From: Bernhard Reiter (bernhard@uwm.edu)
Date: Tue Nov 30 1999 - 02:18:32 CST
Hello hypermailers,
I know I shouldn't have done this,
but I learned about python's XML handling in the process.
This is my first attempt in XML file mangeling, so bear with me.
I was always talking and thinking about how to get montly archives done
and not only done, but the index files created, too:
The problem:
------------
Hypermail in combination with the archive scripts, creates
a bunch of directories for each year and each month when mails come in.
a) How do you make a top page,
linking all the scattered index files?
b) Subproblem: If one mail comes in,
do you really want to rebuild the complete index overviewfiles?
Of course not.
c) What if I want my top index page to have the number of mails
grouped by week or so. :) (Hi egroups.)
Solution: A python script strangles the problem.
Part 1: I patched hypermail so that it creates an archive overview file
complying with the haof.dtd in each directory it operates in.
Oh, back to Part 0:
Wrote a dtd for the Hypermail Archive Overview Format (hoaf).
Part 2a: Wrote a little python module, which creates a HTML snipplet from this
overviewfile and leaves it in the directory above. But only,
if the overviewfile exists and is newer as the the snipplet.
Part 2b: Wrote another python script, which runs through a directory,
and checks each year and month and runs the module from 2a a
couple of times.
Results attached.
Left for the interested reader: Beautify the output.
Interesting research topics:
* Only the mail references are missing in the
hoaf, otherwise threading could be done on that level.
* Well we could write this data into a little database. http://www.dbxml.org/ ?
Or Postgres or MySql-GPL?
Enjoy,
Bernhard
ps:This contribution to hypermail shall be free software under the GPL.