pick(1mh)																 pick(1mh)

Name
       pick - select messages by content

Syntax
       pick [ +folder ] [ msgs ] [ options ]

Description
       The command lets you search messages in a folder on a diverse range of search criteria.

       You can search the mail headers or the text of some or all of the messages within a folder for the specified criteria.  You can use pattern
       matching or date constraint operations.	You can use the messages that you find with other  MH  commands,  or  you  can	place  them  in  a
       sequence.

       By  default, searches all the messages in the current folder.  You can specify a folder other than the current folder using the +foldername
       option.	Also, if you do not want to search all messages within the folder, you can specify more than one message or a  range  of  messages
       using the message numbers.

       You  can search on the contents of the most common header fields by giving the name of the field as an option, preceded by a dash (-).  The
       command allows you to specify the following header fields in this way: To:, cc:, Date:, From:, and Subject:.  You can also search the  con-
       tents of any other header field by preceding the name of the field with two dashes.

       The also allows you to introduce time constraints.  You can search for messages sent before, after, or between specified dates.

   Combining pick with Other Commands
       You can combine the output of directly with any MH command.  by using a technique called back-quoting.  Enclose the command and its associ-
       ated arguments and options in back quotes (`).  The system performs back-quoted commands first.	In the following example, the  command	is
       performed first, and the output is then listed by the command:
       % scan `pick -from jones`
	  3  16/01 jones	      Meeting 10.00 tomorrow<<There wi
	 17  22/01 jones	      Minutes of meeting 16/1<<Any com
	 21  01/02 jones	      Next week's meeting cancelled<<T

       If finds that there is no mail from Jones, it will output the illegal character 0.  This will cause the command to fail gracefully.

       You  can  use  back-quoting  to	combine with any MH command.  For more information on back-quoting, see the reference page for your ULTRIX
       shell; for example, or

Options
       -after date
		 Searches for messages sent after the specified date.  This command can be used with pattern-matching options, and  also  in  con-
		 junction  with  the -before option to specify a date range.  The date must be enclosed in double quotes (").  This option accepts
		 RFC 822-style dates.  It also accepts days of the week, and the special dates today and yesterday.  Days of the week always refer
		 to days in the past; for example, saturday refers to last Saturday, not to next Saturday.

		 By  default,  consults the Date: field of the message.  If you wish to use the date in another header field, you can specify this
		 with the -datefield option.

       -before date
		 Searches for messages sent before the specified date.	This command can be used with pattern-matching options, and also  in  con-
		 junction  with  the  -after option to specify a date range.  The date must be enclosed in double quotes (").  This option accepts
		 RFC 822-style dates.  It also accepts days of the week, and the special dates today, tomorrow, and yesterday.	Days of  the  week
		 always refer to days in the past; for example, saturday refers to last Saturday, not to next Saturday.

		 By  default,  consults the Date: field of the message.  If you wish to use the date in another header field, you can specify this
		 with the -datefield option.

       -cc pattern
		 Searches for the specified pattern in the cc: field of messages.  This option is case-insensitive: lower- and upper-case  letters
		 are  treated  as identical.  So a search for the pattern phillips would also find Phillips and PHILLIPS.  If the pattern contains
		 spaces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

       -date pattern
		 Searches for messages sent on a specified date.  This option consults the Date: field of messages.  You  must	enclose  the  date
		 that you give in double quotes (") if it contains spaces.

       -datefield field
		 Specifies  the  header  field to be used by the -before and -after options.  By default, these options consult the Date: field of
		 the message header.  You can specify a different header field by naming it with this option.  The -datefield option must  precede
		 the -before or -after options it is used with.

       -from pattern
		 Searches  for	the specified pattern in the From: field of messages.  This option is case-insensitive: lower- and upper-case let-
		 ters are treated as identical.  So a search for the pattern phillips would also find Phillips and PHILLIPS.  If the pattern  con-
		 tains spaces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

       -help	 Prints a list of the valid options to this command.

       -list
       -nolist	 The  -list  option lists the numbers of the messages that have met the search criteria.  This is the usual default behavior of If
		 you use the -nolist option, indicates how many messages met the search criteria.

