Hi Steffen, > > mail(1) had the `~e' escape and then added a `~v' one, with VISUAL > > and EDITOR environment variables echoing the cpp(1) macro names of > > the default values. Kurt Shoens, [email protected], is down > > as the author in BSD-1-253-gc145e9e0ab5 of > > https://github.com/dspinellis/unix-history-repo. > > BSD Mail had both of ~v and ~e from the very start. I know of no > known released file which acted otherwise.
But peering at doc/Mail/mail3.nr in BSD-1-3-gfc8c50acc08, so just after BSD 1 was cut, I see it documents all the tilde escapes and has `~e' but no `~v'. https://github.com/dspinellis/unix-history-repo/blob/fc8c50acc0870bf28753d3508770428682e915bb/doc/Mail/mail3.nr By the time of BSD-1-54-ge684660a6a2, src/Mail/Mail.help.~ lists both. https://github.com/dspinellis/unix-history-repo/blob/e684660a6a291c1e4672912bc1b80ffb00934623/src/Mail/Mail.help.%7E So although the released code had both, I think it's likely that `~e' was there on its own, and then `~v' added as ex's vi mode came along. I also noticed that Mail's string option was at one point `EDITOR' for one and `VISEDITOR' for the other; also suggestive that one came first rather than both together. -- Cheers, Ralph. https://plus.google.com/+RalphCorderoy -- nmh-workers https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/nmh-workers
