in summary
24964 If you set this variable, each article will be processed by
24965 SpamAssassin when @code{spam-split} is called. If your mail is
24966 preprocessed by SpamAssassin, and you want to just use the
24967 SpamAssassin headers, set @code{spam-use-spamassassin-headers}
24970 You should not enable this if you use
24971 @code{spam-use-spamassassin-headers}.
24975 @defvar spam-use-spamassassin-headers
24977 Set this variable if your mail is preprocessed by SpamAssassin and
24978 want @code{spam-split} to split based on the SpamAssassin headers.
24980 You should not enable this if you use @code{spam-use-spamassassin}.
24984 @defvar spam-spamassassin-program
24986 This variable points to the SpamAssassin executable. If you have
24987 @code{spamd} running, you can set this variable to the @code{spamc}
24988 executable for faster processing. See the SpamAssassin documentation
24989 for more information on @code{spamd}/@code{spamc}.
24993 SpamAssassin is a powerful and flexible spam filter that uses a wide
24994 variety of tests to identify spam. A ham and a spam processors are
24995 provided, plus the @code{spam-use-spamassassin} and
24996 @code{spam-use-spamassassin-headers} variables to indicate to
24997 spam-split that SpamAssassin should be either used, or has already
24998 been used on the article. The 2.63 version of SpamAssassin was used
24999 to test this functionality.
25001 @node ifile spam filtering
25002 @subsubsection ifile spam filtering
25003 @cindex spam filtering
25004 @cindex ifile, spam filtering
25007 @defvar spam-use-ifile
25009 Enable this variable if you want @code{spam-split} to use @command{ifile}, a
25010 statistical analyzer similar to Bogofilter.
25014 @defvar spam-ifile-all-categories
25016 Enable this variable if you want @code{spam-use-ifile} to give you all
25017 the ifile categories, not just spam/non-spam. If you use this, make
25018 sure you train ifile as described in its documentation.
25022 @defvar spam-ifile-spam-category
25024 This is the category of spam messages as far as ifile is concerned.
25025 The actual string used is irrelevant, but you probably want to leave
25026 the default value of @samp{spam}.
25029 @defvar spam-ifile-database
25031 This is the filename for the ifile database. It is not specified by
25032 default, so ifile will use its own default database name.
25036 The ifile mail classifier is similar to Bogofilter in intent and
25037 purpose. A ham and a spam processor are provided, plus the
25038 @code{spam-use-ifile} variable to indicate to spam-split that ifile
25039 should be used. The 1.2.1 version of ifile was used to test this
25042 @node Spam Statistics Filtering
25043 @subsubsection Spam Statistics Filtering
25044 @cindex spam filtering
25045 @cindex spam-stat, spam filtering
25049 This back end uses the Spam Statistics Emacs Lisp package to perform
25050 statistics-based filtering (@pxref{Spam Statistics Package}). Before
25051 using this, you may want to perform some additional steps to
25052 initialize your Spam Statistics dictionary. @xref{Creating a
25053 spam-stat dictionary}.
25055 @defvar spam-use-stat
25059 @defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-stat
25060 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
25061 customizing the group parameters or the
25062 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
25063 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the spam-marked
25064 articles will be added to the spam-stat database of spam messages.
25068 Instead of the obsolete
25069 @code{gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-stat}, it is recommended
25070 that you use @code{(spam spam-use-stat)}. Everything will work
25071 the same way, we promise.
25074 @defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-stat
25075 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
25076 customizing the group parameters or the
25077 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is
25078 added to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the ham-marked
25079 articles in @emph{ham} groups will be added to the spam-stat database
25080 of non-spam messages.
25084 Instead of the obsolete
25085 @code{gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-stat}, it is recommended
25086 that you use @code{(ham spam-use-stat)}. Everything will work
25087 the same way, we promise.
25090 This enables @code{spam.el} to cooperate with @file{spam-stat.el}.
25091 @file{spam-stat.el} provides an internal (Lisp-only) spam database,
25092 which unlike ifile or Bogofilter does not require external programs.
25093 A spam and a ham processor, and the @code{spam-use-stat} variable for
25094 @code{spam-split} are provided.
25097 @subsubsection Using SpamOracle with Gnus
25098 @cindex spam filtering
25102 An easy way to filter out spam is to use SpamOracle. SpamOracle is an
25103 statistical mail filtering tool written by Xavier Leroy and needs to be
25104 installed separately.
25106 There are several ways to use SpamOracle with Gnus. In all cases, your
25107 mail is piped through SpamOracle in its @emph{mark} mode. SpamOracle will
25108 then enter an @samp{X-Spam} header indicating whether it regards the
25109 mail as a spam mail or not.
25111 One possibility is to run SpamOracle as a @code{:prescript} from the
25112 @xref{Mail Source Specifiers}, (@pxref{SpamAssassin}). This method has
25113 the advantage that the user can see the @emph{X-Spam} headers.
25115 The easiest method is to make @file{spam.el} (@pxref{Spam Package})
25118 @vindex spam-use-spamoracle
25119 To enable SpamOracle usage by @code{spam.el}, set the variable
25120 @code{spam-use-spamoracle} to @code{t} and configure the
25121 @code{nnmail-split-fancy} or @code{nnimap-split-fancy}. @xref{Spam
25122 Package}. In this example the @samp{INBOX} of an nnimap server is
25123 filtered using SpamOracle. Mails recognized as spam mails will be
25124 moved to @code{spam-split-group}, @samp{Junk} in this case. Ham
25125 messages stay in @samp{INBOX}:
25128 (setq spam-use-spamoracle t
25129 spam-split-group "Junk"
25130 nnimap-split-inbox '("INBOX")
25131 nnimap-split-rule 'nnimap-split-fancy
25132 nnimap-split-fancy '(| (: spam-split) "INBOX"))
25135 @defvar spam-use-spamoracle
25136 Set to @code{t} if you want Gnus to enable spam filtering using
25140 @defvar spam-spamoracle-binary
25141 Gnus uses the SpamOracle binary called @file{spamoracle} found in the
25142 user's PATH. Using the variable @code{spam-spamoracle-binary}, this
25146 @defvar spam-spamoracle-database
25147 By default, SpamOracle uses the file @file{~/.spamoracle.db} as a database to
25148 store its analysis. This is controlled by the variable
25149 @code{spam-spamoracle-database} which defaults to @code{nil}. That means
25150 the default SpamOracle database will be used. In case you want your
25151 database to live somewhere special, set
25152 @code{spam-spamoracle-database} to this path.
25155 SpamOracle employs a statistical algorithm to determine whether a
25156 message is spam or ham. In order to get good results, meaning few
25157 false hits or misses, SpamOracle needs training. SpamOracle learns
25158 the characteristics of your spam mails. Using the @emph{add} mode
25159 (training mode) one has to feed good (ham) and spam mails to
25160 SpamOracle. This can be done by pressing @kbd{|} in the Summary
25161 buffer and pipe the mail to a SpamOracle process or using
25162 @file{spam.el}'s spam- and ham-processors, which is much more
25163 convenient. For a detailed description of spam- and ham-processors,
25164 @xref{Spam Package}.
25166 @defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-spamoracle
25167 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
25168 customizing the group parameter or the
25169 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is added
25170 to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, spam-marked articles will be
25171 sent to SpamOracle as spam samples.
25175 Instead of the obsolete
25176 @code{gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-spamoracle}, it is recommended
25177 that you use @code{(spam spam-use-spamoracle)}. Everything will work
25178 the same way, we promise.
25181 @defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-spamoracle
25182 Add this symbol to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter by
25183 customizing the group parameter or the
25184 @code{gnus-spam-process-newsgroups} variable. When this symbol is added
25185 to a group's @code{spam-process} parameter, the ham-marked articles in
25186 @emph{ham} groups will be sent to the SpamOracle as samples of ham
25191 Instead of the obsolete
25192 @code{gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-spamoracle}, it is recommended
25193 that you use @code{(ham spam-use-spamoracle)}. Everything will work
25194 the same way, we promise.
25197 @emph{Example:} These are the Group Parameters of a group that has been
25198 classified as a ham group, meaning that it should only contain ham
25201 ((spam-contents gnus-group-spam-classification-ham)
25202 (spam-process ((ham spam-use-spamoracle)
25203 (spam spam-use-spamoracle))))
25205 For this group the @code{spam-use-spamoracle} is installed for both
25206 ham and spam processing. If the group contains spam message
25207 (e.g. because SpamOracle has not had enough sample messages yet) and
25208 the user marks some messages as spam messages, these messages will be
25209 processed by SpamOracle. The processor sends the messages to
25210 SpamOracle as new samples for spam.
25212 @node Extending the Spam package
25213 @subsection Extending the Spam package
25214 @cindex spam filtering
25215 @cindex spam elisp package, extending
25216 @cindex extending the spam elisp package
25218 Say you want to add a new back end called blackbox. For filtering
25219 incoming mail, provide the following:
25227 (defvar spam-use-blackbox nil
25228 "True if blackbox should be used.")
25231 Write @code{spam-check-blackbox} if Blackbox can check incoming mail.
25233 Write @code{spam-blackbox-register-routine} and
25234 @code{spam-blackbox-unregister-routine} using the bogofilter
25235 register/unregister routines as a start, or other restister/unregister
25236 routines more appropriate to Blackbox, if Blackbox can
25237 register/unregister spam and ham.
25242 The @code{spam-check-blackbox} function should return @samp{nil} or
25243 @code{spam-split-group}, observing the other conventions. See the
25244 existing @code{spam-check-*} functions for examples of what you can
25245 do, and stick to the template unless you fully understand the reasons
25250 For processing spam and ham messages, provide the following:
25257 Note you don't have to provide a spam or a ham processor. Only
25258 provide them if Blackbox supports spam or ham processing.
25260 Also, ham and spam processors are being phased out as single
25261 variables. Instead the form @code{(spam spam-use-blackbox)} or
25262 @code{(ham spam-use-blackbox)} is favored. For now, spam/ham
25263 processor variables are still around but they won't be for long.
25266 (defvar gnus-group-spam-exit-processor-blackbox "blackbox-spam"
25267 "The Blackbox summary exit spam processor.
25268 Only applicable to spam groups.")
25270 (defvar gnus-group-ham-exit-processor-blackbox "blackbox-ham"
25271 "The whitelist summary exit ham processor.
25272 Only applicable to non-spam (unclassified and ham) groups.")
25281 (const :tag "Spam: Blackbox" (spam spam-use-blackbox))
25282 (const :tag "Ham: Blackbox" (ham spam-use-blackbox))
25284 to the @code{spam-process} group parameter in @code{gnus.el}. Make
25285 sure you do it twice, once for the parameter and once for the
25286 variable customization.
25290 (variable-item spam-use-blackbox)
25292 to the @code{spam-autodetect-methods} group parameter in
25293 @code{gnus.el} if Blackbox can check incoming mail for spam contents.
25295 Finally, use the appropriate @code{spam-install-*-backend} function in
25296 @code{spam.el}. Here are the available functions.
25302 @code{spam-install-backend-alias}
25304 This function will simply install an alias for a back end that does
25305 everything like the original back end. It is currently only used to
25306 make @code{spam-use-BBDB-exclusive} act like @code{spam-use-BBDB}.
25309 @code{spam-install-nocheck-backend}
25311 This function installs a back end that has no check function, but can
25312 register/unregister ham or spam. The @code{spam-use-gmane} back end is
25316 @code{spam-install-checkonly-backend}
25318 This function will install a back end that can only check incoming mail
25319 for spam contents. It can't register or unregister messages.
25320 @code{spam-use-blackholes} and @code{spam-use-hashcash} are such
25324 @code{spam-install-statistical-checkonly-backend}
25326 This function installs a statistical back end (one which requires the
25327 full body of a message to check it) that can only check incoming mail
25328 for contents. @code{spam-use-regex-body} is such a filter.
25331 @code{spam-install-statistical-backend}
25333 This function install a statistical back end with incoming checks and
25334 registration/unregistration routines. @code{spam-use-bogofilter} is
25338 @code{spam-install-backend}
25340 This is the most normal back end installation, where a back end that can
25341 check and register/unregister messages is set up without statistical
25342 abilities. The @code{spam-use-BBDB} is such a back end.
25345 @code{spam-install-mover-backend}
25347 Mover back ends are internal to @code{spam.el} and specifically move
25348 articles around when the summary is exited. You will very probably
25349 never install such a back end.
25354 @node Spam Statistics Package
25355 @subsection Spam Statistics Package
25356 @cindex Paul Graham
25357 @cindex Graham, Paul
25358 @cindex naive Bayesian spam filtering
25359 @cindex Bayesian spam filtering, naive
25360 @cindex spam filtering, naive Bayesian
25362 Paul Graham has written an excellent essay about spam filtering using
25363 statistics: @uref{http://www.paulgraham.com/spam.html,A Plan for
25364 Spam}. In it he describes the inherent deficiency of rule-based
25365 filtering as used by SpamAssassin, for example: Somebody has to write
25366 the rules, and everybody else has to install these rules. You are
25367 always late. It would be much better, he argues, to filter mail based
25368 on whether it somehow resembles spam or non-spam. One way to measure
25369 this is word distribution. He then goes on to describe a solution
25370 that checks whether a new mail resembles any of your other spam mails
25373 The basic idea is this: Create a two collections of your mail, one
25374 with spam, one with non-spam. Count how often each word appears in
25375 either collection, weight this by the total number of mails in the
25376 collections, and store this information in a dictionary. For every
25377 word in a new mail, determine its probability to belong to a spam or a
25378 non-spam mail. Use the 15 most conspicuous words, compute the total
25379 probability of the mail being spam. If this probability is higher
25380 than a certain threshold, the mail is considered to be spam.
25382 The Spam Statistics package adds support to Gnus for this kind of
25383 filtering. It can be used as one of the back ends of the Spam package
25384 (@pxref{Spam Package}), or by itself.
25386 Before using the Spam Statistics package, you need to set it up.
25387 First, you need two collections of your mail, one with spam, one with
25388 non-spam. Then you need to create a dictionary using these two
25389 collections, and save it. And last but not least, you need to use
25390 this dictionary in your fancy mail splitting rules.
25393 * Creating a spam-stat dictionary::
25394 * Splitting mail using spam-stat::
25395 * Low-level interface to the spam-stat dictionary::
25398 @node Creating a spam-stat dictionary
25399 @subsubsection Creating a spam-stat dictionary
25401 Before you can begin to filter spam based on statistics, you must
25402 create these statistics based on two mail collections, one with spam,
25403 one with non-spam. These statistics are then stored in a dictionary
25404 for later use. In order for these statistics to be meaningful, you
25405 need several hundred emails in both collections.
25407 Gnus currently supports only the nnml back end for automated dictionary
25408 creation. The nnml back end stores all mails in a directory, one file
25409 per mail. Use the following:
25411 @defun spam-stat-process-spam-directory
25412 Create spam statistics for every file in this directory. Every file
25413 is treated as one spam mail.
25416 @defun spam-stat-process-non-spam-directory
25417 Create non-spam statistics for every file in this directory. Every
25418 file is treated as one non-spam mail.
25421 Usually you would call @code{spam-stat-process-spam-directory} on a
25422 directory such as @file{~/Mail/mail/spam} (this usually corresponds to
25423 the group @samp{nnml:mail.spam}), and you would call
25424 @code{spam-stat-process-non-spam-directory} on a directory such as
25425 @file{~/Mail/mail/misc} (this usually corresponds to the group
25426 @samp{nnml:mail.misc}).
25428 When you are using @acronym{IMAP}, you won't have the mails available
25429 locally, so that will not work. One solution is to use the Gnus Agent
25430 to cache the articles. Then you can use directories such as
25431 @file{"~/News/agent/nnimap/mail.yourisp.com/personal_spam"} for
25432 @code{spam-stat-process-spam-directory}. @xref{Agent as Cache}.
25435 This variable holds the hash-table with all the statistics---the
25436 dictionary we have been talking about. For every word in either
25437 collection, this hash-table stores a vector describing how often the
25438 word appeared in spam and often it appeared in non-spam mails.
25441 If you want to regenerate the statistics from scratch, you need to
25442 reset the dictionary.
25444 @defun spam-stat-reset
25445 Reset the @code{spam-stat} hash-table, deleting all the statistics.
25448 When you are done, you must save the dictionary. The dictionary may
25449 be rather large. If you will not update the dictionary incrementally
25450 (instead, you will recreate it once a month, for example), then you
25451 can reduce the size of the dictionary by deleting all words that did
25452 not appear often enough or that do not clearly belong to only spam or
25453 only non-spam mails.
25455 @defun spam-stat-reduce-size
25456 Reduce the size of the dictionary. Use this only if you do not want
25457 to update the dictionary incrementally.
25460 @defun spam-stat-save
25461 Save the dictionary.
25464 @defvar spam-stat-file
25465 The filename used to store the dictionary. This defaults to
25466 @file{~/.spam-stat.el}.
25469 @node Splitting mail using spam-stat
25470 @subsubsection Splitting mail using spam-stat
25472 This section describes how to use the Spam statistics
25473 @emph{independently} of the @xref{Spam Package}.
25475 First, add the following to your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
25478 (require 'spam-stat)
25482 This will load the necessary Gnus code, and the dictionary you
25485 Next, you need to adapt your fancy splitting rules: You need to
25486 determine how to use @code{spam-stat}. The following examples are for
25487 the nnml back end. Using the nnimap back end works just as well. Just
25488 use @code{nnimap-split-fancy} instead of @code{nnmail-split-fancy}.
25490 In the simplest case, you only have two groups, @samp{mail.misc} and
25491 @samp{mail.spam}. The following expression says that mail is either
25492 spam or it should go into @samp{mail.misc}. If it is spam, then
25493 @code{spam-stat-split-fancy} will return @samp{mail.spam}.
25496 (setq nnmail-split-fancy
25497 `(| (: spam-stat-split-fancy)
25501 @defvar spam-stat-split-fancy-spam-group
25502 The group to use for spam. Default is @samp{mail.spam}.
25505 If you also filter mail with specific subjects into other groups, use
25506 the following expression. Only mails not matching the regular
25507 expression are considered potential spam.
25510 (setq nnmail-split-fancy
25511 `(| ("Subject" "\\bspam-stat\\b" "mail.emacs")
25512 (: spam-stat-split-fancy)
25516 If you want to filter for spam first, then you must be careful when
25517 creating the dictionary. Note that @code{spam-stat-split-fancy} must
25518 consider both mails in @samp{mail.emacs} and in @samp{mail.misc} as
25519 non-spam, therefore both should be in your collection of non-spam
25520 mails, when creating the dictionary!
25523 (setq nnmail-split-fancy
25524 `(| (: spam-stat-split-fancy)
25525 ("Subject" "\\bspam-stat\\b" "mail.emacs")
25529 You can combine this with traditional filtering. Here, we move all
25530 HTML-only mails into the @samp{mail.spam.filtered} group. Note that since
25531 @code{spam-stat-split-fancy} will never see them, the mails in
25532 @samp{mail.spam.filtered} should be neither in your collection of spam mails,
25533 nor in your collection of non-spam mails, when creating the
25537 (setq nnmail-split-fancy
25538 `(| ("Content-Type" "text/html" "mail.spam.filtered")
25539 (: spam-stat-split-fancy)
25540 ("Subject" "\\bspam-stat\\b" "mail.emacs")
25545 @node Low-level interface to the spam-stat dictionary
25546 @subsubsection Low-level interface to the spam-stat dictionary
25548 The main interface to using @code{spam-stat}, are the following functions:
25550 @defun spam-stat-buffer-is-spam
25551 Called in a buffer, that buffer is considered to be a new spam mail.
25552 Use this for new mail that has not been processed before.
25555 @defun spam-stat-buffer-is-no-spam
25556 Called in a buffer, that buffer is considered to be a new non-spam
25557 mail. Use this for new mail that has not been processed before.
