feature request: parameters for reply templates

feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Emmanuel Beffara]

Hello,

Unless I missed something, there is essentially no way to control how
`notmuch reply` formats its template message. The standard behaviour is
adequate except for a few details:

- The attribution line uses a default format which is informative but
  overly verbose for my taste. It would be useful to have a setting to
  control it (something like Mutt's `attribution` settings).

- There is no automatic signature.

- Any part not in plain text produces a line “Non-text part: …” or
  “Attachment: …”, which is essentially useless when writing a reply to
  a message.

- The above is particularly annoying when it comes to replying to
  HTML-only messages, because you get no chance to quote the original
  message in your reply.

I use `notmuch reply` with the default format indirectly, because I use
bower an it delegates the task of preparing replies to this command. I
feel it would make sense to define new settings to handle all this, but
maybe there are good reasons not to?

-- 
Emmanuel

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[David Bremner]

Emmanuel Beffara <manu@beffara.org> writes:

>
> I use `notmuch reply` with the default format indirectly, because I use
> bower an it delegates the task of preparing replies to this command. I
> feel it would make sense to define new settings to handle all this, but
> maybe there are good reasons not to?
>

My gut reaction is that doing more formatting in notmuch reply is
probably a mistake; it's hard enough to get two users to agree on these
kind of customizations, never mind two different MUAs. Probably what we
need to do is make sure the structured (json/s-expr) output has enough
information for clients to do what they need/want to do.

d

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Jörg Volbers]

> My gut reaction is that doing more formatting in notmuch reply 
> is probably a mistake; it's hard enough to get two users to 
> agree on these kind of customizations, never mind two different 
> MUAs. Probably what we need to do is make sure the structured 
> (json/s-expr) output has enough information for clients to do 
> what they need/want to do.

I agree, but why not add some switches which allow to turn some 
aspects of the reply output on or off? I am thinking here in 
particular of the parts which are not plain text. Since not every 
mail has an attachment, it makes perfect sense to let the user 
decide whether a reply includes a text reference to the 
attachment. A simple on-off-switch would be enough.

JV

 

-- 
http://www.joergvolbers.de
https://fu-berlin.academia.edu/joergvolbers
https://www.geisteswissenschaften.fu-berlin.de/we01/institut/mitarbeiter/koop_gaeste/volbers/index.html

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Tomi Ollila]

On Tue, May 12 2020, Jörg Volbers wrote:

>> My gut reaction is that doing more formatting in notmuch reply 
>> is probably a mistake; it's hard enough to get two users to 
>> agree on these kind of customizations, never mind two different 
>> MUAs. Probably what we need to do is make sure the structured 
>> (json/s-expr) output has enough information for clients to do 
>> what they need/want to do.
>
> I agree, but why not add some switches which allow to turn some 
> aspects of the reply output on or off? I am thinking here in 
> particular of the parts which are not plain text. Since not every 
> mail has an attachment, it makes perfect sense to let the user 
> decide whether a reply includes a text reference to the 
> attachment. A simple on-off-switch would be enough.

Did you have spec in mind ? =D

>
> JV
>

Tomi

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Jörg Volbers]

OK, seems there is something I do not understand. What do you mean 
with "spec in mind"?

JV


Tomi Ollila <tomi.ollila@iki.fi> writes:

> On Tue, May 12 2020, Jörg Volbers wrote: 
> 
>>> My gut reaction is that doing more formatting in notmuch reply 
>>> is probably a mistake; it's hard enough to get two users to 
>>> agree on these kind of customizations, never mind two 
>>> different  MUAs. Probably what we need to do is make sure the 
>>> structured  (json/s-expr) output has enough information for 
>>> clients to do  what they need/want to do. 
>> 
>> I agree, but why not add some switches which allow to turn some 
>> aspects of the reply output on or off? I am thinking here in 
>> particular of the parts which are not plain text. Since not 
>> every  mail has an attachment, it makes perfect sense to let 
>> the user  decide whether a reply includes a text reference to 
>> the  attachment. A simple on-off-switch would be enough. 
> 
> Did you have spec in mind ? =D 
> 
>> 
>> JV 
>> 
> 
> Tomi 

-- 
http://www.joergvolbers.de
https://fu-berlin.academia.edu/joergvolbers
https://www.geisteswissenschaften.fu-berlin.de/we01/institut/mitarbeiter/koop_gaeste/volbers/index.html

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Tomi Ollila]

On Wed, May 13 2020, Jörg Volbers wrote:

> OK, seems there is something I do not understand. What do you mean 
> with "spec in mind"?

In this particular case the implementation is probably pretty easy
(still SMOP, though), just what exactly should be done is the hard
part, to get nice, clean, useable and maintainable solution.

Tomi

>
> JV
>
>
> Tomi Ollila <tomi.ollila@iki.fi> writes:
>
>> 
>> Did you have spec in mind ? =D 
>> 

Re: feature request: parameters for reply templates

[Jörg Volbers]

> In this particular case the implementation is probably pretty 
> easy (still SMOP, though), just what exactly should be done is 
> the hard part, to get nice, clean, useable and maintainable 
> solution. 

Thanks for the clarification. That's of course right.

JV

> 
> Tomi 
> 
>> 
>> JV 
>>  
>> Tomi Ollila <tomi.ollila@iki.fi> writes: 
>> 
>>>  Did you have spec in mind ? =D   

-- 
http://www.joergvolbers.de
https://fu-berlin.academia.edu/joergvolbers
https://www.geisteswissenschaften.fu-berlin.de/we01/institut/mitarbeiter/koop_gaeste/volbers/index.html