1 .\"@ nail.1 - S-nail(1) reference manual.
3 .\" Copyright (c) 2000-2008 Gunnar Ritter, Freiburg i. Br., Germany.
4 .\" Copyright (c) 2012 - 2016 Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso <steffen@sdaoden.eu>.
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34 .\"@ S-nail(1): v14.9.0-pre2 / 2016-10-31
36 .ds VV \\%v14.9.0-pre2
46 .\" If not ~/.mailrc, it breaks POSIX compatibility. And adjust main.c.
51 .ds OU [no v15-compat]
52 .ds ID [v15 behaviour may differ]
53 .ds NQ [Only new quoting rules]
64 .Nd send and receive Internet mail
70 .\" Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"SYNOPSIS, main()
78 .Op Fl a Ar attachment
81 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
83 .Op Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value
88 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns Ar mta-option ...
97 .Op Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value
100 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns Ar mta-option ...
108 .Op Fl L Ar spec-list
109 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
110 .Op Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value
113 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns Ar mta-option ...
118 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
121 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
124 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
125 .Sy Compatibility note:
126 S-nail (\*(UA) will wrap up into \%S-mailx in v15.0 (circa 2018).
127 Backward incompatibility has to be expected \(en
131 -style argument quoting rules, for example.
132 New and old behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU, and setting
135 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
136 will choose new behaviour when applicable.
137 \*(OB flags what will vanish, and enabling
141 enables obsoletion warnings.
145 \*(UA is a mail processing system with a command syntax reminiscent of
147 with lines replaced by messages.
148 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
150 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
151 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3 among others.
153 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
156 .Bl -tag -width ".Fl _ Ar _ddr"
159 Explicitly control which of the
161 shall be loaded: if the letter
163 is (case-insensitively) part of the
167 is loaded, likewise the letter
169 controls loading of the user's personal
171 file, whereas the letters
175 explicitly forbid loading of any resource files.
176 This option should be used by scripts: to avoid environmental noise they
179 from any configuration files and create a script-local environment,
180 explicitly setting any of the desired
181 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
184 This option overrides
191 command for the given user email
193 after program startup is complete.
194 Being a special incarnation of
196 macros for the purpose of bundling longer-lived settings, activating
197 such an email account also switches to the accounts system
203 Attach the given file to the message.
204 The same filename conventions as described in the section
206 apply: shell word expansion is restricted to the tilde
210 not be accessible but contain a
212 character, then anything after the
214 is assumed to specify the input character set and anything before
216 the filename: this is the only option to specify the input character set
217 (and don't perform any character set conversion) for text attachments
218 from the command line, not using the
220 tilde escape command.
224 Make standard input and standard output line-buffered.
228 Send a blind carbon copy to
231 May be used multiple times.
233 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
237 Send carbon copies to the given receiver.
238 May be used multiple times.
243 the internal variable
245 which enables debug messages and disables message delivery,
246 among others; effectively turns almost any operation into a dry-run.
252 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body.
253 This is useful for sending messages from scripts.
257 Just check if mail is present (in the specified or system
259 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
260 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
261 specification can be added with the option
266 Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of the
267 first recipient's address (instead of in
272 Read in the contents of the user's
274 (or the specified file) for processing;
275 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
279 Some special conventions are recognized for the optional
281 argument which are documented for the
286 is not a argument to the flag
288 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
292 that starts with a hyphen, prefix it with a (relative) path, as in
293 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
297 Display a summary of the
299 of all messages in the specified mailbox or system
302 A configurable summary view is available via the
308 Show a short usage summary.
309 Because of widespread use a
311 argument will have the same effect.
317 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
320 .It Fl L Ar spec-list
321 Display a summary of all
323 of only those messages in the specified mailbox or the system
329 .Sx "Specifying messages"
336 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
337 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
343 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
344 be enabled explicitly (e.g., by using the option
349 Special send mode that will flag standard input with the MIME
353 and use it as the main message body.
354 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
355 .Va message-inject-head ,
358 .Va message-inject-tail .
364 Special send mode that will MIME classify the specified
366 and use it as the main message body.
367 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
368 .Va message-inject-head ,
371 .Va message-inject-tail .
379 and thus inhibit initial display of message headers when reading mail or
380 editing a mail folder.
384 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
389 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
390 .Sx "Resource files" .
394 Special send mode that will initialize the message body with the
395 contents of the specified
397 which may be standard input
399 only in non-interactive context.
405 Any folder opened will be in read-only mode.
408 .It Fl r Ar from-addr
411 is a valid address then it specifies the envelope sender address to be
412 passed to a file-based
414 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) as
416 when a message is send.
419 include a user name, then the address components will be separated and
420 the name part will be passed to file-based
426 will also be assigned to the
429 .Ql -Sfrom=from-addr ) ,
430 therefore affecting possible SMTP
432 data transfer; note this assignment does not cause value fixation.
434 If instead an empty string is passed as
436 then the content of the variable
438 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the
441 Note that \*(UA by default, without
443 that is, neither passes
447 flags to a file-based MTA by itself.
450 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Op = Ns value
454 iable and, in case of a non-boolean variable which has a value, assign
458 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
462 may be overwritten from within resource files,
463 the command line setting will be reestablished after all resource files
468 Specify the subject of the to-be-sent message.
472 The message given (on standard input) is expected to contain, separated
473 from the message body by an empty line, a message header with
478 fields giving its recipients, which will be added to any recipients
479 specified on the command line.
480 If a message subject is specified via
482 then it'll be used in favour of one given on the command line.
498 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
499 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
500 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
502 Any other (even custom) header field is passed through entirely
503 unchanged, and in conjunction with the option
505 it is even possible to embed
512 Initially read the primary system mailbox of
514 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
524 will also show the list of
526 .Ql $ \*(uA -Xversion -Xx .
531 ting the internal variable
533 enables display of some informational context messages.
534 Using it twice increases the level of verbosity.
538 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
540 to the list of commands to be executed (as a unit, just as via
542 before normal operation starts.
546 .Va batch-exit-on-error ;
547 the only possibility to execute commands in non-interactive mode when
548 reading startup files is actively prohibited.
554 even if not in interactive mode.
555 This can be used to, e.g., automatically format the composed message
556 text before sending the message:
557 .Bd -literal -offset indent
558 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.'; \e
559 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
560 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ -Sttycharset=UTF-8 -d~ bob@exam.ple
566 In batch mode the full set of commands is available, just like in
567 interactive mode, and diverse variable settings and internal states are
568 adjusted for batch necessities, e.g., it
585 is enabled in compose mode.
586 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
587 .Bd -literal -offset indent
588 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'm bob\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\enx\en' | \e
589 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ -d# -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
594 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
597 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
598 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
602 In the above list of supported command line options,
606 are implemented by means of
608 ting the respective option, as via
611 .Op Ar mta-option ...
613 arguments that are given at the end of the command line after a
615 separator will be passed through to a file-based
617 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for an entire (interactive) session
618 \(en if the setting of
620 allows their recognition; no such constraints apply to the variable
624 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{
627 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
629 Mail, a successor of the Research
632 .Dq was there from the start
637 Mail reference manual begins with the following words:
639 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
640 Mail provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
642 It divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows the
643 user to deal with them in any order.
644 In addition, it provides a set of
646 -like commands for manipulating messages and sending mail.
647 Mail offers the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
648 of outgoing messages, as well as providing the ability to define and
649 send to names which address groups of users.
653 \*(UA is thus the user side of the
655 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
656 traditionally taken by
658 and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility purposes.
663 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
667 Because \*(UA strives for compliance with POSIX
669 it is likely that some configuration settings have to be adjusted before
670 using it is a smooth experience.
673 resource file bends those standard imposed settings of the
674 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
675 a bit towards more user friendliness and safety, however, e.g., it
680 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to
682 that would otherwise occur (see
683 .Sx "Message states" )
686 to not remove empty files in order not to mangle file permissions when
687 files eventually get recreated (\*(UA actively manages the file mode
690 upon program startup).
693 in order to synchronize \*(UA with the exit status report of the used
698 contains some more complete configuration examples.
701 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
702 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
704 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or a builtin
706 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
707 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
708 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
712 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
714 .Bd -literal -offset indent
715 $ \*(uA -s ubject -a ttach.txt bill@exam.ple
716 # But... try it in an isolated dry-run mode first
717 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ -d -vv -Ssendwait \e
718 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple -. \e
719 '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
721 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ -d -vv -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait \e
722 -S 'mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465' -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
723 -S 'from=scriptreply@exam.ple' \e
729 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
730 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
731 In this compose mode \*(UA treats lines beginning with the character
733 special \(en these are so-called
735 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
736 attachments and more; e.g., the tilde escape
738 will start the text editor to revise the message in it's current state,
740 allows editing of the most important message headers and
742 gives an overview of available tilde escapes.
746 at the beginning of an empty line leaves compose mode and causes the
747 message to be sent, whereas typing
750 twice will abort the current letter (saving its contents in the file
756 Messages are sent asynchronously, without supervision, unless the variable
758 is set, therefore send errors are not recognizable until then.
764 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
765 can be used to alter default behavior; e.g.,
770 will automatically startup a text editor when compose mode is entered,
772 will cause the user to be prompted actively for carbon-copy recipients
775 option will allow leaving compose mode by writing a line consisting
781 hook macros may be set to automatically adjust some settings dependent
782 on receiver, sender or subject contexts.
785 Especially for using public mail provider accounts with the SMTP
787 it is often necessary to set
789 and saving a copy of sent messages in a
791 may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox file targets some special
792 syntax conventions are recognized (see the
794 command for more on that).
797 for the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
798 be switched to with a single command or command line option may be
801 contains example configurations for sending messages via some of the
802 well-known public mail providers and also gives a compact overview on
803 how to setup a secure SSL/TLS environment).
808 sandbox dry-run tests first will prove correctness.
812 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
813 will spread light on the different ways of how to specify user email
814 account credentials, the
816 variable chains, and accessing protocol-specific resources,
819 goes into the details of character encoding and how to use them for
820 representing messages and MIME part contents by specifying them in
822 and reading the section
823 .Sx "The mime.types files"
824 should help to understand how the MIME-type of outgoing attachments are
825 classified, and what can be done for fine-tuning.
826 Over the wire an intermediate, configurable
827 .Pf content-transfer-\: Va encoding
828 may be applied to the raw message part data.
831 Message recipients (as specified on the command line or defined in
836 may not only be email addressees but can also be names of mailboxes and
837 even complete shell command pipe specifications.
840 is not set then only network addresses (see
842 for a description of mail addresses) and plain user names (including MTA
843 aliases) may be used, other types will be filtered out, giving a warning
846 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
847 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
851 is set then extended recipient addresses will optionally be accepted:
852 Any name which starts with a vertical bar
854 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
856 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
857 Likewise, any name that starts with the character solidus
859 or the character sequence dot solidus
861 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content;
862 likewise a name that solely consists of a hyphen
864 Any other name which contains an at sign
866 character is treated as a network address;
867 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
869 character specifies a mailbox name;
870 Any other name which contains a solidus
872 character but no exclamation mark
876 character before also specifies a mailbox name;
877 What remains is treated as a network address.
879 .Bd -literal -offset indent
880 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
881 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
882 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
883 \*(uA -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Snosave \e
884 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr -s test \e
889 It is possible to create personal distribution lists via the
891 command, so that, for instance, the user can send mail to
893 and have it go to a group of people.
894 These aliases have nothing in common with the system wide aliases that
895 may be used by the MTA, which are subject to the
899 and are often tracked in a file
905 Personal aliases will be expanded by \*(UA before the message is sent,
906 and are thus a convenient alternative to specifying each addressee by
910 .Dl alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/mail/cohorts.mbox
913 To avoid environmental noise scripts should
915 \*(UA from any configuration files and create a script-local
916 environment, ideally with the command line options
918 to disable any configuration file in conjunction with repetitions of
920 to specify variables:
922 .Bd -literal -offset indent
923 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
924 -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Snosave -Sttycharset=utf-8 \e
925 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr \e
926 -S 'mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465' -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
927 -S 'from=scriptreply@exam.ple' \e
928 -s 'subject' -a attachment_file \e
929 -. "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>" rec2@exam.ple \e
934 As shown, scripts can
936 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
939 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
941 In interactive mode, which is introduced in the next section, messages
942 can be sent by calling the
944 command with a list of recipient addresses \(em the semantics are
945 completely identical to non-interactive message sending:
947 .Bd -literal -offset indent
948 $ \*(uA -d -Squiet -Semptystart
949 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
950 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
951 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
952 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
956 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode" {{{
957 .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode"
959 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
961 When used like that the user's system
965 for an in-depth description of the different mailbox types that exist)
966 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed.
967 The visual style of this summary of
969 can be adjusted through the variable
971 and the possible sorting criterion via
977 can be performed with the command
979 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
980 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
989 will give a listing of all available commands and
991 will give a summary of some common ones.
992 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available one can type
995 and see the actual expansion of
997 and what it's purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
998 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
999 order of commands doesn't necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1000 possible to define overwrites with the
1003 These commands can also produce a more
1008 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1009 messages; the current message \(en the
1011 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1012 or the first message of the mailbox; the option
1014 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1019 ful of header summaries containing the
1023 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1027 Message content can be displayed on the users' terminal with the
1031 If instead the command
1033 is used, only the first
1035 of a message will be shown.
1036 By default the current message
1038 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1039 a fancy message specification (see
1040 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1043 will display all unread messages,
1048 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1050 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1054 will display the last and the next message, respectively.
1057 (a more substantial alias of the standard command
1059 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1060 instead of their content, e.g., the following will search for subjects:
1063 .Dl from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1066 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1068 d, but this can be changed: either by blacklisting a list of fields via
1070 or by whitelisting only a given list with the
1073 .Ql Ic \:retain Ns \0from_ date from to cc subject .
1074 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1075 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1081 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1083 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1085 (generally speaking).
1086 Note that historically the global
1088 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1092 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1093 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1094 aims at making user experience with the many
1097 When reading the system
1103 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1105 modifier (propagating the mailbox to a primary one) then messages which
1106 have been read will be moved to a secondary mailbox, the user's
1108 file, automatically when the mailbox is left, either by changing the
1109 active mailbox or by quitting \*(UA (also see
1110 .Sx "Message states" )
1111 \(en this automatic moving from a system or primary to the secondary
1112 mailbox is not performed when the variable
1117 After examining a message the user can also
1121 to the sender and all recipients or
1123 exclusively to the sender(s).
1124 Messages can also be
1126 ed (shorter alias is
1128 Note that when replying to or forwarding a message recipient addresses
1129 will be stripped from comments and names unless the option
1132 Deletion causes \*(UA to forget about the message;
1133 This is not irreversible, though, one can
1135 the message by giving its number,
1136 or the \*(UA session can be ended by giving the
1141 To end a mail processing session one may either issue
1143 to cause a full program exit, which possibly includes
1144 automatic moving of read messages to
1146 as well as updating the \*(OPal line editor
1150 instead in order to prevent any of these actions.
1153 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{
1154 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1156 Messages which are HTML-only get more and more common and of course many
1157 messages come bundled with a bouquet of MIME attachments.
1158 Whereas \*(UA \*(OPally supports a simple HTML-to-text converter to deal
1159 with HTML messages (see
1160 .Sx "The mime.types files" ) ,
1161 it normally can't deal with any of these itself, but instead programs
1162 need to become registered to deal with specific MIME types or file
1164 These programs may either prepare plain text versions of their input
1165 in order to enable \*(UA to display the content on the terminal,
1166 or display the content themselves, for example in a graphical window.
1169 To install an external handler program for a specific MIME type set an
1171 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1172 variable; to instead define a handler for a specific file extension set
1175 variable \(en these handlers take precedence.
1176 \*(OPally \*(UA supports mail user agent configuration as defined in
1177 RFC 1524; this mechanism, documented in the section
1178 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
1179 will be queried for display or quote handlers if none of the former two
1180 .\" TODO v15-compat "will be" -> "is"
1181 did; it will be the sole source for handlers of other purpose.
1182 A last source for handlers may be the MIME type definition itself, if
1183 the \*(UA specific type-marker extension was used when defining the type
1186 (Many of the builtin MIME types do so by default.)
1190 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1191 can be set to improve dealing with faulty MIME part declarations as are
1192 often seen in real-life messages.
1193 E.g., to display a HTML message inline (that is, converted to a more
1194 fancy plain text representation than the builtin converter is capable to
1195 produce) with either of the text-mode browsers
1199 teach \*(UA about MathML documents and make it display them as plain
1200 text, and to open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer,
1201 asynchronously and with some other magic attached:
1203 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1204 if $features !@ +filter-html-tagsoup
1205 #set pipe-text/html='elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1206 set pipe-text/html='lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1207 # Display HTML as plain text instead
1208 #set pipe-text/html=@
1210 mimetype '@ application/mathml+xml mathml'
1211 wysh set pipe-application/pdf='@&=@ \e
1212 trap "rm -f \e"${NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1213 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1214 mupdf "${NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1218 Note: special care must be taken when using such commands as mail
1219 viruses may be distributed by this method: if messages of type
1220 .Ql application/x-sh
1221 or files with the extension
1223 were blindly filtered through the shell, for example, a message sender
1224 could easily execute arbitrary code on the system \*(UA is running on.
1225 For more on MIME, also in respect to sending of messages, see the
1227 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
1228 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
1233 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1236 \*(UA offers some support to ease handling of mailing lists.
1239 promotes all given arguments to known mailing lists, and
1241 sets their subscription attribute, creating them first as necessary.
1246 automatically, but only resets the subscription attribute.)
1247 Using the commands without arguments will show (a subset of) all
1248 currently defined mailing lists.
1253 can be used to mark out messages with configured list addresses
1254 in the header display.
1257 \*(OPally mailing lists may also be specified as (extended) regular
1258 expressions, which allows matching of many addresses with a single
1260 However, all fully qualified list addresses are matched via a fast
1261 dictionary, whereas expressions are placed in (a) list(s) which is
1262 (are) matched sequentially.