25560 @defun spam-stat-buffer-change-to-spam
25561 Called in a buffer, that buffer is no longer considered to be normal
25562 mail but spam. Use this to change the status of a mail that has
25563 already been processed as non-spam.
25566 @defun spam-stat-buffer-change-to-non-spam
25567 Called in a buffer, that buffer is no longer considered to be spam but
25568 normal mail. Use this to change the status of a mail that has already
25569 been processed as spam.
25572 @defun spam-stat-save
25573 Save the hash table to the file. The filename used is stored in the
25574 variable @code{spam-stat-file}.
25577 @defun spam-stat-load
25578 Load the hash table from a file. The filename used is stored in the
25579 variable @code{spam-stat-file}.
25582 @defun spam-stat-score-word
25583 Return the spam score for a word.
25586 @defun spam-stat-score-buffer
25587 Return the spam score for a buffer.
25590 @defun spam-stat-split-fancy
25591 Use this function for fancy mail splitting. Add the rule @samp{(:
25592 spam-stat-split-fancy)} to @code{nnmail-split-fancy}
25595 Make sure you load the dictionary before using it. This requires the
25596 following in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file:
25599 (require 'spam-stat)
25603 Typical test will involve calls to the following functions:
25606 Reset: (setq spam-stat (make-hash-table :test 'equal))
25607 Learn spam: (spam-stat-process-spam-directory "~/Mail/mail/spam")
25608 Learn non-spam: (spam-stat-process-non-spam-directory "~/Mail/mail/misc")
25609 Save table: (spam-stat-save)
25610 File size: (nth 7 (file-attributes spam-stat-file))
25611 Number of words: (hash-table-count spam-stat)
25612 Test spam: (spam-stat-test-directory "~/Mail/mail/spam")
25613 Test non-spam: (spam-stat-test-directory "~/Mail/mail/misc")
25614 Reduce table size: (spam-stat-reduce-size)
25615 Save table: (spam-stat-save)
25616 File size: (nth 7 (file-attributes spam-stat-file))
25617 Number of words: (hash-table-count spam-stat)
25618 Test spam: (spam-stat-test-directory "~/Mail/mail/spam")
25619 Test non-spam: (spam-stat-test-directory "~/Mail/mail/misc")
25622 Here is how you would create your dictionary:
25625 Reset: (setq spam-stat (make-hash-table :test 'equal))
25626 Learn spam: (spam-stat-process-spam-directory "~/Mail/mail/spam")
25627 Learn non-spam: (spam-stat-process-non-spam-directory "~/Mail/mail/misc")
25628 Repeat for any other non-spam group you need...
25629 Reduce table size: (spam-stat-reduce-size)
25630 Save table: (spam-stat-save)
25634 @section Interaction with other modes
25639 @code{gnus-dired-minor-mode} provides some useful functions for dired
25640 buffers. It is enabled with
25642 (add-hook 'dired-mode-hook 'turn-on-gnus-dired-mode)
25647 @findex gnus-dired-attach
25648 @cindex attachments, selection via dired
25649 Send dired's marked files as an attachment (@code{gnus-dired-attach}).
25650 You will be prompted for a message buffer.
25653 @findex gnus-dired-find-file-mailcap
25654 Visit a file according to the appropriate mailcap entry
25655 (@code{gnus-dired-find-file-mailcap}). With prefix, open file in a new
25659 @findex gnus-dired-print
25660 Print file according to the mailcap entry (@code{gnus-dired-print}). If
25661 there is no print command, print in a PostScript image.
25664 @node Various Various
25665 @section Various Various
25671 @item gnus-home-directory
25672 @vindex gnus-home-directory
25673 All Gnus file and directory variables will be initialized from this
25674 variable, which defaults to @file{~/}.
25676 @item gnus-directory
25677 @vindex gnus-directory
25678 Most Gnus storage file and directory variables will be initialized from
25679 this variable, which defaults to the @env{SAVEDIR} environment
25680 variable, or @file{~/News/} if that variable isn't set.
25682 Note that Gnus is mostly loaded when the @file{~/.gnus.el} file is read.
25683 This means that other directory variables that are initialized from this
25684 variable won't be set properly if you set this variable in
25685 @file{~/.gnus.el}. Set this variable in @file{.emacs} instead.
25687 @item gnus-default-directory
25688 @vindex gnus-default-directory
25689 Not related to the above variable at all---this variable says what the
25690 default directory of all Gnus buffers should be. If you issue commands
25691 like @kbd{C-x C-f}, the prompt you'll get starts in the current buffer's
25692 default directory. If this variable is @code{nil} (which is the
25693 default), the default directory will be the default directory of the
25694 buffer you were in when you started Gnus.
25697 @vindex gnus-verbose
25698 This variable is an integer between zero and ten. The higher the value,
25699 the more messages will be displayed. If this variable is zero, Gnus
25700 will never flash any messages, if it is seven (which is the default),
25701 most important messages will be shown, and if it is ten, Gnus won't ever
25702 shut up, but will flash so many messages it will make your head swim.
25704 @item gnus-verbose-backends
25705 @vindex gnus-verbose-backends
25706 This variable works the same way as @code{gnus-verbose}, but it applies
25707 to the Gnus back ends instead of Gnus proper.
25709 @item gnus-add-timestamp-to-message
25710 @vindex gnus-add-timestamp-to-message
25711 This variable controls whether to add timestamps to messages that are
25712 controlled by @code{gnus-verbose} and @code{gnus-verbose-backends} and
25713 are issued. The default value is @code{nil} which means never to add
25714 timestamp. If it is @code{log}, add timestamps to only the messages
25715 that go into the @samp{*Messages*} buffer (in XEmacs, it is the
25716 @w{@samp{ *Message-Log*}} buffer). If it is neither @code{nil} nor
25717 @code{log}, add timestamps not only to log messages but also to the ones
25718 displayed in the echo area.
25720 @item nnheader-max-head-length
25721 @vindex nnheader-max-head-length
25722 When the back ends read straight heads of articles, they all try to read
25723 as little as possible. This variable (default 8192) specifies
25724 the absolute max length the back ends will try to read before giving up
25725 on finding a separator line between the head and the body. If this
25726 variable is @code{nil}, there is no upper read bound. If it is
25727 @code{t}, the back ends won't try to read the articles piece by piece,
25728 but read the entire articles. This makes sense with some versions of
25729 @code{ange-ftp} or @code{efs}.
25731 @item nnheader-head-chop-length
25732 @vindex nnheader-head-chop-length
25733 This variable (default 2048) says how big a piece of each article to
25734 read when doing the operation described above.
25736 @item nnheader-file-name-translation-alist
25737 @vindex nnheader-file-name-translation-alist
25739 @cindex invalid characters in file names
25740 @cindex characters in file names
25741 This is an alist that says how to translate characters in file names.
25742 For instance, if @samp{:} is invalid as a file character in file names
25743 on your system (you OS/2 user you), you could say something like:
25747 (setq nnheader-file-name-translation-alist
25752 In fact, this is the default value for this variable on OS/2 and MS
25753 Windows (phooey) systems.
25755 @item gnus-hidden-properties
25756 @vindex gnus-hidden-properties
25757 This is a list of properties to use to hide ``invisible'' text. It is
25758 @code{(invisible t intangible t)} by default on most systems, which
25759 makes invisible text invisible and intangible.
25761 @item gnus-parse-headers-hook
25762 @vindex gnus-parse-headers-hook
25763 A hook called before parsing headers. It can be used, for instance, to
25764 gather statistics on the headers fetched, or perhaps you'd like to prune
25765 some headers. I don't see why you'd want that, though.
25767 @item gnus-shell-command-separator
25768 @vindex gnus-shell-command-separator
25769 String used to separate two shell commands. The default is @samp{;}.
25771 @item gnus-invalid-group-regexp
25772 @vindex gnus-invalid-group-regexp
25774 Regexp to match ``invalid'' group names when querying user for a group
25775 name. The default value catches some @strong{really} invalid group
25776 names who could possibly mess up Gnus internally (like allowing
25777 @samp{:} in a group name, which is normally used to delimit method and
25780 @acronym{IMAP} users might want to allow @samp{/} in group names though.
25788 Well, that's the manual---you can get on with your life now. Keep in
25789 touch. Say hello to your cats from me.
25791 My @strong{ghod}---I just can't stand goodbyes. Sniffle.
25793 Ol' Charles Reznikoff said it pretty well, so I leave the floor to him:
25799 Not because of victories @*
25802 but for the common sunshine,@*
25804 the largess of the spring.
25808 but for the day's work done@*
25809 as well as I was able;@*
25810 not for a seat upon the dais@*
25811 but at the common table.@*
25816 @chapter Appendices
25819 * XEmacs:: Requirements for installing under XEmacs.
25820 * History:: How Gnus got where it is today.
25821 * On Writing Manuals:: Why this is not a beginner's guide.
25822 * Terminology:: We use really difficult, like, words here.
25823 * Customization:: Tailoring Gnus to your needs.
25824 * Troubleshooting:: What you might try if things do not work.
25825 * Gnus Reference Guide:: Rilly, rilly technical stuff.
25826 * Emacs for Heathens:: A short introduction to Emacsian terms.
25827 * Frequently Asked Questions:: The Gnus FAQ
25834 @cindex installing under XEmacs
25836 XEmacs is distributed as a collection of packages. You should install
25837 whatever packages the Gnus XEmacs package requires. The current
25838 requirements are @samp{gnus}, @samp{mail-lib}, @samp{xemacs-base},
25839 @samp{eterm}, @samp{sh-script}, @samp{net-utils}, @samp{os-utils},
25840 @samp{dired}, @samp{mh-e}, @samp{sieve}, @samp{ps-print}, @samp{W3},
25841 @samp{pgg}, @samp{mailcrypt}, @samp{ecrypto}, and @samp{sasl}.
25848 @sc{gnus} was written by Masanobu @sc{Umeda}. When autumn crept up in
25849 '94, Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen grew bored and decided to rewrite Gnus.
25851 If you want to investigate the person responsible for this outrage,
25852 you can point your (feh!) web browser to
25853 @uref{http://quimby.gnus.org/}. This is also the primary
25854 distribution point for the new and spiffy versions of Gnus, and is
25855 known as The Site That Destroys Newsrcs And Drives People Mad.
25857 During the first extended alpha period of development, the new Gnus was
25858 called ``(ding) Gnus''. @dfn{(ding)} is, of course, short for
25859 @dfn{ding is not Gnus}, which is a total and utter lie, but who cares?
25860 (Besides, the ``Gnus'' in this abbreviation should probably be
25861 pronounced ``news'' as @sc{Umeda} intended, which makes it a more
25862 appropriate name, don't you think?)
25864 In any case, after spending all that energy on coming up with a new and
25865 spunky name, we decided that the name was @emph{too} spunky, so we
25866 renamed it back again to ``Gnus''. But in mixed case. ``Gnus'' vs.
25867 ``@sc{gnus}''. New vs. old.
25870 * Gnus Versions:: What Gnus versions have been released.
25871 * Other Gnus Versions:: Other Gnus versions that also have been released.
25872 * Why?:: What's the point of Gnus?
25873 * Compatibility:: Just how compatible is Gnus with @sc{gnus}?
25874 * Conformity:: Gnus tries to conform to all standards.
25875 * Emacsen:: Gnus can be run on a few modern Emacsen.
25876 * Gnus Development:: How Gnus is developed.
25877 * Contributors:: Oodles of people.
25878 * New Features:: Pointers to some of the new stuff in Gnus.
25882 @node Gnus Versions
25883 @subsection Gnus Versions
25885 @cindex September Gnus
25887 @cindex Quassia Gnus
25888 @cindex Pterodactyl Gnus
25891 @cindex Gnus versions
25893 The first ``proper'' release of Gnus 5 was done in November 1995 when it
25894 was included in the Emacs 19.30 distribution (132 (ding) Gnus releases
25895 plus 15 Gnus 5.0 releases).
25897 In May 1996 the next Gnus generation (aka. ``September Gnus'' (after 99
25898 releases)) was released under the name ``Gnus 5.2'' (40 releases).
25900 On July 28th 1996 work on Red Gnus was begun, and it was released on
25901 January 25th 1997 (after 84 releases) as ``Gnus 5.4'' (67 releases).
25903 On September 13th 1997, Quassia Gnus was started and lasted 37 releases.
25904 It was released as ``Gnus 5.6'' on March 8th 1998 (46 releases).
25906 Gnus 5.6 begat Pterodactyl Gnus on August 29th 1998 and was released as
25907 ``Gnus 5.8'' (after 99 releases and a CVS repository) on December 3rd
25910 On the 26th of October 2000, Oort Gnus was begun and was released as
25911 Gnus 5.10 on May 1st 2003 (24 releases).
25913 On the January 4th 2004, No Gnus was begun.
25915 If you happen upon a version of Gnus that has a prefixed name --
25916 ``(ding) Gnus'', ``September Gnus'', ``Red Gnus'', ``Quassia Gnus'',
25917 ``Pterodactyl Gnus'', ``Oort Gnus'', ``No Gnus'' -- don't panic.
25918 Don't let it know that you're frightened. Back away. Slowly. Whatever
25919 you do, don't run. Walk away, calmly, until you're out of its reach.
25920 Find a proper released version of Gnus and snuggle up to that instead.
25923 @node Other Gnus Versions
25924 @subsection Other Gnus Versions
25927 In addition to the versions of Gnus which have had their releases
25928 coordinated by Lars, one major development has been Semi-gnus from
25929 Japan. It's based on a library called @acronym{SEMI}, which provides
25930 @acronym{MIME} capabilities.
25932 These Gnusae are based mainly on Gnus 5.6 and Pterodactyl Gnus.
25933 Collectively, they are called ``Semi-gnus'', and different strains are
25934 called T-gnus, ET-gnus, Nana-gnus and Chaos. These provide powerful
25935 @acronym{MIME} and multilingualization things, especially important for
25942 What's the point of Gnus?
25944 I want to provide a ``rad'', ``happening'', ``way cool'' and ``hep''
25945 newsreader, that lets you do anything you can think of. That was my
25946 original motivation, but while working on Gnus, it has become clear to
25947 me that this generation of newsreaders really belong in the stone age.
25948 Newsreaders haven't developed much since the infancy of the net. If the
25949 volume continues to rise with the current rate of increase, all current
25950 newsreaders will be pretty much useless. How do you deal with
25951 newsgroups that have thousands of new articles each day? How do you
25952 keep track of millions of people who post?
25954 Gnus offers no real solutions to these questions, but I would very much
25955 like to see Gnus being used as a testing ground for new methods of
25956 reading and fetching news. Expanding on @sc{Umeda}-san's wise decision
25957 to separate the newsreader from the back ends, Gnus now offers a simple
25958 interface for anybody who wants to write new back ends for fetching mail
25959 and news from different sources. I have added hooks for customizations
25960 everywhere I could imagine it being useful. By doing so, I'm inviting
25961 every one of you to explore and invent.
25963 May Gnus never be complete. @kbd{C-u 100 M-x all-hail-emacs} and
25964 @kbd{C-u 100 M-x all-hail-xemacs}.
25967 @node Compatibility
25968 @subsection Compatibility
25970 @cindex compatibility
25971 Gnus was designed to be fully compatible with @sc{gnus}. Almost all key
25972 bindings have been kept. More key bindings have been added, of course,
25973 but only in one or two obscure cases have old bindings been changed.
25978 @center In a cloud bones of steel.
25982 All commands have kept their names. Some internal functions have changed
25985 The @code{gnus-uu} package has changed drastically. @xref{Decoding
25988 One major compatibility question is the presence of several summary
25989 buffers. All variables relevant while reading a group are
25990 buffer-local to the summary buffer they belong in. Although many
25991 important variables have their values copied into their global
25992 counterparts whenever a command is executed in the summary buffer, this
25993 change might lead to incorrect values being used unless you are careful.
25995 All code that relies on knowledge of @sc{gnus} internals will probably
25996 fail. To take two examples: Sorting @code{gnus-newsrc-alist} (or
25997 changing it in any way, as a matter of fact) is strictly verboten. Gnus
25998 maintains a hash table that points to the entries in this alist (which
25999 speeds up many functions), and changing the alist directly will lead to
26003 @cindex highlighting
26004 Old hilit19 code does not work at all. In fact, you should probably
26005 remove all hilit code from all Gnus hooks
26006 (@code{gnus-group-prepare-hook} and @code{gnus-summary-prepare-hook}).
26007 Gnus provides various integrated functions for highlighting. These are
26008 faster and more accurate. To make life easier for everybody, Gnus will
26009 by default remove all hilit calls from all hilit hooks. Uncleanliness!
26012 Packages like @code{expire-kill} will no longer work. As a matter of
26013 fact, you should probably remove all old @sc{gnus} packages (and other
26014 code) when you start using Gnus. More likely than not, Gnus already
26015 does what you have written code to make @sc{gnus} do. (Snicker.)
26017 Even though old methods of doing things are still supported, only the
26018 new methods are documented in this manual. If you detect a new method of
26019 doing something while reading this manual, that does not mean you have
26020 to stop doing it the old way.
26022 Gnus understands all @sc{gnus} startup files.
26024 @kindex M-x gnus-bug
26026 @cindex reporting bugs
26028 Overall, a casual user who hasn't written much code that depends on
26029 @sc{gnus} internals should suffer no problems. If problems occur,
26030 please let me know by issuing that magic command @kbd{M-x gnus-bug}.
26032 @vindex gnus-bug-create-help-buffer
26033 If you are in the habit of sending bug reports @emph{very} often, you
26034 may find the helpful help buffer annoying after a while. If so, set
26035 @code{gnus-bug-create-help-buffer} to @code{nil} to avoid having it pop
26040 @subsection Conformity
26042 No rebels without a clue here, ma'am. We conform to all standards known
26043 to (wo)man. Except for those standards and/or conventions we disagree
26051 There are no known breaches of this standard.
26055 There are no known breaches of this standard, either.
26057 @item Son-of-RFC 1036
26058 @cindex Son-of-RFC 1036
26059 We do have some breaches to this one.
26065 These are considered to be ``vanity headers'', while I consider them
26066 to be consumer information. After seeing so many badly formatted
26067 articles coming from @code{tin} and @code{Netscape} I know not to use
26068 either of those for posting articles. I would not have known that if
26069 it wasn't for the @code{X-Newsreader} header.
26074 USEFOR is an IETF working group writing a successor to RFC 1036, based
26075 on Son-of-RFC 1036. They have produced a number of drafts proposing
26076 various changes to the format of news articles. The Gnus towers will
26077 look into implementing the changes when the draft is accepted as an RFC.
26079 @item MIME - RFC 2045-2049 etc
26080 @cindex @acronym{MIME}
26081 All the various @acronym{MIME} RFCs are supported.
26083 @item Disposition Notifications - RFC 2298
26084 Message Mode is able to request notifications from the receiver.
26086 @item PGP - RFC 1991 and RFC 2440
26089 RFC 1991 is the original @acronym{PGP} message specification,
26090 published as an informational RFC. RFC 2440 was the follow-up, now
26091 called Open PGP, and put on the Standards Track. Both document a
26092 non-@acronym{MIME} aware @acronym{PGP} format. Gnus supports both
26093 encoding (signing and encryption) and decoding (verification and
26096 @item PGP/MIME - RFC 2015/3156
26097 RFC 2015 (superseded by 3156 which references RFC 2440 instead of RFC
26098 1991) describes the @acronym{MIME}-wrapping around the RFC 1991/2440 format.
