Subject: want to view the INBOX directly

From: Bharath Kumar <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 11:38:33 +0000

Hi,

	I started using pine 3.95 version only today and I have a problem with that. 
When I activate the pine program I want to view the messages of INBOX directly. I'm unable to
do that. It is going to the main menu directly. 

	Can we read the messages of the INBOX directly  after invoking pine ?? Can someone help me...

Cheers,
Bharath Kumar.

---

From: Rudolf Kompf <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 09:55:46 +0100 (MET)

On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, Bharath Kumar wrote:

-> Hi,
-> 
-> 	I started using pine 3.95 version only today and I have a problem with that. 
-> When I activate the pine program I want to view the messages of INBOX directly. I'm unable to
-> do that. It is going to the main menu directly. 
-> 
-> 	Can we read the messages of the INBOX directly  after invoking pine ?? Can someone help me...
-> 
-> Cheers,
-> Bharath Kumar.
-> 
Go to the setup-menu and read the help-page for "initial-keystroke-list".

Rudolf

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rudolf Kompf                     | E-mail: [email-masked]

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From: Mike Brudenell <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 14:32:34 +0000 (GMT)

An even easier way to go straight into the INBOX index screen is to start
Pine with the "-i" command line option:

	pine -i

Cheers,

-- 
Mike Brudenell                                         <[email-masked]>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Computing Service, University of York, Heslington, York, YO1 5DD, UK
Tel: +44-1904-433811  FAX: +44-1904-433740  http://www.york.ac.uk/~pmb1/

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From: Paul O Bartlett <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 20:29:50 -0500

On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, Michael wrote (excerpts):

>           This tends to make people lazy. 

> But instead to follow the guideline that most people follow and that is
> don't let the outgoing message exceed 75 columns in the first place. 

> Make sure Pine knows the maximum width is 75 columns by going into the
> configuration and setting that value (composer-wrap-column). 

    However, Pine allows one to use some other editor than the Pine
built-in composer, a VERY valuable feature (the built-in composer
drives me nuts), so your suggestion would have no applicability to
people who use other editors (although most _decent_ editors allow one
to set a line width by default, which accomplishes the same thing).

> And while I'm on the soap box, people need to use proportional fonts too. 

    Uh, why, please should people use proportional fonts?  My
observation has been that people who use proportional fonts often tend
to violate the very principle of maximum line width you were referring
to above.  And proportional fonts are not practical or even feasible
for a lot of people when they are composing news and/or mail.

Paul                             <[email-masked]>
----------------------------------------------------------
Paul O. Bartlett, P.O. Box 857, Vienna, VA 22183-0857, USA
Finger, keyserver, or WWW for PGP 2.6.2 public key 
Home Page:  http://www.access.digex.net/~pobart

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From: Michael <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Nov 1996 13:21:20 -0800

Hi John,

On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, John aka DearOldDad wrote:

: > Make sure Pine knows the maximum width is 75 columns by going into the
: > configuration and setting that value (composer-wrap-column). 
: 
: That makes no sense as the default composer-wrap-column in PINE is 74
: so why would he want to reset it to 75, if anything maybe set it
: lower, perhaps 70?
: 

It has been awhile since I saw the original default for the composers wrap.
So I agree with you. 

But I was basing my information on "A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet
Community" which states...

Limit Line Length and Avoid Control Characters.

Try to keep your text in a generic format.  Many (if not most) of the
people reading Usenet do so from 80 column terminals or from workstations
with 80 column terminal windows.  Try to keep your lines of text to less
than 80 characters for optimal readability.  If people quote part of your
article in a followup, short lines will probably show up better, too.

...so I thought 75 was a good average. But like I said, I agree that 70
would better :)  .

: > Place hard returns at the end of a line ...
: 
: Not a very good idea IMHO, and bad advice to a novice user, see below.
: 

What I meant was that if the composer (like in Nutscrape) doesn't
understand line length, then one should place a return before 80 columns
limit has been exceeded.

I have read many peoples messages that was composed on Nutscrape and they
always exceed several hundred columns of text per paragraph. This is always
fun to include in a reply. So by hitting the return before 80 (75) columns
in the composer, would help and insure that lines are not to long. 

Perhaps this NewsGroups wasn't necessarily the best place to complain about
Nutscrape's composer.

: > More and more people who write E-Mail or post to UseNet use crappy
: > programs such as Nutscrape which has no concept of width (among other
: > things:)  ). 
: 
: Well, I agree with that, but since you 'missed' the original post the
: original poster said he had a total of 1 (one) days experience with
: pine and was asking for help on some other items, and he was using the
: keyboard tab key (which confuses many newsreaders) so I only tried to
: point out to him that perhaps he shouldn't do that and also that a
: smaller line wrap might make his posts more readable. 
: 

I agree, TABS should not be used.

