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NAME

       scan - produce a one line per message scan listing

SYNOPSIS

       scan [+folder] [msgs] [-clear | -noclear] [-form formatfile] [-format
            string] [-header | -noheader] [-width columns] [-reverse |
            -noreverse] [-file filename] [-version] [-help]

DESCRIPTION

       Scan produces a one-line-per-message listing of the specified folder or
       messages.  Each scan line contains the message number (name), the date,
       the  “From:”  field,  the “Subject” field, and, if room allows, some of
       the body of the message.  For example:

            15+  10/05 crocker    nned  Last week I asked some of
            16-  10/05 crocker    message id format  I recommend
            18   10/06 brien      Re: Exit status from mkdir
            19   10/07*brien      “scan” listing format in nmh

       The ‘+’ on message 15 indicates that it is the current message.

       The ‘-’ on message 16  indicates  that  it  has  been  replied  to,  as
       indicated  by  a “Replied:” component (produced by the -annotate switch
       to the repl command).

       The ‘*’ on message 19 indicates that no  “Date:”  header  was  present.
       The time of last modification of the message is given instead.

       If  there  is  sufficient room left on the scan line after the subject,
       the line will be filled with text from the body, preceded by “<<”,  and
       terminated  by  “>>”  if the body is sufficiently short.  Scan actually
       reads each of the specified messages and parses  them  to  extract  the
       desired  fields.   During  parsing,  appropriate error messages will be
       produced if there are format errors in any of the messages.

       By default, scan will decode RFC-2047 (MIME)  encoding  in  these  scan
       listings.   Scan  will  only  decode  these fields if your terminal can
       natively display the character set used in the  encoding.   You  should
       set  the  MM_CHARSET environment variable to your native character set,
       if it is not US-ASCII.  See the  mh-profile(5)  man  page  for  details
       about this environment variable.

       The switch -reverse, makes scan list the messages in reverse order.

       The -file filename switch allows the user to obtain a scan listing of a
       maildrop file as  produced  by  packf.   This  listing  includes  every
       message  in  the file (you can’t scan individual messages).  The switch
       -reverse is ignored with this option.

       The switch -width columns may be used to specify the width of the  scan
       line.  The default is to use the width of the terminal.

       The  -header  switch  produces a header line prior to the scan listing.
       Currently, the name of the folder and the current  date  and  time  are
       output (see the HISTORY section for more information).

       If  the  -clear  switch  is  used  and  scan’s  output is directed to a
       terminal, then scan will consult the environment  variables  $TERM  and
       $TERMCAP  to  determine  your terminal type in order to find out how to
       clear the screen prior to exiting.  If the -clear switch  is  used  and
       scan’s  output  is not directed to a terminal (e.g., a pipe or a file),
       then scan will send a formfeed prior to exiting.

       For example, the command:

            (scan -clear -header; show all -show pr -f) | lpr

       produces a scan listing of the current folder, followed by a  formfeed,
       followed  by a formatted listing of all messages in the folder, one per
       page.   Omitting  “-show pr -f”  will  cause   the   messages   to   be
       concatenated, separated by a one-line header and two blank lines.

       To override the output format used by scan, the -format string or -form
       file switches are used.  This permits individual  fields  of  the  scan
       listing  to  be  extracted  with  ease.   The string is simply a format
       string and the file is simply a format file.  See mh-format(5) for  the
       details.

       In  addition to the standard mh-format(5) escapes, scan also recognizes
       the following additional component escapes:

            Escape    Returns  Description
            body      string   the (compressed) first part of the body
            dtimenow  date     the current date
            folder    string   the name of the current folder

       If no date header is present in the message, the function escapes which
       operate  on {date} will return values for the date of last modification
       of the message file itself.  This feature is handy for scanning a draft
       folder, as message drafts usually aren’t allowed to have dates in them.

       scan will update the nmh context prior  to  starting  the  listing,  so
       interrupting  a  long  scan  listing  preserves  the  new context.  nmh
       purists hate this idea.

FILES

       $HOME/.mh_profile          The user profile

PROFILE COMPONENTS

       Path:                To determine the user’s nmh directory
       Alternate-Mailboxes: To determine the user’s mailboxes
       Current-Folder:      To find the default current folder

SEE ALSO

       inc(1), pick(1), show(1), mh-format(5)

DEFAULTS

+folder’ defaults to the current folder
       ‘msgs’ defaults to all
       ‘-format’ defaulted as described above
       ‘-noheader’
       ‘-width’ defaulted to the width of the terminal

CONTEXT

       If a folder is given, it will become the current folder.

HISTORY

       Prior to using the format string mechanism, -header used to generate  a
       heading  saying  what  each  column in the listing was.  Format strings
       prevent this from happening.

BUGS

       The argument to the -format switch must  be  interpreted  as  a  single
       token  by  the  shell  that  invokes scan.  Therefore, one must usually
       place the argument to this switch inside double-quotes.

       The value of each component escape is set by scan to  the  contents  of
       the  first  message  header  scan  encounters  with  the  corresponding
       component name; any following headers with the same component name  are
       ignored.