NAME

dp − parse dates RFC 822−style

SYNOPSIS

/usr/new/lib/mh/dp ­[−form formatfile] ­[−format string] ­[−width columns] dates ...  ­[−help]

DESCRIPTION

Dp is a program that parses dates according to the ARPA Internet standard.  It also understands many non−standard formats, such as those produced by TOPS−20 sites and some UNIX sites using ctime (3).  It is useful for seeing how MH will interpret a date. 
 
The dp program treats each argument as a single date, and prints the date out in the official 822−format.  Hence, it is usually best to enclose each argument in double−quotes for the shell. 
 
To override the output format used by dp, the ‘−format string’ or ‘−format file’ switches are used.  This permits individual fields of the address to be extracted with ease.  The string is simply a format stringand thefile is simply a format file.  See mh−format (5) for the details. 
 
Here is the default format string used by dp:
 

%<(nodate{text})error: %{text}%|%(putstr(pretty{text}))%>

 
which says that if an error was detected, print the error, a ‘:’, and the date in error. Otherwise, output the 822−proper format of the date. ^$HOME/.mh_profile~^The user profile None ap(8)
Standard for the Format of ARPA Internet Text Messages (aka RFC−822) ‘−format’ default as described above ‘−width’ default to the width of the terminal None The argument to the ‘−format’ switch must be interpreted as a single token by the shell that invokes dp.  Therefore, one must usually place the argument to this switch inside double−quotes. 

NEWS-OSRelease 4.1C