1264 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1265 set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1266 wysh mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1267 mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1272 .Va followup-to-honour
1274 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1275 header is honoured when the message is being replied to (via
1281 controls whether this header is created when sending mails; it will be
1282 created automatically for a couple of reasons, too, like when the
1284 .Dq mailing list specific
1289 is used to respond to a message with its
1290 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1294 A difference in between the handling of known and subscribed lists is
1295 that the address of the sender is usually not part of a generated
1296 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1297 when addressing the latter, whereas it is for the former kind of lists.
1298 Usually because there are exceptions: say, if multiple lists are
1299 addressed and not all of them are subscribed lists.
1301 For convenience \*(UA will, temporarily, automatically add a list
1302 address that is presented in the
1304 header of a message that is being responded to to the list of known
1306 Shall that header have existed \*(UA will instead, dependent on the
1308 .Va reply-to-honour ,
1311 for this purpose in order to accept a list administrators' wish that
1312 is supposed to have been manifested like that (but only if it provides
1313 a single address which resides on the same domain as what is stated in
1317 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
1318 .Ss "Resource files"
1320 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files:
1322 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa _AIL_EXTRA_R_"
1325 System wide initialization file.
1326 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
1330 command line options, or by setting the
1333 .Ev NAIL_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
1337 File giving initial commands.
1338 A different file can be chosen by setting the
1342 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
1344 command line option.
1346 .It Va NAIL_EXTRA_RC
1347 Can be used to define an optional startup file to be read after all
1348 other resource files.
1349 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
1351 implementations, for example.
1352 This variable is only honoured when defined in a resource file, e.g.,
1354 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
1358 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
1361 .Bl -bullet -compact
1363 A lines' leading whitespace is removed.
1365 Empty lines are ignored.
1367 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
1368 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
1370 by placing a reverse solidus character
1372 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
1373 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
1374 remains in the input.
1376 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
1378 then it is a comment-command \(en a real command! \(en and also ignored.
1379 This command is the only form of comment that is understood.
1383 Unless \*(UA is about to enter interactive mode syntax errors that occur
1384 while loading these files are treated as errors and cause program exit.
1385 More files with syntactically equal content can be
1387 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
1389 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1390 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
1391 es, it is really continued here.
1398 .\" .Ss "Character sets" {{{
1399 .Ss "Character sets"
1401 \*(OP \*(UA detects the character set of the terminal by using
1402 mechanisms that are controlled by the
1407 should give an overview); the \*(UA internal variable
1409 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly
1410 and will thus show up in the output of the commands
1416 However, a user supplied
1418 value is not overwritten by this detection mechanism: this
1420 must be used if the detection doesn't work properly,
1421 and it may be used to adjust the name of the locale character set.
1422 E.g., on BSD systems one may use a locale with the character set
1423 ISO8859-1, which is not a valid name for this character set; to be on
1424 the safe side, one may set
1426 to the correct name, which is ISO-8859-1.
1429 Note that changing the value doesn't mean much beside that,
1430 since several aspects of the real character set are implied by the
1431 locale environment of the system,
1432 and that stays unaffected by the content of an overwritten
1435 (This is mostly an issue when interactively using \*(UA, though.
1436 It is actually possible to send mail in a completely
1438 locale environment, an option that \*(UA's test-suite uses excessively.)
1441 If no character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into
1444 doesn't include the term
1448 will be the only supported character set,
1449 it is simply assumed that it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages
1450 (over the wire an intermediate
1451 .Pf content-transfer-\: Va encoding
1453 and the rest of this section does not apply;
1454 it may however still be necessary to explicitly set it if automatic
1455 detection fails, since in that case it defaults to the mentioned
1456 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"Character sets", ./nail.h:CHARSET_*!)
1460 When reading messages, their text is converted into
1462 as necessary in order to display them on the users terminal.
1463 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
1464 and replaced by proper substitution characters (unless the variable
1466 was set once \*(UA was started).
1468 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
1469 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
1472 When sending messages all their parts and attachments are classified.
1473 Whereas no character set conversion is performed on those parts which
1474 appear to be binary data,
1475 the character set being used must be declared within the MIME header of
1476 an outgoing text part if it contains characters that do not conform to
1477 the set of characters that are allowed by the email standards.
1478 Permissible values for character sets can be declared using the
1482 which defines a catch-all last-resort fallback character set that is
1483 implicitly appended to the list of character-sets in
1487 When replying to a message and the variable
1488 .Va reply-in-same-charset
1489 is set then the character set of the message being replied to is tried
1491 And it is also possible to make \*(UA work even more closely related to
1492 the current locale setting automatically by using the variable
1493 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset ,
1494 please see there for more information.
1497 All the specified character sets are tried in order unless the
1498 conversion of the part or attachment succeeds.
1499 If none of the tried (8-bit) character sets is capable to represent the
1500 content of the part or attachment,
1501 then the message will not be sent and its text will optionally be
1505 In general, if the message
1506 .Dq Cannot convert from a to b
1507 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
1508 selected (terminal) character set,
1509 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
1510 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
1512 locale and/or the variable
1516 The best results are usually achieved when \*(UA is run in a UTF-8
1517 locale on a UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
1518 spectrum of characters is available.
1519 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
1520 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
1521 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
1524 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
1525 .Dq portable character set
1526 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
1527 restricted subset named
1528 .Dq portable filename character set
1529 consisting of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
1538 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
1539 .Ss "Message states"
1541 \*(UA differentiates in between several different message states;
1542 the current state will be reflected in header summary displays if
1544 is configured to do so (via the internal variable
1546 and messages can also be selected and be acted upon depending on their
1548 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) .
1549 When operating on the system
1551 or in primary mailboxes opened with the special prefix
1555 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the secondary
1557 mailbox may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly via
1558 a successful exit of \*(UA, but not if the special command
1560 is used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
1563 mail-user-agents, the default global
1569 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
1571 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _reserved"
1573 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
1574 Such messages are retained even in the primary system mailbox.
1577 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
1578 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
1579 Such messages are retained even in the primary system mailbox.
1582 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
1602 commands may also cause the next message to be marked as read, depending
1608 command is used, messages that are in the primary system mailbox or in
1609 mailboxes which were opened with the special
1613 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in
1620 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
1626 can be used to access such messages.
1629 The message has been processed by a
1631 command and it will be retained in its current location.
1634 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
1640 command is used, messages that are in the primary system mailbox or in
1641 mailboxes which were opened with the special
1645 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in
1653 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
1654 .Ss "Specifying messages"
1661 can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a number
1662 of messages at once.
1665 deletes messages 1 and 2,
1668 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
1669 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
1673 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
1674 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
1677 The following special message names exist:
1680 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar _n_u"
1682 The current message, the so-called
1686 The message that was previously the current message.
1689 The parent message of the current message,
1690 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
1692 field or the last entry of the
1694 field of the current message.
1697 The next previous undeleted message,
1698 or the next previous deleted message for the
1701 In sorted/threaded mode,
1702 the next previous such message in the sorted/threaded order.
1705 The next undeleted message,
1706 or the next deleted message for the
1709 In sorted/threaded mode,
1710 the next such message in the sorted/threaded order.
1713 The first undeleted message,
1714 or the first deleted message for the
1717 In sorted/threaded mode,
1718 the first such message in the sorted/threaded order.
1722 In sorted/threaded mode,
1723 the last message in the sorted/threaded order.
1727 selects the message addressed with
1731 is any other message specification,
1732 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
1733 Otherwise it is identical to
1738 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
1743 All messages that were included in the message list for the previous
1747 An inclusive range of message numbers.
1748 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
1753 .Dq any substring matches
1756 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
1758 is set (and POSIX says
1759 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
1762 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
1763 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
1765 is completely ignored.
1766 For finer control and match boundaries use the
1770 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
1771 All messages that contain
1773 in the subject field (case ignored).
1780 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
1782 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
1785 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
1787 ession; if the \*(OPal regular expression (see
1789 support is available
1791 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
1793 (extended) regular expression characters is seen.
1795 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
1796 part is missing, the search is restricted to the subject field body,
1799 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, as in
1801 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
1803 In order to search for a string that includes a
1805 (commercial at) character the
1807 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
1808 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
1822 respectively and case-insensitively.
1827 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
1836 can be used to perform full text searches \(en whereas the former
1837 searches only the body, the latter also searches the message header.
1839 This message specification performs full text comparison, but even with
1840 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
1841 expression that savely matches only a specific address domain.
1842 To request that the content of the header is treated as a list of
1843 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
1844 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the header name
1845 (abbreviation) with a tilde
1848 .Dl @~f@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$
1851 All messages of state
1855 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
1857 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
1862 Old messages (any not in state
1888 Messages marked as draft.
1890 \*(OP Messages classified as spam.
1892 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification.
1898 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
1899 This addressing mode is available with all types of folders;
1900 \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
1901 Strings must be enclosed by double quotes
1903 in their entirety if they contain white space or parentheses;
1904 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
1906 is recognized as an escape character.
1907 All string searches are case-insensitive.
1908 When the description indicates that the
1910 representation of an address field is used,
1911 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
1914 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1915 (\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)
1920 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
1921 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
1925 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
1926 .It Ar ( criterion )
1927 All messages that satisfy the given
1929 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
1930 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
1932 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
1933 All messages that satisfy either
1938 To connect more than two criteria using
1940 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
1942 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
1946 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
1949 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
1950 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
1954 .It Ar ( not criterion )
1955 All messages that do not satisfy
1957 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1958 All messages that contain
1960 in the envelope representation of the
1963 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1964 All messages that contain
1966 in the envelope representation of the
1969 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1970 All messages that contain
1972 in the envelope representation of the
1975 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1976 All messages that contain
1981 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1982 All messages that contain
1984 in the envelope representation of the
1987 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1988 All messages that contain
1993 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1994 All messages that contain
1997 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
1998 All messages that contain
2000 in their header or body.
2001 .It Ar ( larger size )
2002 All messages that are larger than
2005 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2006 All messages that are smaller than
2010 .It Ar ( before date )
2011 All messages that were received before
2013 which must be in the form
2017 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2019 is the name of the month \(en one of
2020 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2023 is the year as four digits, e.g.,
2027 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2028 .It Ar ( since date )
2029 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2030 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2031 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2032 .It Ar ( senton date )
2033 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2034 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2035 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2037 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2038 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2039 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2040 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2044 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{
2045 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
2047 \*(IN For accessing protocol-specific resources usage of Uniform
2048 Resource Locators (URL, RFC 1738) has become omnipresent.
2049 \*(UA expects and understands URLs in the following form;
2052 denote optional parts, optional either because there also exist other
2053 ways to define the information in question or because support of the
2054 part is protocol-specific (e.g.,
2056 is used by the IMAP protocol but not by POP3);
2061 are specified they must be given in URL percent encoded form (RFC 3986;
2067 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
2070 Note that these \*(UA URLs most often don't conform to any real
2071 standard, but instead represent a normalized variant of RFC 1738 \(en
2072 they are not used in data exchange but only meant as a compact,
2073 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in
2074 a well-known notation.
2077 Many internal variables of \*(UA exist in multiple versions, called
2078 variable chains for the rest of this document: the plain
2083 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
2090 had been specified in the respective URL, otherwise it refers to the plain
2096 that had been found when doing the user chain lookup as is described
2099 will never be in URL percent encoded form, whether it came from an URL
2100 or not; i.e., variable chain name extensions of
2101 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2102 must not be URL percent encoded.
2105 For example, whether an hypothetical URL
2106 .Ql smtp://hey%3Ayou@our.house
2107 had been given that includes a user, or whether the URL was
2108 .Ql smtp://our.house
2109 and the user had been found differently, to lookup the variable chain
2110 .Va smtp-use-starttls
2111 \*(UA first looks for whether
2112 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:hey:you@our.house
2113 is defined, then whether
2114 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:our.house
2115 exists before finally ending up looking at the plain variable itself.
2118 \*(UA obeys the following logic scheme when dealing with the
2119 necessary credential information of an account:
2125 has been given in the URL the variables
2129 are looked up; if no such variable(s) can be found then \*(UA will,
2130 when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
2131 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
2138 specific entry which provides a
2140 name: this lookup will only succeed if unambiguous (one possible matching
2143 It is possible to load encrypted
2148 If there is still no
2150 then \*(UA will fall back to the user who is supposed to run \*(UA,
2151 the identity of which has been fixated during \*(UA startup and is
2152 known to be a valid user on the current host.
2155 Authentication: unless otherwise noted this will lookup the
2156 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
2157 variable chain, falling back to a protocol-specific default should this
2163 has been given in the URL, then if the
2165 has been found through the \*(OPal
2167 that may have already provided the password, too.
2168 Otherwise the variable chain
2169 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
2170 is looked up and used if existent.
2172 Afterwards the complete \*(OPal variable chain
2173 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
2177 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
2178 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
2179 but with a password).
2181 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
2182 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
2183 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
2188 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
2192 header field(s), which means that the values of
2193 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
2195 .Va smime-sign-message-digest
2196 will not be looked up using the
2200 chains from above but instead use the corresponding values from the
2201 message that is being worked on.
2202 In unusual cases multiple and different
2206 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
2207 unusual cases become possible.
2208 The usual case is as short as:
2211 .Dl set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
2212 .Dl \ \ \ \ smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair
2217 contains complete example configurations.
2220 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{
2221 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2223 \*(OP Terminal control will be realized through one of the standard
2225 libraries, either the
2227 or, alternatively, the
2229 both of which will be initialized to work with the environment variable
2231 Terminal control will enhance or enable interactive usage aspects, e.g.,
2232 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2233 and extend behaviour of the Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE), which may learn the
2234 byte-sequences of keys like the cursor and function keys, and which will
2235 automatically enter the so-called
2237 alternative screen shall the terminal support it.
2238 The internal variable
2240 can be used to overwrite settings or to learn (correct(ed)) keycodes.
2241 Actual interaction with the chosen library can be disabled completely by
2242 setting the internal variable
2243 .Va termcap-disable ;
2245 will be queried regardless, even if the \*(OPal support for the
2246 libraries has not been enabled at configuration time.
2249 \*(OP The builtin \*(UA Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2250 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2252 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2253 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2255 Prevent usage of a line editor in interactive mode by setting the
2257 .Va line-editor-disable .
2258 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2259 entries in the internal variable
2261 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2262 The MLE can support a little bit of
2268 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2269 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2270 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2272 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2273 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2277 .Va history-gabby-persist
2282 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2283 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2284 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2285 be generated by holding the
2287 key while pressing the key of desire, e.g.,
2291 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2292 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2293 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2295 to establish its builtin key bindings
2296 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2297 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2298 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2299 The following uses the
2301 ell-style quote notation that is documented in the introduction of
2303 combinations not mentioned either cause job control signals or don't
2304 generate a (unique) keycode:
2308 .Bl -tag -compact -width "Ql _M"
2310 Go to the start of the line
2311 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2314 Move the cursor backward one character
2315 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2318 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2319 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the
2322 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2325 Go to the end of the line
2326 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2329 Move the cursor forward one character
2330 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2333 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2334 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2335 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2336 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2337 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2340 Backspace: backward delete one character
2341 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
2345 Horizontal tabulator:
2346 try to expand the word before the cursor, also supporting \*(UA
2349 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ) .
2351 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
2355 commit the current line
2356 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
2359 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
2360 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
2364 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
2367 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
2368 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
2375 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
2376 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
2379 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
2381 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2382 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
2386 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
2387 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
2390 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
2391 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
2394 Paste the snarf buffer
2395 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
2402 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
2405 Prompts for a Unicode character (its hexadecimal number) to be inserted
2406 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
2407 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
2408 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
2409 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
2410 that shortcut purpose); this control code is special-treated and can't
2411 be part of any other sequence, because any occurrence will perform the
2413 function immediately.
2416 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
2418 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
2421 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
2422 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
2425 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
2426 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
2429 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
2430 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
2431 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
2432 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
2433 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
2434 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
2436 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
2437 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
2438 expected input, then it will first be consumed by the active sequence.
2453 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
2455 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
2465 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
2469 ring the audible bell.
2473 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{
2474 .Ss "Coloured display"
2476 \*(OP \*(UA can be configured to support a coloured display and font
2477 attributes by emitting ANSI / ISO 6429 SGR (select graphic rendition)
2479 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
2480 capability of the detected terminal type that is defined by the
2481 environment variable
2483 and which can be fine-tuned by the user via the internal variable
2487 On top of what \*(UA knows about the terminal the boolean variable
2489 defines whether the actually applicable colour and font attribute
2490 sequences should also be generated when output is going to be paged
2491 through the external program defined by the environment variable
2496 This is not enabled by default because different pager programs need
2497 different command line switches or other configuration in order to
2498 support those sequences.
2499 \*(UA however knows about some widely used pagers and in a clean
2500 environment it is often enough to simply set
2502 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
2507 is set then any active usage of colour and font attribute sequences
2508 is suppressed, but without affecting possibly established
2513 To define and control colours and font attributes a single multiplexer
2514 command family exists:
2516 shows or defines colour mappings for the given colour type (e.g.,
2519 can be used to remove mappings of a given colour type.
2520 Since colours are only available in interactive mode, it may make
2521 sense to conditionalize the colour setup by encapsulating it with
2524 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2525 if terminal && $features =@ +colour
2526 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
2527 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red "from,subject"
2528 colour iso view-header fg=red
2530 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
2531 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
2532 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 subject,from
2533 colour mono view-header ft=bold
2534 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
2538 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
2541 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
2544 Each command is typed on a line by itself,
2545 and may take arguments following the command word.
2546 Command names may be abbreviated, in which case the first command that
2547 matches the given prefix will be used.
2550 can be used to show the list of all commands, either alphabetically
2551 sorted or in prefix search order (these don't match, also because the
2552 POSIX standard prescribes a set of abbreviations).
2553 \*(OPally the command
2557 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
2558 command matching the expanded argument, as in
2560 which should be a shorthand of
2562 Both commands support a more
2564 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command.
2567 For commands which take message lists as arguments, the next message
2568 forward that satisfies the command's requirements will be used shall no
2569 explicit message list have been specified.
2570 If there are no messages forward of the current message,
2571 the search proceeds backwards,
2572 and if there are no good messages at all,
2573 \*(UA shows an error message and aborts the command.
2574 \*(ID Non-message-list arguments can be quoted using the following methods:
2577 .Bl -bullet -compact -offset indent
2579 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
2584 any white space, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
2585 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
2586 part of the argument.
