Merging Gnorb commits up to 1.0.1

[gnu-emacs-elpa] / packages / gnorb / gnorb.texi

\input texinfo    @c -*- texinfo -*-
@c %**start of header
@setfilename ./gnorb.info
@settitle Gnorb Manual
@documentencoding UTF-8
@documentlanguage en
@syncodeindex pg cp
@c %**end of header

@dircategory Emacs
@direntry
* Gnorb: (gnorb).       Glue code for Gnus, Org, and BBDB.
@end direntry

@finalout
@titlepage
@title Gnorb Manual
@subtitle for version 1, updated 3 October, 2014
@end titlepage

@ifnottex
@node Top
@top Gnorb Manual
@end ifnottex

@menu
* Introduction::
* Installation::
* Setup::
* Email Tracking::
* Restoring Window Layout::
* Recent Mails From BBDB Contacts::
* BBDB posting styles::
* BBDB Org tagging::
* Misc BBDB::
* Misc Org::
* Misc Gnus::
* Suggested Keybindings::

@detailmenu
--- The Detailed Node Listing ---

Email Tracking

* Email-Related Commands::
* Trigger Actions::
* Viewing Tracked Messages in *Summary* Buffers::
* Hinting in Gnus::
* Message Attachments::
* Likely Workflow::

Misc BBDB

* Searching for messages from BBDB contacts::
* Citing BBDB contacts::
* User Options::

Misc Org

* Inserting BBDB links::
* User Options: User Optionsx. 

Misc Gnus

* Viewing Org headlines relevant to a message::
* User Options: User Optionsxx. 
@end detailmenu
@end menu

@node Introduction
@chapter Introduction

Gnorb provides glue code between the Gnus, Org, and BBDB packages.
It's aimed at supporting email-based project management, and generally
making it easier to keep track of email communication.

Much of the code consists of single-use convenience functions, but
tracking email conversations with Org requires is more complicated,
and requires a bit of setup.

Gnorb can be used in a modular fashion, by selectively loading the
files ``gnorb-org'', ``gnorb-gnus'' or ``gnorb-bbdb'' instead of plain old
``gnorb''. The package as a whole is rather Org-centric, though, and it
won't do much of interest without ``gnorb-org''.

This means that Gnorb doesn't have hard requirements to any of the
three base libraries. For the libraries you are using, however, you'll
get best results from using the most recent stable version (yes, that
means BBDB 3). Some of the features in Gnorb only work with
development versions of these libraries (those cases are noted below).

@node Installation
@chapter Installation

Gnorb is best installed via the Elpa package manager -- look for it in
`list-packages'.

You can also clone the source code from
@uref{https://github.com/girzel/gnorb}, and put the ``gnorb'' directory on your
load-path. The Github site is also a good place to report bugs and
other issues.

@node Setup
@chapter Setup

Loading ``gnorb'' will make the basic functions available. Using Gnorb
for email tracking takes a bit more setup, however:

@enumerate
@item
Email tracking is done via the Gnus registry, so that must be
activated with `gnus-registry-initialize'.
@item
It also requires the org-id package to be loaded, and
`org-id-track-globally' set to t (that's the default value, so
simply loading the package should be enough).
@item
Add a nngnorb entry to your `gnus-secondary-select-methods'
variable. It will look like (nngnorb ``Server name''). This does
nothing but provide a place to hang nnir searches.
@item
Then put a call to `gnorb-tracking-initialize' in your init files,
at some point after the Gnus registry is initialized.
@item
If you're not using a local archive method for saving your sent
messages (ie you're using IMAP), you'll also need to tell Gnorb
where to find your sent messages. Set the variable
`gnorb-gnus-sent-groups' to a list of strings; each string should
indicate a fully-qualified group name, eg ``nnimap+SERVER:GROUP''.
@end enumerate

Lastly, Gnorb doesn't bind any keys by default; see the @ref{Suggested Keybindings,Suggested
Keybindings} section below for possibilities.

@node Email Tracking
@chapter Email Tracking

The most interesting thing Gnorb does is using Org headings to track
email conversations. This can mean anything from reminding yourself to
write to your mother, to conducting delicate business negotiations
over email, to running an email-based bug tracker.

