1 .\"@ nail.1 - S-nail(1) reference manual.
3 .\" Copyright (c) 2000-2008 Gunnar Ritter, Freiburg i. Br., Germany.
4 .\" Copyright (c) 2012 - 2018 Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso <steffen@sdaoden.eu>.
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34 .\"@ S-nail v14.9.6 / 2017-12-05
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()
79 .Op : Ns Fl a Ar attachment Ns \&:
80 .Op : Ns Fl b Ar bcc-addr Ns \&:
81 .Op : Ns Fl c Ar cc-addr Ns \&:
82 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
85 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
88 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
90 .Pf : Ar to-addr Ns \&:
91 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
100 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
102 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
105 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
106 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
115 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
117 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
119 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
121 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
127 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
130 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
133 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
134 .Sy Compatibility note:
135 S-nail (\*(UA) will wrap up into \%S-mailx in v15.0 (circa 2020).
136 Backward incompatibility has to be expected \(en
139 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
140 rules, for example, and shell metacharacters will become meaningful.
141 New and old behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU, and setting
144 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
145 will choose new behaviour when applicable.
146 \*(OB flags what will vanish, and enabling
150 enables obsoletion warnings.
154 \*(UA provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
156 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
158 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
159 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3, among others.
160 \*(UA divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows
161 the user to deal with them in any order.
165 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
166 for manipulating messages and sending mail.
167 It provides the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
168 of outgoing messages, and increasingly powerful and reliable
169 non-interactive scripting capabilities.
171 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
174 .Bl -tag -width ".It Fl BaNg"
177 Explicitly control which of the
181 d (loaded): if the letter
183 is (case-insensitively) part of the
187 is sourced, likewise the letter
189 controls sourcing of the user's personal
191 file, whereas the letters
195 explicitly forbid sourcing of any resource files.
196 Scripts should use this option: to avoid environmental noise they should
198 from any configuration and create a script-specific environment, setting
200 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
203 and running configurating commands via
205 This option overrides
212 command for the given user email
214 after program startup is complete (all resource files are loaded, any
216 setting is being established; only
218 commands have not been evaluated yet).
219 Being a special incarnation of
221 macros for the purpose of bundling longer-lived
223 tings, activating such an email account also switches to the accounts
225 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
230 .It Fl a Ar file Ns Op Ar =input-charset Ns Op Ar #output-charset
233 to the message (for compose mode opportunities refer to
237 .Sx "Filename transformations"
240 will be performed, except that shell variables are not expanded.
243 not be accessible but contain a
245 character, then anything before the
247 will be used as the filename, anything thereafter as a character set
250 If an input character set is specified,
251 .Mx -ix "character set specification"
252 but no output character set, then the given input character set is fixed
253 as-is, and no conversion will be applied;
254 giving the empty string or the special string hyphen-minus
256 will be treated as if
258 has been specified (the default).
260 If an output character set has also been given then the conversion will
261 be performed exactly as specified and on-the-fly, not considering the
262 file's type and content.
263 As an exception, if the output character set is specified as the empty
264 string or hyphen-minus
266 then the default conversion algorithm (see
267 .Sx "Character sets" )
268 is applied (therefore no conversion is performed on-the-fly,
270 will be MIME-classified and its contents will be inspected first) \(em
271 without support for character set conversions
273 does not include the term
275 only this argument is supported.
278 (\*(OB: \*(UA will always use line-buffered output, to gain
279 line-buffered input even in batch mode enable batch mode via
284 Send a blind carbon copy to
291 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
293 The option may be used multiple times.
295 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
299 Send carbon copies to the given receiver, if so allowed by
301 May be used multiple times.
306 the internal variable
308 which enables debug messages and disables message delivery,
309 among others; effectively turns almost any operation into a dry-run.
315 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body.
316 This command line option is \*(OB.
320 Just check if mail is present (in the system
322 or the one specified via
324 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
325 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
326 specification can be added with the option
331 Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of the
332 first recipient's address (instead of in
337 Read in the contents of the user's
339 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
341 (or the specified file) for processing;
342 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
348 argument will undergo some special
349 .Sx "Filename transformations"
354 is not an argument to the flag
356 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
360 that starts with a hyphen-minus, prefix with a relative path, as in
361 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
367 and exit; a configurable summary view is available via the
373 Show a short usage summary.
379 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
385 of all messages that match the given
389 .Sx "Specifying messages"
394 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
395 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
401 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
402 be enabled explicitly (e.g., by using the option
407 Special send mode that will flag standard input with the MIME
411 and use it as the main message body.
412 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
413 .Va message-inject-head
415 .Va message-inject-tail .
421 Special send mode that will MIME classify the specified
423 and use it as the main message body.
424 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
425 .Va message-inject-head
427 .Va message-inject-tail .
433 inhibit the initial display of message headers when reading mail or
438 for the internal variable
443 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
448 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
449 .Sx "Resource files" .
453 Special send mode that will initialize the message body with the
454 contents of the specified
456 which may be standard input
458 only in non-interactive context.
466 opened will be in read-only mode.
470 .It Fl r Ar from-addr
471 Whereas the source address that appears in the
473 header of a message (or in the
475 header if the former contains multiple addresses) is honoured by the
476 builtin SMTP transport, it is not used by a file-based
478 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) for the RFC 5321 reverse-path used for relaying
479 and delegating a message to its destination(s), for delivery errors
480 etc., but it instead uses the local identity of the initiating user.
483 When this command line option is used the given
485 will be assigned to the internal variable
487 but in addition the command line option
488 .Fl \&\&f Ar from-addr
489 will be passed to a file-based
491 whenever a message is sent.
494 include a user name the address components will be separated and
495 the name part will be passed to a file-based
501 If an empty string is passed as
503 then the content of the variable
505 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
507 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the file-based
516 command line options are used when contacting a file-based MTA, unless
517 this automatic deduction is enforced by
519 ing the internal variable
520 .Va r-option-implicit .
523 Remarks: many default installations and sites disallow overriding the
524 local user identity like this unless either the MTA has been configured
525 accordingly or the user is member of a group with special privileges.
529 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Op = Ns value
531 (or, with a prefix string
534 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
537 iable and optionally assign
540 If the operation fails the program will exit if any of
545 Settings established via
547 cannot be changed from within
549 or an account switch initiated by
551 They will become mutable again before commands registered via
557 Specify the subject of the message to be sent.
558 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
559 normalized to space (SP) characters.
563 The message given (on standard input) is expected to contain, separated
564 from the message body by an empty line, a message header with
569 fields giving its recipients, which will be added to any recipients
570 specified on the command line.
571 If a message subject is specified via
573 then it will be used in favour of one given on the command line.
589 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
590 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
591 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
593 Any other custom header field (also see
597 is passed through entirely
598 unchanged, and in conjunction with the options
602 it is possible to embed
603 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
611 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
614 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
615 .Ql Fl \&\&f Ns \0%user .
624 will also show the list of
626 .Ql $ \*(uA -Xversion -Xx .
631 ting the internal variable
633 enables display of some informational context messages.
634 Using it twice increases the level of verbosity.
638 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
640 to the list of commands to be executed,
641 as a last step of program startup, before normal operation starts.
642 This is the only possibility to execute commands in non-interactive mode
643 when reading startup files is actively prohibited.
644 The commands will be evaluated as a unit, just as via
654 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
655 in compose mode even in non-interactive use cases.
656 This can be used to, e.g., automatically format the composed message
657 text before sending the message:
658 .Bd -literal -offset indent
659 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.';\e
660 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
661 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d~:/ -Sttycharset=utf-8 bob@exam.ple
666 Enables batch mode: standard input is made line buffered, the complete
667 set of (interactive) commands is available, processing of
668 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
669 is enabled in compose mode, and diverse
670 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
671 are adjusted for batch necessities, exactly as if done via
687 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
688 .Bd -literal -offset indent
689 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'm bob\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\enx\en' |\e
690 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d#:/ -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
695 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
698 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
699 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
705 arguments and all receivers established via
709 are subject to the checks established by
712 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
715 allows their recognition all
717 arguments given at the end of the command line after a
719 separator will be passed through to a file-based
721 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for the entire session.
723 constraints do not apply to the content of
727 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{
730 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
732 Mail, itself a successor of the Research
735 .Dq was there from the start
738 It thus represents the user side of the
740 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
741 traditionally taken by
743 and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility purposes.
748 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
752 Because \*(UA strives for compliance with POSIX
754 it is likely that some configuration settings have to be adjusted before
755 using it is a smooth experience.
756 (Rather complete configuration examples can be found in the section
761 .Sx "Resource files" ,
762 bends those standard imposed settings of the
763 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
764 a bit towards more user friendliness and safety already.
772 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to the
774 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
776 that would otherwise occur (see
777 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
780 to not remove empty system MBOX mailbox files in order not to mangle
781 file permissions when files eventually get recreated (all empty (MBOX)
782 mailbox files will be removed unless this variable is set whenever
784 .Pf a.k.a.\0 Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
785 mode has been enabled).
790 in order to synchronize \*(UA with the exit status report of the used
797 to enter interactive startup even if the initial mailbox is empty,
799 to allow editing of headers as well as
801 to not strip down addresses in compose mode, and
803 to include the message that is being responded to when
805 ing, which is indented by an
807 that also deviates from standard imposed settings.
808 .Va mime-counter-evidence
809 is fully enabled, too.
813 The file mode creation mask can be managed explicitly via the variable
815 Sufficient system support provided symbolic links will not be followed
816 when files are opened for writing.
817 Files and shell pipe output can be
819 d for evaluation, also during startup from within the
820 .Sx "Resource files" .
823 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
824 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
826 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or built-in
828 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
829 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
830 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
834 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
836 .Bd -literal -offset indent
838 $ \*(uA -s ubject -a ttach.txt bill@exam.ple
840 # But... try it in an isolated dry-run mode (-d) first
841 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
842 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple \e
844 '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
847 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
848 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=none \e
849 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
855 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
856 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
857 In this compose mode \*(UA treats lines beginning with the character
859 special \(en these are so-called
860 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
861 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
862 attachments and more; e.g., the command escape
864 will start the text editor to revise the message in its current state,
866 allows editing of the most important message headers, with
868 custom headers can be created (more specifically than with
871 gives an overview of most other available command escapes.
874 will leave compose mode and send the message once it is completed.
878 at the beginning of an empty line has the same effect, whereas typing
881 twice will abort the current letter (saving its contents in the file
892 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
893 can be used to alter default behavior.
894 E.g., messages are sent asynchronously, without supervision, unless the
897 is set, therefore send errors will not be recognizable until then.
902 will automatically startup a text editor when compose mode is entered,
904 allows editing of headers additionally to plain body content,
908 will cause the user to be prompted actively for (blind) carbon-copy
909 recipients, respectively, and (the default)
911 will request confirmation whether the message shall be sent.
914 The envelope sender address is defined by
916 explicitly defining an originating
918 may be desirable, especially with the builtin SMTP Mail-Transfer-Agent
921 for outgoing message and MIME part content are configurable via
923 whereas input data is assumed to be in
925 Message data will be passed over the wire in a
927 MIME parts a.k.a. attachments need to be assigned a
930 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
931 Saving a copy of sent messages in a
933 mailbox may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox
935 targets the value will undergo
936 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
941 sandbox dry-run tests will prove correctness.
944 Message recipients (as specified on the command line or defined in
949 may not only be email addressees but can also be names of mailboxes and
950 even complete shell command pipe specifications.
953 is not set then only network addresses (see
955 for a description of mail addresses) and plain user names (including MTA
956 aliases) may be used, other types will be filtered out, giving a warning
960 can be used to generate standard compliant network addresses.
962 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
963 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
967 is set then extended recipient addresses will optionally be accepted:
968 Any name which starts with a vertical bar
970 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
972 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
973 Likewise, any name that starts with the character solidus
975 or the character sequence dot solidus
977 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content;
978 likewise a name that solely consists of a hyphen-minus
980 Any other name which contains a commercial at
982 character is treated as a network address;
983 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
985 character specifies a mailbox name;
986 Any other name which contains a solidus
988 character but no exclamation mark
992 character before also specifies a mailbox name;
993 What remains is treated as a network address.
995 .Bd -literal -offset indent
996 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
997 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
998 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
999 \*(uA -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
1000 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr,failinvaddr -s test \e
1005 It is possible to create personal distribution lists via the
1007 command, so that, for instance, the user can send mail to
1009 and have it go to a group of people.
1010 These aliases have nothing in common with the system wide aliases that
1011 may be used by the MTA, which are subject to the
1015 and are often tracked in a file
1021 Personal aliases will be expanded by \*(UA before the message is sent,
1022 and are thus a convenient alternative to specifying each addressee by
1023 itself; they correlate with the active set of
1030 .Dl alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/mail/cohorts.mbox
1033 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
1035 .Va on-compose-cleanup
1036 hook variables may be set to
1038 d macros to automatically adjust some settings dependent
1039 on receiver, sender or subject contexts, and via the
1040 .Va on-compose-splice
1042 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
1043 variables, the former also to be set to a
1045 d macro, increasingly powerful mechanisms to perform automatized message
1046 adjustments, including signature creation, are available.
1047 (\*(ID These hooks work for commands which newly create messages, namely
1048 .Ic forward , mail , reply
1053 for now provide only the hooks
1056 .Va on-resend-cleanup . )
1059 For the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
1060 be switched to with a single command or command line option there are
1062 Alternatively it is also possible to use a flat configuration, making use
1063 of so-called variable chains which automatically pick
1067 context-dependent variable variants: for example addressing
1068 .Ql Ic File Ns \& pop3://yaa@exam.ple
1070 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-yaa@exam.ple ,
1071 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-exam.ple
1076 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1078 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
1081 To avoid environmental noise scripts should
1083 \*(UA from any configuration files and create a script-local
1084 environment, ideally with the command line options
1086 to disable any configuration file in conjunction with repetitions of
1088 to specify variables:
1090 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1091 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
1092 -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf-8 \e
1093 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,failinvaddr \e
1094 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
1095 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
1096 -s 'Subject to go' -a attachment_file \e
1098 'Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>' rec2@exam.ple \e
1103 As shown, scripts can
1105 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
1108 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
1110 In interactive mode, which is introduced in the next section, messages
1111 can be sent by calling the
1113 command with a list of recipient addresses:
1115 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1116 $ \*(uA -d -Squiet -Semptystart
1117 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
1118 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
1120 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
1121 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
1125 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode" {{{
1126 .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode"
1128 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
1130 When used like that the user's system
1132 (for more on mailbox types please see the command
1134 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed if
1138 The visual style of this summary of
1140 can be adjusted through the variable
1142 and the possible sorting criterion via
1148 can be performed with the command
1150 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
1151 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
1160 will give a listing of all available commands and
1162 will give a summary of some common ones.
1163 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available (see
1168 and see the actual expansion of
1170 and what its purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
1171 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
1172 order of commands does not necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1173 however possible to define overwrites with
1174 .Ic commandalias ) .
1175 These commands can also produce a more
1180 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1181 messages; the current message \(en the
1183 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1184 or the first message of the mailbox; the internal variable
1186 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1191 ful of header summaries containing the
1195 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1199 Message content can be displayed with the command
1206 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1208 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1210 the sole difference to the command
1212 which will always use the
1216 will instead only show the first
1218 of a message (maybe even compressed if
1221 Message display experience may improve by setting and adjusting
1222 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
1224 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" .
1227 By default the current message
1229 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1230 a fancy message specification (see
1231 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1234 will display all unread messages,
1239 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1241 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1245 will display the last and the next message, respectively.
1248 (a more substantial alias for
1250 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1251 instead of their content, e.g., the following will search for subjects:
1254 .Dl ? from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1257 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1259 d, but fields can be white- or blacklisted for a variety of
1260 applications by using the command
1262 e.g., to restrict their display to a very restricted set for
1264 .Ql Ic \:headerpick Cd \:type retain Ar \:from to cc subject .
1265 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1266 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1271 will show the raw message content.
1272 Note that historically the global
1274 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1278 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1279 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1280 aims at making the user experience with the many
1283 When reading the system
1289 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1291 modifier (propagating the mailbox to a
1293 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ) ,
1294 then messages which have been read will be automatically moved to a
1296 .Sx "secondary mailbox" ,
1299 file, when the mailbox is left, either by changing the
1300 active mailbox or by quitting \*(UA (also see
1301 .Sx "Message states" )
1302 \(en this automatic moving from a system or primary to the secondary
1303 mailbox is not performed when the variable
1306 Messages can also be explicitly
1308 d to other mailboxes, whereas
1310 keeps the original message.
1312 can be used to write out data content of specific parts of messages.
1315 After examining a message the user can
1317 to the sender and all recipients (which will also be placed in
1320 .Va recipients-in-cc
1323 exclusively to the sender(s).
1325 ing a message will allow editing the new message: the original message
1326 will be contained in the message body, adjusted according to
1332 messages: the former will add a series of
1334 headers, whereas the latter will not; different to newly created
1335 messages editing is not possible and no copy will be saved even with
1337 unless the additional variable
1340 When sending, replying or forwarding messages comments and full names
1341 will be stripped from recipient addresses unless the internal variable
1344 Of course messages can be
1346 and they can spring into existence again via
1348 or when the \*(UA session is ended via the
1353 To end a mail processing session one may either issue
1355 to cause a full program exit, which possibly includes
1356 automatic moving of read messages to the
1358 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1360 as well as updating the \*(OPal (see
1366 instead in order to prevent any of these actions.
1369 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{
1370 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1372 Messages which are HTML-only become more and more common and of course
1373 many messages come bundled with a bouquet of MIME (Multipurpose Internet
1374 Mail Extensions) parts for, e.g., attachments.
1375 To get a notion of MIME types, \*(UA will first read
1376 .Sx "The mime.types files"
1377 (as configured and allowed by
1378 .Va mimetypes-load-control ) ,
1379 and then add onto that types registered directly with
1381 It (normally) has a default set of types built-in, too.
1382 To improve interaction with faulty MIME part declarations which are
1383 often seen in real-life messages, setting
1384 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1385 will allow \*(UA to verify the given assertion and possibly provide
1386 an alternative MIME type.
1389 Whereas \*(UA \*(OPally supports a simple HTML-to-text converter for
1390 HTML messages, it cannot handle MIME types other than plain text itself.
1391 Instead programs need to become registered to deal with specific MIME
1392 types or file extensions.
1393 These programs may either prepare plain text versions of their input in
1394 order to enable \*(UA to integrate their output neatlessly in its own
1395 message visualization (a mode which is called
1396 .Cd copiousoutput ) ,
1397 or display the content themselves, for example in an external graphical
1398 window: such handlers will only be considered by and for the command
1402 To install a handler program for a specific MIME type an according
1403 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1404 variable needs to be set; to instead define a handler for a specific
1405 file extension the respective
1407 variable can be used \(en these handlers take precedence.
1408 \*(OPally \*(UA supports mail user agent configuration as defined in
1409 RFC 1524; this mechanism (see
1410 .Sx "The Mailcap files" )
1411 will be queried for display or quote handlers if none of the former two
1412 .\" TODO v15-compat "will be" -> "is"
1413 did; it will be the sole source for handlers of other purpose.
1414 A last source for handlers is the MIME type definition itself, when
1415 a (\*(UA specific) type-marker was registered with the command
1417 (which many built-in MIME types do).
1420 E.g., to display a HTML message inline (that is, converted to a more
1421 fancy plain text representation than the built-in converter is capable to
1422 produce) with either of the text-mode browsers
1426 teach \*(UA about MathML documents and make it display them as plain
1427 text, and to open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer,
1428 asynchronously and with some other magic attached:
1430 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1431 ? if [ "$features" !% +filter-html-tagsoup ]
1432 ? #set pipe-text/html='@* elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1433 ? set pipe-text/html='@* lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1434 ? # Display HTML as plain text instead
1435 ? #set pipe-text/html=@
1437 ? mimetype @ application/mathml+xml mathml
1438 ? wysh set pipe-application/pdf='@&=@ \e
1439 trap "rm -f \e"${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1440 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1441 mupdf "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1445 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1448 \*(UA offers some support to ease handling of mailing lists.
1451 promotes all given arguments to known mailing lists, and
1453 sets their subscription attribute, creating them first as necessary.
1458 automatically, but only resets the subscription attribute.)
1459 Using the commands without arguments will show (a subset of) all
1460 currently defined mailing lists.
1465 can be used to mark out messages with configured list addresses
1466 in the header display.
1469 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available a mailing list
1470 specification that contains any of the
1472 regular expression characters
1476 will be interpreted as one, which allows matching of many addresses with
1477 a single expression.
1478 However, all fully qualified list addresses are matched via a fast
1479 dictionary, whereas expressions are placed in (a) list(s) which is
1480 (are) matched sequentially.
1482 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1483 ? set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
1484 reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1485 ? wysh mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1486 ? mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1491 .Va followup-to-honour
1493 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1494 header is honoured when the message is being replied to (via
1500 controls whether this header is created when sending mails; it will be
1501 created automatically for a couple of reasons, too, like when the
1503 .Dq mailing list specific
1508 is used to respond to a message with its
1509 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1513 A difference in between the handling of known and subscribed lists is
1514 that the address of the sender is usually not part of a generated
1515 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1516 when addressing the latter, whereas it is for the former kind of lists.
1517 Usually because there are exceptions: say, if multiple lists are
1518 addressed and not all of them are subscribed lists.
1520 For convenience \*(UA will, temporarily, automatically add a list
1521 address that is presented in the
1523 header of a message that is being responded to to the list of known
1525 Shall that header have existed \*(UA will instead, dependent on the
1527 .Va reply-to-honour ,
1530 for this purpose in order to accept a list administrators' wish that
1531 is supposed to have been manifested like that (but only if it provides
1532 a single address which resides on the same domain as what is stated in
1536 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
1537 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
1539 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
1540 message signing and message encryption.
1541 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
1542 The data can be used to verify that the message was sent using a valid
1543 certificate, that the sender's address in the message header matches
1544 that in the certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
1545 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
1546 it can be read regardless of whether the recipient's software is able to
1548 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
1551 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
1552 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
1553 To encrypt a message, the specific recipient's public encryption key
1555 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
1556 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
1558 A message should always be signed before it is encrypted.
1559 Otherwise, it is still possible that the encrypted message text is
1563 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
1564 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
1565 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
1566 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
1568 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered with OpenSSL and installed
1570 If you trust the source of your OpenSSL software installation,
1571 this offers reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet.
1573 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults
1574 to avoid using the default certificates and point
1578 to a trusted pool of certificates.
1579 In general, a certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA
1580 certificate has been retrieved with.
1583 This trusted pool of certificates is used by the command
1585 to ensure that the given S/MIME messages can be trusted.
1586 If so, verified sender certificates that were embedded in signed
1587 messages can be saved locally with the command
1589 and used by \*(UA to encrypt further communication with these senders:
1591 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1593 ? set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
1594 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
1598 To sign outgoing messages in order to allow receivers to verify the
1599 origin of these messages a personal S/MIME certificate is required.
1600 \*(UA supports password-protected personal certificates (and keys),
1601 for more on this, and its automatization, please see the section
1602 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
1604 .Sx "S/MIME step by step"
1605 shows examplarily how such a private certificate can be obtained.
1606 In general, if such a private key plus certificate
1608 is available, all that needs to be done is to set some variables:
1610 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1611 ? set smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
1612 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
1617 Variables of interest for S/MIME in general are
1620 .Va smime-ca-flags ,
1621 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
1623 .Va smime-crl-file .
