Re: The escaped From bugaboo

PSE-L (Sean B. Straw) wrote:
> Robert Bonomi wrote:
> > 
> > A line starting with "From " (5 chars) is the marker for the
> > beginning of a new message.
> >
> > Therefore, an embedded '^From ' is always escaped by the local
> > delivery agent.
>
> IIRC, this is supposed to apply ONLY to "^From " preceded by a
> blank line.

I disagree.  First, most of the software that can operate on mbox
format works exactly like "grep -i '^From '".  Second, I regularly
work with mboxes where the '^From ' lines aren't preceded by a blank
line.  I use an alias 'fivmail' to do 'formail -bcde -m1'.

To extend your argument, that the extra blank line would rule out the
need for escaping in most cases, the mail program that creates these
pathological files, itself parses '^From ' lines strictly.  It has to
be followed by a 'user@host', then something that looks like a date.

And it's case-sensitive.  Just that one requirement could improve the
situation dramatically.  The point is, escaping is all but irrelevant,
to this program, in spite of its output that's so unfriendly to input.

But there are so many programs that "handle" mbox by working exactly
like grep -i '^From ', that this escaping now creeps in at every level
of many mailsystems.  Procmail's fix is stupid, but it is undeniably a
better outcome than the problems it prevents.

Mike