1 Claws Mail - a GTK+ based, lightweight, and fast e-mail client
3 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
5 Copyright(C) 1999-2009 Hiroyuki Yamamoto <hiro-y@kcn.ne.jp> and the
8 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
9 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
10 the Free Software Foundation; either version 3, or (at your option)
13 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
14 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
15 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
16 GNU General Public License for more details.
18 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
19 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
20 Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA.
22 For more details see the file COPYING.
24 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
28 1. What is Claws Mail?
34 7. Partial downloading of POP3 mails
38 11. How to request features
39 12. Installing Claws from CVS
44 1. What is Claws Mail?
45 --------------------------
47 Claws Mail (previously known as Sylpheed-Claws) is a lightweight and
48 highly configurable email client and news reader based on the GTK+
49 GUI toolkit, it runs on the X Window System.
51 Claws Mail is free software distributed under the GNU GPL.
53 To run Claws Mail use 'claws-mail' on the command line.
55 When claws-mail is executed for the first time a configuration
56 'Wizard' will appear prompting you for the minimum information
57 necessary to create a new account.
63 Claws Mail' capabilities are extended by plugins. It comes with
64 the following plugins included, all of which are built automatically
65 if the required libraries are present.
67 Plugins are installed in $PREFIX/lib/claws-mail/plugins/
68 and have a suffix of '.so'
69 To load a plugin go to '/Configuration/Plugins' and click
70 the 'Load Plugin' button.
71 Select the plugin that you want and click 'OK'
74 Enables the scanning of incoming mail received from a POP,
75 IMAP, or LOCAL account using Bogofilter. It can optionally
76 delete mail identified as spam or save it to a designated folder.
77 Bogofilter is a pure Bayesian filter, therefore it has better
78 speed performance than SpamAssassin but might catch less spam.
79 Bogofilter is available from http://bogofilter.sourceforge.net/
82 Enables the viewing of html messages using the Dillo web
83 browser, version 0.7.0 or newer. It uses Dillo's --local
84 option by default for safe browsing. Preferences can be
85 found in '/Configuration/Preferences/Plugins/Dillo Browser'.
86 Dillo is available from http://www.dillo.org/
89 Handles core PGP functions and is required by the PGP/Inline
91 Uses GnuPG/GPGME, <ftp://ftp.gnupg.org/gcrypt/gpgme/>
94 Handles inline PGP signed and/or encrypted mails. You can
95 decrypt mails, verify signatures or sign and encrypt your
96 own mails. Uses GnuPG/GPGME, <ftp://ftp.gnupg.org/gcrypt/gpgme/>
99 Handles PGP/MIME signed and/or encrypted mails. You can
100 decrypt mails, verify signatures or sign and encrypt your
101 own mails. Uses GnuPG/GPGME, <ftp://ftp.gnupg.org/gcrypt/gpgme/>
104 This plugin handles S/MIME signed and/or encrypted mails. You can
105 decrypt mails, verify signatures or sign and encrypt your own mails.
108 Enables the scanning of incoming mail received from a POP,
109 IMAP or LOCAL account using SpamAssassin. It can optionally
110 delete mail identified as spam or save it to a designated
111 folder. Preferences can be found in '/Configuration/
112 Preferences/Plugins/SpamAssassin'.
113 SpamAssassin is available from http://spamassassin.apache.org/.
116 Places an icon in the system tray that indicates whether
117 you have any new mail. A tooltip also shows the current
118 new, unread and total number of messages
120 Additonal plugins can be found here:
121 http://www.claws-mail.org/plugins.php
126 The "actions" feature is a convenient way for the user to launch external
127 commands to process a complete message file including headers and body or
128 just one of its parts. It allows also the use of an external command to
129 filter the whole text or just a selected part in the message window or in
130 the compose window. This is a generic tool that allows to do any uncommon
131 actions on the messages, and thus extends the possibilities of Claws Mail.