Gnorb assists in this process by using the Gnus registry to track
correspondences between emails and Org headings -- specifically,
message IDs are associated with Org heading ids. As a conversation
develops, messages are collected on a heading (and/or its children).
You can compose new messages directly from the Org heading, and Gnorb
will automatically associate your sent message with the conversation.
You can open temporary Gnus *Summary* buffers holding all the messages
associated with an Org subtree, and reply from there. When you receive
new messages relevant to a conversation, Gnorb will notice them and
prompt you to associate them with the appropriate Org heading.
Attachments on incoming messages can be automatically saved as
attachments on Org headings, using org-attach.

In general, the goal is to keep track of whole conversations, reduce
friction when moving between Gnus and Org, and keep you in the Org
agenda rather than in Gnus.
@menu
* Email-Related Commands::
* Trigger Actions::
* Viewing Tracked Messages in *Summary* Buffers::
* Hinting in Gnus::
* Message Attachments::
* Likely Workflow::
@end menu

@node Email-Related Commands
@section Email-Related Commands

Email tracking starts in one of three ways:

@enumerate
@item
With an Org heading that represents an email TODO. Call
`gnorb-org-handle-mail' (see below) on the heading to compose a new
message, and start the tracking process.
@item
By calling org-capture on a received message. Any heading captured
from a message will automatically be associated with that message.
@item
By calling `gnorb-gnus-outgoing-do-todo' in a message composition
buffer -- see below.
@end enumerate

There are three main email-related commands:

@enumerate
@item
`gnorb-org-handle-mail' is called on an Org heading to compose a
new message. By default, this will begin a reply to the most recent
message in the conversation. If there are no associated messages to
reply to (or you call the function with a double prefix arg), Gnorb
will look for mailto: or bbdb: links in the heading, and compose a
new message to them.

The sent message will be associated with the Org heading, and
you'll be brought back to the heading and asked to trigger an
action on it.

`gnorb-email-subtree' is an alternative entry-point to
`gnorb-org-handle-mail'. It does the same thing as the latter, but
first exports the body of the subtree as either text or a file,
then inserts the text into the message body, or attaches the file
to the message, depending on what you've chosen.
@item
`gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' is called on a message in a Gnus
*Summary* buffer. You'll be prompted for an Org heading, taken to
that heading, and asked to trigger an action on it.
@item
`gnorb-gnus-outgoing-do-todo' is called in message mode, while
composing a new message. 

If called without a prefix arg, a new Org heading will be created
after the message is sent, and the sent message associated with it.
The new heading will be created as a capture heading, using the
template specified by the `gnorb-gnus-new-todo-capture-key' option.

If you call this function with a single prefix arg, you'll be
prompted to choose an existing Org heading instead. After the the
message is sent, you'll be taken to that heading and prompted to
trigger an action on it.

If you've called this function, and then realize you've associated
the message with the wrong TODO, call it again with a double prefix
to clear all associations.

It's also possible to call this function *after* a message is sent,
in case you forgot. Gnorb saves information about the most recently
sent message for this purpose.
@end enumerate

Because these three commands all express a similar intent, but are
called in different modes, it can make sense to give each of them the
same keybinding in the keymaps for Org mode, Gnus summary mode, and
Message mode, respectively.

@node Trigger Actions
@section Trigger Actions

After calling `gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on a message, or after
sending a message associated with an Org heading, you'll be taken to
the heading and asked to ``trigger an action'' on it. At the moment
there are four different possibilities: triggering a TODO state-change
on the heading, taking a note on the heading (both these options will
associate the message with the heading), associating the message but
doing nothing else, and lastly, doing nothing at all.

More actions will be added in the future; it's also possible to
rearrange or delete existing actions, and add your own: see the
docstring of `gnorb-org-trigger-actions'.

@node Viewing Tracked Messages in *Summary* Buffers
@section Viewing Tracked Messages in *Summary* Buffers

Call `gnorb-org-view' on an Org heading to open an nnir *Summary*
buffer showing all the messages associated with that heading (this
requires that you've added an nngnorb server to your Gnus backends). A
minor mode will be in effect, ensuring that any replies you send to
messages in this buffer will automatically be associated with the
original Org heading. You can also invoke
`gnorb-summary-disassociate-message' (``C-c d'') to disassociate the
message with the Org heading.

