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1 .H0 "Previous Situation
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2 .P
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3 foo
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4
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5 .H1 "Historic Background
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6 .P
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7 In order to understand the state, goals and dynamics of a project,
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8 you need to know its history. MH comes from a time before the
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9 Internet, a time before networking became universal, a time when
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10 emailing was small, short and simple. Then it grew, spread and
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11 adopted to the changes. The core-concepts, however, remained the
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12 same. During the XXX a small group of students at the University of
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13 California, actively worked on MH. They added features and optimized,
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14 like it is common for scientific work. This is still in pre-ANSI C
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15 times. The source code contains many ancient parts. Code constructs
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16 specific to BSD or hardware of that time are usual.
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17 .P
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18 Nmh started eight years after the ANSI C standard had been
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19 established. A more modern coding style entered the code base. Still
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20 a part of the developers come from ``the old days''. The developer
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21 base became more diverse and thus the code. Programming practices
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22 from different decades merged into the project. Different coding
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23 styles came together. It appears as if multiple peers added code
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24 parts, resulting in a conclomeration rather than an homogenic
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25 of-one-cast mail system. Still, the basic concepts hold it together.
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26 They were mostly untouched throughout the years.
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27 .P
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28 Although, at the surface, nmh is a toolchest, meaning a collection
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29 of completely modularized small programs, on the source code level,
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30 it is much more interweaved. Parts of the basic functions are
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31 collected in a MH standard library, which is good, but often
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32 separate functions are compiled into programs, for effiency reasons.
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33 This lead to intricate innards.
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34 The advent of MIME rose the complexity of email by a magnitude. This
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35 is visible in nmh. The MIME-related parts are the most complex ones.
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36 It's also visible that MIME support had been added on top of the
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37 original MH later. The MH style made this easily possible, but it
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38 also lead to duplicated functions (e.g. \f(CWshow\fP, \f(CWmhshow\fP)
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39 and had not been thoroughly included into the concepts (e.g. the
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40 user-visible access to whole messages and MIME parts are inherently
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41 different).
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42 .P
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43 For compatibility's sake, it is a common understanding to have the
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44 default settings to be compatible, requiring any new feature to be
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45 explicitely enabled. This puts a burden on new users, because nmh
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46 out-of-the-box keeps staying in the same ancient style, where users
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47 usually want to have it practical for modern emailing.
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48 But of course, this depends on if nmh is seen to be a front-end or a
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49 back-end.
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50
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51 .H1 "My Vision
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52 .P
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53 The general goals of the mmh project are the following:
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54 .BU
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55 I believe that mmh should be perfectly suited for modern emailing,
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56 out-of-the-box.
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57 .BU
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58 I care less about compatibility and more about conceptionally elegant
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59 approaches.
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60 .BU
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61 I care for general, clear, and simple concepts.
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62 .BU
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63 I like to create an of-one-style email system.
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64 .BU
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65 I plan to remove any optimizations that rises obscurity, unless it
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66 appears to be neccessary to make mmh usable at all.
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67 .P
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68 .B "The target user in mind
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69 likes Unix and its philosophy.
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70 He likes to use programs that are conceptionally appealing.
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71 He's familiar with the command line and enjoys its power.
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72 He is at least capable of shell scripting and wants to improve his
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73 productivity by scripting the mail system.
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74 His computer and operating system are from post-ANSI C times.
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75 He likes to attach files, exchanges text containing non-ASCII
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76 characters, signs or encrypts his messages.
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77 He does not use bulletin boards anymore, nor non-mbox style mail
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78 drops, nor does he rely on compatibility to nmh.
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79 He already has and MTA/MSA and MRA running or is able to set them
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80 up.
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81 He does not want to have to read a book in order to make his MUA
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82 usable.
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83
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84 .H1 "Things to do
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85 .P
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86
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