[Pan-users] Re: Seeing message in original format

[Duncan]

Lenny Nero posted <address@hidden>,
excerpted below,  on Tue, 11 Oct 2005 17:32:24 +0100:

> I have checked and I cant see anything on the 'raw'.msg (from my pan.saved
> folder) file when put into an editor that I dont see when I use the
> 'H'eaders key. I know that my version has had a lot of work done on it,
> but nothing with the gspawn module.
> 
> I understand that it would not show an encoded attachment, but what is a
> 'sub' header ?
> A header that is not normally seen on the standard view pane ? because
> this is exactly what the 'h'eader key is for... show all headers in body
> pane.
> 
> Unless of course something non RFC is being used, or the OP wants to send
> HTML.

Sub-headers, in this context, would mean a message conforming to the MIME
RFCs.  Depending on the message, often these have multiple parts, usually
a plain text part, with either an HTML part or an attachment as well,
sometimes both.

The main headers of such a message will usually say multi-part/related
(IIRC this is the MS style) or multi-part/mixed (IIRC this is the Mozilla
style).  The RFCs specify that the main headers end with a blank line, so
anything beyond that is "body" according to the original RFCs.  However,
the "body" will itself consist of multiple parts (thus the multi-part/* in
the main headers), each with its own encoding (7-bit-text, base-64 or
quoted-printable, or possibly with the unofficial yEnc extension
implementation for news only, 8-bit-yenc).  Additionally and most
importantly, individual parts will often have a suggested file name and/or
other interesting information in their part-headers.

Unfortunately, PAN has no way to toggle display of the individual part
headers, or the entire message in raw format, including encoded binary
attachments.  Even where attachment info isn't needed, this
sub-header information, if it's present, can at times be very useful for
troubleshooting, or analyzing a post in ordered to potentially trace it or
match it to a known poster.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman in
http://www.linuxdevcenter.com/pub/a/linux/2004/12/22/rms_interview.html