Re: command-line biff?

[Nori Heikkinen <nori@sccs.swarthmore.edu>]

on Sun, 23 Feb 2003 12:25:23PM -0500, sean finney insinuated:
> On Sun, Feb 23, 2003 at 11:38:29AM -0500, Nori Heikkinen wrote:
> > > take a look at mailstat (comes w/procmail), which might do
> > > something along the lines of what you're interested in.
> > 
> > this only uses procmail logs, though, right?  and i can't see how
> > to make it tell me just what's *new* in the mailbox?
> 
> right.  the idea is that you use it without -k, such that it
> truncates the log every time you call it, and if there's mail in the
> log, it's new.  of course if you've already read it it doesn't
> matter, so this program does have its deficiencies.  

right -- i want it pretty much to be a console version of xbuffy, but
without the programmable middle button.  so any time i call it, i want
said utility to read in a list of mailboxes (for ease i'm just using
my ~/.xbuffy file), and then tell me how many new are in each -- if
i've just marked them as new, or if they've been sitting as "new" in
my box for weeks.

> plus, if you want to actually keep your logs around for posterity...

well, i look at them if i think i'm not receiving mail, or if a recipe
i wrote is weird and i want to see where something's going, so it
would be nice to not clobber them every time i call this.

> how does your script do this?

BOXES=`egrep ^box $HOME/.xbuffy | sed 's/^box ~\///'`;
for box in `echo $BOXES`; do
  MAIL=`ls $HOME/$box/new/`;
  pieces=0;
  for i in `echo $MAIL`; do
    pieces=$(($pieces+1)); 
  done;
  if [[ ( $pieces>0 ) ]]; then
    echo -n "$box: $pieces new message";
    if [[ ( $pieces>1 ) ]]; then
      echo "s";
    else
      echo;
    fi;
    for j in `echo $MAIL`; do
      # prints the Subject and From on the same line
      echo -n "     " && 
        echo -n `egrep ^From: $HOME/$box/new/$j` | sed 's/From: //';
      echo -n " : " && 
        echo `egrep ^Subject: $HOME/$box/new/$j` | sed 's/Subject: //';
    done;
  fi;
done

i realize this is not a fine piece of code, but it does what i want it
to, which is this:

merlin:~> clbiff.sh                                                        [33]
Mail/inbox: 5 new messages
     "Florian Nimmerrichter" <f.nimmerrichter@ceranova.at> : Re: wien
     "Sibley" <tim.sibley@streamsage.com> : Re: Small world
     Danny Loss <dloss1@swarthmore.edu> : ldc
Mail/debian-user: 2 new messages
     Nori Heikkinen <nori@sccs.swarthmore.edu> : Re: [OT] hardware failure
     Ismael Valladolid Torres <ismaeval@terra.es> : Re: command-line biff?
Mail/slug: 1 new message
     gabriel rosenkoetter <gr@eclipsed.net> : Re: colored threads

</nori>

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