1SORTM(1) General Commands Manual SORTM(1)
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6 sortm - sort nmh messages
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9 sortm [-help] [-version] [+folder] [msgs] [-all | -noall] [-datefield
10 field] [-textfield field] [-notextfield] [-limit days] [-nolimit]
11 [-check | -nocheck] [-verbose | -noverbose]
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14 sortm sorts the specified messages in the named folder according to the
15 chronological order of the “Date:” field of each message.
16 If no messages are specified, the default is all messages in the
18 folder. However, if no messages are specified and the -noall switch is
19 enabled, then sortm reports that as an error and exits with non-zero
20 status. -noall is most useful in the user's profile, to avoid inadver‐
21 tent sorting of an entire folder. The -all switch can then be used on
22 the command line to disable it. Of course, a message specification of
23 all can be used in any case.
24 The -verbose switch directs sortm to tell the user the general actions
26 that it is taking to place the folder in sorted order.
27 The -datefield field switch tells sortm the name of the field to use
29 when making the date comparison. If the user has a special field in
30 each message, such as “BB-Posted:” or “Delivery-Date:”, then the -date‐
31 field switch can be used to direct sortm which field to examine.
32 The -textfield field switch causes sortm to sort messages by the speci‐
34 fied text field. All characters except letters and numbers are
35 stripped and the resulting strings are sorted datefield-major,
36 textfield-minor, using a case insensitive comparison. If this field is
37 “subject”, any leading "re:" is stripped off.
38 With -textfield field, if -limit days is specified, messages with the
40 same textfields that are dated within `days' of each other appear
41 together. Specifying -nolimit makes the limit infinity. With -limit
42 0, the sort is instead simply textfield-major.
43 For example, to order a folder by date-major, grouping messages with
45 the same subject on the same date together, use:
46 sortm -textfield subject +folder
48 sortm always issues a warning for each message that is missing a
50 “Date:” field, has a “Date:” field that cannot be parsed, or has a for‐
51 mat error in any header field. With the -check switch, sortm inhibits
52 all modifications to the folder if there are any such messages, and
53 exits with non-zero status. With the default of -nocheck, sortm sorts
54 messages with a missing or invalid “Date:” field using their file modi‐
55 fication times.
56 When ordering messages based on their dates, if they have the same
58 dates, their original message order is preserved.
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61 $HOME/.mh_profile The user profile
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64 Path: To determine the user's nmh directory
65 Current-Folder: To find the default current folder
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68 folder(1)
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71 `+folder' defaults to the current folder
72 `msgs"'defaultstoallwithout-noall,nodefaultwith-noall"
73 `-all'
74 `-datefield' defaults to date
75 `-notextfield'
76 `-noverbose'
77 `-nolimit'
78 `-nocheck'
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81 If a folder is given, it will become the current folder. If the cur‐
82 rent message is moved, sortm will preserve its status as current.
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85 Timezones used to be ignored when comparing dates: they aren't any
86 more.
87 Messages which were in the folder, but not specified by `msgs', used to
89 be moved to the end of the folder; now such messages are left
90 untouched.
91 sortm sometimes did not preserve the message numbering in a folder
93 (e.g., messages 1, 3, and 5, might have been renumbered to 1, 2, 3
94 after sorting). This was a bug, and has been fixed. To compress the
95 message numbering in a folder, use “folder -pack” as always.
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98 When sortm complains about a message which it can't temporally order,
99 it complains about the message number prior to sorting. It should
100 indicate what the message number will be after sorting.
101nmh-1.7.1 2014-03-23 SORTM(1)