This is vm-pcrisis.info, produced by makeinfo version 6.0 from
vm-pcrisis.texinfo.

INFO-DIR-SECTION Emacs
START-INFO-DIR-ENTRY
* VM-pcrisis: (vm-pcrisis).                  A personality crisis solver for VM
END-INFO-DIR-ENTRY

This is the documentation for Personality Crisis, an add-on for the mail
reader VM which allows you to do all sorts of things automatically when
you compose new mail messages or replies.

Copyright (C) 1999 Rob Hodges, 2006 Robert Widhopf-Fenk


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Top,  Next: Getting Started,  Prev: (dir),  Up: (dir)

1 Personality Crisis for VM
***************************

This is the documentation for Personality Crisis 0.9.1

It was written by Rob Hodges <s323140@student.uq.edu.au>.

It is currently maintained by Robert Widhopf-Fenk <hack@robf.de>

Please read the docs before sending email about problems you are having.
Most problems are due to incorrect regexps.  That said, if something in
the docs is unclear, I'd like to know so that I can improve them.  And
if you find a bug, I'd definitely like to know.  I hope you enjoy this
package.

* Menu:

* Getting Started::             
* vmpc-conditions::             
* vmpc-actions::                
* Associating Conditions with Actions::  
* Miscellaneous Variables::     
* Debugging::                   
* New In This Version::         

The incompete list of Roberts which have been involved in vm-prisis:

   * Rob Hodges
   * Robert Widhopf-Fenk
   * Robert P. Goldman
   * Robert Marshall


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Getting Started,  Next: vmpc-conditions,  Prev: Top,  Up: Top

2 Getting Started
*****************

* Menu:

* Installation::                
* Quick start::                 
* Description::                 
* Specific Abilities::          
* Common Uses::                 
* Overview::                    
* Calling Automorph::           


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Installation,  Next: Quick start,  Prev: Getting Started,  Up: Getting Started

2.1 Installation
================

  1. Load VM if you haven't previously done so in your current Emacs
     session.

  2. Byte-compile vm-pcrisis.el, using 'M-x byte-compile-file'.  You may
     get some byte-compiler warnings; ignore them.  (For the curious:
     Personality Crisis uses some functions that have different names in
     FSF Emacs and XEmacs, automatically detecting which one you are
     running.  The byte-compiler isn't smart enough to know this, so it
     warns of the functions it doesn't know about, even though they'll
     never be run.)

  3. Place the resulting .elc file somewhere in your Emacs load-path.
     It would probably be a good idea to leave the .el file there with
     it too, but you don't have to.

  4. Add the following line to your ~/.vm file:
          (require 'vm-pcrisis)

  5. Read the rest of this manual and set up the variables it describes.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Quick start,  Next: Description,  Prev: Installation,  Up: Getting Started

2.2 Quick start
===============

You do not want to read a manual but solve your personal crisis now?

Then add the following to your ~/.vm file:

     (require 'vm-pcrisis)
     (vmpc-my-identities "me@company1.nil" "me@home.nil" "me@alterego.nil")

Where you add you own email addresses to the call of
'vmpc-my-identities'.  This will prompt you for the profile to use when
first writing an message to a unknown email address.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Description,  Next: Specific Abilities,  Prev: Quick start,  Up: Getting Started

2.3 Description
===============

Personality Crisis can look at the headers of a message you are replying
to or forwarding, or a message you are composing, and you can set it up
to do just about anything based on those.  To get some ideas about how
this might be useful, see *note Common Uses::.  You can also use it to
explicitly choose a "personality" when composing new messages.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Specific Abilities,  Next: Common Uses,  Prev: Description,  Up: Getting Started

2.4 Specific Abilities
======================

Based on the headers of a message you are replying to, you can get
vm-pcrisis to do any number of these things:

   * Change or insert any headers you like in your reply.
   * Change or insert a signature in your reply.
   * Insert some text in the body of your reply.
   * Change any header in your reply to the value of any of the headers
     in the message you are replying to.
   * Call some functions before VM creates the reply.
   * Call some functions in the reply buffer.
   * Prompt you for a personality profile to use, and optionally,
     remember to use that profile when sending messages to the same
     address in the future.

Similar functionality is available when forwarding messages.

Based on the headers of a message you are composing, it can do these
things:

   * Change or insert any headers you like.
   * Change or insert a signature.
   * Insert some text in the message body.
   * Call some functions in the message buffer.
   * Prompt you for a personality profile to use, and optionally,
     remember to use that profile when sending messages to the same
     address in the future.

If you wish, you can also have vm-pcrisis prompt you for a personality
when composing a new mail, which is useful if you need to set up VM
variables with new mails, or if you prefer to more deliberatly choose
who you are for each message.

If you write your own functions to do things that vm-pcrisis can't do by
itself, ready-made functions are provided to allow you easy access to
the contents of headers in both the message you are replying to, and the
message you are writing.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Common Uses,  Next: Overview,  Prev: Specific Abilities,  Up: Getting Started

2.5 Common Uses
===============

These are some of the common uses for Personality Crisis.

   * People with multiple e-mail addresses can automatically set up
     headers such as From: and Reply-To:, so that eg.  their work email
     keeps going to their work account, and their private email to their
     private account.

   * People who like to have different nicknames and signatures for
     different lists can do so.  (Well, uh, that's why I called it
     Personality Crisis...)  As of version 0.7, you can select your
     personality for new mail messages as well as replies.

