show − show (list) messages show [+folder] [msgs] [−draft] [−header] [−noheader] [−showproc program] [−noshowproc] [switches for showproc] [−help]
DESCRIPTION
Show lists each of the specified messages to the standard output (typically, the terminal). Typically, the messages are listed exactly as they are, with no reformatting. A program named by the showproc profile component is invoked to do the listing, and any switches not recognized by show are passed along to that program. The default program is known as more (1). To override the default and the showproc profile component, use the ‘−showproc program’ switch. For example, ‘−show pr’ will cause the pr (1) program to list the messages. The MH command mhl can be used as a showproc to show messages in a more uniform format. Normally, this program is specified as the showproc is the user’s .mh_profile. See mhl (1) for the details. If the ‘−noshowproc’ option is specified, ‘/bin/cat’ is used instead of showproc.
The ‘−header’ switch tells show to display a one−line description of the message being shown. This description includes the folder and the message number.
If no ‘msgs’ are specified, the current message is used. If more than one message is specified, more will prompt for a <RETURN> prior to listing each message. more will list each message, a page at a time. When the end of page is reached, more will ring the bell and wait for a <SPACE> or <RETURN>. If a <RETURN> is entered, more will print the next line, whereas <SPACE> will print the next screenful. To exit more, type “q”.
If the standard output is not a terminal, no queries are made, and each file is listed with a one−line header and two lines of separation.
“show −draft” will list the file <mh−dir>/draft if it exists.
If the profile entry “Unseen−Sequence” is present and non−empty, then show will remove each of the messages shown from each sequence named by the profile entry. This is similar to the “Previous−Sequence” profile entry supported by all MH commands which take ‘msgs’ or ‘msg’ arguments. ^$HOME/.mh_profile~^The user profile ^Path:~^To determine the user’s MH directory ^Current−Folder:~^To find the default current folder ^Unseen−Sequence:~^To name sequences denoting unseen messages ^showproc:~^Program to show messages mhl(1), more(1), next(1), pick(1), prev(1), scan(1) ‘+folder’ defaults to the current folder ‘msgs’ defaults to cur ‘−header’ If a folder is given, it will become the current folder. The last message shown will become the current message. The ‘−header’ switch doesn’t work when ‘msgs’ expands to more than one message. If the showproc is mhl, then is problem can be circumvented by referencing the “messagename” field in the mhl format file.
Show updates the user’s context before showing the message. Hence show will mark messages as seen prior to the user actually seeing them. This is generally not a problem, unless the user relies on the “unseen” messages mechanism, and interrupts show while it is showing “unseen” messages.
If showproc is mhl, then show uses a built−in mhl: it does not actually run the mhl program. Hence, if you define your own showproc, don’t call it mhl since show won’t run it.
If more (1) is your showproc (the default), then avoid running show in the background with only its standard output piped to another process, as in
show | imprint &
Due to a bug in more, show will go into a “tty input” state. To avoid this problem, re−direct show’s diagnostic output as well. For users of csh:
show |& imprint &
For users of sh:
show 2>&1 | imprint &
NEWS-OSRelease 3.3