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2.7 readmsg — Extract Messages from a Folder

The readmsg utility extracts messages from a mailbox according to the criteria specified in the command line. These criteria are:

  1. A lone ‘*’ means “select all messages in the mailbox”.
  2. A list of message numbers may be specified. Values of ‘0’ and ‘$’ in the list both mean the last message in the mailbox. For example:
     
    readmsg 1 3 0

    extracts three messages from the folder: the first, the third, and the last.

  3. Finally, the selection may be some text to match. This will select a mail message which exactly matches the specified text. For example,
     
    readmsg staff meeting

    extracts the message which contains the words ‘staff meeting’. Note that it will not match a message containing ‘Staff Meeting’ – the matching is case sensitive. Normally only the first message which matches the pattern is printed.

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