   * When people send you html-formatted email, you can have your reply
     automatically include a form letter explaining why they shouldn't,
     and how to turn it off.  (Such a letter is not included with this
     package; you'll have to write it yourself.)

   * People who email in multiple languages can set up the encoding for
     the reply, along with the keymap, ispell dictionary, attribution
     line for citations, etc, in the reply buffer.

   * When you get email from a mailing list that has the Reply-To:
     header set for the whole list, automatically change the To: field
     in your reply to point to the original sender instead.  (You can do
     the reverse as well...  if you can take the flamage.)  VM allows
     you to do this, but only if the correct reply address is in the
     "From" field.

   * Automatically change the signature and various headers, etc, in a
     new mail message after typing in the To: address.

   * Automatically remember which personality to use when sending to a
     particular address.

   * If you put your imagination to work while reading through this
     manual, you'll probably think of other ways that vm-pcrisis can
     help you.  Have fun!


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Overview,  Next: Calling Automorph,  Prev: Common Uses,  Up: Getting Started

2.6 Overview
============

When setting up variables for Personality Crisis, you begin by thinking
about what you want it to do when a certain condition occurs, either
when you are replying to or forwarding a message, or in the midst of
writing a message.

You define the condition in 'vmpc-conditions', and the action you want
vm-pcrisis to take in 'vmpc-actions', giving a name to each.  You then
associate the condition with the action in 'vmpc-reply-alist' if it's
one that relies on the headers of a message you are replying to,
'vmpc-forward-alist' if it's a message you are forwarding, or
'vmpc-automorph-alist' if it's based on the headers of your own message.
As of v0.84, you may also use 'vmpc-newmail-alist' to associate
conditions with actions for new messages, and since v0.85,
'vmpc-resend-alist' for resending (bouncing) messages.

If you want to use the 'vmpc-automorph' function, which takes actions
based on the headers of a message you are composing, you should read
*note Calling Automorph:: to decide where you want to hook it in.

The remainder of this manual will provide more information about how to
do all of these things.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Calling Automorph,  Prev: Overview,  Up: Getting Started

2.7 Calling Automorph
=====================

The 'vmpc-automorph' function automatically sets various things in a
mail message based on what's already present in its headers.  Obviously,
you'll need to have entered those headers before it is called.

You'll have to set up what this function does -- for which, see *note
vmpc-conditions::, *note vmpc-actions:: and *note vmpc-automorph-alist::
-- but you'll also have to consider when you want it called.

Most people would prefer never to have to call it explicitly; it's
generally nicer to just have it called automatically when you do one of
the other things that you have to do in the course of composing a
message.  Here are a couple of ideas:

   * Hitching a ride on the mail-text function: automorph with C-c C-t.
     A very good idea if you are in the habit of using this to move from
     your headers to the body of your message.

   * Let vm-pcrisis help you: tab between headers.
     See below for more about this.

   * Pre-empting vm-mail-send-and-exit: automorph with C-c C-c.
     A rather foolish idea, in my opinion.  You'll never get to see the
     results of what automorph does.  If there should happen to be a bug
     in Personality Crisis that fails to take into account, say,
     multi-line headers, you might end up sending a mail to your boss
     with an inappropriate signature that, say, mentions his wife in an
     unflattering way, and find yourself all-too-suddenly unemployed.
     How likely is this?  Well, in a previous version, such a bug
     existed.  I fixed it, but there could be more like it; I wouldn't
     risk it.

   * Calling it explicitly with some key combo.
     Boring but easy.

The last of these is the easiest -- just bind it to a key in mail mode.
For example, to bind it to the F7 key, you might put this in your ~/.vm
file:

     (define-key vm-mail-mode-map [f7] 'vmpc-automorph)

Attaching to other functions is also fairly straightforward.  Just use a
wrapper function.  For example:

     (defun mail-text-and-automorph ()
        (interactive)
        (mail-text)
        (vmpc-automorph))

Then bind this function to C-c C-t (or whatever keystroke you like to
use).

But what's this thing about tabbing between headers?  Well, if you just
want to hit TAB to go from the To: field to the Subject: field, and TAB
again to then go to the start of the message body, calling
'vmpc-automorph' along the way, you can add this in your ~/.vm file:

     (define-key vm-mail-mode-map [tab] 'vmpc-tab-header-or-tab-stop)

If you also want shift-tab to take you back to the previous header, you
should check what keysym is produced by shift-tab on your system, by
doing 'Ctrl-h k Shift-TAB' - for me, it produces 'iso-left-tab'.  So I
add this to my ~/.vm:

     (define-key vm-mail-mode-map [iso-left-tab] 'vmpc-backward-tab-header-or-tab-stop)

You can use any one or more of these ideas, calling the automorph
function as often as you like.  Because its actions depend on the
headers, and those actions can include the changing of headers, calling
it twice may not have the same effect as calling it once.  It may pay to
bear this in mind when you set up the profiles!