132 For example, Claws Mail does not include the rot13 cyphering algorithm
133 popular in some newsgroups. It does not support uuencoded messages. As
134 all these features can be handled by external programs, the actions
135 provide a convenient way to use them from the menu bar.
140 To create a new action, go to Configuration -> Actions.... The "Action
141 Creation" dialog offers to enter the Menu name that will trigger the
142 command. The created menu will be found in the Tools -> Actions submenu.
143 By inserting a slash / in the menu name, you create a submenu.
145 The command is entered in the Command line entry. Note that Claws Mail
146 stores every single email in a separate file. This allows to use the
147 following syntax for the command:
149 * %f denotes the file name of the selected message. If you selected more
150 than one, then the command will be launched for each message with
151 the appropriate file name
152 * %F denotes the list of the file names of the selected message. If only
153 one message is selected, this amounts to %f, but if more messages
154 are selected, then the command will be launched only once with the
155 list of the file names. (You can use both %f and %F in one command:
156 then the command will be launched for each selected message with
157 the name of this message and with the list of all selected
158 messages. I did not find a practical example for this.)
159 * %p denotes the current selected message part of a multipart message.
160 The part is decoded accordingly. If the message is not a multipart
161 message, it denotes the message body.
162 * Prepending >: this will allow you to send to the command's standard
163 input a text that you will enter in a dialog window.
164 * Prepending *: this will allow you to send to the command's standard
165 input a text that you will enter in a dialog window. But in
166 contrast to prepending >, the entered text is hidden (useful when
168 * Appending an ampersand &: this will run the command asynchronously.
169 That means "fire and forget". Claws Mail won't wait for the
170 command to finish, nor will it catch its output or its error
172 * Prepending the vertical bar | (pipe-in): this will send the current
173 displayed text or the current selected text from the message view
174 or the compose window to the command standard input. The command
175 will silently fail if more than one message is selected.
176 * Appending the vertical bar | (pipe-out): this will replace the current
177 displayed text or the current selected text from the message window
178 or the compose window by the command standard output. The command
179 will silently fail if more than one message is selected.
181 Note: It is not possible to use actions containing %f, %F or %p from the
184 When a command is run, and unless it is run asynchronously, Claws Mail
185 will be insensitive to any interaction and it will wait for the command to
186 finish. If the command takes too long (5 seconds), it will popup a dialog
187 window allowing to stop it. This dialog will also be displayed as soon as
188 the command has some output: error messages or even its standard output
189 when the command is not a "pipe-out" command. When multiple commands are
190 being run, they are run in parallel and each command output is separated
191 from the outputs of the others.
196 Here are some examples that are listed in the same syntax as used for
197 storing the actions list. You can copy and past the definition in your
198 ~/.claws-mail/actionsrc file (exit Claws Mail before). The syntax
199 is very simple: one line per action, each action contains the menu name
200 and the command line separated by a colon and a space ": "
202 Purpose: rot13 cyphering
203 Definition: Rot13: |tr a-zA-Z n-za-mN-ZA-M|
204 Details: This will apply the rot13 cyphering algorithm to the
205 (selected) text in the message/compose view.
207 Purpose: Decoding uuencoded messages
208 Definition: UUdeview: xdeview %F&
209 Details: xdeview comes with uudeview. If an encoded file is split in
210 multiple messages, just select them all and run the command.
212 Purpose: Display uuencoded image
213 Definition: Display uuencoded: uudec %f&
214 Details: Displays uuencoded files. The uudec[1] script can be found in
215 the 'tools' directory of the distribution package.
217 Purpose: Alter messages
218 Definition: Edit message: gvim -f %F
219 Details: Allows editing of any received message. Can be used to remove
220 unneeded message parts, etc.