1624 For S/MIME signing of interest are
1626 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
1627 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
1629 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
1630 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
1633 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
1636 \*(ID Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to
1637 message subjects or other header fields yet.
1638 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
1639 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
1640 When sending signed messages,
1641 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
1645 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{
1646 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1648 \*(IN For accessing protocol-specific resources usage of Uniform
1649 Resource Locators (URL, RFC 1738) has become omnipresent.
1650 \*(UA expects and understands URLs in the following form;
1653 denote optional parts, optional either because there also exist other
1654 ways to define the information in question or because support of the
1655 part is protocol-specific (e.g.,
1657 is used by the local maildir and the IMAP protocol, but not by POP3);
1662 are specified they must be given in URL percent encoded form (RFC 3986;
1668 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
1671 Note that these \*(UA URLs most often do not conform to any real
1672 standard, but instead represent a normalized variant of RFC 1738 \(en
1673 they are not used in data exchange but only meant as a compact,
1674 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in
1675 a well-known notation.
1678 Many internal variables of \*(UA exist in multiple versions, called
1679 variable chains for the rest of this document: the plain
1684 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
1691 had been specified in the respective URL, otherwise it refers to the plain
1697 that had been found when doing the user chain lookup as is described
1700 will never be in URL percent encoded form, whether it came from an URL
1701 or not; i.e., variable chain name extensions of
1702 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1703 must not be URL percent encoded.
1706 For example, whether an hypothetical URL
1707 .Ql smtp://hey%3Ayou@our.house
1708 had been given that includes a user, or whether the URL was
1709 .Ql smtp://our.house
1710 and the user had been found differently, to lookup the variable chain
1711 .Va smtp-use-starttls
1712 \*(UA first looks for whether
1713 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:hey:you@our.house
1714 is defined, then whether
1715 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:our.house
1716 exists before finally ending up looking at the plain variable itself.
1719 \*(UA obeys the following logic scheme when dealing with the
1720 necessary credential information of an account:
1726 has been given in the URL the variables
1730 are looked up; if no such variable(s) can be found then \*(UA will,
1731 when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
1732 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
1739 specific entry which provides a
1741 name: this lookup will only succeed if unambiguous (one possible matching
1744 It is possible to load encrypted
1749 If there is still no
1751 then \*(UA will fall back to the user who is supposed to run \*(UA,
1752 the identity of which has been fixated during \*(UA startup and is
1753 known to be a valid user on the current host.
1756 Authentication: unless otherwise noted this will lookup the
1757 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
1758 variable chain, falling back to a protocol-specific default should this
1764 has been given in the URL, then if the
1766 has been found through the \*(OPal
1768 that may have already provided the password, too.
1769 Otherwise the variable chain
1770 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
1771 is looked up and used if existent.
1773 Afterwards the complete \*(OPal variable chain
1774 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
1778 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
1779 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
1780 but with a password).
1782 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
1783 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
1784 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
1789 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
1793 header field(s), which means that the values of
1794 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
1796 .Va smime-sign-message-digest
1797 will not be looked up using the
1801 chains from above but instead use the corresponding values from the
1802 message that is being worked on.
1803 In unusual cases multiple and different
1807 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
1808 unusual cases become possible.
1809 The usual case is as short as:
1811 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1812 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
1813 smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair
1819 contains complete example configurations.
1822 .\" .Ss "Encrypted network communication" {{{
1823 .Ss "Encrypted network communication"
1825 SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) a.k.a. its successor TLS (Transport Layer
1826 Security) are protocols which aid in securing communication by providing
1827 a safely initiated and encrypted network connection.
1828 A central concept of SSL/TLS is that of certificates: as part of each
1829 network connection setup a (set of) certificates will be exchanged, and
1830 by using those the identity of the network peer can be cryptographically
1832 SSL/TLS works by using a locally installed pool of trusted certificates,
1833 and verifying the connection peer succeeds if that provides
1834 a certificate which has been issued or is trusted by any certificate in
1835 the trusted local pool.
1838 The local pool of trusted so-called CA (Certification Authority)
1839 certificates is usually delivered with the used SSL/TLS library, and
1840 will be selected automatically, but it is also possible to create and
1841 use an own pool of trusted certificates.
1842 If this is desired, set
1843 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults
1844 to avoid using the default certificate pool, and point
1848 to a trusted pool of certificates.
1849 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
1850 has been retrieved with.
1853 It depends on the used protocol whether encrypted communication is
1854 possible, and which configuration steps have to be taken to enable it.
1855 Some protocols, e.g., POP3S, are implicitly encrypted, others, like
1856 POP3, can upgrade a plain text connection if so requested: POP3 offers
1858 which will be used if the variable (chain)
1859 .Va pop3-use-starttls
1862 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1863 shortcut encpop1 pop3s://pop1.exam.ple
1865 shortcut encpop2 pop3://pop2.exam.ple
1866 set pop3-use-starttls-pop2.exam.ple
1868 set mta=smtps://smtp.exam.ple:465
1869 set mta=smtp://smtp.exam.ple smtp-use-starttls
1873 Normally that is all there is to do, given that SSL/TLS libraries try to
1874 provide safe defaults, plenty of knobs however exist to adjust settings.
1875 For example certificate verification settings can be fine-tuned via
1877 and the SSL/TLS configuration basics are accessible via
1878 .Va ssl-config-pairs ,
1879 e.g., to specify the allowed protocols or cipher lists that
1880 a communication channel may use.
1881 In the past hints of how to restrict the set of protocols to highly
1882 secure ones were indicated, as of the time of this writing the allowed
1883 protocols or cipher list may need to become relaxed in order to be able
1884 to connect to some servers; the following example allows connecting to a
1886 that uses OpenSSL 0.9.8za from June 2014 (refer to
1887 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1888 for more on variable chains):
1890 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1891 wysh set ssl-config-pairs-lion@exam.ple='MinProtocol=TLSv1.1,\e
1892 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:\e
1893 ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:\e
1894 DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:@STRENGTH'
1900 can be used and should be referred to when creating a custom cipher list.
1901 Variables of interest for SSL/TLS in general are
1905 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ,
1906 .Va ssl-config-file ,
1907 .Va ssl-config-module ,
1908 .Va ssl-config-pairs ,
1916 .\" .Ss "Character sets" {{{
1917 .Ss "Character sets"
1919 \*(OP \*(UA detects the character set of the terminal by using
1920 mechanisms that are controlled by the
1922 environment variable
1927 in that order, see there).
1928 The internal variable
1930 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly,
1931 and will thus show up in the output of commands like, e.g.,
1937 However, the user may give a value for
1939 during startup, so that it is possible to send mail in a completely
1941 locale environment, an option which can be used to generate and send,
1942 e.g., 8-bit UTF-8 input data in a pure 7-bit US-ASCII
1944 environment (an example of this can be found in the section
1945 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
1946 Changing the value does not mean much beside that, because several
1947 aspects of the real character set are implied by the locale environment
1948 of the system, which stays unaffected by
1952 Messages and attachments which consist of 7-bit clean data will be
1953 classified as consisting of
1956 This is a problem if the
1958 character set is a multibyte character set that is also 7-bit clean.
1959 For example, the Japanese character set ISO-2022-JP is 7-bit clean but
1960 capable to encode the rich set of Japanese Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana
1961 characters: in order to notify receivers of this character set the mail
1962 message must be MIME encoded so that the character set ISO-2022-JP can
1964 To achieve this, the variable
1966 must be set to ISO-2022-JP.
1967 (Today a better approach regarding email is the usage of UTF-8, which
1968 uses 8-bit bytes for non-US-ASCII data.)
1971 If the \*(OPal character set conversion capabilities are not available
1973 does not include the term
1977 will be the only supported character set,
1978 it is simply assumed that it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages
1979 (over the wire an intermediate, configurable
1982 and the rest of this section does not apply;
1983 it may however still be necessary to explicitly set it if automatic
1984 detection fails, since in that case it defaults to
1985 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"Character sets", ./config.h:CHARSET_*!)
1986 LATIN1 a.k.a. ISO-8859-1.
1989 \*(OP When reading messages, their text is converted into
1991 as necessary in order to display them on the users terminal.
1992 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
1993 and replaced by proper substitution characters.
1994 Character set mappings for source character sets can be established with
1997 which may be handy to work around faulty character set catalogues (e.g.,
1998 to add a missing LATIN1 to ISO-8859-1 mapping), or to enforce treatment
1999 of one character set as another one (e.g., to interpret LATIN1 as CP1252).
2001 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
2002 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
2005 When sending messages all their parts and attachments are classified.
2006 Whereas no character set conversion is performed on those parts which
2007 appear to be binary data,
2008 the character set being used must be declared within the MIME header of
2009 an outgoing text part if it contains characters that do not conform to
2010 the set of characters that are allowed by the email standards.
2011 Permissible values for character sets used in outgoing messages can be
2016 which defines a catch-all last-resort fallback character set that is
2017 implicitly appended to the list of character sets in
2021 When replying to a message and the variable
2022 .Va reply-in-same-charset
2023 is set, then the character set of the message being replied to
2024 is tried first (still being a subject of
2025 .Ic charsetalias ) .
2026 And it is also possible to make \*(UA work even more closely related to
2027 the current locale setting automatically by using the variable
2028 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset ,
2029 please see there for more information.
2032 All the specified character sets are tried in order unless the
2033 conversion of the part or attachment succeeds.
2034 If none of the tried (8-bit) character sets is capable to represent the
2035 content of the part or attachment,
2036 then the message will not be sent and its text will optionally be
2040 In general, if a message saying
2041 .Dq cannot convert from a to b
2042 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
2043 selected (terminal) character set,
2044 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
2045 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
2047 locale and/or the variable
2051 The best results are usually achieved when \*(UA is run in a UTF-8
2052 locale on an UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
2053 spectrum of characters is available.
2054 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
2055 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
2056 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
2059 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
2060 .Dq portable character set
2061 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
2062 restricted subset named
2063 .Dq portable filename character set
2064 consists of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
2072 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
2073 .Ss "Message states"
2075 \*(UA differentiates in between several different message states;
2076 the current state will be reflected in header summary displays if
2078 is configured to do so (via the internal variable
2080 and messages can also be selected and be acted upon depending on their
2082 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) .
2083 When operating on the system
2087 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
2088 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the
2090 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2092 may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly via
2093 a successful exit of \*(UA, but not if the special command
2095 is used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
2098 mail-user-agents, the default global
2104 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
2106 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ql new"
2108 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
2109 Such messages are retained even in the
2111 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2114 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
2115 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
2116 Such messages are retained even in the
2118 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2121 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2140 will always try to automatically
2146 logical message, and may thus mark multiple messages as read, the
2148 command will do so if the internal variable
2153 command is used, messages that are in a
2155 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2158 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in the
2160 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2162 unless the internal variable
2167 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2173 can be used to access such messages.
2176 The message has been processed by a
2178 command and it will be retained in its current location.
2181 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2187 command is used, messages that are in a
2189 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2192 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in the
2194 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2196 when the internal variable
2202 In addition to these message states, flags which otherwise have no
2203 technical meaning in the mail system except allowing special ways of
2204 addressing them when
2205 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2206 can be set on messages.
2207 These flags are saved with messages and are thus persistent, and are
2208 portable between a set of widely used MUAs.
2210 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ic answered"
2212 Mark messages as having been answered.
2214 Mark messages as being a draft.
2216 Mark messages which need special attention.
2220 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
2221 .Ss "Specifying messages"
2224 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
2232 can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a number
2233 of messages at once.
2236 deletes messages 1 and 2,
2239 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
2240 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
2244 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
2245 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
2248 The following special message names exist:
2251 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar BaNg"
2253 The current message, the so-called
2257 The message that was previously the current message.
2260 The parent message of the current message,
2261 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
2263 field or the last entry of the
2265 field of the current message.
2268 The next previous undeleted message,
2269 or the next previous deleted message for the
2272 In sorted/threaded mode,
2273 the next previous such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2276 The next undeleted message,
2277 or the next deleted message for the
2280 In sorted/threaded mode,
2281 the next such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2284 The first undeleted message,
2285 or the first deleted message for the
2288 In sorted/threaded mode,
2289 the first such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2293 In sorted/threaded mode,
2294 the last message in the sorted/threaded order.
2298 selects the message addressed with
2302 is any other message specification,
2303 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
2304 Otherwise it is identical to
2309 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
2314 All messages that were included in the
2315 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2316 of the previous command.
2319 An inclusive range of message numbers.
2320 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
2325 .Dq any substring matches
2328 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
2330 is set (and POSIX says
2331 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
2334 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
2335 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
2337 is completely ignored.
2338 For finer control and match boundaries use the
2342 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
2343 All messages that contain
2345 in the subject field (case ignored according to locale).
2352 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
2355 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
2358 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
2360 ession; If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available
2362 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
2364 regular expression characters
2369 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
2370 part is missing the search is restricted to the subject field body,
2373 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, e.g.,
2376 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
2379 In order to search for a string that includes a
2381 (commercial at) character the
2383 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
2384 Also, specifying an empty search
2386 ession will effectively test for existence of the given header fields.
2387 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
2401 respectively and case-insensitively.
2402 \*(OPally, and just like
2405 will be interpreted as (an extended) regular expression if any of the
2407 regular expression characters is seen.
2414 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
2423 will perform full text searches \(en whereas the former searches only
2424 the body, the latter also searches the message header (\*(ID this mode
2425 yet brute force searches over the entire decoded content of messages,
2426 including administrativa strings).
2429 This specification performs full text comparison, but even with
2430 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
2431 expression that savely matches only a specific address domain.
2432 To request that the body content of the header is treated as a list of
2433 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
2434 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the effective
2440 .Dl @~f@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$
2444 All messages of state or with matching condition
2448 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
2450 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
2453 messages (cf. the variable
2454 .Va markanswered ) .
2466 Messages with receivers that match
2470 Messages with receivers that match
2477 Old messages (any not in state
2485 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification (see
2486 .Sx "Handling spam" ) .
2488 \*(OP Messages classified as spam.
2500 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
2501 This addressing mode is available with all types of mailbox
2503 s; \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
2504 Strings must be enclosed by double quotes
2506 in their entirety if they contain whitespace or parentheses;
2507 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
2509 is recognized as an escape character.
2510 All string searches are case-insensitive.
2511 When the description indicates that the
2513 representation of an address field is used,
2514 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
2517 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2518 (\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)
2523 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
2524 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
2528 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
2529 .It Ar ( criterion )
2530 All messages that satisfy the given
2532 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
2533 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
2535 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
2536 All messages that satisfy either
2541 To connect more than two criteria using
2543 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
2545 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
2549 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
2552 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
2553 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
2557 .It Ar ( not criterion )
2558 All messages that do not satisfy
2560 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2561 All messages that contain
2563 in the envelope representation of the
2566 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2567 All messages that contain
2569 in the envelope representation of the
2572 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2573 All messages that contain
2575 in the envelope representation of the
2578 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2579 All messages that contain
2584 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2585 All messages that contain
2587 in the envelope representation of the
2590 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2591 All messages that contain
2596 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2597 All messages that contain
2600 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2601 All messages that contain
2603 in their header or body.
2604 .It Ar ( larger size )
2605 All messages that are larger than
2608 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2609 All messages that are smaller than
2613 .It Ar ( before date )
2614 All messages that were received before
2616 which must be in the form
2620 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2622 is the name of the month \(en one of
2623 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2626 is the year as four digits, e.g.,
2630 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2631 .It Ar ( since date )
2632 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2633 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2634 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2635 .It Ar ( senton date )
2636 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2637 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2638 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2640 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2641 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2642 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2643 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2647 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{
2648 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2650 \*(OP Terminal control will be realized through one of the standard
2652 libraries, either the
2654 or, alternatively, the
2656 both of which will be initialized to work with the environment variable
2658 Terminal control will enhance or enable interactive usage aspects, e.g.,
2659 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2660 and extend behaviour of the Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE), which may learn the
2661 byte-sequences of keys like the cursor and function keys.
2664 The internal variable
2666 can be used to overwrite settings or to learn (correct(ed)) keycodes.
2667 \*(UA may also become a fullscreen application by entering the
2668 so-called ca-mode and switching to an alternative exclusive screen
2669 (content) shall the terminal support it and the internal variable
2671 has been set explicitly.
2672 Actual interaction with the chosen library can be disabled completely by
2673 setting the internal variable
2674 .Va termcap-disable ;
2676 will be queried regardless, which is true even if the \*(OPal library
2677 support has not been enabled at configuration time as long as some other
2678 \*(OP which (may) query terminal control sequences has been enabled.
2681 \*(OP The built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2682 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2684 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2685 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2687 Prevent usage of a line editor in interactive mode by setting the
2689 .Va line-editor-disable .
2690 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2691 entries in the internal variable
2693 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2694 The MLE can support a little bit of
2700 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2701 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2702 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2704 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2705 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2709 .Va history-gabby-persist
2714 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2715 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2716 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2717 be generated by holding the
2719 key while pressing the key of desire, e.g.,
2723 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2724 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2725 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2727 to establish its built-in key bindings
2728 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2729 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2730 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2731 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2732 notation is used in the following;
2733 combinations not mentioned either cause job control signals or do not
2734 generate a (unique) keycode:
2738 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql \eBa"
2740 Go to the start of the line
2742 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2745 Move the cursor backward one character
2747 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2750 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2751 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the internal variable
2755 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2758 Go to the end of the line
2760 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2763 Move the cursor forward one character
2765 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2768 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2769 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2770 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2771 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2773 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2776 Backspace: backward delete one character
2778 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
2782 Horizontal tabulator:
2783 try to expand the word before the cursor, supporting the usual
2784 .Sx "Filename transformations"
2786 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ;
2788 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2792 commit the current line
2794 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
2797 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
2799 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
2804 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
2807 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
2809 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
2812 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2816 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
2818 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
2821 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
2824 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2825 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
2826 is committed; also see
2830 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
2832 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
2835 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
2837 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
2840 Paste the snarf buffer
2842 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
2850 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
2853 Prompts for a Unicode character (hexadecimal number without prefix, see
2857 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
2858 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
2859 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
2860 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
2861 that shortcut purpose); this control code is special-treated and cannot
2862 be part of any other sequence, because any occurrence will perform the
2864 function immediately.
2867 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
2870 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
2873 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
2875 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
2878 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
2880 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
2883 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
2884 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
2886 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
2887 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
2888 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
2889 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
2891 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
2892 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
2893 expected input, then it will first be consumed by the active sequence.
2896 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2900 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2904 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2908 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
2911 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
2922 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
2927 ring the audible bell.
2931 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{
2932 .Ss "Coloured display"
2934 \*(OP \*(UA can be configured to support a coloured display and font
2935 attributes by emitting ANSI a.k.a. ISO 6429 SGR (select graphic
2936 rendition) escape sequences.
2937 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
2938 capability of the detected terminal type that is defined by the
2939 environment variable
2941 and which can be fine-tuned by the user via the internal variable
2945 On top of what \*(UA knows about the terminal the boolean variable
2947 defines whether the actually applicable colour and font attribute
2948 sequences should also be generated when output is going to be paged
2949 through the external program defined by the environment variable
2954 This is not enabled by default because different pager programs need
2955 different command line switches or other configuration in order to
2956 support those sequences.
2957 \*(UA however knows about some widely used pagers and in a clean
2958 environment it is often enough to simply set
2960 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
2965 is set then any active usage of colour and font attribute sequences
2966 is suppressed, but without affecting possibly established
2971 To define and control colours and font attributes a single multiplexer
2972 command family exists:
2974 shows or defines colour mappings for the given colour type (e.g.,
2977 can be used to remove mappings of a given colour type.
2978 Since colours are only available in interactive mode, it may make
2979 sense to conditionalize the colour setup by encapsulating it with
2982 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2983 if terminal && [ "$features" =% +colour ]
2984 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
2985 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red from,subject
2986 colour iso view-header fg=red
2988 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
2989 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
2990 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 "subject,from"
2991 colour mono view-header ft=bold
2992 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
2997 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
3000 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
3001 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
3002 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
3004 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
3005 Once messages have been identified as spam their (volatile)
3007 state can be prompted: the
3011 message specifications will address respective messages and their
3013 entries will be used when displaying the
3015 in the header display.
3020 rates the given messages and sets their
3023 If the spam interface offers spam scores those can also be displayed in
3024 the header display by including the
3034 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
3035 the given messages as
3039 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
3041 of messages; it adheres to their current
3043 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
3048 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
3050 message flag, without any interface interaction.
3059 requires a running instance of the
3061 server in order to function, started with the option
3063 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
3065 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3066 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
3067 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
3068 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
3072 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
3074 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3075 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3076 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3077 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
3079 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3080 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3081 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
3085 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
3087 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
3090 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3091 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3092 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
3093 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
3094 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
3095 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
3096 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
3097 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
3101 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
3102 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
3103 perform the local spam check last.
3104 Spam can be checked automatically when opening specific folders by
3105 setting a specialized form of the internal variable
3108 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3109 define spamdelhook {
3111 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
3112 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
3113 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
3114 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
3120 set folder-hook-SOMEFOLDER=spamdelhook
3124 See also the documentation for the variables
3125 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
3126 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
3127 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
3130 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
3133 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
3136 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
3139 \*(UA reads input in lines.
3140 An unquoted reverse solidus
3142 at the end of a command line
3144 the newline character: it is discarded and the next line of input is
3145 used as a follow-up line, with all leading whitespace removed;
3146 once an entire line is completed, the whitespace characters
3147 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3148 as well as those defined by the variable
3150 are removed from the beginning and end.
3151 Placing any whitespace characters at the beginning of a line will
3152 prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
3156 The beginning of such input lines is then scanned for the name of
3157 a known command: command names may be abbreviated, in which case the
3158 first command that matches the given prefix will be used.
3159 .Sx "Command modifiers"
3160 may prefix a command in order to modify its behaviour.
3161 A name may also be a
3163 which will become expanded until no more expansion is possible.
3164 Once the command that shall be executed is known, the remains of the
3165 input line will be interpreted according to command-specific rules,
3166 documented in the following.
3169 This behaviour is different to the
3171 ell, which is a programming language with syntactic elements of clearly
3172 defined semantics, and therefore capable to sequentially expand and
3173 evaluate individual elements of a line.
3174 \*(UA will never be able to handle
3175 .Ql ? set one=value two=$one
3176 in a single statement, because the variable assignment is performed by
3184 can be used to show the list of all commands, either alphabetically
3185 sorted or in prefix search order (these do not match, also because the
3186 POSIX standard prescribes a set of abbreviations).
3187 \*(OPally the command
3191 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
3192 command matching the expanded argument, as in
3194 which should be a shorthand of
3196 with these documentation strings both commands support a more
3198 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command and other
3199 information which applies; a handy suggestion might thus be:
3201 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3203 # Before v15: need to enable sh(1)ell-style on _entire_ line!
3204 localopts 1;wysh set verbose;ignerr eval "${@}";return ${?}
3206 ? commandalias xv '\ecall __xv'
3210 .\" .Ss "Command modifiers" {{{
3211 .Ss "Command modifiers"
3213 Commands may be prefixed by one or multiple command modifiers.
3214 Some command modifiers can be used with a restricted set of commands
3219 will (\*(OPally) show which modifiers apply.
3223 The modifier reverse solidus
3226 to be placed first, prevents
3228 expansions on the remains of the line, e.g.,
3230 will always evaluate the command
3232 even if an (command)alias of the same name exists.
3234 content may itself contain further command modifiers, including
3235 an initial reverse solidus to prevent further expansions.
