.Dd $Mdocdate$
.Dt mboxu 5
.Os
.
.Sh NAME
.Nm mboxu
.Nd mbox in UTF-8
.
.
.Sh DESCIPTION
.Pp
.Nm
is a simple and readable mbox-like format, in which messages are encoded directly in UTF-8.

Messages are differentiated from one another via a line beginning with
.Ql From\  ,
.Em followed by at least one header line .

Otherwise,
.Nm
is identical to traditional mbox.
.
.Sh RATIONALE
.Pp
.Nm
has two goals:
.Bl -enum
.It
to be easily writable and readable by humans, and
.It
to be easily generated and parsed by machines.
.El
.Pp
Normally, non-ASCII e-mail messages must be encoded in base64 or quoted-printable, rendering them more or less unreadable in raw form.
Mailboxes using
.Nm ,
on the other hand, do not require any decoding to be read by a human.

Likewise,
.Nm
is much easier to generate and manually write than standard mbox.
.
.Sh FUTURE
.Pp
In the future, a readable alternative to multipart messages may be added, where non-canonical parts are stored in separate files and referenced via some
.Ql Attachment:
header.
.Pp
If that is added, a translator between
.Nm
and standard mbox might be desirable.
.
.Sh AUTHORS
.Pp
.Nm
is created by John Ankarström
.Aq Mt john (at) ankarstrom.se .