2587 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
2589 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
2590 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
2596 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
2597 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
2601 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
2602 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
2607 Some commands which don't take message-list arguments can also be
2608 prefixed with the special keyword
2610 to choose \*(INible argument quoting rules, and some new commands only
2611 support the new rules (without that keyword) and are flagged \*(NQ.
2612 In the future \*(UA will (mostly) use
2614 compatible argument parsing:
2615 Non-message-list arguments can be quoted using the following shell-style
2616 mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes, double-quotes and
2617 dollar-single-quotes; any unquoted number sign
2619 that parses as a new token starts a comment that ends argument processing.
2620 The overall granularity of error reporting and diagnostics, also
2621 regarding function arguments and their content, will improve.
2625 .Bl -bullet -compact -offset indent
2627 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
2628 with the escape character reverse solidus
2632 will cause variable expansion of the given name: \*(UA
2633 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2636 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
2637 enclosing the name is supported.
2640 Arguments which are enclosed in
2641 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
2642 retain their literal value.
2643 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
2646 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
2647 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
2648 is retained, with the exception of dollar
2650 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
2652 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
2654 which will escape any of the characters dollar
2656 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
2660 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
2662 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
2663 but has no special meaning otherwise.
2666 Arguments enclosed in
2667 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
2668 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
2669 expanded as follows:
2671 .Bl -tag -compact -width "Ql \eNNN"
2677 an escape character.
2679 an escape character.
2691 emits a reverse solidus character.
2695 double quote (escaping is optional).
2697 eight-bit byte with the octal value
2699 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
2701 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
2703 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
2705 (one or two hexadecimal characters).
2706 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
2708 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
2710 (one to eight hexadecimal digits) \(em note that Unicode defines the
2711 maximum codepoint to be ever supported as
2716 This escape is only supported in locales which support Unicode (see
2717 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
2718 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
2719 point is ASCII compatible or can be represented in the current locale.
2720 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
2724 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal digits.
2726 A mechanism that allows usage of the non-printable (ASCII and
2727 compatible) control codes 0 to 31: to create the printable
2728 representation of a control code the numeric value 64 is added, and the
2729 resulting ASCII character set code point is then printed, e.g., BEL is
2730 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
2731 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
2732 visualization purposes of control codes, e.g.,
2734 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
2736 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO 10646, ISO C) alias
2737 representations, as shown above (e.g.,
2741 whenever such an alias exists \*(UA will use it for display purposes.
2742 The control code NUL
2744 ends argument processing without producing further output.
2746 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
2747 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
2749 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
2755 .Sy Compatibility notes:
2756 \*(ID Note these are new mechanisms which are not supported by all
2758 Round-tripping (feeding in things shown in list modes again) are not yet
2759 stable or possible at all.
2760 On new-style command lines it is wise to quote semicolon
2764 characters in order to ensure upward compatibility: the author would
2765 like to see things like
2766 .Ql ? echo $'trouble\etahead' | cat >> in_the_shell.txt
2768 .Ql ? top 2 5 10; type 3 22
2770 Before \*(UA will switch entirely to shell-style argument parsing there
2771 will be a transition phase where using
2773 will emit obsoletion warnings.
2775 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2776 echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
2777 echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
2778 echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
2782 In any event an unquoted reverse solidus at the end of a command line is
2783 discarded and the next line continues the command.
2784 \*(ID Note that line continuation is handled before the above parsing is
2785 applied, i.e., the parsers documented above will see merged lines.
2786 Filenames, where expected, are subsequently subjected to the following
2787 transformations, in sequence:
2790 .Bl -bullet -compact -offset indent
2792 If the filename begins with an unquoted plus sign, and the
2794 variable is defined,
2795 the plus sign will be replaced by the value of the
2797 variable followed by a solidus.
2800 variable is unset or is set to null, the filename will be unchanged.
2803 Meta expansions are applied to the filename: a leading tilde
2805 character will be replaced by the expansion of
2807 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
2808 directory of the given user is used instead.
2813 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible; \*(UA
2814 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2817 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, and the usual
2818 escape mechanism has to be applied to prevent interpretation.
2819 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
2820 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
2822 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
2824 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, e.g., a file
2825 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
2827 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
2831 The following commands are available:
2833 .Bl -tag -width ".Ic _ccount"
2840 ) command which follows.
2844 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
2846 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
2849 indicating special character, which means that, e.g., trailing comments
2850 on a line are not possible.
2854 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
2860 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
2861 a numeric argument n.
2865 Show the current message number (the
2870 Show a brief summary of commands.
2873 output is available.
2874 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
2875 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
2876 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
2877 synopsis, try, e.g.,
2882 and see how the output changes.
2892 Interprets the remainder of the word as a macro name and passes it
2897 is a shorter synonym for
2898 .Ql call Ar mymacro .
2902 (ac) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
2903 Accounts are special incarnations of
2905 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
2906 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
2907 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
2909 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
2914 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted via
2917 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
2918 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
2920 of that account will be activated (as via
2922 and a possibly installed
2925 The two argument form is identical to defining a macro as via
2927 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2929 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
2930 set from='myname@myisp.example (My Name)'
2931 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
2937 (a) With no arguments, shows all currently-defined aliases.
2938 With one argument, shows that alias.
2939 With more than one argument,
2940 creates a new alias or appends to an existing one.
2942 can be used to delete aliases.
2946 (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses / names of the active user,
2947 members of which will be removed from recipient lists when replying to
2950 variable is not set).
2951 If arguments are given the set of alternate names is replaced by them,
2952 without arguments the current set is displayed.
2956 Takes a message list and marks each message as having been answered.
2957 This mark has no technical meaning in the mail system;
2958 it just causes messages to be marked in the header summary,
2959 and makes them specially addressable.
2964 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
2965 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
2966 with freely configurable key bindings.
2967 With one argument all bindings for the given context are shown,
2968 specifying an asterisk
2970 will show the bindings of all contexts; a more verbose listing will be
2971 produced if either of
2976 With two or more arguments a binding is (re)established:
2977 the first argument is the context to which the binding shall apply,
2978 the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
2980 which form the binding, and any remaining arguments form the expansion.
2981 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
2982 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, an at-sign
2984 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
2985 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
2986 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
2989 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding won't be seen
2990 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
2991 This is not true for the shared binding
2993 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
2994 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
2995 The available contexts are the shared
2999 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
3001 which applies to compose-mode only.
3005 which form the binding are specified as a comma-separated list of
3006 byte-sequences, where each list entry corresponds to one key(press).
3007 \*(OPally a list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
3009 also refer to the name of a terminal capability;
3010 several dozen names will be compiled into \*(UA and may be specified
3013 or, if existing, by their
3015 name, regardless of the actually used terminal control library.
3016 It is however possible to use any capability, as long as the name is
3017 resolvable by the control library or defined in the internal variable
3019 Input sequences are not case-normalized, so that an exact match is
3020 required to update or remove a binding.
3023 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3024 bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
3025 bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc, Delete
3026 bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo An editable binding@'
3027 bind default a,b,c rm -rf / @ # Another editable binding
3028 bind default :kf1 File %
3029 bind compose :kf1 ~e
3033 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
3034 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, before being parsed
3035 and expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
3036 whitespace needs to be properly quoted:
3037 shell-style quoting is documented in the introduction of
3039 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
3040 defunctional if the locale doesn't support Unicode (see
3041 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3042 and using terminal capabilities does so if no terminal control support
3043 is (currently) available.
3046 The following terminal capability names are builtin and can be used in
3048 or (if available) the two-letter
3050 notation regardless of the actually used library.
3051 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
3054 can be used to show all the capabilities of
3056 or the given terminal type;
3059 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
3062 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
3063 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
3065 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
3067 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
3068 \(em shifted variant.
3069 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
3070 Clear to end of line.
3071 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
3073 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
3075 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
3076 \(em shifted variant.
3077 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
3079 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
3080 \(em shifted variant.
3081 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
3083 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
3085 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
3087 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
3088 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
3089 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
3090 \(em shifted variant.
3091 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
3092 Right cursor (ditto).
3093 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
3094 \(em shifted variant.
3095 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
3096 Down cursor (ditto).
3098 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
3099 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
3102 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
3103 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
3105 Add one for each function key up to
3110 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
3112 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
3114 Add one for each function key up to
3122 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
3124 For example, the delete key,
3126 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
3128 then a number is appended for the states
3140 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
3142 The same for the left cursor key,
3144 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
3147 Key bindings can be removed with the command
3149 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (e.g.,
3151 for bindings which describe user key combinations (as opposed to purely
3152 terminal capability based ones), in order to avoid ambiguities whether
3153 input belongs to key sequences or not; it also reduces search time.
3156 may help shall keys and sequences be falsely recognized.
3161 Calls a macro that has been created via
3166 (ch) Change the working directory to
3168 or the given argument.
3174 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
3175 Takes a message list and a file name and saves the certificates
3176 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
3177 human-readable and PEM format.
3178 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
3179 respective message senders by setting
3180 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
3185 (ch) Change the working directory to
3187 or the given argument.
3193 Only applicable to threaded mode.
3194 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
3195 in header summaries, unless they are in state
3201 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings for the type of colour given as the
3202 (case-insensitive) first argument, which must be one of
3204 for 256-colour terminals,
3209 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 color palette and
3213 for monochrome terminals.
3214 Monochrome terminals cannot deal with colours, but only (some) font
3218 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
3219 for the given colour type is shown (as a special case giving
3223 will iterate over all types in order).
3224 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, the third
3225 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
3226 specification(s), and the optional fourth argument can be used to
3227 specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are tested in
3228 (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been found, and
3229 the default mapping (if any has been established) will only be chosen as
3231 The types of precondition available depend on the mappable slot, the
3232 following of which exist:
3235 Mappings prefixed with
3237 are used for the \*(OPal builtin Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
3238 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
3239 and don't support preconditions.
3241 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
3243 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
3244 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
3251 Mappings prefixed with
3253 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
3255 (the current message) and
3257 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
3258 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
3260 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
3262 This mapping is used for the
3264 that can be created with the
3268 formats of the variable
3271 For the complete header summary line except the
3273 and the thread structure.
3275 For the thread structure which can be created with the
3277 format of the variable
3282 Mappings prefixed with
3284 are used when displaying messages.
3286 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
3288 This mapping is used for so-called
3290 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines.
3293 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
3294 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
3295 available then if any of the
3297 (extended) regular expression characters is seen the precondition will
3298 be evaluated as (an extended) one.
3300 For the introductional message info line.
3301 .It Cd view-partinfo
3302 For MIME part info lines.
3306 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
3307 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
3317 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
3318 attributes for a single mapping.
3321 foreground colour attribute:
3331 To specify a 256-color mode a decimal number colour specification in
3332 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
3334 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
3336 the standard ISO 6429 colors, as above.
3338 high intensity variants of the standard colors.
3340 216 colors in tuples of 6.
3342 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
3344 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3346 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
3347 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
3349 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
3350 printf "\e033[0m\en"
3352 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
3353 printf "\e033[0m\en"
3357 background colour attribute (see
3359 for possible values).
3363 Mappings may be removed with the command
3365 For a generic overview see the section
3366 .Sx "Coloured display" .
3371 (C) Copy messages to files whose names are derived from the author of
3372 the respective message and don't mark them as being saved;
3373 otherwise identical to
3378 (c) Copy messages to the named file and don't mark them as being saved;
3379 otherwise identical to
3384 \*(NQ With no arguments, shows all currently-defined custom headers.
3385 With one argument, shows that custom header.
3386 With more than one argument, creates a new or replaces an existing
3387 custom header with the name given as the first argument, the content of
3388 which being defined by the concatenated remaining arguments.
3390 can be used to delete custom headers.
3391 \*(ID Overwriting of automatically managed headers is neither supported
3393 Defined custom headers will be injected into newly composed or forwarded
3396 .Dl customhdr OpenPGP id=12345678; url=http://www.YYY.ZZ
3400 may also be used to inject custom headers; it is covered by
3405 Show the name of the current working directory.
3409 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
3411 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
3415 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
3417 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
3421 Without arguments the current list of macros, including their content,
3422 is shown, otherwise a macro is defined.
3423 A macro definition is a sequence of commands in the following form:
3424 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3433 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
3437 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, e.g., a
3439 Note that interpretation of
3441 depends on how (i.e.,
3443 normal macro, folder hook, hook, account switch) the macro is invoked.
3444 Macros can be deleted via
3448 Macro behaviour, including option localization, will change in v15.
3449 Please be aware of that and possibly embed a version check in a resource
3454 (d) Marks the given message list as
3456 Deleted messages will neither be saved in
3458 nor will they be available for most other commands.
3470 Deletes the current message and displays the next message.
3471 If there is no next message, \*(UA says
3478 up or down by one message when given
3482 argument, respectively.
3486 Takes a message list and marks each given message as a draft.
3487 This mark has no technical meaning in the mail system;
3488 it just causes messages to be marked in the header summary,
3489 and makes them specially addressable.
3493 (ec) Echoes its arguments after applying
3495 expansions and filename transformations, as documented for
3500 (e) Point the text editor (as defined in
3502 at each message from the given list in turn.
3503 Modified contents are discarded unless the
3510 .Ic if Ns / Ns Ic elif Ns / Ns Ic else Ns / Ns Ic endif
3511 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
3513 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
3514 if it evaluates true.
3519 .Ic if Ns / Ns Ic elif Ns / Ns Ic else Ns / Ns Ic endif
3520 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
3524 commands was true, the
3530 (en) Marks the end of an
3531 .Ic if Ns / Ns Ic elif Ns / Ns Ic else Ns / Ns Ic endif
3532 conditional execution block.
3537 \*(NQ \*(UA has a strict notion about which variables are
3538 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3539 and which are managed in the program
3541 Since some of the latter are a vivid part of \*(UAs functioning,
3542 however, they are transparently integrated into the normal handling of
3543 internal variables via
3547 To integrate other environment variables of choice into this
3548 transparent handling, and also to export internal variables into the
3549 process environment where they normally are not, a
3551 needs to become established with this command, as in, e.g.,
3554 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB from TZ
3557 Afterwards changing such variables with
3559 will cause automatic updates of the program environment, and therefore
3560 be inherited by newly created child processes.
3561 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
3562 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
3564 will remove them also from the program environment, but in any way
3565 the knowledge they ever have been
3568 Note this implies that
3570 may cause loss of links.
3575 will remove an existing link, but leaves the variables as such intact.
3576 Additionally the subcommands
3580 are provided, which work exactly the same as the documented commands
3584 but (additionally) link the variable(s) with the program environment and
3585 thus immediately export them to, or remove them from (if possible),
3586 respectively, the program environment.
3591 \*(OP Since \*(UA uses the console as a user interface it can happen
3592 that messages scroll by too fast to become recognized.
3593 Optionally an error message ring queue is available which stores
3594 duplicates of any error message and notifies the user in interactive
3595 sessions whenever a new error has occurred.
3596 The queue is finite: if its maximum size is reached any new message
3597 replaces the eldest.
3600 can be used to manage this message queue: if given
3602 or no argument the queue will be displayed and cleared,
3604 will only clear all messages from the queue.
3608 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
3609 any saving of messages in
3611 as well as a possibly tracked line editor history file.
3617 but open the mailbox readonly.
3621 (fi) The file command switches to a new mailbox.
3622 Without arguments it shows status information of the current mailbox.
3623 If an argument is given, it will write out changes (such as deletions)
3624 the user has made and open a new mailbox.
3625 Some special conventions are recognized for the
3629 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".Ar %:__lespec"
3631 (number sign) means the previous file,
3633 (percent sign) means the invoking user's system mailbox, which either
3634 is the (itself expandable)
3636 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3638 if that is set, or a builtin compile-time default otherwise.
3640 means the primary system mailbox of
3642 (and never the value of
3644 regardless of its actual setting),
3646 (ampersand) means the invoking user's
3656 expands to the same value as
3658 but the file is handled as a primary system mailbox by, e.g., the
3662 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3663 session will be moved to the
3665 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3668 If the name matches one of the strings defined with the command
3670 it is replaced by its long form and expanded.
3671 If the name ends with
3676 it is treated as being compressed with
3681 respectively, and transparently handled through an intermediate
3682 (un)compression step (using a temporary file) with the according
3683 facility, sufficient support provided.
3684 Likewise, if the named file doesn't exist, but a file with one of the
3685 mentioned compression extensions does, then the name is automatically
3686 expanded and the compressed file is used.
3688 Otherwise, if the name ends with an extension for which
3689 .Va file-hook-load-EXTENSION
3691 .Va file-hook-save-EXTENSION
3692 variables are set, then the given hooks will be used to load and save
3694 and \*(UA will work with an intermediate temporary file.
3696 MBOX files (flat file-based mailboxes) are generally locked during file
3697 operations in order to avoid inconsistencies due to concurrent
3699 \*(OPal Mailbox files which \*(UA treats as the system
3702 and primary mailboxes will also be protected by so-called dotlock
3703 files, the traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
3707 will be created for the duration of the synchronization \(em
3708 as necessary a privilege-separated dotlock child process will be used
3709 to accommodate for necessary privilege adjustments in order to create
3710 the dotlock file in the same directory
3711 and with the same user and group identities as the file of interest.
3715 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
3720 then it is treated as a folder in
3722 format; \*(ID the variable
3724 can be used to control the format of yet non-existent folders.
3727 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
3728 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
3730 is taken as an Internet mailbox specification.
3731 The \*(OPally supported protocols are
3735 (POP3 with SSL/TLS encrypted transport).
3738 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
3740 Also see the section
3741 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
3745 contains special characters, in particular
3749 they must be escaped in URL notation \(en the command
3751 can be used to show the necessary conversion.
3755 Takes a message list and marks the messages as
3757 ged for urgent/special attention.
3758 This mark has no technical meaning in the mail system;
3759 it just causes messages to be highlighted in the header summary,
3760 and makes them specially addressable.
3769 With no arguments, list the names of the folders in the folder directory.
3770 With an existing folder as an argument,
3771 lists the names of folders below the named folder.
3777 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
3778 recipient's address (instead of in
3785 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
3786 recipient's address (instead of in
3793 but responds to all recipients regardless of the
3798 .It Ic followupsender
3801 but responds to the sender only regardless of the
3817 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
3818 their message headers, exactly as via
3820 An alias of this command is
3823 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
3829 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
3830 recipient's address (instead of in
3835 Takes a message and the address of a recipient
3836 and forwards the message to him.