26099 Gnus supports both encoding and decoding.
26101 @item S/MIME - RFC 2633
26102 RFC 2633 describes the @acronym{S/MIME} format.
26104 @item IMAP - RFC 1730/2060, RFC 2195, RFC 2086, RFC 2359, RFC 2595, RFC 1731
26105 RFC 1730 is @acronym{IMAP} version 4, updated somewhat by RFC 2060
26106 (@acronym{IMAP} 4 revision 1). RFC 2195 describes CRAM-MD5
26107 authentication for @acronym{IMAP}. RFC 2086 describes access control
26108 lists (ACLs) for @acronym{IMAP}. RFC 2359 describes a @acronym{IMAP}
26109 protocol enhancement. RFC 2595 describes the proper @acronym{TLS}
26110 integration (STARTTLS) with @acronym{IMAP}. RFC 1731 describes the
26111 GSSAPI/Kerberos4 mechanisms for @acronym{IMAP}.
26115 If you ever notice Gnus acting non-compliant with regards to the texts
26116 mentioned above, don't hesitate to drop a note to Gnus Towers and let us
26121 @subsection Emacsen
26127 Gnus should work on:
26135 XEmacs 21.4 and up.
26139 This Gnus version will absolutely not work on any Emacsen older than
26140 that. Not reliably, at least. Older versions of Gnus may work on older
26141 Emacs versions. Particularly, Gnus 5.10.8 should also work on Emacs
26142 20.7 and XEmacs 21.1.
26144 There are some vague differences between Gnus on the various
26145 platforms---XEmacs features more graphics (a logo and a toolbar)---but
26146 other than that, things should look pretty much the same under all
26150 @node Gnus Development
26151 @subsection Gnus Development
26153 Gnus is developed in a two-phased cycle. The first phase involves much
26154 discussion on the @samp{ding@@gnus.org} mailing list, where people
26155 propose changes and new features, post patches and new back ends. This
26156 phase is called the @dfn{alpha} phase, since the Gnusae released in this
26157 phase are @dfn{alpha releases}, or (perhaps more commonly in other
26158 circles) @dfn{snapshots}. During this phase, Gnus is assumed to be
26159 unstable and should not be used by casual users. Gnus alpha releases
26160 have names like ``Red Gnus'' and ``Quassia Gnus''.
26162 After futzing around for 50-100 alpha releases, Gnus is declared
26163 @dfn{frozen}, and only bug fixes are applied. Gnus loses the prefix,
26164 and is called things like ``Gnus 5.6.32'' instead. Normal people are
26165 supposed to be able to use these, and these are mostly discussed on the
26166 @samp{gnu.emacs.gnus} newsgroup.
26169 @vindex mail-source-delete-incoming
26170 Some variable defaults differ between alpha Gnusae and released Gnusae.
26171 In particular, @code{mail-source-delete-incoming} defaults to @code{nil} in
26172 alpha Gnusae and @code{t} in released Gnusae. This is to prevent
26173 lossage of mail if an alpha release hiccups while handling the mail.
26175 The division of discussion between the ding mailing list and the Gnus
26176 newsgroup is not purely based on publicity concerns. It's true that
26177 having people write about the horrible things that an alpha Gnus release
26178 can do (sometimes) in a public forum may scare people off, but more
26179 importantly, talking about new experimental features that have been
26180 introduced may confuse casual users. New features are frequently
26181 introduced, fiddled with, and judged to be found wanting, and then
26182 either discarded or totally rewritten. People reading the mailing list
26183 usually keep up with these rapid changes, while people on the newsgroup
26184 can't be assumed to do so.
26189 @subsection Contributors
26190 @cindex contributors
26192 The new Gnus version couldn't have been done without the help of all the
26193 people on the (ding) mailing list. Every day for over a year I have
26194 gotten billions of nice bug reports from them, filling me with joy,
26195 every single one of them. Smooches. The people on the list have been
26196 tried beyond endurance, what with my ``oh, that's a neat idea <type
26197 type>, yup, I'll release it right away <ship off> no wait, that doesn't
26198 work at all <type type>, yup, I'll ship that one off right away <ship
26199 off> no, wait, that absolutely does not work'' policy for releases.
26200 Micro$oft---bah. Amateurs. I'm @emph{much} worse. (Or is that
26201 ``worser''? ``much worser''? ``worsest''?)
26203 I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Academy for@dots{} oops,
26209 Masanobu @sc{Umeda}---the writer of the original @sc{gnus}.
26212 Shenghuo Zhu---uudecode.el, mm-uu.el, rfc1843.el, webmail.el,
26213 nnwarchive and many, many other things connected with @acronym{MIME} and
26214 other types of en/decoding, as well as general bug fixing, new
26215 functionality and stuff.
26218 Per Abrahamsen---custom, scoring, highlighting and @sc{soup} code (as
26219 well as numerous other things).
26222 Luis Fernandes---design and graphics.
26225 Joe Reiss---creator of the smiley faces.
26228 Justin Sheehy---the @acronym{FAQ} maintainer.
26231 Erik Naggum---help, ideas, support, code and stuff.
26234 Wes Hardaker---@file{gnus-picon.el} and the manual section on
26235 @dfn{picons} (@pxref{Picons}).
26238 Kim-Minh Kaplan---further work on the picon code.
26241 Brad Miller---@file{gnus-gl.el} and the GroupLens manual section.
26244 Sudish Joseph---innumerable bug fixes.
26247 Ilja Weis---@file{gnus-topic.el}.
26250 Steven L. Baur---lots and lots and lots of bugs detections and fixes.
26253 Vladimir Alexiev---the refcard and reference booklets.
26256 Felix Lee & Jamie Zawinski---I stole some pieces from the XGnus
26257 distribution by Felix Lee and JWZ.
26260 Scott Byer---@file{nnfolder.el} enhancements & rewrite.
26263 Peter Mutsaers---orphan article scoring code.
26266 Ken Raeburn---POP mail support.
26269 Hallvard B Furuseth---various bits and pieces, especially dealing with
26273 Brian Edmonds---@file{gnus-bbdb.el}.
26276 David Moore---rewrite of @file{nnvirtual.el} and many other things.
26279 Kevin Davidson---came up with the name @dfn{ding}, so blame him.
26282 Fran@,{c}ois Pinard---many, many interesting and thorough bug reports, as
26283 well as autoconf support.
26287 This manual was proof-read by Adrian Aichner, with Ricardo Nassif, Mark
26288 Borges, and Jost Krieger proof-reading parts of the manual.
26290 The following people have contributed many patches and suggestions:
26305 Jason L. Tibbitts, III,
26307 Katsumi Yamaoka, @c Yamaoka
26311 Also thanks to the following for patches and stuff:
26321 Alexei V. Barantsev,
26336 Massimo Campostrini,
26341 Jae-you Chung, @c ?
26342 James H. Cloos, Jr.,
26346 Andrew J. Cosgriff,
26349 Geoffrey T. Dairiki,
26355 Michael Welsh Duggan,
26360 Enami Tsugutomo, @c Enami
26364 Nelson Jose dos Santos Ferreira,
26372 Arne Georg Gleditsch,
26374 Michelangelo Grigni,
26378 Kenichi Handa, @c Handa
26380 Yoshiki Hayashi, @c Hayashi
26382 Hisashige Kenji, @c Hisashige
26390 Fran@,{c}ois Felix Ingrand,
26391 Tatsuya Ichikawa, @c Ichikawa
26392 Ishikawa Ichiro, @c Ishikawa
26394 Iwamuro Motonori, @c Iwamuro
26404 Peter Skov Knudsen,
26405 Shuhei Kobayashi, @c Kobayashi
26407 Koseki Yoshinori, @c Koseki
26408 Thor Kristoffersen,
26411 Seokchan Lee, @c Lee
26429 Morioka Tomohiko, @c Morioka
26430 Erik Toubro Nielsen,
26437 Masaharu Onishi, @c Onishi
26442 Jens-Ulrik Holger Petersen,
26446 John McClary Prevost,
26452 Lars Balker Rasmussen,
26457 Christian von Roques,
26460 Wolfgang Rupprecht,
26467 Philippe Schnoebelen,
26469 Randal L. Schwartz,
26483 Kiyokazu Suto, @c Suto
26488 Tozawa Akihiko, @c Tozawa
26508 For a full overview of what each person has done, the ChangeLogs
26509 included in the Gnus alpha distributions should give ample reading
26510 (550kB and counting).
26512 Apologies to everybody that I've forgotten, of which there are many, I'm
26515 Gee, that's quite a list of people. I guess that must mean that there
26516 actually are people who are using Gnus. Who'd'a thunk it!
26520 @subsection New Features
26521 @cindex new features
26524 * ding Gnus:: New things in Gnus 5.0/5.1, the first new Gnus.
26525 * September Gnus:: The Thing Formally Known As Gnus 5.2/5.3.
26526 * Red Gnus:: Third time best---Gnus 5.4/5.5.
26527 * Quassia Gnus:: Two times two is four, or Gnus 5.6/5.7.
26528 * Pterodactyl Gnus:: Pentad also starts with P, AKA Gnus 5.8/5.9.
26529 * Oort Gnus:: It's big. It's far out. Gnus 5.10/5.11.
26530 * No Gnus:: Very punny.
26533 These lists are, of course, just @emph{short} overviews of the
26534 @emph{most} important new features. No, really. There are tons more.
26535 Yes, we have feeping creaturism in full effect.
26538 @subsubsection (ding) Gnus
26540 New features in Gnus 5.0/5.1:
26545 The look of all buffers can be changed by setting format-like variables
26546 (@pxref{Group Buffer Format} and @pxref{Summary Buffer Format}).
26549 Local spool and several @acronym{NNTP} servers can be used at once
26550 (@pxref{Select Methods}).
26553 You can combine groups into virtual groups (@pxref{Virtual Groups}).
26556 You can read a number of different mail formats (@pxref{Getting Mail}).
26557 All the mail back ends implement a convenient mail expiry scheme
26558 (@pxref{Expiring Mail}).
26561 Gnus can use various strategies for gathering threads that have lost
26562 their roots (thereby gathering loose sub-threads into one thread) or it
26563 can go back and retrieve enough headers to build a complete thread
26564 (@pxref{Customizing Threading}).
26567 Killed groups can be displayed in the group buffer, and you can read
26568 them as well (@pxref{Listing Groups}).
26571 Gnus can do partial group updates---you do not have to retrieve the
26572 entire active file just to check for new articles in a few groups
26573 (@pxref{The Active File}).
26576 Gnus implements a sliding scale of subscribedness to groups
26577 (@pxref{Group Levels}).
26580 You can score articles according to any number of criteria
26581 (@pxref{Scoring}). You can even get Gnus to find out how to score
26582 articles for you (@pxref{Adaptive Scoring}).
26585 Gnus maintains a dribble buffer that is auto-saved the normal Emacs
26586 manner, so it should be difficult to lose much data on what you have
26587 read if your machine should go down (@pxref{Auto Save}).
26590 Gnus now has its own startup file (@file{~/.gnus.el}) to avoid
26591 cluttering up the @file{.emacs} file.
26594 You can set the process mark on both groups and articles and perform
26595 operations on all the marked items (@pxref{Process/Prefix}).
26598 You can grep through a subset of groups and create a group from the
26599 results (@pxref{Kibozed Groups}).
26602 You can list subsets of groups according to, well, anything
26603 (@pxref{Listing Groups}).
26606 You can browse foreign servers and subscribe to groups from those
26607 servers (@pxref{Browse Foreign Server}).
26610 Gnus can fetch articles, asynchronously, on a second connection to the
26611 server (@pxref{Asynchronous Fetching}).
26614 You can cache articles locally (@pxref{Article Caching}).
26617 The uudecode functions have been expanded and generalized
26618 (@pxref{Decoding Articles}).
26621 You can still post uuencoded articles, which was a little-known feature
26622 of @sc{gnus}' past (@pxref{Uuencoding and Posting}).
26625 Fetching parents (and other articles) now actually works without
26626 glitches (@pxref{Finding the Parent}).
26629 Gnus can fetch @acronym{FAQ}s and group descriptions (@pxref{Group Information}).
26632 Digests (and other files) can be used as the basis for groups
26633 (@pxref{Document Groups}).
26636 Articles can be highlighted and customized (@pxref{Customizing
26640 URLs and other external references can be buttonized (@pxref{Article
26644 You can do lots of strange stuff with the Gnus window & frame
26645 configuration (@pxref{Window Layout}).
26648 You can click on buttons instead of using the keyboard
26654 @node September Gnus
26655 @subsubsection September Gnus
26659 \gnusfig{-28cm}{0cm}{\epsfig{figure=ps/september,height=20cm}}
26663 New features in Gnus 5.2/5.3:
26668 A new message composition mode is used. All old customization variables
26669 for @code{mail-mode}, @code{rnews-reply-mode} and @code{gnus-msg} are
26673 Gnus is now able to generate @dfn{sparse} threads---threads where
26674 missing articles are represented by empty nodes (@pxref{Customizing
26678 (setq gnus-build-sparse-threads 'some)
26682 Outgoing articles are stored on a special archive server
26683 (@pxref{Archived Messages}).
26686 Partial thread regeneration now happens when articles are
26690 Gnus can make use of GroupLens predictions.
26693 Picons (personal icons) can be displayed under XEmacs (@pxref{Picons}).
26696 A @code{trn}-like tree buffer can be displayed (@pxref{Tree Display}).
26699 (setq gnus-use-trees t)
26703 An @code{nn}-like pick-and-read minor mode is available for the summary
26704 buffers (@pxref{Pick and Read}).
26707 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'gnus-pick-mode)
26711 In binary groups you can use a special binary minor mode (@pxref{Binary
26715 Groups can be grouped in a folding topic hierarchy (@pxref{Group
26719 (add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)
26723 Gnus can re-send and bounce mail (@pxref{Summary Mail Commands}).
26726 Groups can now have a score, and bubbling based on entry frequency
26727 is possible (@pxref{Group Score}).
26730 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-exit-hook 'gnus-summary-bubble-group)
26734 Groups can be process-marked, and commands can be performed on
26735 groups of groups (@pxref{Marking Groups}).
26738 Caching is possible in virtual groups.
26741 @code{nndoc} now understands all kinds of digests, mail boxes, rnews
26742 news batches, ClariNet briefs collections, and just about everything
26743 else (@pxref{Document Groups}).
26746 Gnus has a new back end (@code{nnsoup}) to create/read SOUP packets
26750 The Gnus cache is much faster.
26753 Groups can be sorted according to many criteria (@pxref{Sorting
26757 New group parameters have been introduced to set list-addresses and
26758 expiry times (@pxref{Group Parameters}).
26761 All formatting specs allow specifying faces to be used
26762 (@pxref{Formatting Fonts}).
26765 There are several more commands for setting/removing/acting on process
26766 marked articles on the @kbd{M P} submap (@pxref{Setting Process Marks}).
26769 The summary buffer can be limited to show parts of the available
26770 articles based on a wide range of criteria. These commands have been
26771 bound to keys on the @kbd{/} submap (@pxref{Limiting}).
26774 Articles can be made persistent with the @kbd{*} command
26775 (@pxref{Persistent Articles}).
26778 All functions for hiding article elements are now toggles.
26781 Article headers can be buttonized (@pxref{Article Washing}).
26784 All mail back ends support fetching articles by @code{Message-ID}.
26787 Duplicate mail can now be treated properly (@pxref{Duplicates}).
26790 All summary mode commands are available directly from the article
26791 buffer (@pxref{Article Keymap}).
26794 Frames can be part of @code{gnus-buffer-configuration} (@pxref{Window
26798 Mail can be re-scanned by a daemonic process (@pxref{Daemons}).
26801 \marginpar[\mbox{}\hfill\epsfig{figure=ps/fseptember,height=5cm}]{\epsfig{figure=ps/fseptember,height=5cm}}
26806 Gnus can make use of NoCeM files to weed out spam (@pxref{NoCeM}).
26809 (setq gnus-use-nocem t)
26813 Groups can be made permanently visible (@pxref{Listing Groups}).
26816 (setq gnus-permanently-visible-groups "^nnml:")
26820 Many new hooks have been introduced to make customizing easier.
26823 Gnus respects the @code{Mail-Copies-To} header.
26826 Threads can be gathered by looking at the @code{References} header
26827 (@pxref{Customizing Threading}).
26830 (setq gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
26831 'gnus-gather-threads-by-references)
26835 Read articles can be stored in a special backlog buffer to avoid
26836 refetching (@pxref{Article Backlog}).
26839 (setq gnus-keep-backlog 50)
26843 A clean copy of the current article is always stored in a separate
26844 buffer to allow easier treatment.
26847 Gnus can suggest where to save articles (@pxref{Saving Articles}).
26850 Gnus doesn't have to do as much prompting when saving (@pxref{Saving
26854 (setq gnus-prompt-before-saving t)
26858 @code{gnus-uu} can view decoded files asynchronously while fetching
26859 articles (@pxref{Other Decode Variables}).
26862 (setq gnus-uu-grabbed-file-functions 'gnus-uu-grab-view)
26866 Filling in the article buffer now works properly on cited text
26867 (@pxref{Article Washing}).
26870 Hiding cited text adds buttons to toggle hiding, and how much
26871 cited text to hide is now customizable (@pxref{Article Hiding}).
26874 (setq gnus-cited-lines-visible 2)
26878 Boring headers can be hidden (@pxref{Article Hiding}).
26881 Default scoring values can now be set from the menu bar.
26884 Further syntax checking of outgoing articles have been added.
26890 @subsubsection Red Gnus
26892 New features in Gnus 5.4/5.5:
26896 \gnusfig{-5.5cm}{-4cm}{\epsfig{figure=ps/red,height=20cm}}
26903 @file{nntp.el} has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
26906 Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
26907 Gnus (@pxref{Asynchronous Fetching}).
26910 Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like @code{and},
26911 @code{or}, @code{not}, and parent redirection (@pxref{Advanced
26915 Article washing status can be displayed in the
26916 article mode line (@pxref{Misc Article}).
26919 @file{gnus.el} has been split into many smaller files.
26922 Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID can be done
26923 (@pxref{Duplicate Suppression}).
26926 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
26930 New variables for specifying what score and adapt files are to be
26931 considered home score and adapt files (@pxref{Home Score File}) have
26935 @code{nndoc} was rewritten to be easily extendable (@pxref{Document
26936 Server Internals}).
26939 Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics (@pxref{Topic
26943 Article editing has been revamped and is now actually usable.
26946 Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions
26947 (@pxref{Article Signature}).
26950 Summary pick mode has been made to look more @code{nn}-like. Line
26951 numbers are displayed and the @kbd{.} command can be used to pick
26952 articles (@code{Pick and Read}).
26955 Commands for moving the @file{.newsrc.eld} from one server to
26956 another have been added (@pxref{Changing Servers}).
26959 There's a way now to specify that ``uninteresting'' fields be suppressed
26960 when generating lines in buffers (@pxref{Advanced Formatting}).
26963 Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with @kbd{C-M-_}
26967 Scoring can be done on words using the new score type @code{w}
26968 (@pxref{Score File Format}).
26971 Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis
26972 (@pxref{Adaptive Scoring}).
26975 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
26979 Scores can be decayed (@pxref{Score Decays}).
26982 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
26986 Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The Date is
26987 normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first (@pxref{Score File Format}).
26990 A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
26991 the native server (@pxref{Changing Servers}).
26994 A new command for reading collections of documents
26995 (@code{nndoc} with @code{nnvirtual} on top) has been added---@kbd{C-M-d}
26996 (@pxref{Really Various Summary Commands}).
26999 Process mark sets can be pushed and popped (@pxref{Setting Process
27003 A new mail-to-news back end makes it possible to post even when the @acronym{NNTP}
27004 server doesn't allow posting (@pxref{Mail-To-News Gateways}).
27007 A new back end for reading searches from Web search engines
27008 (@dfn{DejaNews}, @dfn{Alta Vista}, @dfn{InReference}) has been added
27009 (@pxref{Web Searches}).
27012 Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard sorting
27013 functions, and each topic can be sorted independently (@pxref{Topic
27017 Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently (@code{Sorting
27021 Cached articles can be pulled into the groups (@pxref{Summary Generation
27025 \marginpar[\mbox{}\hfill\epsfig{figure=ps/fred,width=3cm}]{\epsfig{figure=ps/fred,width=3cm}}
27030 Score files are now applied in a more reliable order (@pxref{Score
27034 Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated (@pxref{Splitting
27038 More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk from incoming
27039 mail before saving the mail (@pxref{Washing Mail}).
