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SCAN(1mh)                                                            SCAN(1mh)

NAME
       scan - produce a summary listing of nmh messages

SYNOPSIS
       scan [-help] [-version] [+folder] [msgs] [-clear | -noclear] [-form
            formatfile] [-format string] [-header | -noheader] [-width col-
            umns] [-reverse | -noreverse] [-file filename]

DESCRIPTION
       scan produces a one-line-per-message listing of the specified folder or
       messages.  Each scan line contains the message number (name), the date,
       the  "From:"  field,  the "Subject" field, and, if room allows, some of
       the body of the message.  For example:

            15+  10/05 crocker    nned  <<Last week I asked some of
            16-  10/05 crocker    message id format  <<I recommend
            18   10/06 brien      Re: Exit status from mkdir
            19   10/07*brien      "scan" listing format in nmh

       The `+' on message 15 indicates that it is the current message.

       The `-' on message 16 indicates that it has been replied to,  as  indi-
       cated  by  a  "Replied:" component (produced by the -annotate switch to
       the repl command).

       The `*' on message 19 indicates that no  "Date:"  header  was  present.
       The time of last modification of the message is given instead.

       If  there  is  sufficient room left on the scan line after the subject,
       the line will be filled with text from the body, preceded by "<<",  and
       terminated  by  ">>"  if the body is sufficiently short.  scan actually
       reads each of the specified messages and parses them to extract the de-
       sired  fields.  During parsing, appropriate error messages will be pro-
       duced if there are format errors in any of the messages.

       By default, scan will decode RFC 2047 (MIME)  encoding  in  these  scan
       listings.   scan will only decode these fields if your terminal can na-
       tively display the character set used in the encoding.  You should  set
       the  appropriate locale(1) environment variables to your native charac-
       ter set, if it is not US-ASCII.  See locale(1) for more details on  the
       appropriate environment variables.

       The switch -reverse, makes scan list the messages in reverse order.

       The -file filename switch allows the user to obtain a scan listing of a
       mail drop file as produced by packf.  This listing includes every  mes-
       sage in the file (you can't scan individual messages).  The switch -re-
       verse is ignored with this option.

       The switch -width columns may be used to specify the width of the  scan
       line.  The default is to use the width of the terminal.

       The  -header  switch  produces a header line prior to the scan listing.
       Currently, the name of the folder and the current  date  and  time  are
       output (see the HISTORY section for more information).

       If  the -clear switch is used and scan's output is directed to a termi-
       nal, then scan will consult the environment variables $TERM and  $TERM-
       CAP  to  determine your terminal type in order to find out how to clear
       the screen prior to exiting.  If the -clear switch is used  and  scan's
       output  is  not  directed  to a terminal (e.g., a pipe or a file), then
       scan will send a formfeed prior to exiting.

       For example, the command:

            (scan -clear -header; show all -show pr -f) | lpr

       produces a scan listing of the current folder, followed by a  formfeed,
       followed  by a formatted listing of all messages in the folder, one per
       page.  Omitting "-show pr -f" will cause the messages  to  be  concate-
       nated, separated by a one-line header and two blank lines.

       To override the output format used by scan, the -format string or -form
       file switches are used.  This permits individual  fields  of  the  scan
       listing  to  be  extracted  with  ease.   The string is simply a format
       string and the file is simply a format file.  See mh-format(5) for  the
       details.

       In  addition to the standard mh-format(5) escapes, scan also recognizes
       the following additional component escapes:

            Escape    Returns  Description
            body      string   the (compressed) first part of the body
            dtimenow  date     the current date
            folder    string   the name of the current folder

       {body} returns a string without MIME decoding, i.e. the  MIME  boundary
       seperator may be the first text shown.

       If no date header is present in the message, the function escapes which
       operate on {date} will return values for the date of last  modification
       of the message file itself.  This feature is handy for scanning a draft
       folder, as message drafts usually aren't allowed to have dates in them.

       The /etc/nmh directory contains several format  files  as  examples  of
       customized scan output.

       scan  will update the nmh context prior to starting the listing, so in-
       terrupting a long scan listing preserves the new context.  nmh  purists
       hate this idea.

FILES
       $HOME/.mh_profile          The user profile

PROFILE COMPONENTS
       Path:                To determine the user's nmh directory
       Alternate-Mailboxes: To determine the user's mailboxes
       Current-Folder:      To find the default current folder

SEE ALSO
       pick(1), show(1), mh-format(5)

DEFAULTS
       `+folder' defaults to the current folder
       `msgs' defaults to all
       `-format' defaulted as described above
       `-noheader'
       `-width' defaulted to the width of the terminal

CONTEXT
       If a folder is given, it will become the current folder.

HISTORY
       Prior  to using the format string mechanism, -header used to generate a
       heading saying what each column in the  listing  was.   Format  strings
       prevent this from happening.

BUGS
       The  value  of  each component escape is set by scan to the contents of
       the first message header scan encounters with the corresponding  compo-
       nent  name;  any following headers with the same component name are ig-
       nored.

nmh-1.7.1                         2014-01-20                         SCAN(1mh)