3837 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
3838 with the value of the
3840 variable preceding it.
3845 commands specify which header fields are included in the new message.
3846 Only the first part of a multipart message is included unless the
3847 .Va forward-as-attachment
3851 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
3855 Specifies which header fields are to be ignored with the command
3857 This command has no effect when the
3858 .Va forward-as-attachment
3863 Specifies which header fields are to be retained with the command
3868 This command has no effect when the
3869 .Va forward-as-attachment
3874 Define or list command aliases, so-called ghosts.
3875 Without arguments a list of all currently known aliases is shown.
3876 With one argument the expansion of the given alias is shown.
3877 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
3878 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
3879 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
3880 A ghost can be used everywhere a normal command can be used, but always
3881 takes precedence; any arguments that are given to the command alias are
3882 joined onto the alias content, and the resulting string forms the
3883 command line that is, in effect, executed.
3886 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3888 `ghost': no such alias: "xx"
3891 ghost xx "echo hello,"
3900 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
3903 and the style of which can be adjusted with the variable
3905 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
3906 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
3921 the list of history entries;
3924 argument selects and shows the respective history entry \(en
3927 to accept it, and the history entry will become the new history top.
3928 The default mode if no arguments are given is
3935 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
3940 Does not override the
3943 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
3945 command issued after
3947 will display the following message, not the current one.
3952 (i) Part of the nestable
3953 .Ic if Ns / Ns Ic elif Ns / Ns Ic else Ns / Ns Ic endif
3954 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
3955 the encapsulated block is executed.
3956 POSIX only supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
3961 end, all remaining conditions are non-portable extensions; note that
3962 falsely specified conditions cause the execution of the entire
3963 conditional construct until the (matching) closing
3965 command to be suppressed.
3966 The syntax of the nestable
3968 conditional execution construct requires that each condition and syntax
3969 element is surrounded by whitespace.
3971 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3980 The (case-insensitive) condition
3982 erminal will evaluate to true if the standard input is a terminal, i.e.,
3983 in interactive sessions.
3984 Another condition can be any boolean value (see the section
3985 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3986 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
3989 .Dq always execute .
3990 It is possible to check
3991 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3994 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
3995 value or another variable by using the
3997 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
3998 conditional trigger character;
3999 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
4001 The variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
4004 The available comparison operators are
4008 (less than or equal to),
4014 (greater than or equal to),
4018 (is substring of) and
4020 (is not substring of).
4021 The values of the left and right hand side are treated as strings and
4022 are compared 8-bit byte-wise, ignoring case according to the rules of
4023 the US-ASCII encoding (therefore, dependent on the active locale,
4024 possibly producing false results for strings in the locale encoding).
4025 Except for the substring checks the comparison will instead be performed
4026 arithmetically if both, the user given value as well as the variable
4027 content, can be parsed as numbers (integers).
4028 An unset variable is treated as the empty string.
4031 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
4037 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
4038 matched case-insensitively and according to the active
4040 locale, meaning that strings in the locale encoding should be matched
4044 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
4046 and the OR operator is
4048 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
4049 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
4051 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
4052 them in pairs of brackets
4053 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
4054 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
4058 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
4059 via unary operators: the unary operator
4061 will reverse the result.
4063 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4067 if $ttycharset == "UTF-8"
4068 echo *ttycharset* is set to UTF-8, case-insensitively
4072 echo These two variables are equal
4074 if $version-major >= 15
4075 echo Running a new version..
4076 if $features =@ +regex
4077 if $TERM =~ "^xterm\&.*"
4078 echo ..in an X terminal
4081 if [ [ true ] && [ [ ${debug} ] || [ $verbose ] ] ]
4084 if true && $debug || ${verbose}
4085 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
4087 if ! ! true && ! [ ! $debug && ! $verbose ]
4088 echo Unary operator support
4096 Without arguments the list of ignored header fields is shown,
4097 otherwise the given list of header fields is added to the ignore list:
4098 Header fields in the ignore list are not shown on the terminal when
4099 a message is displayed.
4100 To display a message in its entirety, use the commands
4111 Shows the names of all available commands, alphabetically sorted.
4112 If given any non-whitespace argument the list will be shown in the order
4113 in which command prefixes are searched.
4116 output is available.
4120 This command can be used to localize changes to variables, meaning that
4121 their state will be reverted to the former one once the covered scope
4123 It can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
4127 and is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
4128 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ) ;
4131 of an account is left once it is switched off again.
4132 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4133 define temporary_settings {
4148 enables change localization and calls
4150 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
4152 will still be reverted by
4154 \*(ID Once the outermost level, the one which enabled localization
4155 first, is left, but no earlier, all adjustments will be unrolled.
4156 \*(ID Likewise worth knowing, if in this example
4158 changes to a different
4160 which sets some variables that are yet covered by localizations, their
4161 scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
4163 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
4164 were defined in a local, private context.
4168 Reply to messages that come in via known
4171 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
4172 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
4173 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
4176 functionality this will actively resort and even remove message
4177 recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be sent to
4179 For example it will also implicitly generate a
4180 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
4181 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
4188 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
4189 recipient's address (instead of in
4194 (m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
4195 or asks on standard input if none were given;
4196 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
4200 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to
4202 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the
4205 \*(ID This command can only be used in a primary system mailbox (see
4210 Without any arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed.
4211 Otherwise each argument defines a complete MIME type specification of
4212 a type that shall be added (prepended) to the cache.
4213 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
4214 .Va mimetypes-load-control
4215 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
4216 Refer to the section on
4217 .Sx "The mime.types files"
4218 for more on MIME type specifications and this topic in general.
4219 MIME type unregistration and cache resets can be triggered with
4224 Without arguments the list of all currently defined mailing lists
4225 (and their attributes, if any) is shown; a more verbose listing will be
4226 produced if either of
4231 Otherwise all given arguments (which need not be quoted except for
4232 whitespace) will be added and henceforth be recognized as mailing lists.
4233 Mailing lists may be removed via the command
4236 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available then mailing
4237 lists may also be specified as (extended) regular expressions (see
4243 Without arguments the list of all currently defined mailing lists which
4244 have a subscription attribute is shown; a more verbose listing will be
4245 produced if either of
4250 Otherwise this attribute will be set for all given mailing lists,
4251 newly creating them as necessary (as via
4253 Subscription attributes may be removed via the command
4262 but moves the messages to a file named after the local part of the
4263 sender address of the first message (instead of in
4270 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
4277 but also displays ignored header fields and all MIME parts.
4285 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
4286 standard output is a terminal.
4292 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
4294 has been given the content of the
4296 cache is shown, loading it first as necessary.
4299 then the cache will only be initialized and
4301 will remove its contents.
4302 Note that \*(UA will try to load the file only once, use
4303 .Ql Ic \&\&netrc Ns \:\0\:clear
4304 to unlock further attempts.
4309 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
4311 .Sx "The .netrc file"
4312 documents the file format in detail.
4316 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
4318 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
4322 the headers of each new message are also shown.
4323 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
4331 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
4332 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
4346 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
4348 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
4354 but also displays ignored header fields and all MIME parts.
4362 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
4363 standard output is a terminal.
4371 but also pipes ignored header fields and all parts of MIME
4372 .Ql multipart/alternative
4377 (pi) Takes a message list and a shell command
4378 and pipes the messages through the command.
4379 Without an argument the current message is piped through the command
4386 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
4407 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
4410 preserving all messages marked with
4414 or never referenced in the system
4416 and removing all other messages from the primary system mailbox.
4417 If new mail has arrived during the session,
4419 .Dq You have new mail
4421 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line flag
4423 then the edit file is rewritten.
4424 A return to the shell is effected,
4425 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
4426 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
4440 Removes the named files or directories.
4441 If a name refer to a mailbox, e.g., a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
4442 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
4443 The user is asked for confirmation in interactive mode.
4447 Takes the name of an existing folder
4448 and the name for the new folder
4449 and renames the first to the second one.
4450 Both folders must be of the same type.
4454 (R) Reply to originator.
4455 Does not reply to other recipients of the original message.
4457 will exchange this command with
4461 is set the recipient address will be stripped from comments, names etc.
4465 (r) Take a message and group-responds to it by addressing the sender
4468 .Va followup-to-honour ,
4471 .Va recipients-in-cc
4472 influence response behaviour.
4475 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
4478 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
4491 but initiates a group-reply regardless of the value of
4498 but responds to the sender only regardless of the value of
4505 but does not add any header lines.
4506 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
4507 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
4511 Takes a list of messages and a user name
4512 and sends each message to the named user.
4514 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
4532 .It Ic respondsender
4538 (ret) Without arguments the list of retained header fields is shown,
4539 otherwise the given list of header fields is added to the retain list:
4540 Header fields in the retain list are shown on the terminal when
4541 a message is displayed, all other header fields are suppressed.
4542 To display a message in its entirety, use the commands
4551 takes precedence over the mentioned.
4557 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
4558 sender of the first message instead of (in
4560 and) taking a filename argument.
4564 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
4565 to the end of the file.
4566 If no filename is given, the
4569 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
4570 is echoed on the user's terminal.
4571 If editing a primary system mailbox the messages are marked for deletion.
4572 Filename interpretation as described for the
4574 command is performed.
4591 Header fields thus marked are filtered out when saving a message by
4593 or when automatically saving to
4595 This command should only be applied to header fields that do not contain
4596 information needed to decode the message,
4597 as MIME content fields do.
4609 Header fields thus marked are the only ones saved with a message when
4612 or when automatically saving to
4617 The use of this command is strongly discouraged since it may strip
4618 header fields that are needed to decode the message correctly.
4622 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
4623 all matching messages, as via
4625 This command is an alias of
4628 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
4632 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
4636 (se) Without arguments this command shows all internal variables which
4637 are currently known to \*(UA (they have been set).
4638 A more verbose listing will be produced if either of
4642 are set, in which case variables may be preceded with a comment line
4643 that gives some context of what \*(UA knows about the given variable.
4645 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
4646 Arguments are of the form
4648 (no space before or after
4652 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
4653 Quotation marks may be placed around any part of the assignment
4654 statement to quote blanks or tabs, e.g.,
4656 .Dl set indentprefix='->'
4658 If an argument begins with
4662 the effect is the same as invoking the
4664 command with the remaining part of the variable
4665 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
4669 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
4670 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
4671 environment requires corresponding system support).
4672 Please use the command
4674 for further environmental control.
4679 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4685 (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell.
4689 Without arguments the list of all currently defined shortcuts is
4691 Otherwise all given arguments (which need not be quoted except for
4692 whitespace) are treated as pairs of shortcuts and their expansions,
4693 creating new or changing already existing shortcuts, as necessary.
4694 Shortcuts may be removed via the command
4696 The expansion strings should be in the syntax that has been described
4705 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
4706 message text is shown.
4710 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
4715 Shows the current sorting criterion when used without an argument.
4716 Otherwise creates a sorted representation of the current folder,
4719 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
4721 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
4725 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
4726 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
4728 variable, as in, e.g.,
4729 .Ql set autosort=thread .
4730 Possible sorting criterions are:
4732 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
4734 Sort the messages by their
4736 field, that is by the time they were sent.
4738 Sort messages by the value of their
4740 field, that is by the address of the sender.
4743 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
4745 Sort the messages by their size.
4747 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
4750 Sort the messages by their message status.
4752 Sort the messages by their subject.
4754 Create a threaded display.
4756 Sort messages by the value of their
4758 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
4761 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
4766 (so) The source command reads commands from the given file, which is
4767 subject to the usual filename expansions (see introductional words of
4769 If the given argument ends with a vertical bar
4771 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
4772 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
4773 Interpretation of commands read is stopped when an error is encountered.
4776 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
4777 .Va folder-hook Ns s
4780 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
4787 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
4788 this command will not generate an error if the given file argument
4789 cannot be opened successfully.
4793 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
4799 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
4801 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
4802 Unless otherwise noted the
4804 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
4812 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
4816 This also clears the
4818 flag of the messages in question.
4822 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
4823 .Va spam-interface ,
4824 without modifying the messages, but setting their
4826 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
4827 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
4828 Refer to the manual section
4830 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
4834 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
4840 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
4846 flag of the messages in question.
4855 Create a threaded representation of the current folder,
4856 i.\|e. indent messages that are replies to other messages in the header
4857 display and change the
4859 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in the
4861 Message numbers are the same as in unthreaded mode.
4865 a header summary in threaded order is also displayed.
4879 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
4881 lines of each message on the users' terminal.
4882 The only header fields that are displayed are
4889 will instead honour configured lists).
4890 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
4892 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
4897 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in
4899 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
4902 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
4908 but also displays out ignored header fields and all parts of MIME
4909 .Ql multipart/alternative
4914 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the users'
4920 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
4924 are shown, the other are hidden except for their headers.
4925 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
4930 Delete all given accounts.
4931 An error message is shown if a given account is not defined.
4934 will discard all existing accounts.
4938 (una) Takes a list of names defined by alias commands
4939 and discards the remembered groups of users.
4942 will discard all existing aliases.
4946 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been answered.
4952 ing, specified by its context and input sequence, both of which may be
4953 specified as a wildcard (asterisk,
4957 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
4961 Only applicable to threaded mode.
4962 Takes a message list and makes the message and all replies to it visible
4963 in header summaries again.
4964 When a message becomes the current message,
4965 it is automatically made visible.
4966 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4967 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4973 mapping for the given colour type (see
4975 for a list of types) and mapping; if the optional precondition argument
4976 is used then only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4979 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed).
4981 .Sx "Coloured display"
4982 for the general picture.
4986 Deletes the custom headers given as arguments.
4989 will remove all custom headers.
4993 Undefine all given macros.
4994 An error message is shown if a given macro is not defined.
4997 will discard all existing macros.
5001 (u) Takes a message list and marks each message as not being deleted.
5005 Takes a message list and
5011 Takes a message list and marks each message as not being
5016 Removes the header field names from the list of ignored fields for the
5021 will remove all fields.
5025 Removes the header field names from the list of retained fields for the
5030 will remove all fields.
5034 Remove all the given command
5038 will remove all ghosts.
5042 Removes the header field names from the list of ignored fields.
5045 will remove all fields.
5049 Delete all given MIME types, e.g.,
5050 .Ql unmimetype text/plain
5051 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
5055 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
5057 but which also reenables cache initialization via
5058 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
5062 Forget about all the given mailing lists.
5065 will remove all lists.
5070 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
5071 Remove the subscription attribute from all given mailing lists.
5074 will clear the attribute from all lists which have it set.
5085 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
5089 Removes the header field names from the list of retained fields.
5092 will remove all fields.
5096 Removes the header field names from the list of ignored fields for
5100 will remove all fields.
5104 Removes the header field names from the list of retained fields for
5108 will remove all fields.
5112 (uns) Takes a list of internal variable names and discards their
5113 remembered values; the reverse of
5120 Deletes the shortcut names given as arguments.
5123 will remove all shortcuts.
5127 Disable sorted or threaded mode
5133 return to normal message order and,
5137 displays a header summary.
5147 Perform URL percent codec operations, rather according to RFC 3986,
5148 on all given strings.
5149 This is character set agnostic and thus locale dependent, and it may
5150 decode bytes which are invalid in the current locale, unless the input
5151 solely consists of characters in the portable character set, see
5152 .Sx "Character sets" .
5153 The first argument specifies the operation:
5157 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
5161 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
5162 pathnames: it doesn't allow a tilde
5164 and will neither accept hyphen
5168 as an initial character.
5172 Edit the values of or create the given variable(s) in the
5174 Boolean variables cannot be edited.
5178 This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
5182 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
5186 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
5187 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
5188 verification will fail for it.
5189 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
5191 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
5192 within the certificate,
5193 and if the message content has been altered.
5205 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor on each message.
5206 Modified contents are discarded unless the
5212 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
5213 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
5215 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
5216 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
5217 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
5218 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
5219 depends on the execution mode.
5220 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
5222 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
5223 the processed parts.
5224 For convience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
5225 value, the same result as writing it to
5227 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
5229 character for the filename is supported.
5230 Other user input is expanded as usually for folders, e.g., tilde
5231 expansion is performed, and contents of the destination file are
5232 overwritten if the file previously existed.
5234 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
5235 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
5236 URL percent encoded (as via
5238 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
5239 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
5240 Existing files won't be overwritten, instead the part number or
5241 a dot are appended after a number sign
5243 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
5253 \*(UA presents message headers in
5255 fuls as described under the
5258 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
5259 likewise if the argument is
5263 scrolls to the last,
5265 scrolls to the first, and
5270 A number argument prefixed by
5274 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
5275 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
5281 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
5290 .\" .Sh TILDE ESCAPES {{{
5293 Here is a summary of the tilde escapes,
5294 which are used to perform special functions when composing messages.
5295 Tilde escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines.
5298 is somewhat of a misnomer since the actual escape character can be
5299 changed by adjusting the option
5302 .Bl -tag -width ".Ic __ filename"
5305 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
5307 (If the escape character has been changed,
5308 that character must be doubled
5309 in order to send it at the beginning of a line.)
5312 .It Ic ~! Ar command
5313 Execute the indicated shell
5315 then return to the message.
5319 Same effect as typing the end-of-file character.
5322 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
5323 Execute the given \*(UA command.
5324 Not all commands, however, are allowed.
5328 Write a summary of command escapes.
5331 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
5336 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
5338 is executed using the shell.
5339 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
5342 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
5343 With no arguments, edit the attachment list interactively.
5344 If an attachment's file name is left empty,
5345 that attachment is deleted from the list.
5346 When the end of the attachment list is reached,
5347 \*(UA will ask for further attachments until an empty name is given.
5348 If a given file name solely consists of the number sign
5350 followed by a valid message number of the currently active mailbox, then
5351 the given message is attached as a MIME
5353 and the rest of this section does not apply.
5355 If character set conversion has been compiled into \*(UA, then this mode
5356 gives the user the option to specify input and output character sets,
5357 unless the file extension indicates binary content, in which case \*(UA
5358 asks whether this step shall be skipped for the attachment in question.
5359 If not skipped, then the charset that succeeds to represent the
5360 attachment data will be used in the
5362 MIME parameter of the mail message:
5364 .Bl -bullet -compact
5366 If input and output character sets are specified, then the conversion is
5367 performed on the fly.