222 Purpose: Pretty format
223 Definition: Par: |par 72Tbgjqw74bEe B=._A_a 72bg|
224 Details: par is a utility that can pretty format any text. It does a
225 very good job in indenting quoted messages, and justifying
226 text. Used when composing a message
229 Definition: Part/Dillo: dillo %p&
230 Details: Browse the selected message part in Dillo.
233 [1] The uudec script can be found in the 'tools' directory of the
234 distribution package. It needs uudecode and ImageMagick's display. The
235 latter can be replaced by any image viewer that can get input from
236 standard input. The script could also be modified to use temporary files
237 instead of standard input.
242 Claws has support for different icon sets. Several icon sets can be
243 downloaded from http://www.claws-mail.org/themes.php
244 You will need to create a directory called 'themes' in your config
245 directory, unpack them into this directory, and then use the interface
246 to select them, /Configuration/Preferences/Display/Themes
248 This interface can also be used to install new themes.
251 5. Quick Search with extended search
252 ------------------------------------
253 Quick Search, with its powerful Extended search function,
254 enables searching through folder's messages.
256 Extended Search allows one to define criteria that messages must
257 have in order to match and be displayed in the summary view pane.
258 Search types titled From, Subject and To are self explanatory.
259 Search type extended allows one to use Claws Mail's powerful
260 filtering engine to select messages. Examples:
261 from regexpcase "foo"
262 subject regexp "Bug" & to regexp "claws-mail"
264 Additionally, it is possible to use simpler yet equally
265 powerfull patterns for message selections. Mutt users will
266 immediately recognise most of the available patterns:
268 Pattern Parameter Selects
269 ----------------------------------------------------
271 ag # messages whose age is greater than #
272 al # messages whose age is lower than #
273 b S messages which contain S in the message body
274 B S messages which contain S in the whole message
275 c S messages carbon-copied to S
276 C S message is either to: or cc: to S
278 e S messages which contain S in the Sender field
279 E S true if execute "S" succeeds
280 f S messages originating from user S
282 h S messages which contain header S
283 i S messages which contain S in Message-Id header
284 I S messages which contain S in inreplyto header
285 k # messages which are marked with color #
287 n S messages which are in newsgroup S
290 r messages which have been replied to
292 s S messages which contain S in subject
293 se # messages whose score is equal to #
294 sg # messages whose score is greater than #
295 sl # messages whose score is lower than #
296 Se # messages whose size is equal to #
297 Sg # messages whose size is greater than #
298 Ss # messages whose size is smaller than #
299 t S messages which have been sent to S
300 tg S messages with tags containing S
301 tagged messages which are tagged
304 x S messages which contain S in References header
305 x "cmd args" messages returning 0 when passed to command
307 y S messages which contain S in X-Label header
309 & logical AND operator
310 | logical OR operator
311 ! or ~ logical NOT operator
312 % case sensitive search
314 all filtering expressions are allowed
317 S means regexp string
319 It is possible to use logical operators AND (&), OR (|) and
320 NOT (! or ~). Case sensitive search is achieved with %.
324 f "john beavis" messages from john beavis
325 %f "John Beavis" messages from John Beavis (case sensitive)
326 ~s foo messages which do not have foo in the subject
327 f foo & ~s bar messages from foo that do not have bar in thesubject
333 /Configuration/Preferences/Customize Toolbars lets you define the
334 toolbar you want. The configuration dialog enables you to set an icon,
335 an appropriate text, and map an action to it. Actions to choose
336 from are predefined. You can also have your "Claws Mail Actions"
337 (refer to "Actions" above) on your toolbar.
340 * Configuration->Actions
341 - add an entry "Dillo: dillo %p&"
342 * Configuration->Custom toolbar
343 - select Claws Mail Actions Feature
344 - select "Dillo: dillo %p&" from drop down list
345 - choose an icon and click ok
349 7. Partial downloading of POP3 mails
350 ------------------------------------
351 Messages over the configured size limit, (/[Account preferences]/
352 Receive/Message size limit), will be partially retrieved. These
353 messages will have a Notice View displayed (above the Message View),
354 informing of the partially retrieved state and the total size of the
355 message. The Notice View will also contain two buttons, 'Mark for
356 download' and 'Mark for deletion'. If the user clicks 'Mark for
357 download', the message will be downloaded in full at the next message
358 retrieval, (and the partial one deleted); if the user checks 'Mark for
359 deletion' it will be removed from the server after the normal delay
360 as specified in the POP3 account's 'Receive' preferences.