3241 indicates that any error generated by the following command should be
3242 ignored by the state machine and not cause a program exit with enabled
3244 or for the standardized exit cases in
3249 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3250 will be set to the real exit status of the command regardless.
3255 will alter the called command to apply changes only temporarily,
3256 local to block-scope, and can thus only be used inside of a
3261 Specifying it implies the modifier
3263 Block-scope settings will not be inherited by macros deeper in the
3265 chain, and will be garbage collected once the current block is left.
3266 To record and unroll changes in the global scope use the command
3272 does yet not implement any functionality.
3277 does yet not implement any functionality.
3280 Some commands support the
3283 modifier: if used, they expect the name of a variable, which can itself
3284 be a variable, i.e., shell expansion is applied, as their first
3285 argument, and will place their computation result in it instead of the
3286 default location (it is usually written to standard output).
3288 The given name will be tested for being a valid
3290 variable name, and may therefore only consist of upper- and lowercase
3291 characters, digits, and the underscore; the hyphen-minus may be used as
3292 a non-portable extension; digits may not be used as first, hyphen-minus
3293 may not be used as last characters.
3294 In addition the name may either not be one of the known
3295 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3296 or must otherwise refer to a writable (non-boolean) value variable.
3297 The actual put operation may fail nonetheless, e.g., if the variable
3298 expects a number argument only a number will be accepted.
3299 Any error during these operations causes the command as such to fail,
3300 and the error number
3303 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTSUP ,
3308 but some commands deviate from the latter, which is documented.
3311 Last, but not least, the modifier
3314 can be used for some old and established commands to choose the new
3315 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3316 rules over the traditional
3317 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting" .
3321 .\" .Ss "Message list arguments" {{{
3322 .Ss "Message list arguments"
3324 Some commands expect arguments that represent messages (actually
3325 their symbolic message numbers), as has been documented above under
3326 .Sx "Specifying messages"
3328 If no explicit message list has been specified, the next message
3329 forward that satisfies the command's requirements will be used,
3330 and if there are no messages forward of the current message,
3331 the search proceeds backwards;
3332 if there are no good messages at all to be found, an error message is
3333 shown and the command is aborted.
3336 .\" .Ss "Old-style argument quoting" {{{
3337 .Ss "Old-style argument quoting"
3339 \*(ID This section documents the old, traditional style of quoting
3340 non-message-list arguments to commands which expect this type of
3341 arguments: whereas still used by the majority of such commands, the new
3342 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3343 may be available even for those via
3346 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
3347 Nonetheless care must be taken, because only new commands have been
3348 designed with all the capabilities of the new quoting rules in mind,
3349 which can, e.g., generate control characters.
3352 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3354 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
3359 any whitespace, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
3360 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
3361 part of the argument.
3362 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
3364 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
3365 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
3371 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
3372 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
3376 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
3377 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
3381 .\" .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting" {{{
3382 .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting"
3384 Commands which don't expect message-list arguments use
3386 ell-style, and therefore POSIX standardized, argument parsing and
3388 \*(ID Most new commands only support these new rules and are flagged
3389 \*(NQ, some elder ones can use them with the command modifier
3391 in the future only this type of argument quoting will remain.
3394 A command line is parsed from left to right and an input token is
3395 completed whenever an unquoted, otherwise ignored, metacharacter is seen.
3396 Metacharacters are vertical bar
3402 as well as all characters from the variable
3405 .Cm space , tabulator , newline .
3406 The additional metacharacters left and right parenthesis
3408 and less-than and greater-than signs
3412 supports are not used, and are treated as ordinary characters: for one
3413 these characters are a vivid part of email addresses, and it seems
3414 highly unlikely that their function will become meaningful to \*(UA.
3416 .Bd -filled -offset indent
3417 .Sy Compatibility note:
3418 \*(ID Please note that even many new-style commands do not yet honour
3420 to parse their arguments: whereas the
3422 ell is a language with syntactic elements of clearly defined semantics,
3423 \*(UA parses entire input lines and decides on a per-command base what
3424 to do with the rest of the line.
3425 This also means that whenever an unknown command is seen all that \*(UA
3426 can do is cancellation of the processing of the remains of the line.
3428 It also often depends on an actual subcommand of a multiplexer command
3429 how the rest of the line should be treated, and until v15 we are not
3430 capable to perform this deep inspection of arguments.
3431 Nonetheless, at least the following commands which work with positional
3432 parameters fully support
3434 for an almost shell-compatible field splitting:
3435 .Ic call , call_if , read , vpospar , xcall .
3439 Any unquoted number sign
3441 at the beginning of a new token starts a comment that extends to the end
3442 of the line, and therefore ends argument processing.
3443 An unquoted dollar sign
3445 will cause variable expansion of the given name, which must be a valid
3447 ell-style variable name (see
3449 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3452 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
3453 enclosing the name is supported (i.e., to subdivide a token).
3456 Whereas the metacharacters
3457 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3458 only complete an input token, vertical bar
3464 also act as control operators and perform control functions.
3465 For now supported is semicolon
3467 which terminates a single command, therefore sequencing the command line
3468 and making the remainder of the line a subject to reevaluation.
3469 With sequencing, multiple command argument types and quoting rules may
3470 therefore apply to a single line, which can become problematic before
3471 v15: e.g., the first of the following will cause surprising results.
3474 .Dl ? echo one; set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3475 .Dl ? echo one; wysh set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3478 Quoting is a mechanism that will remove the special meaning of
3479 metacharacters and reserved words, and will prevent expansion.
3480 There are four quoting mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes,
3481 double-quotes and dollar-single-quotes:
3484 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3486 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
3487 with the escape character reverse solidus
3491 Arguments which are enclosed in
3492 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
3493 retain their literal value.
3494 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
3497 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
3498 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
3499 is retained, with the exception of dollar sign
3501 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
3503 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
3505 which will escape any of the characters dollar sign
3507 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
3511 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
3513 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
3514 but has no special meaning otherwise.
3517 Arguments enclosed in
3518 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
3519 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
3520 expanded as follows:
3522 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".Ql \eNNN"
3524 bell control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BEL).
3526 backspace control characer (ASCII and ISO-10646 BS).
3528 escape control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 ESC).
3532 form feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 FF).
3534 line feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 LF).
3536 carriage return control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 CR).
3538 horizontal tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 HT).
3540 vertical tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 VT).
3542 emits a reverse solidus character.
3546 double quote (escaping is optional).
3548 eight-bit byte with the octal value
3550 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
3552 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3554 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
3556 (one or two hexadecimal characters, no prefix, see
3558 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3560 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
3562 (one to eight hexadecimal characters) \(em note that Unicode defines the
3563 maximum codepoint ever to be supported as
3568 This escape is only supported in locales that support Unicode (see
3569 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3570 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
3571 point is ASCII compatible or (if the \*(OPal character set conversion is
3572 available) can be represented in the current locale.
3573 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3577 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal characters.
3579 Emits the non-printable (ASCII and compatible) C0 control codes
3580 0 (NUL) to 31 (US), and 127 (DEL).
3581 Printable representations of ASCII control codes can be created by
3582 mapping them to a different part of the ASCII character set, which is
3583 possible by adding the number 64 for the codes 0 to 31, e.g., 7 (BEL) is
3584 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
3585 The real operation is a bitwise logical XOR with 64 (bit 7 set, see
3587 thus also covering code 127 (DEL), which is mapped to 63 (question mark):
3588 .Ql ? vexpr ^ 127 64 .
3590 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
3591 visualization purposes of control codes, e.g.,
3593 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
3595 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO-10646, ISO C) aliases,
3596 as shown above (e.g.,
3600 whenever such an alias exists it will be used for display purposes.
3601 The control code NUL
3603 a non-standard extension) will suppress further output for the remains
3604 of the token (which may extend beyond the current quote), or, depending
3605 on the context, the remains of all arguments for the current command.
3607 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
3608 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
3610 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
3617 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3618 ? echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
3619 ? echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
3620 ? echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
3624 .\" .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands" {{{
3625 .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands"
3627 A special set of commands, which all have the string
3629 in their name, e.g.,
3633 take raw string data as input, which means that the content of the
3634 command input line is passed completely unexpanded and otherwise
3635 unchanged: like this the effect of the actual codec is visible without
3636 any noise of possible shell quoting rules etc., i.e., the user can input
3637 one-to-one the desired or questionable data.
3638 To gain a level of expansion, the entire command line can be
3642 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3643 ? vput shcodec res encode /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3645 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3647 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3648 ? eval shcodec d $res
3649 /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3653 .\" .Ss "Filename transformations" {{{
3654 .Ss "Filename transformations"
3656 Filenames, where expected, and unless documented otherwise, are
3657 subsequently subject to the following filename transformations, in
3660 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3662 If the given name is a registered
3664 it will be replaced with the expanded shortcut.
3667 The filename is matched against the following patterns or strings:
3669 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".Ar %user"
3671 (Number sign) is expanded to the previous file.
3673 (Percent sign) is replaced by the invoking
3674 .Mx -ix "primary system mailbox"
3675 user's primary system mailbox, which either is the (itself expandable)
3677 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3679 if that is set, or a built-in compile-time default otherwise.
3681 Expands to the primary system mailbox of
3683 (and never the value of
3685 regardless of its actual setting).
3687 (Ampersand) is replaced with the invoking users
3688 .Mx -ix "secondary mailbox"
3689 secondary mailbox, the
3696 directory (if that variable is set).
3698 Expands to the same value as
3700 but has special meaning when used with, e.g., the command
3702 the file will be treated as a primary system mailbox by, e.g., the
3706 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3707 session will be moved to the
3709 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3713 Meta expansions may be applied to the resulting filename, as allowed by
3714 the operation and applicable to the resulting access protocol (also see
3715 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
3716 For the file-protocol, a leading tilde
3718 character will be replaced by the expansion of
3720 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
3721 directory of the given user is used instead.
3723 A shell expansion as if specified in double-quotes (see
3724 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
3725 may be applied, so that any occurrence of
3729 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible;
3730 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3733 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism.
3735 Shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
3737 may be applied as documented.
3738 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
3739 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
3741 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
3743 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, e.g., a file
3744 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
3746 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
3750 .\" .Ss "Commands" {{{
3753 The following commands are available:
3755 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
3762 command which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the
3763 previously executed command if the internal variable
3766 This command supports
3769 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
3770 and manages the error number
3772 A 0 or positive exit status
3774 reflects the exit status of the command, negative ones that
3775 an error happened before the command was executed, or that the program
3776 did not exit cleanly, but, e.g., due to a signal: the error number is
3777 .Va ^ERR Ns -CHILD ,
3781 In conjunction with the
3783 modifier the following special cases exist:
3784 a negative exit status occurs if the collected data could not be stored
3785 in the given variable, which is a
3787 error that should otherwise not occur.
3788 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
3789 indicates that no temporary file could be created to collect the command
3790 output at first glance.
3791 In case of catchable out-of-memory situations
3793 will occur and \*(UA will try to store the empty string, just like with
3794 all other detected error conditions.
3799 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
3801 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
3804 indicating special character, which means that, e.g., trailing comments
3805 on a line are not possible.
3809 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
3815 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
3816 a numeric argument n.
3820 Show the current message number (the
3825 Show a brief summary of commands.
3826 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
3827 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
3828 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
3829 synopsis, try, e.g.,
3834 and see how the output changes.
3835 This mode also supports a more
3837 output, which will provide the informations documented for
3848 .It Ic account , unaccount
3849 (ac, una) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
3850 Accounts are special incarnations of
3852 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
3853 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
3854 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
3856 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
3861 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted by the
3862 latter command, and in one operation with the special name
3864 Also for all but it a possibly set
3865 .Va on-account-cleanup
3866 hook is called once they are left.
3868 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
3869 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
3871 of that account will be activated (as via
3873 a possibly installed
3875 will be run, and the internal variable
3878 The two argument form is identical to defining a macro as via
3880 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3882 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
3883 set from='(My Name) myname@myisp.example'
3884 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
3891 Perform email address codec transformations on raw-data argument, rather
3892 according to email standards (RFC 5322; \*(ID will furtherly improve).
3896 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
3897 and manages the error number
3899 The first argument must be either
3900 .Ar [+[+[+]]]e[ncode] ,
3905 and specifies the operation to perform on the rest of the line.
3908 Decoding will show how a standard-compliant MUA will display the given
3909 argument, which should be an email address.
3910 Please be aware that most MUAs have difficulties with the address
3911 standards, and vary wildly when (comments) in parenthesis,
3913 strings, or quoted-pairs, as below, become involved.
3914 \*(ID \*(UA currently does not perform decoding when displaying addresses.
3917 Skinning is identical to decoding but only outputs the plain address,
3918 without any string, comment etc. components.
3919 Another difference is that it may fail with the error number
3923 if decoding fails to find a(n) (valid) email address, in which case the
3924 unmodified input will be output again.
3928 first performs a skin operation, and thereafter checks a valid
3929 address for whether it is a registered mailing-list (see
3933 eventually reporting that state in the error number
3936 .Va ^ERR Ns -EXIST .
3937 (This state could later become overwritten by an I/O error, though.)
3940 Encoding supports four different modes, lesser automatized versions can be
3941 chosen by prefixing one, two or three plus signs: the standard imposes
3942 a special meaning on some characters, which thus have to be transformed
3943 to so-called quoted-pairs by pairing them with a reverse solidus
3945 in order to remove the special meaning; this might change interpretation
3946 of the entire argument from what has been desired, however!
3947 Specify one plus sign to remark that parenthesis shall be left alone,
3948 two for not turning double quotation marks into quoted-pairs, and three
3949 for also leaving any user-specified reverse solidus alone.
3950 The result will always be valid, if a successful exit status is reported
3951 (\*(ID the current parser fails this assertion for some constructs).
3952 \*(ID Addresses need to be specified in between angle brackets
3955 if the construct becomes more difficult, otherwise the current parser
3956 will fail; it is not smart enough to guess right.
3958 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3959 ? addrc enc "Hey, you",<diet@exam.ple>\e out\e there
3960 "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3961 ? addrc d "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3962 "Hey, you", \e out\e there <diet@exam.ple>
3963 ? addrc s "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3970 .It Ic alias , unalias
3971 (a, una) Aliases are a method of creating personal distribution lists
3972 that map a single alias name to none to multiple real receivers;
3973 these aliases become expanded after message composing is completed.
3974 The latter command removes the given list of aliases, the special name
3976 will discard all existing aliases.
3978 The former command shows all currently defined aliases when used without
3979 arguments, and with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
3980 With more than one argument, creates or appends to the alias name given
3981 as the first argument the remaining arguments.
3982 Alias names adhere to the Postfix MTA
3984 rules and are thus restricted to alphabetic characters, digits, the
3985 underscore, hyphen-minus, the number sign, colon and commercial at,
3986 the last character can also be the dollar sign; the regular expression:
3987 .Ql [[:alnum:]_#:@-]+$? .
3988 As extensions the exclamation mark
3993 .Dq any character that has the high bit set
3998 .It Ic alternates , unalternates
3999 \*(NQ (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses or names of the active user,
4000 members of which will be removed from recipient lists.
4001 The latter command removes the given list of alternates, the special name
4003 will discard all existing aliases.
4004 The former command manages the error number
4006 and shows the current set of alternates when used without arguments; in
4007 this mode it supports
4010 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4011 Otherwise the given arguments (after being checked for validity) are
4012 appended to the list of alternate names; in
4014 mode they replace that list instead.
4015 There is a set of implicit alternates which is formed of the values of
4024 .It Ic answered , unanswered
4025 Take a message lists and mark each message as having been answered,
4026 having not been answered, respectively.
4027 Messages will be marked answered when being
4029 to automatically if the
4033 .Sx "Message states" .
4038 .It Ic bind , unbind
4039 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
4040 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4041 with freely configurable key bindings.
4042 The latter command removes from the given context the given key binding,
4043 both of which may be specified as a wildcard
4047 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
4048 Due to initialization order unbinding will not work for built-in key
4049 bindings upon program startup, however: please use
4050 .Va line-editor-no-defaults
4051 for this purpose instead.
4054 With one argument the former command shows all key bindings for the
4055 given context, specifying an asterisk
4057 will show the bindings of all contexts; a more verbose listing will be
4058 produced if either of
4063 With two or more arguments a binding is (re)established:
4064 the first argument is the context to which the binding shall apply,
4065 the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
4067 which form the binding, and any remaining arguments form the expansion.
4068 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
4069 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, a commercial at
4071 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
4072 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
4073 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
4076 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding will not be seen
4077 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
4078 This is not true for the shared binding
4080 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
4081 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
4082 The available contexts are the shared
4086 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
4088 which applies to compose mode only.
4092 which form the binding are specified as a comma-separated list of
4093 byte-sequences, where each list entry corresponds to one key(press).
4094 A list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
4096 also refer to the name of a terminal capability; several dozen names
4097 will be compiled in and may be specified either by their
4099 or, if existing, by their
4101 name, regardless of the actually used \*(OPal terminal control library.
4102 It is possible to use any capability, as long as the name is resolvable
4103 by the \*(OPal control library or was defined via the internal variable
4105 Input sequences are not case-normalized, so that an exact match is
4106 required to update or remove a binding.
4109 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4110 ? bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
4111 ? bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc, Delete
4112 ? bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo An editable binding@'
4113 ? bind default a,b,c rm -irf / @ # Another editable binding
4114 ? bind default :kf1 File %
4115 ? bind compose :kf1 ~e
4119 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
4120 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, before being parsed
4121 and expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
4122 whitespace needs to be properly quoted, see
4123 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
4124 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
4125 defunctional if the locale does not support Unicode (see
4126 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
4127 and using terminal capabilities does so if no (corresponding) terminal
4128 control support is (currently) available.
4131 The following terminal capability names are built-in and can be used in
4133 or (if available) the two-letter
4136 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
4139 can be used to show all the capabilities of
4141 or the given terminal type;
4144 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
4147 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
4148 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
4150 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
4152 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
4153 \(em shifted variant.
4154 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
4155 Clear to end of line.
4156 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
4158 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
4160 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
4161 \(em shifted variant.
4162 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
4164 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
4165 \(em shifted variant.
4166 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
4168 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
4170 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
4172 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
4173 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
4174 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
4175 \(em shifted variant.
4176 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
4177 Right cursor (ditto).
4178 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
4179 \(em shifted variant.
4180 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
4181 Down cursor (ditto).
4183 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4184 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
4187 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4188 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
4190 Add one for each function key up to
4195 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
4197 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
4199 Add one for each function key up to
4207 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
4209 For example, the delete key,
4211 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
4213 then a number is appended for the states
4225 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
4227 The same for the left cursor key,
4229 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
4232 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (e.g.,
4234 for bindings which describe user key combinations (as opposed to purely
4235 terminal capability based ones), in order to avoid ambiguities whether
4236 input belongs to key sequences or not; it also reduces search time.
4239 may help shall keys and sequences be falsely recognized.
4244 \*(NQ Calls the given macro, which must have been created via
4249 Calling macros recursively will at some time excess the stack size
4250 limit, causing a hard program abortion; if recursively calling a macro
4251 is the last command of the current macro, consider to use the command
4253 which will first release all resources of the current macro before
4254 replacing the current macro with the called one.
4255 Numeric and string operations can be performed via
4259 may be helpful to recreate argument lists.
4266 if the given macro has been created via
4268 but doesn't fail nor warn if the macro doesn't exist.
4272 (ch) Change the working directory to
4274 or the given argument.
4280 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
4281 Takes a message list and a filename and saves the certificates
4282 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
4283 human-readable and PEM format.
4284 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
4285 respective message senders by setting
4286 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
4291 .It Ic charsetalias , uncharsetalias
4292 \*(NQ Manage (character set conversion) character set alias mappings,
4293 as documented in the section
4294 .Sx "Character sets" .
4295 Character set aliases are expanded recursively, but no expansion is
4296 performed on values of the user-settable variables, e.g.,
4298 These are effectively no-operations if character set conversion
4299 is not available (i.e., no
4303 Without arguments the list of all currently defined aliases is shown,
4304 with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
4305 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of character sets and
4306 their desired target alias name, creating new or changing already
4307 existing aliases, as necessary.
4309 The latter deletes all aliases given as arguments, the special argument
4311 will remove all aliases.
4315 (ch) Change the working directory to
4317 or the given argument.
4323 .It Ic collapse , uncollapse
4324 Only applicable to threaded mode.
4325 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
4326 in header summaries, except for
4330 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4331 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4332 The latter command undoes collapsing.
4337 .It Ic colour , uncolour
4338 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings of and for a
4339 .Sx "Coloured display" .
4340 The type of colour is given as the (case-insensitive) first argument,
4341 which must be one of
4343 for 256-colour terminals,
4348 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 color palette and
4352 for monochrome terminals.
4353 Monochrome terminals cannot deal with colours, but only (some) font
4357 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
4358 for the given colour type is shown (as a special case giving
4362 will show the mappings of all types).
4363 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, and the third
4364 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
4365 specification(s), and the optional fourth argument can be used to
4366 specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are tested in
4367 (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been found, and
4368 the default mapping (if any has been established) will only be chosen as
4370 The types of precondition available depend on the mappable slot (see
4371 .Sx "Coloured display"
4372 for some examples), the following of which exist:
4375 Mappings prefixed with
4377 are used for the \*(OPal built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
4378 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4379 and do not support preconditions.
4381 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4383 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
4384 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
4391 Mappings prefixed with
4393 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
4395 (the current message) and
4397 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
4398 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
4400 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4402 This mapping is used for the
4404 that can be created with the
4408 formats of the variable
4411 For the complete header summary line except the
4413 and the thread structure.
4415 For the thread structure which can be created with the
4417 format of the variable
4422 Mappings prefixed with
4424 are used when displaying messages.
4426 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4428 This mapping is used for so-called
4430 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines.
4433 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
4434 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
4435 available then if any of the
4437 (extended) regular expression characters is seen the precondition will
4438 be evaluated as (an extended) one.
4440 For the introductional message info line.
4441 .It Ar view-partinfo
4442 For MIME part info lines.
4446 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
4447 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
4457 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
4458 attributes for a single mapping.
4461 foreground colour attribute:
4471 To specify a 256-color mode a decimal number colour specification in
4472 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
4474 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
4476 the standard ISO 6429 colors, as above.
4478 high intensity variants of the standard colors.
4480 216 colors in tuples of 6.
4482 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
4484 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4486 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4487 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4489 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4490 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4492 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4493 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4497 background colour attribute (see
4499 for possible values).
4505 will remove for the given colour type (the special type
4507 selects all) the given mapping; if the optional precondition argument is
4508 given only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4511 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed), thus
4513 will remove all established mappings.
4518 .It Ic commandalias , uncommandalias
4519 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, command aliases.
4520 An (command)alias can be used everywhere a normal command can be used,
4521 but always takes precedence: any arguments that are given to the command
4522 alias are joined onto the alias expansion, and the resulting string
4523 forms the command line that is, in effect, executed.
4524 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name
4526 will remove all existing aliases.
4527 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4528 known aliases, with one argument only the expansion of the given one.
4530 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
4531 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
4532 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
4533 An alias may itself expand to another alias, but to avoid expansion loops
4534 further expansion will be prevented if an alias refers to itself or if
4535 an expansion depth limit is reached.