5368 The user will be asked repeatedly until the desired conversion succeeds.
5370 If only an output character set is specified, then the input is assumed
5373 charset and will be converted to the given output charset on the fly.
5374 The user will be asked repeatedly until the desired conversion succeeds.
5376 If no character sets are specified at all then the algorithm that is
5377 documented in the section
5378 .Sx "Character sets"
5379 is applied, but directly and on the fly.
5380 The user will be asked repeatedly until the desired conversion succeeds.
5382 Finally, if an input-, but no output character set is specified, then no
5383 conversion is ever performed, but the
5385 MIME parameter value will still be set to the user input.
5387 The character set selection loop can be left by typing
5389 i.e., causing an interrupt.
5390 .\" \*(OU next sentence
5391 Note that before \*(UA version 15.0 this terminates the entire
5392 current attachment selection, not only the character set selection.
5395 Without character set conversion support, \*(UA will ask for the input
5396 character set only, and it'll set the
5398 MIME parameter value to the given input, if any;
5399 if no user input is seen then the
5401 character set will be used for the parameter value instead.
5402 Note that the file extension check isn't performed in this mode, since
5403 no conversion will take place anyway.
5405 Note that in non-interactive mode, for reproduceabilities sake, there
5406 will always be two questions for each attachment, regardless of whether
5407 character set conversion is available and what the file extension is.
5408 The first asks for the filename, and the second asks for the input
5409 character set to be passed through to the corresponding MIME parameter;
5410 no conversion will be tried if there is input to the latter question,
5411 otherwise the usual conversion algorithm, as above, is applied.
5412 For message attachments, the answer to the second question is completely
5417 arguments are specified for the
5419 command they are treated as a file list of
5421 -style quoted arguments, optionally also separated by commas, which are
5422 expanded and then appended to the existing list of message attachments.
5423 Message attachments can only be added via the first method.
5424 In this mode the (text) attachments are assumed to be in
5426 encoding, and will be evaluated as documented in the section
5427 .Sx "Character sets" .
5431 Inserts the string contained in the
5434 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \0Sign ) .
5435 The escape sequences tabulator
5443 Inserts the string contained in the
5446 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \0sign ) .
5447 The escape sequences tabulator
5454 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
5455 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
5458 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
5459 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
5463 Read the file specified by the
5465 variable into the message.
5469 Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far.
5470 After the editing session is finished,
5471 the user may continue appending text to the message.
5474 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
5475 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
5476 message headers and MIME parts.
5477 If no messages are specified, read in the current message.
5480 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
5481 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
5482 If no messages are specified, read in the current message.
5486 lists are used to modify the message headers.
5487 For MIME multipart messages,
5488 only the first displayable part is included.
5492 Edit the message header fields
5497 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
5498 The default values for these fields originate from the
5506 Edit the message header fields
5512 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
5515 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
5516 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message,
5517 adding a newline character at the end.
5518 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
5519 The escape sequences tabulator
5526 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
5527 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
5530 If no messages are specified, read the current message.
5533 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
5534 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
5537 If no messages are specified, read the current message.
5541 lists are used to modify the message headers.
5542 For MIME multipart messages,
5543 only the first displayable part is included.
5547 Display the message collected so far,
5548 prefaced by the message header fields
5549 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
5553 Abort the message being sent,
5554 copying it to the file specified by the
5561 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
5562 Read the named file into the message, indented by
5566 .It Ic ~r Ar filename
5567 Read the named file into the message.
5571 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
5574 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
5575 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
5578 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
5579 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
5583 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
5584 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
5588 Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the
5590 option) on the message collected so far.
5591 Usually, the alternate editor will be a screen editor.
5592 After the editor is quit,
5593 the user may resume appending text to the end of the message.
5596 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
5597 Write the message onto the named file.
5599 the message is appended to it.
5605 except that the message is not saved at all.
5608 .It Ic ~| Ar command
5609 Pipe the message through the specified filter command.
5610 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
5611 retain the original text of the message.
5614 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
5619 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
5620 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5622 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
5626 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
5630 has the same effect as using
5636 Creation or editing of variables can be performed in the
5641 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
5643 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
5644 Both commands support a more
5647 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
5650 implicitly, others can be explicitly imported with the command
5652 and henceforth share the said properties.
5655 Two different kind of internal variables exist.
5656 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
5660 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
5661 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
5662 introduction of the section
5664 documents the supported quoting rules.
5666 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5667 wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
5668 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''
5669 varshow one two three four
5670 unset one two three four
5674 Dependent upon the actual option the string values will be interpreted
5675 as numbers, colour names, normal text etc., but there also exists
5676 a special kind of string value, the
5677 .Dq boolean string ,
5678 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
5682 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
5688 for a false boolean and
5694 for a true boolean; a special kind of boolean string is the
5696 which is a boolean string that can optionally be prefixed with the
5697 (case-insensitive) term
5701 which causes prompting of the user in interactive mode, with the given
5702 boolean as the default value.
5704 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
5705 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
5706 .Ss "Initial Settings"
5708 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
5714 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
5728 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
5730 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
5732 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
5740 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
5749 Notes: \*(UA doesn't support the
5751 variable \(en use command line options or
5753 to pass options through to a
5755 And the default global
5757 file (which is loaded unless the
5759 command line flag has been used or the
5760 .Ev NAIL_NO_SYSTEM_RC
5761 environment variable is set) bends those initial settings a bit, e.g.,
5762 it sets the variables
5767 to name a few, calls
5769 etc., and should thus be taken into account.
5772 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
5775 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va _utoprin_"
5777 .It Va -account-name
5778 \*(RO Is set to the active
5783 \*(RO The status of the last command.
5786 .It Va -folder-resolved
5787 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
5789 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
5792 .It Va -mailbox-display
5793 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
5795 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
5798 .It Va -mailbox-resolved
5799 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
5802 .It Va add-file-recipients
5803 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
5804 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
5805 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
5806 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
5810 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
5811 when comparing addresses.
5815 \*(BO Causes messages saved in
5817 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
5818 This should always be set.
5822 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt for the subject of each message sent.
5823 If the user responds with simply a newline,
5824 no subject field will be sent.
5828 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
5832 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
5836 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks for files to attach at the end of each message,
5837 shall the list be found empty at that time.
5838 An empty line finalizes the list.
5842 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for carbon copy recipients
5843 (at the end of each message if
5847 are set) shall the list be found empty (at that time).
5848 An empty line finalizes the list.
5852 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
5853 recipients (at the end of each message if
5857 are set) shall the list be found empty (at that time).
5858 An empty line finalizes the list.
5862 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the user to be prompted if the message is to be
5863 signed at the end of each message.
5866 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
5870 \*(BO Alternative name for
5877 .It Va attachment-ask-content-description , \
5878 attachment-ask-content-disposition , \
5879 attachment-ask-content-id , \
5880 attachment-ask-content-type
5881 \*(BO If set then the user will be prompted for some attachment
5882 information when editing the attachment list.
5883 It is advisable to not use these but for the first of the variables;
5884 even for that it has to be noted that the data is used
5890 A sequence of characters to display in the
5894 as shown in the display of
5896 each for one type of messages (see
5897 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
5898 with the default being
5901 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
5904 variable is set, in the following order:
5906 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
5928 start of a collapsed thread.
5930 an uncollapsed thread (TODO ignored for now).
5934 classified as possible spam.
5940 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
5941 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
5945 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
5946 message will be sent automatically.
5950 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when threaded mode
5957 \*(BO Causes the delete command to behave like
5959 thus, after deleting a message the next one will be typed automatically.
5963 \*(BO\*(OB Causes threaded mode (see the
5965 command) to be entered automatically when a folder is opened.
5967 .Ql autosort=thread .
5971 Causes sorted mode (see the
5973 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this option as
5974 sorting method when a folder is opened, e.g.,
5975 .Ql set autosort=thread .
5979 \*(BO Enables the substitution of
5981 by the contents of the last command line in shell escapes.
5984 .It Va batch-exit-on-error
5985 \*(BO If the batch mode has been enabled via the
5987 command line option, then this variable will be consulted whenever \*(UA
5988 completes one operation (returns to the command prompt); if it is set
5989 then \*(UA will terminate if the last operation generated an error.
5993 \*(OP Terminals generate multi-byte sequences for certain forms of
5994 input, for example for function and other special keys.
5995 Some terminals however do not write these multi-byte sequences as
5996 a whole, but byte-by-byte, and the latter is what \*(UA actually reads.
5997 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
5998 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
5999 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
6005 \*(BO Causes automatic display of a header summary after executing a
6007 command, and thus complements the standard variable
6009 which controls header summary display on program startup.
6010 It is only meaningful if
6016 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
6017 has the same affect as setting
6019 and all other variables prefixed with
6021 it also changes the behaviour of
6023 (which doesn't exist in BSD).
6027 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
6028 summary to traditional BSD style.
6032 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
6037 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
6043 field to appear immediately after the
6045 field in message headers and with the
6047 .Sx "TILDE ESCAPES" .
6051 The value that should appear in the
6055 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
6057 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
6058 US-ASCII compatible.
6062 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
6063 member of the variable
6065 This defaults to UTF-8.
6066 If no character set conversion capabilities are available in \*(UA then
6067 the only supported character set is
6069 Refer to the section
6070 .Sx "Character sets"
6071 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
6074 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
6075 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
6077 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
6079 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
6080 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
6081 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
6083 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
6084 otherwise the (final) value of
6086 is used for this purpose.
6088 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
6089 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
6090 of a MIME message part that uses the
6092 character set is forcefully treated as text.
6096 The default value for the
6101 .It Va colour-disable
6102 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
6103 Also see the section
6104 .Sx "Coloured display" .
6108 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
6110 Note that pagers may need special flags, e.g.,
6118 in order to support colours.
6119 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
6120 adjustments dependend on the value of the environment variable
6122 (see there for more).
6126 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued option is set
6127 it'll be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
6128 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
6132 can be forced by setting this to the value
6134 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
6135 terminal screen to compute the treshold (see
6143 \*(OB A variable counterpart of the
6145 command (see there for documentation), interpreted as a comma-separated
6146 list of custom headers to be injected, to include commas in the header
6147 bodies escape them with reverse solidus, e.g.:
6149 .Dl set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
6155 the message date, if any is to be displayed according to the format of
6157 is by default taken from the
6159 line of the message.
6160 If this variable is set the date as given in the
6162 header field is used instead, converted to local time.
6163 To control the display format of the date assign a valid
6168 format should not be used, because \*(UA doesn't take embedded newlines
6169 into account when calculating how many lines fit onto the screen.)
6171 .Va datefield-markout-older .
6174 .It Va datefield-markout-older
6175 This option, when set in addition to
6179 messages (concept is rather comparable to the
6181 option of the POSIX utility
6183 The content interpretation is identical to
6188 \*(BO Enables debug messages and obsoletion warnings, disables the
6189 actual delivery of messages and also implies
6195 .It Va disposition-notification-send
6197 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
6198 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
6202 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
6204 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
6205 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
6206 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
6208 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
6209 .\"for a specific account.
6213 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
6215 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive) compose mode
6216 will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the normal end-of-file
6225 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
6226 \*(BO\*(OP Synchronization of mailboxes which \*(UA treats as system
6227 mailboxes (see the command
6229 will be protected with so-called dotlock files\(emthe traditional mail
6230 spool file locking method\(emin addition to system file locking.
6231 Because \*(UA ships with a privilege-separated dotlock creation program
6232 that should always be able to create such a dotlock file there is no
6233 good reason to ignore dotlock file creation errors, and thus these are
6234 fatal unless this variable is set.
6238 \*(BO If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically
6239 when a message is composed in interactive mode, as if the
6245 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
6249 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
6250 its header is included in the editable text.
6260 fields are accepted within the header, other fields are ignored.
6264 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
6265 .Dq \&No mail for user
6266 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or doesn't exist.
6267 If this option is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or nonexistent
6268 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
6275 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
6276 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable.
6277 (7-bit clean text messages are sent as-is, without a transfer encoding.)
6280 .Bl -tag -compact -width "_%%_"
6283 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
6284 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
6285 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
6286 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
6287 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
6288 .It Ql quoted-printable
6290 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
6291 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
6292 be read as-is; it is also acceptible for other single-byte locales that
6293 share many characters with ASCII, like, e.g., ISO-8859-1.
6294 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
6295 sets: e.g., it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode a single
6296 UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
6298 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
6299 The default encoding, it is 7-bit clean and will always be used for
6301 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
6302 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
6303 to four bytes of output.
6304 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
6310 If defined, the first character of this option
6311 gives the character to use in place of
6314 .Sx "TILDE ESCAPES" .
6318 If not set then file and command pipeline targets are not allowed,
6319 and any such address will be filtered out, giving a warning message.
6320 If set without a value then all possible recipient address
6321 specifications will be accepted \(en see the section
6322 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
6324 To accept them, but only in interactive mode, or when tilde commands
6325 were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
6329 set this to the (case-insensitive) value
6331 (note right now this is actually like setting
6332 .Ql restrict,-all,+name,+addr ) .
6334 In fact the value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of values.
6337 then the existence of disallowed specifications is treated as a hard
6338 send error instead of only filtering them out.
6339 The remaining values specify whether a specific type of recipient
6340 address specification is allowed (optionally indicated by a plus sign
6342 prefix) or disallowed (prefixed with a hyphen
6346 addresses all possible address specifications,
6350 command pipeline targets,
6352 plain user names and (MTA) aliases (\*(OB
6354 may be used as an alternative syntax to
6359 These kind of values are interpreted in the given order, so that
6360 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
6361 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
6362 unless \*(UA is in interactive mode or has been started with the
6366 command line option; in the latter case(s) any address may be used, then.
6370 Unless this variable is set additional
6372 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
6373 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
6375 separator, are ignored due to safety reasons.
6376 However, if set to the special (case-insensitive) value
6378 then the presence of additional MTA arguments is treated as a hard
6379 error that causes \*(UA to exit with failure status.
6380 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
6382 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
6383 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
6390 \*(RO String giving a list of features \*(UA, preceded with a plus-sign
6392 if the feature is available, and a minus-sign
6395 The output of the command
6397 will include this information.
6401 \*(BO This option reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
6402 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
6403 included in the header of a message
6404 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
6405 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
6406 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
6409 .Ic replysender , respondsender , followupsender
6411 .Ic replyall , respondall , followupall
6412 are not affected by the current setting of
6417 .It Va file-hook-load-EXTENSION , file-hook-save-EXTENSION
6418 It is possible to install file hooks which will be used by the
6420 command in order to be able to transparently handle (through an
6421 intermediate temporary file) files with specific
6423 s: the variable values can include shell snippets and are expected to
6424 write data to standard output / read data from standard input,
6426 \*(ID The variables may not be changed while there is a mailbox
6428 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6429 set file-hook-load-xy='echo >&2 XY-LOAD; gzip -cd' \e
6430 file-hook-save-xy='echo >&2 XY-SAVE; gzip -c' \e
6431 record=+null-sent.xy
6436 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
6437 file names that begin with the plus-sign
6439 will be expanded by prefixing them with the value of this variable.
6440 The same special syntax conventions as documented for the
6442 command may be used; if the non-empty value doesn't start with a solidus
6446 will be prefixed automatically.
6447 If unset or the empty string any
6449 prefixing file names will remain unexpanded.
6453 This variable can be set to the name of a
6455 macro which will be called whenever a
6458 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
6459 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
6460 only include newly arrived messages then.
6462 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
6463 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
6466 Macro behaviour, including option localization, will change in v15.
6467 Please be aware of that and possibly embed a version check in a resource
6471 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER
6476 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
6477 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
6478 However, if the mailbox resides under
6482 specification is tried in addition, e.g., if
6486 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
6487 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
6489 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
6490 first, but then followed by
6491 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
6495 \*(BO Controls whether a
6496 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
6497 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
6499 .Va followup-to-honour
6501 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
6506 .It Va followup-to-honour
6508 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
6509 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
6513 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
6523 .It Va forward-as-attachment
6524 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
6527 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
6528 With this option messages are sent as unmodified MIME
6530 attachments with all of their parts included.
6534 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
6536 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
6537 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
6538 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
6541 ing to messages these addresses are handled as if they were in the
6545 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
6546 a dialup machine) then either this variable or
6548 (\*(IN and with a defined SMTP protocol in
6551 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities),
6555 contains more than one address,
6558 variable is required (according to the standard RFC 5322).
6562 \*(BO When replying to or forwarding a message \*(UA normally removes
6563 the comment and name parts of email addresses.
6564 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed,
6565 and comments, names etc. are retained.
6569 The string to put before the text of a message with the
6573 .Va forward-as-attachment
6576 .Dq -------- Original Message --------
6577 if unset; No heading is put if it is set to the empty string.
6581 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
6582 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
6583 the current folder; enabled by default.
6584 The command line option
6590 complements this and controls header summary display on folder changes.
6595 A format string to use for the summary of
6597 similar to the ones used for
6600 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent character
6602 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
6603 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
6604 Valid format specifiers are:
6607 .Bl -tag -compact -width "_%%_"
6609 A plain percent character.
6612 a space character but for the current message
6614 for which it expands to
6618 a space character but for the current message
6620 for which it expands to
6623 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
6626 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
6628 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
6632 The date when the message was received, or the date found in the
6636 variable is set (optionally to a date display format string).
6638 The indenting level in threaded mode.
6640 The address of the message sender.
6642 The message thread tree structure.
6643 (Note that this format doesn't support a field width.)
6645 The number of lines of the message, if available.
6649 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
6651 Message subject (if any).
6653 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
6655 Message recipient flags: is the addressee of the message a known or
6656 subscribed mailing list \(en see
6661 The position in threaded/sorted order.
6665 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
6667 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
6678 .It Va headline-bidi
6679 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
6680 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
6681 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
6682 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
6683 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
6684 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
6686 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
6687 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
6688 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
6690 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
6691 fields that may occur when displaying
6693 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
6695 with special Unicode control sequences;
6696 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
6698 no value (or any value other than
6703 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
6704 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
6705 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
6707 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
6709 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
6711 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
6712 sequences onto the line).
