Customization Parameters

bbdb-file

The name of the file which contains your personal database. Default: `~/.bbdb'.

bbdb-default-area-code

The default area code to use when prompting for a new phone number. Default: 415. This must be a number, not a string.

bbdb-north-american-phone-numbers-p

Whether syntax-checking of phone numbers should be enforced. Default: t. This only works for Bell-system phone numbers. If this is true, then you can't enter invalid phone numbers, and all phone numbers are pretty-printed in the same way. European phone numbers don't have as strict a syntax, however, so this is a harder problem for them (on which I am punting). You can have both styles of phone number in your database by providing a prefix argument to the bbdb-insert-new-field command.

bbdb-electric-p

Whether bbdb mode should be "electric" like electric-buffer-list. Default: t. Basically this means that when you type space after M-x bbdb, your window configuration will be restored to what it was before you invoked the db list. (The bbdb-mode commands still work as well.)

bbdb-case-fold-search

Default: the same as case-fold-search. case-fold-search is bound to this by M-x bbdb and related commands. This variable lets the case-sensitivity of ^S and of the bbdb searching commands be different.

bbdb/mail-auto-create-p

If this is t (the default), then VM, MH, and RMAIL will automatically create new bbdb records for people you receive mail from. If this variable is a function name or lambda expression, then it is called with no arguments to decide whether an entry should be automatically created. You can use this to, for example, not create records for messages which have reached you through a particular mailing list, or to only create records automatically if the mail has a particular subject. See the variables bbdb-ignore-most-messages-alist and bbdb-ignore-some-messages-alist (See section Predefined Hooks)

bbdb/news-auto-create-p

If this is t (default: nil), then GNUS will automatically create new BBDB records for people you read messages by. If this is a function name or lambda expression, then it is called with no arguments to decide whether an entry should be automatically created. You can use this to, for example, create or not create messages which have a particular subject. See the variable bbdb-auto-notes-alist (See section Predefined Hooks). If you want to autocreate messages based on the current newsgroup, it's probably a better idea to set this variable to t or nil from your gnus-Select-group-hook instead. To automatically remember users in certain groups, you can do something like

(setq gnus-Select-group-hook
  '(lambda ()
     (setq bbdb/news-auto-create-p
           (or (string= "some.news.group" gnus-newsgroup-name)
               (string= "other.news.group" gnus-newsgroup-name)))))

bbdb-quiet-about-name-mismatches

If this is false (the default), then BBDB will prompt you when it notices a name change, that is, when the "real name" in a message doesn't correspond to a record already in the database with the same network address. As in, "John Smith <jqs@frob.com>" versus "John Q. Smith <jqs@frob.com>". If this is true, then you will not be asked if you want to change it (and it will not be changed.)

bbdb-use-alternate-names

If this is false, then the BBDB will not use the AKA field. Otherwise (the default) then the mail and news interfaces will ask you if you want to add an alternate name when a name-change is noticed, and will ask you whether the new name should be made the primary one. Note that if bbdb-quiet-about-name-mismatches is true, you will not be asked any questions about alternate names.

bbdb-readonly-p

If this is true (default: nil), then nothing will attempt to change the database implicitly, and you will be prevented from doing it explicitly. If you have more than one emacs running at the same time, you might want to arrange for this to be set to t in all but one of them.

bbdb-auto-revert-p

If this variable is true (default: nil) and the BBDB file is noticed to have changed on disk, it will be automatically reverted without prompting you first. Otherwise you will be asked. (But if the file has changed and you have made changes in memory as well, you will always be asked.)

bbdb-notice-auto-save-file

If this is true (default: nil), then the BBDB will notice when its auto-save file is newer than the file is was read from, and will offer to revert.

bbdb-use-pop-up

If true (the default), display a continuously-updating BBDB window while in VM, MH, RMAIL, or GNUS. Each time a new message is selected, the record corresponding to that message's sender will be displayed in another window. The buffer in this other window will be in bbdb-mode, and all corresponding commands will be available. This buffer will be positioned on the screen by finding the tallest of the windows present, and splitting it such that the bottom bbdb-pop-up-target-lines lines of the window display the `*BBDB*' buffer. With the default configurations of VM, MH, RMAIL, and GNUS, this means that the bbdb-list buffer will be just below the message-body buffer. If this is the symbol horiz, then the BBDB window will be stacked horizontally instead of vertically, if there is room to do that tastefully.

