Re: [Nmh-workers] Is Pick Antiquated?

[Joel Uckelman]

Thus spake Ralph Corderoy:
> Hi,
> 
> I've a fan of the Unix philosophy, many small programs doing one thing
> each and doing it well, with the whole being greater than the sum of the
> parts, but I wonder if these days pick(1) wouldn't be a separate
> program.
> 
> What if scan, refile, etc., all accepted the same expression grammar for
> selecting messages in a similar way to pick and not just their limited
> message sequence (set) notation, e.g. `lp:-5'.  I know it's not much of
> a leap from
> 
>     refile +cor `pick -list -sub inet -o -from rss last:100`
> 
> to
> 
>     refile +cor -sub inet -o -from rss last:100
> 
> but it avoids the `pick -list echoing 0' issue, the limited number of
> sequences, the need for xargs, and perhaps pick's grammar isn't the
> right one anyway?
> 
>     refile +cor sub:inet or from:rss -100
> 
> I'm not sure if I was starting now I'd have pick(1).  If mark(1) took an
> expression then it alters the sequence/set.  scan with a format does
> pick's -list of the message numbers.

Having other nmh command understand pick syntax might be uesful. But
removing pick would not be. Because message numbers are also filenames,
pick is handy for generating lists of filenames to be consumed by other
non-nmh programs.
 
-- 
J.