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-conditions,  Next: vmpc-actions,  Prev: Getting Started,  Up: Top

3 vmpc-conditions
*****************

* Menu:

* The vmpc-conditions variable::  
* vmpc-conditions examples::    


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: The vmpc-conditions variable,  Next: vmpc-conditions examples,  Prev: vmpc-conditions,  Up: vmpc-conditions

3.1 The vmpc-conditions variable
================================

The 'vmpc-conditions' variable is a list of conditions, each of which
can cause Personality Crisis to take a different action.  You give each
condition a unique, descriptive name.  The format of the list is
something like this:

     '(   ("a descriptive name"
                  (lisp-statement-1) )
          ("another descriptive name"
                  (lisp-statement-2) )   )

The lisp-statement can be any statement in lisp that will evaluate to
nil if the condition is to be considered false, or non-nil if true.
(Don't be afraid, non-lispers, examples are coming...)  Personality
Crisis provides some functions which can be used there, in combination
with 'and', 'or', and 'vmpc-xor' to produce a fine-grained control over
when your actions will trigger.

If you are using 'vm-avirtual.el' you can also use
'vmpc-check-virtual-selector' to check a virtual folder selector.

   * 'vmpc-header-match' is of course the main one.  When making replies
     or forwards, this matches against the contents of a header in the
     message you are replying/forwarding; when using the
     'vmpc-automorph' function, it matches against a header in the
     message you are composing.

   * 'vmpc-body-match' is just like 'vmpc-header-match' but allows you
     to match against the text in the body of the message.

   * 'vmpc-other-cond' returns true when a specified condition earlier
     in the list has been found true.  It's essentially a shortcut for
     building more complex conditions from basic ones.

   * 'vmpc-none-true-yet' returns true if none of the conditions that
     come before it in 'vmpc-conditions' have returned true.  You can
     optionally specify exceptions, so that it can act as a
     "none-true-yet-except..."  condition.  This is a very useful
     shortcut to place last in the list, in order to trigger an action
     prompting you for a profile to use.

You can also use 'y-or-n-p' if you always want to have a choice in what
to do when a certain condition occurs.

We will cover all of these in the examples that follow.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-conditions examples,  Prev: The vmpc-conditions variable,  Up: vmpc-conditions

3.2 vmpc-conditions examples
============================

Suppose you wanted to set up a condition that triggered when you replied
to messages that came from a particular mailing list.  Looking at the
headers of these messages, (exposing all of them with 't' in VM), you
see that they always have a header like this:

Resent-Sender: foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com

Then, in your ~/.vm file, you would have something like this:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("foo-list messages"
             (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                      "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com"))
     ))

This gives you a condition called "foo-list messages" which returns true
when the contents of the "Resent-Sender" header include a match for the
regular expression "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com".

-------------------------------------------

Regexp Aside #1:
----------------

Usually this will be perfectly adequate.  Of course, since the second
string is a regexp, this will also match
"foo-list-maintainer@barybaz.com", but the odds that you'll come across
that are pretty low.  However, if the header contents had included
another regexp special character, it might not match at all.  The
easiest way to deal with both these problems is to wrap the string up in
a call to 'regexp-quote'.  Like this:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("foo-list messages"
             (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                     (regexp-quote "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com")))
     ))

Regexp Aside #2:
----------------

The 'regexp-opt' function provides a convenient way of producing a
regexp to match against any number of strings.  Suppose the
"Resent-Sender" field could contain either
"foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com" or "foo-list-bot@bar.baz.com".  Then
you could use 'regexp-opt' like this:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("foo-list messages"
             (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                     (regexp-opt '("foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com"
                                     "foo-list-bot@bar.baz.com"))))
     ))

Regexp Aside #3:
----------------

If you write your own regular expressions instead of using
'regexp-quote' and 'regexp-opt', you should keep in mind that they must
be in lisp syntax.  In short, this means that you should use two
backslashes wherever you would usually use one, and if you use a
double-quote (") it should be escaped with a backslash to avoid
prematurely ending the string.  You can learn more about regexps from
your Emacs documentation.

Regexp Aside #4:
----------------

The behaviour of vmpc-header-match is to return true if a match for the
regular expression occurs anywhere in the contents of the header.  If
you want your regexp to only match the entire header contents, it should
begin with a caret (^) and end with a dollar sign ($).

-------------------------------------------

Alright, enough about regexps!  Let's get on with the example.

Suppose the next thing you want to do is set up a condition that
triggers when somebody sends you one of those blasted HTML emails.
(When we look at 'vmpc-actions' you'll see how you can automatically
include a form letter asking them not to do this in your reply.)  Your
setup might now expand to this:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("foo-list messages"
             (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                     (regexp-quote "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com")))
             ("html messages"
             (vmpc-header-match "Content-type"
     			    "multipart/alternative\\|html"))
     ))

Let's further suppose that foo-list is set up so that replies go to the
entire list, and that you haven't over-ridden this with
'vm-reply-ignored-reply-tos' because it's usually what you want.  But
when somebody sends an html message to the list, you now have a setup
which results in your anti-html form letter being included in a message
to the whole list.  You'd rather it went to them personally.  Okay,
let's set up some more refined conditions:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("foo-list messages"
               (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                     (regexp-quote "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com")))
             ("html messages"
               (vmpc-header-match "Content-type"
     			    "multipart/alternative\\|html"))
             ("plaintext messages from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list messages")
                    (not (vmpc-other-cond "html messages"))))
             ("html messages from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list-messages")
                    (vmpc-other-cond "html messages")))
             ("html messages not from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "html messages")
                    (not (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list messages"))))
     ))

All of a sudden you have five conditions, but you'll only associate the
last three of them with actions.  The first two are just building blocks
for the others.  So now you can associate different actions with each
condition: For html messages from foo-list, you can change the To:
address in your reply to point to the original sender, as well as
including your anti-html form letter; for html messages not from
foo-list, just include the form letter; and for plaintext messages from
foo-list, set up your desired personality for a normal reply to the
list.