361 If a user moves a partially retrieved message to the Trash folder
362 it will be deleted on the server at the next retrieval after the
363 Trash folder has been emptied.
369 It is recommnede that you use Clawsker to edit these options,
370 http://www.claws-mail.org/clawsker
372 addressbook_use_editaddress_dialog (default: 1)
373 Use a separate dialogue to edit a person's details. '0'
374 will use a form embedded in the addressbook's main window.
377 bold_unread (default: 1)
378 show unread messages using bold font in summary view
381 cache_max_mem_usage (default: 4096)
382 the maximum kB of memory Claws Mail should use. It will try
383 to keep the memory usage below this value, but it will always
384 use the assigned amount of memory for speed gain.
386 cache_min_keep_time (default: 15)
387 the minimum time in minutes Claws Mail will keep the folder
388 cache in memory. If a cache is more recent than this time it
389 will not be freed even if the memory usage is above the
390 maximum. You should probably set this value higher than your
391 mail check interval. Otherwise the cache will always be freed
392 between checks even if the folder is accessed on every check,
393 which will cause much disk IO.
395 compose_no_markup (default: 0)
396 prevent italic and bold text in the Compose dialog account
398 0: normal (markup) 1: no markup
400 emphasis_color (default: #0000CF)
401 The colour used for the X-Mailer line when its value is
404 enable_dotted_lines (default: 0)
405 Use the old dotted line look in the main window GtkTreeView
406 components, (Folder List and Message List), instead of the
407 modern lineless look.
410 enable_hscrollbar (default: 1)
411 enable horizontal scroll bar in summary view
414 enable_swap_from (default: 0)
415 display sender's email address in To column in Sent folder
416 instead of recipient's
419 folderview_vscrollbar_policy (default: 0)
420 specify the policy of vertical scroll bar of folder view
421 0: always 1: automatic 2: never
423 hover_timeout (default: 500)
424 time in milliseconds that will cause a folder tree to expand
425 during drag n drop when the mouse cover is held over it
427 live_dangerously (default: 0)
428 Don't ask for confirmation before definitive deletion of
432 log_error_color (default: #af0000)
433 log_in_color (default: #000000)
434 log_msg_color (default: #00af00)
435 log_out_color (default: #0000ef)
436 log_warn_color (default: #af0000)
437 log_status_ok_color (default: #00af00)
438 log_status_nok_color (default: #0000af)
439 log_status_skip_color (default: #aa00aa)
440 The colours used in the Network Log window.
442 outgoing_fallback_to_ascii (default: 1)
443 The outgoing encoding of a message will use 7bit US-ASCII
444 whenever it is suitable for the message content, ignoring
445 the "Outgoing encoding" option unless it is necessary.
446 Turning this option off forces the user-defined encoding to
447 be used, regardless of message content.
450 primary_paste_unselects (default: 0)
451 Causes the primary buffer to be cleared and the insertion
452 point to be repositioned when the middle mouse button is used
456 respect_flowed_format (default: 0)
457 Respect format=flowed on text/plain message parts. This will
458 cause some mails to have long lines, but will fix some URLs
459 that would otherwise be wrapped.
462 save_parts_readwrite (default: 0)
463 Saves temporary files when opening attachment with write bit
467 skip_ssl_cert_check (default: 0)
468 Disables the verification of SSL certificates.
471 statusbar_update_step (default: 10)
472 update stepping in progress bars.
474 stripes_color_offset (default: 4000)
475 Specify the value to use when creating alternately coloured
476 lines in GtkTreeView components. The smaller the value, the
477 less visible the difference in the alternating colours of the
480 textview_cursor_visible (default: 0)
481 display the cursor in the message view.