As a bonus, it's possible to go into Gnus' *Server* buffer, find the
line specifying your nngnorb server, and hit ``G'' (aka
`gnus-group-make-nnir-group'). At the query prompt, enter an Org-style
tags-todo Agenda query string (eg ``+work-computer'', or what have you).
Gnorb will find all headings matching this query, scan their subtrees
for gnus links, and then give you a Summary buffer containing all the
linked messages. This is dog-slow at the moment; it will get faster.

@node Hinting in Gnus
@section Hinting in Gnus

When you receive new mails that might be relevant to existing Org
TODOs, Gnorb can alert you to that fact. When
`gnorb-gnus-hint-relevant-article' is t (the default), Gnorb will
display a message in the minibuffer when opening potentially relevant
messages. You can then use `gnorb-gnus-incoming-to-todo' to trigger an
action on the relevant TODO.

This hinting can happen in the Gnus summary buffer as well. If you use
the escape indicated by `gnorb-gnus-summary-mark-format-letter'' as
part of your `gnus-summary-line-format', articles that are relevant to
TODOs will be marked with a special character in the Summary buffer,
as determined by `gnorb-gnus-summary-mark'. By default, the format
letter is ``g'' (meaning it is used as ``%ug'' in the format line), and
the mark is ``¡''.

@node Message Attachments
@section Message Attachments

Gnorb simplifies the handling of attachments that you receive in
emails. When you call `gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on a message,
you'll be prompted to re-attach the email's attachments onto the Org
heading, using the org-attach library.

You can also do this as part of the capture process. Set the
new :gnus-attachments key to ``t'' in a capture template that you use on
mail messages, and you'll be queried to re-attach the message's
attachments onto the newly-captured heading. Or set
`gnorb-gnus-capture-always-attach' to ``t'' to have Gnorb do this for
all capture templates.

You can also do this using the regular system of MIME commands,
without invoking the email tracking process. See @ref{Suggested Keybindings,Suggested
Keybindings}, below.

The same process works in reverse: when you send a message from an Org
heading using `gnorb-org-handle-mail', Gnorb will ask if you want to
attach the files in the heading's org-attach directory to the outgoing
message.

@node Likely Workflow
@section Likely Workflow

You receive an email from Jimmy, who wants to rent a room in your
house. ``I'll respond to this later,'' you think.

You capture an Org TODO from the email, call it ``Jimmy renting a
room'', and give it a REPLY keyword. Gnorb quietly records the
correspondence between the email and the TODO, using the Gnus
registry.

The next day, looking at your Agenda, you see the TODO and decide to
respond to the email. You call `gnorb-org-handle-mail' on the heading,
and Gnorb opens Jimmy's email and starts a reply to it.

You tell Jimmy the room's available in March, and send the message.
Gnorb takes you back to the heading, and asks you to trigger an action
on it. You choose ``todo state'', and change the heading keyword to
WAIT.

Two days later, Jimmy replies to your message, saying that March is
perfect. When you open his response, Gnorb politely reminds you that
the message is relevant to an existing TODO. You call
`gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on the message, and are again taken to
the TODO and asked to trigger an action. Again you choose ``todo
state'', and change the heading keyword back to REPLY.

You get another email, from Samantha, warning you not to rent the room
to Jimmy. She even attaches a picture of a room in her house, as it
looked after Jimmy had stayed there for six months. It's bad. You call
`gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on her message, and pick the ``Jimmy
renting a room'' heading. This time, you choose ``take note'' as the
trigger action, and make a brief note about how bad that room looked.
Gnorb asks if you'd like to attach the picture to the Org heading. You
decide you will.

Now it's time to write to Jimmy and say something noncommittal.
Calling `gnorb-org-handle-mail' on the heading would respond to
Samantha's email, the most recent of the associated messages, which
isn't what you want. Instead you call `gnorb-org-view' on the heading,
which opens up a Gnus *Summary* buffer containing all four messages:
Jimmy's first, your response, his response to that, and Samantha's
message. You pick Jimmy's second email, and reply to it normally.
Gnorb asks if you'd like to send the picture of the room as an
attachment. You would not. When you send the reply Gnorb tracks that
as well, and does the ``trigger an action'' trick again.