27042 Emphasized text can be properly fontisized:
27048 @subsubsection Quassia Gnus
27050 New features in Gnus 5.6:
27055 New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
27056 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added.
27057 @xref{Gnus Unplugged}, for the full story.
27060 The @code{nndraft} back end has returned, but works differently than
27061 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the @code{nndraft}
27062 group, which is created automatically.
27065 @code{gnus-alter-header-function} can now be used to alter header
27069 @code{gnus-summary-goto-article} now accept Message-ID's.
27072 A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
27073 outside the region: @kbd{C-c C-v}.
27076 You can now post to component group in @code{nnvirtual} groups with
27080 @code{nntp-rlogin-program}---new variable to ease customization.
27083 @code{C-u C-c C-c} in @code{gnus-article-edit-mode} will now inhibit
27084 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
27087 New element in @code{gnus-boring-article-headers}---@code{long-to}.
27090 @kbd{M-i} symbolic prefix command. @xref{Symbolic Prefixes}, for
27094 @kbd{L} and @kbd{I} in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
27095 @kbd{a} to add the score rule to the @file{all.SCORE} file.
27098 @code{gnus-simplify-subject-functions} variable to allow greater
27099 control over simplification.
27102 @kbd{A T}---new command for fetching the current thread.
27105 @kbd{/ T}---new command for including the current thread in the
27109 @kbd{M-RET} is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
27112 @samp{\\1}-expressions are now valid in @code{nnmail-split-methods}.
27115 The @code{custom-face-lookup} function has been removed.
27116 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
27117 rewrite them to use @code{face-spec-set} instead.
27120 Canceling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
27121 @kbd{a} forces normal posting method.
27124 New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper
27128 For easier debugging of @code{nntp}, you can set
27129 @code{nntp-record-commands} to a non-@code{nil} value.
27132 @code{nntp} now uses @file{~/.authinfo}, a @file{.netrc}-like file, for
27133 controlling where and how to send @sc{authinfo} to @acronym{NNTP} servers.
27136 A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
27140 A history of where mails have been split is available.
27143 A new article date command has been added---@code{article-date-iso8601}.
27146 Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
27147 @code{gnus-score-thread-simplify}.
27150 A new function for citing in Message has been
27151 added---@code{message-cite-original-without-signature}.
27154 @code{article-strip-all-blank-lines}---new article command.
27157 A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
27161 A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
27162 @code{gnus-adaptive-word-minimum} variable.
27165 The ``lapsed date'' article header can be kept continually
27166 updated by the @code{gnus-start-date-timer} command.
27169 Web listserv archives can be read with the @code{nnlistserv} back end.
27172 Old dejanews archives can now be read by @code{nnweb}.
27176 @node Pterodactyl Gnus
27177 @subsubsection Pterodactyl Gnus
27179 New features in Gnus 5.8:
27184 The mail-fetching functions have changed. See the manual for the
27185 many details. In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.
27187 If you used procmail like in
27190 (setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
27191 (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
27192 (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
27193 (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")
27196 this now has changed to
27200 '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
27204 @xref{Mail Source Specifiers}.
27207 Gnus is now a @acronym{MIME}-capable reader. This affects many parts of
27208 Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands. See the manual for details.
27211 Gnus has also been multilingualized. This also affects too
27212 many parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables.
27215 @code{gnus-auto-select-first} can now be a function to be
27216 called to position point.
27219 The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
27220 summary buffers and @acronym{NOV} files.
27223 @code{gnus-article-display-hook} has been removed. Instead, a number
27224 of variables starting with @code{gnus-treat-} have been added.
27227 The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now works in a
27228 subtly different manner.
27231 New web-based back ends have been added: @code{nnslashdot},
27232 @code{nnwarchive} and @code{nnultimate}. nnweb has been revamped,
27233 again, to keep up with ever-changing layouts.
27236 Gnus can now read @acronym{IMAP} mail via @code{nnimap}.
27241 @subsubsection Oort Gnus
27244 New features in Gnus 5.10:
27248 @item Installation changes
27249 @c ***********************
27253 Upgrading from previous (stable) version if you have used Oort.
27255 If you have tried Oort (the unstable Gnus branch leading to this
27256 release) but went back to a stable version, be careful when upgrading to
27257 this version. In particular, you will probably want to remove all
27258 @file{.marks} (nnml) and @file{.mrk} (nnfolder) files, so that flags are
27259 read from your @file{.newsrc.eld} instead of from the
27260 @file{.marks}/@file{.mrk} file where this release store flags. See a
27261 later entry for more information about marks. Note that downgrading
27262 isn't save in general.
27265 Lisp files are now installed in @file{.../site-lisp/gnus/} by default.
27266 It defaulted to @file{.../site-lisp/} formerly. In addition to this,
27267 the new installer issues a warning if other Gnus installations which
27268 will shadow the latest one are detected. You can then remove those
27269 shadows manually or remove them using @code{make
27270 remove-installed-shadows}.
27273 New @file{make.bat} for compiling and installing Gnus under MS Windows
27275 Use @file{make.bat} if you want to install Gnus under MS Windows, the
27276 first argument to the batch-program should be the directory where
27277 @file{xemacs.exe} respectively @file{emacs.exe} is located, if you want
27278 to install Gnus after compiling it, give @file{make.bat} @code{/copy} as
27279 the second parameter.
27281 @file{make.bat} has been rewritten from scratch, it now features
27282 automatic recognition of XEmacs and GNU Emacs, generates
27283 @file{gnus-load.el}, checks if errors occur while compilation and
27284 generation of info files and reports them at the end of the build
27285 process. It now uses @code{makeinfo} if it is available and falls
27286 back to @file{infohack.el} otherwise. @file{make.bat} should now
27287 install all files which are necessary to run Gnus and be generally a
27288 complete replacement for the @code{configure; make; make install}
27289 cycle used under Unix systems.
27291 The new @file{make.bat} makes @file{make-x.bat} and @file{xemacs.mak}
27292 superfluous, so they have been removed.
27295 @file{~/News/overview/} not used.
27297 As a result of the following change, the @file{~/News/overview/}
27298 directory is not used any more. You can safely delete the entire
27301 @c FIXME: `gnus-load' is mentioned in README, which is not included in
27302 @c CVS. We should find a better place for this item.
27304 @code{(require 'gnus-load)}
27306 If you use a stand-alone Gnus distribution, you'd better add
27307 @code{(require 'gnus-load)} into your @file{~/.emacs} after adding the Gnus
27308 lisp directory into load-path.
27310 File @file{gnus-load.el} contains autoload commands, functions and variables,
27311 some of which may not be included in distributions of Emacsen.
27315 @item New packages and libraries within Gnus
27316 @c *****************************************
27321 The revised Gnus @acronym{FAQ} is included in the manual,
27322 @xref{Frequently Asked Questions}.
27325 @acronym{TLS} wrapper shipped with Gnus
27327 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} is now supported in @acronym{IMAP} and
27328 @acronym{NNTP} via @file{tls.el} and GNUTLS. The old
27329 @acronym{TLS}/@acronym{SSL} support via (external third party)
27330 @file{ssl.el} and OpenSSL still works.
27333 Improved anti-spam features.
27335 Gnus is now able to take out spam from your mail and news streams
27336 using a wide variety of programs and filter rules. Among the supported
27337 methods are RBL blocklists, bogofilter and white/blacklists. Hooks
27338 for easy use of external packages such as SpamAssassin and Hashcash
27339 are also new. @ref{Thwarting Email Spam} and @ref{Spam Package}.
27340 @c FIXME: @xref{Spam Package}?. Should this be under Misc?
27343 Gnus supports server-side mail filtering using Sieve.
27345 Sieve rules can be added as Group Parameters for groups, and the
27346 complete Sieve script is generated using @kbd{D g} from the Group
27347 buffer, and then uploaded to the server using @kbd{C-c C-l} in the
27348 generated Sieve buffer. @xref{Sieve Commands}, and the new Sieve
27349 manual @ref{Top, , Top, sieve, Emacs Sieve}.
27353 @item Changes in group mode
27354 @c ************************
27359 @code{gnus-group-read-ephemeral-group} can be called interactively,
27363 Retrieval of charters and control messages
27365 There are new commands for fetching newsgroup charters (@kbd{H c}) and
27366 control messages (@kbd{H C}).
27369 The new variable @code{gnus-parameters} can be used to set group parameters.
27371 Earlier this was done only via @kbd{G p} (or @kbd{G c}), which stored
27372 the parameters in @file{~/.newsrc.eld}, but via this variable you can
27373 enjoy the powers of customize, and simplified backups since you set the
27374 variable in @file{~/.gnus.el} instead of @file{~/.newsrc.eld}. The
27375 variable maps regular expressions matching group names to group
27378 (setq gnus-parameters
27380 (gnus-show-threads nil)
27381 (gnus-use-scoring nil))
27382 ("^nnimap:\\(foo.bar\\)$"
27383 (to-group . "\\1"))))
27387 Unread count correct in nnimap groups.
27389 The estimated number of unread articles in the group buffer should now
27390 be correct for nnimap groups. This is achieved by calling
27391 @code{nnimap-fixup-unread-after-getting-new-news} from the
27392 @code{gnus-setup-news-hook} (called on startup) and
27393 @code{gnus-after-getting-new-news-hook}. (called after getting new
27394 mail). If you have modified those variables from the default, you may
27395 want to add @code{nnimap-fixup-unread-after-getting-new-news} again. If
27396 you were happy with the estimate and want to save some (minimal) time
27397 when getting new mail, remove the function.
27400 Group names are treated as UTF-8 by default.
27402 This is supposedly what USEFOR wanted to migrate to. See
27403 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-group-alist} and
27404 @code{gnus-group-name-charset-method-alist} for customization.
27407 @code{gnus-group-charset-alist} and
27408 @code{gnus-group-ignored-charsets-alist}.
27410 The regexps in these variables are compared with full group names
27411 instead of real group names in 5.8. Users who customize these
27412 variables should change those regexps accordingly. For example:
27414 ("^han\\>" euc-kr) -> ("\\(^\\|:\\)han\\>" euc-kr)
27419 @item Changes in summary and article mode
27420 @c **************************************
27425 @kbd{F} (@code{gnus-article-followup-with-original}) and @kbd{R}
27426 (@code{gnus-article-reply-with-original}) only yank the text in the
27427 region if the region is active.
27430 In draft groups, @kbd{e} is now bound to @code{gnus-draft-edit-message}.
27431 Use @kbd{B w} for @code{gnus-summary-edit-article} instead.
27436 More buttons for URLs, mail addresses, Message-IDs, Info links, man
27437 pages and Emacs or Gnus related references. @xref{Article Buttons}. The
27438 variables @code{gnus-button-@var{*}-level} can be used to control the
27439 appearance of all article buttons. @xref{Article Button Levels}.
27442 Single-part yenc encoded attachments can be decoded.
27447 The picons code has been reimplemented to work in GNU Emacs---some of
27448 the previous options have been removed or renamed.
27450 Picons are small ``personal icons'' representing users, domain and
27451 newsgroups, which can be displayed in the Article buffer.
27455 If the new option @code{gnus-treat-body-boundary} is non-@code{nil}, a
27456 boundary line is drawn at the end of the headers.
27459 Signed article headers (X-PGP-Sig) can be verified with @kbd{W p}.
27462 The Summary Buffer uses an arrow in the fringe to indicate the current
27463 article. Use @code{(setq gnus-summary-display-arrow nil)} to disable it.
27466 Warn about email replies to news
27468 Do you often find yourself replying to news by email by mistake? Then
27469 the new option @code{gnus-confirm-mail-reply-to-news} is just the thing for
27473 If the new option @code{gnus-summary-display-while-building} is
27474 non-@code{nil}, the summary buffer is shown and updated as it's being
27478 The new @code{recent} mark @samp{.} indicates newly arrived messages (as
27479 opposed to old but unread messages).
27482 Gnus supports RFC 2369 mailing list headers, and adds a number of
27483 related commands in mailing list groups. @xref{Mailing List}.
27486 The Date header can be displayed in a format that can be read aloud
27487 in English. @xref{Article Date}.
27490 diffs are automatically highlighted in groups matching
27491 @code{mm-uu-diff-groups-regexp}
27494 Better handling of Microsoft citation styles
27496 Gnus now tries to recognize the mangled header block that some Microsoft
27497 mailers use to indicate that the rest of the message is a citation, even
27498 though it is not quoted in any way. The variable
27499 @code{gnus-cite-unsightly-citation-regexp} matches the start of these
27502 The new command @kbd{W Y f}
27503 (@code{gnus-article-outlook-deuglify-article}) allows deuglifying broken
27504 Outlook (Express) articles.
27507 @code{gnus-article-skip-boring}
27509 If you set @code{gnus-article-skip-boring} to @code{t}, then Gnus will
27510 not scroll down to show you a page that contains only boring text,
27511 which by default means cited text and signature. You can customize
27512 what is skippable using @code{gnus-article-boring-faces}.
27514 This feature is especially useful if you read many articles that
27515 consist of a little new content at the top with a long, untrimmed
27516 message cited below.
27519 Smileys (@samp{:-)}, @samp{;-)} etc) are now displayed graphically in
27522 Put @code{(setq gnus-treat-display-smileys nil)} in @file{~/.gnus.el} to
27526 Face headers handling. @xref{Face}.
27529 In the summary buffer, the new command @kbd{/ N} inserts new messages
27530 and @kbd{/ o} inserts old messages.
27533 Gnus decodes morse encoded messages if you press @kbd{W m}.
27536 @code{gnus-summary-line-format}
27538 The default value changed to @samp{%U%R%z%I%(%[%4L: %-23,23f%]%)
27539 %s\n}. Moreover @code{gnus-extra-headers},
27540 @code{nnmail-extra-headers} and @code{gnus-ignored-from-addresses}
27541 changed their default so that the users name will be replaced by the
27542 recipient's name or the group name posting to for @acronym{NNTP}
27546 Deleting of attachments.
27548 The command @code{gnus-mime-save-part-and-strip} (bound to @kbd{C-o}
27549 on @acronym{MIME} buttons) saves a part and replaces the part with an
27550 external one. @code{gnus-mime-delete-part} (bound to @kbd{d} on
27551 @acronym{MIME} buttons) removes a part. It works only on back ends
27552 that support editing.
27555 @code{gnus-default-charset}
27557 The default value is determined from the
27558 @code{current-language-environment} variable, instead of
27559 @code{iso-8859-1}. Also the @samp{.*} item in
27560 @code{gnus-group-charset-alist} is removed.
27563 Printing capabilities are enhanced.
27565 Gnus supports Muttprint natively with @kbd{O P} from the Summary and
27566 Article buffers. Also, each individual @acronym{MIME} part can be
27567 printed using @kbd{p} on the @acronym{MIME} button.
27570 Extended format specs.
27572 Format spec @samp{%&user-date;} is added into
27573 @code{gnus-summary-line-format-alist}. Also, user defined extended
27574 format specs are supported. The extended format specs look like
27575 @samp{%u&foo;}, which invokes function
27576 @code{gnus-user-format-function-@var{foo}}. Because @samp{&} is used as the
27577 escape character, old user defined format @samp{%u&} is no longer supported.
27580 @kbd{/ *} (@code{gnus-summary-limit-include-cached}) is rewritten.
27581 @c FIXME: Was this a user-visible change?
27583 It was aliased to @kbd{Y c}
27584 (@code{gnus-summary-insert-cached-articles}). The new function filters
27585 out other articles.
27588 Some limiting commands accept a @kbd{C-u} prefix to negate the match.
27590 If @kbd{C-u} is used on subject, author or extra headers, i.e., @kbd{/
27591 s}, @kbd{/ a}, and @kbd{/ x}
27592 (@code{gnus-summary-limit-to-@{subject,author,extra@}}) respectively, the
27593 result will be to display all articles that do not match the expression.
27596 Gnus inlines external parts (message/external).
27600 @item Changes in Message mode and related Gnus features
27601 @c ****************************************************
27608 You can delay the sending of a message with @kbd{C-c C-j} in the Message
27609 buffer. The messages are delivered at specified time. This is useful
27610 for sending yourself reminders. @xref{Delayed Articles}.
27613 If the new option @code{nnml-use-compressed-files} is non-@code{nil},
27614 the nnml back end allows compressed message files.
27617 The new option @code{gnus-gcc-mark-as-read} automatically marks
27618 Gcc articles as read.
27621 Externalizing of attachments
27623 If @code{gnus-gcc-externalize-attachments} or
27624 @code{message-fcc-externalize-attachments} is non-@code{nil}, attach
27625 local files as external parts.
27628 The envelope sender address can be customized when using Sendmail.
27629 @xref{Mail Variables, Mail Variables,, message, Message Manual}.
27632 Gnus no longer generate the Sender: header automatically.
27634 Earlier it was generated when the user configurable email address was
27635 different from the Gnus guessed default user address. As the guessing
27636 algorithm is rarely correct these days, and (more controversially) the
27637 only use of the Sender: header was to check if you are entitled to
27638 cancel/supersede news (which is now solved by Cancel Locks instead,
27639 see another entry), generation of the header has been disabled by
27640 default. See the variables @code{message-required-headers},
27641 @code{message-required-news-headers}, and
27642 @code{message-required-mail-headers}.
27645 Features from third party @file{message-utils.el} added to @file{message.el}.
27647 Message now asks if you wish to remove @samp{(was: <old subject>)} from
27648 subject lines (see @code{message-subject-trailing-was-query}). @kbd{C-c
27649 M-m} and @kbd{C-c M-f} inserts markers indicating included text.
27650 @kbd{C-c C-f a} adds a X-No-Archive: header. @kbd{C-c C-f x} inserts
27651 appropriate headers and a note in the body for cross-postings and
27652 followups (see the variables @code{message-cross-post-@var{*}}).
27655 References and X-Draft-From headers are no longer generated when you
27656 start composing messages and @code{message-generate-headers-first} is
27660 Easy inclusion of X-Faces headers. @xref{X-Face}.
27663 Group Carbon Copy (GCC) quoting
27665 To support groups that contains SPC and other weird characters, groups
27666 are quoted before they are placed in the Gcc: header. This means
27667 variables such as @code{gnus-message-archive-group} should no longer
27668 contain quote characters to make groups containing SPC work. Also, if
27669 you are using the string @samp{nnml:foo, nnml:bar} (indicating Gcc
27670 into two groups) you must change it to return the list
27671 @code{("nnml:foo" "nnml:bar")}, otherwise the Gcc: line will be quoted
27672 incorrectly. Note that returning the string @samp{nnml:foo, nnml:bar}
27673 was incorrect earlier, it just didn't generate any problems since it
27674 was inserted directly.
27677 @code{message-insinuate-rmail}
27679 Adding @code{(message-insinuate-rmail)} and @code{(setq
27680 mail-user-agent 'gnus-user-agent)} in @file{.emacs} convinces Rmail to
27681 compose, reply and forward messages in message-mode, where you can
27682 enjoy the power of @acronym{MML}.
27685 @code{message-minibuffer-local-map}
27687 The line below enables BBDB in resending a message:
27689 (define-key message-minibuffer-local-map [(tab)]
27690 'bbdb-complete-name)
27694 @code{gnus-posting-styles}
27696 Add a new format of match like
27698 ((header "to" "larsi.*org")
27699 (Organization "Somewhere, Inc."))
27701 The old format like the lines below is obsolete, but still accepted.
27703 (header "to" "larsi.*org"
27704 (Organization "Somewhere, Inc."))
27708 @code{message-ignored-news-headers} and @code{message-ignored-mail-headers}
27710 @samp{X-Draft-From} and @samp{X-Gnus-Agent-Meta-Information} have been
27711 added into these two variables. If you customized those, perhaps you
27712 need add those two headers too.