6717 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
6718 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
6722 \*(OP If a line editor is available then this can be set to
6723 name the (expandable) path of the location of a permanent history file.
6726 .It Va history-gabby
6727 \*(BO\*(OP Add more entries to the history as is normally done.
6730 .It Va history-gabby-persist
6731 \*(BO\*(OP \*(UA's own MLE will not save the additional
6733 entries in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
6734 On the other hand it will not loose the knowledge of whether
6735 a persistent entry was gabby or not.
6741 \*(OP If a line editor is available this value restricts the
6742 amount of history entries that are saved into a set and valid
6744 A value of less than 0 disables this feature;
6745 note that loading and incorporation of
6747 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
6748 If unset or 0, a default value will be used.
6749 Dependent on the available line editor this will also define the
6750 number of history entries in memory;
6751 it is also editor-specific whether runtime updates of this value will
6756 \*(BO This option is used to hold messages in the system
6758 and it is set by default.
6762 Use this string as hostname when expanding local addresses instead of
6763 the value obtained from
6772 Note that when SMTP transport is not used (via
6774 then it is normally the responsibility of the MTA to create these
6775 fields, \*(IN in conjunction with SMTP however
6777 also influences the results:
6778 you should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
6787 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
6788 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
6790 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
6792 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
6793 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
6797 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
6798 messages; instead echo them as
6800 characters and discard the current line.
6804 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
6805 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
6806 in compose mode on message input and in interactive command input.
6807 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
6808 explicitly using one of the commands
6812 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
6815 on a line by itself or by using the
6817 .Sx "TILDE ESCAPES" ;
6819 overrides a setting of
6824 If this is set to a non-empty string it will be used for expansions of
6829 The value supports a subset of filename expansions itself.
6840 option for indenting messages,
6841 in place of the normal tabulator character
6843 which is the default.
6844 Be sure to quote the value if it contains spaces or tabs.
6848 \*(BO If set, an empty mailbox file is not removed.
6849 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
6850 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
6851 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
6852 Note this only applies to local regular (MBOX) files, other mailbox
6853 types will never be removed.
6856 .It Va keep-content-length
6857 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing
6859 mailbox files \*(UA can be told to keep the
6863 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
6864 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
6865 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
6866 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
6867 work with with same mailbox files.
6868 Note that, if this is not set but
6869 .Va writebackedited ,
6870 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
6871 fields already marks the message as being modified.
6875 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
6876 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
6877 Setting this option causes all saved message to be retained.
6880 .It Va line-editor-disable
6881 \*(BO Turn off any enhanced line editing capabilities (see
6882 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
6886 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
6887 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
6891 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
6892 it is marked as having been answered.
6893 This mark has no technical meaning in the mail system;
6894 it just causes messages to be marked in the header summary,
6895 and makes them specially addressable.
6899 \*(BO Internal development variable.
6902 .It Va message-id-disable
6903 \*(BO By setting this option the generation of
6905 can be completely suppressed, effectively leaving this task up to the
6907 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
6908 (According to RFC 5321 your SMTP server is not required to add this
6909 field by itself, so you should ensure that it accepts messages without a
6913 .It Va message-inject-head
6914 A string to put at the beginning of each new message.
6915 The escape sequences tabulator
6922 .It Va message-inject-tail
6923 A string to put at the end of each new message.
6924 The escape sequences tabulator
6932 \*(BO Usually, when an
6934 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
6935 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
6940 option to be passed through to the
6942 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
6943 this flag, no MTA is known which doesn't support it (for historical
6947 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
6948 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
6949 in order to classify the
6952 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
6955 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
6956 a computation rather similar to what the
6958 command produces when used with the
6962 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
6963 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
6964 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
6969 .Ql application/octet-stream :
6970 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
6972 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
6973 interpret the contents of the part.
6975 If this option is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as text
6976 data at first glance (by a
6980 file extension), then the original
6982 will not be overwritten.
6985 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
6986 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
6987 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
6988 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
6989 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
6990 (E.g., at the time of this writing some newsletters ship their full
6991 content only in the rich HTML part, whereas the plain text part only
6992 contains topic subjects.)
6995 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
6998 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
6999 Some MUAs however don't use
7001 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but simply specify
7002 .Ql application/octet-stream ,
7003 even for plain text attachments like
7005 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to classify such MIME
7006 message parts on its own, if possible, for example via a possibly
7007 existing attachment filename.
7008 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
7009 actually a carrier of bits.
7010 Creating the bit-carrying number is a simple addition:
7011 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7012 ? !echo Value should be set to $((2 + 4 + 8))
7013 Value should be set to 14
7016 .Bl -bullet -compact
7018 If bit two is set (2) then the detected
7020 content-type will be carried along with the message and be used for
7022 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
7023 is responsible for the MIME part, shall that question arise;
7024 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
7025 overridden content-type by showing a plus-sign
7028 If bit three is set (4) then the counter-evidence is always produced
7029 and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even forcefully
7030 overriding the parts given MIME type.
7032 If bit four is set (8) then as a last resort the actual content of
7033 .Ql application/octet-stream
7034 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
7039 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
7040 This option can be used to control which of the
7042 databases are loaded by \*(UA, as furtherly described in the section
7043 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
7046 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
7048 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
7050 controls loading of the system wide
7051 .Pa /etc/mime.types ;
7052 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
7054 If this option is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
7055 Incorporation of the \*(UA-builtin MIME types cannot be suppressed,
7056 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
7059 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
7060 value string contains an equals sign
7062 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
7065 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
7066 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
7067 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
7068 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
7069 the MIME type cache).
7074 To choose an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent, set this option to either
7075 the full pathname of an executable (optionally prefixed with a
7077 protocol indicator), or \*(OPally a SMTP protocol URL, e.g., \*(IN
7079 .Dl smtps?://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
7082 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
7083 The default has been chosen at compie time.
7084 All supported data transfers are executed in child processes, which
7085 run asynchronously, and without supervision, unless either the
7090 If such a child receives a TERM signal, it will abort and
7097 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
7099 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
7102 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
7105 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
7108 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
7113 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
7114 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean option
7115 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
7116 (which will also disable passing
7120 (for not treating a line with only a dot
7122 character as the end of input),
7130 option is set); in conjunction with the
7132 command line option \*(UA will also pass
7138 \*(OP \*(UA can send mail over SMTP network connections to a single
7139 defined SMTP smarthost, the access URL of which has to be assigned to
7141 To use this mode it is helpful to read
7142 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
7143 It may be necessary to set the
7145 variable in order to use a specific combination of
7150 with some mail providers.
7153 .Bl -bullet -compact
7155 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
7156 server port 25 and requires setting the
7157 .Va smtp-use-starttls
7158 variable to enter a SSL/TLS encrypted session state.
7159 Assign a value like \*(IN
7160 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
7162 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
7163 to choose this protocol.
7165 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
7166 and is automatically SSL/TLS secured.
7167 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
7168 be supported by your hosts network service database
7169 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
7172 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
7173 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
7174 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
7176 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
7177 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
7182 Finally there is the SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409), which usually
7183 lives on server port 587 and is practically identically to the SMTP
7184 protocol from \*(UA's point of view beside that; it requires setting the
7185 .Va smtp-use-starttls
7186 variable to enter a SSL/TLS secured session state.
7187 Assign a value like \*(IN
7188 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
7190 .Ql submission://server[:port] ) .
7195 .It Va mta-arguments
7196 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
7198 can be given via this variable, the content of which will be split up in
7199 a vector of arguments, to be joined onto other possible MTA options:
7201 .Dl set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"'
7204 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
7205 \*(BO Unless this option is set \*(UA will pass some well known
7206 standard command line options to a file-based
7208 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), see there for more.
7212 Many systems use a so-called
7214 environment to ensure compatibility with
7216 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
7218 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
7219 actually executed when calling the file-based
7221 will treat its contents as that name.
7226 .It Va NAIL_EXTRA_RC
7227 The name of an optional startup file to be read last.
7228 This variable has an effect only if it is set in any of the
7229 .Sx "Resource files" ,
7230 it is not imported from the environment.
7231 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
7236 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
7237 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the users
7239 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
7240 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
7244 .Sx "The .netrc file"
7245 documents the file format.
7257 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the users
7259 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
7260 This can be used to, e.g., store
7264 .Dl set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
7268 If this variable has the value
7270 newly created local folders will be in Maildir format.
7274 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
7275 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
7276 If this variable is set to the special value
7278 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
7279 timestamp changes are detected.
7283 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
7284 \*(ID Macro hooks which will be executed before compose mode is
7285 entered, and after composing has been finished, respectively.
7286 Please note that this interface is very likely to change in v15, and
7287 should therefore possibly even be seen as experimental.
7289 are by default enabled for these hooks, causing any setting to be
7290 forgotten after the message has been sent.
7291 The following variables will be set temporarily during execution of the
7294 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va compose_subject"
7297 .It Va compose-sender
7299 .It Va compose-to , compose-cc , compose-bcc
7300 The list of receiver addresses as a space-separated list.
7301 .It Va compose-subject
7307 \*(BO Causes the filename given in the
7310 and the sender-based filenames for the
7314 commands to be interpreted relative to the directory given in the
7316 variable rather than to the current directory,
7317 unless it is set to an absolute pathname.
7321 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
7323 is followed by a formfeed character
7327 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
7328 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
7329 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
7330 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
7331 the authentication method requires a password.
7332 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
7333 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
7335 .It Va password-USER@HOST
7336 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
7337 Set the password for
7341 If no such variable is defined for a host,
7342 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
7343 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
7344 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
7348 \*(BO Send messages to the
7350 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
7354 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
7355 When a MIME message part of type
7357 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
7358 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
7362 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, e.g.,
7363 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=@
7364 will henceforth display XML
7366 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
7369 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
7370 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
7371 \(em corresponding flag strings are shown in parenthesis below.)
7376 can in fact be used to adjust usage and behaviour of a following shell
7377 command specification by appending trigger characters to it, e.g., the
7378 following hypothetical command specification could be used:
7379 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7380 set pipe-X/Y='@*!++=@vim ${NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
7384 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
7386 Simply by using the special
7388 prefix the MIME type (shell command) handler will only be invoked to
7389 display or convert the MIME part if the message is addressed directly
7390 and alone by itself.
7391 Use this trigger to disable this and always invoke the handler
7392 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-always ) .
7395 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
7396 but only when it will be displayed
7397 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-noquote ) .
7400 The command will be run asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA,
7401 which may be a handy way to display a, e.g., PDF file while also
7402 continuing to read the mail message
7403 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-async ) .
7404 Asynchronous execution implies
7408 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
7409 temporarily release the terminal to it
7410 .Pf ( Cd needsterminal ) .
7411 This flag is mutual exclusive with
7413 will only be used in interactive mode and implies
7417 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
7418 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
7419 .Ev NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
7420 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ) .
7421 If this trigger is given twice then the file will be unlinked
7422 automatically by \*(UA when the command loop is entered again at latest
7423 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink ) .
7424 (Don't use this for asynchronous handlers.)
7427 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
7428 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
7429 .Ev NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
7430 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
7431 the creation of which is implied; note however that in order to cause
7432 deletion of the temporary file you still have to use two plus signs
7437 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content you can use
7438 another at-sign to forcefully terminate interpretation of remaining
7440 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
7444 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
7445 the environment of the shell command:
7448 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
7451 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
7454 .It Ev NAIL_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
7456 .Va mime-counter-evidence
7457 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
7458 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
7459 .Ev \&\&NAIL_CONTENT
7463 .It Ev NAIL_FILENAME
7464 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
7467 .It Ev NAIL_FILENAME_GENERATED
7471 .It Ev NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
7472 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
7473 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
7478 The temporary directory that \*(UA uses.
7479 Usually identical to
7481 but guaranteed to be set and usable by child processes;
7482 to ensure the latter condition for
7489 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
7490 This is identical to
7491 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
7494 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
7495 names a file extension, e.g.,
7497 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
7500 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
7501 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
7502 The only possible value as of now is
7504 which is thus the default.
7507 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
7508 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
7509 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
7510 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
7511 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
7513 If this option is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
7514 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
7516 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
7517 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
7518 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
7519 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
7520 but practical experience may vary.
7521 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
7525 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
7528 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
7529 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the
7531 authentication method will be used when connecting to a POP3 server that
7535 is that the password is not sent in clear text over the wire and that
7536 only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
7538 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
7541 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
7542 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
7543 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
7545 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session SSL/TLS encrypted.
7546 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
7547 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
7549 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
7553 .It Va print-alternatives
7554 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
7555 .Ql multipart/alternative
7556 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
7558 other parts are normally discarded.
7559 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
7560 just as if the surrounding part was of type
7561 .Ql multipart/mixed .
7565 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
7566 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is shell-expanded using
7567 dollar-single-quote expansion mode (see
7569 and it is an error if the prompt expands to more than a single token.
7570 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
7571 status information, for example
7575 .Va -mailbox-display .
7576 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
7577 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
7578 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
7580 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
7582 .Ql set noprompt ) .
7586 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
7593 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
7597 If set, \*(UA starts a replying message with the original message
7598 prefixed by the value of the variable
7600 Normally, a heading consisting of
7601 .Dq Fromheaderfield wrote:
7602 is put before the quotation.
7607 variable, this heading is omitted.
7610 is assigned, the headers selected by the
7611 .Ic ignore Ns / Ns Ic retain
7612 commands are put above the message body,
7615 acts like an automatic
7621 is assigned, all headers are put above the message body and all MIME
7622 parts are included, making
7624 act like an automatic
7627 .Va quote-as-attachment .
7630 .It Va quote-as-attachment
7631 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
7633 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
7634 Note this works regardless of the setting of
7639 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
7641 Setting this turns on a more fancy quotation algorithm in that leading
7642 quotation characters are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
7644 can be set to either one or two (space separated) numeric values,
7645 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
7646 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
7648 program, but line-, not paragraph-based.
7649 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
7650 The goal can't be smaller than the length of
7652 plus some additional pad.
7653 Necessary adjustments take place silently.
7656 .It Va recipients-in-cc
7657 \*(BO On group replies, specify only the sender of the original mail in
7659 and mention the other recipients in the secondary
7661 By default all recipients of the original mail will be addressed via
7666 If defined, gives the pathname of the folder used to record all outgoing
7668 If not defined, then outgoing mail is not saved.
7669 When saving to this folder fails the message is not sent,
7670 but instead saved to
7674 .It Va record-resent
7675 \*(BO If both this variable and the
7682 commands save messages to the
7684 folder as it is normally only done for newly composed messages.
7687 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
7688 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
7689 character set of the original message for replies.
7690 If this fails, the mechanism described in
7691 .Sx "Character sets"
7692 is evaluated as usual.
7695 .It Va reply_strings
7696 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
7697 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
7700 reply message indicators \(en builtin are
7702 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
7707 A list of addresses to put into the
7709 field of the message header.
7710 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
7715 .It Va reply-to-honour
7718 header is honoured when replying to a message via
7722 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
7726 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
7727 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
7729 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
7731 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience.
7735 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
7737 upon interrupt or delivery error.
7741 The number of lines that represents a
7750 line display and scrolling via
7752 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
7753 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
7754 terminal, the more will be shown.
7755 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
7756 environment variables
7764 .It Va searchheaders
7765 \*(BO Expand message-list specifiers in the form
7767 to all messages containing the substring
7771 The string search is case insensitive.
7775 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
7776 outgoing internet mail.
7777 The value of the variable
7779 is automatically appended to this list of character-sets.
7780 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
7781 the only supported charset is
7784 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
7785 and refer to the section
7786 .Sx "Character sets"
7787 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
7790 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
7791 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
7793 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
7795 had been set to the value of the variable
7797 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
7798 character set of the current locale (given that
7800 hasn't been set manually), i.e., without converting it to the
7802 fallback character set.
7803 Thus, mail message text will be in ISO-8859-1 encoding when send from
7804 within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8 encoding when send from within
7806 If no character set conversion capabilities are available in \*(UA then
7807 the only supported character set is
7812 An address that is put into the
7814 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
7815 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
7816 This field should normally not be used unless the
7818 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
7821 address is handled as if it were in the
7827 \*(OB Predecessor of
7831 .It Va sendmail-arguments
7832 \*(OB Predecessor of
7836 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
7837 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
7838 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
7841 .It Va sendmail-progname
7842 \*(OB Predecessor of
7847 \*(BO When sending a message wait until the
7849 (including the builtin SMTP one) exits before accepting further commands.
7851 with this variable set errors reported by the MTA will be recognizable!
7852 If the MTA returns a non-zero exit status,
7853 the exit status of \*(UA will also be non-zero.
7857 \*(BO Setting this option causes \*(UA to start at the last message
7858 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder.
7862 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
7863 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
7867 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
7868 summary if the message was sent by the user.
7872 A string for use with the
7878 A string for use with the
7884 Must correspond to the name of a readable file if set.
7885 The file's content is then appended to each singlepart message
7886 and to the first part of each multipart message.
7887 Be warned that there is no possibility to edit the signature for an
7891 .It Va skipemptybody
7892 \*(BO If an outgoing message does not contain any text in its first or
7893 only message part, do not send it but discard it silently (see also the
7899 \*(OP Specifies a directory with CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
7900 Enhanced Mail) format for verification of S/MIME signed messages.
7903 .It Va smime-ca-file
7904 \*(OP Specifies a file with CA certificates in PEM format for
7905 verification of S/MIME signed messages.
7908 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
7909 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
7910 messages (for the specified account).
7911 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
7914 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
7922 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
7924 isn't available) and
7928 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
7929 library that \*(UA uses.
7930 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
7931 dynamic loading via, e.g.,
7932 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
7933 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
7936 .It Va smime-crl-dir
7937 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
7938 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
7941 .It Va smime-crl-file
7942 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
7943 verifying S/MIME messages.
7946 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
7947 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
7948 encrypted before sending.
7949 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
7950 contains a certificate in PEM format.
7952 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
7953 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
7954 individually encrypted message;
7955 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
7957 .Va smime-force-encryption
7959 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
7964 .It Va smime-force-encryption
7965 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
7968 .It Va smime-no-default-ca
7969 \*(BO\*(OP Don't load default CA locations when verifying S/MIME signed
7974 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's private key
7975 and include the user's certificate as a MIME attachment.
7976 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
7977 a valid certificate,
7978 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
7979 header and that the message content has not been altered.