What if you want a condition that always returns true, so you can
associate it with an action that you want performed every time?  It
would look like this:

             ("condition that's always true"
               't)

-------------------------------------------

Aside:
------

If you want one that always triggers for replies, but not when using
'vmpc-automorph', it would look like this:

             ("condition that's always true for replies"
               (eq vmpc-current-state 'reply))

Similarly, for one that always triggers with automorph, but not for
replies, you'd have:

             ("condition that's always true for automorph"
               (eq vmpc-current-state 'automorph))

-------------------------------------------

If you add that condition, and more to deal with other mailing lists and
situations, you might want to be prompted about what action to take when
none of the conditions match (except, of course, the one that's always
true).  This simplest way to produce such a condition (which you can
then associate with a prompting action) is to use 'vmpc-none-true-yet'.
So you'd end up with something like:

     (setq vmpc-conditions '(
             ("condition that's always true"
               't)
             ("foo-list messages"
               (vmpc-header-match "Resent-Sender"
                     (regexp-quote "foo-list-maintainer@bar.baz.com")))
             ("html messages"
               (vmpc-header-match "Content-type"
     			    "multipart/alternative\\|html"))
             ("plaintext messages from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list messages")
                    (not (vmpc-other-cond "html messages"))))
             ("html messages from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list-messages")
                    (vmpc-other-cond "html messages")))
             ("html messages not from foo-list"
               (and (vmpc-other-cond "html messages")
                    (not (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list messages"))))

             ;; any number of other conditions could go here

             ("unknown sender"
               (vmpc-none-true-yet "condition that's always true"))
     ))

It's also possible to match against the text in the body of a message
you are replying to, forwarding or composing.  If you wanted to check
whether the phrase "make money fast" appeared in a message, you'd have a
condition like this:

     ("message from an idiot"
             (vmpc-body-match "make[\n ]+money[\n ]+fast"))

Note how the regexp is constructed in order to take account of the fact
that the phrase may be split over more than one line.

Both 'vmpc-header-match' and 'vmpc-body-match' are affected by your
default value of 'case-fold-search'.  If you wanted to force a
case-sensitive search in the previous example, you'd re-write it like
this:

     ("message from an idiot using all-caps"
             (let ((case-fold-search nil))
               (vmpc-body-match "MAKE[\n ]+MONEY[\n ]+FAST")))

Similarly, if you wanted to force it to be case-insensitive, you'd do
this:

     ("message from an idiot using any case"
             (let ((case-fold-search t))
               (vmpc-body-match "make[\n ]+money[\n ]+fast")))

You can use 'vmpc-header-match' to test if a regexp appears in any
header field matching another regexp.  For example, to find out if the
regexp "fire\\|water" appears in any header, you would use something
like
     (vmpc-header-match "[^ \t\n:]+:" "fire\\|water" ", ")

Essentially what this does is to take the contents of every header in
the message, put them all together in a gigantic string - separated from
each other by a comma and a space - and run
     (string-match "fire\\|water" gigantic-string-of-all-headers)

In the event that you want to look for a regexp that includes ", " you
can use a different string as the separator to ensure that a match
doesn't span the contents of different headers.

The above header field regexp checks every single header - even the
X-VM-v5-Data header.  You could use a more restrictive regular
expression for the header name if you prefer.  For example, to check
only the From: and Apparently-To: headers, you could use
     (vmpc-header-match "From:\\|Apparently-To:" "fire\\|water" ", ")

What if you have an action that you only want to perform if the message
is from foo-list and doesn't have "bar" in the subject, or the message
is not from foo-list and does have "bar" in the subject, or if the
message has "quux" in the subject, regardless of whether it's from
foo-list or not?  And what if, even then, you only want the action
performed if you answer yes to a prompt?  Here's what the condition
would look like:

     ("a complex condition"
       (and
         (or  (vmpc-xor (vmpc-other-cond "foo-list-messages")
                        (vmpc-header-match "bar"))
              (vmpc-header-match "quux"))
         (y-or-n-p "Perform action for complex condition? ")))

It will only prompt you if the 'or' part is true, because that's how the
'and' form works in elisp -- it stops evaluating its arguments after the
first false one it finds.

Okay, I believe I've gone into much more depth here than the average
user will ever need; the point is that with a little lisp knowledge you
can have as fine a control over the automated actions of vm-pcrisis as
you need.  Even without real lisp knowledge, I hope that you can figure
out enough from these examples to achieve such control.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-actions,  Next: Associating Conditions with Actions,  Prev: vmpc-conditions,  Up: Top

4 vmpc-actions
**************

* Menu:

* The vmpc-actions variable::   
* vmpc-actions examples::       


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: The vmpc-actions variable,  Next: vmpc-actions examples,  Prev: vmpc-actions,  Up: vmpc-actions

4.1 The vmpc-actions variable
=============================

The 'vmpc-actions' variable is a list of actions, which can equally be
referred to as "profiles".  You will set up some of them for replies,
some for 'vmpc-automorph' (if you use it), and some for when you are
prompted for a profile (if you have an action that uses
'vmpc-prompt-for-profile').  Many will be equally applicable in all
three cases, which is why they are all kept in the same place.