27715 Gnus supports the ``format=flowed'' (RFC 2646) parameter. On
27716 composing messages, it is enabled by @code{use-hard-newlines}.
27717 Decoding format=flowed was present but not documented in earlier
27721 The option @code{mm-fill-flowed} can be used to disable treatment of
27722 ``format=flowed'' messages. Also, flowed text is disabled when sending
27723 inline PGP signed messages. @xref{Flowed text, , Flowed text,
27724 emacs-mime, The Emacs MIME Manual}. (New in Gnus 5.10.7)
27725 @c This entry is also present in the node "No Gnus".
27728 Gnus supports the generation of RFC 2298 Disposition Notification requests.
27730 This is invoked with the @kbd{C-c M-n} key binding from message mode.
27733 Message supports the Importance: (RFC 2156) header.
27735 In the message buffer, @kbd{C-c C-f C-i} or @kbd{C-c C-u} cycles through
27739 Gnus supports Cancel Locks in News.
27741 This means a header @samp{Cancel-Lock} is inserted in news posting. It is
27742 used to determine if you wrote an article or not (for canceling and
27743 superseding). Gnus generates a random password string the first time
27744 you post a message, and saves it in your @file{~/.emacs} using the Custom
27745 system. While the variable is called @code{canlock-password}, it is not
27746 security sensitive data. Publishing your canlock string on the web
27747 will not allow anyone to be able to anything she could not already do.
27748 The behavior can be changed by customizing @code{message-insert-canlock}.
27751 Gnus supports @acronym{PGP} (RFC 1991/2440), @acronym{PGP/MIME} (RFC
27752 2015/3156) and @acronym{S/MIME} (RFC 2630-2633).
27754 It needs an external @acronym{S/MIME} and OpenPGP implementation, but no
27755 additional Lisp libraries. This add several menu items to the
27756 Attachments menu, and @kbd{C-c RET} key bindings, when composing
27757 messages. This also obsoletes @code{gnus-article-hide-pgp-hook}.
27760 @acronym{MML} (Mime compose) prefix changed from @kbd{M-m} to @kbd{C-c
27763 This change was made to avoid conflict with the standard binding of
27764 @code{back-to-indentation}, which is also useful in message mode.
27767 The default for @code{message-forward-show-mml} changed to the symbol
27770 The behavior for the @code{best} value is to show @acronym{MML} (i.e.,
27771 convert to @acronym{MIME}) when appropriate. @acronym{MML} will not be
27772 used when forwarding signed or encrypted messages, as the conversion
27773 invalidate the digital signature.
27776 If @code{auto-compression-mode} is enabled, attachments are automatically
27777 decompressed when activated.
27778 @c FIXME: Does this affect article or message mode?
27781 Support for non-@acronym{ASCII} domain names
27783 Message supports non-@acronym{ASCII} domain names in From:, To: and
27784 Cc: and will query you whether to perform encoding when you try to
27785 send a message. The variable @code{message-use-idna} controls this.
27786 Gnus will also decode non-@acronym{ASCII} domain names in From:, To:
27787 and Cc: when you view a message. The variable @code{gnus-use-idna}
27790 @item You can now drag and drop attachments to the Message buffer.
27791 See @code{mml-dnd-protocol-alist} and @code{mml-dnd-attach-options}.
27792 @xref{MIME, ,MIME, message, Message Manual}.
27793 @c New in 5.10.9 / 5.11
27797 @item Changes in back ends
27798 @c ***********************
27802 Gnus can display RSS newsfeeds as a newsgroup. @xref{RSS}.
27805 The nndoc back end now supports mailman digests and exim bounces.
27808 Gnus supports Maildir groups.
27810 Gnus includes a new back end @file{nnmaildir.el}. @xref{Maildir}.
27813 The nnml and nnfolder back ends store marks for each groups.
27815 This makes it possible to take backup of nnml/nnfolder servers/groups
27816 separately of @file{~/.newsrc.eld}, while preserving marks. It also
27817 makes it possible to share articles and marks between users (without
27818 sharing the @file{~/.newsrc.eld} file) within e.g. a department. It
27819 works by storing the marks stored in @file{~/.newsrc.eld} in a per-group
27820 file @file{.marks} (for nnml) and @file{@var{groupname}.mrk} (for
27821 nnfolder, named @var{groupname}). If the nnml/nnfolder is moved to
27822 another machine, Gnus will automatically use the @file{.marks} or
27823 @file{.mrk} file instead of the information in @file{~/.newsrc.eld}.
27824 The new server variables @code{nnml-marks-is-evil} and
27825 @code{nnfolder-marks-is-evil} can be used to disable this feature.
27835 The menu bar item (in Group and Summary buffer) named ``Misc'' has
27836 been renamed to ``Gnus''.
27839 The menu bar item (in Message mode) named ``@acronym{MML}'' has been
27840 renamed to ``Attachments''. Note that this menu also contains security
27841 related stuff, like signing and encryption (@pxref{Security, Security,,
27842 message, Message Manual}).
27845 The tool bars have been updated to use GNOME icons in Group, Summary and
27846 Message mode. You can also customize the tool bars. This is a new
27847 feature in Gnus 5.10.9. (Only for Emacs, not in XEmacs.)
27849 @item The tool bar icons are now (de)activated correctly
27850 in the group buffer, see the variable @code{gnus-group-update-tool-bar}.
27851 Its default value depends on your Emacs version. This is a new feature
27856 @item Miscellaneous changes
27857 @c ************************
27864 The Gnus Agent has seen a major updated and is now enabled by default,
27865 and all nntp and nnimap servers from @code{gnus-select-method} and
27866 @code{gnus-secondary-select-method} are agentized by default. Earlier
27867 only the server in @code{gnus-select-method} was agentized by the
27868 default, and the agent was disabled by default. When the agent is
27869 enabled, headers are now also retrieved from the Agent cache instead
27870 of the back ends when possible. Earlier this only happened in the
27871 unplugged state. You can enroll or remove servers with @kbd{J a} and
27872 @kbd{J r} in the server buffer. Gnus will not download articles into
27873 the Agent cache, unless you instruct it to do so, though, by using
27874 @kbd{J u} or @kbd{J s} from the Group buffer. You revert to the old
27875 behavior of having the Agent disabled with @code{(setq gnus-agent
27876 nil)}. Note that putting @code{(gnus-agentize)} in @file{~/.gnus.el}
27877 is not needed any more.
27880 Gnus reads the @acronym{NOV} and articles in the Agent if plugged.
27882 If one reads an article while plugged, and the article already exists
27883 in the Agent, it won't get downloaded once more. @code{(setq
27884 gnus-agent-cache nil)} reverts to the old behavior.
27889 @code{gnus-dired-minor-mode} (see @ref{Other modes}) installs key
27890 bindings in dired buffers to send a file as an attachment, open a file
27891 using the appropriate mailcap entry, and print a file using the mailcap
27895 The format spec @code{%C} for positioning point has changed to @code{%*}.
27898 @code{gnus-slave-unplugged}
27900 A new command which starts Gnus offline in slave mode.
27907 @subsubsection No Gnus
27910 New features in No Gnus:
27911 @c FIXME: Gnus 5.12?
27913 @include gnus-news.texi
27919 @section The Manual
27923 This manual was generated from a TeXinfo file and then run through
27924 either @code{texi2dvi}
27926 or my own home-brewed TeXinfo to \LaTeX\ transformer,
27927 and then run through @code{latex} and @code{dvips}
27929 to get what you hold in your hands now.
27931 The following conventions have been used:
27936 This is a @samp{string}
27939 This is a @kbd{keystroke}
27942 This is a @file{file}
27945 This is a @code{symbol}
27949 So if I were to say ``set @code{flargnoze} to @samp{yes}'', that would
27953 (setq flargnoze "yes")
27956 If I say ``set @code{flumphel} to @code{yes}'', that would mean:
27959 (setq flumphel 'yes)
27962 @samp{yes} and @code{yes} are two @emph{very} different things---don't
27963 ever get them confused.
27967 Of course, everything in this manual is of vital interest, so you should
27968 read it all. Several times. However, if you feel like skimming the
27969 manual, look for that gnu head you should see in the margin over
27970 there---it means that what's being discussed is of more importance than
27971 the rest of the stuff. (On the other hand, if everything is infinitely
27972 important, how can anything be more important than that? Just one more
27973 of the mysteries of this world, I guess.)
27979 @node On Writing Manuals
27980 @section On Writing Manuals
27982 I guess most manuals are written after-the-fact; documenting a program
27983 that's already there. This is not how this manual is written. When
27984 implementing something, I write the manual entry for that something
27985 straight away. I then see that it's difficult to explain the
27986 functionality, so I write how it's supposed to be, and then I change the
27987 implementation. Writing the documentation and writing the code go hand
27990 This, of course, means that this manual has no, or little, flow. It
27991 documents absolutely everything in Gnus, but often not where you're
27992 looking for it. It is a reference manual, and not a guide to how to get
27995 That would be a totally different book, that should be written using the
27996 reference manual as source material. It would look quite different.
28001 @section Terminology
28003 @cindex terminology
28008 This is what you are supposed to use this thing for---reading news.
28009 News is generally fetched from a nearby @acronym{NNTP} server, and is
28010 generally publicly available to everybody. If you post news, the entire
28011 world is likely to read just what you have written, and they'll all
28012 snigger mischievously. Behind your back.
28016 Everything that's delivered to you personally is mail. Some news/mail
28017 readers (like Gnus) blur the distinction between mail and news, but
28018 there is a difference. Mail is private. News is public. Mailing is
28019 not posting, and replying is not following up.
28023 Send a mail to the person who has written what you are reading.
28027 Post an article to the current newsgroup responding to the article you
28032 Gnus considers mail and news to be mostly the same, really. The only
28033 difference is how to access the actual articles. News articles are
28034 commonly fetched via the protocol @acronym{NNTP}, whereas mail
28035 messages could be read from a file on the local disk. The internal
28036 architecture of Gnus thus comprises a ``front end'' and a number of
28037 ``back ends''. Internally, when you enter a group (by hitting
28038 @key{RET}, say), you thereby invoke a function in the front end in
28039 Gnus. The front end then ``talks'' to a back end and says things like
28040 ``Give me the list of articles in the foo group'' or ``Show me article
28043 So a back end mainly defines either a protocol (the @code{nntp} back
28044 end accesses news via @acronym{NNTP}, the @code{nnimap} back end
28045 accesses mail via @acronym{IMAP}) or a file format and directory
28046 layout (the @code{nnspool} back end accesses news via the common
28047 ``spool directory'' format, the @code{nnml} back end access mail via a
28048 file format and directory layout that's quite similar).
28050 Gnus does not handle the underlying media, so to speak---this is all
28051 done by the back ends. A back end is a collection of functions to
28052 access the articles.
28054 However, sometimes the term ``back end'' is also used where ``server''
28055 would have been more appropriate. And then there is the term ``select
28056 method'' which can mean either. The Gnus terminology can be quite
28061 Gnus will always use one method (and back end) as the @dfn{native}, or
28062 default, way of getting news.
28066 You can also have any number of foreign groups active at the same time.
28067 These are groups that use non-native non-secondary back ends for getting
28072 Secondary back ends are somewhere half-way between being native and being
28073 foreign, but they mostly act like they are native.
28077 A message that has been posted as news.
28080 @cindex mail message
28081 A message that has been mailed.
28085 A mail message or news article
28089 The top part of a message, where administrative information (etc.) is
28094 The rest of an article. Everything not in the head is in the
28099 A line from the head of an article.
28103 A collection of such lines, or a collection of heads. Or even a
28104 collection of @acronym{NOV} lines.
28106 @item @acronym{NOV}
28107 @cindex @acronym{NOV}
28108 @acronym{NOV} stands for News OverView, which is a type of news server
28109 header which provide datas containing the condensed header information
28110 of articles. They are produced by the server itself; in the @code{nntp}
28111 back end Gnus uses the ones that the @acronym{NNTP} server makes, but
28112 Gnus makes them by itself for some backends (in particular, @code{nnml}).
28114 When Gnus enters a group, it asks the back end for the headers of all
28115 unread articles in the group. Most servers support the News OverView
28116 format, which is more compact and much faster to read and parse than the
28117 normal @sc{head} format.
28119 The @acronym{NOV} data consist of one or more text lines (@pxref{Text
28120 Lines, ,Motion by Text Lines, elisp, The Emacs Lisp Reference Manual})
28121 where each line has the header information of one article. The header
28122 information is a tab-separated series of the header's contents including
28123 an article number, a subject, an author, a date, a message-id,
28126 Those data enable Gnus to generate summary lines quickly. However, if
28127 the server does not support @acronym{NOV} or you disable it purposely or
28128 for some reason, Gnus will try to generate the header information by
28129 parsing each article's headers one by one. It will take time.
28130 Therefore, it is not usually a good idea to set nn*-nov-is-evil
28131 (@pxref{Slow/Expensive Connection}) to a non-@code{nil} value unless you
28132 know that the server makes wrong @acronym{NOV} data.
28136 Each group is subscribed at some @dfn{level} or other (1-9). The ones
28137 that have a lower level are ``more'' subscribed than the groups with a
28138 higher level. In fact, groups on levels 1-5 are considered
28139 @dfn{subscribed}; 6-7 are @dfn{unsubscribed}; 8 are @dfn{zombies}; and 9
28140 are @dfn{killed}. Commands for listing groups and scanning for new
28141 articles will all use the numeric prefix as @dfn{working level}.
28143 @item killed groups
28144 @cindex killed groups
28145 No information on killed groups is stored or updated, which makes killed
28146 groups much easier to handle than subscribed groups.
28148 @item zombie groups
28149 @cindex zombie groups
28150 Just like killed groups, only slightly less dead.
28153 @cindex active file
28154 The news server has to keep track of what articles it carries, and what
28155 groups exist. All this information in stored in the active file, which
28156 is rather large, as you might surmise.
28159 @cindex bogus groups
28160 A group that exists in the @file{.newsrc} file, but isn't known to the
28161 server (i.e., it isn't in the active file), is a @emph{bogus group}.
28162 This means that the group probably doesn't exist (any more).
28165 @cindex activating groups
28166 The act of asking the server for info on a group and computing the
28167 number of unread articles is called @dfn{activating the group}.
28168 Un-activated groups are listed with @samp{*} in the group buffer.
28172 News servers store their articles locally in one fashion or other.
28173 One old-fashioned storage method is to have just one file per
28174 article. That's called a ``traditional spool''.
28178 A machine one can connect to and get news (or mail) from.
28180 @item select method
28181 @cindex select method
28182 A structure that specifies the back end, the server and the virtual
28185 @item virtual server
28186 @cindex virtual server
28187 A named select method. Since a select method defines all there is to
28188 know about connecting to a (physical) server, taking the thing as a
28189 whole is a virtual server.
28193 Taking a buffer and running it through a filter of some sort. The
28194 result will (more often than not) be cleaner and more pleasing than the
28197 @item ephemeral groups
28198 @cindex ephemeral groups
28199 @cindex temporary groups
28200 Most groups store data on what articles you have read. @dfn{Ephemeral}
28201 groups are groups that will have no data stored---when you exit the
28202 group, it'll disappear into the aether.
28205 @cindex solid groups
28206 This is the opposite of ephemeral groups. All groups listed in the
28207 group buffer are solid groups.
28209 @item sparse articles
28210 @cindex sparse articles
28211 These are article placeholders shown in the summary buffer when
28212 @code{gnus-build-sparse-threads} has been switched on.
28216 To put responses to articles directly after the articles they respond
28217 to---in a hierarchical fashion.
28221 @cindex thread root
28222 The first article in a thread is the root. It is the ancestor of all
28223 articles in the thread.
28227 An article that has responses.
28231 An article that responds to a different article---its parent.
28235 A collection of messages in one file. The most common digest format is
28236 specified by RFC 1153.
28239 @cindex splitting, terminology
28240 @cindex mail sorting
28241 @cindex mail filtering (splitting)
28242 The action of sorting your emails according to certain rules. Sometimes
28243 incorrectly called mail filtering.
28249 @node Customization
28250 @section Customization
28251 @cindex general customization
28253 All variables are properly documented elsewhere in this manual. This
28254 section is designed to give general pointers on how to customize Gnus
28255 for some quite common situations.
28258 * Slow/Expensive Connection:: You run a local Emacs and get the news elsewhere.
28259 * Slow Terminal Connection:: You run a remote Emacs.
28260 * Little Disk Space:: You feel that having large setup files is icky.
28261 * Slow Machine:: You feel like buying a faster machine.
28265 @node Slow/Expensive Connection
28266 @subsection Slow/Expensive Connection
28268 If you run Emacs on a machine locally, and get your news from a machine
28269 over some very thin strings, you want to cut down on the amount of data
28270 Gnus has to get from the server.
28274 @item gnus-read-active-file
28275 Set this to @code{nil}, which will inhibit Gnus from requesting the
28276 entire active file from the server. This file is often very large. You
28277 also have to set @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} and
28278 @code{gnus-check-bogus-newsgroups} to @code{nil} to make sure that Gnus
28279 doesn't suddenly decide to fetch the active file anyway.
28281 @item gnus-nov-is-evil
28282 @vindex gnus-nov-is-evil
28283 Usually this one must @emph{always} be @code{nil} (which is the
28284 default). If, for example, you wish to not use @acronym{NOV}
28285 (@pxref{Terminology}) with the @code{nntp} back end (@pxref{Crosspost
28286 Handling}), set @code{nntp-nov-is-evil} to a non-@code{nil} value
28287 instead of setting this. But you normally do not need to set
28288 @code{nntp-nov-is-evil} since Gnus by itself will detect whether the
28289 @acronym{NNTP} server supports @acronym{NOV}. Anyway, grabbing article
28290 headers from the @acronym{NNTP} server will not be very fast if you tell
28291 Gnus not to use @acronym{NOV}.
28293 As the variables for the other back ends, there are
28294 @code{nndiary-nov-is-evil}, @code{nndir-nov-is-evil},
28295 @code{nnfolder-nov-is-evil}, @code{nnimap-nov-is-evil},
28296 @code{nnml-nov-is-evil}, @code{nnspool-nov-is-evil}, and
28297 @code{nnwarchive-nov-is-evil}. Note that a non-@code{nil} value for
28298 @code{gnus-nov-is-evil} overrides all those variables.@footnote{Although
28299 the back ends @code{nnkiboze}, @code{nnslashdot}, @code{nnultimate}, and
28300 @code{nnwfm} don't have their own nn*-nov-is-evil.}
28304 @node Slow Terminal Connection
28305 @subsection Slow Terminal Connection
28307 Let's say you use your home computer for dialing up the system that runs
28308 Emacs and Gnus. If your modem is slow, you want to reduce (as much as
28309 possible) the amount of data sent over the wires.
28313 @item gnus-auto-center-summary
28314 Set this to @code{nil} to inhibit Gnus from re-centering the summary
28315 buffer all the time. If it is @code{vertical}, do only vertical
28316 re-centering. If it is neither @code{nil} nor @code{vertical}, do both
28317 horizontal and vertical recentering.
28319 @item gnus-visible-headers
28320 Cut down on the headers included in the articles to the
28321 minimum. You can, in fact, make do without them altogether---most of the
28322 useful data is in the summary buffer, anyway. Set this variable to
28323 @samp{^NEVVVVER} or @samp{From:}, or whatever you feel you need.
28325 Use the following to enable all the available hiding features:
28327 (setq gnus-treat-hide-headers 'head
28328 gnus-treat-hide-signature t
28329 gnus-treat-hide-citation t)
28332 @item gnus-use-full-window
28333 By setting this to @code{nil}, you can make all the windows smaller.
28334 While this doesn't really cut down much generally, it means that you
28335 have to see smaller portions of articles before deciding that you didn't
28336 want to read them anyway.
