Changes between Initial Version and Version 1 of FolderFormat

Timestamp:

2012-02-05 08:35:45 (16 months ago)

Author:

rado

Comment:

migrate wiki.mutt.org

FolderFormat

@@ +1 @@
+Mutt recognizes four FolderFormat""s. If a folder is '''correct''' by any of those formats' standard,
+then mutt can automatically read them, nothing needs to be done just for reading.
+However, when you create new folders (MuttFaq/Action), the format used is specified via "`mbox_type`":
+ * mbox
+ * maildir
+ * MH
+ * MMDF
+See OverloadedNames for clarification of the various uses of "mbox" and "maildir".
+
+== mbox ==
+
+An mbox folder is a plain text file. Each message starts with a "From " line (note the trailing space). For example:
+  `From roessler@does-not-xxx.invalid Fri Jun 23 02:56:55 2000`
+Body-lines starting with "From" are usually escaped as ">From" if they occur in messages,
+but there is also a header "Content-Length:" that gives the number of lines in the message
+so that From escaping is not necessary. Mutt supports all formats.
+
+The header is separated from the body by a blank line. See http://www.qmail.org/man/man5/mbox.html for details.
+
+== maildir ==
+
+A maildir folder is a directory with '''exactly three subdirectories''' "new", "cur", and "tmp".
+Each message is a separate file. See MaildirFormat for details.
+
+== MH ==
+
+An MH folder is a directory containing either a .mh_sequences or .xmhcache file.
+Messages are separate files that are numbered sequentially.
+MH is rarely used, most prefer the maildir format.
+
+== MMDF ==
+
+This is a variant of the mbox format.  Each message is surrounded by lines containing "^A^A^A^A" (four control-A's).
+Using this format is not recommended, few other programs support it.
+
+== Which format to use? ==
+
+Don't use MH or MMDF, as these are not widely supported by other programs.
+Whether to use mbox or maildir is a matter of taste.
+mbox is sometimes easier to handle because it is just a single file,
+whereas with maildir you don't need to read the whole folder just to get a single message.
+The rest is philosophy, a big source of flamebaits, and an endless quest for the best way to benchmark it.
+Maybe MuttFaq/Maildir can help you out.
+
+If you happend to choose either MH or Maildir, you can improve performance by using header caching, see MuttGuide/Caching for details.