484 thread_by_subject_max_age (default: 10)
485 number of days to include a message in a thread when using
486 'Thread using subject in addition to standard headers'.
488 toolbar_detachable (default: 0)
489 hide handles in the toolbar.
492 two_line_vertical (default: 1)
493 Spread message list information over two lines when using the
497 unsafe_ssl_certs (default: 0)
498 Allows Claws to remember multiple SSL certificates for a
502 use_networkmanager (default: 1)
503 Use NetworkManager to switch offline automatically.
506 use_stripes_everywhere (default: 1)
507 Enable alternately coloured lines in GtkTreeView components.
510 use_stripes_in_summaries (default: 1)
511 Enable alternately coloured lines in the main window
512 GtkTreeView components, (Folder List and Message List). The
513 only useful way to use this option is to set it to 0 when
514 use_stripes_everywhere is set to 1.
517 utf8_instead_of_locale_for_broken_mail (default: 0)
518 Use UTF-8 encoding for broken mails instead of current
522 warn_dnd (default: 1)
523 Display a confirmation dialog on drag'n'drop of folders.
528 You will find all of these tools in the 'tools' directory:
530 acroread2claws-mail.pl
531 send PDFs from Adobe Reader 7
533 import mbox files exported by calypso
534 claws-mail-compose-insert-files.pl
535 insert files into a new Compose window
537 convert mbox format to MH format
539 import Becky, Thunderbird, Kmail, Gmail and Fox Mail
542 convert a Eudora (v.3?) addressbook to vCard
545 convert sylpheed main's filter rules, (< 0.9.99),
546 into Claws' filtering format
548 convert sylpheed main's filter rules, (>= 0.9.99),
549 into Claws' filtering format
551 Replace/Add a message's Date field
553 Actions script to lookup the selected text on
554 Freshmeat www.freshmeat.net using the configured
557 convert a gif file to an xface
559 Actions script to lookup selected message-id on
560 google using mozilla.
562 Actions script to lookup up the selected text on
563 google using the configured browser
565 Service Menus for Konqueror to allow sending
568 convert a Kmail addressbook to a Claws Mail
570 kmail2claws-mail_v2.pl
571 new version of the address book conversion script
572 for newer versions of Kmail/Kaddressbook
573 kmail-mailbox2claws-mail.pl
574 convert a Kmail mailbox into a Claws mail mailbox
576 a wrapper to mairix, to enable global searches in mail
579 import a Mew address book
581 search any searchable website for the selected text
582 nautilus2claws-mail.sh
583 enables sending files from the Nautilus file manager
586 enable OpenOffice to send documents through
588 outlook2claws-mail.pl
589 convert an Outlook contacts list to a Claws Mail
592 open messages in POPFile control center to edit their status
594 process a Claws Mail message and print it using enscript
595 if available or lpr if not
597 convert an addressbook exported from The Bat! into
598 a Claws Mail addressbook
600 integrate a Thunderbird folder tree into Claws Mail
602 Display various attachments as text
604 attempt to view an attachment as plain text
605 thunderbird-filters-convertor.pl
606 convert Thunderbird filtering rules
608 translators' tool that eases the creation of
611 decode UUencoded mails, for use with Actions
613 Decode uuencoded attachments and open them with OpenOffice
615 import an Evolution vCard
618 10. How to contribute
619 ---------------------
621 You are encourged to send patches via the Claws Mail bugzilla at
622 http://www.thewildbeast.co.uk/claws-mail/bugzilla/index.cgi
623 But please first read the patch guidelines here:
624 http://www.claws-mail.org/devel.php
626 If that's too troublesome, either contact Paul Mangan
627 <paul@claws-mail.org> or consider posting to the
628 Claws Mail-users mailing list.
629 http://www.claws-mail.org/MLs.php
631 Bugs can be reported with Claws' bugzilla at:
632 http://www.thewildbeast.co.uk/claws-mail/bugzilla/index.cgi
634 Of course, you can also post to the Claws Mail-users mailing list.
636 Also, we really try to incorporate good contributions, but sometimes we
637 don't have enough time. If the contribution is really big, or requires
638 a long time to stabilise, send a mail to Paul Mangan
639 <paul@claws-mail.org>. We can probably arrange access to the
644 11. How to request features
645 ---------------------------
647 Ask around in Claws Mail-users ML. Note that some developers may
648 have already thought about your feature and may, perhaps, be implementing
649 it, or the feature was already discussed and rejected for whatever reason.
