NAME

       burst - explode digests into messages

SYNOPSIS

       burst [+folder] [msgs] [-inplace | -noinplace] [-quiet | -noquiet] [-verbose | -noverbose]
            [-version] [-help]

DESCRIPTION

       Burst considers the specified messages in the named folder to  be  Internet  digests,  and
       explodes them in that folder.

       If  -inplace  is  given, each digest is replaced by the “table of contents” for the digest
       (the original digest is removed).  Burst then renumbers all of the messages following  the
       digest  in  the  folder to make room for each of the messages contained within the digest.
       These messages are placed immediately after the digest.

       If -noinplace is given, each digest is preserved, no table of contents  is  produced,  and
       the  messages  contained  within  the  digest  are placed at the end of the folder.  Other
       messages are not tampered with in any way.

       The -quiet switch directs burst to be silent about reporting  messages  that  are  not  in
       digest format.

       The  -verbose  switch directs burst to tell the user the general actions that it is taking
       to explode the digest.

       It turns out that burst works equally well on forwarded messages  and  blind-carbon-copies
       as on Internet digests, provided that the former two were generated by forw or send.

FILES

       $HOME/.mh_profile          The user profile

PROFILE COMPONENTS

       Path:                To determine the user's nmh directory
       Current-Folder:      To find the default current folder
       Msg-Protect:         To set mode when creating a new message

SEE ALSO

       inc(1), msh(1), pack(1), Proposed Standard for Message Encapsulation (RFC-934)

DEFAULTS

       `+folder' defaults to the current folder
       `msgs' defaults to cur
       `-noinplace'
       `-noquiet'
       `-noverbose'

CONTEXT

       If  a  folder is given, it will become the current folder.  If -inplace is given, then the
       first message burst becomes the current message.  This leaves the context ready for a show
       of the table of contents of the digest, and a next to see the first message of the digest.
       If -noinplace is given, then the first message  extracted  from  the  first  digest  burst
       becomes  the  current  message.   This leaves the context in a similar, but not identical,
       state to the context achieved when using -inplace.

BUGS

       The burst program enforces a limit on the number of messages which may  be  burst  from  a
       single  message.  This number is on the order of 1000 messages.  There is usually no limit
       on the number of messages which may reside in the folder after the bursting.

       Although burst uses a sophisticated algorithm to determine where one encapsulated  message
       ends and another begins, not all digestifying programs use an encapsulation algorithm.  In
       degenerate cases,  this  usually  results  in  burst  finding  an  encapsulation  boundary
       prematurely  and splitting a single encapsulated message into two or more messages.  These
       erroneous digestifying programs should be fixed.

       Furthermore, any text which appears after the last encapsulated message is not placed in a
       separate  message  by burst.  In the case of digestified messages, this text is usually an
       “End of digest” string.  As a result of this possibly un-friendly behavior on the part  of
       burst,  note that when the -inplace option is used, this trailing information is lost.  In
       practice, this is not a problem since correspondents usually place remarks in  text  prior
       to the first encapsulated message, and this information is not lost.