Editing a Draft
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When you edit a message that you want to send (called a
draft
in this case), the mode used is
MH-Letter.
This mode provides several commands in addition to the normal Emacs
editing commands to help you edit your draft.
Command | Description
___________|___________________________________________
C-c C-y | Insert contents of message to which
| you're replying
C-c C-i | Insert message from a folder
C-c C-f C-t| Move to To: header field
C-c C-f C-c| Move to cc: header field
C-c C-f C-s| Move to Subject: header field
C-c C-c C-r| Move to From: header field
C-c C-f C-b| Move to Bcc: header field
C-c C-c C-f| Move to Fcc: header field
C-c C-f C-d| Move to Dcc: header field
C-c C-w | Display expanded recipient list
C-c C-s | Insert signature in message
C-c C-m C-f| Include forwarded message (MIME)
C-c C-m C-e| Include anonymous ftp reference (MIME)
C-c C-m C-t| Include anonymous ftp reference to
| compressed tar file (MIME)
C-c C-m C-i| Include binary, image, sound, etc. (MIME)
C-c C-e | Run through mhn before sending
C-c C-m C-u| Undo effects of mhn
C-c C-c | Save draft and send message
C-c C-q | Quit editing and delete draft message
___________|___________________________________________
The following sections show you how to edit a draft.
The commands described here are also applicable to messages that have
multimedia components.
Inserting letter to which you're replying
It is often useful to insert a snippet of text from a letter that
someone mailed to provide some
context for your reply.
The command
C-c C-y
does this by yanking a portion of text from the message to which
you're replying and inserting "> "
before each line.
You can control how much text is included when you run this command.
If you run this command right away, without entering the buffer
containing the message to you, this command will yank the entire
message, as is, into your reply.
(If you'd rather have the header cleaned up, use
C-u r
instead of
r
when replying (see the Section
Replying to Mail).)
If you enter the buffer containing the message sent to you and move
the cursor to a certain point and return to your reply and run
C-c C-y,
then the text yanked will range from that point to the end of the message.
Finally, the most common action you'll perform is to enter the message
sent to you, move the cursor to the beginning of a paragraph or
phrase, set the
mark
with
C-SPC
or
C-@,
and move the cursor to the end of the paragraph or phrase.
The cursor position is called the
point,
and the space between the mark and point is called the
region.
Having done that,
C-c C-y
will insert the region or phrase you selected.
Inserting Messages
Messages can be inserted with
C-c C-i.
This command prompts you for the folder and message number and inserts
the message, indented by "> ".
Certain undesirable header fields are removed before insertion.
If given a prefix argument (like
C-u C-c C-y),
the header is left intact, the message is
not indented, and "> " is not inserted before each line.
Editing the Header
Because the header is part of the message, you can edit the header
fields as you wish.
However, several convenience functions exist to help you create and
edit them. For example, the command
C-c C-f C-t
(alternatively,
C-c C-f t)
moves the cursor to the
To:
header field, creating it if necessary.
The functions to move to the
cc:,
Subject:,
From:,
Bcc:,
and
Dcc:
header fields are similar.
The Section Fields You Add to a Header
explains the fields
Bcc:,
Dcc:,
and others.
One function behaves differently from the others, namely,
C-c C-f C-f
(alternatively,
C-c C-f f).
This function can be given a prefix argument (for instance,
C-u C-c C-f C-f outfolder RET
which will cause the function
to prompt you for the folder name in which to refile the draft).
Be sure to leave a row of dashes or a blank line between the header
and the body of the message.
Checking recipients
Aliases can be expanded and addresses can be checked by using the
C-c C-w
command.
A new buffer is created with the output of
whom(1)
(The Section
What now? -- and the whatnow Program).
Inserting your signature
You can insert your signature at the current cursor location with the
C-c C-s
command.
Place the text of your signature in the file
~/.signature
before typing the command.
mh-e has the capability to create multimedia messages.
It uses the MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) protocol.
The MIME protocol allows you to incorporate images, sound, video,
binary files, and even commands that fetch a file with
ftp(1)
when your recipient reads the message!
If you were to create a
multimedia message with plain MH commands, you would use
mhn;
indeed, the mh-e MIME commands merely insert
mhn
directives which are later expanded by
mhn.
Each of the mh-e commands for editing multimedia messages or
for incorporating multimedia objects is prefixed with
C-c C-m.
Several MIME objects are defined.
They are called
content types.
The table in the Section
Editing a Draft contains a list of the content
types that mh-e currently knows about.
Several of the mh-e commands fill in the content type for you, whereas others
require you to enter one. Most of the time, it should be obvious
which one to use (that is, use
image/gif
to include a GIF image).
If not, you can refer to the Chapter
Introduction to MIME
to learn more about MIME in general.
You are also sometimes asked for a
content description.
This is simply an optional brief phrase, in your own words, that
describes the object.
If you don't care to enter a content description, just press return and
none will be included; however, a reader may skip over multimedia
fields unless the content description is compelling.
Remember: you can always add
mhn
directives by hand.
The Section Composing and Sending MIME Messages
explains how.
Forwarding multimedia messages
Mail may be forwarded with MIME using the command
C-c C-m C-f.
You are prompted for a content description, the name of the folder in
which the messages to forward are located, and the messages' numbers.
Including an ftp reference
You can even have your message initiate an
ftp
transfer when the recipient reads the message.
To do this, use the
C-c C-m C-e
command.
You are prompted for the remote host and pathname, the
content type, and the content description.
Including tar files
If the remote file is a compressed tar file, you can use
C-c C-m C-t.
Then, in addition to retrieving the file via anonymous
ftp,
the file will also be uncompressed and untarred.
You are prompted for the remote host and pathname and the
content description.
The pathname should contain at least one
/
(slash), because the pathname is broken up into directory and name components.
Including other multimedia objects
Images, sound, and video can be inserted in your message with the
C-c C-m C-i
command.
You are prompted for the filename containing the object, the content
type, and a content description of the object.
Readying multimedia messages for sending
When you are finished editing a MIME message, it might look like
the Figure mh-e MIME draft:
Figure: mh-e MIME draft
The lines added by the previous commands are
mhn
directives and need to be converted to MIME directives before sending.
This is accomplished by the command
C-c C-e,
which runs
mhn
on the message.
The Figure mh-e MIME draft ready to send
shows what those commands look like in full MIME format.
You can see why mail user agents are usually built to hide
these details from the user.
This action can be undone by running
C-c C-m C-u.
It does this by reverting to a backup file.
You are prompted to confirm this action, but you can avoid the
confirmation by adding an argument (for example,
C-u C-c C-m C-u).
When you are all through editing a message, you send it with the
C-c C-c
command.
You can give an argument (as in
C-u C-c C-c)
to monitor the first stage of the delivery (see the Section
What now? -- and the whatnow Program for more
details).
Figure: mh-e MIME draft ready to send
If for some reason you are not happy with the draft, you can kill it
instead with
C-c C-q.
Emacs then kills the draft buffer and deletes the draft message.
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