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This is a list of undocumented (as well as "underdocumented") features
of Becky.
The list is structured like this:
1. Main Window
a. Tree-pane
b. Message List
c. Message View
2. Compose Window
3. Address Book
4. Other
a. Templates
b. A word about short-cuts
c. Keywords and commentblocks
And here it is:
1. MAIN WINDOW
Ctrl + Alt + arrows: minimizing/maximizing the various panes.
a. Tree-pane
- Ctrl + Shift + arrow/up down (with cursor in tree-pane): Scrolls the
entire folder-structure up or down, if the view of this structure is
blocked by any of the other panes
b. Message List
- Right-clicking the envelope-icon of a message: pops up a colour-label
list
- Right-clicking the empty space to the left of the envelope-icon: pops
up a priority-menu
- Left-clicking the empty column-header (grey area) to the left of
"Subject": pops up a menu with additional sorting-options
- The "View related"-feature does not just single out all messages in a
thread. It will also look in the "Sent"-folder and place whatever it
finds in the thread. Nothing is moved - the thread thus created is
only "virtual". This means that one doesn't *have* to filter ones sent
messages into different folders if one wants to see view them in their
context. The feature will not work when activated from the
"Sent"-folder.
c. Message View
- Left-clicking the various fields in the header pane pops up useful
little menus. For instance, clicking the address-fields pops up menus
with additional addresses from the headers of the message. Clicking
any one of these pops up yet another menu with the options: "Compose
to this address", "Reply to this address", "Add to addressbook".
- Ctrl + up/down arrows with cursor in message-body: auto-scroll of
message. Stops when any key is pressed
- Tab sheets
Every message viewed in Becky has at least two tab sheets on the
bottom of the message-view. Normally these sheets does not show unless
you move your cursor to the bottom of the message-view or press the
TAB-key when you have focus in the message-view or are viewing the
message-headers (or have set up Becky to always show tab sheets in
General Setup | Message View). When a message has anything more than
the standard text-part, the tab sheets shows automatically.Each of
these tab has a number and if you hit the TAB-key when you have focus
in the message-body, you can navigate the tab sheets by either using
the left/right-arrows, the number-keys or the TAB-key.
- More on multi-part messages
If one or more of the parts of a multi-part message is a non-text part
this part is shown as an attachment in a field of it's own in the
message-view. If a message has several attachments, they are all shown
together in this field - even if they are attachments to different
text-parts of the message. The benefit of this is, that all
attachments can be spotted at once and that the text-parts are
presented in the linear fashion of the tab sheets making them very
easy to navigate. To gain an overview of the structure of the
multi-part message one has to hit Ctrl + P or choose "Properties" on
the context-menu of the message.
2. COMPOSE-WINDOW
- When in the Compose Window and entering addresses you don't have to go
to the little arrows next to the smiling stamp for priority to unfold
additional address-fields. As long as the cursor is placed in an
address-field, you can press Ctrl + Alt + Arrow Down to unfold
additional fields and Ctrl + Alt + Arrow Up to close them again
- One way to quote from Reference view: place your cursor where you want
the quote to be. Press Shift + Tab to move cursor to reference view.
Select text with Shift + up or down arrow (no need to press Ctrl + C).
Press Alt + E + M. The selected part of the message are pasted with
citation prefixes
- If the passage quoted in the above way needs to be reformatted, this
is done by highlighting the passage and activating the
"Format"-command (Edit | Paragraph Formatting | Format - or: ALT + E +
G + F - or: any shortcut one cares to assign to this command in
General Setup | Shortcut Keys).
3. ADDRESSBOOK
- Becky does not use auto-complete - only nick names. When addressing a
message just type in the nick name and press Enter. You can also give
a nick to a group. Select the group, press Ctrl + P, and enter the
nick in the field for this. When you type in this nick in any of the
address-fields in the compose-window, all addresses in the group will
be expanded. You can also give every member in a group the same nick
name as the whole group. When you fill in the nick name of the group
in one of the fields in the compose-window and press Enter, a menu
unfolds with all the names in the group. If you have entered a
"group-nick" as well, this will also be on the menu. If the group-nick
is entered in the "To"-field, the message will be sent to all members
of the group with addresses on the list visible to each recipient. If
it is chosen in the "Bcc"-field - and a "fake" address is put into the
"To"-field, the message will be sent to all members of the group with
no recipients being able to see anything other than the fake address.
- The "related"-field in the AB is for http-urls (Becky adds the
http-prefix to whatever you put in there). You can type in as many
urls as you like (separated by commas). When you press the "Related
URL"-field in the address-preview window a menu unfolds with all the
urls for that address
- At present, it does not seem to be possible to let contacts have more
that one e-mail address (you can fill in as many as you like, but
Becky will then expand the nick name to all of them). If you want to
have several addresses for an individual in the address-book, you
should create a group for that individual with entries for each of the
addresses. You can then either give each entry it's own nick-name or
every entry the same nickname. If the latter options is chosen, you
can type in the nickname when composing and get a menu of all the
addresses to choose from.
4. OTHER
a. Templates
- Composing a template: Go to main window and press File | Edit
template.The template window pops-up. Press OK without doing anything
else. A compose-window opens where right-clicking pops up menus with
template-macros.
- Choosing a template on the fly: When adding Shift to the commands for
composing a new message, replying, forwarding etc. the Template-window
pops up - allowing you to choose a template for the message. This, of
course, overrules any other template-setting.
b. A word about short-cuts
Almost all default-shortcuts can be changed in General setup | Shortcuts
- but it is also possible to create shortcuts for a couple of
menu-commands that do not have a shortcut by default ("Paste from
history" is an example)
c. Keywords and comment-blocks
- Keywords: They can be used for a wide variety of purposes. Say you
are on a very busy mailing list. Subject-headings and threads give you
some control over the information - Becky's keyword-function can take
you to a new level of control. You can create groups of keywords for
the various topics discussed on the list - or groups of keywords for
several topics (ie, "security" for matters related to pgp, anti-virus,
firewalls). Whenever you receive messages with what you have defined
as keywords for these groups, the keywords in those messages will
appear as you have defined them (bold, coloured etc)
- Comment Blocks: CB's is another way to use keywords. Again they can
be used for a number of purposes. Say, that you read a message and
would like to add notes to it. This can be outlines of your answer to
the messages or reminders of things you should look up etc. Usually,
this is done with the aid of some kind of Memo Pad-function.The
problem with this solution, is that you separate your comments from
the document which they are comments to. Suppose, you would like to
add comments to particular *paragraphs* - just like you can do in your
word-processor. This isn't possible with a traditional Memo Pad - but
in Becky it is! "Comment Block"-settings for this purpose could look
like this: Begin: [, End: ] and the colour is orange. When you read a
message and want to add a comment, you quite simply use the Direct
Edit-mode and begin your comment with a "[" and end it with a "]".
Everything you've written is now coloured orange. To make sure, you
won't forget that this message is commented, you could colour-code it
in the same colour as the comment. If you don't like editing the
original messages, you could make a folder called "Commented". You can
then settle with colour-coding the original message in order to show
yourself, that this message has a commented copy in the
"Commented"-folder.
Another use of comment blocks could be this: Make one comment block,
that starts with ">", another that starts with ">>" etc. In this way
you can have the various levels in a message with several levels of
quotes coloured in different colours.
The list is compiled by Jannik Lindquist.
MultiQuote
Posted 07 April 2004 - 05:27 AM