Contrasted with other nmh commands, a message argument to mhpath may often be intended for writing. Because of this:

1)

the name ``new'' has been added to mhpath's list of reserved message names (the others are ``first'', ``last'', ``prev'', ``next'', ``cur'', and ``all''). The new message is equivalent to the message after the last message in a folder (and equivalent to 1 in a folder without messages). The ``new'' message may not be used as part of a message range.

2)

Within a message list, the following designations may refer to messages that do not exist: a single numeric message name, the single message name ``cur'', and (obviously) the single message name ``new''. All other message designations must refer to at least one existing message, if the folder contains messages.

3)

An empty folder is not in itself an error.

A message number less than that of the smallest existing message in a folder is treated as if the message already exists. A message number greater than that of the highest existing message in a folder causes an ``out of range'' error message to be displayed.

As part of a range designation that contains messages that do exist, message numbers less than the smallest, or greater than the highest, existing message in a folder are ignored.

Examples: The current folder foo contains messages 3 5 6. Cur is 4.

% mhpath
/r/phyl/Mail/foo
% mhpath all
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/3
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/5
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/6
% mhpath 2001
mhpath: message 2001 out of range 1-6
% mhpath 1-2001
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/3
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/5
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/6
% mhpath new
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/7
% mhpath last new
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/6
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/7
% mhpath last-new
mhpath: bad message list last-new
% mhpath cur
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/4
% mhpath 1-2
mhpath: no messages in range 1-2
% mhpath first:2
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/3
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/5
% mhpath 1 2
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/1
/r/phyl/Mail/foo/2

mhpath is also useful in back-quoted operations:

% cd `mhpath +inbox`
% echo `mhpath +`
/r/phyl/Mail