28338 @item gnus-thread-hide-subtree
28339 If this is non-@code{nil}, all threads in the summary buffer will be
28343 @item gnus-updated-mode-lines
28344 If this is @code{nil}, Gnus will not put information in the buffer mode
28345 lines, which might save some time.
28349 @node Little Disk Space
28350 @subsection Little Disk Space
28353 The startup files can get rather large, so you may want to cut their
28354 sizes a bit if you are running out of space.
28358 @item gnus-save-newsrc-file
28359 If this is @code{nil}, Gnus will never save @file{.newsrc}---it will
28360 only save @file{.newsrc.eld}. This means that you will not be able to
28361 use any other newsreaders than Gnus. This variable is @code{t} by
28364 @item gnus-read-newsrc-file
28365 If this is @code{nil}, Gnus will never read @file{.newsrc}---it will
28366 only read @file{.newsrc.eld}. This means that you will not be able to
28367 use any other newsreaders than Gnus. This variable is @code{t} by
28370 @item gnus-save-killed-list
28371 If this is @code{nil}, Gnus will not save the list of dead groups. You
28372 should also set @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} to @code{ask-server}
28373 and @code{gnus-check-bogus-newsgroups} to @code{nil} if you set this
28374 variable to @code{nil}. This variable is @code{t} by default.
28380 @subsection Slow Machine
28381 @cindex slow machine
28383 If you have a slow machine, or are just really impatient, there are a
28384 few things you can do to make Gnus run faster.
28386 Set @code{gnus-check-new-newsgroups} and
28387 @code{gnus-check-bogus-newsgroups} to @code{nil} to make startup faster.
28389 Set @code{gnus-show-threads}, @code{gnus-use-cross-reference} and
28390 @code{gnus-nov-is-evil} to @code{nil} to make entering and exiting the
28391 summary buffer faster. Also @pxref{Slow/Expensive Connection}.
28395 @node Troubleshooting
28396 @section Troubleshooting
28397 @cindex troubleshooting
28399 Gnus works @emph{so} well straight out of the box---I can't imagine any
28407 Make sure your computer is switched on.
28410 Make sure that you really load the current Gnus version. If you have
28411 been running @sc{gnus}, you need to exit Emacs and start it up again before
28415 Try doing an @kbd{M-x gnus-version}. If you get something that looks
28417 @samp{No Gnus v0.7} @c Adjust ../Makefile.in if you change this line!
28419 you have the right files loaded. Otherwise you have some old @file{.el}
28420 files lying around. Delete these.
28423 Read the help group (@kbd{G h} in the group buffer) for a
28424 @acronym{FAQ} and a how-to.
28427 @vindex max-lisp-eval-depth
28428 Gnus works on many recursive structures, and in some extreme (and very
28429 rare) cases Gnus may recurse down ``too deeply'' and Emacs will beep at
28430 you. If this happens to you, set @code{max-lisp-eval-depth} to 500 or
28431 something like that.
28434 If all else fails, report the problem as a bug.
28437 @cindex reporting bugs
28439 @kindex M-x gnus-bug
28441 If you find a bug in Gnus, you can report it with the @kbd{M-x gnus-bug}
28442 command. @kbd{M-x set-variable RET debug-on-error RET t RET}, and send
28443 me the backtrace. I will fix bugs, but I can only fix them if you send
28444 me a precise description as to how to reproduce the bug.
28446 You really can never be too detailed in a bug report. Always use the
28447 @kbd{M-x gnus-bug} command when you make bug reports, even if it creates
28448 a 10Kb mail each time you use it, and even if you have sent me your
28449 environment 500 times before. I don't care. I want the full info each
28452 It is also important to remember that I have no memory whatsoever. If
28453 you send a bug report, and I send you a reply, and then you just send
28454 back ``No, it's not! Moron!'', I will have no idea what you are
28455 insulting me about. Always over-explain everything. It's much easier
28456 for all of us---if I don't have all the information I need, I will just
28457 mail you and ask for more info, and everything takes more time.
28459 If the problem you're seeing is very visual, and you can't quite explain
28460 it, copy the Emacs window to a file (with @code{xwd}, for instance), put
28461 it somewhere it can be reached, and include the URL of the picture in
28465 If you would like to contribute a patch to fix bugs or make
28466 improvements, please produce the patch using @samp{diff -u}.
28469 If you want to debug your problem further before reporting, possibly
28470 in order to solve the problem yourself and send a patch, you can use
28471 edebug. Debugging Lisp code is documented in the Elisp manual
28472 (@pxref{Debugging, , Debugging Lisp Programs, elisp, The GNU Emacs
28473 Lisp Reference Manual}). To get you started with edebug, consider if
28474 you discover some weird behavior when pressing @kbd{c}, the first
28475 step is to do @kbd{C-h k c} and click on the hyperlink (Emacs only) in
28476 the documentation buffer that leads you to the function definition,
28477 then press @kbd{M-x edebug-defun RET} with point inside that function,
28478 return to Gnus and press @kbd{c} to invoke the code. You will be
28479 placed in the lisp buffer and can single step using @kbd{SPC} and
28480 evaluate expressions using @kbd{M-:} or inspect variables using
28481 @kbd{C-h v}, abort execution with @kbd{q}, and resume execution with
28482 @kbd{c} or @kbd{g}.
28487 Sometimes, a problem do not directly generate an elisp error but
28488 manifests itself by causing Gnus to be very slow. In these cases, you
28489 can use @kbd{M-x toggle-debug-on-quit} and press @kbd{C-g} when things are
28490 slow, and then try to analyze the backtrace (repeating the procedure
28491 helps isolating the real problem areas).
28493 A fancier approach is to use the elisp profiler, ELP. The profiler is
28494 (or should be) fully documented elsewhere, but to get you started
28495 there are a few steps that need to be followed. First, instrument the
28496 part of Gnus you are interested in for profiling, e.g. @kbd{M-x
28497 elp-instrument-package RET gnus} or @kbd{M-x elp-instrument-package
28498 RET message}. Then perform the operation that is slow and press
28499 @kbd{M-x elp-results}. You will then see which operations that takes
28500 time, and can debug them further. If the entire operation takes much
28501 longer than the time spent in the slowest function in the profiler
28502 output, you probably profiled the wrong part of Gnus. To reset
28503 profiling statistics, use @kbd{M-x elp-reset-all}. @kbd{M-x
28504 elp-restore-all} is supposed to remove profiling, but given the
28505 complexities and dynamic code generation in Gnus, it might not always
28508 @cindex gnu.emacs.gnus
28509 @cindex ding mailing list
28510 If you just need help, you are better off asking on
28511 @samp{gnu.emacs.gnus}. I'm not very helpful. You can also ask on
28512 @email{ding@@gnus.org, the ding mailing list}. Write to
28513 @email{ding-request@@gnus.org} to subscribe.
28517 @node Gnus Reference Guide
28518 @section Gnus Reference Guide
28520 It is my hope that other people will figure out smart stuff that Gnus
28521 can do, and that other people will write those smart things as well. To
28522 facilitate that I thought it would be a good idea to describe the inner
28523 workings of Gnus. And some of the not-so-inner workings, while I'm at
28526 You can never expect the internals of a program not to change, but I
28527 will be defining (in some details) the interface between Gnus and its
28528 back ends (this is written in stone), the format of the score files
28529 (ditto), data structures (some are less likely to change than others)
28530 and general methods of operation.
28533 * Gnus Utility Functions:: Common functions and variable to use.
28534 * Back End Interface:: How Gnus communicates with the servers.
28535 * Score File Syntax:: A BNF definition of the score file standard.
28536 * Headers:: How Gnus stores headers internally.
28537 * Ranges:: A handy format for storing mucho numbers.
28538 * Group Info:: The group info format.
28539 * Extended Interactive:: Symbolic prefixes and stuff.
28540 * Emacs/XEmacs Code:: Gnus can be run under all modern Emacsen.
28541 * Various File Formats:: Formats of files that Gnus use.
28545 @node Gnus Utility Functions
28546 @subsection Gnus Utility Functions
28547 @cindex Gnus utility functions
28548 @cindex utility functions
28550 @cindex internal variables
28552 When writing small functions to be run from hooks (and stuff), it's
28553 vital to have access to the Gnus internal functions and variables.
28554 Below is a list of the most common ones.
28558 @item gnus-newsgroup-name
28559 @vindex gnus-newsgroup-name
28560 This variable holds the name of the current newsgroup.
28562 @item gnus-find-method-for-group
28563 @findex gnus-find-method-for-group
28564 A function that returns the select method for @var{group}.
28566 @item gnus-group-real-name
28567 @findex gnus-group-real-name
28568 Takes a full (prefixed) Gnus group name, and returns the unprefixed
28571 @item gnus-group-prefixed-name
28572 @findex gnus-group-prefixed-name
28573 Takes an unprefixed group name and a select method, and returns the full
28574 (prefixed) Gnus group name.
28576 @item gnus-get-info
28577 @findex gnus-get-info
28578 Returns the group info list for @var{group}.
28580 @item gnus-group-unread
28581 @findex gnus-group-unread
28582 The number of unread articles in @var{group}, or @code{t} if that is
28586 @findex gnus-active
28587 The active entry for @var{group}.
28589 @item gnus-set-active
28590 @findex gnus-set-active
28591 Set the active entry for @var{group}.
28593 @item gnus-add-current-to-buffer-list
28594 @findex gnus-add-current-to-buffer-list
28595 Adds the current buffer to the list of buffers to be killed on Gnus
28598 @item gnus-continuum-version
28599 @findex gnus-continuum-version
28600 Takes a Gnus version string as a parameter and returns a floating point
28601 number. Earlier versions will always get a lower number than later
28604 @item gnus-group-read-only-p
28605 @findex gnus-group-read-only-p
28606 Says whether @var{group} is read-only or not.
28608 @item gnus-news-group-p
28609 @findex gnus-news-group-p
28610 Says whether @var{group} came from a news back end.
28612 @item gnus-ephemeral-group-p
28613 @findex gnus-ephemeral-group-p
28614 Says whether @var{group} is ephemeral or not.
28616 @item gnus-server-to-method
28617 @findex gnus-server-to-method
28618 Returns the select method corresponding to @var{server}.
28620 @item gnus-server-equal
28621 @findex gnus-server-equal
28622 Says whether two virtual servers are equal.
28624 @item gnus-group-native-p
28625 @findex gnus-group-native-p
28626 Says whether @var{group} is native or not.
28628 @item gnus-group-secondary-p
28629 @findex gnus-group-secondary-p
28630 Says whether @var{group} is secondary or not.
28632 @item gnus-group-foreign-p
28633 @findex gnus-group-foreign-p
28634 Says whether @var{group} is foreign or not.
28636 @item gnus-group-find-parameter
28637 @findex gnus-group-find-parameter
28638 Returns the parameter list of @var{group}. If given a second parameter,
28639 returns the value of that parameter for @var{group}.
28641 @item gnus-group-set-parameter
28642 @findex gnus-group-set-parameter
28643 Takes three parameters; @var{group}, @var{parameter} and @var{value}.
28645 @item gnus-narrow-to-body
28646 @findex gnus-narrow-to-body
28647 Narrows the current buffer to the body of the article.
28649 @item gnus-check-backend-function
28650 @findex gnus-check-backend-function
28651 Takes two parameters, @var{function} and @var{group}. If the back end
28652 @var{group} comes from supports @var{function}, return non-@code{nil}.
28655 (gnus-check-backend-function "request-scan" "nnml:misc")
28659 @item gnus-read-method
28660 @findex gnus-read-method
28661 Prompts the user for a select method.
28666 @node Back End Interface
28667 @subsection Back End Interface
28669 Gnus doesn't know anything about @acronym{NNTP}, spools, mail or virtual
28670 groups. It only knows how to talk to @dfn{virtual servers}. A virtual
28671 server is a @dfn{back end} and some @dfn{back end variables}. As examples
28672 of the first, we have @code{nntp}, @code{nnspool} and @code{nnmbox}. As
28673 examples of the latter we have @code{nntp-port-number} and
28674 @code{nnmbox-directory}.
28676 When Gnus asks for information from a back end---say @code{nntp}---on
28677 something, it will normally include a virtual server name in the
28678 function parameters. (If not, the back end should use the ``current''
28679 virtual server.) For instance, @code{nntp-request-list} takes a virtual
28680 server as its only (optional) parameter. If this virtual server hasn't
28681 been opened, the function should fail.
28683 Note that a virtual server name has no relation to some physical server
28684 name. Take this example:
28688 (nntp-address "ifi.uio.no")
28689 (nntp-port-number 4324))
28692 Here the virtual server name is @samp{odd-one} while the name of
28693 the physical server is @samp{ifi.uio.no}.
28695 The back ends should be able to switch between several virtual servers.
28696 The standard back ends implement this by keeping an alist of virtual
28697 server environments that they pull down/push up when needed.
28699 There are two groups of interface functions: @dfn{required functions},
28700 which must be present, and @dfn{optional functions}, which Gnus will
28701 always check for presence before attempting to call 'em.
28703 All these functions are expected to return data in the buffer
28704 @code{nntp-server-buffer} (@samp{ *nntpd*}), which is somewhat
28705 unfortunately named, but we'll have to live with it. When I talk about
28706 @dfn{resulting data}, I always refer to the data in that buffer. When I
28707 talk about @dfn{return value}, I talk about the function value returned by
28708 the function call. Functions that fail should return @code{nil} as the
28711 Some back ends could be said to be @dfn{server-forming} back ends, and
28712 some might be said not to be. The latter are back ends that generally
28713 only operate on one group at a time, and have no concept of ``server''
28714 ---they have a group, and they deliver info on that group and nothing
28717 Gnus identifies each message by way of group name and article number. A
28718 few remarks about these article numbers might be useful. First of all,
28719 the numbers are positive integers. Secondly, it is normally not
28720 possible for later articles to ``re-use'' older article numbers without
28721 confusing Gnus. That is, if a group has ever contained a message
28722 numbered 42, then no other message may get that number, or Gnus will get
28723 mightily confused.@footnote{See the function
28724 @code{nnchoke-request-update-info}, @ref{Optional Back End Functions}.}
28725 Third, article numbers must be assigned in order of arrival in the
28726 group; this is not necessarily the same as the date of the message.
28728 The previous paragraph already mentions all the ``hard'' restrictions that
28729 article numbers must fulfill. But it seems that it might be useful to
28730 assign @emph{consecutive} article numbers, for Gnus gets quite confused
28731 if there are holes in the article numbering sequence. However, due to
28732 the ``no-reuse'' restriction, holes cannot be avoided altogether. It's
28733 also useful for the article numbers to start at 1 to avoid running out
28734 of numbers as long as possible.
28736 Note that by convention, back ends are named @code{nnsomething}, but
28737 Gnus also comes with some @code{nnnotbackends}, such as
28738 @file{nnheader.el}, @file{nnmail.el} and @file{nnoo.el}.
28740 In the examples and definitions I will refer to the imaginary back end
28743 @cindex @code{nnchoke}
28746 * Required Back End Functions:: Functions that must be implemented.
28747 * Optional Back End Functions:: Functions that need not be implemented.
28748 * Error Messaging:: How to get messages and report errors.
28749 * Writing New Back Ends:: Extending old back ends.
28750 * Hooking New Back Ends Into Gnus:: What has to be done on the Gnus end.
28751 * Mail-like Back Ends:: Some tips on mail back ends.
28755 @node Required Back End Functions
28756 @subsubsection Required Back End Functions
28760 @item (nnchoke-retrieve-headers ARTICLES &optional GROUP SERVER FETCH-OLD)
28762 @var{articles} is either a range of article numbers or a list of
28763 @code{Message-ID}s. Current back ends do not fully support either---only
28764 sequences (lists) of article numbers, and most back ends do not support
28765 retrieval of @code{Message-ID}s. But they should try for both.
28767 The result data should either be HEADs or @acronym{NOV} lines, and the result
28768 value should either be @code{headers} or @code{nov} to reflect this.
28769 This might later be expanded to @code{various}, which will be a mixture
28770 of HEADs and @acronym{NOV} lines, but this is currently not supported by Gnus.
28772 If @var{fetch-old} is non-@code{nil} it says to try fetching ``extra
28773 headers'', in some meaning of the word. This is generally done by
28774 fetching (at most) @var{fetch-old} extra headers less than the smallest
28775 article number in @code{articles}, and filling the gaps as well. The
28776 presence of this parameter can be ignored if the back end finds it
28777 cumbersome to follow the request. If this is non-@code{nil} and not a
28778 number, do maximum fetches.
28780 Here's an example HEAD:
28783 221 1056 Article retrieved.
28784 Path: ifi.uio.no!sturles
28785 From: sturles@@ifi.uio.no (Sturle Sunde)
28786 Newsgroups: ifi.discussion
28787 Subject: Re: Something very droll
28788 Date: 27 Oct 1994 14:02:57 +0100
28789 Organization: Dept. of Informatics, University of Oslo, Norway
28791 Message-ID: <38o8e1$a0o@@holmenkollen.ifi.uio.no>
28792 References: <38jdmq$4qu@@visbur.ifi.uio.no>
28793 NNTP-Posting-Host: holmenkollen.ifi.uio.no
28797 So a @code{headers} return value would imply that there's a number of
28798 these in the data buffer.
28800 Here's a BNF definition of such a buffer:
28804 head = error / valid-head
28805 error-message = [ "4" / "5" ] 2number " " <error message> eol
28806 valid-head = valid-message *header "." eol
28807 valid-message = "221 " <number> " Article retrieved." eol
28808 header = <text> eol
28812 (The version of BNF used here is the one used in RFC822.)
28814 If the return value is @code{nov}, the data buffer should contain
28815 @dfn{network overview database} lines. These are basically fields
28819 nov-buffer = *nov-line
28820 nov-line = field 7*8[ <TAB> field ] eol
28821 field = <text except TAB>
28824 For a closer look at what should be in those fields,
28828 @item (nnchoke-open-server SERVER &optional DEFINITIONS)
28830 @var{server} is here the virtual server name. @var{definitions} is a
28831 list of @code{(VARIABLE VALUE)} pairs that define this virtual server.
28833 If the server can't be opened, no error should be signaled. The back end
28834 may then choose to refuse further attempts at connecting to this
28835 server. In fact, it should do so.
28837 If the server is opened already, this function should return a
28838 non-@code{nil} value. There should be no data returned.
28841 @item (nnchoke-close-server &optional SERVER)
28843 Close connection to @var{server} and free all resources connected
28844 to it. Return @code{nil} if the server couldn't be closed for some
28847 There should be no data returned.
28850 @item (nnchoke-request-close)
28852 Close connection to all servers and free all resources that the back end
28853 have reserved. All buffers that have been created by that back end
28854 should be killed. (Not the @code{nntp-server-buffer}, though.) This
28855 function is generally only called when Gnus is shutting down.
28857 There should be no data returned.
28860 @item (nnchoke-server-opened &optional SERVER)
28862 If @var{server} is the current virtual server, and the connection to the
28863 physical server is alive, then this function should return a
28864 non-@code{nil} value. This function should under no circumstances
28865 attempt to reconnect to a server we have lost connection to.
28867 There should be no data returned.
28870 @item (nnchoke-status-message &optional SERVER)
28872 This function should return the last error message from @var{server}.
28874 There should be no data returned.
28877 @item (nnchoke-request-article ARTICLE &optional GROUP SERVER TO-BUFFER)
28879 The result data from this function should be the article specified by
28880 @var{article}. This might either be a @code{Message-ID} or a number.
28881 It is optional whether to implement retrieval by @code{Message-ID}, but
28882 it would be nice if that were possible.
28884 If @var{to-buffer} is non-@code{nil}, the result data should be returned
28885 in this buffer instead of the normal data buffer. This is to make it
28886 possible to avoid copying large amounts of data from one buffer to
28887 another, while Gnus mainly requests articles to be inserted directly
28888 into its article buffer.
