# man > show(1) [_SHOW_(1mh)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/SHOW/1mh/markdown) [_SHOW_(1mh)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/SHOW/1mh/markdown) ## NAME show - display nmh messages ## SYNOPSIS **show **[**-help**] [**-version**] [_+folder_] [_msgs_] [**-draft**] [**-showproc _**program_] [**-showmimeproc _**program_] [**-header **| **-noheader**] [**-checkmime **| **-nocheckmime**] [**-concat **| **-noconcat**] [switches for _showproc_ or _showmimeproc_] ## DESCRIPTION **show **lists each of the specified messages to the standard output (typically, the terminal). By default, text (non-MIME) messages are filtered and displayed by the **nmh **command **mhl**. This command will display text messages in a nice, uniform format. It also allows you to config‐ ure the format of the displayed messages and which headers fields are shown. See the [_mhl_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/mhl/1/markdown) manual page for the details about this command. This default can be changed by defining the _showproc_ profile component. Any switches not recognized by **show**, as well as **-header **and **-no‐** **header**, are passed along to that program. To override the default and the _showproc_ profile component, use the **-showproc _**program_ switch. For example, **-showproc _**more_ will cause the **more** program to list the messages with no reformatting. Normally, this program is specified as the _showproc_ in the user's _.mh_profile_, rather than using a command line switch. By default, non-text messages (MIME messages with multi-media contents) are processed and displayed by the **nmh **command **mhshow**. See the [_mhshow_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/mhshow/1/markdown) manual page for details about this command. This default can changed by defining the _showmimeproc_ profile component. Any switches not recognized by **show **are passed along to that program. To override this default and the **showmimeproc **profile component, use the **-showmimeproc _**program_ switch. Note that in some cases, **show **may invoke the _showmimeproc_ even for textual contents. This will happen for text messages that specify a transfer encoding (such as MIME quoted-printable or base64) or specify a character set that **show **doesn't believe can be displayed natively. The appropriate [_locale_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/locale/1/markdown) environment variables should be set to the terminal's native char‐ acter set to avoid gratuitous invocations of the _showmimeproc_. See [_locale_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/locale/1/markdown) for details about these environment variables. The option **-checkmime **(set by default) instructs **show **to test if any of the messages to be displayed are non-text (MIME) messages. If any are non-text, they are displayed by the pro‐ gram _showmimeproc_, else they are displayed by the program _showproc_. The option **-nocheckmime** disables this test and instructs **show **to use _showproc_, regardless of whether any of the mes‐ sages are non-text (MIME) messages. The **-noshowproc **switch will disable any formatting or paging of messages. It is equivalent to **-nocheckmime -showproc _**cat_. It is still accepted, but should be considered (somewhat) ob‐ solete. The **-header **switch tells **show **to display a one-line description of the message being shown. This description includes the folder and the message number. By default **show **will concatenate all content under one pager. If you want each part to dis‐ played separately, you can override the default behavior with **-noconcat.** If no `msgs' are specified, the current message is used. Although it depends on the specific _showproc_ or _showmimeproc_, in the default setup when more than one message is specified, you will be prompted for a prior to listing each message. Each message will be listed a page at a time, and when the end of page is reached, the program will wait for a or . If a is entered, it will print the next line, whereas will print the next screenful. If the standard output is not a terminal, no queries are made, and each file is listed with a one-line header and two lines of separation. “**show -draft**” will list the file /draft if it exists. If the profile entry “Unseen-Sequence” is present and non-empty, then **show **will remove each of the messages shown from each sequence named by the profile entry. ## FILES $HOME/.mh_profile The user profile ## PROFILE COMPONENTS Path: To determine the user's nmh directory Current-Folder: To find the default current folder Unseen-Sequence: To name sequences denoting unseen messages showproc: Program to show text (non-MIME) messages showmimeproc: Program to show non-text (MIME) messages ## SEE ALSO [_mhl_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/mhl/1/markdown), [_mhshow_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/mhshow/1/markdown), [_next_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/next/1/markdown), [_prev_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/prev/1/markdown), [_scan_(1)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/scan/1/markdown) ## DEFAULTS `**+folder**' defaults to the current folder `**msgs**' defaults to cur `**-checkmime**' `**-header**' `**-concat**' ## CONTEXT If a folder is given, it will become the current folder. The last message selected will be‐ come the current message. ## BUGS The **-header **switch doesn't work when `msgs' expands to more than one message. If the _show‐_ _proc_ is **mhl**, then this problem can be circumvented by referencing the “messagename” field in the **mhl **format file. **show **updates the user's context before showing the message. Hence **show **will mark messages as seen prior to the user actually seeing them. This is generally not a problem, unless the user relies on the “unseen” messages mechanism, and interrupts **show **while it is showing “un‐ seen” messages. If your _showproc_ is **mhl **(the default), then **show **uses a built-in **mhl**: it does not actually run the **mhl **program. Hence, if you define your own **showproc**, don't call it **mhl **since **show** won't run it. If your _showproc_ is the pager **more**, then avoid running **show **in the background with only its standard output piped to another process, as in show | imprint & Due to a bug in **more**, show will go into a “tty input” state. To avoid this problem, re-di‐ rect **show**'s diagnostic output as well. For users of **csh**: show |& imprint & For users of **sh**: show 2>&1 | imprint & nmh-1.8 2016-03-24 [_SHOW_(1mh)](https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/SHOW/1mh/markdown)