Re: compatibility of nnml and MH

[Justin Sheehy <justin@linus.mitre.org>]

Jason R Mastaler <jason@mastaler.com> writes:

> I'm not interested in reading existing nnml groups with MH or MH
> front-end

Too bad.  :-)   That's the easy part.

> but I am interested in being able to manipulate saved articles from
> those nnml groups at a later date with MH and not run into problems.

If you manipulate nnml group messages with anything but Gnus (such as
mh), it will probably work but will be very likely to cause problems
for Gnus when you next try to read said group.

If you are not interested in reading them as nnml messages again, then
you can treat them as mh messages with impunity.

> Also, there seems to be conflicting ideas about the compatibility
> of nnml with other formats (such as MH).  

[snip]

> This seems to imply that nnml is somewhat compatable with MH since
> nnmh (which is MH compliant) is "just like `nnml', except that is
> doesn't generate NOV databases and it doesn't keep an active file".
> Is the existance of the NOV databases and active file enough to
> introduce these incompatibilities?  It really doesn't seem like it
> could, so is there something else I've missed?

It is.

nnml and nnmh both use exactly the same format for storing the actual
messages, which is the mh spool format.  nnml also stores additional,
Gnus-specific data.  Altering the messages from outside of Gnus is
likely to make the nnml group misbehave.

So, you can read either one with mh.  If you are planning on switching
back and forth between Gnus and mh for _altering_ the messages, then
stick with nnmh.

-- 
Justin Sheehy

In a cloud bones of steel.