tach.el: an attachment interface for message mode.

[Jesse Rosenthal]

Dear All,

I sent this to the list a couple of years back, but now that things are
moving again, and there are new eyes on the list, I thought I'd send it
again. I believe I'm the only person to use this (and might well
continue to be so) but I've been using it for a couple of years without
any problems, and it has made using message mode a lot more
convenient. As far as I know, this doesn't intersect with the recent
security problems pointed out in mml-mode, but I could be wrong.

My issue was this: the handling of (outgoing) attachments in
message-mode left a lot to be desired. MML's markup can be confusing,
and can easily be edited by mistake.

Thus: tach.el. Tach is a minor mode that adds mutt-like attachment
handling to message mode. It's not notmuch specific, but I wrote it to
use with notmuch, and I thought it might be of use to some on the
list.

You can find tach.el attached to this email.

To use tach, put tach.el in your load-path, and add the following to
your .emacs:

(require 'tach)
(add-hook 'message-mode-hook 'tach-minor-mode)

Now when you type "C-c C-a" in message-mode, you should get a new window
with an attachment list. In that window, you can add and delete
attachments using `+' and `-', and scroll through them using the arrow
keys or the emacs direction commands.

tach.el will convert the attachments into MML markup as a last
step before sending. Hopefully you should never have to deal with it by
hand.

Some details: tach actually makes a numerical list at the bottom of the
message itself, separated by a custom separator. The message is narrowed
to above this separator, and the attachment window is an indirect buffer
narrowed to the region below the separator. The separator is erased when
the messages are translated to mml markup at the end.

This has remained at its earliest stages, and the usual disclaimers
apply. It certainly needs more a lot more commenting and
documentation. But I thought it might be useful, or at least fun to play
around with. And it might fill a niche for some users, as notmuch's
popularity continues to grow.

Best,
Jesse


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