4536 Explicit expansion prevention is available via reverse solidus
4539 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
4540 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4542 \*(uA: `commandalias': no such alias: xx
4543 ? commandalias xx echo hello,
4545 commandalias xx 'echo hello,'
4554 (C) Copy messages to files whose names are derived from the author of
4555 the respective message and do not mark them as being saved;
4556 otherwise identical to
4561 (c) Copy messages to the named file and do not mark them as being saved;
4562 otherwise identical to
4567 Show the name of the current working directory, as reported by
4572 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4573 The return status is tracked via
4578 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4580 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4584 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4586 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4591 .It Ic define , undefine
4592 The latter command deletes the given macro, the special name
4594 will discard all existing macros.
4595 Deletion of (a) macro(s) can be performed from within running macro(s).
4596 Without arguments the former command prints the current list of macros,
4597 including their content, otherwise it it defines a macro, replacing an
4598 existing one of the same name as applicable.
4601 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
4606 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, e.g., a
4608 Execution of a macro body can be stopped from within by calling
4612 Temporary macro block-scope variables can be created or deleted with the
4614 command modifier in conjunction with the commands
4619 To enforce unrolling of changes made to (global)
4620 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4623 can be used instead; its covered scope depends on how (i.e.,
4625 normal macro, folder hook, hook,
4627 switch) the macro is invoked.
4632 ed macro, the given positional parameters are implicitly local
4633 to the macro's scope, and may be accessed via the variables
4639 as well as any other positive unsigned decimal number (less than
4641 Positional parameters can be
4643 ed, or become completely replaced, removed etc. via
4646 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4656 echo Parameter 1 of ${#} is ${1}, all: ${*} / ${@}
4659 call exmac Hello macro exmac!
4660 echo ${?}/${!}/${^ERRNAME}
4666 .It Ic delete , undelete
4667 (d, u) Marks the given message list as being or not being
4669 respectively; if no argument has been specified then the usual search
4670 for a visible message is performed, as documented for
4671 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
4672 showing only the next input prompt if the search fails.
4673 Deleted messages will neither be saved in the
4675 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4677 nor will they be available for most other commands.
4680 variable is set, the new
4682 or the last message restored, respectively, is automatically
4692 Superseded by the multiplexer
4698 Delete the given messages and automatically
4702 if one exists, regardless of the setting of
4709 up or down by one message when given
4713 argument, respectively.
4717 .It Ic draft , undraft
4718 Take message lists and mark each given message as being draft, or not
4719 being draft, respectively, as documented in the section
4720 .Sx "Message states" .
4724 \*(NQ (ec) Echoes arguments to standard output and writes a trailing
4725 newline, whereas the otherwise identical
4728 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
4730 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4731 are applied to the expanded arguments.
4732 This command also supports
4735 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
4736 and manages the error number
4738 if data is stored in a variable then the return value reflects the
4739 length of the result string in case of success and is
4747 except that is echoes to standard error.
4750 In interactive sessions the \*(OPal message ring queue for
4752 will be used instead, if available and
4760 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
4766 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
4770 (e) Point the text editor (as defined in
4772 at each message from the given list in turn.
4773 Modified contents are discarded unless the
4775 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
4776 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
4781 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4782 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
4784 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
4785 if it evaluates true.
4790 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4791 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
4795 commands was true, the
4801 (en) Marks the end of an
4802 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4803 conditional execution block.
4808 \*(NQ \*(UA has a strict notion about which variables are
4809 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4810 and which are managed in the program
4812 Since some of the latter are a vivid part of \*(UAs functioning,
4813 however, they are transparently integrated into the normal handling of
4814 internal variables via
4818 To integrate other environment variables of choice into this
4819 transparent handling, and also to export internal variables into the
4820 process environment where they normally are not, a
4822 needs to become established with this command, as in, e.g.,
4825 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB TZ
4828 Afterwards changing such variables with
4830 will cause automatic updates of the program environment, and therefore
4831 be inherited by newly created child processes.
4832 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
4833 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
4835 will remove them also from the program environment, but in any way
4836 the knowledge they ever have been
4839 Note that this implies that
4841 may cause loss of such links.
4846 will remove an existing link, but leaves the variables as such intact.
4847 Additionally the subcommands
4851 are provided, which work exactly the same as the documented commands
4855 but (additionally un)link the variable(s) with the program environment
4856 and thus immediately export them to, or remove them from (if possible),
4857 respectively, the program environment.
4862 \*(OP Since \*(UA uses the console as a user interface it can happen
4863 that messages scroll by too fast to become recognized.
4864 An error message ring queue is available which stores duplicates of any
4865 error message and notifies the user in interactive sessions whenever
4866 a new error has occurred.
4867 The queue is finite: if its maximum size is reached any new message
4868 replaces the eldest.
4871 can be used to manage this message queue: if given
4873 or no argument the queue will be displayed and cleared,
4875 will only clear all messages from the queue.
4879 \*(NQ Construct a command by concatenating the arguments, separated with
4880 a single space character, and then evaluate the result.
4881 This command passes through the exit status
4885 of the evaluated command; also see
4887 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4898 call yyy '\ecall xxx' "b\e$'\et'u ' "
4906 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
4907 any saving of messages in the
4909 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4911 as well as a possibly tracked line editor
4913 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
4915 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
4916 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
4917 otherwise success indicating status.
4923 but open the mailbox read-only.
4928 (fi) The file command switches to a new mailbox.
4929 Without arguments it shows status information of the current mailbox.
4930 If an argument is given, it will write out changes (such as deletions)
4931 the user has made, open a new mailbox, update the internal variables
4932 .Va mailbox-resolved
4934 .Va mailbox-display ,
4935 and optionally display a summary of
4942 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4943 will be applied to the
4947 prefixes are, i.e., URL syntax is understood, e.g.,
4948 .Ql maildir:///tmp/mdirbox :
4949 if a protocol prefix is used the mailbox type is fixated and neither
4950 the auto-detection (read on) nor the
4953 \*(OPally URLs can also be used to access network resources, which may
4954 be accessed securely via
4955 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
4956 if so supported, and it is possible to proxy all network traffic over
4957 a SOCKS5 server given via
4961 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
4962 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
4965 \*(OPally supported network protocols are
4969 (POP3 with SSL/TLS encrypted transport),
4975 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
4977 Network URLs require a special encoding as documented in the section
4978 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
4981 If the resulting file protocol (MBOX database)
4983 is located on a local filesystem then the list of all registered
4985 s is traversed in order to see whether a transparent intermediate
4986 conversion step is necessary to handle the given mailbox, in which case
4987 \*(UA will use the found hook to load and save data into and from
4988 a temporary file, respectively.
4989 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes.
4990 For example, the following creates hooks for the
4992 compression tool and a combined compressed and encrypted format:
4994 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4996 gzip 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' \e
4997 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5001 MBOX database files are generally locked during file operations in order
5002 to avoid inconsistencies due to concurrent modifications.
5003 \*(OPal Mailbox files which \*(UA treats as the system
5008 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
5009 es in general will also be protected by so-called dotlock files, the
5010 traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
5014 will be created for the duration of the synchronization \(em
5015 as necessary a privilege-separated dotlock child process will be used
5016 to accommodate for necessary privilege adjustments in order to create
5017 the dotlock file in the same directory
5018 and with the same user and group identities as the file of interest.
5021 \*(UA by default uses tolerant POSIX rules when reading MBOX database
5022 files, but it will detect invalid message boundaries in this mode and
5023 complain (even more with
5025 if any is seen: in this case
5027 can be used to create a valid MBOX database from the invalid input.
5030 If no protocol has been fixated, and
5032 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
5037 then it is treated as a folder in
5040 The maildir format stores each message in its own file, and has been
5041 designed so that file locking is not necessary when reading or writing
5045 \*(ID If no protocol has been fixated and no existing file has
5046 been found, the variable
5048 controls the format of mailboxes yet to be created.
5053 .It Ic filetype , unfiletype
5054 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, file handler hooks,
5055 which provide (shell) commands that enable \*(UA to load and save MBOX
5056 files from and to files with the registered file extensions;
5057 it will use an intermediate temporary file to store the plain data.
5058 The latter command removes the hooks for all given extensions,
5060 will remove all existing handlers.
5062 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
5063 defined file hooks, with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
5064 Otherwise three arguments are expected, the first specifying the file
5065 extension for which the hook is meant, and the second and third defining
5066 the load- and save commands, respectively, to deal with the file type,
5067 both of which must read from standard input and write to standard
5069 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes (\*(ID except below).
5070 \*(ID For now too much work is done, and files are oftened read in twice
5071 where once would be sufficient: this can cause problems if a filetype is
5072 changed while such a file is opened; this was already so with the
5073 built-in support of .gz etc. in Heirloom, and will vanish in v15.
5074 \*(ID For now all handler strings are passed to the
5075 .Ev SHELL for evaluation purposes; in the future a
5077 prefix to load and save commands may mean to bypass this shell instance:
5078 placing a leading space will avoid any possible misinterpretations.
5079 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5080 ? filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
5081 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
5082 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
5083 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5084 ? set record=+sent.zst.pgp
5089 .It Ic flag , unflag
5090 Take message lists and mark the messages as being flagged, or not being
5091 flagged, respectively, for urgent/special attention.
5093 .Sx "Message states" .
5102 With no arguments, list the names of the folders in the folder directory.
5103 With an existing folder as an argument,
5104 lists the names of folders below the named folder.
5110 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5111 recipient's address (instead of in
5118 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5119 recipient's address (instead of in
5126 but responds to all recipients regardless of the
5131 .It Ic followupsender
5134 but responds to the sender only regardless of the
5142 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
5143 recipient's address (instead of in
5148 Takes a message and the address of a recipient
5149 and forwards the message to him.
5150 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
5151 with the value of the
5152 .Va forward-inject-head
5153 variable preceding it.
5154 To filter the included header fields to the desired subset use the
5156 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
5158 Only the first part of a multipart message is included unless
5159 .Va forward-as-attachment ,
5160 and recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names
5161 etc. unless the internal variable
5165 This may generate the errors
5166 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5167 if no receiver has been specified,
5169 if some addressees where rejected by
5172 if no applicable messages have been given,
5174 if multiple messages have been specified,
5176 if an I/O error occurs,
5178 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5184 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
5185 their message headers, exactly as via
5187 An alias of this command is
5190 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
5201 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5205 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5208 .It Ic ghost , unghost
5211 .Ic uncommandalias .
5215 .It Ic headerpick , unheaderpick
5216 \*(NQ Multiplexer command to manage white- and blacklisting
5217 selections of header fields for a variety of applications.
5218 Without arguments the set of contexts that have settings is displayed.
5219 When given arguments, the first argument is the context to which the
5220 command applies, one of (case-insensitive)
5222 for display purposes (via, e.g.,
5225 for selecting which headers shall be stored persistently when
5231 ing messages (note that MIME related etc. header fields should not be
5232 ignored in order to not destroy usability of the message in this case),
5234 for stripping down messages when
5236 ing message (has no effect if
5237 .Va forward-as-attachment
5240 for defining user-defined set of fields for the command
5243 The current settings of the given context are displayed if it is the
5245 A second argument denotes the type of restriction that is to be chosen,
5246 it may be (a case-insensitive prefix of)
5250 for white- and blacklisting purposes, respectively.
5251 Establishing a whitelist suppresses inspection of the corresponding
5254 If no further argument is given the current settings of the given type
5255 will be displayed, otherwise the remaining arguments specify header
5256 fields, which \*(OPally may be given as regular expressions, to be added
5258 The special wildcard field (asterisk,
5260 will establish a (fast) shorthand setting which covers all fields.
5262 The latter command always takes three or more arguments and can be used
5263 to remove selections, i.e., from the given context, the given type of
5264 list, all the given headers will be removed, the special argument
5266 will remove all headers.
5270 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
5273 and the style of which can be adjusted with the variable
5275 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
5276 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
5289 (this mode also supports a more
5293 the list of history entries;
5296 argument selects and evaluates the respective history entry,
5297 which will become the new history top; a negative number is used as an
5298 offset to the current command, e.g.,
5300 will select the last command, the history top.
5301 The default mode if no arguments are given is
5304 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
5305 for more on this topic.
5311 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
5316 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5318 Does not override the
5321 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
5323 command issued after
5325 will display the following message, not the current one.
5330 (i) Part of the nestable
5331 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
5332 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
5333 the encapsulated block is executed.
5334 The POSIX standards supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
5339 end, all remaining conditions are non-portable extensions.
5340 \*(ID These commands do not yet use
5341 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5342 and therefore do not know about input tokens, so that syntax
5343 elements have to be surrounded by whitespace; in v15 \*(UA will inspect
5344 all conditions bracket group wise and consider the tokens, representing
5345 values and operators, therein, which also means that variables will
5346 already have been expanded at that time (just like in the shell).
5348 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5357 The (case-insensitive) condition
5359 erminal will evaluate to true if the standard input is a terminal, i.e.,
5360 in interactive sessions.
5361 Another condition can be any boolean value (see the section
5362 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5363 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
5366 .Dq always execute .
5367 (It shall be remarked that a faulty condition skips all branches until
5372 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5373 will be used, and this command will simply interpret expanded tokens.)
5374 It is possible to check
5375 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5378 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
5379 value or another variable by using the
5381 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
5382 conditional trigger character;
5383 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
5385 Variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
5386 When this mode has been triggered, several operators are available:
5389 Integer operators treat the arguments on the left and right hand side of
5390 the operator as integral numbers and compare them arithmetically.
5391 It is an error if any of the operands is not a valid integer, an empty
5392 argument (which implies it had been quoted) is treated as if it were 0.
5393 Available operators are
5397 (less than or equal to),
5403 (greater than or equal to), and
5408 String data operators compare the left and right hand side according to
5409 their textual content.
5410 Unset variables are treated as the empty string.
5411 The behaviour of string operators can be adjusted by prefixing the
5412 operator with the modifier trigger commercial at
5414 followed by none to multiple modifiers: for now supported is
5416 which turns the comparison into a case-insensitive one: this is
5417 implied if no modifier follows the trigger.
5420 Available string operators are
5424 (less than or equal to),
5430 (greater than or equal to),
5434 (is substring of) and
5436 (is not substring of).
5437 By default these operators work on bytes and (therefore) do not take
5438 into account character set specifics.
5439 If the case-insensitivity modifier has been used, case is ignored
5440 according to the rules of the US-ASCII encoding, i.e., bytes are
5444 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
5450 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
5451 matched according to the active locale (see
5452 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
5453 i.e., character sets should be honoured correctly.
5456 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
5458 and the OR operator is
5460 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
5461 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
5463 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
5464 them in pairs of brackets
5465 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
5466 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
5470 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
5471 via unary operators: the unary operator
5473 will reverse the result.
5475 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5476 # (This not in v15, there [ -n "$debug"]!)
5480 if [ "$ttycharset" == UTF-8 ] || \e
5481 [ "$ttycharset" @i== UTF8 ]
5482 echo *ttycharset* is UTF-8, the former case-sensitive!
5485 if [ "${t1}" == "${t2}" ]
5486 echo These two variables are equal
5488 if [ "$features" =% +regex ] && \e
5489 [ "$TERM" @i=~ "^xterm\&.*" ]
5490 echo ..in an X terminal
5492 if [ [ true ] && [ [ "${debug}" != '' ] || \e
5493 [ "$verbose" != '' ] ] ]
5496 if true && [ "$debug" != '' ] || [ "${verbose}" != '' ]
5497 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
5506 Superseded by the multiplexer
5511 Shows the names of all available commands, alphabetically sorted.
5512 If given any non-whitespace argument the list will be shown in the order
5513 in which command prefixes are searched.
5514 \*(OP In conjunction with a set variable
5516 additional information will be provided for each command: the argument
5517 type will be indicated, the documentation string will be shown,
5518 and the set of command flags will show up:
5520 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql NEEDS_BOX"
5522 command supports the command modifier
5525 command supports the command modifier
5528 the error number is tracked in
5531 commands needs an active mailbox, a
5533 .It Ql "ok: batch/interactive"
5534 command may only be used in interactive or
5537 .It Ql "ok: send mode"
5538 command can be used in send mode.
5539 .It Ql "not ok: compose mode"
5540 command is not available when in compose mode.
5541 .It Ql "not ok: startup"
5542 command cannot be used during program startup, e.g., while loading
5543 .Sx "Resource files" .
5544 .It Ql "ok: subprocess"
5545 command is allowed to be used when running in a subprocess instance,
5546 e.g., from within a macro that is called via
5547 .Va on-compose-splice .
5549 The command produces
5558 This command can be used to localize changes to (linked)
5561 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
5562 meaning that their state will be reverted to the former one once the
5565 Just like the command modifier
5567 which provides block-scope localization for some commands (instead),
5568 it can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
5572 The covered scope of an
5574 is left once a different account is activated, and some macros, notably
5575 .Va folder-hook Ns s ,
5576 use their own specific notion of covered scope, here it will be extended
5577 until the folder is left again.
5580 This setting stacks up: i.e., if
5582 enables change localization and calls
5584 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
5586 will still be reverted when the scope of
5589 (Caveats: if in this example
5591 changes to a different
5593 which sets some variables that are already covered by localizations,
5594 their scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
5596 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
5597 were defined in a local, macro private context!)
5600 This command takes one or two arguments, the optional first one
5601 specifies an attribute that may be one of
5603 which refers to the current scope and is thus the default,
5605 which causes any macro that is being
5607 ed to be started with localization enabled by default, as well as
5609 which (if enabled) disallows any called macro to turn off localization:
5610 like this it can be ensured that once the current scope regains control,
5611 any changes made in deeper levels have been reverted.
5612 The latter two are mutually exclusive, and neither affects
5614 The (second) argument is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
5615 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
5616 and states whether the given attribute shall be turned on or off.
5618 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5619 define temporary_settings {
5620 set possibly_global_option1
5622 set localized_option1
5623 set localized_option2
5625 set possibly_global_option2
5632 Reply to messages that come in via known
5635 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
5636 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
5637 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
5640 functionality this will actively resort and even remove message
5641 recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be sent to
5643 For example it will also implicitly generate a
5644 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
5645 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
5647 For more documentation please refer to
5648 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5650 This may generate the errors
5651 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5652 if no receiver has been specified,
5654 if some addressees where rejected by
5657 if no applicable messages have been given,
5659 if an I/O error occurs,
5661 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5664 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5670 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5671 recipient's address (instead of in
5676 (m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
5677 or asks on standard input if none were given;
5678 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
5679 Unless the internal variable
5681 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
5682 For more documentation please refer to
5683 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5685 This may generate the errors
5686 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5687 if no receiver has been specified,
5689 if some addressees where rejected by
5692 if no applicable messages have been given,
5694 if multiple messages have been specified,
5696 if an I/O error occurs,
5698 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5704 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to the
5706 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5708 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the variable
5711 \*(ID This command can only be used in a
5713 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5717 .It Ic mimetype , unmimetype
5718 Without arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed;
5719 a more verbose listing will be produced if either of
5724 When given arguments they will be joined, interpreted as shown in
5725 .Sx "The mime.types files"
5727 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) ,
5728 and the resulting entry will be added (prepended) to the cache.
5729 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
5730 .Va mimetypes-load-control
5731 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
5733 The latter command deletes all specifications of the given MIME type, thus
5734 .Ql ? unmimetype text/plain
5735 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
5739 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
5741 but which also reenables cache initialization via
5742 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
5746 .It Ic mlist , unmlist
5747 The latter command removes all given mailing-lists, the special name
5749 can be used to remove all registered lists.
5750 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists (and their
5751 attributes, if any) when used without arguments; a more verbose listing
5752 will be produced if either of
5757 Otherwise all given arguments will be added and henceforth be recognized
5759 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available then any argument
5760 which contains any of the
5762 regular expression characters
5766 will be interpreted as one, which allows matching of many addresses with
5767 a single expression.
5770 pair of commands manages subscription attributes of mailing-lists.
5774 \*(ID Only available in interactive mode, this command allows to display
5775 MIME parts which require external MIME handler programs to run which do
5776 not integrate in \*(UAs normal
5779 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
5780 (\*(ID No syntax to directly address parts, this restriction may vanish.)
5781 The user will be asked for each non-text part of the given message in
5782 turn whether the registered handler shall be used to display the part.
5786 .It Ic mlsubscribe , unmlsubscribe
5787 The latter command removes the subscription attribute from all given
5788 mailing-lists, the special name
5790 can be used to do so for any registered list.
5791 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists which have
5792 a subscription attribute when used without arguments; a more verbose
5793 listing will be produced if either of
5798 Otherwise this attribute will be set for all given mailing lists,
5799 newly creating them as necessary (as via
5808 but moves the messages to a file named after the local part of the
5809 sender address of the first message (instead of in
5816 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
5823 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5825 selection, and all MIME parts.
5833 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5834 standard output is a terminal.
5840 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
5842 has been given the content of the
5844 cache is shown, loading it first as necessary.
5847 then the cache will only be initialized and
5849 will remove its contents.
5850 Note that \*(UA will try to load the file only once, use
5851 .Ql Ic \&\&netrc Ns \:\0\:clear
5852 to unlock further attempts.
5857 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
5859 .Sx "The .netrc file"
5860 documents the file format in detail.
5864 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
5866 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
5870 the headers of each new message are also shown.
5871 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
5879 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
5880 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
5894 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
5896 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
5902 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5904 selection, and all MIME parts.
5912 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5913 standard output is a terminal.
5921 but also pipes header fields which would not pass the
5923 selection, and all parts of MIME
5924 .Ql multipart/alternative
5929 (pi) Takes a message list and a shell command
5930 and pipes the messages through the command.
5931 Without an argument the current message is piped through the command
5938 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
5959 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
5962 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5964 preserving all messages marked with
5968 or never referenced in the system
5970 and removing all other messages from the
5972 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5973 If new mail has arrived during the session,
5975 .Dq You have new mail
5977 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line option
5979 then the edit file is rewritten.
5980 A return to the shell is effected,
5981 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
5982 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
5983 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
5985 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
5986 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
5987 otherwise success indicating status.
5991 \*(NQ Read a line from standard input, or the channel set active via
5993 and assign the data, which will be splitted as indicated by
5995 to the given variables.
5996 The variable names are checked by the same rules as documented for
5998 and the same error codes will be seen in
6002 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6004 with the error number
6008 in case of I/O errors, or
6011 If there are more fields than variables, assigns successive fields to the
6012 last given variable.
6013 If there are less fields than variables, assigns the empty string to the
6015 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6018 ? echo "<$a> <$b> <$c>"
6020 ? wysh set ifs=:; read a b c;unset ifs
6021 hey2.0,:"'you ",:world!:mars.:
6022 ? echo $?/$^ERRNAME / <$a><$b><$c>
6023 0/NONE / <hey2.0,><"'you ",><world!:mars.:><><>
6028 \*(NQ Read anything from standard input, or the channel set active via
6030 and assign the data to the given variable.
6031 The variable name is checked by the same rules as documented for
6033 and the same error codes will be seen in
6037 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6039 with the error number
6043 in case of I/O errors, or
6046 \*(ID The input data length is restricted to 31-bits.
6050 \*(NQ Manages input channels for
6054 to be used to avoid complicated or impracticable code, like calling
6056 from within a macro in non-interactive mode.
6057 Without arguments, or when the first argument is
6059 a listing of all known channels is printed.
6060 Channels can otherwise be
6062 d, and existing channels can be
6066 d by giving the string used for creation.
6068 The channel name is expected to be a file descriptor number, or,
6069 if parsing the numeric fails, an input file name that undergoes
6070 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
6071 E.g. (this example requires a modern shell):
6072 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6073 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enyou\enecho $a' |\e
6076 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enecho $a' |\e
6077 LC_ALL=C 6<<< 'you' \*(uA -R#X'readctl create 6'
6091 Removes the named files or directories.
6092 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6093 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6095 are performed on the arguments.
