USER DEFINABLE ACTIONS ---------------------- The "actions" feature is a convenient way for the user to launch external commands to process a complete message file including headers and body or just one of its parts. It allows also the use of an external command to filter the whole text or just a selected part in the message window or in the compose window. This is a generic tool that allows to do any uncommon actions on the messages, and thus extends the possibilities of Sylpheed. For example, Sylpheed does not include the rot13 cyphering algorithm popular in some newsgroups. Currently it does not fully support ASCII-armored encryption or clear signing. It does not support uuencoded messages. As all these features can be handled by external programs, the actions provide a convenient way to use them from the menu bar. a. Usage -------- To create a new action, go to Configuration -> Actions.... The "Action Creation" dialog offers to enter the Menu name that will trigger the command. The created menu will be found in the Tools -> Actions submenu. By inserting a slash / in the menu name, you create a submenu. The command is entered in the Command line entry. Note that Sylpheed stores every single email in a separate file. This allows to use the following syntax for the command: * %f denotes the file name of the selected message. If you selected more than one, then the command will be launched for each message with the appropriate file name * %F denotes the list of the file names of the selected message. If only one message is selected, this amounts to %f, but if more messages are selected, then the command will be launched only once with the list of the file names. (You can use both %f and %F in one command: then the command will be launched for each selected message with the name of this message and with the list of all selected messages. I did not find a practical example for this.) * %p denotes the current selected message part of a multipart message. The part is decoded accordingly. If the message is not a multipart message, it denotes the message body. * Prepending >: this will allow you to send to the command's standard input a text that you will enter in a dialog window. * Prepending *: this will allow you to send to the command's standard input a text that you will enter in a dialog window. But in contrast to prepending >, the entered text is hidden (useful when entering passwords). * Appending an ampersand &: this will run the command asynchronously. That means "fire and forget". Sylpheed won't wait for the command to finish, nor will it catch its output or its error messages. * Prepending the vertical bar | (pipe-in): this will send the current displayed text or the current selected text from the message view or the compose window to the command standard input. The command will silently fail if more than one message is selected. * Appending the vertical bar | (pipe-out): this will replace the current displayed text or the current selected text from the message window or the compose window by the command standard output. The command will silently fail if more than one message is selected. Note: It is not possible to use actions containing %f, %F or %p from the compose window. When a command is run, and unless it is run asynchronously, Sylpheed will be insensitive to any interaction and it will wait for the command to finish. If the command takes too long (5 seconds), it will popup a dialog window allowing to stop it. This dialog will also be displayed as soon as the command has some output: error messages or even its standard output when the command is not a "pipe-out" command. When multiple commands are being run, they are run in parallel and each command output is separated from the outputs of the others. b. Examples ----------- Here are some examples that are listed in the same syntax as used for storing the actions list. You can copy and past the definition in your ~/.sylpheed/actionsrc file (exit Sylpheed before). The syntax is very simple: one line per action, each action contains the menu name and the command line separated by a colon and a space ": " Purpose: rot13 cyphering Definition: Rot13: |tr a-zA-Z n-za-mN-ZA-M| Details: This will apply the rot13 cyphering algorithm to the (selected) text in the message/compose view. Purpose: Decoding uuencoded messages Definition: UUdeview: xdeview %F& Details: xdeview comes with uudeview. If an encoded file is split in multiple messages, just select them all and run the command. Purpose: Display uuencoded image Definition: Display uuencoded: uudec %f& Details: Displays uuencoded files. The uudec[1] script can be found in the 'tools' directory of the distribution package. Purpose: Alter messages Definition: Edit message: gvim -f %F Details: Allows editing of any received message. Can be used to remove unneeded message parts, etc. Purpose: Pretty format Definition: Par: |par 72Tbgjqw74bEe B=._A_a 72bg| Details: par is a utility that can pretty format any text. It does a very good job in indenting quoted messages, and justifying text. Used when composing a message Purpose: Browse Definition: Part/Dillo: dillo %p& Details: Browse the selected message part in Dillo. Purpose: Clear Sign Definition: GnuPG/Clear Sign: |gpg-sign-syl| Details: Clear sign a message. The gpg-sign-syl[2] script is responsible for asking the passphrase and for running gnupg. Purpose: Verify Clear Signed Definition: GnuPG/Verify: |gpg --no-tty --verify Details: Verify clear signed messages. The result is displayed in the actions output dialog. Purpose: Decrypt ASCII Armored Definition: GnuPG/Decrypt: *gpg --no-tty --command-fd 0 --passphrase-fd 0 --decrypt %f| Details: Decrypt ASCII armored messages. The passphrase is entered into the opened action's input dialog. [1] The uudec script can be found in the 'tools' directory of the distribution package. It needs uudecode and ImageMagick's display. The latter can be replaced by any image viewer that can get input from standard input. The script could also be modified to use temporary files instead of standard input. [2] The gpg-sign-syl script can be found in the 'tools' directory of the distribution package.