From: Jani Nikula <jani@nikula.org>
To: Carl Worth <cworth@cworth.org>,
David Mazieres expires 2014-08-01 PDT
<mazieres-m3ssd5tf29djdm7jf9qfi4atf2@temporary-address.scs.stanford.edu>,
Mark Walters <markwalters1009@gmail.com>
Cc: notmuch@notmuchmail.org
Subject: Re: folder and path completely broken in HEAD?
Date: Tue, 06 May 2014 01:34:30 +0300 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <87bnvb4zyh.fsf@nikula.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <87mwewkjzu.fsf@yoom.home.cworth.org>
Hi Carl -
On Tue, 06 May 2014, Carl Worth <cworth@cworth.org> wrote:
> dm-list-email-notmuch@scs.stanford.edu writes:
>> However, currently it seems strange that there are *two* different
>> search terms (folder and path), and that neither one lets you search for
>> a portion of your folder name.
>
> For what it's worth, I totally agree. I'm guilty as far as sitting out
> of the detailed design discussions, (I don't use any sort of
> folder-based searching, so I don't care too much). I was aware of the
> problems of the original "folder:" code I wrote, and I was happy to hear
> that people were addressing those problems.
>
> But it's terribly strange to me that notmuch now has two different
> search terms that overlap so much in functionality. I know that I will
> never trust myself to be able to distinguish/describe the folder:
> vs. path: semantics without consulting the documentation. And that's
> discouraging.
The discussions about this were lengthy and tedious, and I was glad we
eventually reached some consensus about what we wanted. It's always
disappointing to find out one hasn't found the solution to satisfy
everyone, but in the end I think I'm happier we were able to reach a
decision, do something about the real issues people were facing with
folder: and move on, rather than just grind to a halt. I think we were
pretty close to everyone just dropping the ball and letting the folder:
prefix be, warts and all.
The idea of path: is that it's the exact filesystem directory, relative
from the maildir root, with an rsync like ** syntax for recursive
matching. Turns out people want folder: to hide maildir implementation
details like cur and new. These are not compatible, or you need to add a
syntax that's not easy or discoverable.
path: is now pretty much complete, and allows one to do robust scripting
that won't break in surprising ways. folder: is something we can still
add new functionality into, for example fancier interpretations of
maildir++, or anchoring if we ever get the custom query parser.
> I think the original "folder:" shortcomings could have been addressed
> without adding two terms, and also without losing some functionality,
> (as shown in David's use case).
>
> I would have liked to have seen some explicit syntax for anchoring the
> beginning and end of the directory name, (which could have then been
> re-used for anchoring subject: or even some future header: prefix).
As I understood it, that would have required writing a custom query
parser, a significant effort. At least nobody came up with a scheme to
do the anchoring without the parser while addressing the other issues
with the old folder: prefix.
> I've always thought that the "cur" and "new" directories were somewhere
> on the spectrum between pointless and annoying. The idea with the
> original "folder:" indexing was to implicitly ignore these, (when both
> existed).
>
> It seems that the new "folder:" continues this idea, while the new
> "path:" does not.
Correct.
> Meanwhile, the new "folder:" anchors the search to the beginning of
> the directory, while "path:" does not.
Incorrect (or I don't understand you).
> And finally, "path:" adds a magic syntax to do hierarchical matching
> while "folder:" does not.
Correct.
> That's an odd hodgepodge of non-orthogonal distinction in
> functionality.
I'm sorry to hear you think that way. One is verbatim filesystem path,
the other hides mail store folder implementation details as a
convenience.
BR,
Jani.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2014-05-05 22:34 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 17+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2014-05-03 4:57 folder and path completely broken in HEAD? dm-list-email-notmuch
2014-05-03 5:49 ` Suvayu Ali
2014-05-03 7:11 ` Mark Walters
2014-05-03 15:55 ` dm-list-email-notmuch
2014-05-03 17:53 ` Jani Nikula
2014-05-04 1:34 ` dm-list-email-notmuch
[not found] ` <87mwewkjzu.fsf@yoom.home.cworth.org>
2014-05-05 22:34 ` Jani Nikula [this message]
2014-05-06 7:44 ` Mark Walters
[not found] ` <87eh06jngf.fsf@yoom.home.cworth.org>
2014-05-07 19:24 ` Mark Walters
2014-05-09 20:01 ` Jameson Graef Rollins
2014-05-03 18:57 ` Mark Walters
2014-05-03 7:29 ` Tomi Ollila
-- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2014-05-02 17:41 dm-list-email-notmuch
2014-05-02 18:10 ` Mark Walters
2014-05-02 21:16 ` David Mazieres expires 2014-07-31 PDT
2014-05-03 5:44 ` Suvayu Ali
2014-05-02 21:29 ` Jani Nikula
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