meillo@0: .H0 "Preface" no
meillo@0: 
meillo@23: .P
meillo@53: I have discovered the mail client \fInmh\fP in September 2009.
meillo@53: At that time I used to use \fImutt\fP, as many advanced Unix users do.
meillo@53: When I read about nmh, its concepts had convinced me at once.
meillo@31: The transition from mutt to nmh was similar to
meillo@53: managing files in the Unix shell when being used to the
meillo@53: \fImidnight commander\fP,
meillo@53: or like editing with vi when being used to modeless editors.
meillo@31: Such a change is not trivial, but in being convinced by the
meillo@31: concepts and by having done similar transitions for file management
meillo@53: and editing already, it was not too difficult.
meillo@51: In contrast, setting up nmh to a convenient state became a tedious task
meillo@23: that took several months.
meillo@28: Once having nmh arranged to a convenient state, I enjoyed using it
meillo@28: because of its conceptional elegance and its scripting capabilities.
meillo@52: On the other hand, nevertheless, it still was
meillo@31: inconvenient for handling attachments, non-ASCII character encodings,
meillo@23: and similar features of modern emailing.
meillo@31: My setup demanded more and more additional configuration and helper scripts
meillo@31: to get nmh behave the way I wanted, although my
meillo@31: expectations were rather common for modern emailing.
meillo@31: In being a computer scientist and programmer,
meillo@31: I wanted to improve the situation.
meillo@8: .P
meillo@31: In Spring 2010, I asked on the \fInmh-workers\fP mailing list for the
meillo@53: possibility to offer a Google Summer of Code project for me.
meillo@53: Participating in the development of nmh this way appeared attractive to me,
meillo@53: because I would have been able to work full time on nmh as the project
meillo@53: could have been part of my official studies at university.
meillo@53: Although the nmh community had been generally positive on the suggestion,
meillo@53: the administrative work for a GSoC project had been to much to have
meillo@53: it realized.
meillo@53: Nontheless, my proposal had activated the nmh community.
meillo@31: In the following weeks, goals for nmh's future were discussed.
meillo@31: In these discussions, I became involved in the
meillo@53: question whether nmh should include mail transfer facilities.
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: nmh-workers thread mta mua
meillo@34: .]
meillo@31: In this central point, my opinion differed from the opinion of most others.
meillo@31: I argued for the MTA facility of nmh to be removed.
meillo@31: Besides the discussions, hardly any real work was done.
meillo@31: Being unable to work on nmh in a way that would be
meillo@31: accepted as part of my official studies, I needed to choose another project.
meillo@8: .P
meillo@23: Half a year later, starting in August 2010,
meillo@23: I took one semester off to travel through Latin America.
meillo@53: During my time in Argentina, I planned to work on Free Software.
meillo@23: This brought me back to nmh.
meillo@53: Richard Sandelman, an active nmh user, cared for the official basis.
meillo@53: Juan Granda, an argentine Free Software developer,
meillo@53: provided a computer with Internet connection for my work.
meillo@53: Thanks to them, I was able to work on nmh during my three-month
meillo@53: stay in Santiago del Estero in Argentina.
meillo@53: Quickly it became obvious that I wouldn't succeed with my main goal:
meillo@53: improving the character encoding handling within the project.
meillo@53: One of its ramifications is the
meillo@31: missing transfer decoding of quoted text in replies.
meillo@23: As this is one of the most intricate parts of the system, the goal
meillo@53: was simply set too high.
meillo@53: Instead, I improved the code base as I read through it.
meillo@53: I found minor bugs for which I proposed fixes to the community.
meillo@53: In the same go, I improved the documentation in minor ways.
meillo@53: When I started with larger code changes,
meillo@53: I had to discover that the community was reluctant to change.
meillo@53: Its wish for compatibility was much stronger than its
meillo@31: wish for convenient out-of-the-box setups \(en in contrast to my opinion.
meillo@52: This led to long discussions, again.
meillo@53: I came to understand their point of view, but it was different to mine.
meillo@23: At the end of my three-month project, I had become familiar with
meillo@53: nmh's code base and community.
meillo@53: I had improved the project in minor ways,
meillo@31: and I still was convinced that I wanted to go on to do so.
meillo@23: .P
meillo@53: Another half year later, the end of my studies came within reach.
meillo@23: I needed a topic for my master's thesis.
meillo@52: No question, I wanted to work on nmh.
meillo@53: But well, not exactly on nmh, because I had accepted that the
meillo@53: nmh community has different goals than I have.
meillo@53: This would result in much discussion and thus little progress.
meillo@23: After careful thought, I decided to start an experimental version of nmh.
meillo@31: I wanted to implement my own ideas of how an MH-like system should look like.
meillo@31: I wanted to create a usable alternative version to be compared with
meillo@31: the present state of nmh.
meillo@53: Eventually, my work would be proven successful or not.
meillo@53: In any case, the nmh project would profit from my experiences.
meillo@28: 
meillo@30: .U2 "Focus of this Document
meillo@8: .P
meillo@53: This document explains the design goals and implementation decisions
meillo@53: for mmh.