6096 If a name refer to a mailbox, e.g., a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
6097 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
6098 The user is asked for confirmation in interactive mode.
6102 Takes the name of an existing folder
6103 and the name for the new folder
6104 and renames the first to the second one.
6105 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6106 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6108 are performed on both arguments.
6109 Both folders must be of the same type.
6113 (R) Replies to only the sender of each message of the given message
6114 list, by using the first message as the template to quote, for the
6118 will exchange this command with
6120 Unless the internal variable
6122 is set the recipient address will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6124 headers will be inspected if
6128 This may generate the errors
6129 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6130 if no receiver has been specified,
6132 if some addressees where rejected by
6135 if no applicable messages have been given,
6137 if an I/O error occurs,
6139 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6145 (r) Take a message and group-responds to it by addressing the sender
6146 and all recipients, subject to
6150 .Va followup-to-honour ,
6153 .Va recipients-in-cc
6154 influence response behaviour.
6155 Unless the internal variable
6157 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6167 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
6168 For more documentation please refer to
6169 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6171 This may generate the errors
6172 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6173 if no receiver has been specified,
6175 if some addressees where rejected by
6178 if no applicable messages have been given,
6180 if an I/O error occurs,
6182 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6185 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6191 but initiates a group-reply regardless of the value of
6198 but responds to the sender only regardless of the value of
6205 but does not add any header lines.
6206 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
6207 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
6211 Takes a list of messages and a user name
6212 and sends each message to the named user.
6214 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
6217 is only performed if
6221 This may generate the errors
6222 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6223 if no receiver has been specified,
6225 if some addressees where rejected by
6228 if no applicable messages have been given,
6230 if an I/O error occurs,
6232 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6235 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6253 .It Ic respondsender
6259 (ret) Superseded by the multiplexer
6264 Only available inside the scope of a
6268 this will stop evaluation of any further macro content, and return
6269 execution control to the caller.
6270 The two optional parameters must be specified as positive decimal
6271 numbers and default to the value 0:
6272 the first argument specifies the signed 32-bit return value (stored in
6274 \*(ID and later extended to signed 64-bit),
6275 the second the signed 32-bit error number (stored in
6279 a non-0 exit status may cause the program to exit.
6285 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
6286 sender of the first message instead of (in
6288 and) taking a filename argument; the variable
6290 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
6294 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
6295 to the end of the file.
6296 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6297 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6299 is performed on the filename.
6300 If no filename is given, the
6302 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6305 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
6306 is echoed on the user's terminal.
6309 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
6310 the messages are marked for deletion.
6311 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6313 To filter the saved header fields to the desired subset use the
6315 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
6319 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6323 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6327 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6332 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
6333 all matching messages, as via
6335 This command is an alias of
6338 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6342 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
6348 (se, \*(NQ uns) The latter command will delete all given global
6349 variables, or only block-scope local ones if the
6351 command modifier has been used.
6352 The former, when used without arguments, will show all
6353 currently known variables, being more verbose if either of
6358 Remarks: this list mode will not automatically link-in known
6360 variables, but only explicit addressing will, e.g., via
6362 using a variable in an
6364 condition or a string passed to
6368 ting, as well as some program-internal use cases.
6371 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
6372 Arguments are of the form
6374 (no space before or after
6378 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
6379 If a name begins with
6383 the effect is the same as invoking the
6385 command with the remaining part of the variable
6386 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
6387 \*(ID In conjunction with the
6389 .Pf (or\0 Cm local )
6391 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
6392 can be used to quote arguments as necessary.
6393 \*(ID Otherwise quotation marks may be placed around any part of the
6394 assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs.
6397 When operating in global scope any
6399 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
6400 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
6401 environment requires corresponding system support) \(em use the command
6403 for further environmental control.
6404 If the command modifier
6406 has been used to alter the command to work in block-scope all variables
6407 have values (may they be empty), and creation of names which shadow
6408 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6409 is actively prevented (\*(ID shadowing of linked
6411 variables and free-form versions of variable chains is not yet detected).
6416 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6420 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6421 ? wysh set indentprefix=' -> '
6422 ? wysh set atab=$'\t' aspace=' ' zero=0
6428 Apply shell quoting rules to the given raw-data arguments.
6432 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6433 The first argument specifies the operation:
6437 cause shell quoting to be applied to the remains of the line, and
6438 expanded away thereof, respectively.
6439 If the former is prefixed with a plus-sign, the quoted result will not
6440 be roundtrip enabled, and thus can be decoded only in the very same
6441 environment that was used to perform the encode; also see
6442 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
6443 If the coding operation fails the error number
6446 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6447 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6448 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6452 \*(NQ (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell,
6453 and returns its exit status.
6457 .It Ic shortcut , unshortcut
6458 Without arguments the list of all currently defined shortcuts is
6459 shown, with one argument the expansion of the given shortcut.
6460 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of shortcuts and
6461 their expansions, creating new or changing already existing shortcuts,
6463 The latter command will remove all given shortcuts, the special name
6465 will remove all registered shortcuts.
6469 \*(NQ Shift the positional parameter stack (starting at
6471 by the given number (which must be a positive decimal),
6472 or 1 if no argument has been given.
6473 It is an error if the value exceeds the number of positional parameters.
6474 If the given number is 0, no action is performed, successfully.
6475 The stack as such can be managed via
6477 Note this command will fail in
6479 and hook macros unless the positional parameter stack has been
6480 explicitly created in the current context via
6487 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
6488 message text is shown.
6492 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
6497 \*(NQ Sleep for the specified number of seconds (and optionally
6498 milliseconds), by default interruptably.
6499 If a third argument is given the sleep will be uninterruptible,
6500 otherwise the error number
6504 if the sleep has been interrupted.
6505 The command will fail and the error number will be
6506 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
6507 if the given duration(s) overflow the time datatype, and
6509 if the given durations are no valid integers.
6514 .It Ic sort , unsort
6515 The latter command disables sorted or threaded mode, returns to normal
6516 message order and, if the
6519 displays a header summary.
6520 The former command shows the current sorting criterion when used without
6521 an argument, but creates a sorted representation of the current folder
6522 otherwise, and changes the
6524 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
6526 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
6530 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
6531 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
6533 variable, as in, e.g.,
6534 .Ql set autosort=thread .
6535 Possible sorting criterions are:
6538 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
6540 Sort the messages by their
6542 field, that is by the time they were sent.
6544 Sort messages by the value of their
6546 field, that is by the address of the sender.
6549 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
6551 Sort the messages by their size.
6553 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
6556 Sort the messages by their message status.
6558 Sort the messages by their subject.
6560 Create a threaded display.
6562 Sort messages by the value of their
6564 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
6567 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
6573 \*(NQ (so) The source command reads commands from the given file.
6574 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6576 If the given expanded argument ends with a vertical bar
6578 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
6579 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
6580 Dependent on the settings of
6584 and also dependent on whether the command modifier
6586 had been used, encountering errors will stop sourcing of the given input.
6589 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
6590 .Va folder-hook Ns s
6593 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
6598 \*(NQ The difference to
6600 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
6601 this command will not generate an error nor warn if the given file
6602 argument cannot be opened successfully.
6606 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
6612 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
6614 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
6615 Unless otherwise noted the
6617 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
6625 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6629 This also clears the
6631 flag of the messages in question.
6635 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
6636 .Va spam-interface ,
6637 without modifying the messages, but setting their
6639 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
6640 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
6641 Refer to the manual section
6643 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
6647 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
6653 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6659 flag of the messages in question.
6675 slot for white- and blacklisting header fields.
6679 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
6681 lines of each message on the users' terminal.
6682 Unless a special selection has been established for the
6686 command, the only header fields that are displayed are
6697 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
6699 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6704 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in the
6706 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6708 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
6711 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
6717 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6719 selection, and all visualizable parts of MIME
6720 .Ql multipart/alternative
6725 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the users terminal.
6726 The display of message headers is selectable via
6728 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
6730 all parts which have a registered MIME type handler (see
6731 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
6732 which produces plain text output, and all
6734 parts are shown, others are hidden except for their headers.
6735 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6739 can be used to display parts which are not displayable as plain text.
6782 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6786 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6791 Superseded by the multiplexer
6802 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
6813 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
6817 Superseded by the multiplexer
6821 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6825 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6847 Perform URL percent codec operations on the raw-data argument, rather
6848 according to RFC 3986.
6852 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
6853 and manages the error number
6855 This is a character set agnostic and thus locale dependent operation,
6856 and it may decode bytes which are invalid in the current
6858 \*(ID This command does not know about URLs beside that.
6860 The first argument specifies the operation:
6864 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
6868 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
6869 pathnames: it does not allow a tilde
6871 and will neither accept hyphen-minus
6875 as an initial character.
6876 The remains of the line form the URL data which is to be converted.
6877 If the coding operation fails the error number
6880 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6881 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6882 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6886 \*(NQ Edit the values of or create the given variable(s) in the
6888 Boolean variables cannot be edited, and variables can also not be
6894 \*(NQ This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
6898 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
6902 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
6903 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
6904 verification will fail for it.
6905 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
6907 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
6908 within the certificate,
6909 and if the message content has been altered.
6922 \*(NQ Evaluate arguments according to a given operator.
6923 This is a multiplexer command which can be used to perform signed 64-bit
6924 numeric calculations as well as byte string and string operations.
6925 It uses polish notation, i.e., the operator is the first argument and
6926 defines the number and type, and the meaning of the remaining arguments.
6927 An empty argument is replaced with a 0 if a number is expected.
6931 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6934 The result that is shown in case of errors is always
6936 for usage errors and numeric operations, and the empty string for byte
6937 string and string operations;
6938 if the latter two fail to provide result data for
6940 errors, e.g., when a search operation failed, they also set the
6943 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
6944 Except when otherwise noted numeric arguments are parsed as signed 64-bit
6945 numbers, and errors will be reported in the error number
6947 as the numeric error
6948 .Va ^ERR Ns -RANGE .
6951 Numeric operations work on one or two signed 64-bit integers.
6952 Numbers prefixed with
6956 are interpreted as hexadecimal (base 16) numbers, whereas
6958 indicates octal (base 8), and
6962 denote binary (base 2) numbers.
6963 It is possible to use any base in between 2 and 36, inclusive, with the
6965 notation, where the base is given as an unsigned decimal number, e.g.,
6967 is a different way of specifying a hexadecimal number.
6970 One integer is expected by assignment (equals sign
6972 which does nothing but parsing the argument, thus detecting validity and
6973 possible overflow conditions, and unary not (tilde
6975 which creates the bitwise complement.
6976 Two integers are used by addition (plus sign
6978 subtraction (hyphen-minus
6980 multiplication (asterisk
6984 and modulo (percent sign
6986 as well as for the bitwise operators logical or (vertical bar
6989 bitwise and (ampersand
6992 bitwise xor (circumflex
6994 the bitwise signed left- and right shifts
6997 as well as for the unsigned right shift
7001 All numeric operators can be suffixed with a commercial at
7005 this will turn the operation into a saturated one, which means that
7006 overflow errors and division and modulo by zero are no longer reported
7007 via the exit status, but the result will linger at the minimum or
7008 maximum possible value, instead of overflowing (or trapping).
7009 This is true also for the argument parse step.
7010 For the bitwise shifts, the saturated maximum is 63.
7011 Any catched overflow will be reported via the error number
7014 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7015 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7016 ? vexpr -@ +1 -9223372036854775808
7017 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME
7021 Character set agnostic string functions have no notion of locale
7022 settings and character sets.
7024 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
7027 .Sx "Filename transformations"
7030 Generates a random string of the given length, or of
7032 bytes (a constant from
7034 if the value 0 is given; the random string will be base64url encoded
7035 according to RFC 4648, and thus be usable as a (portable) filename.
7039 Byte string operations work on 8-bit bytes and have no notion of locale
7040 settings and character sets, effectively assuming ASCII data.
7043 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm length"
7045 Queries the length of the given argument.
7048 Calculates the Chris Torek hash of the given argument.
7051 Byte-searches in the first for the second argument.
7052 Shows the resulting 0-based offset shall it have been found.
7057 but works case-insensitively according to the rules of the ASCII
7061 Creates a substring of its first argument.
7062 The second argument is the 0-based starting offset, a negative one
7063 counts from the end;
7064 the optional third argument specifies the length of the desired result,
7065 a negative length leaves off the given number of bytes at the end of the
7066 original string, by default the entire string is used;
7067 this operation tries to work around faulty arguments (set
7069 for error logs), but reports them via the error number
7072 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7075 Trim away whitespace characters from both ends of the argument.
7078 Trim away whitespace characters from the begin of the argument.
7081 Trim away whitespace characters from the end of the argument.
7086 String operations work, sufficient support provided, according to the
7087 active user's locale encoding and character set (see
7088 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
7091 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm regex"
7093 (One-way) Converts the argument to something safely printable on the
7097 \*(OP A string operation that will try to match the first argument with
7098 the regular expression given as the second argument.
7099 If the optional third argument has been given then instead of showing
7100 the match offset a replacement operation is performed: the third
7101 argument is treated as if specified via dollar-single-quote (see
7102 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) ,
7103 and any occurrence of a positional parameter, e.g.,
7105 is replaced by the corresponding match group of the regular expression:
7106 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7107 ? vput vexpr res regex bananarama \e
7108 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7109 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7113 On otherwise identical case-insensitive equivalent to
7115 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7116 ? vput vexpr res ire bananarama \e
7117 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7118 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7125 \*(NQ Manage the positional parameter stack (see
7129 If the first argument is
7131 then the positional parameter stack of the current context, or the
7132 global one, if there is none, is cleared.
7135 then the remaining arguments will be used to (re)create the stack,
7136 if the parameter stack size limit is excessed an
7137 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
7141 If the first argument is
7143 a round-trip capable representation of the stack contents is created,
7144 with each quoted parameter separated from each other with the first
7147 and followed by the first character of
7149 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
7150 If that results in no separation at all a
7156 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7157 I.e., the subcommands
7161 can be used (in conjunction with
7163 to (re)create an argument stack from and to a single variable losslessly.
7165 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7166 ? vpospar set hey, "'you ", world!
7167 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7168 ? vput vpospar x quote
7170 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7171 ? eval vpospar set ${x}
7172 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7178 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor on each message.
7179 Modified contents are discarded unless the
7181 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
7182 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
7186 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
7187 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
7189 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
7190 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
7191 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
7192 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
7193 depends on the execution mode.
7194 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
7196 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
7197 the processed parts.
7198 For convience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
7199 value, the same result as writing it to
7201 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
7203 character for the filename is supported.
7204 Other user input undergoes the usual
7205 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7206 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
7208 and shell variable expansion for the message as such, not the individual
7209 parts, and contents of the destination file are overwritten if the file
7212 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
7213 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
7214 URL percent encoded (as via
7216 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
7217 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
7218 Existing files will not be overwritten, instead the part number or
7219 a dot are appended after a number sign
7221 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
7226 \*(NQ The sole difference to
7228 is that the new macro is executed in place of the current one, which
7229 will not regain control: all resources of the current macro will be
7231 This implies that any setting covered by
7233 will be forgotten and covered variables will become cleaned up.
7234 If this command is not used from within a
7236 ed macro it will silently be (a more expensive variant of)
7246 \*(NQ \*(UA presents message headers in
7248 fuls as described under the
7251 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
7252 likewise if the argument is
7256 scrolls to the last,
7258 scrolls to the first, and
7263 A number argument prefixed by
7267 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
7268 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
7274 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
7285 .\" .Sh COMMAND ESCAPES {{{
7286 .Sh "COMMAND ESCAPES"
7288 Here is a summary of the command escapes available in compose mode,
7289 which are used to perform special functions when composing messages.
7290 Command escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines, and
7291 consist of a trigger (escape) and a command character.
7292 The actual escape character can be set via the internal variable
7294 it defaults to the tilde
7296 Otherwise ignored whitespace characters following the escape character
7297 will prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
7301 Unless otherwise noted all compose mode command escapes ensure proper
7302 updates of the variables which represent the error number
7308 is set they will, unless stated otherwise, error out message compose
7309 mode and cause a progam exit if an operation fails.
7310 It is however possible to place the character hyphen-minus
7312 after (possible whitespace following) the escape character, which has an
7313 effect equivalent to the command modifier
7315 If the \*(OPal key bindings are available it is possible to create
7317 ings specifically for the compose mode.
7320 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
7323 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
7325 (If the escape character has been changed,
7326 that character must be doubled instead.)
7329 .It Ic ~! Ar command
7330 Execute the indicated shell
7332 which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the previously
7333 executed command if the internal variable
7335 is set, then return to the message.
7339 End compose mode and send the message.
7341 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
7343 .Va on-compose-splice ,
7344 in order, will be called when set, after which
7346 will be checked, a set
7347 .Va on-compose-leave
7348 hook will be called,
7352 will be joined in if set,
7354 will be honoured in interactive mode, finally a given
7355 .Va message-inject-tail
7356 will be incorporated, after which the compose mode is left.
7359 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
7360 Execute the given \*(UA command.
7361 Not all commands, however, are allowed.
7364 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
7369 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
7371 is executed using the shell.
7372 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
7376 Write a summary of command escapes.
7379 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
7380 Append or edit the list of attachments.
7381 Does not manage the error number
7387 instead if this is a concern).
7390 arguments is expected as shell tokens (see
7391 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ;
7392 token-separating commas are ignored, too), to be
7393 interpreted as documented for the command line option
7395 with the message number exception as below.
7399 arguments the attachment list is edited, entry by entry;
7400 if a filename is left empty, that attachment is deleted from the list;
7401 once the end of the list is reached either new attachments may be
7402 entered or the session can be quit by committing an empty
7406 For all mode, if a given filename solely consists of the number sign
7408 followed by a valid message number of the currently active mailbox, then
7409 the given message is attached as a
7412 As the shell comment character the number sign must be quoted.
7415 .It Ic ~| Ar command
7416 Pipe the message through the specified filter command.
7417 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
7418 retain the original text of the message.
7421 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
7425 .It Ic ~^ Ar cmd Op Ar subcmd Op Ar arg3 Op Ar arg4
7426 Low-level command meant for scripted message access, i.e., for
7427 .Va on-compose-splice
7429 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
7430 The used protocol is likely subject to changes, and therefore the
7431 mentioned hooks receive the used protocol version as an initial line.
7432 In general the first field of a response line represents a status code
7433 which specifies whether a command was successful or not, whether result
7434 data is to be expected, and if, the format of the result data.
7435 Does not manage the error number
7439 because errors are reported via the protocol
7440 (hard errors like I/O failures cannot be handled).
7441 This command has read-only access to several virtual pseudo headers in
7442 the \*(UA private namespace, which may not exist (except for the first):
7446 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
7447 .It Ql Mailx-Command:
7448 The name of the command that generates the message, one of
7456 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-To:
7457 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Cc:
7458 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Bcc:
7459 Represent the frozen initial state of these headers before any
7460 transformation (e.g.,
7463 .Va recipients-in-cc
7466 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-From:
7467 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-To:
7468 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Cc:
7469 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Bcc:
7470 The values of said headers of the original message which has been
7472 .Ic reply , forward , resend .
7476 The status codes are:
7480 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql 210"
7482 Status ok; the remains of the line are the result.
7485 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7486 What follows are lines of result addresses, terminated by an empty line.
7487 The address lines consist of two fields, the first of which is the
7488 plain address, e.g.,
7490 separated by a single ASCII SP space from the second which contains the
7491 unstripped address, even if that is identical to the first field, e.g.,
7492 .Ql (Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple> .
7493 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7494 commands can be issued.
7497 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7498 What follows are lines of furtherly unspecified string content,
7499 terminated by an empty line.
7500 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7501 commands can be issued.
7504 Syntax error; invalid command.
7507 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
7510 Error: an argument fails verification.
7511 For example an invalid address has been specified, or an attempt was
7512 made to modify anything in \*(UA's own namespace.
7515 Error: an otherwise valid argument is rendered invalid due to context.
7516 For example, a second address is added to a header which may consist of
7517 a single address only.
7522 If a command indicates failure then the message will have remained
7524 Most commands can fail with
7526 if required arguments are missing (false command usage).
7527 The following (case-insensitive) commands are supported:
7530 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm header"
7532 This command allows listing, inspection, and editing of message headers.
7533 Header name case is not normalized, and case-insensitive comparison
7534 should be used when matching names.
7535 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7537 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7539 Without a third argument a list of all yet existing headers is given via
7541 this command is the default command of
7543 if no second argument has been given.
7544 A third argument restricts output to the given header only, which may
7547 if no such field is defined.
7550 Shows the content of the header given as the third argument.
7551 Dependent on the header type this may respond with
7555 any failure results in
7559 This will remove all instances of the header given as the third
7564 if no such header can be found, and
7566 on \*(UA namespace violations.
7569 This will remove from the header given as the third argument the
7570 instance at the list position (counting from one!) given with the fourth
7575 if the list position argument is not a number or on \*(UA namespace
7578 if no such header instance exists.
7581 Create a new or an additional instance of the header given in the third
7582 argument, with the header body content as given in the fourth argument
7583 (the remains of the line).
7586 if the third argument specifies a free-form header field name that is
7587 invalid, or if body content extraction fails to succeed,
7589 if any extracted address does not pass syntax and/or security checks or
7590 on \*(UA namespace violations, and
7592 to indicate prevention of excessing a single-instance header \(em note that
7594 can be appended to (a space separator will be added automatically first).
7597 is returned upon success, followed by the name of the header and the list
7598 position of the newly inserted instance.
7599 The list position is always 1 for single-instance header fields.
7600 All free-form header fields are managed in a single list.
7605 This command allows listing, removal and addition of message attachments.
7606 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7608 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7610 List all attachments via
7614 if no attachments exist.
7615 This command is the default command of
7617 if no second argument has been given.
7620 This will remove the attachment given as the third argument, and report
7624 if no such attachment can be found.
7625 If there exists any path component in the given argument, then an exact
7626 match of the path which has been used to create the attachment is used
7627 directly, but if only the basename of that path matches then all
7628 attachments are traversed to find an exact match first, and the removal
7629 occurs afterwards; if multiple basenames match, a
7632 Message attachments are treated as absolute pathnames.
7634 If no path component exists in the given argument, then all attachments
7635 will be searched for
7637 parameter matches as well as for matches of the basename of the path
7638 which has been used when the attachment has been created; multiple
7643 This will interpret the third argument as a number and remove the
7644 attachment at that list position (counting from one!), reporting
7648 if the argument is not a number or
7650 if no such attachment exists.
7653 Adds the attachment given as the third argument, specified exactly as
7654 documented for the command line option
7656 and supporting the message number extension as documented for
7660 upon success, with the index of the new attachment following,
7662 if the given file cannot be opened,
7664 if an on-the-fly performed character set conversion fails, otherwise
7666 is reported; this is also reported if character set conversion is
7667 requested but not available.
7670 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7672 and prints any known attributes of the first found attachment via
7676 if no such attachment can be found.
7677 The attributes are written as lines of keyword and value tuples, the
7678 keyword being separated from the rest of the line with an ASCII SP space
7682 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7684 and is otherwise identical to
7687 .It Cm attribute-set
7688 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7690 and will assign the attribute given as the fourth argument, which is
7691 expected to be a value tuple of keyword and other data, separated by
7692 a ASCII SP space or TAB tabulator character.
7693 If the value part is empty, then the given attribute is removed, or
7694 reset to a default value if existence of the attribute is crucial.