Each action is given a unique, descriptive name, and consists of one or
more function calls, so that the format of the list looks something like
this:

     '(  ("foo"
             (function-1 arg1 arg2)
             (function-2)
             (function-3 arg1))
         ("bar"
             (function-4))  )

This will start making sense with the real examples in the next section.
But first, we'll look at what functions are available here:

   * (vmpc-signature "signature-file") will replace the signature in
     your message with the contents of the specified file, if it exists;
     otherwise the string itself will be used as the signature.
   * (vmpc-pre-signature "pre-signature-file") works in the same way,
     but specifies a "pre-signature" -- text that is inserted in your
     message above the signature.
   * (vmpc-substitute-header "Header-Field" "new header contents") will
     replace the contents of the specified header-field in your message
     with the new contents, creating the header field if necessary.
   * (vmpc-substitute-replied-header "Dest-Header" "Src-Header") takes
     the contents of the Src-Header field in the message you are
     replying to, and inserts them as the contents of the Dest-Header
     field in your reply, creating the Dest-Header field if necessary.
     (If it's contained in an action which is called when you are not
     replying to a message, it does nothing.  The same is true of all of
     these functions: when they are called in an inappropriate context,
     they only do as much as they can.)
   * (vmpc-pre-function (foo-function args)) evaluates the lisp
     expression
          (foo-function args)
     before VM creates a mail composition buffer.  (This is useful for
     setting VM variables which need to be set at this stage, such as
     the message encoding.)  It therefore does nothing in automorph
     mode.
   * (vmpc-composition-buffer (foo-function args)) does the same, but in
     the composition buffer.
   * (vmpc-prompt-for-profile arg) prompts the user for a profile
     (action) to run.  (The user would be well advised not to choose one
     which itself contains this function!)  If ARG is present, it should
     be set to 'prompt or 'always.  The presence of ARG indicates that
     you want it to check who your message is destined for, and remember
     to apply the profile you choose now to messages sent to that person
     in the future, instead of prompting you for a profile the next
     time.  If set to 'prompt, it will ask whether it should remember;
     if set to 'always, it will always remember.  If ARG is not present,
     it does not remember.

Do not include your own functions in actions directly; call them with
'vmpc-pre-function' or 'vmpc-composition-buffer' instead - otherwise
they will be called twice, both before and after the composition buffer
is created.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-actions examples,  Prev: The vmpc-actions variable,  Up: vmpc-actions

4.2 vmpc-actions examples
=========================

In your ~/.vm you'll have something like this:

     (setq vmpc-actions '(
             ;; actions go here
     ))

Okay, here come some example actions which you can adapt and place, one
after the other, in the place of the comment above.

Say you wanted two personality profiles from which you could choose when
prompted, and to automatically apply when certain conditions were met
with replies or in automorph mode.  One thing to bear in mind is that
when you are prompted, there will be auto-completion available -- you'll
only need to type enough to uniquely identify a profile (you won't even
need to hit TAB). Also, the first profile in 'vmpc-actions' will be the
default at the prompt, so you can just hit RET to use it.  Therefore,
the first profile you place in 'vmpc-actions' should be the one you
expect to use most often, and you should choose names for profiles which
uniquely distinguish themselves at the first or second character.

Okay, here are a couple of profiles which show how to insert signatures
and change the contents of a header field.

     ("foo on the hill"
       (vmpc-substitute-header "From"
             "\"The Foo On The Hill\" <foo@hill.com>")
       (vmpc-signature "~/.foo-sig"))
     ("david"
       (vmpc-substitute-header "From"
             "\"David Foo\" <foo@hill.com>")
       (vmpc-signature ""))

When an empty string is given as the signature, as in the second
profile, vm-pcrisis will actually remove any signature that has been
placed there by other actions.

Also note that by including a From: header, we override the values of
'user-full-name' and 'user-mail-address'.

We could equally well have chosen to override those values directly
using composition-buffer-functions, like this:

     ("foo on the hill"
       (vmpc-composition-buffer
          (setq user-full-name "The Foo On The Hill")
          (setq user-mail-address "foo@hill.com"))
       (vmpc-signature "~/.foo-sig"))
     ("david"
       (vmpc-composition-buffer
           (setq user-full-name "David Foo"))
           (setq user-mail-address "foo@hill.com"))
       (vmpc-signature ""))

If we had two different mailboxes and wanted to direct replies back into
the right one, we would want to also set 'mail-default-reply-to', or use
'vmpc-substitute-header' to insert a Reply-To: header.

-------------------------------------------

Aside:
------

Why did we use 'vmpc-composition-buffer' rather than 'vmpc-pre-function'
to set those variables?  Well, their values are only examined when you
actually send your message, so you could equally well set them with
either, but the 'vmpc-automorph' function does not run pre-functions, so
if we want these profiles to work properly for automorph, we need to use
composition-buffer-functions.

In other cases, such as setting VM's charset variables, you have no
option but to use pre-functions, because they have to be set to
appropriate values before the composition buffer is created.  If anyone
finds a workaround for this, please let me know so I can include it
here.

