Re: Alias support

[Matthew Guenther <mguenthe attcanada ca>]

On Sat, Jul 08, 2000 at 01:36:15PM +0200, Berend De Schouwer wrote:
> On Fri, 07 Jul 2000 19:14:55 Berend De Schouwer wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > I added the beginnings of alias support to Balsa 0.9.0.  Now, when you
> > type "To: balsa<enter>", it will expand to
> > "Balsa Mailing List <balsa-list@gnome.org>", as long as the Balsa mailing
> > list is in your GnomeCard.  It will also move the cursor to "Subject:".
> > It does the same for "cc:".
> > 
> > How does it work?
> > - splits "to:" by "," and strips leading spaces.
> > - checks if it has "@".  If it doesn't, it...
> > - compares the alias to any single word in your full name.
> > - counts the number of matches.
> >   If its exactly one, it expands the alias.
> 
> Update: everything can now be set in the preferences, and it searches
> your GnomeCard for ALIAS entries first, so you can add aliases
> yourself for frequent mailers.  You'll have to do this with a text editor
> until someone adds it to GnomeCard.
>  
> > I don't know CVS, and I didn't want to spam the list without permission,
> > so try http://www.ucs.co.za/~bds/balsa-alias-patch-2
> 
> The new patch is twice as big at
> http://www.ucs.co.za/~bds/balsa-alias-patch-3
> and patches against a clean Balsa 0.9.0
> 
> When you try this, please let me know if it works.
> 

Okay, I tried your patch, and it seems to be working for me so far (although
it did seem to cause an infinite loop of Balsa Error dialog boxes, but I
can't repeat it).  However I've noticed a few things that should probably be
fixed before it goes into CVS.  

Primarily, I think you're duplicating a lot of effort with your expand_alias
and word_in_array functions that already exists in Glib's string-completion
functions.  It would be a good idea to use as much of glib as possible IMHO.

Secondarily, for me it is very natural to press TAB to complete the alias,
it would be very helpful to be able to do so in Balsa (so it would be
similar to my other, console-based mail client, mutt and pine). 

Also, it would be helpful (to me at least) to see what I'm currently typing
will be expanded into before I actually complete it (similar to many windows
applications, like typing urls into win32 netscape).  Have you given any
thought into how you will handle multiple alias matches?

I think the patch is an excellent start to adding alias support, thanks for
the help!

MBG

-- 
      Matthew Guenther
      mguenthe@netcom.ca                          Nice guys get sick.
      http://www.netcom.ca/~mguenthe/

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