lynx-dev e-mail improvement

[Philip Webb]

000107 Klaus Weide wrote:
> Passing more things across the EXTERNAL interface may be useful (or not),
> but seems completely irrelevant to what Eduardo wants.
> He wants to use ACTIVATE instead of EXTERN.
 
what's needed is quite simple from the behaviour side,
tho' i did read your comments re interfacing from the programming side.

i frequently want to e-mail while using Lynx: there are  2  situations.
(1) i'm reading a newspaper article & want to reply to the author,
whose appended e-address is known, but garbled on-screen (commonplace):
i enter  g , then `mailto:address@hidden' & Lynx presents a screen for choices
before opening my editor to compose the message; after exiting the editor,
i am asked a couple more questions by Lynx, which then sends the message
(ok, be fussy, it doesn't send it if you tell it not to (smile)).
(2) here's an article Joe Friendly would love to see!
i enter  p , follow the 2nd choice, replace the default with his e-address
& Lynx sends the article, incl all the garbage at beginning & end,
which newspaper sites add in hopes of attracting advertising revenue.
AFAIK using EXTERNAL won't help me in either of these cases.

the current device has serious limitations:
(1) i have to enter the e-address in full each time,
whereas my e-mailer (now Mutt) understands a long list of short aliases;
(2) i can't decide after composing the message to add a `cc'opy,
whereas Mutt allows me to edit all the headers in an easy manner;
(3) with `p', i can't edit the file to top/tail the garbage;
(4) if i don't include an explicit `cc', no copy is made of what i send
& in the case of `p' no copy is kept whatever i do.

why don't i simply go to Mutt & do the work there (using Screen, of course)?
because i could not then include the Lynx document,
unless i previously download it to a file & then call it up with the editor.

on average, i run into one of these irritations  once/day ;
if appears that i'm not alone nor is the problem recent.

how difficult is it to add an option in  lynx.cfg
to call a chosen e-mailer like Mutt for all cases where Lynx sends e-mails?
if it's a problem, simply always include the current document,
which the user can use his/her editor to delete if necessary.
if it's going to be a problem for eg DOS/Windows/VMS,
users will be warned of that fact in  lynx.cfg
& any choice of e-mailer they make there will be ignored on those systems,
the current behaviour being retained in those cases.

such a feature would be a noticeable improvement to Lynx for many users.
TD (who seems willing), KED (who uses Mutt), VH (who loves programming)?
 
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