[MlMt] Search across lines in compose view

[Alex Abdo]

Hi all,

I’m wondering if there’s a way to search across lines in the compose
view. Specifically, does the search interface have a way of searching
for a newline (or carriage return?) character?

The reason I’m trying to do this is somewhat arcane. I’ve noticed
that MailMate seems to increase the number of line breaks between
paragraphs in forwarded or replied-to emails. When I’m inserting
responses inline in those messages, the extra spacing can be kind of
distracting, and so I was going to explore using a simple
search-and-replace to reduce the number of extra line breaks between
paragraphs. But that requires being able to search for consecutive line
breaks—e.g., “>\n>”.

Is that possible? Or, even better, is there a way of changing the
underlying behavior of MailMate adding extra line breaks in forwarded or
replied-to emails? Or maybe I’m doing something wrong that’s causing
those extra line breaks to appear?

Thanks!
Alex

My system: MailMate/5552 MacBookPro15,1/x86_64/12/10.14.1

[Philip Paeps]

Post by Alex Abdo
I’m wondering if there’s a way to search across lines in the
compose view. Specifically, does the search interface have a way of
searching for a newline (or carriage return?) character?

You can do the usual ⌘F to bring up the standard fruity search box. I
don't now if you can search for things like newlines in there though.
On cursory inspection, it seems not.

Post by Alex Abdo
The reason I’m trying to do this is somewhat arcane. I’ve noticed
that MailMate seems to increase the number of line breaks between
paragraphs in forwarded or replied-to emails. When I’m inserting
responses inline in those messages, the extra spacing can be kind of
distracting, and so I was going to explore using a simple
search-and-replace to reduce the number of extra line breaks between
paragraphs. But that requires being able to search for consecutive
line breaks—e.g., “>\n>”.
Is that possible? Or, even better, is there a way of changing the
underlying behavior of MailMate adding extra line breaks in forwarded
or replied-to emails? Or maybe I’m doing something wrong that’s
causing those extra line breaks to appear?

I would just use an external editor from a bundle. I use MacVim.

As far as I can tell, MailMate leaves the buffer alone after the
external editor gives it back.

Philip

[Benny Kjær Nielsen]

Post by Alex Abdo
I’m wondering if there’s a way to search across lines in the
compose view. Specifically, does the search interface have a way of
searching for a newline (or carriage return?) character?

It's a standard window provided by Apple. You can use option+return to
insert an “invisible” line-feed.

Post by Alex Abdo
The reason I’m trying to do this is somewhat arcane. I’ve noticed
that MailMate seems to increase the number of line breaks between
paragraphs in forwarded or replied-to emails. When I’m inserting
responses inline in those messages, the extra spacing can be kind of
distracting, and so I was going to explore using a simple
search-and-replace to reduce the number of extra line breaks between
paragraphs. But that requires being able to search for consecutive
line breaks—e.g., “>\n>”.

Sounds like there might be a bug we should look into, but let's do that
off list (Help ▾ Send Feedback). I'll need an example messages
(drag'n'drop it into the message) and a series of steps to reproduce.

Post by Alex Abdo
Is that possible? Or, even better, is there a way of changing the
underlying behavior of MailMate adding extra line breaks in forwarded
or replied-to emails? Or maybe I’m doing something wrong that’s
causing those extra line breaks to appear?

I don't think you could be doing anything wrong, but maybe there's some
issue with MailMate and the other email client used in the
correspondence.