7980 It does not change the message text,
7981 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
7983 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
7985 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
7987 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
7988 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
7989 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
7990 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
7991 user's private key as well as his certificate.
7995 is always derived from the value of
7997 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
7999 For the purpose of encryption the recipient's public encryption key
8000 (certificate) is expected; the command
8002 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
8003 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
8004 gives some details).
8005 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
8007 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
8012 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
8014 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
8015 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user's addresses
8016 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
8018 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
8019 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
8020 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
8021 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
8022 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
8025 This is most useful for long certificate chains if it is desired to aid
8026 the receiving party's verification process.
8027 Note that top level certificates may also be included in the chain but
8028 don't play a role for verification.
8030 .Va smime-sign-cert .
8031 Remember that for this
8033 refers to the variable
8035 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
8038 .Mx Va smime-sign-message-digest
8039 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
8040 \*(OP Specifies the message digest to use when signing S/MIME messages.
8041 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
8043 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
8051 The actually available message digest algorithms depend on the
8052 cryptographic library that \*(UA uses.
8053 \*(OP Support for more message digest algorithms may be available
8054 through dynamic loading via, e.g.,
8055 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3
8056 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
8057 Remember that for this
8059 refers to the variable
8061 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
8066 \*(OB\*(OP To use the builtin SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
8068 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
8070 is used in preference of
8074 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
8075 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
8077 authentication method, possible values are
8083 as well as the \*(OPal methods
8089 method doesn't need any user credentials,
8091 requires a user name and all other methods require a user name and
8099 .Va smtp-auth-password
8101 .Va smtp-auth-user ) .
8106 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
8107 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
8110 .It Va smtp-auth-password
8111 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
8112 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
8113 .Va smtp-auth-password
8115 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
8117 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
8119 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
8121 .Va smtp-auth-password
8122 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
8125 .It Va smtp-auth-user
8126 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
8127 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
8130 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
8132 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
8134 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
8137 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
8141 .It Va smtp-hostname
8142 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
8144 to derive the necessary
8146 information in order to issue a
8153 can be used to use the
8155 from the SMTP account
8162 from the content of this variable (or, if that is the empty string,
8164 or the local hostname as a last resort).
8165 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
8166 a provider other than which (in
8168 is about to send the message.
8169 Setting this variable also influences the generated
8172 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
8173 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
8174 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
8176 command to make an SMTP
8178 session SSL/TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
8182 .It Va spam-interface
8183 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like, e.g.,
8185 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
8186 Please refer to the manual section
8188 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
8189 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
8191 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
8197 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
8199 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
8200 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
8201 knowledge to parse the program's output.
8204 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
8209 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
8210 using a configuration file for that), the variable
8212 can be used as in, e.g.,
8213 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
8214 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
8216 Note that this interface doesn't inspect the
8218 flag of a message for the command
8222 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
8223 This interface is meant for programs like
8225 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
8226 status for at least the command
8229 meaning a message is spam,
8233 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
8234 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
8235 can be intercepted as necessary.
8237 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
8240 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
8243 contains examples for some programs.
8244 The process environment of the hooks will have the variables
8245 .Ev NAIL_TMPDIR , TMPDIR
8247 .Ev NAIL_FILENAME_GENERATED
8249 Note that spam score support for
8251 isn't supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
8253 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
8260 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size won't be passed through to the
8262 .Va spam-interface .
8263 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
8266 .It Va spamc-command
8267 \*(OP The path to the
8271 .Va spam-interface .
8272 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
8274 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
8275 executable had been found during compilation.
8278 .It Va spamc-arguments
8279 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
8282 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
8283 connection-related ones via this variable, e.g.,
8284 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
8288 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
8290 .Va spam-interface .
8291 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
8300 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
8301 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
8302 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
8304 .Va spam-interface .
8307 contains examples for some programs.
8310 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
8311 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
8314 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPtional
8315 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
8316 be used to overcome this restriction.
8317 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
8318 must be followed by a semicolon
8320 and an extended regular expression.
8321 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
8323 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
8324 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
8328 \*(OP Specifies a directory with CA certificates in PEM (Pricacy
8329 Enhanced Mail) for verification of of SSL/TLS server certificates.
8331 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
8332 for more information.
8336 \*(OP Specifies a file with CA certificates in PEM format for
8337 verification of SSL/TLS server certificates.
8339 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
8340 for more information.
8343 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
8344 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the file name for a SSL/TLS client
8345 certificate required by some servers.
8346 This is a direct interface to the
8350 function of the OpenSSL library, if available.
8352 .Mx Va ssl-cipher-list
8353 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
8354 \*(OP Specifies a list of ciphers for SSL/TLS connections.
8355 This is a direct interface to the
8359 function of the OpenSSL library, if available; see
8361 for more information.
8362 By default \*(UA doesn't set a list of ciphers, which in effect will use a
8364 specific cipher (protocol standards ship with a list of acceptable
8365 ciphers), possibly cramped to what the actually used SSL/TLS library
8366 supports \(en the manual section
8367 .Sx "An example configuration"
8368 also contains a SSL/TLS use case.
8371 .It Va ssl-config-file
8372 \*(OP If this variable is set \*(UA will call
8373 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
8374 to allow OpenSSL to be configured according to the host system wide
8376 If a non-empty value is given then this will be used to specify the
8377 configuration file to be used instead of the global OpenSSL default;
8378 note that in this case it is an error if the file cannot be loaded.
8379 The application name will always be passed as
8384 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
8385 verifying SSL/TLS server certificates.
8389 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
8390 to use when verifying SSL/TLS server certificates.
8393 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
8394 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the file name for the private key of
8395 a SSL/TLS client certificate.
8396 If unset, the name of the certificate file is used.
8397 The file is expected to be in PEM format.
8398 This is a direct interface to the
8402 function of the OpenSSL library, if available.
8405 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
8406 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the newer and more flexible
8408 instead: if both values are set,
8410 will take precedence!
8411 Can be set to the following values, the actually used
8413 specification to which it is mapped is shown in parenthesis:
8415 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1.2 ) ,
8417 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1.1 ) ,
8419 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1 )
8422 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, SSLv3 ) ;
8427 and thus includes the SSLv3 protocol.
8428 Note that SSLv2 is no longer supported at all.
8431 .It Va ssl-no-default-ca
8432 \*(BO\*(OP Don't load default CA locations to verify SSL/TLS server
8436 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
8437 \*(OP Specify the used SSL/TLS protocol.
8438 This is a direct interface to the
8442 function of the OpenSSL library, if available;
8443 otherwise an \*(UA internal parser is used which understands the
8444 following subset of (case-insensitive) command strings:
8450 as well as the special value
8452 Multiple specifications may be given via a comma-separated list which
8453 ignores any whitespace.
8456 plus prefix will enable a protocol, a
8458 minus prefix will disable it, so that
8460 will enable only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
8462 It depends upon the used TLS/SSL library which protocols are actually
8463 supported and which protocols are used if
8465 is not set, but note that SSLv2 is no longer supported at all and
8467 Especially for older protocols explicitly securing
8469 may be worthwile, see
8470 .Sx "An example configuration" .
8474 \*(OP Gives the pathname to an entropy daemon socket, see
8476 Not all SSL/TLS libraries support this.
8479 .It Va ssl-rand-file
8480 \*(OP Gives the filename to a file with random entropy data, see
8481 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
8482 If this variable is not set, or set to the empty string, or if the
8483 filename expansion failed, then
8484 .Xr RAND_file_name 3
8485 will be used to create the filename if, and only if,
8487 documents that the SSL PRNG is not yet sufficiently seeded.
8488 If \*(UA successfully seeded the SSL PRNG then it'll update the file via
8489 .Xr RAND_write_file 3 .
8490 This variable is only used if
8492 is not set (or not supported by the SSL/TLS library).
8495 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
8496 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
8497 occurs during SSL/TLS server certificate validation.
8498 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
8500 (fail and close connection immediately),
8502 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
8504 (show a warning and continue),
8506 (do not perform validation).
8512 If only set without an assigned value, then this option inhibits the
8517 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
8518 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
8519 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
8520 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
8521 to track down the originating mail user agent.
8526 suppression doesn't occur.
8531 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
8536 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
8537 escape commas with reverse solidus) to be used to overwrite or define
8539 Note that this variable will only be queried once at program startup and
8540 can thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
8543 String capabilities form
8545 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
8546 Numerics have to be notated as
8548 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
8549 Finally, booleans don't have any value but indicate a true or false
8550 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
8551 doesn't support undefining an existing boolean.
8552 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
8553 for one notations like
8556 .Ql control-LETTER ,
8557 and for clarification purposes
8559 can be used to specify
8561 (the control notation
8563 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
8564 the standard CSI sequence);
8565 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
8568 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
8569 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
8571 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8572 set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
8576 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
8577 operation of the builtin line editor or \*(UA in general:
8580 .Bl -tag -compact -width yay
8582 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
8584 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
8585 Note that \*(UA doesn't actually care about the terminal beside that,
8586 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences.
8589 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
8593 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen
8595 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
8596 To disable that, set (at least) one to the empty string.
8598 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
8602 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
8603 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
8604 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
8605 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
8607 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
8611 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
8613 clear the screen and home cursor.
8614 (Will be simulated via
8619 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
8624 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
8626 clear to the end of line.
8627 (Will be simulated via
8629 plus repetitions of space characters.)
8631 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
8632 .Cd column_address :
8633 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
8634 (Will be simulated via
8640 .Cd carriage_return :
8641 move to the first column in the current row.
8642 The default builtin fallback is
8645 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
8647 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
8648 The default builtin fallback is
8651 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
8653 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
8654 The default builtin fallback is
8656 which is used by most terminals.
8664 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
8668 .It Va termcap-disable
8669 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
8670 If set only some generic fallback builtins and possibly the content of
8672 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
8674 that this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
8675 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
8679 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
8682 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
8685 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for right
8688 height; (shifting bitwise is like dividing algorithmically, but since
8689 it takes away bits the value decreases pretty fast).
8693 \*(BO If set then the
8695 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
8699 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
8700 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
8701 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
8702 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1 unless it can deduce a value
8706 Refer to the section
8707 .Sx "Character sets"
8708 for the complete picture about character sets.
8711 .It Va typescript-mode
8712 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
8713 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
8716 .Va colour-disable ,
8717 .Va line-editor-disable
8718 and (before startup completed only)
8719 .Va termcap-disable .
8720 Unsetting it doesn't restore the former state of the covered settings.
8724 For a safety-by-default policy \*(UA sets its process
8728 but this variable can be used to override that:
8729 set it to an empty value to don't change the (current) setting,
8730 otherwise the process file mode creation mask is updated to the new value.
8731 Child processes inherit the process file mode creation mask.
8734 .It Va user-HOST , user
8735 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, which is
8736 used in case none has been given in the protocol and account-specific
8738 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
8742 \*(BO Setting this option enables upward compatibility with \*(UA
8743 version 15.0 in respect to which configuration options are available and
8744 how they are handled.
8745 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
8746 doing things, respectively.
8750 \*(BO Setting this option, also controllable via the command line option
8752 causes \*(UA to be more verbose, e.g., it will display obsoletion
8753 warnings and SSL/TLS certificate chains.
8754 Even though marked \*(BO this option may be set twice in order to
8755 increase the level of verbosity even more, in which case even details of
8756 the actual message delivery and protocol conversations are shown.
8759 is sufficient to disable verbosity as such.
8765 .It Va version , version-major , version-minor , version-update
8766 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable contains a string
8767 containing the complete version identification, the latter three contain
8768 only digits: the major, minor and update version numbers.
8769 The output of the command
8771 will include this information.
8774 .It Va writebackedited
8775 If this variable is set messages modified using the
8779 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
8780 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
8781 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
8782 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
8783 performed, and proper RFC 4155
8785 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an excercise to
8789 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
8792 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
8796 .Dq environment variable
8797 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
8798 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
8799 commonly found in there.
8800 The process environment is inherited from the
8802 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
8803 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
8804 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
8805 from \*(UA's point of view.
8806 This means that, e.g., they can be managed via
8810 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
8811 newly created child processes).
8814 In order to transparently integrate other environment variables equally
8815 they need to be imported (linked) with the command
8817 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
8818 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
8819 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
8821 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
8823 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
8825 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8826 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
8828 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
8831 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev _AILR_"
8834 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen
8836 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
8837 processes and the MLE (see
8838 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
8839 in interactive mode thereafter.
8843 The name of the (mailbox)
8845 to use for saving aborted messages if
8847 is set; this defaults to
8854 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
8859 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
8863 .Sx "TILDE ESCAPES" .
8864 A default editor is used if this value is not defined.
8868 The user's home directory.
8869 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
8876 .It Ev LANG , LC_ALL , LC_COLLATE , LC_CTYPE , LC_MESSAGES
8880 .Sx "Character sets" .
8884 The user's preferred number of lines on a page or the vertical screen
8885 or window size in lines.
8886 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
8887 processes in interactive mode thereafter.
8891 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
8893 command when operating on local mailboxes.
8896 (path search through
8901 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
8902 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
8903 name to any newly created child process.
8907 Is used as the user's primary system mailbox, unless
8911 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
8915 \*(OP Overrides the default path search for
8916 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
8917 which is defined in the standard RFC 1524 as
8918 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
8919 .\" TODO we should have a mailcaps-default virtual RDONLY option!
8920 (\*(UA makes it a configuration option, however.)
8921 Note this is not a search path, but a path search.
8925 Is used as a startup file instead of
8928 When \*(UA scripts are invoked on behalf of other users,
8929 either this variable should be set to
8933 command line option should be used in order to avoid side-effects from
8934 reading their configuration files.
8935 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
8939 The name of the user's mbox file.
8940 A logical subset of the special conventions that are documented for the
8945 The fallback default is
8950 Traditionally this secondary mailbox is used as the file to save
8951 messages from the primary system mailbox that have been read.
8953 .Sx "Message states" .
8956 .It Ev NAIL_NO_SYSTEM_RC
8957 If this variable is set then reading of
8959 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
8960 had been started up with the option
8962 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
8966 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
8972 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
8976 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
8977 The default paginator is
8979 (path search through
8982 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
8984 then a non-existing environment variable
8991 dependent on whether terminal control support is available and whether
8992 that supports full (alternative) screen mode or not (also see
8993 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ) .
8997 will optionally be set to
9004 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
9005 looking for commands, e.g.,
9006 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
9010 The shell to use for the commands
9016 and when starting subprocesses.
9017 A default shell is used if this option is not defined.
9020 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
9021 If set, this specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch
9022 (1970-01-01) to be used in place of the current time.
9023 This is for the sake of reproduceability of tests, to be used during
9024 development or by software packagers.
9028 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
9029 For extended colour and font control please refer to
9030 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
9031 and for terminal management in general to
9032 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
9036 Used as directory for temporary files instead of
9039 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
9045 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
9046 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
9050 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
9054 .Sx "TILDE ESCAPES" .
9062 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa _etc/mime.type_"
9064 File giving initial commands.
9067 System wide initialization file.
9071 \*(OP Personal MIME type handler definition file, see
9072 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
9073 (RFC 1524 location, the actual path is a configuration option.)
9077 \*(OP System wide MIME type handler definition file, see
9078 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
9079 (RFC 1524 location, the actual path is a configuration option.)
9082 .It Pa ~/.mime.types
9083 Personal MIME types, see
9084 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
9087 .It Pa /etc/mime.types
9088 System wide MIME types, see
9089 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
9093 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the users
9095 file \(en the section
9096 .Sx "The .netrc file"
9097 documents the file format.
9100 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
9101 .Ss "The mime.types files"
9103 When sending messages \*(UA tries to determine the content type of all
9105 When displaying message content or attachments \*(UA uses the content
9106 type to decide whether it can directly display data or whether it needs
9107 to deal with content handlers.
9108 It learns about M(ultipurpose) I(nternet) M(ail) E(xtensions) types and
9109 how to treat them by reading
9111 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
9112 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
9115 can also be used to deal with MIME types.)
9117 files have the following syntax:
9120 .Dl type/subtype extension [extension ...]
9125 are strings describing the file contents, and one or multiple
9127 s, separated by whitespace, name the part of a filename starting after
9128 the last dot (of interest).
9129 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
9131 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
9133 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in specially
9134 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
9135 .Va mimetypes-load-control
9136 and prepends an optional
9140 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
9143 The following type markers are supported:
9146 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
9148 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
9153 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
9154 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
9155 the content as plain text instead.
9159 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
9160 handler to be defined.
9165 for sending messages:
9167 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
9168 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
9169 For reading etc. messages:
9170 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
9171 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
9173 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
9174 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
9175 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
9176 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
9179 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{
9180 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
9183 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
9184 which \*(UA \*(OPally supports.
9185 It defines a file format to be used to inform mail user agent programs
9186 about the locally-installed facilities for handling various data
9187 formats, i.e., about commands and how they can be used to display, edit
9188 etc. MIME part contents, as well as a default path search that includes
9189 multiple possible locations of
9193 environment variable that can be used to overwrite that (repeating here
9194 that it is not a search path, but instead a path search specification).
9195 Any existing files will be loaded in sequence, appending any content to
9196 the list of MIME type handler directives.
9200 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
9201 Comment lines start with a number sign
9203 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
9204 Empty lines are also ignored.
9205 All other lines form individual entries that must adhere to the syntax
9207 To extend a single entry (not comment) its line can be continued on
9208 follow lines if newline characters are
9210 by preceding them with the reverse solidus character
9212 The standard doesn't specify how leading whitespace of follow lines is
9213 to be treated, therefore \*(UA retains it.
9217 entries consist of a number of semicolon
9219 separated fields, and the reverse solidus
9221 character can be used to escape any following character including
9222 semicolon and itself.
9223 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
9224 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
9225 Leading and trailing whitespace of content is ignored (removed).
9228 The first field defines the MIME
9230 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively, and no reverse solidus
9231 escaping is possible in this field).
9232 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
9234 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
9236 would match any audio type.
9237 The second field defines the shell command which shall be used to
9239 MIME parts of the given type; it is implicitly called the
9246 shell commands message (MIME part) data is passed via standard input
9247 unless the given shell command includes one or more instances of the
9250 in which case these instances will be replaced with a temporary filename
9251 and the data will have been stored in the file that is being pointed to.
