message-citation-line-format - should %F have a fall back?

message-citation-line-format - should %F have a fall back?

[Adam Sjøgren]

Should %F in message-citation-line-format fall back to something
different than nil, if no first name can be detected?

Like, say, the email address?

,----[ C-h v message-citation-line-format RET ]
| message-citation-line-format is a variable defined in `message.el'.
| Its value is "%F writes:
| "
| Original value was 
| "On %a, %b %d %Y, %N wrote:\n"
| 
| Documentation:
| Format of the "Whomever writes:" line.
| 
| The string is formatted using `format-spec'.  The following constructs
| are replaced:
| 
|   %f   The full From, e.g. "John Doe <john.doe@example.invalid>".
|   %n   The mail address, e.g. "john.doe@example.invalid".
|   %N   The real name if present, e.g.: "John Doe", else fall
|        back to the mail address.
|   %F   The first name if present, e.g.: "John".
|   %L   The last name if present, e.g.: "Doe".
|   %Z, %z   The time zone in the numeric form, e.g.:"+0000".
| 
| All other format specifiers are passed to `format-time-string'
| which is called using the date from the article your replying to, but
| the date in the formatted string will be expressed in the author's
| time zone as much as possible.
| Extracting the first (%F) and last name (%L) is done heuristically,
| so you should always check it yourself.
| 
| Please also read the note in the documentation of
| `message-citation-line-function'.
`----

Or is there already some way of doing this? The "you should always check
it yourself" might be implying so?

It is kind of weird to get "nil writes:" when From: is just an email
address...

What do y'all think?


  Best regards,

    Adam

-- 
 "You have to be optimistic about the possibility of          Adam Sjøgren
  solving the problem, but skeptical about the value of  asjo@koldfront.dk
  whatever solution you've got so far."

Re: message-citation-line-format - should %F have a fall back?

[Katsumi Yamaoka]

On Wed, 25 Feb 2015 21:34:24 +0100, Adam Sjøgren wrote:
> Should %F in message-citation-line-format fall back to something
> different than nil, if no first name can be detected?

The most corner‐cutting way would be:

--- message.el~	2015-01-29 02:00:24.303787500 +0000
+++ message.el	2015-02-26 00:40:28.328441100 +0000
@@ -4085,3 +4085,3 @@
 	      (push ?E lst) (push "<E>" lst)
-	      (push ?F lst) (push fname lst)
+	      (push ?F lst) (push (or fname name-or-net) lst)
 	      ;; We might want to use "" instead of "<X>" later.

This is what %N does.

Re: message-citation-line-format - should %F have a fall back?

[Adam Sjøgren]

Katsumi Yamaoka writes:

> On Wed, 25 Feb 2015 21:34:24 +0100, Adam Sjøgren wrote:
>> Should %F in message-citation-line-format fall back to something
>> different than nil, if no first name can be detected?

> The most corner‐cutting way would be:

> --- message.el~	2015-01-29 02:00:24.303787500 +0000
> +++ message.el	2015-02-26 00:40:28.328441100 +0000
> @@ -4085,3 +4085,3 @@
>  	      (push ?E lst) (push "<E>" lst)
> -	      (push ?F lst) (push fname lst)
> +	      (push ?F lst) (push (or fname name-or-net) lst)
>  	      ;; We might want to use "" instead of "<X>" later.
>
> This is what %N does.

I was testing this:

--- a/lisp/message.el
+++ b/lisp/message.el
@@ -4036,7 +4036,7 @@ See `message-citation-line-format'."
 			      from)
 		   (error nil)))
 	   (name (car data))
-	   (fname name)
+	   (fname-or-net (or name (car (cdr data)) from))
 	   (lname name)
 	   (net (car (cdr data)))
 	   (name-or-net (or (car data)
@@ -4083,7 +4083,7 @@ See `message-citation-line-format'."
                       (setq fname lname lname newlname)))))
 	      ;; The following letters are not used in `format-time-string':
 	      (push ?E lst) (push "<E>" lst)
-	      (push ?F lst) (push fname lst)
+	      (push ?F lst) (push fname-or-net lst)
 	      ;; We might want to use "" instead of "<X>" later.
 	      (push ?J lst) (push "<J>" lst)
 	      (push ?K lst) (push "<K>" lst)

I don't know if that is better or worse...


  Best regards,

    Adam

-- 
 "Apparantly I was misinformed."                              Adam Sjøgren
                                                         asjo@koldfront.dk