7698 upon success, with the index of the found attachment following,
7700 for message attachments or if the given keyword is invalid, and
7702 if no such attachment can be found.
7703 The following keywords may be used (case-insensitively):
7705 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".It Ql filename"
7707 Sets the filename of the MIME part, i.e., the name that is used for
7708 display and when (suggesting a name for) saving (purposes).
7709 .It Ql content-description
7710 Associate some descriptive information to the attachment's content, used
7711 in favour of the plain filename by some MUAs.
7713 May be used for uniquely identifying MIME entities in several contexts;
7714 this expects a special reference address format as defined in RFC 2045
7717 upon address content verification failure.
7719 Defines the media type/subtype of the part, which is managed
7720 automatically, but can be overwritten.
7721 .It Ql content-disposition
7722 Automatically set to the string
7726 .It Cm attribute-set-at
7727 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7729 and is otherwise identical to
7738 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va Sign .
7743 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va sign .
7746 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
7747 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
7750 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
7751 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
7755 Read the file specified by the
7757 variable into the message.
7761 Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far.
7762 After the editing session is finished,
7763 the user may continue appending text to the message.
7766 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
7767 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
7768 message headers and MIME parts.
7769 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7773 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
7774 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
7775 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7777 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7779 white- and blacklist selection of
7781 For MIME multipart messages,
7782 only the first displayable part is included.
7786 Edit the message header fields
7791 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7792 The default values for these fields originate from the
7800 Edit the message header fields
7806 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7809 .It Ic ~I Ar variable
7810 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message.
7811 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
7812 Any embedded character sequences
7814 horizontal tabulator and
7816 line feed are expanded in
7818 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
7820 time by using the command modifier
7824 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
7825 Insert the value of the specified variable followed by a newline
7826 character into the message.
7827 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
7828 Any embedded character sequences
7830 horizontal tabulator and
7832 line feed are expanded in
7834 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
7836 time by using the command modifier
7840 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
7841 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7844 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7848 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
7849 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7852 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7854 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7856 white- and blacklist selection of
7858 For MIME multipart messages,
7859 only the first displayable part is included.
7863 Display the message collected so far,
7864 prefaced by the message header fields
7865 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
7869 Abort the message being sent,
7870 copying it to the file specified by the
7877 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
7880 but indent each line that has been read by
7884 .It Ic ~r Ar filename Op Ar HERE-delimiter
7885 Read the named file, object to the usual
7886 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7887 into the message; if (the expanded)
7891 then standard input is used, e.g., for pasting purposes.
7892 Only in this latter mode
7894 may be given: if it is data will be read in until the given
7896 is seen on a line by itself, and encountering EOF is an error; the
7898 is a required argument in non-interactive mode; if it is single-quote
7899 quoted then the pasted content will not be expanded, \*(ID otherwise
7900 a future version of \*(UA may perform shell-style expansion on the content.
7904 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
7905 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
7906 normalized to space (SP) characters.
7909 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
7910 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
7913 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
7914 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
7918 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
7919 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
7923 Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the
7925 environment variable) on the message collected so far.
7926 Usually, the alternate editor will be a screen editor.
7927 After the editor is quit,
7928 the user may resume appending text to the end of the message.
7931 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
7932 Write the message onto the named file, which is object to the usual
7933 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
7935 the message is appended to it.
7941 except that the message is not saved at all.
7947 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
7948 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
7950 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
7954 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
7958 has the same effect as using
7964 Creation or editing of variables can be performed in the
7969 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
7971 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
7972 Both commands support a more
7975 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
7978 implicitly, others can be imported explicitly with the command
7980 and henceforth share said properties.
7983 Two different kinds of internal variables exist, and both of which can
7985 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
7989 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
7990 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
7991 introduction of the section
7993 documents the supported quoting rules.
7995 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7996 ? wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
7997 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''; \e
7998 varshow one two three four; \e
7999 unset one two three four
8003 Dependent upon the actual option string values may become interpreted as
8004 colour names, command specifications, normal text, etc.
8005 They may be treated as numbers, in which case decimal values are
8006 expected if so documented, but otherwise any numeric format and
8007 base that is valid and understood by the
8009 command may be used, too.
8012 There also exists a special kind of string value, the
8013 .Dq boolean string ,
8014 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
8018 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
8024 for a false boolean and
8030 for a true boolean; a special kind of boolean string is the
8032 which is a boolean string that can optionally be prefixed with the
8033 (case-insensitive) term
8037 which causes prompting of the user in interactive mode, with the given
8038 boolean as the default value.
8041 Variable chains extend a plain
8046 .Ql variable-USER@HOST
8054 had been specified in the contextual Uniform Resource Locator URL, see
8055 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
8056 Even though this mechanism is based on URLs no URL percent encoding may
8057 be applied to neither of
8061 variable chains need to be specified using raw data;
8062 the mentioned section contains examples.
8063 Variables which support chains are explicitly documented as such, and
8064 \*(UA treats the base name of any such variable special, meaning that
8065 users should not create custom names like
8067 in order to avoid false classifications and treatment of such variables.
8069 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
8070 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
8071 .Ss "Initial settings"
8073 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
8079 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
8093 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
8095 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
8097 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
8105 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
8114 Notes: \*(UA does not support the
8116 variable \(en use command line options or
8118 to pass options through to a
8120 And the default global
8122 file, which is loaded unless the
8124 (with according argument) or
8126 command line options have been used, or the
8127 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
8128 environment variable is set (see
8129 .Sx "Resource files" )
8130 bends those initial settings a bit, e.g., it sets the variables
8135 to name a few, establishes a default
8137 selection etc., and should thus be taken into account.
8140 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
8143 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
8147 \*(RO The exit status of the last command, or the
8152 This status has a meaning in the state machine: in conjunction with
8154 any non-0 exit status will cause a program exit, and in
8156 mode any error while loading (any of the) resource files will have the
8160 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
8161 can be used to instruct the state machine to ignore errors.
8165 \*(RO The current error number
8166 .Pf ( Xr errno 3 ) ,
8167 which is set after an error occurred; it is also available via
8169 and the error name and documentation string can be queried via
8173 \*(ID This machinery is new and the error number is only really usable
8174 if a command explicitly states that it manages the variable
8176 for others errno will be used in case of errors, or
8178 if that is 0: it thus may or may not reflect the real error.
8179 The error number may be set with the command
8185 \*(RO This is a multiplexer variable which performs dynamic expansion of
8186 the requested state or condition, of which there are:
8189 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
8193 .It Va ^ERR , ^ERRDOC , ^ERRNAME
8194 The number, documentation, and name of the current
8196 respectively, which is usually set after an error occurred.
8197 \*(ID This machinery is new and is usually reliable only if a command
8198 explicitly states that it manages the variable
8200 which is effectively identical to
8202 Each of those variables can be suffixed with a hyphen minus followed by
8203 a name or number, in which case the expansion refers to the given error.
8204 Note this is a direct mapping of (a subset of) the system error values:
8205 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8207 eval echo \e$1: \e$^ERR-$1:\e
8208 \e$^ERRNAME-$1: \e$^ERRDOC-$1
8209 vput vexpr i + "$1" 1
8221 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8223 separated by the first character of the value of
8225 \*(ID The special semantics of the equally named special parameter of the
8227 are not yet supported.
8231 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8233 separated by a space character.
8234 If placed in double quotation marks, each positional parameter is
8235 properly quoted to expand to a single parameter again.
8239 \*(RO Expands to the number of positional parameters, i.e., the size of
8240 the positional parameter stack in decimal.
8244 \*(RO Inside the scope of a
8248 ed macro this expands to the name of the calling macro, or to the empty
8249 string if the macro is running from top-level.
8250 For the \*(OPal regular expression search and replace operator of
8252 this expands to the entire matching expression.
8253 It represents the program name in global context.
8257 \*(RO Access of the positional parameter stack.
8258 All further parameters can be accessed with this syntax, too, e.g.,
8261 etc.; positional parameters can be shifted off the stack by calling
8263 The parameter stack contains, e.g., the arguments of a
8267 d macro, the matching groups of the \*(OPal regular expression search
8268 and replace expression of
8270 and can be explicitly created or overwritten with the command
8275 \*(RO Is set to the active
8279 .It Va add-file-recipients
8280 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
8281 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
8282 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
8283 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
8287 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
8288 when comparing addresses.
8292 \*(BO Causes messages saved in the
8294 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
8296 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
8297 This should always be set.
8301 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
8305 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
8309 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks for files to attach at the end of each message.
8310 An empty line finalizes the list.
8314 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for carbon copy recipients
8315 (at the end of each message if
8323 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
8324 recipients (at the end of each message if
8332 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for confirmation to send the
8333 message or reenter compose mode after having been shown an envelope
8335 This is by default enabled.
8339 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the user to be prompted if the message is to be
8340 signed at the end of each message.
8343 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
8347 .\" The alternative *ask* is not documented on purpose
8348 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt for the subject upon entering compose mode
8349 unless a subject already exists.
8353 A sequence of characters to display in the
8357 as shown in the display of
8359 each for one type of messages (see
8360 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
8361 with the default being
8364 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
8367 variable is set, in the following order:
8369 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
8391 start of a collapsed thread.
8393 an uncollapsed thread (TODO ignored for now).
8397 classified as possible spam.
8403 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
8404 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
8408 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
8409 message will be sent automatically.
8413 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when threaded mode
8420 \*(BO Enable automatic
8422 ing of a(n existing)
8428 commands, e.g., the message that becomes the new
8430 is shown automatically, as via
8437 Causes sorted mode (see the
8439 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this variable as
8440 sorting method when a folder is opened, e.g.,
8441 .Ql set autosort=thread .
8445 \*(BO Enables the substitution of all not (reverse-solidus) escaped
8448 characters by the contents of the last executed command for the
8450 shell escape command and
8452 one of the compose mode
8453 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8454 If this variable is not set no reverse solidus stripping is performed.
8458 \*(OP Terminals generate multi-byte sequences for certain forms of
8459 input, for example for function and other special keys.
8460 Some terminals however do not write these multi-byte sequences as
8461 a whole, but byte-by-byte, and the latter is what \*(UA actually reads.
8462 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
8463 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
8464 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
8470 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
8471 has the same affect as setting
8473 and all other variables prefixed with
8475 it also changes the behaviour of
8477 (which does not exist in BSD).
8481 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
8482 summary to traditional BSD style.
8486 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
8491 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
8497 field to appear immediately after the
8499 field in message headers and with the
8501 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8505 .It Va build-os , build-osenv
8506 \*(RO The operating system \*(UA has been build for, usually taken from
8512 respectively, the former being lowercased.
8516 The value that should appear in the
8520 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
8522 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
8523 US-ASCII compatible.
8527 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
8528 member of the variable
8530 This defaults to UTF-8 if character set conversion capabilities are
8531 available, and to ISO-8859-1 otherwise, in which case the only supported
8534 and this variable is effectively ignored.
8535 Refer to the section
8536 .Sx "Character sets"
8537 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
8540 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
8541 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
8543 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
8545 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
8546 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
8547 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
8549 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
8550 otherwise the (final) value of
8552 is used for this purpose.
8554 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
8555 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
8556 of a MIME message part that uses the
8558 character set is forcefully treated as text.
8562 The default value for the
8567 .It Va colour-disable
8568 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
8569 Also see the section
8570 .Sx "Coloured display" .
8574 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
8576 Note that pagers may need special command line options, e.g.,
8584 in order to support colours.
8585 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
8586 adjustments dependent on the value of the environment variable
8588 (see there for more).
8592 .It Va contact-mail , contact-web
8593 \*(RO Addresses for contact per email and web, respectively, e.g., for
8594 bug reports, suggestions, or help regarding \*(UA.
8595 The former can be used directly:
8596 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
8600 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued variable is
8601 set it will be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
8602 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
8606 can be forced by setting this to the value
8608 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
8609 terminal screen to compute the treshold (see
8614 \*(ID At the moment this uses the count of lines of the message in wire
8615 format, which, dependent on the
8617 of the message, is unrelated to the number of display lines.
8618 (The software is old and historically the relation was a given thing.)
8622 Define a set of custom headers to be injected into newly composed or
8623 forwarded messages; it is also possible to create custom headers in
8626 which can be automatized by setting one of the hooks
8627 .Va on-compose-splice
8629 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
8630 The value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of custom headers to
8631 be injected, to include commas in the header bodies escape them with
8633 \*(ID Overwriting of automatically managed headers is neither supported
8636 .Dl ? set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
8640 Controls the appearance of the
8642 date and time format specification of the
8644 variable, that is used, for example, when viewing the summary of
8646 If unset, then the local receiving date is used and displayed
8647 unformatted, otherwise the message sending
8649 It is possible to assign a
8651 format string and control formatting, but embedding newlines via the
8653 format is not supported, and will result in display errors.
8655 .Ql %Y-%m-%d %H:%M ,
8657 .Va datefield-markout-older .
8660 .It Va datefield-markout-older
8661 Only used in conjunction with
8663 Can be used to create a visible distinction of messages dated more than
8664 a day in the future, or older than six months, a concept comparable to the
8666 option of the POSIX utility
8668 If set to the empty string, then the plain month, day and year of the
8670 will be displayed, but a
8672 format string to control formatting can be assigned.
8678 \*(BO Enables debug messages and obsoletion warnings, disables the
8679 actual delivery of messages and also implies
8685 .It Va disposition-notification-send
8687 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
8688 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
8692 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
8694 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8695 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
8696 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
8698 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8699 .\"for a specific account.
8703 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
8705 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive or batch
8707 compose mode will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the
8708 normal end-of-file condition).
8709 This behaviour is implied in
8715 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
8716 \*(BO\*(OP Synchronization of mailboxes which \*(UA treats as
8718 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
8719 es (see, e.g., the notes on
8720 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
8721 as well as the documentation of
8723 will be protected with so-called dotlock files\(emthe traditional mail
8724 spool file locking method\(emin addition to system file locking.
8725 Because \*(UA ships with a privilege-separated dotlock creation program
8726 that should always be able to create such a dotlock file there is no
8727 good reason to ignore dotlock file creation errors, and thus these are
8728 fatal unless this variable is set.
8732 \*(BO If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically
8733 when a message is composed in interactive mode, as if the
8735 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8739 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
8743 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
8744 its header is included in the editable text.
8748 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
8749 .Dq \&No mail for user
8750 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or does not exist.
8751 If this variable is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or non-existent
8752 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
8758 \*(BO Let each command with a non-0 exit status, including every
8762 s a non-0 status, cause a program exit unless prefixed by
8765 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
8767 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
8768 but which use a different modifier for ignoring the error.
8769 Please refer to the variable
8771 for more on this topic.
8775 The first character of this value defines the escape character for
8776 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8778 The default value is the character tilde
8780 If set to the empty string, command escapes are disabled.
8784 If not set then file and command pipeline targets are not allowed,
8785 and any such address will be filtered out, giving a warning message.
8786 If set without a value then all possible recipient address
8787 specifications will be accepted \(en see the section
8788 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
8790 To accept them, but only in interactive mode, or when tilde commands
8791 were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8795 set this to the (case-insensitive) value
8797 (it actually acts like
8798 .Ql restrict,-all,+name,+addr ,
8799 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8801 In fact the value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of values.
8804 then the existence of disallowed specifications is treated as a hard
8805 send error instead of only filtering them out.
8806 The remaining values specify whether a specific type of recipient
8807 address specification is allowed (optionally indicated by a plus sign
8809 prefix) or disallowed (prefixed with a hyphen-minus
8813 addresses all possible address specifications,
8817 command pipeline targets,
8819 plain user names and (MTA) aliases and
8822 These kind of values are interpreted in the given order, so that
8823 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
8824 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
8825 unless \*(UA is in interactive mode or has been started with the
8829 command line option; in the latter case(s) any address may be used, then.
8831 Historically invalid network addressees are silently stripped off.
8832 To change this so that any encountered invalid email address causes
8833 a hard error it must be ensured that
8835 is an entry in the above list.
8836 Setting this automatically enables network addressees
8837 (it actually acts like
8838 .Ql failinvaddr,+addr ,
8839 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8843 Unless this variable is set additional
8845 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
8846 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
8848 separator, are ignored due to safety reasons.
8849 However, if set to the special (case-insensitive) value
8851 then the presence of additional MTA arguments is treated as a hard
8852 error that causes \*(UA to exit with failure status.
8853 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
8855 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
8856 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8863 \*(RO String giving a list of optional features.
8864 Features are preceded with a plus sign
8866 if they are available, with a hyphen-minus
8869 The output of the command
8871 will include this information in a more pleasant output.
8875 \*(BO This setting reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
8876 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
8877 included in the header of a message
8878 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
8879 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
8880 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
8883 .Ic replysender , respondsender , followupsender
8885 .Ic replyall , respondall , followupall
8886 are not affected by the current setting of
8891 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
8892 filenames that begin with the plus sign
8894 will have the plus sign replaced with the value of this variable if set,
8895 otherwise the plus sign will remain unchanged when doing
8896 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
8899 for more on this topic.
8900 The value supports a subset of transformations itself, and if the
8901 non-empty value does not start with a solidus
8905 will be prefixed automatically.
8906 Once the actual value is evaluated first, the internal variable
8908 will be updated for caching purposes.
8911 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER , Va folder-hook
8914 macro which will be called whenever a
8917 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
8918 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
8919 only include newly arrived messages then.
8921 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
8922 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
8924 The specialized form will override the generic one if
8926 matches the file that is opened.
8927 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
8928 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
8929 However, if the mailbox resides under
8933 specification is tried in addition, e.g., if
8937 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
8938 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
8940 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
8941 first, but then followed by
8942 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
8945 .It Va folder-resolved
8946 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
8948 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
8952 \*(BO Controls whether a
8953 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8954 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
8956 .Va followup-to-honour
8958 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
8963 .It Va followup-to-honour
8965 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8966 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
8970 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
8980 .It Va forward-as-attachment
8981 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
8984 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
8985 With this setting enabled messages are sent as unmodified MIME
8987 attachments with all of their parts included.
8990 .It Va forward-inject-head
8991 The string to put before the text of a message with the
8993 command instead of the default
8994 .Dq -------- Original Message -------- .
8995 No heading is put if it is set to the empty string.
8996 This variable is ignored if the
8997 .Va forward-as-attachment
9003 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
9005 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
9006 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
9007 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
9008 According to that RFC setting the
9010 variable is required if
9012 contains more than one address.
9015 ing to messages these addresses are handled as if they were in the
9020 If a file-based MTA is used, then
9022 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
9024 can nonetheless be enforced to appear as the envelope sender address at
9025 the MTA protocol level (the RFC 5321 reverse-path), either by using the
9027 command line option (with an empty argument; see there for the complete
9028 picture on this topic), or by setting the internal variable
9029 .Va r-option-implicit .
9032 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
9033 a dialup machine) then either this variable or
9037 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities with
9038 .Va smtp-hostname ) ,
9039 have to be set; if so the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9043 will be created (except when disallowed by
9044 .Va message-id-disable
9051 \*(BO Due to historical reasons comments and name parts of email
9052 addresses are removed by default when sending mail, replying to or
9053 forwarding a message.
9054 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed.
9057 \*(OB Predecessor of
9058 .Va forward-inject-head .
9062 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
9063 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
9068 mode a header summary will also be displayed on folder changes.
9069 The command line option
9077 A format string to use for the summary of
9079 similar to the ones used for
9082 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent sign
9084 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
9085 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
9086 Valid format specifiers are:
9089 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
9091 A plain percent sign.
9094 a space character but for the current message
9096 for which it expands to
9100 a space character but for the current message
9102 for which it expands to
9105 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
9108 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
9110 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
9114 The date found in the
9116 header of the message when
9118 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
9119 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
9124 The indenting level in threaded mode.
9126 The address of the message sender.
9128 The message thread tree structure.
9129 (Note that this format does not support a field width.)
9131 The number of lines of the message, if available.
9135 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
9137 Message subject (if any).
9139 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
9141 Message recipient flags: is the addressee of the message a known or
9142 subscribed mailing list \(en see
9147 The position in threaded/sorted order.
9151 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
9153 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
9164 .It Va headline-bidi
9165 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
9166 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
9167 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
9168 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
9169 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
9170 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
9172 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
9173 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
9174 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
9176 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
9177 fields that may occur when displaying
9179 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
9181 with special Unicode control sequences;
9182 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
9184 no value (or any value other than
9189 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
9190 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
9191 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
9193 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
9195 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
9197 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
9198 sequences onto the line).
9203 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
9204 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
9208 \*(OP If a line editor is available then this can be set to
9209 name the (expandable) path of the location of a permanent history file.
9214 .It Va history-gabby
9215 \*(BO\*(OP Add more entries to the history as is normally done.
9218 .It Va history-gabby-persist
9219 \*(BO\*(OP \*(UA's own MLE will not save the additional
9221 entries in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
9222 On the other hand it will not loose the knowledge of whether
9223 a persistent entry was gabby or not.
9229 \*(OP Setting this variable imposes a limit on the number of concurrent
9231 If set to the value 0 then no further history entries will be added, and
9232 loading and incorporation of the
9234 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
9235 Runtime changes will not be reflected, but will affect the number of
9236 entries saved to permanent storage.
9240 \*(BO This setting controls whether messages are held in the system
9242 and it is set by default.
9246 Used instead of the value obtained from
9250 as the hostname when expanding local addresses, e.g., in
9254 or this variable Is set the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9258 will be created (except when disallowed by
9259 .Va message-id-disable
9262 Setting it to the empty string will cause the normal hostname to be
9263 used, but nonetheless enables creation of said ID fields.
9264 \*(IN in conjunction with the built-in SMTP
9267 also influences the results:
9268 one should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
9277 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
9278 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
9280 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
9282 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
9283 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
9287 The input field separator that is used (\*(ID by some functions) to
9288 determine where to split input data.
9290 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9292 Unsetting is treated as assigning the default value,
9295 If set to the empty value, no field splitting will be performed.
9297 If set to a non-empty value, all whitespace characters are extracted
9298 and assigned to the variable
9302 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9305 will be ignored at the beginning and end of input.
9306 Diverging from POSIX shells default whitespace is removed in addition,
9307 which is owed to the entirely different line content extraction rules.
9309 Each occurrence of a character of
9311 will cause field-splitting, any adjacent
9313 characters will be skipped.
9318 \*(RO Automatically deduced from the whitespace characters in
9323 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
9324 messages; instead echo them as
9326 characters and discard the current line.
9330 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
9331 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
9332 in compose mode on message input and in interactive command input.
9333 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
9334 explicitly using one of the commands
9338 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
9341 on a line by itself or by using the
9343 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ;
9344 Setting this implies the behaviour that
9352 If this is set to a non-empty string it will specify the users
9354 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
9357 and the system-dependent default, and (thus) be used to replace
9360 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
9363 for more on this topic.
9364 The value supports a subset of transformations itself.
9372 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9375 option for indenting messages,
9376 in place of the POSIX mandated default tabulator character
9383 \*(BO If set, an empty
9385 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
9386 file is not removed.
9387 Note that, in conjunction with
9389 mode any empty file will be removed unless this variable is set.
9390 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
9391 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
9392 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
9393 \*(ID Only local regular (MBOX) files are covered, Maildir or other
9394 mailbox types will never be removed, even if empty.
9397 .It Va keep-content-length
9398 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing MBOX mailbox files \*(UA can
9403 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
9404 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
9405 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
9406 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
9407 work with with same mailbox files.
9408 Note that, if this is not set but
9409 .Va writebackedited ,
9410 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
9411 fields already marks the message as being modified.
