show(1)show(1)NAMEshow - show (list) messages (only available within the message handling
system, mh)
SYNOPSISshow [+folder] [msgs] [-draft] [-[no]header] [-help] [-showproc pro‐
gram] [-noshowproc] [options to showproc]
OPTIONS
Displays the draft message, or the current message in your +drafts
folder, if you have one set up. You cannot give a msgs argument when
you use this option. Displays a one-line header before the message.
The header consists of the name of the folder and the message number.
This is the default behavior. It can be suppressed with the -noheader
option. Prints a list of the valid options to this command. Specifies
an alternative program to list messages. The default is to use the pro‐
gram defined by the showproc: entry in the file. You can give options
to the showproc program at the command line. These are passed directly
to showproc by show. (If you specify an option that has a numerical
value, leave no space between the argument and the value. See RESTRIC‐
TIONS for more information.)
If the -noshowproc option is specified, /bin/cat is used instead
of showproc.
The MH command mhl can be used as a showproc to show messages in
a more uniform format. See mhl(1) for more details.
If you are going to use the same showproc all the time, it is
advisable to specify it in your file. See mh_profile(4) for more
details.
The defaults for this command are as follows:
+folder defaults to the current folder
msgs defaults to the current message
-header
DESCRIPTION
Use show to display the contents of the current message. You can spec‐
ify alternative messages or folders by using the +folder or msgs argu‐
ments.
If a folder is given, it becomes the current folder. The last message
shown becomes the current message.
You can specify a number of messages or a range of messages using the
msgs argument. If you specify more than one message, show prompts for a
<RETURN> prior to listing each message.
Typically, the messages are listed exactly as they are, with no refor‐
matting. A program named by the showproc component in the file is
invoked to do the listing, and any options not recognized by show are
passed along to that program. The default program is more(1).
By default, the show command use the more program to list each message,
a page at a time. When the end of the page is reached, it waits for a
<RETURN> or a space. If you press <RETURN>, show prints the next line.
If you press the space bar, it prints the next screen of data. At the
end of the message, show automatically returns you to the system
prompt. Press q to quit before the end of the message.
If the profile entry Unseen-Sequence: is present and non-empty, then
show will remove each of the messages shown from the sequences named by
the profile entry.
RESTRICTIONS
The -header option does not work when msgs expands to more than one
message. If the showproc is mhl, then this problem can be circumvented
by referencing the messagename field in the mhl format file.
The command show updates your mail environment before showing the mes‐
sage. Hence show may mark messages as seen before you actually see
them. However, this is generally not a problem, unless you are using
the unseen messages mechanism, and you interrupt show while it is show‐
ing unseen messages.
If you use the showproc switch to specify an alternative viewer, leave
no space between the options specified with the viewer and their val‐
ues. For example, if you want to use the more command to scroll through
messages 6 through 10 in your inbox folder, and you want to pause every
five lines, you would enter the following command, where there is no
space between the option n and the value 5: % show +inbox 6-10 -show‐
proc more -n5
If there is space between the option n and the value 5, the command
interprets 5 as a message number to view.
If your showprocviewer is mhl, then show uses a built-in mhl: it does
not actually run the mhl program. Hence, if you define your own show‐
proc, do not call it mhl since show will not run it.
If more(1) is your showproc (which is the default), then avoid running
show in the background with only its standard output piped to another
process. You should re-direct the diagnostic output of show as well
For example, in the following incorrect example, show will go into a
tty input state: % show | print &
For users of csh, the correct command is: % show |& print &
For users of sh, the correct command is: % show 2>&1 | print &
PROFILE COMPONENTS
Path: To determine the user's Mail directory
Unseen-Sequence: To name sequences denoting unseen messages
showproc: Program to show messages
EXAMPLES
In the first example, show displays the contents of message 36 in the
current folder: % show 36 In the next example, the pr(1) program is
used to list the current message: % show-showproc pr
FILES
The user profile.
SEE ALSOmore(1), mhl(1), next(1), pick(1), prev(1), scan(1)show(1)