		 If you use the -sequence option to add the messages found to a sequence, the default behavior is to use the -nolist option.

       -public
       -nopublic Sets the read permissions of sequences.  Normally, when you create a sequence with the -sequence option, the sequence will not be
		 accessible  to  other	MH  users.  The -public option makes the sequence accessible to other MH users.  You can use the -nopublic
		 option to ensure that the sequence that you create is only accessible to yourself.

       -search pattern
		 Searches the entire message for the specified string.	Each line of the message is searched for the  pattern  that  you  specify.
		 The  -search option is a modified Like this option is case-sensitive; it treats upper- and lower-case letters as different.  So a
		 search for the word strawberries would not find a messages which contained the word STRAWBERRIES.  If the search pattern contains
		 spaces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

       -sequence name
		 Specifies  a  sequence  in which places the messages found.  For more information on sequences, see The name of the sequence must
		 begin with a letter, and must consist entirely of alphabetic or numeric characters; no punctuation is allowed.

       -subject pattern
		 Searches for the specified pattern in the Subject: field of messages.	This option is	case-insensitive:  lower-  and	upper-case
		 letters  are  treated	as identical.  So a search for the pattern phillips would also find Phillips and PHILLIPS.  If the pattern
		 contains spaces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

       -to pattern
		 Searches for the specified pattern in the To: field of messages.  This option is case-insensitive: lower- and upper-case  letters
		 are  treated  as identical.  So a search for the pattern phillips would also find Phillips and PHILLIPS.  If the pattern contains
		 spaces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

       -zero
       -nozero	 Specifies whether to zero existing sequences before adding new messages.  Normally, removes all existing messages from a sequence
		 before  adding messages to it.  If you specify the -nozero option, will add the messages it finds to the existing contents of the
		 sequence.  This option only works with the -sequence option.

       --component pattern
		 Searches a specified header field.  If you wish to search for a pattern in a particular header field, you can specify	the  field
		 by  placing  two  dashes  (-)	before	the name of the field.	This option is case-insensitive: lower- and upper-case letters are
		 treated as identical.	So a search for the pattern phillips would also find Phillips and PHILLIPS.  If the pattern contains  spa-
		 ces, you must enclose it in double quotes (").

		 The  command recognizes the following common header fields: To:, cc:, Date:, From:, and Subject:.  You can search these fields by
		 preceding the name with one dash only.

       In addition to the above options, you can direct to start its search a specified number of days ago.  To do this,  precede  the	number	of
       days with a dash (-).  For example, the following command searches all messages sent in the last ten days:
       % pick -subject strawberries -10
       1
       6

       The  command also supports complex boolean operations.  The -not, -or and -and options allow you to modify the behavior of pattern-matching
       options.  In the following command, the -not option means that searches for messages that were not from fred:
       % pick -not -from fred

       In the next example, the -or option finds all messages from fred or from david.	If the -or option is not used, searches for messages  with
       both the string fred and the string david in the From: field.
       % pick -from fred -or -from david

       The  pattern-matching  options normally take precedence over -not, which in turn takes precedence over -and, which in turn takes precedence
       over -or.

       You can override the default precedence with the -lbrace and -rbrace options.  These act just like opening and closing parentheses in logi-
       cal expressions.

Restrictions
       The  sequence  name,  punctuation and message list must not exceed 1024 characters.  In practice, this gives a reasonable limit of approxi-
       mately 200 non-consecutive messages in a sequence.

Examples
       The first example finds all the mail in the current folder that was sent by Christine:
       % pick -from christine
       1
       3
       8

       In the next example, searches messages 10-20 in the folder for messages that were sent to Kafka:
       % pick +sent 10-20 -to Kafka
       pick: no messages match specification

       The next example finds all messages from Jack, and places them in a sequence called testing:
       % pick -from Jack -sequence testing
       3 hits

       The final example finds all messages sent to Holloway since 10th June:
       % pick -to holloway -after "10 Jun 90"
       19

Profile Components
       Path:   To determine your Mail directory

Files
       The user profile.

See Also
       csh(1), ed(1), grep(1), sh(1), inc(1mh), mark(1mh)

																	 pick(1mh)