In this way Gnorb helps you manage an entire conversation, possibly
with multiple threads and multiple participants. Mostly all you need
to do is call `gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on newly-received
messages, and `gnorb-org-handle-mail' on the heading when it's time to
compose a new reply.

@node Restoring Window Layout
@chapter Restoring Window Layout

Many Gnorb functions alter the window layout and value of point. In
most of these cases, you can restore the previous layout using the
interactive function `gnorb-restore-layout'.

@node Recent Mails From BBDB Contacts
@chapter Recent Mails From BBDB Contacts

If you're using a recent git version of BBDB (circa mid-May 2014 or
later), you can give your BBDB contacts a special field which will
collect links to recent emails from that contact. The default name of
the field is ``messages'', but you can customize that name using the
`gnorb-bbdb-messages-field' option.

Gnorb will not collect links by default: you need to call
`gnorb-bbdb-open-link' on a contact once to start the process.
Thereafter, opening mails from that contact will store a link to the
message.

Once some links are stored, `gnorb-bbdb-open-link' will open them: Use
a prefix arg to the function call to select particular messages to
open. There are several options controlling how all this works; see
the gnorb-bbdb user options section below for details.

@node BBDB posting styles
@chapter BBDB posting styles

Gnorb comes with a BBDB posting-style system, inspired by (copied
from) gnus-posting-styles. You can specify how messages are composed
to specific contacts, by matching on contact field values (the same
way gnus-posting-styles matches on group names). See the docstring of
`gnorb-bbdb-posting-styles' for details.

In order not to be too intrusive, Gnorb doesn't alter the behavior of
`bbdb-mail', the usual mail-composition function. Instead it provides
an alternate `gnorb-bbdb-mail', which does exactly the same thing, but
first processes the new mail according to `gnorb-bbdb-posting-styles'.
If you want to use this feature regularly, you can remap `bbdb-mail'
to `gnorb-bbdb-mail' in the `bbdb-mode-map'.

@node BBDB Org tagging
@chapter BBDB Org tagging

BBDB contacts can be tagged with the same tags you use in your Org
files. This allows you to pop up a *BBDB* buffer alongside your Org
Agenda when searching for certain tags. This can happen automatically
for all Org tags-todo searches, if you set the option
`gnorb-org-agenda-popup-bbdb' to t. Or you can do it manually, by
calling the command of the same name. This command only shows TODOs by
default: use a prefix argument to show all tagged headings.

Tags are stored in an xfield named org-tags, by default. You can
customize the name of this field using `gnorb-bbdb-org-tag-field'.

@node Misc BBDB
@chapter Misc BBDB

@menu
* Searching for messages from BBDB contacts::
* Citing BBDB contacts::
* User Options::
@end menu

@node Searching for messages from BBDB contacts
@section Searching for messages from BBDB contacts

Call `gnorb-bbdb-mail-search' to search for all mail messages from the
record(s) displayed. Currently supports the notmuch, mairix, and
namazu search backends; set `gnorb-gnus-mail-search-backend' to one of
those symbol values.

@node Citing BBDB contacts
@section Citing BBDB contacts

Calling `gnorb-bbdb-cite-contact' will prompt for a BBDB record and
insert a string of the type ``Bob Smith <bob@@smith.com>''.

@node User Options
@section User Options

@table @samp
@item `gnorb-bbdb-org-tag-field
The name of the BBDB xfield, as a
symbol, that holds Org-related tags. Specified as a string with
the ``:'' separator between tags, same as for Org headings.
Defaults to org-tag.
@item `gnorb-bbdb-messages-field'
The name of the BBDB xfield that
holds links to recently-received messages from this contact.
Defaults to `messages.
@item `gnorb-bbdb-collect-N-messages'
Collect at most this many links
to messages from this contact. Defaults to 5.
@item `gnorb-bbdb-define-recent'
What does ``recently-received'' mean?
Possible values are the symbols seen and received. When set to
seen, the most recently-opened messages are collected. When set
to received, the most recently-received (by Date header) messages
are collected. Defaults to seen.
@item `gnorb-bbdb-message-link-format-multi'
How is a single message's
link formatted in the multi-line BBDB layout format? Defaults to
``%:count. %D: %:subject'' (see the docstring for details).
@item ` gnorb-bbdb-message-link-format-one'
How is a single message's
link formatted in the one-line BBDB layout format? Defaults to
nil (see the docstring for details).
@item `gnorb-bbdb-posting-styles'
Styles to use for influencing the
format of mails composed to the BBDB record(s) under point (see
the docstring for details).
@end table