: > And while I'm on the soap box, people need to use proportional fonts
: > too. 
: 
: Why?  Do ya wanna SHOUT?
: 

It is my understanding that a proportional font merely means that the
letter "i" is the same width as the letter "w". So that 75 "i"'s would end
up on the same column as 75 "w"'s

This is useful if someone wants to point out something...
                                   ^^^^^
...so the carrots should be under the word "point".
 
However, after further review, perhaps I should of said fixed-pitch font
instead?

: > Press CTRL + L-AMIGA + R-AMIGA to continue...
: 
: What's a AMIGA ... That's like one of them supernintendos??
: 

Where to begin? It is a computer that can run the PC OS, Mac OS, Unix OS,
etc and of course its own great OS.

It is a computer that had multitasking 10 years before the Microsloth's
Windows95.

I could go on, but....

Thanks for the reply,

Michael ([email-masked])

Press CTRL + L-AMIGA + R-AMIGA to continue...

---

From: Michael <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 14:42:11 -0800

Hi John,

On 25 Nov 1996, DearOldDad wrote:

: ...set your communications program to line-wrap outgoing messages.
: 

I hope this is on topic since I don't have the original post, sorry if I'm
wrong. I am NOT intending this to be a flame, but rather an observation.

As I see it, the best way to fix lines that go over 80 columns is not to
tell the person to have their communication software do the word wrapping
for them. This tends to make people lazy. 

Place hard returns at the end of a line if you must or use the 'JUSTIFY'
(^J) in Pine to fix lines that go beyond 75 columns (most important
including quoted text and how to trim them). 

More and more people who write E-Mail or post to UseNet use crappy programs
such as Nutscrape which has no concept of width (among other things:)  ). 

If people would learn that there is such a thing as Net-etiquette as it
pertains to columns, quoting would be so much easier overall.

I done :)  . 

C-ya,

---

From: [email-masked] (R. Stewart Ellis)
Date: 26 Nov 1996 12:44:06 GMT

[email-masked] (DearOldDad) writes:

 >Bharath Kumar ([email-masked]) wrote:
 >: I started using pine 3.95 version only today and I have a problem with that. 
 >: When I activate the pine program I want to view the messages of INBOX directly. I'm unable to
 >: do that. It is going to the main menu directly. 

Wrap your lines at 65 or chars.

 >That's the default behavior of PINE.

 >: Can we read the messages of the INBOX directly  after invoking pine ?? Can someone help me...

 >You have 2 choices (actually there are more but if have only started using
 >it today these will do for now) ... 1 as soon as you get to the main menu
 >type "i"  ... 2 invoke pine with the command "pine -i" rather than just
 >"pine"

Actually 3 choices, and the best one is not listed.  I read two replies to
the above message.  Neither the current one nor the other one pointed out
that you can set an option in pine to play an initial keystroke list.  Here
are the comment line and the setting line from my
.pinerc:

# Pine executes these keys upon startup (e.g. to view msg 13: i,j,1,3,CR,v)
initial-keystroke-list=i

 >Two more suggestions, unrelated to your questions ... don't use the TAB
 >key to indent ... set your communications program to line-wrap outgoing
 >messages.  Hope this helps.  BYE.

Amen.

 >John
-- 
  R.Stewart(Stew) Ellis, Assoc.Prof., (Off)810-762-9765   ___________________
  Humanities & Social Science,  GMI Eng.& Mgmt.Inst. ()  /   _____  ______
  Flint, MI 48504    Free speech and free software!  /\ /        / /  /  / /
  Web admin:  http://www.gmi.edu/      [email-masked]   /________/ /  /  / /

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From: [email-masked] (R. Stewart Ellis)
Date: 30 Nov 1996 21:56:55 GMT

>On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, John aka DearOldDad wrote:

[...]

 >: Why?  Do ya wanna SHOUT?

The whole exchange above is confusing.  What do proportional fonts have to
do with shouting?

 >up on the same column as 75 "w"'s

The above is serious, right?  Proportional means that "i" is approximately
1/4 as wide as "w".  The ones that are the same width for all chars are
called "fixed-width".  Get it?

 >However, after further review, perhaps I should of said fixed-pitch font

Maybe, but you have me so confused I am not sure

 >: What's a AMIGA ... That's like one of them supernintendos??

Again, is the person serious?  Are there such newbies that they do not know
what an Amiga is?