Gnus works `at it is' but isn't that a coincidence?

[Merciadri Luca]

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Hi,

I like to understand how things work. My Gnus works perfectly now, but
I still do not understand how it can work. You might file the description of
my .emacs and .gnus files at
http://www.student.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~merciadri/emacs.php.

1. I am personally mixing nnml and nnmail. It looks like I am only
using nnml, because

==
(setq nnmail-spool-file "/var/mail/merciadriluca")
==
seems to do no effect, as I do not even have a `merciadriluca'
directory in /var/mail/.

2. What's the interest of gnus-select-method? Is it the `primary'
method? I think so, but then, what is the interest of defining a
secondary method? What is the difference in their order? I define

==
(setq gnus-select-method '((nntp "news.stuff.com")))
(setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnml "")))
==

but I do not know what they do exactly.

3. If I define

==
(setq message-directory "~/.Mail/")
(setq nnml-directory "~/Mail/")
==

what will be the difference between both concepts?

4. To me,

==
(setq mail-sources
   (list '(directory
             :path "~/Mail/"
             :suffix "" 
          )
   )
)
==
simply tells Gnus to fetch e-mails at ~/Mail/: it tells it `okay,
messages are there. There is a MUA which brings them there, and do not
try to understand it further.' Am I right?

5. Is there an interesting in defining iso-8859-15 as a charset, such
as in

==
(defun mm-read-charset (prompt)
   "Return a charset."
   'iso-8859-15)
 (setq gnus-default-posting-charset (quote iso-8859-15))
==
?

6. I use

==
(setq message-send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it); For message-mode
(setq send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it); ditto
(setq send-mail-command 'smtpmail-send-it); For mail-mode (Rmail)
==

but why do I need the three ones to make the whole stuff work?

7. What's the interest of `my-signature' in

==
(setq message-signature 'my-signature)
(setq gnus-signature-separator '("^-- $"))
==
?

8. I set

==
(setq nntp-authinfo-file ".someauthfile.gpg")
(setq smtpmail-auth-credentials ".someauthfile.gpg")
==

but what's the difference between them?

9. Providing that the whole stuff works as it is, what is the scheme
which is done when I want to fetch e-mails, or when I want to send an
e-mail, both through Gnus?

Thanks.

- -- 
Merciadri Luca
See http://www.student.montefiore.ulg.ac.be/~merciadri/
I use PGP. If there is an incompatibility problem with your mail
client, please contact me.
- -- 

 If it's too good to be true, then it probably is.
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