9412 \*(ID At some future time \*(UA will be capable to rewrite and apply an
9414 to modified messages, and then those fields will be stripped silently.
9418 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
9419 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
9420 This setting causes all saved message to be retained.
9423 .It Va line-editor-disable
9424 \*(BO Turn off any enhanced line editing capabilities (see
9425 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
9429 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
9430 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
9434 Error log message prefix string
9435 .Pf ( Ql "\*(uA: " ) .
9438 .It Va mailbox-display
9439 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
9441 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
9444 .It Va mailbox-resolved
9445 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
9448 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
9449 An additional startup file that is loaded as the last of the
9450 .Sx "Resource files" .
9451 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
9453 implementations, i.e., mostly anything which is not covered by
9454 .Sx "Initial settings" .
9458 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
9459 it is marked as having been
9462 .Sx "Message states" .
9466 \*(BO When opening MBOX mailbox databases \*(UA by default uses tolerant
9467 POSIX rules for detecting message boundaries (so-called
9469 lines) due to compatibility reasons, instead of the stricter rules that
9470 have been standardized in RFC 4155.
9471 This behaviour can be switched to the stricter RFC 4155 rules by
9472 setting this variable.
9473 (This is never necessary for any message newly generated by \*(UA,
9474 it only applies to messages generated by buggy or malicious MUAs, or may
9475 occur in old MBOX databases: \*(UA itself will choose a proper
9477 to avoid false interpretation of
9479 content lines in the MBOX database.)
9481 This may temporarily be handy when \*(UA complains about invalid
9483 lines when opening a MBOX: in this case setting this variable and
9484 re-opening the mailbox in question may correct the result.
9485 If so, copying the entire mailbox to some other file, as in
9486 .Ql copy * SOME-FILE ,
9487 will perform proper, all-compatible
9489 quoting for all detected messages, resulting in a valid MBOX mailbox.
9490 Finally the variable can be unset again:
9491 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9493 localopts yes; wysh set mbox-rfc4155;\e
9494 wysh File "${1}"; eval copy * "${2}"
9496 call mboxfix /tmp/bad.mbox /tmp/good.mbox
9501 \*(BO Internal development variable.
9504 .It Va message-id-disable
9505 \*(BO By setting this variable the generation of
9509 message and MIME part headers can be completely suppressed, effectively
9510 leaving this task up to the
9512 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
9513 Note that according to RFC 5321 a SMTP server is not required to add this
9514 field by itself, so it should be ensured that it accepts messages without
9518 .It Va message-inject-head
9519 A string to put at the beginning of each new message, followed by a newline.
9520 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9524 are understood (use the
9528 ting the variable(s) instead).
9531 .It Va message-inject-tail
9532 A string to put at the end of each new message, followed by a newline.
9533 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9537 are understood (use the
9541 ting the variable(s) instead).
9545 \*(BO Usually, when an
9547 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
9548 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
9553 option to be passed through to the
9555 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
9556 this flag, no MTA is known which does not support it (for historical
9560 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
9561 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
9562 in order to classify the
9565 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
9568 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
9569 a computation rather similar to what the
9571 command produces when used with the
9575 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
9576 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
9577 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
9582 .Ql application/octet-stream :
9583 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
9585 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
9586 interpret the contents of the part.
9588 If this variable is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as
9589 text data at first glance (by a
9593 file extension), then the original
9595 will not be overwritten.
9598 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
9599 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
9600 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
9601 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
9602 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
9603 (E.g., at the time of this writing some newsletters ship their full
9604 content only in the rich HTML part, whereas the plain text part only
9605 contains topic subjects.)
9608 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
9611 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
9612 Some MUAs, however, do not use
9613 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9615 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
9616 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but specify an
9617 unspecific MIME type
9618 .Pf ( Ql application/octet-stream )
9619 even for plain text attachments.
9620 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to re-classify such MIME
9621 message parts, if possible, for example via a possibly existing
9622 attachment filename.
9623 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
9624 actually a carrier of bits, best specified as a binary value, e.g.,
9627 .Bl -bullet -compact
9629 If bit two is set (counting from 1, decimal 2) then the detected
9631 will be carried along with the message and be used for deciding which
9632 MIME handler is to be used, for example;
9633 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
9634 overridden content-type by showing a plus sign
9637 If bit three is set (decimal 4) then the counter-evidence is always
9638 produced and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even
9639 forcefully overriding the parts given MIME type.
9641 If bit four is set (decimal 8) as a last resort the actual content of
9642 .Ql application/octet-stream
9643 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
9645 This mode is even more relaxed when data is to be displayed to the user
9646 or used as a message quote (data consumers which mangle data for display
9647 purposes, which includes masking of control characters, for example).
9651 .It Va mime-encoding
9653 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
9654 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable.
9655 (7-bit clean text messages are sent as-is, without a transfer encoding.)
9658 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
9661 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
9662 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
9663 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
9664 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
9665 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
9666 .It Ql quoted-printable
9668 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
9669 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
9670 be read as-is; it is also acceptible for other single-byte locales that
9671 share many characters with ASCII, like, e.g., ISO-8859-1.
9672 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
9673 sets: e.g., it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode a single
9674 UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
9675 It is the default encoding.
9677 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
9678 This encoding is 7-bit clean and will always be used for binary data.
9679 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
9680 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
9681 to four bytes of output.
9682 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
9687 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
9688 Can be used to control which of
9689 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9690 are loaded: if the letter
9692 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
9694 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
9696 controls loading of the system wide
9697 .Pa /etc/mime.types ;
9698 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
9700 If this variable is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
9701 Incorporation of the \*(UA-built-in MIME types cannot be suppressed,
9702 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
9705 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
9706 value string contains an equals sign
9708 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
9711 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
9712 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
9713 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
9714 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
9715 the MIME type cache).
9720 To choose an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent, set this option to either
9721 the full pathname of an executable (optionally prefixed with a
9723 protocol indicator), or \*(OPally a SMTP protocol URL, e.g., \*(IN
9725 .Dl smtps?://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9728 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
9729 The default has been chosen at compile time.
9730 All supported data transfers are executed in child processes, which
9731 run asynchronously and without supervision unless either the
9736 If such a child receives a TERM signal, it will abort and
9743 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
9745 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
9748 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
9751 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
9754 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
9759 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
9760 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean variable
9761 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
9762 (which will also disable passing
9766 (for not treating a line with only a dot
9768 character as the end of input),
9776 variable is set); in conjunction with the
9778 command line option \*(UA will also (not) pass
9784 \*(OPally \*(UA can send mail over SMTP network connections to a single
9785 defined SMTP smart host by specifying a SMTP URL as the value (see
9786 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
9787 Encrypted network connections are \*(OPally available, the section
9788 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
9789 should give an overview and provide links to more information on this.
9790 \*(UA also supports forwarding of all network traffic over a specified
9792 Note that with some mail providers it may be necessary to set the
9794 variable in order to use a specific combination of
9799 The following SMTP variants may be used:
9803 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
9804 server port 25 and requires setting the
9805 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9806 variable to enter a SSL/TLS encrypted session state.
9807 Assign a value like \*(IN
9808 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9810 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
9811 to choose this protocol.
9813 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
9814 and is automatically SSL/TLS secured.
9815 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
9816 be supported by your hosts network service database
9817 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
9820 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
9821 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
9822 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9824 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
9825 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
9830 Finally there is the SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409), which usually
9831 lives on server port 587 and is practically identically to the SMTP
9832 protocol from \*(UA's point of view beside that; it requires setting the
9833 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9834 variable to enter a SSL/TLS secured session state.
9835 Assign a value like \*(IN
9836 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9838 .Ql submission://server[:port] ) .
9843 .It Va mta-arguments
9844 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
9846 can be given via this variable, which is parsed according to
9847 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
9848 into an array of arguments, and which will be joined onto MTA options
9849 from other sources, and then passed individually to the MTA:
9850 .Ql ? wysh set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"' .
9853 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
9854 \*(BO Unless this variable is set \*(UA will pass some well known
9855 standard command line options to a file-based
9857 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), see there for more.
9860 .It Va mta-no-receiver-arguments
9861 \*(BO By default a file-based
9863 will be passed all receiver addresses on the command line.
9864 This variable can be set to suppress any such argument.
9868 Many systems use a so-called
9870 environment to ensure compatibility with
9872 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
9874 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
9875 actually executed when calling the file-based
9877 will treat its contents as that name.
9880 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
9881 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the users
9883 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
9884 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
9888 .Sx "The .netrc file"
9889 documents the file format.
9901 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the users
9903 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
9904 This can be used to, e.g., store
9907 .Ql ? set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp' .
9911 If this variable has the value
9913 newly created local folders will be in Maildir instead of MBOX format.
9917 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
9918 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
9919 If this variable is set to the special value
9921 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
9922 timestamp changes are detected.
9926 \*(BO Causes the filename given in the
9929 and the sender-based filenames for the
9933 commands to be interpreted relative to the directory given in the
9935 variable rather than to the current directory,
9936 unless it is set to an absolute pathname.
9938 .Mx Va on-account-cleanup
9939 .It Va on-account-cleanup-ACCOUNT , Va on-account-cleanup
9940 Macro hook which will be called once an
9942 is left, as the very last step before unrolling per-account
9944 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
9945 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
9948 The specialized form is used in favour of the generic one if found.
9951 .It Va on-compose-cleanup
9952 Macro hook which will be called after the message has been sent (or not,
9953 in case of failures), as the very last step before unrolling compose mode
9955 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
9956 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
9960 For compose mode hooks that may affect the message content please see
9961 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave , on-compose-splice .
9962 \*(ID This hook exists because
9963 .Ic alias , alternates , commandalias , shortcut ,
9964 to name a few, are not covered by
9966 changes applied in compose mode will continue to be in effect thereafter.
9971 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
9972 Macro hooks which will be called once compose mode is entered,
9973 and after composing has been finished, but before a set
9974 .Va message-inject-tail
9975 has been injected etc., respectively.
9977 are enabled for these hooks, and changes on variables will be forgotten
9978 after the message has been sent.
9979 .Va on-compose-cleanup
9980 can be used to perform other necessary cleanup steps.
9982 The following (read-only) variables will be set temporarily during
9983 execution of the macros to represent respective message headers, to
9984 the empty string otherwise; most of them correspond to according virtual
9985 message headers that can be accessed via
9988 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9990 .Va on-compose-splice
9994 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va mailx_subject"
9995 .It Va mailx-command
9996 The command that generates the message.
9997 .It Va mailx-subject
10001 .It Va mailx-sender
10003 .It Va mailx-to , mailx-cc , mailx-bcc
10004 The list of receiver addresses as a space-separated list.
10005 .It Va mailx-raw-to , mailx-raw-cc , mailx-raw-bcc
10006 The list of receiver addresses before any mangling (due to, e.g.,
10009 .Va recipients-in-cc )
10010 as a space-separated list.
10011 .It Va mailx-orig-from
10012 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
10014 of the given message.
10015 .It Va mailx-orig-to , mailx-orig-cc , mailx-orig-bcc
10016 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
10017 receivers of the given message.
10021 Here is am example that injects a signature via
10022 .Va message-inject-tail ;
10024 .Va on-compose-splice
10025 to simply inject the file of desire via
10029 may be a better approach.
10031 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10033 vput ! i cat ~/.mysig
10035 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
10039 readctl create ~/.mysig
10043 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
10045 readctl remove ~/.mysig
10048 set on-compose-leave=t_ocl
10054 .It Va on-compose-splice , on-compose-splice-shell
10055 These hooks run once the normal compose mode is finished, but before the
10056 .Va on-compose-leave
10057 macro hook is called, the
10058 .Va message-inject-tail
10060 Both hooks will be executed in a subprocess, with their input and output
10061 connected to \*(UA such that they can act as if they would be an
10063 The difference in between them is that the latter is a
10065 command, whereas the former is a normal \*(UA macro, but which is
10066 restricted to a small set of commands (the
10070 will indicate said capability).
10072 are enabled for these hooks (in the parent process), causing any setting
10073 to be forgotten after the message has been sent;
10074 .Va on-compose-cleanup
10075 can be used to perform other cleanup as necessary.
10078 During execution of these hooks \*(UA will temporarily forget whether it
10079 has been started in interactive mode, (a restricted set of)
10080 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10081 will always be available, and for guaranteed reproducibilities sake
10085 will be set to their defaults.
10086 The compose mode command
10088 has been especially designed for scriptability (via these hooks).
10089 The first line the hook will read on its standard input is the protocol
10090 version of said command escape, currently
10092 backward incompatible protocol changes have to be expected.
10095 Care must be taken to avoid deadlocks and other false control flow:
10096 if both involved processes wait for more input to happen at the
10097 same time, or one does not expect more input but the other is stuck
10098 waiting for consumption of its output, etc.
10099 There is no automatic synchronization of the hook: it will not be
10100 stopped automatically just because it, e.g., emits
10102 The hooks will however receive a termination signal if the parent enters
10103 an error condition.
10104 \*(ID Protection against and interaction with signals is not yet given;
10105 it is likely that in the future these scripts will be placed in an
10106 isolated session, which is signalled in its entirety as necessary.
10108 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10109 define ocs_signature {
10111 echo '~< ~/.mysig' # '~<! fortune pathtofortunefile'
10113 set on-compose-splice=ocs_signature
10115 wysh set on-compose-splice-shell=$'\e
10117 printf "hello $version! Headers: ";\e
10118 echo \e'~^header list\e';\e
10119 read status result;\e
10120 echo "status=$status result=$result";\e
10125 echo Splice protocol version is $version
10126 echo '~^h l'; read hl; vput vexpr es substring "${hl}" 0 1
10128 echoerr 'Cannot read header list'; echo '~x'; xit
10130 if [ "$hl" @i!% ' cc' ]
10131 echo '~^h i cc Diet is your <mirr.or>'; read es;\e
10132 vput vexpr es substring "${es}" 0 1
10134 echoerr 'Cannot insert Cc: header'; echo '~x'
10135 # (no xit, macro finishs anyway)
10139 set on-compose-splice=ocsm
10144 .It Va on-resend-cleanup
10146 .Va on-compose-cleanup ,
10147 but is only triggered by
10151 .It Va on-resend-enter
10153 .Va on-compose-enter ,
10154 but is only triggered by
10159 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
10161 is followed by a formfeed character
10165 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
10166 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
10167 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
10168 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
10169 the authentication method requires a password.
10170 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10171 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10173 .It Va password-USER@HOST
10174 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
10175 Set the password for
10179 If no such variable is defined for a host,
10180 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
10181 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10182 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10186 \*(BO Send messages to the
10188 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
10192 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10193 When a MIME message part of type
10195 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
10196 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
10198 Note that only parts which can be displayed inline as plain text (see
10199 .Cd copiousoutput )
10200 are displayed unless otherwise noted, other MIME parts will only be
10201 considered by and for the command
10205 The special value commercial at
10207 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, e.g.,
10208 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=@
10209 will henceforth display XML
10211 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
10214 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
10215 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
10216 \(em these directives,
10218 has already been used, should be referred to for further documentation.
10223 can in fact be used as a trigger character to adjust usage and behaviour
10224 of a following shell command specification more thoroughly by appending
10225 more special characters which refer to further mailcap directives, e.g.,
10226 the following hypothetical command specification could be used:
10228 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10229 ? set pipe-X/Y='@!++=@vim ${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
10233 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
10235 The command produces plain text to be integrated in \*(UAs output:
10236 .Cd copiousoutput .
10239 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
10240 but only when it will be displayed:
10241 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
10244 Run the command asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA:
10245 .Cd x-mailx-async .
10248 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
10249 temporarily release the terminal to it:
10250 .Cd needsterminal .
10253 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
10254 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
10255 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY :
10256 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
10257 If given twice then the file will be unlinked automatically by \*(UA
10258 when the command loop is entered again at latest:
10259 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
10262 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
10263 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
10264 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10265 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
10266 the creation of which is implied; note however that in order to cause
10267 deletion of the temporary file you still have to use two plus signs
10272 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content you can use
10273 another commercial at to forcefully terminate interpretation of
10274 remaining characters.
10275 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
10279 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
10280 the environment of the shell command:
10283 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
10285 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT
10286 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
10289 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
10291 .Va mime-counter-evidence
10292 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
10293 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
10294 .Ev \&\&MAILX_CONTENT
10298 .It Ev MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL
10300 .Ql message/external-body access-type=url
10301 will store the access URL in this variable, it is empty otherwise.
10304 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME
10305 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
10308 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
10312 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10313 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
10314 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
10320 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
10321 This is identical to
10322 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10325 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
10326 names a file extension, e.g.,
10328 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
10331 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
10332 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
10333 The only possible value as of now is
10335 which is thus the default.
10337 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
10338 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
10339 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
10340 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
10341 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
10343 If this variable is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
10344 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
10346 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
10347 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
10348 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
10349 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
10350 but practical experience may vary.
10351 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
10355 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
10357 .Mx Va pop3-no-apop
10358 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
10359 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the
10361 authentication method will be used when connecting to a POP3 server that
10362 advertises support.
10365 is that the password is not sent in clear text over the wire and that
10366 only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
10368 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
10371 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
10372 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
10373 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
10375 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session SSL/TLS encrypted.
10376 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
10377 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
10379 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
10385 \*(BO This flag enables POSIX mode, which changes behaviour of \*(UA
10386 where that deviates from standardized behaviour.
10387 It will be set implicitly before the
10388 .Sx "Resource files"
10389 are loaded if the environment variable
10390 .Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
10391 is set, and adjusting any of those two will be reflected by the other
10393 The following behaviour is covered and enforced by this mechanism:
10396 .Bl -bullet -compact
10398 In non-interactive mode, any error encountered while loading resource
10399 files during program startup will cause a program exit, whereas in
10400 interactive mode such errors will stop loading of the currently loaded
10401 (stack of) file(s, i.e., recursively).
10402 These exits can be circumvented on a per-command base by using
10405 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
10406 for each command which shall be allowed to fail.
10410 will replace the list of alternate addresses instead of appending to it.
10413 The variable inserting
10414 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10420 will expand embedded character sequences
10422 horizontal tabulator and
10425 \*(ID For compatibility reasons this step will always be performed.
10428 Upon changing the active
10432 will be displayed even if
10439 implies the behaviour described by
10445 is extended to cover any empty mailbox, not only empty
10447 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
10448 es: they will be removed when they are left in empty state otherwise.
10453 .It Va print-alternatives
10454 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
10455 .Ql multipart/alternative
10456 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
10458 other parts are normally discarded.
10459 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
10460 just as if the surrounding part was of type
10461 .Ql multipart/mixed .
10465 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
10466 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is expanded as via
10467 dollar-single-quote expansion (see
10468 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
10469 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
10470 status information, for example
10475 .Va mailbox-display .
10477 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
10478 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
10479 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
10481 a slot for coloured prompts is also available with the \*(OPal command
10483 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
10485 .Ql set noprompt ) .
10489 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
10496 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
10500 If set, \*(UA starts a replying message with the original message
10501 prefixed by the value of the variable
10503 Normally, a heading consisting of
10504 .Dq Fromheaderfield wrote:
10505 is put before the quotation.
10510 variable, this heading is omitted.
10513 is assigned, only the headers selected by the
10516 selection are put above the message body,
10519 acts like an automatic
10521 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10525 is assigned, all headers are put above the message body and all MIME
10526 parts are included, making
10528 act like an automatic
10531 .Va quote-as-attachment .
10534 .It Va quote-as-attachment
10535 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
10537 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
10538 Note this works regardless of the setting of
10543 Can be set to a string consisting of non-whitespace ASCII characters
10544 which shall be treated as quotation leaders, the default being
10549 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
10551 Setting this turns on a more fancy quotation algorithm in that leading
10552 quotation characters
10553 .Pf ( Va quote-chars )
10554 are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
10556 can be set to either one or two (space separated) numeric values,
10557 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
10558 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
10560 program, but line-, not paragraph-based.
10561 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
10562 The goal cannot be smaller than the length of
10564 plus some additional pad.
10565 Necessary adjustments take place silently.
10568 .It Va r-option-implicit
10569 \*(BO Setting this option evaluates the contents of
10571 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10573 and passes the results onto the used (file-based) MTA as described for the
10575 option (empty argument case).
10578 .It Va recipients-in-cc
10585 are by default merged into the new
10587 If this variable is set, only the original
10591 the rest is merged into
10596 Unless this variable is defined, no copies of outgoing mail will be saved.
10597 If defined it gives the pathname, subject to the usual
10598 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
10599 of a folder where all new, replied-to or forwarded messages are saved:
10600 when saving to this folder fails the message is not sent, but instead
10604 The standard defines that relative (fully expanded) paths are to be
10605 interpreted relative to the current directory
10607 to force interpretation relative to
10610 needs to be set in addition.
10613 .It Va record-files
10614 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10616 will be extended to cover messages which target only file and pipe
10619 These address types will not appear in recipient lists unless
10620 .Va add-file-recipients
10624 .It Va record-resent
10625 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10627 will be extended to also cover the
10634 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
10635 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
10636 character set of the original message for replies.
10637 If this fails, the mechanism described in
10638 .Sx "Character sets"
10639 is evaluated as usual.
10642 .It Va reply-strings
10643 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
10644 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
10645 built-in strings as
10647 reply message indicators \(en built-in are
10649 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
10654 which often has been seen in the wild;
10655 I.e., the separating colon has to be specified explicitly.
10659 A list of addresses to put into the
10661 field of the message header.
10662 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
10671 .It Va reply-to-honour
10674 header is honoured when replying to a message via
10678 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
10682 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
10683 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
10685 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
10687 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience.
10691 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
10693 upon interrupt or delivery error.
10697 The number of lines that represents a
10706 line display and scrolling via
10708 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
10709 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
10710 terminal, the more will be shown.
10711 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
10712 environment variables
10720 .It Va searchheaders
10721 \*(BO Expand message-list specifiers in the form
10723 to all messages containing the substring
10725 in the header field
10727 The string search is case insensitive.
10730 .It Va sendcharsets
10731 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
10732 outgoing internet mail.
10733 The value of the variable
10735 is automatically appended to this list of character sets.
10736 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
10737 the only supported charset is
10740 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10741 and refer to the section
10742 .Sx "Character sets"
10743 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
10746 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10747 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
10749 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
10751 had been set to the value of the variable
10753 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
10754 character set of the current locale encoding:
10755 therefore mail message text will be (assumed to be) in ISO-8859-1
10756 encoding when send from within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8
10757 encoding when send from within an UTF-8 locale.
10761 never comes into play as
10763 is implicitly assumed to be 8-bit and capable to represent all files the
10764 user may specify (as is the case when no character set conversion
10765 support is available in \*(UA and the only supported character set is
10767 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
10768 This might be a problem for scripts which use the suggested
10770 setting, since in this case the character set is US-ASCII by definition,
10771 so that it is better to also override
10777 An address that is put into the
10779 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
10780 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
10781 This field should normally not be used unless the
10783 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
10786 address is handled as if it were in the
10790 .Va r-option-implicit .
10793 \*(OB Predecessor of
10796 .It Va sendmail-arguments
10797 \*(OB Predecessor of
10798 .Va mta-arguments .
10800 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
10801 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
10802 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
10804 .It Va sendmail-progname
10805 \*(OB Predecessor of
10810 \*(BO When sending a message wait until the
10812 (including the built-in SMTP one) exits before accepting further commands.
10814 with this variable set errors reported by the MTA will be recognizable!
10815 If the MTA returns a non-zero exit status,
10816 the exit status of \*(UA will also be non-zero.
