[Design] mailing list manager: intelligent digest parsing

[Curt Hibbs]

Bruce Dykes wrote:
>
> Nobody ever replies to a list digest, do they? Don't
> people tend to reply to single messages within the
> digest?
>
> While not all digests look exactly alike, they don't
> all look radically different, either, so it would be
> nice if Chandler was able to separate out the
> component messages, and ask which message you're
> replying to, and only present you with the one
> message, and filling in the message's subject line, as
> opposed to Re: Digest #106.

It would also be nice to be able treat a digest as a container container of
multiple logical items (which is what it really is) rather than just as a
single item -- much like a zip file or a tarball.

This would enable many useful things in the UI in addition to the one you
mentioned above. For example, when a digest appears in the inbox, it might
have a little "+" icon to its left (like a tree control) that lets you drop
down and expansion list of its logical contents. Opening one of these
logical items could display a synthesized email containing only that item.

Perhaps there is a general theme here on the ability for Chandler to support
other contains of items, like zip files and tarballs.

Curt