@node Misc Org
@chapter Misc Org

@menu
* Inserting BBDB links::
* User Options: User Optionsx. 
@end menu

@node Inserting BBDB links
@section Inserting BBDB links

Calling `gnorb-org-contact-link' will prompt for a BBDB record and
insert an Org link to that record at point.

@node User Optionsx
@section User Options

@table @samp
@item `gnorb-org-after-message-setup-hook'
Hook run in a message buffer
after setting up the message, from `gnorb-org-handle-mail' or
`gnorb-org-email-subtree'.
@item `gnorb-org-trigger-actions'
List of potential actions that can be
taken on headings after a message is sent. See docstring for
details.
@item `gnorb-org-mail-scan-scope'
The number of paragraphs to scan for
mail-related links. This comes into play when calling
`gnorb-org-handle-mail' on a heading with no associated messages,
or when `gnorb-org-handle-mail' is called with a prefix arg.
@item `gnorb-org-find-candidates-match'
When searching all Org files
for headings to collect messages from, this option can limit
which headings are searched. It is used as the second argument to
a call to `org-map-entries', and has the same syntax as that used
in an agenda tags view.
@item `gnorb-org-email-subtree-text-parameters'
A plist of export
parameters corresponding to the EXT-PLIST argument to the export
functions, for use when exporting to text.
@item `gnorb-org-email-subtree-file-parameters'
A plist of export
parameters corresponding to the EXT-PLIST argument to the export
functions, for use when exporting to a file.
@item `gnorb-org-email-subtree-text-options'
A list of ts and nils
corresponding to Org's export options, to be used when exporting
to text. The options, in order, are async, subtreep,
visible-only, and body-only.
@item `gnorb-org-email-subtree-file-options'
A list of ts and nils
corresponding to Org's export options, to be used when exporting
to a file. The options, in order, are async, subtreep,
visible-only, and body-only.
@item `gnorb-org-export-extensions'
Correspondence between export
backends and their respective (usual) file extensions.
@item `gnorb-org-capture-collect-link-p'
When this is set to t, the
capture process will always store a link to the Gnus message or
BBDB record under point, even when the link isn't part of the
capture template. It can then be added to the captured heading
with org-insert-link, as usual.
@item `gnorb-org-agenda-popup-bbdb'
Set to ``t'' to automatically pop up
the BBDB buffer displaying records corresponding to the Org
Agenda tags search underway. If this is nil you can always do it
manually with the command of the same name.
@item `gnorb-org-bbdb-popup-layout'
Controls the layout of the
Agenda-related BBDB popup, takes the same values as
bbdb-pop-up-layout.
@end table

@node Misc Gnus
@chapter Misc Gnus

@menu
* Viewing Org headlines relevant to a message::
* User Options: User Optionsxx. 
@end menu

@node Viewing Org headlines relevant to a message
@section Viewing Org headlines relevant to a message

Call `gnorb-gnus-view' on a message that is associated with an Org
heading to jump to that heading.