meillo@31: It discusses technical, historical, social and philosophical considerations.
meillo@31: On the technical side, this document
meillo@31: explains how an existing project was stream-lined by removing rough edges
meillo@31: and exploiting the central concepts better.
meillo@31: On the historical
meillo@31: side, changes through time in the use cases and the email features,
meillo@31: as well as the reactions to them, are discussed.
meillo@31: Socially, this document describes the effects
meillo@28: and experiences of a newcomer with revolutionary aims entering an old
meillo@53: and matured software project.
meillo@53: Philosophical thoughts on style, mainly based to the Unix
meillo@53: philosophy, are present throughout the discussions.
meillo@53: The document describes the changes to nmh,
meillo@53: but as well, it clarifies my personal perception of the
meillo@53: concepts of MH and Unix, and explain my therefrom resulting point of view.
meillo@23: .P
meillo@31: This document is written for the community around MH-like mail systems,
meillo@31: including developers and users.
meillo@52: Despite the focus on MH-like systems, this document is may be precious
meillo@31: to anyone interested in the Unix philosophy and anyone in contact to
meillo@31: old software projects, be it code or community-related.
meillo@28: .P
meillo@53: The reader is expected to be well familiar with Unix, C and emailing.
meillo@53: Good Unix shell knowledge is required, because MH relies fundamentally
meillo@28: on the shell. Without the power of the shell, MH becomes a motorbike
meillo@30: without winding roads: boring.
meillo@31: Introductions to Unix and its shell can be found in ``The UNIX Programming
meillo@37: Environment'' by Kernighan and Pike
meillo@37: .[
meillo@37: kernighan pike unix prog env
meillo@37: .]
meillo@37: or ``The UNIX System'' by Bourne.
meillo@37: .[
meillo@37: bourne unix system
meillo@37: .]
meillo@53: The reader is assumed to be a C programmer,
meillo@53: but the document should be understandable otherwise, too.
meillo@53: The definitive guide to C is Kernighan and Ritchie's
meillo@53: ``The C Programming Language''.
meillo@37: .[
meillo@37: kernighan ritchie c prog lang
meillo@37: .]
meillo@52: Some book about system-level C programming can be helpful
meillo@52: additional literature. Rochkind and Curry have written such books.
meillo@37: .[
meillo@37: rochkind advanced unix prog
meillo@37: .]
meillo@37: .[
meillo@37: curry system prog
meillo@37: .]
meillo@53: As large parts of the source code are old,
meillo@53: old books are likely more helpful for understanding.
meillo@53: The reader is expected to know the format of email messages and
meillo@53: the structure of email transfer systems, at least on a basic level.
meillo@53: It's advisable to have cross-read the RFCs 821 and 822.
meillo@31: Further more, basic understanding of MIME is good to have.
meillo@31: The Wikipedia provides good introduction-level information to email.
meillo@53: .P
meillo@28: Frequent references to the Unix philosophy will be made.
meillo@53: Gancarz has tried to sum it up in his book
meillo@34: ``The UNIX Philosophy''.
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: gancarz unix phil
meillo@34: .]
meillo@47: Even better, though less concrete, are ``The UNIX Programming Environment''
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: kernighan pike unix prog env
meillo@34: .]
meillo@34: and ``The Practice of Programming''
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: kernighan pike practice of prog
meillo@34: .]
meillo@34: by Kernighan and Pike.
meillo@34: The term paper ``Why the Unix Philosophy still matters''
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: why unix phil still matters schnalke
meillo@34: .]
meillo@34: by myself
meillo@53: provides an overview on the philosophy, including a case study of MH.
meillo@53: .P
meillo@30: Although a brief introduction to MH is provided in Chapter 1, the reader
meillo@53: is encouraged to have a look at the \fIMH Book\fP
meillo@53: ``MH & nmh: Email for Users & Programmers'' by Jerry Peek.
meillo@34: .[
meillo@34: peek mh
meillo@34: .]
meillo@53: The current version is available freely on the Internet.
meillo@30: It is the definitive guide to MH and nmh.
meillo@30: .P
meillo@30: This document is neither a user's tutorial to mmh nor an introduction
meillo@53: to any of the topics covered.
meillo@53: The technical discussions are on an advanced level.
meillo@52: Nevertheless, as knowledge of the fundamental concepts is the most valuable
meillo@51: information a user can acquire about some program or software system,
meillo@52: this document may be worth a read for non-developers as well.
meillo@8: 
meillo@8: 
meillo@28: .U2 "Organization
meillo@0: .P
meillo@28: Which font for what use.
meillo@28: Meaning of `foo(1)'.
meillo@28: RFCs.
meillo@28: .P
meillo@51: This thesis is divided into XXX chapters, ...
meillo@24: .P
meillo@24: .I Chapter 1
meillo@24: introduces ...
meillo@24: .P
meillo@24: .I Chapter 2
meillo@24: describes ...
meillo@24: .P
meillo@24: .I Chapter 3
meillo@24: covers ...
meillo@24: 
meillo@23: 
meillo@28: .U2 "Acknowledgments
meillo@23: .P
meillo@24: To be written at the very end.