Overlooking attachments

[Peter Pearson]

People sometimes send me email with attachments, but don't mention
the attachments in the text of the email, with the sometimes
embarassing result that I overlook the attachment entirely.
I've inserted a "%X" into index_format, which supposedly displays
the number of attachments, but that seems not to work for messages
with complicated structures like this:

I 1 <no description> [multipa/alternativ, 7bit, 505K]
I 2 ├─><no description> [text/plain, 7bit, us-ascii, 0.1K]
I 3 └─><no description> [multipa/related, 7bit, 505K]
I 4 ├─><no description> [text/html, 7bit, us-ascii, 0.5K]
I 5 └─>Screen Shot 2020-08-28 at 15.54.28.png [image/png, base64, 504K]

The message describe above is listed with an attachment count (%X) of zero.

How does everybody else deal with this?

[Jorgen Grahn]

Post by Peter Pearson
People sometimes send me email with attachments, but don't mention
the attachments in the text of the email, with the sometimes
embarassing result that I overlook the attachment entirely.
I've inserted a "%X" into index_format, which supposedly displays
the number of attachments, but that seems not to work for messages
I 1 <no description> [multipa/alternativ, 7bit, 505K]
I 2 ├─><no description> [text/plain, 7bit, us-ascii, 0.1K]
I 3 └─><no description> [multipa/related, 7bit, 505K]
I 4 ├─><no description> [text/html, 7bit, us-ascii, 0.5K]
I 5 └─>Screen Shot 2020-08-28 at 15.54.28.png [image/png, base64, 504K]
The message describe above is listed with an attachment count (%X) of zero.

That may be because there /are/ no attachments in a sense. IIUC, the
"I" is for "inline", as opposed to "A" for "attachment".

The example looks like a mail that comes in two versions:
- text/plain
- HTML with an inline image

only the text/plain is a poor representation of the HTML in this case,
since it omits the screenshot (and doesn't even say "here should be a
pretty large image" anywhere?)

I think if you counted everything but the two multipart/alternative
parts as attachments, you might see a lot of false positives in the form
of purely decorative images in mail headers and footers.

Post by Peter Pearson
How does everybody else deal with this?

I don't deal with it well, but I don't get a lot of HTML mail because
normal people don't seem to use mail nowadays. I guess I often press
'v' if I get the feeling I'm missing something.

/Jorgen

[Peter Pearson]

[snip]

Post by Jorgen Grahn

Post by Peter Pearson
The message describe above is listed with an attachment count (%X) of zero.

[snip]

Post by Jorgen Grahn
I think if you counted everything but the two multipart/alternative
parts as attachments, you might see a lot of false positives in the form
of purely decorative images in mail headers and footers.

Yes, absolutely.

Post by Jorgen Grahn

Post by Peter Pearson
How does everybody else deal with this?

I don't deal with it well, but I don't get a lot of HTML mail because
normal people don't seem to use mail nowadays. I guess I often press
'v' if I get the feeling I'm missing something.

Clear, if discouraging. Thank you.

[Jorgen Grahn]

...

Post by Peter Pearson

Post by Jorgen Grahn

Post by Peter Pearson
How does everybody else deal with this?

I don't deal with it well, but I don't get a lot of HTML mail because
normal people don't seem to use mail nowadays. I guess I often press
'v' if I get the feeling I'm missing something.

Clear, if discouraging. Thank you.

That's just me, though. I haven't optimized my Mutt workflow in a
decade.

/Jorgen