bbdb-pop-up-target-lines

Desired number of lines in a VM/MH/RMAIL/GNUS pop-up BBDB window, default 5.

bbdb-completion-type

Controls the behavior of the bbdb-complete-name command. If nil (the default), completion is done across the set of all full-names and user-ids in the database; if the symbol name, completion is done on real-names only; if the symbol net, completion is done on network addresses only; if it is primary, then completion is done only across the set of primary network addresses (the first address in the list of addresses for a given user). If it is primary-or-name, completion is done across primaries and real names.

bbdb-user-mail-names

A regular expression identifying the addresses that belong to you. If a message from an address matching this is seen, the BBDB record for the `To:' line will be shown instead of the one for the `From:' line. If this is nil, it will default to the value of (user-login-name).

bbdb-always-add-addresses

If this is t, then whenever the Insidious Big Brother Database notices a new email address corresponding to a person who is in the database, it will add it to the database. If this is nil (the default), then whenever a new network address is noticed for a person in the database, you will be asked whether to add the address. If this is the symbol never (really if it is not t and not nil) then new network addresses will never be automatically added.

bbdb-new-nets-always-primary

If this is t, then when the Insidious Big Brother Database adds a new address to a record, it will always add it to the front of the list of addresses, making it the primary address. If this is nil (the default), then you will be asked. If this is the symbol never (really if it is not t and not nil) then new network addresses will always be added to the end of the list.

bbdb-message-caching-enabled

Whether caching of the message->bbdb-record association should be used for the interfaces which support it (VM, MH, and RMAIL). This can speed things up a lot. One implication of this variable being true (the default) is that the bbdb-notice-hook will not be called each time a message is selected, but only the first time. Likewise, if selecting a message would generate a question (whether to add an address, change the name, etc) you will only be asked that question the very first time the message is selected.

bbdb-elided-display

Default: nil. Set this to t to make the bbdb-display commands default to displaying one line per record instead of a full listing. Set this to a list of some of the symbols '(address phone net notes) to select those fields to be left out of the listing (you can't leave out the name field). This is the default state for M-x bbdb and friends. You can have a different default for when the BBDB buffer is automatically updated by the mail and news interfaces by setting the variable bbdb-pop-up-elided-display. If that variable is unbound, this variable will be consulted instead.

bbdb-pop-up-elided-display

Default: unbound. Set this to t if to make the pop-up BBDB buffer default to displaying one line per record instead of a full listing. Set this to a list of some of the symbols '(address phone net notes) to select those fields to be left out of the listing (you can't leave out the name field). The default state for M-x bbdb and friends is controlled by the variable bbdb-elided-display; this variable is the default for when the BBDB buffer is automatically updated by the mail and news interfaces. If bbdb-pop-up-elided-display is unbound, then bbdb-elided-display the former will be consulted instead by mail and news.

bbdb-offer-save

If t (the default), then certain actions will cause the BBDB to ask you whether you wish to save the database. If nil, then the offer to save will never be made. If not t and not nil, then any time it would ask you, it will just save it without asking.

The following variables apply only to the GNUS interface to BBDB. To make use of them, you must add this forms to your `.emacs' file:

(autoload 'bbdb/gnus-lines-and-from "bbdb-gnus")
(setq gnus-optional-headers 'bbdb/gnus-lines-and-from)

bbdb/gnus-mark-known-posters

If t (the default), then the GNUS subject list will contain an indication of those messages posted by people who have entries in the Insidious Big Brother Database (they will be marked with an asterisk.)

bbdb/gnus-header-prefer-real-names

Default: nil. if t, then the GNUS subject list will display real names instead of network addresses.

bbdb/gnus-lines-and-from-length

Default: 18. The number of characters used to display `From:' info in GNUS, if you have set gnus-optional-headers to bbdb/gnus-lines-and-from.