-------------------------------------------

Pre-signatures can be specified in the same way as signatures:

     ("insert anti-html form letter"
       (vmpc-pre-signature "~/stuff/formletters/why_html_is_bad.txt"))

Alright, suppose that messages from foo-list have their Reply-To: header
set to point back to the list, with the address of the real sender in
the From: field.  We could override it with
'vm-reply-ignored-reply-tos', but usually we prefer this behaviour.
Only under certain conditions do we want to set our To: field to the
contents of the From: field in the replied message.  The action to do
this would look like this:

     ("set To to From"
       (vmpc-substitute-replied-header "To" "From"))

Let's say we also want an action that can prompt us for a profile, so we
can associate it with an "unknown sender" condition.  Here we go:

     ("prompt for a profile"
       (vmpc-prompt-for-profile))

If we want vm-pcrisis to figure out who our message is destined for and
to remember to use the profile we choose the next time we send to that
address instead of prompting, we would do it like this:

     ("prompt for a profile, and remember it automatically"
       (vmpc-prompt-for-profile 'always))

The associations between addresses and profiles will be stored in the
file named by 'vmpc-auto-profiles-file' -- by default, this is
"~/.vmpc-auto-profiles".  If your OS has a shonky filesystem that can
not deal with filenames like that, you might have to change this value.

Keep in mind that the associations stored in this file are only used by
'vmpc-prompt-for-profile'.  They do not have the effect of adding new
associations between addresses and profiles in the general operation of
vm-pcrisis; they are simply used by 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' instead of
prompting you in the future.

IMPORTANT: When vm-pcrisis decides who your message is destined for, it
does so on the basis of the Reply-To: or From: field of the message
being replied (or in the case of automorph, the To: field of your
message).  This takes account of 'vm-reply-ignored-reply-tos', but DOES
NOT take account of any other actions which might change the To: address
in your message.  There is, therefore, a possibility that when using
this feature in both automorph and reply mode, an association made in
one mode may not be properly suited to the other.  The best way to avoid
this problem is to set up your conditions so that the above action is
not run in conjunction with other actions that change the To: field.
This is not really limiting, because the situations in which you are
changing the To: field will generally be ones in which you know which
profile you want to use anyway.

You can also set it up so that after prompting you for a profile, it
will tell you which address it has decided your message is going to, and
prompt you whether to save an association between that profile and that
address.  Like this:

     ("prompt for a profile, and remember it if I say so"
       (vmpc-prompt-for-profile 'prompt))


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Associating Conditions with Actions,  Next: Miscellaneous Variables,  Prev: vmpc-actions,  Up: Top

5 Associating Conditions with Actions
*************************************

* Menu:

* vmpc-action-alist::           
* vmpc-reply-alist::            
* vmpc-automorph-alist::        
* vmpc-forward-alist::          
* vmpc-resend-alist::           
* vmpc-newmail-alist::          


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-action-alist,  Next: vmpc-reply-alist,  Prev: Associating Conditions with Actions,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.1 vmpc-action-alist
=====================

The 'vmpc-action-alist' variable controls which actions are performed if
various conditions are met when creating a reply.  Its format is
something like this:

     '(  ("condition 1" "action 1" "action 2")
         ("condition 2" "action 3")
         ...                         )

If you do not want to set all the other alists then sent this one as it
will be used as a fall back.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-reply-alist,  Next: vmpc-automorph-alist,  Prev: vmpc-action-alist,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.2 vmpc-reply-alist
====================

The 'vmpc-reply-alist' variable controls which actions are performed if
various conditions are met when creating a reply.  Its format is
something like this:

     '(  ("condition 1" "action 1" "action 2")
         ("condition 2" "action 3")
         ...                         )

If we follow on from our examples in the previous sections, we might
have this in our ~/.vm file:

     (setq vmpc-reply-alist '(
       ("condition that's always true" "david")
       ("plaintext messages from foo-list" "foo on the hill")
       ("html messages from foo-list" "set To to From"
                                      "insert anti-html form letter")
       ("html messages not from foo-list" "insert anti-html form letter")
       ("unknown sender" "prompt for a profile, and remember it if I say so")
     ))


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-automorph-alist,  Next: vmpc-forward-alist,  Prev: vmpc-reply-alist,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.3 vmpc-automorph-alist
========================

The 'vmpc-automorph-alist' variable has the same syntax as
'vmpc-reply-alist' and follows the same principles.  (See *note
vmpc-reply-alist::.)  The only difference is that it controls which
actions are associated with which conditions when the 'vmpc-automorph'
function is called.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-forward-alist,  Next: vmpc-resend-alist,  Prev: vmpc-automorph-alist,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.4 vmpc-forward-alist
======================

The 'vmpc-forward-alist' variable has the same syntax as
'vmpc-reply-alist' and follows the same principles.  (See *note
vmpc-reply-alist::.)  The only difference is that it controls which
actions are associated with which conditions when forwarding messages.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-resend-alist,  Next: vmpc-newmail-alist,  Prev: vmpc-forward-alist,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.5 vmpc-resend-alist
=====================

The 'vmpc-resend-alist' variable has the same syntax as
'vmpc-reply-alist' and follows the same principles.  (See *note
vmpc-reply-alist::.)  The only difference is that it controls which
actions are associated with which conditions when resending messages
with 'vm-resend-message'.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-newmail-alist,  Prev: vmpc-resend-alist,  Up: Associating Conditions with Actions

5.6 vmpc-newmail-alist
======================

The 'vmpc-newmail-alist' variable has the same syntax as
'vmpc-reply-alist' and follows the same principles.  (See *note
vmpc-reply-alist::.)  The only difference is that it controls which
actions are associated with which conditions when creating new messages
with vm-mail.

