Auto convert the base64 code in Abook

Abook is a text-based addressbook program designed to use with mutt mail client.

There is a chapter about using abook with mutt in the ArchWiki.

If you want to use Abook instead of aliases, remove the aliases configuration in .muttrc and add this:

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set query_command= "abook --mutt-query '%s'"
macro index,pager  a "<pipe-message>abook --add-email-quiet<return>" "Add this sender to Abook"
bind editor        <Tab> complete-query

But sadly, the command abook --add-email-quiet always gets names like “=?utf-8?B?55m+5ZCI5LuZ5a2Q?=” which is base64 encoded.

To convert the base64 string and automatically fit the correct encoding, you can use a shell function:

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conv() {
	eval `echo $1 | awk -F '?' '{ print "echo " $4 " | base64 -d | iconv -f " $2 }'`
}

Then:

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$ conv name==?utf-8?B?55m+5ZCI5LuZ5a2Q?=

Or a python script like this:

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#!/usr/bin/env python2
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
import email
import email.header
import sys
import re
def abookdecode(origin_name):
    name=email.Header.decode_header(origin_name)
	if name[0][1] is None:
	    return name[0][0]
	else:
	    return name[0][0].decode(name[0][1]).encode('utf-8')
    if '__main__'==__name__:
	infile=open(sys.argv[1],"r")
    content=infile.readlines()
    infile.close()
    outfile=open(sys.argv[1],"wb")
	for line in content:
	if line[0:4]=='name':
	    outfile.write(line[0:5]+abookdecode(line[5:-1])+'\n')
	    else:
		outfile.write(line)
    outfile.close()

And then change your .muttrc to call the script:

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macro index,pager  a "<pipe-message>abook --add-email-quiet && abook-decode ~/.abook/addressbook<return>" "Add this sender to Abook"

Now the addressbook will be written correctly.