@node User Optionsxx
@section User Options

@table @samp
@item `gnorb-gnus-mail-search-backend'
Specifies the search backend
that you use for searching mails. Currently supports notmuch,
mairix, and namazu: set this option to one of those symbols.
@item `gnorb-gnus-capture-always-attach'
Treat all capture templates as
if they had the :gnus-attachments key set to ``t''. This only has
any effect if you're capturing from a Gnus summary or article
buffer.
@item `gnorb-trigger-todo-default'
Set to either `note or `todo to tell
`gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' what to do by default. You can
reach the non-default behavior by calling that function with a
prefix argument. Alternately, set to `prompt to always prompt for
the appropriate action.
@item `gnorb-gnus-trigger-refile-targets'
If you use
`gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo' on an incoming message, Gnorb will
try to locate a TODO heading that's relevant to that message. If
it can't, it will prompt you for one, using the refile interface.
This option will be used as the value of `org-refile-targets'
during that process: see the docstring of `org-refile-targets'
for the appropriate syntax.
@item `gnorb-gnus-new-todo-capture-key'
Set this to a single-character
string pointing at an Org capture template to use when creating
TODOs from outgoing messages. The template is a regular capture
template, with a few exceptions. If Gnus helps you archive
outgoing messages (ie you have `gnus-message-archive-group' set
to something, and your outgoing messages have a ``Fcc'' header), a
link to that message will be made, and you'll be able to use all
the escapes related to gnus messages. If you don't archive
outgoing messages, you'll still be able to use the %:subject,
%:to, %:toname, %:toaddress, and %:date escapes in the capture
template.
@item `gnorb-gnus-hint-relevant-article'
Set to ``t'' (the default) to
have Gnorb give you a hint in the minibuffer when opening
messages that might be relevant to existing Org TODOs.
@item `gnorb-gnus-summary-mark-format-letter'
The formatting letter to
use as part of your `gnus-summary-line-format', to indicate
messages which might be relevant to Org TODOs. Defaults to ``g'',
meaning it should be used as ``%ug'' in the format line.
@item `gnorb-gnus-summary-mark'
The mark used to indicate relevant
messages in the Summary buffer, when
`gnorb-gnus-summary-mark-format-letter' is present in the format
line. Defaults to ``¡''.
@end table

@node Suggested Keybindings
@chapter Suggested Keybindings

@lisp
(eval-after-load "gnorb-bbdb"
  '(progn
     (define-key bbdb-mode-map (kbd "O") 'gnorb-bbdb-tag-agenda)
     (define-key bbdb-mode-map (kbd "S") 'gnorb-bbdb-mail-search)
     (define-key bbdb-mode-map [remap bbdb-mail] 'gnorb-bbdb-mail)
     (define-key bbdb-mode-map (kbd "l") 'gnorb-bbdb-open-link)
     (global-set-key (kbd "C-c C") 'gnorb-bbdb-cite-contact)))

(eval-after-load "gnorb-org"
  '(progn
     (org-defkey org-mode-map (kbd "C-c C") 'gnorb-org-contact-link)
     (org-defkey org-mode-map (kbd "C-c t") 'gnorb-org-handle-mail)
     (org-defkey org-mode-map (kbd "C-c e") 'gnorb-org-view)
     (org-defkey org-mode-map (kbd "C-c E") 'gnorb-org-email-subtree)
     (org-defkey org-mode-map (kbd "C-c V") 'gnorb-org-popup-bbdb)
     (setq gnorb-org-agenda-popup-bbdb t)
     (eval-after-load "org-agenda"
       '(progn (org-defkey org-agenda-mode-map (kbd "H") 'gnorb-org-handle-mail)
               (org-defkey org-agenda-mode-map (kbd "V") 'gnorb-org-popup-bbdb)))))

(eval-after-load "gnorb-gnus"
  '(progn
     (define-key gnus-summary-mime-map "a" 'gnorb-gnus-article-org-attach)
     (define-key gnus-summary-mode-map (kbd "C-c t") 'gnorb-gnus-incoming-do-todo)
     (push '("attach to org heading" . gnorb-gnus-mime-org-attach)
           gnus-mime-action-alist)
     ;; The only way to add mime button command keys is by redefining
     ;; gnus-mime-button-map, possibly not ideal. Ideal would be a
     ;; setter function in gnus itself.
     (push '(gnorb-gnus-mime-org-attach "a" "Attach to Org heading")
           gnus-mime-button-commands)
     (setq gnus-mime-button-map
           (let ((map (make-sparse-keymap)))
             (define-key map gnus-mouse-2 'gnus-article-push-button)
             (define-key map gnus-down-mouse-3 'gnus-mime-button-menu)
             (dolist (c gnus-mime-button-commands)
               (define-key map (cadr c) (car c)))
             map))))

(eval-after-load "message"
  '(progn
     (define-key message-mode-map (kbd "C-c t") 'gnorb-gnus-outgoing-do-todo)))
@end lisp

@c Emacs 25.0.50.8 (Org mode 8.3beta)
@bye