Subject: Bug in Pine's Message Composer?

From: Felix Karpfen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 1997 07:52:13 +1100 (EST)

I have recently encountered a problem when using the Pine program to reply
to an Email, which may be due to a bug.  It may also be due to a missing
entry in my Configuration file.  

I have configured my `Reply to Email messages' so that the reply starts
with the received message.  When that received message is long and I only
want to include part of it in my reply, I would like to be able to snip
out the rest.  According to the relevant Help screen, it ought to be
possible to mark the beginning and the end of the text to be snipped with
`Ctrl ^' and then snip it with `Ctrl K'.  However, I cannot get the `Ctrl
^' to work.  I note that the `Ctrl ^' command is listed on the `Help'
screen, but is not among the listed available options at the bottom of the
screen in use when actually composing a message.

Any help that will enable me to snip a block of text without having to
snip it line by line will be gratefully received.

Felix Karpfen

---

From: "Mike Brudenell" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 1997 09:42:17 +0000

> entry in my Configuration file.

Nope... Pine _does_ recognise Ctrl/^ but can only do so if your
terminal/terminal emulator actually *sends* the control character...

For terminal emulators the problem may relate to the keyboard mapping that
your micro is set up to use.  For example by default an Apple Macintosh
(running System 7.5.5) and using BetterTelnet 1.2.2 doesn't transmit the
Ctrl/^ keystroke *as* Ctrl/^ but instead transmits "6" (the "^" character is
Shift/6).  Obviously Pine thinks you have instead pressed the "6" key, and
so inserts "6" into your message.

Other terminal emulators on other micros may have similar foibles, as may
even real live (hardware) terminals.

One solution is to try various combinations of other modifier keys: for
example in the case of the Mac+BetterTelnet solution described above typing
Ctrl/Shift/6 has the desired effect ... this is a function of the micro's
operating system and its selected keymapping.

A more general solution is to change the Ctrl/ prefix to the two keystrokes
Escape Escape.  Thus Ctrl/^ can also be typed as:

    Escape Escape ^

(Note that this is *not* "Escape Escape 6" (using the Mac keyboard layout
referred to above) but instead "Escape Escape Shift/6" (where the Shift/6
gives the necessary "^" character).)

Aren't terminal( emulator)s fun?!

-- 
Mike Brudenell                                         <[email-masked]>
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