28890 If it is at all possible, this function should return a cons cell where
28891 the @code{car} is the group name the article was fetched from, and the @code{cdr} is
28892 the article number. This will enable Gnus to find out what the real
28893 group and article numbers are when fetching articles by
28894 @code{Message-ID}. If this isn't possible, @code{t} should be returned
28895 on successful article retrieval.
28898 @item (nnchoke-request-group GROUP &optional SERVER FAST)
28900 Get data on @var{group}. This function also has the side effect of
28901 making @var{group} the current group.
28903 If @var{fast}, don't bother to return useful data, just make @var{group}
28906 Here's an example of some result data and a definition of the same:
28909 211 56 1000 1059 ifi.discussion
28912 The first number is the status, which should be 211. Next is the
28913 total number of articles in the group, the lowest article number, the
28914 highest article number, and finally the group name. Note that the total
28915 number of articles may be less than one might think while just
28916 considering the highest and lowest article numbers, but some articles
28917 may have been canceled. Gnus just discards the total-number, so
28918 whether one should take the bother to generate it properly (if that is a
28919 problem) is left as an exercise to the reader. If the group contains no
28920 articles, the lowest article number should be reported as 1 and the
28924 group-status = [ error / info ] eol
28925 error = [ "4" / "5" ] 2<number> " " <Error message>
28926 info = "211 " 3* [ <number> " " ] <string>
28930 @item (nnchoke-close-group GROUP &optional SERVER)
28932 Close @var{group} and free any resources connected to it. This will be
28933 a no-op on most back ends.
28935 There should be no data returned.
28938 @item (nnchoke-request-list &optional SERVER)
28940 Return a list of all groups available on @var{server}. And that means
28943 Here's an example from a server that only carries two groups:
28946 ifi.test 0000002200 0000002000 y
28947 ifi.discussion 3324 3300 n
28950 On each line we have a group name, then the highest article number in
28951 that group, the lowest article number, and finally a flag. If the group
28952 contains no articles, the lowest article number should be reported as 1
28953 and the highest as 0.
28956 active-file = *active-line
28957 active-line = name " " <number> " " <number> " " flags eol
28959 flags = "n" / "y" / "m" / "x" / "j" / "=" name
28962 The flag says whether the group is read-only (@samp{n}), is moderated
28963 (@samp{m}), is dead (@samp{x}), is aliased to some other group
28964 (@samp{=other-group}) or none of the above (@samp{y}).
28967 @item (nnchoke-request-post &optional SERVER)
28969 This function should post the current buffer. It might return whether
28970 the posting was successful or not, but that's not required. If, for
28971 instance, the posting is done asynchronously, it has generally not been
28972 completed by the time this function concludes. In that case, this
28973 function should set up some kind of sentinel to beep the user loud and
28974 clear if the posting could not be completed.
28976 There should be no result data from this function.
28981 @node Optional Back End Functions
28982 @subsubsection Optional Back End Functions
28986 @item (nnchoke-retrieve-groups GROUPS &optional SERVER)
28988 @var{groups} is a list of groups, and this function should request data
28989 on all those groups. How it does it is of no concern to Gnus, but it
28990 should attempt to do this in a speedy fashion.
28992 The return value of this function can be either @code{active} or
28993 @code{group}, which says what the format of the result data is. The
28994 former is in the same format as the data from
28995 @code{nnchoke-request-list}, while the latter is a buffer full of lines
28996 in the same format as @code{nnchoke-request-group} gives.
28999 group-buffer = *active-line / *group-status
29003 @item (nnchoke-request-update-info GROUP INFO &optional SERVER)
29005 A Gnus group info (@pxref{Group Info}) is handed to the back end for
29006 alterations. This comes in handy if the back end really carries all
29007 the information (as is the case with virtual and imap groups). This
29008 function should destructively alter the info to suit its needs, and
29009 should return a non-@code{nil} value (exceptionally,
29010 @code{nntp-request-update-info} always returns @code{nil} not to waste
29011 the network resources).
29013 There should be no result data from this function.
29016 @item (nnchoke-request-type GROUP &optional ARTICLE)
29018 When the user issues commands for ``sending news'' (@kbd{F} in the
29019 summary buffer, for instance), Gnus has to know whether the article the
29020 user is following up on is news or mail. This function should return
29021 @code{news} if @var{article} in @var{group} is news, @code{mail} if it
29022 is mail and @code{unknown} if the type can't be decided. (The
29023 @var{article} parameter is necessary in @code{nnvirtual} groups which
29024 might very well combine mail groups and news groups.) Both @var{group}
29025 and @var{article} may be @code{nil}.
29027 There should be no result data from this function.
29030 @item (nnchoke-request-set-mark GROUP ACTION &optional SERVER)
29032 Set/remove/add marks on articles. Normally Gnus handles the article
29033 marks (such as read, ticked, expired etc) internally, and store them in
29034 @file{~/.newsrc.eld}. Some back ends (such as @acronym{IMAP}) however carry
29035 all information about the articles on the server, so Gnus need to
29036 propagate the mark information to the server.
29038 @var{action} is a list of mark setting requests, having this format:
29041 (RANGE ACTION MARK)
29044 @var{range} is a range of articles you wish to update marks on.
29045 @var{action} is @code{add} or @code{del}, used to add marks or remove
29046 marks (preserving all marks not mentioned). @var{mark} is a list of
29047 marks; where each mark is a symbol. Currently used marks are
29048 @code{read}, @code{tick}, @code{reply}, @code{expire}, @code{killed},
29049 @code{dormant}, @code{save}, @code{download}, @code{unsend},
29050 @code{forward} and @code{recent}, but your back end should, if
29051 possible, not limit itself to these.
29053 Given contradictory actions, the last action in the list should be the
29054 effective one. That is, if your action contains a request to add the
29055 @code{tick} mark on article 1 and, later in the list, a request to
29056 remove the mark on the same article, the mark should in fact be removed.
29058 An example action list:
29061 (((5 12 30) 'del '(tick))
29062 ((10 . 90) 'add '(read expire))
29063 ((92 94) 'del '(read)))
29066 The function should return a range of articles it wasn't able to set the
29067 mark on (currently not used for anything).
29069 There should be no result data from this function.
29071 @item (nnchoke-request-update-mark GROUP ARTICLE MARK)
29073 If the user tries to set a mark that the back end doesn't like, this
29074 function may change the mark. Gnus will use whatever this function
29075 returns as the mark for @var{article} instead of the original
29076 @var{mark}. If the back end doesn't care, it must return the original
29077 @var{mark}, and not @code{nil} or any other type of garbage.
29079 The only use for this I can see is what @code{nnvirtual} does with
29080 it---if a component group is auto-expirable, marking an article as read
29081 in the virtual group should result in the article being marked as
29084 There should be no result data from this function.
29087 @item (nnchoke-request-scan &optional GROUP SERVER)
29089 This function may be called at any time (by Gnus or anything else) to
29090 request that the back end check for incoming articles, in one way or
29091 another. A mail back end will typically read the spool file or query
29092 the @acronym{POP} server when this function is invoked. The
29093 @var{group} doesn't have to be heeded---if the back end decides that
29094 it is too much work just scanning for a single group, it may do a
29095 total scan of all groups. It would be nice, however, to keep things
29096 local if that's practical.
29098 There should be no result data from this function.
29101 @item (nnchoke-request-group-description GROUP &optional SERVER)
29103 The result data from this function should be a description of
29107 description-line = name <TAB> description eol
29109 description = <text>
29112 @item (nnchoke-request-list-newsgroups &optional SERVER)
29114 The result data from this function should be the description of all
29115 groups available on the server.
29118 description-buffer = *description-line
29122 @item (nnchoke-request-newgroups DATE &optional SERVER)
29124 The result data from this function should be all groups that were
29125 created after @samp{date}, which is in normal human-readable date format
29126 (i.e., the date format used in mail and news headers, and returned by
29127 the function @code{message-make-date} by default). The data should be
29128 in the active buffer format.
29130 It is okay for this function to return ``too many'' groups; some back ends
29131 might find it cheaper to return the full list of groups, rather than
29132 just the new groups. But don't do this for back ends with many groups.
29133 Normally, if the user creates the groups herself, there won't be too
29134 many groups, so @code{nnml} and the like are probably safe. But for
29135 back ends like @code{nntp}, where the groups have been created by the
29136 server, it is quite likely that there can be many groups.
29139 @item (nnchoke-request-create-group GROUP &optional SERVER)
29141 This function should create an empty group with name @var{group}.
29143 There should be no return data.
29146 @item (nnchoke-request-expire-articles ARTICLES &optional GROUP SERVER FORCE)
29148 This function should run the expiry process on all articles in the
29149 @var{articles} range (which is currently a simple list of article
29150 numbers.) It is left up to the back end to decide how old articles
29151 should be before they are removed by this function. If @var{force} is
29152 non-@code{nil}, all @var{articles} should be deleted, no matter how new
29155 This function should return a list of articles that it did not/was not
29158 There should be no result data returned.
29161 @item (nnchoke-request-move-article ARTICLE GROUP SERVER ACCEPT-FORM &optional LAST)
29163 This function should move @var{article} (which is a number) from
29164 @var{group} by calling @var{accept-form}.
29166 This function should ready the article in question for moving by
29167 removing any header lines it has added to the article, and generally
29168 should ``tidy up'' the article. Then it should @code{eval}
29169 @var{accept-form} in the buffer where the ``tidy'' article is. This
29170 will do the actual copying. If this @code{eval} returns a
29171 non-@code{nil} value, the article should be removed.
29173 If @var{last} is @code{nil}, that means that there is a high likelihood
29174 that there will be more requests issued shortly, so that allows some
29177 The function should return a cons where the @code{car} is the group name and
29178 the @code{cdr} is the article number that the article was entered as.
29180 There should be no data returned.
29183 @item (nnchoke-request-accept-article GROUP &optional SERVER LAST)
29185 This function takes the current buffer and inserts it into @var{group}.
29186 If @var{last} in @code{nil}, that means that there will be more calls to
29187 this function in short order.
29189 The function should return a cons where the @code{car} is the group name and
29190 the @code{cdr} is the article number that the article was entered as.
29192 The group should exist before the back end is asked to accept the
29193 article for that group.
29195 There should be no data returned.
29198 @item (nnchoke-request-replace-article ARTICLE GROUP BUFFER)
29200 This function should remove @var{article} (which is a number) from
29201 @var{group} and insert @var{buffer} there instead.
29203 There should be no data returned.
29206 @item (nnchoke-request-delete-group GROUP FORCE &optional SERVER)
29208 This function should delete @var{group}. If @var{force}, it should
29209 really delete all the articles in the group, and then delete the group
29210 itself. (If there is such a thing as ``the group itself''.)
29212 There should be no data returned.
29215 @item (nnchoke-request-rename-group GROUP NEW-NAME &optional SERVER)
29217 This function should rename @var{group} into @var{new-name}. All
29218 articles in @var{group} should move to @var{new-name}.
29220 There should be no data returned.
29225 @node Error Messaging
29226 @subsubsection Error Messaging
29228 @findex nnheader-report
29229 @findex nnheader-get-report
29230 The back ends should use the function @code{nnheader-report} to report
29231 error conditions---they should not raise errors when they aren't able to
29232 perform a request. The first argument to this function is the back end
29233 symbol, and the rest are interpreted as arguments to @code{format} if
29234 there are multiple of them, or just a string if there is one of them.
29235 This function must always returns @code{nil}.
29238 (nnheader-report 'nnchoke "You did something totally bogus")
29240 (nnheader-report 'nnchoke "Could not request group %s" group)
29243 Gnus, in turn, will call @code{nnheader-get-report} when it gets a
29244 @code{nil} back from a server, and this function returns the most
29245 recently reported message for the back end in question. This function
29246 takes one argument---the server symbol.
29248 Internally, these functions access @var{back-end}@code{-status-string},
29249 so the @code{nnchoke} back end will have its error message stored in
29250 @code{nnchoke-status-string}.
29253 @node Writing New Back Ends
29254 @subsubsection Writing New Back Ends
29256 Many back ends are quite similar. @code{nnml} is just like
29257 @code{nnspool}, but it allows you to edit the articles on the server.
29258 @code{nnmh} is just like @code{nnml}, but it doesn't use an active file,
29259 and it doesn't maintain overview databases. @code{nndir} is just like
29260 @code{nnml}, but it has no concept of ``groups'', and it doesn't allow
29263 It would make sense if it were possible to ``inherit'' functions from
29264 back ends when writing new back ends. And, indeed, you can do that if you
29265 want to. (You don't have to if you don't want to, of course.)
29267 All the back ends declare their public variables and functions by using a
29268 package called @code{nnoo}.
29270 To inherit functions from other back ends (and allow other back ends to
29271 inherit functions from the current back end), you should use the
29277 This macro declares the first parameter to be a child of the subsequent
29278 parameters. For instance:
29281 (nnoo-declare nndir
29285 @code{nndir} has declared here that it intends to inherit functions from
29286 both @code{nnml} and @code{nnmh}.
29289 This macro is equivalent to @code{defvar}, but registers the variable as
29290 a public server variable. Most state-oriented variables should be
29291 declared with @code{defvoo} instead of @code{defvar}.
29293 In addition to the normal @code{defvar} parameters, it takes a list of
29294 variables in the parent back ends to map the variable to when executing
29295 a function in those back ends.
29298 (defvoo nndir-directory nil
29299 "Where nndir will look for groups."
29300 nnml-current-directory nnmh-current-directory)
29303 This means that @code{nnml-current-directory} will be set to
29304 @code{nndir-directory} when an @code{nnml} function is called on behalf
29305 of @code{nndir}. (The same with @code{nnmh}.)
29307 @item nnoo-define-basics
29308 This macro defines some common functions that almost all back ends should
29312 (nnoo-define-basics nndir)
29316 This macro is just like @code{defun} and takes the same parameters. In
29317 addition to doing the normal @code{defun} things, it registers the
29318 function as being public so that other back ends can inherit it.
29320 @item nnoo-map-functions
29321 This macro allows mapping of functions from the current back end to
29322 functions from the parent back ends.
29325 (nnoo-map-functions nndir
29326 (nnml-retrieve-headers 0 nndir-current-group 0 0)
29327 (nnmh-request-article 0 nndir-current-group 0 0))
29330 This means that when @code{nndir-retrieve-headers} is called, the first,
29331 third, and fourth parameters will be passed on to
29332 @code{nnml-retrieve-headers}, while the second parameter is set to the
29333 value of @code{nndir-current-group}.
29336 This macro allows importing functions from back ends. It should be the
29337 last thing in the source file, since it will only define functions that
29338 haven't already been defined.
29344 nnmh-request-newgroups)
29348 This means that calls to @code{nndir-request-list} should just be passed
29349 on to @code{nnmh-request-list}, while all public functions from
29350 @code{nnml} that haven't been defined in @code{nndir} yet should be
29355 Below is a slightly shortened version of the @code{nndir} back end.
29358 ;;; @r{nndir.el --- single directory newsgroup access for Gnus}
29359 ;; @r{Copyright (C) 1995,96 Free Software Foundation, Inc.}
29363 (require 'nnheader)
29367 (eval-when-compile (require 'cl))
29369 (nnoo-declare nndir
29372 (defvoo nndir-directory nil
29373 "Where nndir will look for groups."
29374 nnml-current-directory nnmh-current-directory)
29376 (defvoo nndir-nov-is-evil nil
29377 "*Non-nil means that nndir will never retrieve NOV headers."
29380 (defvoo nndir-current-group ""
29382 nnml-current-group nnmh-current-group)
29383 (defvoo nndir-top-directory nil nil nnml-directory nnmh-directory)
29384 (defvoo nndir-get-new-mail nil nil nnml-get-new-mail nnmh-get-new-mail)
29386 (defvoo nndir-status-string "" nil nnmh-status-string)
29387 (defconst nndir-version "nndir 1.0")
29389 ;;; @r{Interface functions.}
29391 (nnoo-define-basics nndir)
29393 (deffoo nndir-open-server (server &optional defs)
29394 (setq nndir-directory
29395 (or (cadr (assq 'nndir-directory defs))
29397 (unless (assq 'nndir-directory defs)
29398 (push `(nndir-directory ,server) defs))
29399 (push `(nndir-current-group
29400 ,(file-name-nondirectory
29401 (directory-file-name nndir-directory)))
29403 (push `(nndir-top-directory
29404 ,(file-name-directory (directory-file-name nndir-directory)))
29406 (nnoo-change-server 'nndir server defs))
29408 (nnoo-map-functions nndir
29409 (nnml-retrieve-headers 0 nndir-current-group 0 0)
29410 (nnmh-request-article 0 nndir-current-group 0 0)
29411 (nnmh-request-group nndir-current-group 0 0)
29412 (nnmh-close-group nndir-current-group 0))
29416 nnmh-status-message
29418 nnmh-request-newgroups))
29424 @node Hooking New Back Ends Into Gnus
29425 @subsubsection Hooking New Back Ends Into Gnus
29427 @vindex gnus-valid-select-methods
29428 @findex gnus-declare-backend
29429 Having Gnus start using your new back end is rather easy---you just
29430 declare it with the @code{gnus-declare-backend} functions. This will
29431 enter the back end into the @code{gnus-valid-select-methods} variable.
29433 @code{gnus-declare-backend} takes two parameters---the back end name and
29434 an arbitrary number of @dfn{abilities}.
29439 (gnus-declare-backend "nnchoke" 'mail 'respool 'address)
29442 The above line would then go in the @file{nnchoke.el} file.
29444 The abilities can be:
29448 This is a mailish back end---followups should (probably) go via mail.
29450 This is a newsish back end---followups should (probably) go via news.
29452 This back end supports both mail and news.
29454 This is neither a post nor mail back end---it's something completely
29457 It supports respooling---or rather, it is able to modify its source
29458 articles and groups.
29460 The name of the server should be in the virtual server name. This is
29461 true for almost all back ends.
29462 @item prompt-address
29463 The user should be prompted for an address when doing commands like
29464 @kbd{B} in the group buffer. This is true for back ends like
29465 @code{nntp}, but not @code{nnmbox}, for instance.
29469 @node Mail-like Back Ends
29470 @subsubsection Mail-like Back Ends
29472 One of the things that separate the mail back ends from the rest of the
29473 back ends is the heavy dependence by most of the mail back ends on
29474 common functions in @file{nnmail.el}. For instance, here's the
29475 definition of @code{nnml-request-scan}:
29478 (deffoo nnml-request-scan (&optional group server)
29479 (setq nnml-article-file-alist nil)
29480 (nnmail-get-new-mail 'nnml 'nnml-save-nov nnml-directory group))
29483 It simply calls @code{nnmail-get-new-mail} with a few parameters,
29484 and @code{nnmail} takes care of all the moving and splitting of the
29487 This function takes four parameters.
29491 This should be a symbol to designate which back end is responsible for
29494 @item exit-function
29495 This function should be called after the splitting has been performed.
29497 @item temp-directory
29498 Where the temporary files should be stored.
29501 This optional argument should be a group name if the splitting is to be
29502 performed for one group only.
29505 @code{nnmail-get-new-mail} will call @var{back-end}@code{-save-mail} to
29506 save each article. @var{back-end}@code{-active-number} will be called to
29507 find the article number assigned to this article.
29509 The function also uses the following variables:
29510 @var{back-end}@code{-get-new-mail} (to see whether to get new mail for
29511 this back end); and @var{back-end}@code{-group-alist} and
29512 @var{back-end}@code{-active-file} to generate the new active file.
29513 @var{back-end}@code{-group-alist} should be a group-active alist, like
29517 (("a-group" (1 . 10))
29518 ("some-group" (34 . 39)))
29522 @node Score File Syntax
29523 @subsection Score File Syntax
29525 Score files are meant to be easily parseable, but yet extremely
29526 mallable. It was decided that something that had the same read syntax
29527 as an Emacs Lisp list would fit that spec.