9254 shell commands data is assumed to be generated on standard output unless
9255 the given command includes (one ore multiple)
9257 In any case any given
9259 format is replaced with a(n already) properly quoted filename.
9260 Note that when a command makes use of a temporary file via
9262 then \*(UA will remove it again, as if the
9263 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ,
9264 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
9266 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
9267 flags had been set; see below for more.
9270 The optional fields either define a shell command or an attribute (flag)
9271 value, the latter being a single word and the former being a keyword
9272 naming the field followed by an equals sign
9274 succeeded by a shell command, and as usual for any
9276 content any whitespace surrounding the equals sign will be removed, too.
9277 Optional fields include the following:
9280 .Bl -tag -width textualnewlines
9282 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
9289 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
9291 header field to be applied to the composed data.
9295 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
9300 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
9305 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, e.g., the machine
9306 architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether or not
9307 this mailcap entry applies.
9308 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
9309 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
9311 .It Cd needsterminal
9312 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
9313 an interactive terminal.
9314 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
9315 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
9316 ignored; this flag implies
9317 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
9319 .It Cd copiousoutput
9320 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
9322 command will be an extended stream of textual output that can be
9323 (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
9324 It is mutually exclusive with
9327 .Cd x-mailx-always .
9329 .It Cd textualnewlines
9330 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
9333 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
9334 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
9338 This field gives a file name format, in which
9340 will be replaced by a random string, the joined combination of which
9341 will be used as the filename denoted by
9342 .Ev NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
9343 One could specify that a GIF file being passed to an image viewer should
9344 have a name ending in
9347 .Ql nametemplate=%s.gif .
9348 Note that \*(UA ignores the name template unless that solely specifies
9349 a filename suffix that consists of (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
9350 characters, the underscore and dot only.
9353 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
9354 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
9355 This field is not used by \*(UA.
9358 A textual description that describes this type of data.
9360 .It Cd x-mailx-always
9361 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
9363 command shall be executed even if multiple messages will be displayed
9365 Normally messages which require external viewers that produce output
9366 which doesn't integrate into \*(UA's visual display (i.e., don't have
9368 set) have to be addressed directly and individually.
9369 (To avoid cases where, e.g., a thousand PDF viewer instances are spawned
9372 .It Cd x-mailx-even-if-not-interactive
9373 An extension flag test field \(em by default handlers without
9375 are entirely ignored in non-interactive mode, but if this flag is set
9376 then their use will be considered.
9377 It is an error if this flag is set for commands that use the flag
9380 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
9381 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
9384 command shall not be used to generate message quotes
9385 (as it would be by default).
9387 .It Cd x-mailx-async
9388 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
9390 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
9391 Cannot be used in conjunction with
9394 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
9395 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
9397 command shall be evaluated once only and the (boolean) result be cached.
9398 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
9399 .Dq running under the X Window System .
9401 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
9402 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
9403 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
9404 .Ev NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
9405 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
9409 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
9410 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
9411 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
9413 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
9414 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
9415 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
9417 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
9421 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
9422 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
9423 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
9424 (Don't use this for asynchronous handlers.)
9425 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
9427 format, or without also setting
9430 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill .
9432 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
9435 implies the three tmpfile related flags above, but if you want, e.g.,
9437 and deal with the temporary file yourself, you can add in this flag to
9439 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
9444 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
9445 entry fields, prefixed by
9447 Flag fields apply to the entire
9449 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
9450 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
9451 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
9452 one does not provide enough information.
9455 command needs to specify the
9459 command shall not, the following will help out the latter (with enabled
9463 level \*(UA will show information about handler evaluation):
9465 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9466 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
9467 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
9471 In fields any occurrence of the format string
9473 will be replaced by the
9476 Named parameters from the
9478 field may be placed in the command execution line using
9480 followed by the parameter name and a closing
9483 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
9484 regardless of embedded spaces; thus:
9486 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9488 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
9491 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
9492 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
9494 # Executed shell command
9495 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
9499 .\" TODO v15: Mailcap: %n,%F
9500 Note that \*(UA doesn't support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
9501 shown in this example (as of today).
9502 \*(UA doesn't support the additional formats
9506 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
9508 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
9509 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
9510 in additional user-provided quotes:
9512 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9514 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
9516 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s
9520 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
9521 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
9523 x-mailx-async; x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
9525 application/*; echo "This is \e"%t\e" but \e
9526 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 1024 | cat -vET; \e
9527 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote
9532 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
9533 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
9536 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
9537 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
9538 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
9541 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{
9542 .Ss "The .netrc file"
9546 file contains user credentials for machine accounts.
9547 The default location in the user's
9549 directory may be overridden by the
9551 environment variable.
9552 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
9553 \*(UA implements a parser that supports a superset of the original BSD
9554 syntax, but users should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches
9555 of that file format, shall their
9557 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
9560 .Bl -bullet -compact
9562 BSD doesn't support single, but only double quotation marks, e.g.,
9563 .Ql password="pass with spaces" .
9565 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
9566 (e.g., a space can be escaped via
9568 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
9570 BSD doesn't require the final quotation mark of the final user input token.
9572 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
9573 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
9574 still seems to support this syntax, \*(UA does not!
9576 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
9577 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
9578 whitespace, with a number sign
9580 then the rest of the line is ignored.
9582 Whereas other programs may require that the
9584 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
9590 \*(UA will always require these strict permissions.
9594 Of the following list of supported tokens \*(UA only uses (and caches)
9599 At runtime the command
9601 can be used to control \*(UA's
9605 .Bl -tag -width password
9606 .It Cd machine Ar name
9607 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized by \*(UA
9609 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
9614 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
9617 As an extension that shouldn't be the cause of any worries
9618 \*(UA supports a single wildcard prefix for
9620 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9621 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
9622 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
9623 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
9629 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
9633 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
9634 Note that in the example neither
9635 .Ql pop3.example.com
9637 .Ql smtp.example.com
9638 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
9639 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
9644 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
9645 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
9646 and it must be the last first-class token.
9648 .It Cd login Ar name
9649 The user name on the remote machine.
9651 .It Cd password Ar string
9652 The user's password on the remote machine.
9654 .It Cd account Ar string
9655 Supply an additional account password.
9656 This is merely for FTP purposes.
9658 .It Cd macdef Ar name
9660 A macro is defined with the specified
9662 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
9663 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
9666 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
9667 defined following the
9669 they are intended to be used with.)
9672 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
9673 This is merely for FTP purposes.
9680 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
9683 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
9684 .Ss "An example configuration"
9686 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9687 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
9690 # Where are the up-to-date SSL certificates?
9691 #set ssl-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
9692 set ssl-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
9694 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, don't use any,
9695 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
9696 set ssl-no-default-ca
9698 # Don't use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
9699 # Change this only when the remote server doesn't support it:
9700 # maybe use ssl-protocol-HOST (or -USER@HOST) syntax to define
9701 # such explicit exceptions, then
9702 set ssl-protocol='-ALL,+TLSv1.2'
9704 # Explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may improve security,
9705 # especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2. See ciphers(1).
9706 # Including "@STRENGTH" will sort the final list by algorithm strength.
9707 # In reality it is possibly best to only use ssl-cipher-list-HOST
9708 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
9709 set ssl-cipher-list=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:!MEDIUM:!LOW:!EXPORT:@STRENGTH
9710 # ALL:!aNULL:!MEDIUM:!LOW:!MD5:!RC4:!EXPORT:@STRENGTH
9712 # Request strict transport security checks!
9713 set ssl-verify=strict
9715 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
9716 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
9718 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
9719 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
9720 set reply-in-same-charset
9722 # When replying to or forwarding a message the comment and name
9723 # parts of email addresses are removed unless this variable is set
9726 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
9727 # Only like this you'll be able to see errors reported through the
9728 # exit status of the MTA (including the builtin SMTP one)!
9731 # Only use builtin MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
9732 set mimetypes-load-control
9734 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
9736 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
9737 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
9738 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox record=+sent.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt
9740 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
9741 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
9743 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
9744 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
9746 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
9747 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from don't match.
9748 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
9749 set mta=(smtps?|submission)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
9750 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
9753 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
9755 colour-pager crt= \e
9756 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
9757 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
9758 mime-counter-evidence=0xE \e
9759 prompt='[\e${-account-name} \e${-mailbox-display}]? ' \e
9760 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
9763 # When `t'yping messages, show only these headers
9764 # (use `T'ype for all headers and `S'how for raw message)
9765 retain date from to cc subject
9767 # Some mailing lists
9768 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
9769 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
9771 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
9773 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
9774 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
9775 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
9778 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
9779 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
9780 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
9781 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
9782 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
9783 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
9785 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
9786 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
9787 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.ru:465 \e
9788 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
9791 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
9792 wysh ghost lls '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
9793 wysh ghost llS '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlS'
9794 wysh ghost ls '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFrS'
9795 wysh ghost lS '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFS'
9796 wysh ghost lla '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlr'
9797 wysh ghost llA '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFl'
9798 wysh ghost la '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFr'
9799 wysh ghost lA '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aF'
9800 wysh ghost ll '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFltr'
9801 wysh ghost lL '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlt'
9802 wysh ghost l '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFtr'
9803 wysh ghost L '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFt'
9805 # We don't support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
9806 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
9808 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'@*#++=@\e
9809 < "${NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
9810 -v TMPFILE="${NAIL_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
9812 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/{\e
9815 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
9816 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
9817 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
9821 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
9822 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
9832 !printf 'Key IDs to gpg --recv-keys: ';\e
9834 gpg --recv-keys ${keyids};
9840 When storing passwords in
9842 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
9843 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
9846 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
9848 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
9849 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
9851 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9853 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
9854 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
9856 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
9857 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
9859 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
9860 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
9861 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
9862 ghost xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
9871 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9872 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
9876 This configuration should now work just fine:
9879 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -vv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
9882 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
9883 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
9885 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
9886 message signing and message encryption.
9887 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
9888 The data can be used to verify that the message was sent using a valid
9889 certificate, that the sender's address in the message header matches
9890 that in the certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
9891 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
9892 it can be read regardless of whether the recipient's software is able to
9896 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
9897 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
9898 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
9899 To encrypt a message, the specific recipient's public encryption key
9901 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
9902 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
9904 A message should always be signed before it is encrypted.
9905 Otherwise, it is still possible that the encrypted message text is
9909 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
9910 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
9911 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
9912 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
9914 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered with OpenSSL and installed
9916 If you trust the source of your OpenSSL software installation,
9917 this offers reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet.
9919 .Va smime-no-default-ca
9920 to avoid using the default certificate and point
9924 to a trusted pool of certificates.
9925 In general, a certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA
9926 certificate has been retrieved with.
9929 The first thing you need for participating in S/MIME message exchange is
9930 your personal certificate, including a private key.
9931 The certificate contains public information, in particular your name and
9932 your email address(es), and the public key that is used by others to
9933 encrypt messages for you,
9934 and to verify signed messages they supposedly received from you.
9935 The certificate is included in each signed message you send.
9936 The private key must be kept secret.
9937 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with your
9938 public key, and to sign messages.
9941 For personal use it is recommended that you get a S/MIME certificate
9942 from one of the major CAs on the Internet using your WWW browser.
9943 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
9945 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
9946 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
9947 community for free; their root certificate
9948 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
9949 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
9950 which means you will have to download their root certificate separately
9951 and ensure it is part of our S/MIME certificate validation chain by
9954 or as a vivid member of the
9956 But let's take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
9957 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
9960 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
9961 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
9962 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
9963 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
9964 entries of the web interface.
9965 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let's create a new
9966 .Dq client certificate ,
9967 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
9968 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
9972 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
9973 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
9974 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
9977 .Dl openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
9980 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
9982 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
9983 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
9984 .Dq advanced options
9985 to see the corresponding text field).
9986 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
9987 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
9988 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
9989 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
9990 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
9995 In order to use your new S/MIME setup you will have to create
9996 a combined private key/public key (certificate) file:
9999 .Dl cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
10002 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
10003 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
10004 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted.
10005 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
10007 is of interest for verification only):
10009 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10010 set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
10011 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
10012 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
10017 From each signed message you send, the recipient can fetch your
10018 certificate and use it to send encrypted mail back to you.
10019 Accordingly if somebody sends you a signed message, you can do the same,
10022 command to check the validity of the certificate.
10025 Variables of interest for S/MIME signing:
10027 .Va smime-ca-file ,
10028 .Va smime-crl-dir ,
10029 .Va smime-crl-file ,
10030 .Va smime-no-default-ca ,
10032 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
10033 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
10035 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
10038 After it has been verified save the certificate via
10040 and tell \*(UA that it should use it for encryption for further
10041 communication with that somebody:
10043 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10045 set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
10046 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
10050 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
10053 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
10056 You should carefully consider if you prefer to store encrypted messages
10058 If you do, anybody who has access to your mail folders can read them,
10059 but if you do not, you might be unable to read them yourself later if
10060 you happen to lose your private key.
10063 command saves messages in decrypted form, while the
10067 commands leave them encrypted.
10070 Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to message
10071 subjects or other header fields yet.
10072 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
10073 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
10074 When sending signed messages,
10075 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
10079 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS" {{{
10080 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS"
10082 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
10083 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
10084 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
10085 declared invalid after they have been issued.
10086 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
10088 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
10089 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
10090 To seriously use S/MIME or SSL/TLS verification,
10091 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
10092 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
10093 invalidated certificates.
10094 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
10095 the Internet, so you have to retrieve them by some external mechanism.
10098 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
10099 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
10102 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
10105 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
10106 (and no other files) must be created.
10111 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
10112 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
10113 to verify a certificate.
10116 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
10117 .Ss "Handling spam"
10119 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
10120 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
10121 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
10123 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
10124 Once messages have been identified as spam their (volatile)
10126 state can be prompted: the
10130 message specifications will address respective messages and their
10132 entries will be used when displaying the
10134 in the header display.
10139 rates the given messages and sets their
10142 If the spam interface offers spam scores those can also be displayed in
10143 the header display by including the
10153 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
10154 the given messages as
10158 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
10160 of messages; it adheres to their current
10162 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
10167 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
10169 message flag, without any interface interaction.
10178 requires a running instance of the
10180 server in order to function, started with the option
10182 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
10184 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10185 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
10186 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
10187 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
10191 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
10193 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10194 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
10195 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
10196 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
10198 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
10199 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
10200 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
10204 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
10206 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
10209 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10210 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
10211 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
10212 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
10213 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
10214 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
10215 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
10216 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
10220 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
10221 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
10222 perform the local spam check last:
10224 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10225 define spamdelhook {
10227 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
10228 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
10229 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
10230 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
10231 move :S +maybe-spam
10234 move :S +maybe-spam
10236 set folder-hook-FOLDER=spamdelhook
10240 See also the documentation for the variables
10241 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
10242 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
10243 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
10246 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
10254 In general it is a good idea to turn on
10260 twice) if something doesn't work well.
10261 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
10262 problems' solution.
10264 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
10265 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
10267 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
10268 and can't be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
10270 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
10271 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
10273 You may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
10277 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
10280 return what you'd expect?
10281 Does this local hostname has a domain suffix?
10282 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
10286 .\" .Ss "\*(UA exits quick, and output is cleared away" {{{
10287 .Ss "\*(UA exits quick, and output is cleared away"
10289 When this happens even with
10291 set, then this most likely indicates a problem with the creation of
10292 so-called dotlock files: setting
10293 .Va dotlock-ignore-error
10294 should overcome this situation.
10295 This only avoids symptoms, it doesn't address the problem, though.
10296 Since the output is cleared away \*(UA has support for
10297 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
10298 and switches to the
10300 which causes the output clearance: by doing
10301 .Ql set termcap='smcup='
10302 this mode can be suppressed, and by setting
10304 (twice) the actual problem should be reported.
10307 .\" .Ss "I can't login to Google mail aka GMail" {{{
10308 .Ss "I can't login to Google mail aka GMail"
10310 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
10312 unless they use a special authentification method (OAuth 2.0) which
10313 wasn't standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
10314 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
10317 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
10318 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
10319 her- and himself with the locally installed
10321 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
10322 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
10323 local cache this query has to be performed whenever \*(UA is invoked
10324 from the command line (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
10327 \*(UA doesn't support OAuth.
10328 Because of this it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
10329 .Dq less secure app
10330 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
10331 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
10336 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
10339 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
10341 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
10343 use that special password instead of your real Google account password in
10344 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
10345 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
10349 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key won't work" {{{
10350 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key won't work"
10352 It can happen that the terminal library (see
10353 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
10356 reports different codes than the terminal really sends, in which case
10357 \*(UA will tell that a key binding is functional, but won't be able to
10358 recognize it because the received data doesn't match anything expected.
10359 The verbose listing of
10361 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
10364 To overcome the situation, use, e.g., the program
10366 in conjunction with the
10368 flag if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
10369 by keypresses, and use the variable
10371 to make \*(UA aware of them.
10372 E.g., the terminal this is typed on produces some false sequences, here
10373 an example showing the shifted home key:
10375 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10378 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
10383 ? \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
10392 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
10402 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
10411 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
10416 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
10419 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
10420 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
10421 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
10424 command already appeared in First Edition
10428 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
10429 Electronic mail was there from the start.
10430 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
10431 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
10432 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
10433 freeloaders, or whatever.
10434 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
10435 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
10436 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
10442 Mail was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
10445 distribution until 1995.
10446 Mail has then seen further development in open source
10448 variants, noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
10450 Basing upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
10451 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
10452 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso.
10453 This man page is derived from
10454 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
10455 that was originally written by Kurt Shoens.
10461 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
10462 .An "Edward Wang" ,
10463 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
10464 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
10465 .An "Gunnar Ritter" ,
10466 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" Aq Mt s-nail-users@lists.sourceforge.net
10468 .Mt s-mailx@sdaoden.eu ) .
10471 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
10474 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
10478 is often problematic: many library functions cannot deal with the
10480 that this software (still) performs.
10483 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
10484 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
10485 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
10490 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
10491 that is capable of message queuing.
10497 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
10498 claims that there are no messages to display, you need to perform
10499 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
10501 In threaded display a power user may encounter crashes very
10502 occasionally (this is may and very).
10506 in the source repository lists future directions.