One strategy for this is to have conditions based on the folder from
which you are sending mail.  You might like to set things this up for
some folders, and have vm-pcrisis prompt you for an action in the other
folders.  Here's how you might do that...

In 'vmpc-conditions', you'd have a couple of conditions like this:

     ("mail to foo-list"
      (string-match "^foo" (buffer-name (current-buffer))))
     ("no cond"
      (vmpc-none-true-yet))

Then in 'vmpc-actions', you'd set up an action for your mail to
foo-list, and another one to prompt you for a profile:

     ("foo profile"
      (vmpc-substitute-header "From"
     			 "\"The Foo King\" <david@bar.com>")
      (vmpc-signature "~/.foo-sig"))
     ("prompt"
      (vmpc-prompt-for-profile))

Finally, you'd set up 'vmpc-newmail-alist' like this:

     (setq vmpc-newmail-alist
           '(
             ("mail to foo-list" "foo profile")
             ("no cond" "prompt")
             ))


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Miscellaneous Variables,  Next: Debugging,  Prev: Associating Conditions with Actions,  Up: Top

6 Miscellaneous Variables
*************************

* Menu:

* vmpc-auto-profiles-file::     
* vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days::  
* vmpc-sig-face::               
* vmpc-pre-sig-face::           
* vmpc-intangible-sig::         
* vmpc-intangible-pre-sig::     
* vmpc-expect-default-signature::  


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-auto-profiles-file,  Next: vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days,  Prev: Miscellaneous Variables,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.1 vmpc-auto-profiles-file
===========================

The variable 'vmpc-auto-profiles-file' contains the name of the file
used for saving profiles when 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' is used with an
'always or 'prompt argument (see *note The vmpc-actions variable:: and
*note vmpc-actions examples::).

By default it is set to "~/.vmpc-auto-profiles".


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days,  Next: vmpc-sig-face,  Prev: vmpc-auto-profiles-file,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.2 vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days
===================================

In order to keep vmpc-auto-profiles-file from becoming massive,
Personality Crisis will check the age of profile associations in that
file each time it adds a new one.  Associations that have not been used
in the last number of days given by 'vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days'
will be removed.  This variable is set to 100 by default.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-sig-face,  Next: vmpc-pre-sig-face,  Prev: vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.3 vmpc-sig-face
=================

This is the face used to highlight the signature.  You can use
'set-face-foreground', 'set-face-background' and 'set-face-font' to
change the colours and font.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-pre-sig-face,  Next: vmpc-intangible-sig,  Prev: vmpc-sig-face,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.4 vmpc-pre-sig-face
=====================

This is the face used to highlight the pre-signature.  You can use
'set-face-foreground', 'set-face-background' and 'set-face-font' to
change the colours and font.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-intangible-sig,  Next: vmpc-intangible-pre-sig,  Prev: vmpc-pre-sig-face,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.5 vmpc-intangible-sig
=======================

If 'vmpc-intangible-sig' is non-nil, movement and mouse commands will
cause your cursor to slide to one side or the other of the signature,
preventing you from actually writing text inside the area that
Personality Crisis calls the signature.

This is somewhat useful because if automorph replaces the signature, you
probably won't want any text you added to be replaced along with it.  To
activate this feature, just add the following to your ~/.vm file:

     (setq vmpc-intangible-sig t)


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-intangible-pre-sig,  Next: vmpc-expect-default-signature,  Prev: vmpc-intangible-sig,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.6 vmpc-intangible-pre-sig
===========================

The 'vmpc-intangible-pre-sig' variable works just like
'vmpc-intangible-sig', but affects the pre-signature.  See *note
vmpc-intangible-sig::.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: vmpc-expect-default-signature,  Prev: vmpc-intangible-pre-sig,  Up: Miscellaneous Variables

6.7 vmpc-expect-default-signature
=================================

Traditionally, signatures are added to new mail messages using a
signature-insertion function bound to 'mail-mode-hook' or similar, so
that every message you wrote started off containing a signature.  If you
use the vm-pcrisis signature functions in addition to such a setup, you
should add the following to your ~/.vm file:

(setq vmpc-expect-default-signature t)

This will allow Personality Crisis to properly take account of your
setup, provided that your signature-insertion function uses the standard
'\n-- \n' signature delimiter.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: Debugging,  Next: New In This Version,  Prev: Miscellaneous Variables,  Up: Top

7 Debugging
***********

With a complex setup it can be come hard to understand why vm-pcrisis is
doing a specific thing.  In order to understand what is going on you
should check the value of the following variables:

   * 'vmpc-true-conditions' is the list of true conditions.

   * 'vmpc-actions-to-run' is the list of actions to run, i.e.  those
     actions mapped by a 'vmpc-*-alist'.

   * 'vmpc-saved-headers-alist' the value of headers saved for
     substitution.

If you want to check new contions you can run
'vmpc-build-true-conditions-list' interactively.

If you want to check which true conditions are mapped to actions you can
run 'vmpc-build-actions-to-run-list' interactively.  True conditions
which are not mapped to an action are silently ignored.

If you want to run new actions you can run 'vmpc-read-actions' and
'vmpc-run-actions' interactively.


