An Idea for Gnus

An Idea for Gnus

[Randy Yates]

I sometimes like to work at "lightning speed" and don't want to wait
for 30 seconds (or more) for gnus to send a message to the server and
copy the sent message into the sent message folder. It "Sure Would Be
Nice" (TM) if gnus could be made "multitasking"so that message
transmission is done in the background while control of gnus is returned
immediately back to the user. An auxiliary buffer could be maintained 
with the result of the transmission so that the user could come back
at a later time and check to see that the message was successfully 
transmitted.

Good idea? Any comments? 
-- 
%  Randy Yates                  % "With time with what you've learned, 
%% Fuquay-Varina, NC            %  they'll kiss the ground you walk 
%%% 919-577-9882                %  upon."
%%%% <yates@ieee.org>           % '21st Century Man', *Time*, ELO
http://www.digitalsignallabs.com

Re: An Idea for Gnus

[Michael Widerkrantz]

Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:

> I sometimes like to work at "lightning speed" and don't want to wait
> for 30 seconds (or more) for gnus to send a message to the server and
> copy the sent message into the sent message folder. It "Sure Would Be
> Nice" (TM) if gnus could be made "multitasking"so that message
> transmission is done in the background while control of gnus is returned
> immediately back to the user. 

Do you have to do this in elisp?

The standard way is to have a local MTA on your machine do this for
you, usually sendmail, exim or postfix. 

The usual way to configure them is to use a smarthost for delivery,
perhaps with authentication.

If you think sendmail, exim or postfix are overkill on your
workstation, consider using ssmtp or a similar lightweight mail
deliver client.

-- 
MC, http://hack.org/mc/

Re: An Idea for Gnus

[Randy Yates]

Michael Widerkrantz <mc@hack.org> writes:

> Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:
>
>> I sometimes like to work at "lightning speed" and don't want to wait
>> for 30 seconds (or more) for gnus to send a message to the server and
>> copy the sent message into the sent message folder. It "Sure Would Be
>> Nice" (TM) if gnus could be made "multitasking"so that message
>> transmission is done in the background while control of gnus is returned
>> immediately back to the user. 
>
> Do you have to do this in elisp?
>
> The standard way is to have a local MTA on your machine do this for
> you, usually sendmail, exim or postfix. 
>
> The usual way to configure them is to use a smarthost for delivery,
> perhaps with authentication.
>
> If you think sendmail, exim or postfix are overkill on your
> workstation, consider using ssmtp or a similar lightweight mail
> deliver client.

That's an idea, but the server waiting time is only part of the
story. Due to the way gnus stores sent mail in one long file, that
file has grown to be quite large, and now every time I send a mail
it takes some number of seconds for gnus just to append the sent 
mail to the end of that file. 

Is there a way to move mail in the sent folder to another folder
so that a) this file size doesn't affect the sending of new messages
and b) I still have it available in a gnus-compatible folder for
searching and reading?
-- 
%  Randy Yates                  % "With time with what you've learned, 
%% Fuquay-Varina, NC            %  they'll kiss the ground you walk 
%%% 919-577-9882                %  upon."
%%%% <yates@ieee.org>           % '21st Century Man', *Time*, ELO
http://www.digitalsignallabs.com

Re: An Idea for Gnus

[It's me FKtPp ;)]

Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:

> Is there a way to move mail in the sent folder to another folder
> so that a) this file size doesn't affect the sending of new messages
> and b) I still have it available in a gnus-compatible folder for
> searching and reading?

Please read gnus info manual section: (gnus)Incorporating Old Mail

* Incorporating Old Mail::      What about the old mail you have?

And also, in gnus info manual section: (gnus)Archive Messages

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
   You can, however, use any mail select method (`nnml', `nnmbox',
etc.).  `nnfolder' is a quite likable select method for doing this sort
of thing, though.  If you don't like the default directory chosen, you
could say something like:
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

And gnus info manual section: (gnus)Choosing a Mail Back End

-- 
To reply, remove string `ccol' from the email address.

Re: An Idea for Gnus

[Scott Gifford]

Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:

> Michael Widerkrantz <mc@hack.org> writes:
>
>> Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:
>>
>>> I sometimes like to work at "lightning speed" and don't want to wait
>>> for 30 seconds (or more) for gnus to send a message to the server and
>>> copy the sent message into the sent message folder. It "Sure Would Be
>>> Nice" (TM) if gnus could be made "multitasking"so that message
>>> transmission is done in the background while control of gnus is returned
>>> immediately back to the user. 
>>
>> Do you have to do this in elisp?
>>
>> The standard way is to have a local MTA on your machine do this for
>> you, usually sendmail, exim or postfix. 
>>
>> The usual way to configure them is to use a smarthost for delivery,
>> perhaps with authentication.
>>
>> If you think sendmail, exim or postfix are overkill on your
>> workstation, consider using ssmtp or a similar lightweight mail
>> deliver client.
>
> That's an idea, but the server waiting time is only part of the
> story. Due to the way gnus stores sent mail in one long file, that
> file has grown to be quite large, and now every time I send a mail
> it takes some number of seconds for gnus just to append the sent 
> mail to the end of that file. 
>
> Is there a way to move mail in the sent folder to another folder
> so that a) this file size doesn't affect the sending of new messages
> and b) I still have it available in a gnus-compatible folder for
> searching and reading?

I have my Gnus configured to save sent messages in nnml, which uses
one message per file, and automatically create a new sent mail folder
every year.  This is slightly modified from the "Archived Messages"
info page:

  (setq gnus-message-archive-group
      (concat "nnml:archive." (format-time-string
			   "%Y" (current-time))))

This is fast enough for me, although it seems that one big file would
be faster; it doesn't take any longer to append to a big file than a
small one.

To move your current messages, just create a new group and move the
messages to it.

Hope this helps!

----Scott.

Re: An Idea for Gnus

[Michael Widerkrantz]

Randy Yates <yates@ieee.org> writes:

> Due to the way gnus stores sent mail in one long file, that
> file has grown to be quite large, and now every time I send a mail
> it takes some number of seconds for gnus just to append the sent 
> mail to the end of that file. 

Do you use a single nnfolder for archiving all your outgoing messages?

You can fix this in a number of ways. One way is to automatically
create a new nnfolder every month, like this:

  ;;; Archive my outgoing messages, both mail and news in a group called
  ;;; out.year-month. Use the nnfolder backend for the archives.
  (setq gnus-message-archive-group
      '((concat "out." (format-time-string
                           "%Y-%m" (current-time)))))

I keep them in a Topic called "Outgoing archive" and get a list like
this on the top level:

  Outgoing archive: 12190
    out.1999-05: 15 (77)
    out.1999-06: 110 (118)
    out.1999-07: 69 (88)
    out.1999-08: 196 (197)
    out.1999-09: 280 (350)

    ...

    out.2007-11: 118 (127)

The number in parentheses are the total number of messages in that
folder. Taken together they all currently take up 65 MB worth of sent
messages since May 1999 when I had this configuration set up. I send
very little attachments, so this is mostly text written by me. Wow.

-- 
MC, http://hack.org/mc/