650 You might want to go ahead and hack a patch for it. (That would be very
651 cool!) Another possibility is to add a request to our bugzilla, (severity:
653 http://www.thewildbeast.co.uk/claws-mail/bugzilla/index.cgi
656 12. Installing Claws Mail from CVS
657 --------------------------------------
662 To download the latest cvs cd to the directory where you wish to download
663 to and type the following information:
666 cvs -z3 -d:ext:cvs@scm.dotsrc.org:/srv/cvs/claws-mail co -r gtk2 claws
668 Later, when you want to update your local repository, you'll just have to
669 go back to the 'claws' directory, and type:
677 To compile and install use the following commands:
679 ./autogen.sh [add configure options as required]
681 make install [as root]
683 You will need a full set of development tools installed to be able to run
684 autogen.sh. See also ac/README.
716 2006-12-04 2.6.1 [first release as Claws Mail]
757 2004-05-31 0.9.11claws
758 2004-03-08 0.9.10claws
759 2004-02-06 0.9.9claws
760 2003-12-19 0.9.8claws
761 2003-11-26 0.9.7claws
762 2003-10-02 0.9.6claws
763 2003-09-10 0.9.5claws
764 2003-08-04 0.9.4claws
765 2003-07-12 0.9.3claws
766 2003-05-24 0.9.0claws
767 2003-03-12 0.8.11claws
768 2003-02-12 0.8.10claws
769 2003-01-24 0.8.9claws
770 2002-12-26 0.8.8claws
771 2002-12-23 0.8.7claws
772 2002-11-25 0.8.6claws
773 2002-10-07 0.8.5claws
774 2002-09-22 0.8.3claws
775 2002-08-28 0.8.2claws
776 2002-07-30 0.8.1claws
777 2002-07-23 0.8.0claws
778 2002-06-15 0.7.8claws
779 2002-05-18 0.7.6claws
780 2002-04-28 0.7.5claws
781 2002-03-11 0.7.4claws
782 2002-02-19 0.7.2claws
783 2002-02-14 0.7.1claws
784 2002-01-14 0.7.0claws
785 2001-12-16 0.6.6claws
786 2001-10-16 0.6.5claws8
787 2001-09-30 0.6.2claws
788 2001-08-14 0.6.1claws
789 2001-07-13 0.5.1claws
790 2001-07-01 0.5.0claws3
791 2001-06-16 0.4.99claws
792 2001-05-29 0.4.99claws3
793 2001-05-11 0.4.67claws1
800 http://www.claws-mail.org/
802 http://www.claws-mail.org/faq/
804 http://sourceforge.net/projects/sylpheed-claws/
806 http://www.claws-mail.org/downloads.php
808 http://www.claws-mail.org/plugins.php
810 http://www.claws-mail.org/themes.php
812 http://scm.dotsrc.org/viewvc.cgi/claws-mail/claws/?pathrev=gtk2
814 http://www.claws-mail.org/MLs.php
815 Users Mailing List archive
816 http://lists.sunsite.dk/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi/28
817 Commits Announcement List archive
818 http://lists.sunsite.dk/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi/27
819 Bug/Patch/Feature Request Tracker
820 http://www.thewildbeast.co.uk/claws-mail/bugzilla/index.cgi
821 Internationalisation Status
822 http://www.claws-mail.org/i18n.php
824 http://www.claws-mail.org/sponsors.php
826 http://planet.claws-mail.org/
827 Claws Mail for Windows homepage
828 http://www.claws-mail.org/win32/