29529 Here's a typical score file:
29533 ("win95" -10000 nil s)
29540 BNF definition of a score file:
29543 score-file = "" / "(" *element ")"
29544 element = rule / atom
29545 rule = string-rule / number-rule / date-rule
29546 string-rule = "(" quote string-header quote space *string-match ")"
29547 number-rule = "(" quote number-header quote space *number-match ")"
29548 date-rule = "(" quote date-header quote space *date-match ")"
29550 string-header = "subject" / "from" / "references" / "message-id" /
29551 "xref" / "body" / "head" / "all" / "followup"
29552 number-header = "lines" / "chars"
29553 date-header = "date"
29554 string-match = "(" quote <string> quote [ "" / [ space score [ "" /
29555 space date [ "" / [ space string-match-t ] ] ] ] ] ")"
29556 score = "nil" / <integer>
29557 date = "nil" / <natural number>
29558 string-match-t = "nil" / "s" / "substring" / "S" / "Substring" /
29559 "r" / "regex" / "R" / "Regex" /
29560 "e" / "exact" / "E" / "Exact" /
29561 "f" / "fuzzy" / "F" / "Fuzzy"
29562 number-match = "(" <integer> [ "" / [ space score [ "" /
29563 space date [ "" / [ space number-match-t ] ] ] ] ] ")"
29564 number-match-t = "nil" / "=" / "<" / ">" / ">=" / "<="
29565 date-match = "(" quote <string> quote [ "" / [ space score [ "" /
29566 space date [ "" / [ space date-match-t ] ] ] ] ")"
29567 date-match-t = "nil" / "at" / "before" / "after"
29568 atom = "(" [ required-atom / optional-atom ] ")"
29569 required-atom = mark / expunge / mark-and-expunge / files /
29570 exclude-files / read-only / touched
29571 optional-atom = adapt / local / eval
29572 mark = "mark" space nil-or-number
29573 nil-or-number = "nil" / <integer>
29574 expunge = "expunge" space nil-or-number
29575 mark-and-expunge = "mark-and-expunge" space nil-or-number
29576 files = "files" *[ space <string> ]
29577 exclude-files = "exclude-files" *[ space <string> ]
29578 read-only = "read-only" [ space "nil" / space "t" ]
29579 adapt = "adapt" [ space "ignore" / space "t" / space adapt-rule ]
29580 adapt-rule = "(" *[ <string> *[ "(" <string> <integer> ")" ] ")"
29581 local = "local" *[ space "(" <string> space <form> ")" ]
29582 eval = "eval" space <form>
29583 space = *[ " " / <TAB> / <NEWLINE> ]
29586 Any unrecognized elements in a score file should be ignored, but not
29589 As you can see, white space is needed, but the type and amount of white
29590 space is irrelevant. This means that formatting of the score file is
29591 left up to the programmer---if it's simpler to just spew it all out on
29592 one looong line, then that's ok.
29594 The meaning of the various atoms are explained elsewhere in this
29595 manual (@pxref{Score File Format}).
29599 @subsection Headers
29601 Internally Gnus uses a format for storing article headers that
29602 corresponds to the @acronym{NOV} format in a mysterious fashion. One could
29603 almost suspect that the author looked at the @acronym{NOV} specification and
29604 just shamelessly @emph{stole} the entire thing, and one would be right.
29606 @dfn{Header} is a severely overloaded term. ``Header'' is used in
29607 RFC 1036 to talk about lines in the head of an article (e.g.,
29608 @code{From}). It is used by many people as a synonym for
29609 ``head''---``the header and the body''. (That should be avoided, in my
29610 opinion.) And Gnus uses a format internally that it calls ``header'',
29611 which is what I'm talking about here. This is a 9-element vector,
29612 basically, with each header (ouch) having one slot.
29614 These slots are, in order: @code{number}, @code{subject}, @code{from},
29615 @code{date}, @code{id}, @code{references}, @code{chars}, @code{lines},
29616 @code{xref}, and @code{extra}. There are macros for accessing and
29617 setting these slots---they all have predictable names beginning with
29618 @code{mail-header-} and @code{mail-header-set-}, respectively.
29620 All these slots contain strings, except the @code{extra} slot, which
29621 contains an alist of header/value pairs (@pxref{To From Newsgroups}).
29627 @sc{gnus} introduced a concept that I found so useful that I've started
29628 using it a lot and have elaborated on it greatly.
29630 The question is simple: If you have a large amount of objects that are
29631 identified by numbers (say, articles, to take a @emph{wild} example)
29632 that you want to qualify as being ``included'', a normal sequence isn't
29633 very useful. (A 200,000 length sequence is a bit long-winded.)
29635 The solution is as simple as the question: You just collapse the
29639 (1 2 3 4 5 6 10 11 12)
29642 is transformed into
29645 ((1 . 6) (10 . 12))
29648 To avoid having those nasty @samp{(13 . 13)} elements to denote a
29649 lonesome object, a @samp{13} is a valid element:
29652 ((1 . 6) 7 (10 . 12))
29655 This means that comparing two ranges to find out whether they are equal
29656 is slightly tricky:
29659 ((1 . 5) 7 8 (10 . 12))
29665 ((1 . 5) (7 . 8) (10 . 12))
29668 are equal. In fact, any non-descending list is a range:
29674 is a perfectly valid range, although a pretty long-winded one. This is
29681 and is equal to the previous range.
29683 Here's a BNF definition of ranges. Of course, one must remember the
29684 semantic requirement that the numbers are non-descending. (Any number
29685 of repetition of the same number is allowed, but apt to disappear in
29689 range = simple-range / normal-range
29690 simple-range = "(" number " . " number ")"
29691 normal-range = "(" start-contents ")"
29692 contents = "" / simple-range *[ " " contents ] /
29693 number *[ " " contents ]
29696 Gnus currently uses ranges to keep track of read articles and article
29697 marks. I plan on implementing a number of range operators in C if The
29698 Powers That Be are willing to let me. (I haven't asked yet, because I
29699 need to do some more thinking on what operators I need to make life
29700 totally range-based without ever having to convert back to normal
29705 @subsection Group Info
29707 Gnus stores all permanent info on groups in a @dfn{group info} list.
29708 This list is from three to six elements (or more) long and exhaustively
29709 describes the group.
29711 Here are two example group infos; one is a very simple group while the
29712 second is a more complex one:
29715 ("no.group" 5 ((1 . 54324)))
29717 ("nnml:my.mail" 3 ((1 . 5) 9 (20 . 55))
29718 ((tick (15 . 19)) (replied 3 6 (19 . 3)))
29720 ((auto-expire . t) (to-address . "ding@@gnus.org")))
29723 The first element is the @dfn{group name}---as Gnus knows the group,
29724 anyway. The second element is the @dfn{subscription level}, which
29725 normally is a small integer. (It can also be the @dfn{rank}, which is a
29726 cons cell where the @code{car} is the level and the @code{cdr} is the
29727 score.) The third element is a list of ranges of read articles. The
29728 fourth element is a list of lists of article marks of various kinds.
29729 The fifth element is the select method (or virtual server, if you like).
29730 The sixth element is a list of @dfn{group parameters}, which is what
29731 this section is about.
29733 Any of the last three elements may be missing if they are not required.
29734 In fact, the vast majority of groups will normally only have the first
29735 three elements, which saves quite a lot of cons cells.
29737 Here's a BNF definition of the group info format:
29740 info = "(" group space ralevel space read
29741 [ "" / [ space marks-list [ "" / [ space method [ "" /
29742 space parameters ] ] ] ] ] ")"
29743 group = quote <string> quote
29744 ralevel = rank / level
29745 level = <integer in the range of 1 to inf>
29746 rank = "(" level "." score ")"
29747 score = <integer in the range of 1 to inf>
29749 marks-lists = nil / "(" *marks ")"
29750 marks = "(" <string> range ")"
29751 method = "(" <string> *elisp-forms ")"
29752 parameters = "(" *elisp-forms ")"
29755 Actually that @samp{marks} rule is a fib. A @samp{marks} is a
29756 @samp{<string>} consed on to a @samp{range}, but that's a bitch to say
29759 If you have a Gnus info and want to access the elements, Gnus offers a
29760 series of macros for getting/setting these elements.
29763 @item gnus-info-group
29764 @itemx gnus-info-set-group
29765 @findex gnus-info-group
29766 @findex gnus-info-set-group
29767 Get/set the group name.
29769 @item gnus-info-rank
29770 @itemx gnus-info-set-rank
29771 @findex gnus-info-rank
29772 @findex gnus-info-set-rank
29773 Get/set the group rank (@pxref{Group Score}).
29775 @item gnus-info-level
29776 @itemx gnus-info-set-level
29777 @findex gnus-info-level
29778 @findex gnus-info-set-level
29779 Get/set the group level.
29781 @item gnus-info-score
29782 @itemx gnus-info-set-score
29783 @findex gnus-info-score
29784 @findex gnus-info-set-score
29785 Get/set the group score (@pxref{Group Score}).
29787 @item gnus-info-read
29788 @itemx gnus-info-set-read
29789 @findex gnus-info-read
29790 @findex gnus-info-set-read
29791 Get/set the ranges of read articles.
29793 @item gnus-info-marks
29794 @itemx gnus-info-set-marks
29795 @findex gnus-info-marks
29796 @findex gnus-info-set-marks
29797 Get/set the lists of ranges of marked articles.
29799 @item gnus-info-method
29800 @itemx gnus-info-set-method
29801 @findex gnus-info-method
29802 @findex gnus-info-set-method
29803 Get/set the group select method.
29805 @item gnus-info-params
29806 @itemx gnus-info-set-params
29807 @findex gnus-info-params
29808 @findex gnus-info-set-params
29809 Get/set the group parameters.
29812 All the getter functions take one parameter---the info list. The setter
29813 functions take two parameters---the info list and the new value.
29815 The last three elements in the group info aren't mandatory, so it may be
29816 necessary to extend the group info before setting the element. If this
29817 is necessary, you can just pass on a non-@code{nil} third parameter to
29818 the three final setter functions to have this happen automatically.
29821 @node Extended Interactive
29822 @subsection Extended Interactive
29823 @cindex interactive
29824 @findex gnus-interactive
29826 Gnus extends the standard Emacs @code{interactive} specification
29827 slightly to allow easy use of the symbolic prefix (@pxref{Symbolic
29828 Prefixes}). Here's an example of how this is used:
29831 (defun gnus-summary-increase-score (&optional score symp)
29832 (interactive (gnus-interactive "P\ny"))
29837 The best thing to do would have been to implement
29838 @code{gnus-interactive} as a macro which would have returned an
29839 @code{interactive} form, but this isn't possible since Emacs checks
29840 whether a function is interactive or not by simply doing an @code{assq}
29841 on the lambda form. So, instead we have @code{gnus-interactive}
29842 function that takes a string and returns values that are usable to
29843 @code{interactive}.
29845 This function accepts (almost) all normal @code{interactive} specs, but
29850 @vindex gnus-current-prefix-symbol
29851 The current symbolic prefix---the @code{gnus-current-prefix-symbol}
29855 @vindex gnus-current-prefix-symbols
29856 A list of the current symbolic prefixes---the
29857 @code{gnus-current-prefix-symbol} variable.
29860 The current article number---the @code{gnus-summary-article-number}
29864 The current article header---the @code{gnus-summary-article-header}
29868 The current group name---the @code{gnus-group-group-name}
29874 @node Emacs/XEmacs Code
29875 @subsection Emacs/XEmacs Code
29879 While Gnus runs under Emacs, XEmacs and Mule, I decided that one of the
29880 platforms must be the primary one. I chose Emacs. Not because I don't
29881 like XEmacs or Mule, but because it comes first alphabetically.
29883 This means that Gnus will byte-compile under Emacs with nary a warning,
29884 while XEmacs will pump out gigabytes of warnings while byte-compiling.
29885 As I use byte-compilation warnings to help me root out trivial errors in
29886 Gnus, that's very useful.
29888 I've also consistently used Emacs function interfaces, but have used
29889 Gnusey aliases for the functions. To take an example: Emacs defines a
29890 @code{run-at-time} function while XEmacs defines a @code{start-itimer}
29891 function. I then define a function called @code{gnus-run-at-time} that
29892 takes the same parameters as the Emacs @code{run-at-time}. When running
29893 Gnus under Emacs, the former function is just an alias for the latter.
29894 However, when running under XEmacs, the former is an alias for the
29895 following function:
29898 (defun gnus-xmas-run-at-time (time repeat function &rest args)
29902 (,function ,@@args))
29906 This sort of thing has been done for bunches of functions. Gnus does
29907 not redefine any native Emacs functions while running under XEmacs---it
29908 does this @code{defalias} thing with Gnus equivalents instead. Cleaner
29911 In the cases where the XEmacs function interface was obviously cleaner,
29912 I used it instead. For example @code{gnus-region-active-p} is an alias
29913 for @code{region-active-p} in XEmacs, whereas in Emacs it is a function.
29915 Of course, I could have chosen XEmacs as my native platform and done
29916 mapping functions the other way around. But I didn't. The performance
29917 hit these indirections impose on Gnus under XEmacs should be slight.
29920 @node Various File Formats
29921 @subsection Various File Formats
29924 * Active File Format:: Information on articles and groups available.
29925 * Newsgroups File Format:: Group descriptions.
29929 @node Active File Format
29930 @subsubsection Active File Format
29932 The active file lists all groups available on the server in
29933 question. It also lists the highest and lowest current article numbers
29936 Here's an excerpt from a typical active file:
29939 soc.motss 296030 293865 y
29940 alt.binaries.pictures.fractals 3922 3913 n
29941 comp.sources.unix 1605 1593 m
29942 comp.binaries.ibm.pc 5097 5089 y
29943 no.general 1000 900 y
29946 Here's a pseudo-BNF definition of this file:
29949 active = *group-line
29950 group-line = group spc high-number spc low-number spc flag <NEWLINE>
29951 group = <non-white-space string>
29953 high-number = <non-negative integer>
29954 low-number = <positive integer>
29955 flag = "y" / "n" / "m" / "j" / "x" / "=" group
29958 For a full description of this file, see the manual pages for
29959 @samp{innd}, in particular @samp{active(5)}.
29962 @node Newsgroups File Format
29963 @subsubsection Newsgroups File Format
29965 The newsgroups file lists groups along with their descriptions. Not all
29966 groups on the server have to be listed, and not all groups in the file
29967 have to exist on the server. The file is meant purely as information to
29970 The format is quite simple; a group name, a tab, and the description.
29971 Here's the definition:
29975 line = group tab description <NEWLINE>
29976 group = <non-white-space string>
29978 description = <string>
29983 @node Emacs for Heathens
29984 @section Emacs for Heathens
29986 Believe it or not, but some people who use Gnus haven't really used
29987 Emacs much before they embarked on their journey on the Gnus Love Boat.
29988 If you are one of those unfortunates whom ``@kbd{C-M-a}'', ``kill the
29989 region'', and ``set @code{gnus-flargblossen} to an alist where the key
29990 is a regexp that is used for matching on the group name'' are magical
29991 phrases with little or no meaning, then this appendix is for you. If
29992 you are already familiar with Emacs, just ignore this and go fondle your
29996 * Keystrokes:: Entering text and executing commands.
29997 * Emacs Lisp:: The built-in Emacs programming language.
30002 @subsection Keystrokes
30006 Q: What is an experienced Emacs user?
30009 A: A person who wishes that the terminal had pedals.
30012 Yes, when you use Emacs, you are apt to use the control key, the shift
30013 key and the meta key a lot. This is very annoying to some people
30014 (notably @code{vi}le users), and the rest of us just love the hell out
30015 of it. Just give up and submit. Emacs really does stand for
30016 ``Escape-Meta-Alt-Control-Shift'', and not ``Editing Macros'', as you
30017 may have heard from other disreputable sources (like the Emacs author).
30019 The shift keys are normally located near your pinky fingers, and are
30020 normally used to get capital letters and stuff. You probably use it all
30021 the time. The control key is normally marked ``CTRL'' or something like
30022 that. The meta key is, funnily enough, never marked as such on any
30023 keyboard. The one I'm currently at has a key that's marked ``Alt'',
30024 which is the meta key on this keyboard. It's usually located somewhere
30025 to the left hand side of the keyboard, usually on the bottom row.
30027 Now, us Emacs people don't say ``press the meta-control-m key'',
30028 because that's just too inconvenient. We say ``press the @kbd{C-M-m}
30029 key''. @kbd{M-} is the prefix that means ``meta'' and ``C-'' is the
30030 prefix that means ``control''. So ``press @kbd{C-k}'' means ``press
30031 down the control key, and hold it down while you press @kbd{k}''.
30032 ``Press @kbd{C-M-k}'' means ``press down and hold down the meta key and
30033 the control key and then press @kbd{k}''. Simple, ay?
30035 This is somewhat complicated by the fact that not all keyboards have a
30036 meta key. In that case you can use the ``escape'' key. Then @kbd{M-k}
30037 means ``press escape, release escape, press @kbd{k}''. That's much more
30038 work than if you have a meta key, so if that's the case, I respectfully
30039 suggest you get a real keyboard with a meta key. You can't live without
30045 @subsection Emacs Lisp
30047 Emacs is the King of Editors because it's really a Lisp interpreter.
30048 Each and every key you tap runs some Emacs Lisp code snippet, and since
30049 Emacs Lisp is an interpreted language, that means that you can configure
30050 any key to run any arbitrary code. You just, like, do it.
30052 Gnus is written in Emacs Lisp, and is run as a bunch of interpreted
30053 functions. (These are byte-compiled for speed, but it's still
30054 interpreted.) If you decide that you don't like the way Gnus does
30055 certain things, it's trivial to have it do something a different way.
30056 (Well, at least if you know how to write Lisp code.) However, that's
30057 beyond the scope of this manual, so we are simply going to talk about
30058 some common constructs that you normally use in your @file{~/.gnus.el}
30059 file to customize Gnus. (You can also use the @file{~/.emacs} file, but
30060 in order to set things of Gnus up, it is much better to use the
30061 @file{~/.gnus.el} file, @xref{Startup Files}.)
30063 If you want to set the variable @code{gnus-florgbnize} to four (4), you
30064 write the following:
30067 (setq gnus-florgbnize 4)
30070 This function (really ``special form'') @code{setq} is the one that can
30071 set a variable to some value. This is really all you need to know. Now
30072 you can go and fill your @file{~/.gnus.el} file with lots of these to
30073 change how Gnus works.
30075 If you have put that thing in your @file{~/.gnus.el} file, it will be
30076 read and @code{eval}ed (which is Lisp-ese for ``run'') the next time you
30077 start Gnus. If you want to change the variable right away, simply say
30078 @kbd{C-x C-e} after the closing parenthesis. That will @code{eval} the
30079 previous ``form'', which is a simple @code{setq} statement here.
30081 Go ahead---just try it, if you're located at your Emacs. After you
30082 @kbd{C-x C-e}, you will see @samp{4} appear in the echo area, which
30083 is the return value of the form you @code{eval}ed.
30087 If the manual says ``set @code{gnus-read-active-file} to @code{some}'',
30091 (setq gnus-read-active-file 'some)
30094 On the other hand, if the manual says ``set @code{gnus-nntp-server} to
30095 @samp{nntp.ifi.uio.no}'', that means:
30098 (setq gnus-nntp-server "nntp.ifi.uio.no")
30101 So be careful not to mix up strings (the latter) with symbols (the
30102 former). The manual is unambiguous, but it can be confusing.
30105 @include gnus-faq.texi
30107 @node GNU Free Documentation License
30108 @chapter GNU Free Documentation License
30109 @include doclicense.texi
30129 @c Local Variables:
30131 @c coding: iso-8859-1
30135 arch-tag: c9fa47e7-78ca-4681-bda9-9fef45d1c819