File: vm-pcrisis.info,  Node: New In This Version,  Prev: Debugging,  Up: Top

8 New In This Version
*********************

Version 0.11:

   * Profiles can now be stored in the BBDB instead of the file
     'vmpc-auto-profiles-file'.  To enable this and migrate your old
     profiles you should call 'vmpc-migrate-profiles-to-BBDB' once.  A
     backup of your BBDB will be created first as
     '~/.bbdb-vmpc-profile-migration-backup' and your old profiles-file
     will be moved to '~/.vmpc-auto-profiles-migrated-to-BBDB'.

   * Added 'vmpc-add-header' which allows to create a header multiple
     times.  This is useful when having more than one FCC header.

   * 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' finds now all profiles, i.e.  before it
     stopped at the first match, now it will check all email addresses.

Version 0.10:

   * Added support for a list of actions in 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile'.
     Before it was only possible to specify a single action.

Version 0.9:

   * The new maintainer is: Robert Widhopf-Fenk <hack@robf.de>

   * All variables of pcrisis can be customized now.

   * Added new function 'vmpc-toggle-no-automorph' to disable automorph
     for the current buffer.

   * 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' checks all relevant headers now and will
     only prompt for a profile if no matches were found.  It also can be
     called interactively to correct a existing profile association.

   * Renamed 'vmpc-composition-buffer-function' to
     'vmpc-composition-buffer'.

   * 'vmpc-pre-function' and 'vmpc-composition-buffer' handle forms now,
     not only a single function which must be quoted.

   * Renamed 'vmpc-replies-alist' to 'vmpc-reply-alist' and
     'vmpc-forwards-alist' to 'vmpc-forward-alist' for consistency.

   * New function 'vmpc-true-conditions' to test conditions without
     actually running some actions.

   * New function 'vmpc-read-actions' to set actions by hand.

   * 'vmpc-build-actions-to-run-list' and 'vmpc-run-actions' are
     interactive now.

   * 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' will search all headers for a recipient
     with an associated profile before prompting for one.

   * When calling 'vmpc-prompt-for-profile' interactively form a
     composition buffer one will get prompted again for a profile.  This
     allows to easily fix a bad association.

   * The state variables become buffer-local now, which should prevent
     some bugs, i.e.  for saved headers.

   * Rewrite of unlispish code.

   * 'M-x checkdoc RET'

   * Several bug fixes and enhancements from Robert P. Goldman.

   * Fixes and updates of the info file.

Version 0.85:

   * This version adds 'vmpc-resend-alist', which should be especially
     useful for mailing list maintainers who receive bounced non-member
     posts, and anyone else who frequently uses 'vm-resend-message'.

Version 0.84:

   * There is now a 'vmpc-newmail-alist' in recognition of the fact that
     you *can* actually test for useful criteria (such as what folder
     you are in when you invoke vm-mail) when creating a brand new
     message.

   * Due to the above, the 'vmpc-newmail-prompt-for-profile' variable is
     now obsoleted.  Its effect can be duplicated easily enough; see
     *note vmpc-newmail-alist:: for details.

Older versions:

   * Pre-signatures and signatures are now dealt with in a more sensible
     manner.  You might not notice the difference, except that you can
     now have them highlighted in 'vmpc-pre-sig-face' and
     'vmpc-sig-face', and you can set up either so that your cursor
     skips across them with 'vmpc-intangible-pre-sig' and
     'vmpc-intangible-sig'.  However, if you use another signature
     package to insert a signature in every mail buffer, you should look
     at setting 'vmpc-expect-default-signature'.

   * You can now use vm-pcrisis in conjunction with the forwarding
     functions of VM. Just set up 'vmpc-forwards-alist', which has an
     identical format to 'vmpc-replies-alist'.

   * There is now a 'vmpc-body-match' function which matches text in the
     body of a message you are composing, replying to or forwarding.
     See *note vmpc-conditions examples:: for more about that.

   * You can now use 'vmpc-header-match' to test if a regexp appears in
     any header field matching another regexp.  For example, to find out
     if the regexp "fire\\|water" appears in any header, you would use
     something like
          (vmpc-header-match "[^ \t\n:]+:" "fire\\|water" ", ")
     For further details, again see *note vmpc-conditions examples::.

   * 'vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days' can now be set to nil if you want
     to never expunge old profile associations.  Associations are now
     "touched" each time they are used, so that as long as they are used
     more often than 'vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days' they will never
     be expunged.



Tag Table:
Node: Top473
Node: Getting Started1501
Node: Installation1874
Node: Quick start2887
Node: Description3425
Node: Specific Abilities3923
Node: Common Uses5684
Node: Overview7603
Node: Calling Automorph8864
Node: vmpc-conditions12137
Node: The vmpc-conditions variable12356
Node: vmpc-conditions examples14624
Node: vmpc-actions25608
Node: The vmpc-actions variable25839
Node: vmpc-actions examples29319
Node: Associating Conditions with Actions35551
Node: vmpc-action-alist35968
Node: vmpc-reply-alist36560
Node: vmpc-automorph-alist37558
Node: vmpc-forward-alist38040
Node: vmpc-resend-alist38497
Node: vmpc-newmail-alist38973
Node: Miscellaneous Variables40374
Node: vmpc-auto-profiles-file40805
Node: vmpc-auto-profiles-expunge-days41316
Node: vmpc-sig-face41873
Node: vmpc-pre-sig-face42214
Node: vmpc-intangible-sig42555
Node: vmpc-intangible-pre-sig43237
Node: vmpc-expect-default-signature43591
Node: Debugging44324
Node: New In This Version45309

End Tag Table