10820 \*(BO This setting causes \*(UA to start at the last message
10821 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder.
10825 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
10826 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
10830 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
10831 summary if the message was sent by the user.
10838 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
10840 .Va message-inject-tail ,
10841 .Va on-compose-leave
10843 .Va on-compose-splice .
10850 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
10852 .Va message-inject-tail ,
10853 .Va on-compose-leave
10855 .Va on-compose-splice .
10860 .Va on-compose-splice
10862 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
10864 .Va on-compose-leave
10866 .Va message-inject-tail
10870 .It Va skipemptybody
10871 \*(BO If an outgoing message does not contain any text in its first or
10872 only message part, do not send it but discard it silently (see also the
10873 command line option
10878 .It Va smime-ca-dir , smime-ca-file
10879 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
10880 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
10881 purpose of verification of S/MIME signed messages.
10882 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
10883 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
10884 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
10885 be explicitly turned off by setting
10886 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
10887 and further fine-tuning is possible via
10888 .Va smime-ca-flags .
10891 .It Va smime-ca-flags
10892 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
10893 storage, and the certificate verification that is used.
10894 The actual values and their meanings are documented for
10898 .It Va smime-ca-no-defaults
10899 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
10900 used to SSL/TLS library to verify S/MIME signed messages.
10902 .Mx Va smime-cipher
10903 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
10904 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
10905 messages (for the specified account).
10906 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
10909 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
10917 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
10919 is not available) and
10921 (DES CBC, 56 bits).
10923 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
10924 library that \*(UA uses.
10925 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
10926 dynamic loading via, e.g.,
10927 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
10928 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
10931 .It Va smime-crl-dir
10932 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
10933 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
10936 .It Va smime-crl-file
10937 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
10938 verifying S/MIME messages.
10941 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
10942 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
10943 encrypted before sending.
10944 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
10945 contains a certificate in PEM format.
10947 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
10948 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
10949 individually encrypted message;
10950 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
10952 .Va smime-force-encryption
10954 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
10959 .It Va smime-force-encryption
10960 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
10964 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's private key
10965 and include the user's certificate as a MIME attachment.
10966 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
10967 a valid certificate,
10968 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
10969 header and that the message content has not been altered.
10970 It does not change the message text,
10971 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
10973 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
10975 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
10977 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
10978 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
10979 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
10980 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
10981 user's private key, followed by his certificate.
10983 For message signing
10985 is always derived from the value of
10987 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10989 For the purpose of encryption the recipient's public encryption key
10990 (certificate) is expected; the command
10992 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
10993 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
10994 gives some details).
10995 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
10997 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
11002 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
11004 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
11005 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user's addresses
11006 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
11008 For signing and decryption purposes it is possible to use encrypted
11009 keys, and the pseudo-host(s)
11010 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-key
11011 for the private key
11013 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-cert
11014 for the certificate stored in the same file)
11015 will be used for performing any necessary password lookup,
11016 therefore the lookup can be automatized via the mechanisms described in
11017 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
11018 For example, the hypothetical address
11020 could be driven with a private key / certificate pair path defined in
11021 .Va \&\&smime-sign-cert-bob@exam.ple ,
11022 and needed passwords would then be looked up via the pseudo hosts
11023 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-key
11025 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-cert ) .
11026 To include intermediate certificates, use
11027 .Va smime-sign-include-certs .
11029 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
11030 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
11031 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
11032 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
11033 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
11034 .Va smime-sign-cert
11036 This can be used to include intermediate certificates of the certificate
11037 authority, in order to allow the receiver's S/MIME implementation to
11038 perform a verification of the entire certificate chain, starting from
11039 a local root certificate, over the intermediate certificates, down to the
11040 .Va smime-sign-cert .
11041 Even though top level certificates may also be included in the chain,
11042 they won't be used for the verification on the receiver's side.
11044 For the purpose of the mechanisms involved here,
11046 refers to the content of the internal variable
11048 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11051 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-include-certs
11052 will be used for performing password lookups for these certificates,
11053 shall they have been given one, therefore the lookup can be automatized
11054 via the mechanisms described in
11055 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
11057 .Mx Va smime-sign-message-digest
11058 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
11059 \*(OP Specifies the message digest to use when signing S/MIME messages.
11060 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
11062 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
11070 The actually available message digest algorithms depend on the
11071 cryptographic library that \*(UA uses.
11072 \*(OP Support for more message digest algorithms may be available
11073 through dynamic loading via, e.g.,
11074 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3
11075 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
11076 Remember that for this
11078 refers to the variable
11080 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11084 \*(OB\*(OP To use the built-in SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
11086 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
11088 is used in preference of
11092 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
11093 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
11095 authentication method, possible values are
11101 as well as the \*(OPal methods
11107 method does not need any user credentials,
11109 requires a user name and all other methods require a user name and
11117 .Va smtp-auth-password
11119 .Va smtp-auth-user ) .
11124 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
11125 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
11128 .It Va smtp-auth-password
11129 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
11130 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
11131 .Va smtp-auth-password
11133 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11135 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
11137 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11139 .Va smtp-auth-password
11140 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11143 .It Va smtp-auth-user
11144 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
11145 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
11148 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11150 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
11152 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11155 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11159 .It Va smtp-hostname
11160 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
11162 to derive the necessary
11164 information in order to issue a
11171 can be used to use the
11173 from the SMTP account
11180 from the content of this variable (or, if that is the empty string,
11182 or the local hostname as a last resort).
11183 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
11184 a provider other than which (in
11186 is about to send the message.
11187 Setting this variable also influences generated
11193 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
11194 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
11195 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
11197 command to make an SMTP
11199 session SSL/TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
11202 .It Va socks-proxy-USER@HOST , socks-proxy-HOST , socks-proxy
11203 \*(OP If this is set to the hostname (SOCKS URL) of a SOCKS5 server then
11204 \*(UA will proxy all of its network activities through it.
11205 This can be used to proxy SMTP, POP3 etc. network traffic through the
11206 Tor anonymizer, for example.
11207 The following would create a local SOCKS proxy on port 10000 that
11208 forwards to the machine
11210 and from which the network traffic is actually instantiated:
11211 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11212 # Create local proxy server in terminal 1 forwarding to HOST
11213 $ ssh -D 10000 USER@HOST
11214 # Then, start a client that uses it in terminal 2
11215 $ \*(uA -Ssocks-proxy-USER@HOST=localhost:10000
11219 .It Va spam-interface
11220 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like, e.g.,
11222 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
11223 Please refer to the manual section
11224 .Sx "Handling spam"
11225 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
11226 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
11228 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
11234 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
11236 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
11237 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
11238 knowledge to parse the program's output.
11239 A default value for
11241 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
11245 during compilation.
11246 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
11247 using a configuration file for that), the variable
11248 .Va spamc-arguments
11249 can be used as in, e.g.,
11250 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11251 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
11253 Note that this interface does not inspect the
11255 flag of a message for the command
11259 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
11260 This interface is meant for programs like
11262 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
11263 status for at least the command
11266 meaning a message is spam,
11270 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
11271 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
11272 can be intercepted as necessary.
11274 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
11277 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
11279 .Sx "Handling spam"
11280 contains examples for some programs.
11281 The process environment of the hooks will have the variable
11282 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
11284 Note that spam score support for
11286 is not supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
11288 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11294 .It Va spam-maxsize
11295 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size will not be passed through to the
11297 .Va spam-interface .
11298 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
11301 .It Va spamc-command
11302 \*(OP The path to the
11306 .Va spam-interface .
11307 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
11309 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
11310 executable had been found during compilation.
11313 .It Va spamc-arguments
11314 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
11317 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
11318 connection-related ones via this variable, e.g.,
11319 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11323 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
11325 .Va spam-interface .
11326 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
11335 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
11336 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
11337 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
11339 .Va spam-interface .
11341 .Sx "Handling spam"
11342 contains examples for some programs.
11345 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11346 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
11349 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPnal
11350 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
11351 be used to overcome this restriction.
11352 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
11353 must be followed by a semicolon
11355 and an extended regular expression.
11356 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
11357 .Va spamfilter-rate
11358 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
11359 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
11363 .It Va ssl-ca-dir-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-dir-HOST , ssl-ca-dir ,\
11364 ssl-ca-file-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-file-HOST , ssl-ca-file
11365 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
11366 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
11367 purpose of verification of SSL/TLS server certificates.
11368 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
11369 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
11370 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
11371 be explicitly turned off by setting
11372 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ,
11373 and further fine-tuning is possible via
11376 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
11377 for more information.
11378 \*(UA will try to use the TLS/SNI (ServerNameIndication) extension when
11379 establishing TLS connections to servers identified with hostnames.
11382 .Mx Va ssl-ca-flags
11383 .It Va ssl-ca-flags-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-flags-HOST , ssl-ca-flags
11384 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
11385 storage, and the certificate verification that is used (also see
11387 The value is expected to consist of a comma-separated list of
11388 configuration directives, with any intervening whitespace being ignored.
11389 The directives directly map to flags that can be passed to
11390 .Xr X509_STORE_set_flags 3 ,
11391 which are usually defined in a file
11392 .Pa openssl/x509_vfy.h ,
11393 and the availability of which depends on the used SSL/TLS library
11394 version: a directive without mapping is ignored (error log subject to
11396 Directives currently understood (case-insensitively) include:
11399 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd BaNg"
11400 .It Cd no-alt-chains
11401 If the initial chain is not trusted, do not attempt to build an
11403 Setting this flag will make OpenSSL certificate verification match that
11404 of older OpenSSL versions, before automatic building and checking of
11405 alternative chains has been implemented; also see
11406 .Cd trusted-first .
11407 .It Cd no-check-time
11408 Do not check certificate/CRL validity against current time.
11409 .It Cd partial-chain
11410 By default partial, incomplete chains which cannot be verified up to the
11411 chain top, a self-signed root certificate, will not verify.
11412 With this flag set, a chain succeeds to verify if at least one signing
11413 certificate of the chain is in any of the configured trusted stores of
11415 The OpenSSL manual page
11416 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
11417 gives some advise how to manage your own trusted store of CA certificates.
11419 Disable workarounds for broken certificates.
11420 .It Cd trusted-first
11421 Try building a chain using issuers in the trusted store first to avoid
11422 problems with server-sent legacy intermediate certificates.
11423 Newer versions of OpenSSL support alternative chain checking and enable
11424 it by default, resulting in the same behaviour; also see
11425 .Cd no-alt-chains .
11429 .Mx Va ssl-ca-no-defaults
11430 .It Va ssl-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
11432 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
11433 used to SSL/TLS library to verify SSL/TLS server certificates.
11436 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
11437 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11440 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11442 .Mx Va ssl-cipher-list
11443 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
11444 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11447 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11450 .It Va ssl-config-file
11451 \*(OP If this variable is set
11452 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
11454 .Ql +modules-load-file
11457 is used to allow resource file based configuration of the SSL/TLS library.
11458 This happens once the library is used first, which may also be early
11459 during startup (logged with
11461 If a non-empty value is given then the given file, after performing
11462 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
11463 will be used instead of the global OpenSSL default, and it is an error
11464 if the file cannot be loaded.
11465 The application name will always be passed as
11467 Some SSL/TLS libraries support application-specific configuration via
11468 resource files loaded like this, please see
11469 .Va ssl-config-module .
11471 .Mx Va ssl-config-module
11472 .It Va ssl-config-module-USER@HOST , ssl-config-module-HOST ,\
11474 \*(OP If file based application-specific configuration via
11475 .Va ssl-config-file
11476 is available, announced as
11480 indicating availability of
11481 .Xr SSL_CTX_config 3 ,
11482 then, it becomes possible to use a central SSL/TLS configuration file
11483 for all programs, including \*(uA, e.g.:
11484 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11485 # Register a configuration section for \*(uA
11486 \*(uA = mailx_master
11487 # The top configuration section creates a relation
11488 # in between dynamic SSL configuration and an actual
11489 # program specific configuration section
11491 ssl_conf = mailx_ssl_config
11492 # Well that actual program specific configuration section
11493 # now can map individual ssl-config-module names to sections,
11494 # e.g., ssl-config-module=account_xy
11496 account_xy = mailx_account_xy
11497 account_yz = mailx_account_yz
11499 MinProtocol = TLSv1.2
11502 CipherString = TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:
11503 MinProtocol = TLSv1.1
11508 .Mx Va ssl-config-pairs
11509 .It Va ssl-config-pairs-USER@HOST , ssl-config-pairs-HOST , ssl-config-pairs
11510 \*(OP The value of this variable chain will be interpreted as
11511 a comma-separated list of directive/value pairs.
11512 Different to when placing these pairs in a
11513 .Va ssl-config-module
11515 .Va ssl-config-file
11518 need to be escaped with a reverse solidus
11520 when included in pairs.
11521 Just likewise directives and values need to be separated by equals signs
11523 any whitespace surrounding pair members is removed.
11524 Keys are (usually) case-insensitive.
11525 Unless proper support is announced by
11527 .Pf ( Ql +conf-ctx )
11528 only the keys below are supported, otherwise the pairs will be used
11529 directly as arguments to the function
11530 .Xr SSL_CONF_cmd 3 .
11533 may be preceded with an asterisk
11536 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11537 shall be performed on the value; it is an error if these fail.
11540 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd C_rtificate"
11542 Filename of a SSL/TLS client certificate (chain) required by some servers.
11543 Fallback support via
11544 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_certificate_chain_file 3 .
11545 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11547 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
11549 if you use this you need to specify the private key via
11555 A list of ciphers for SSL/TLS connections, see
11557 By default no list of ciphers is set, resulting in a
11558 .Cd Protocol Ns - Ns
11559 specific list of ciphers (the protocol standards define lists of
11560 acceptable ciphers; possibly cramped by the used SSL/TLS library).
11561 Fallback support via
11562 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_cipher_list 3 .
11565 A list of supported elliptic curves, if applicable.
11566 By default no curves are set.
11567 Fallback support via
11568 .Xr SSL_CTX_set1_curves_list 3 ,
11571 .It Cd MaxProtocol , MinProtocol
11572 The maximum and minimum supported SSL/TLS versions, respectively.
11573 Optional fallback support via
11574 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_max_proto_version 3
11576 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_min_proto_version 3
11580 .Ql +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ,
11581 otherwise this directive results in an error.
11582 The fallback uses an internal parser which understands the strings
11587 and the special value
11589 which disables the given limit.
11592 Various flags to set.
11594 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
11595 in which case any other value but (exactly)
11597 results in an error.
11600 Filename of the private key in PEM format of a SSL/TLS client certificate.
11601 If unset, the name of the certificate file is used.
11602 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11605 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file 3 .
11606 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
11608 if you use this you need to specify the certificate (chain) via
11614 The used SSL/TLS protocol.
11620 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
11627 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
11628 driven via an internal parser which understands the strings
11633 and the special value
11635 Multiple protocols may be given as a comma-separated list, any
11636 whitespace is ignored, an optional plus sign
11638 prefix enables, a hyphen-minus
11640 prefix disables a protocol, so that
11642 enables only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
11648 .It Va ssl-crl-dir , ssl-crl-file
11649 \*(OP Specify a directory / a file, respectively that contains a CRL in
11650 PEM format to use when verifying SSL/TLS server certificates.
11653 .It Va ssl-curves-USER@HOST , ssl-curves-HOST , ssl-curves
11654 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11657 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11660 .It Va ssl-features
11661 \*(OP\*(RO This expands to a comma separated list of the TLS/SSL library
11662 identity and optional TLS/SSL library features.
11663 Currently supported identities are
11667 (OpenSSL v1.1.x series)
11670 (elder OpenSSL series, other clones).
11671 Optional features are preceded with a plus sign
11673 when available, and with a hyphen-minus
11676 .Ql modules-load-file
11677 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-file ) ,
11679 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-pairs ) ,
11681 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-module ) ,
11682 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
11683 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-pairs )
11686 .Pf ( Va ssl-rand-egd ) .
11689 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
11690 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11693 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11695 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
11696 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11699 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11701 .Mx Va ssl-protocol
11702 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
11703 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11706 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11709 .It Va ssl-rand-egd
11710 \*(OP Gives the pathname to an entropy daemon socket, see
11712 Not all SSL/TLS libraries support this,
11714 announces availability with
11718 .It Va ssl-rand-file
11719 \*(OP Gives the filename to a file with random entropy data, see
11720 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
11721 If this variable is not set, or set to the empty string, or if the
11722 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11724 .Xr RAND_file_name 3
11725 will be used to create the filename.
11726 If the SSL PRNG was seeded successfully
11727 The file will be updated
11728 .Pf ( Xr RAND_write_file 3 )
11729 if and only if seeding and buffer stirring succeeds.
11730 This variable is only used if
11732 is not set (or not supported by the SSL/TLS library).
11735 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
11736 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
11737 occurs during SSL/TLS server certificate validation against the
11738 specified or default trust stores
11741 or the SSL/TLS library built-in defaults (unless usage disallowed via
11742 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ) ,
11743 and as fine-tuned via
11745 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
11747 (fail and close connection immediately),
11749 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
11751 (show a warning and continue),
11753 (do not perform validation).
11759 If only set without an assigned value, then this setting inhibits the
11765 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
11766 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
11767 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
11768 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
11769 to track down the originating mail user agent.
11770 If set to the value
11776 suppression does not occur.
11781 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
11786 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
11787 escape commas with reverse solidus) to be used to overwrite or define
11790 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11791 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11794 String capabilities form
11796 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
11797 Numerics have to be notated as
11799 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
11800 Finally, booleans do not have any value but indicate a true or false
11801 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
11802 does not support undefining an existing boolean.
11803 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
11804 for one notations like
11807 .Ql control-LETTER ,
11808 and for clarification purposes
11810 can be used to specify
11812 (the control notation
11814 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
11815 the standard CSI sequence);
11816 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
11819 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
11820 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
11822 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11823 ? set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
11827 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
11828 operation of the built-in line editor or \*(UA in general:
11831 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd yay"
11833 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
11835 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
11836 Note that \*(UA does not actually care about the terminal beside that,
11837 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences.
11840 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
11843 .Cd enter_ca_mode ,
11844 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen ca-mode,
11845 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
11846 This must be enabled explicitly by setting
11847 .Va termcap-ca-mode .
11849 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
11853 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
11854 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
11855 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
11856 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
11858 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
11862 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
11864 clear the screen and home cursor.
11865 (Will be simulated via
11870 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
11875 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
11877 clear to the end of line.
11878 (Will be simulated via
11880 plus repetitions of space characters.)
11882 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
11883 .Cd column_address :
11884 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
11885 (Will be simulated via
11891 .Cd carriage_return :
11892 move to the first column in the current row.
11893 The default built-in fallback is
11896 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
11898 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
11899 The default built-in fallback is
11902 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
11904 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
11905 The default built-in fallback is
11907 which is used by most terminals.
11915 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
11920 .It Va termcap-ca-mode
11921 \*(OP Allow usage of the
11925 terminal capabilities, effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen
11926 application, as documented for
11929 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11930 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11933 .It Va termcap-disable
11934 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
11935 If set only some generic fallback built-ins and possibly the content of
11937 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
11939 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11940 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11944 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
11947 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
11950 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for
11951 unsigned right shifting (see
11959 \*(BO If set then the
11961 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
11965 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
11966 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
11967 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
11968 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1.
11969 Otherwise it defaults to UTF-8.
11970 Sufficient locale support provided the default will be preferably
11971 deduced from the locale environment if that is set (e.g.,
11973 see there for more); runtime locale changes will be reflected by
11975 except during the program startup phase and if
11977 had been used to freeze the given value.
11978 Refer to the section
11979 .Sx "Character sets"
11980 for the complete picture about character sets.
11983 .It Va typescript-mode
11984 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
11985 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
11988 .Va colour-disable ,
11989 .Va line-editor-disable
11990 and (before startup completed only)
11991 .Va termcap-disable .
11992 Unsetting it does not restore the former state of the covered settings.
11996 For a safety-by-default policy \*(UA sets its process
12000 but this variable can be used to override that:
12001 set it to an empty value to do not change the (current) setting (on
12002 startup), otherwise the process file mode creation mask is updated to
12004 Child processes inherit the process file mode creation mask.
12007 .It Va user-HOST , user
12008 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, which is
12009 used in case none has been given in the protocol and account-specific
12011 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
12015 \*(BO Setting this enables upward compatibility with \*(UA
12016 version 15.0 in respect to which configuration options are available and
12017 how they are handled.
12018 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
12019 doing things, respectively.
12023 \*(BO This setting, also controllable via the command line option
12025 causes \*(UA to be more verbose, e.g., it will display obsoletion
12026 warnings and SSL/TLS certificate chains.
12027 Even though marked \*(BO this option may be set twice in order to
12028 increase the level of verbosity even more, in which case even details of
12029 the actual message delivery and protocol conversations are shown.
12032 is sufficient to disable verbosity as such.
12039 .It Va version , version-date , \
12040 version-hexnum , version-major , version-minor , version-update
12041 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable is a string with
12042 the complete version identification, the second the release date in ISO
12043 8601 notation without time.
12044 The third is a 32-bit hexadecimal number with the upper 8 bits storing
12045 the major, followed by the minor and update version numbers which occupy
12047 The latter three variables contain only decimal digits: the major, minor
12048 and update version numbers.
12049 The output of the command
12051 will include this information.
12054 .It Va writebackedited
12055 If this variable is set messages modified using the
12059 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
12060 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
12061 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
12062 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
12063 performed, and proper RFC 4155
12065 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an excercise to
12068 .\" }}} (Variables)
12070 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
12073 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
12077 .Dq environment variable
12078 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
12079 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
12080 commonly found in there.
12081 The process environment is inherited from the
12083 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
12084 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
12085 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
12086 from \*(UA's point of view.
12087 This means that, e.g., they can be managed via
12091 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
12092 newly created child processes).
12095 In order to transparently integrate other environment variables equally
12096 they need to be imported (linked) with the command
12098 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
12099 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
12100 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
12102 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
12104 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
12106 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12107 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
12109 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
12112 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev BaNg"
12115 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen
12117 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
12118 processes and the MLE (see
12119 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
12120 in interactive mode thereafter.
12121 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 80 columns, unless in
12127 The name of the (mailbox)
12129 to use for saving aborted messages if
12131 is set; this defaults to
12138 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
12143 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
12147 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12148 A default editor is used if this value is not defined.
12152 The user's home directory.
12153 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12154 The calling user's home directory will be used instead if this directory
12155 does not exist, is not accessible or cannot be read;
12156 it will always be used for the root user.
12157 (No test for being writable is performed to allow usage by
12158 non-privileged users within read-only jails, but dependent on the
12159 variable settings this directory is a default write target, e.g. for
12167 .It Ev LC_ALL , LC_CTYPE , LANG
12168 \*(OP The (names in lookup order of the)
12172 which indicates the used
12173 .Sx "Character sets" .
12174 Runtime changes trigger automatic updates of the entire locale system,
12175 which includes updating
12177 (except during startup if the variable has been frozen via
12182 The user's preferred number of lines on a page or the vertical screen
12183 or window size in lines.
12184 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
12185 processes in interactive mode thereafter.
12186 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 24 lines, unless in
12192 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
12194 command when operating on local mailboxes.
12197 (path search through
12202 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
12203 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
12204 name to any newly created child process.
12208 Is used as the users
12210 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12214 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
12218 \*(OP Overrides the default path search for
12219 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
12220 which is defined in the standard RFC 1524 as
12221 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
12222 .\" TODO we should have a mailcaps-default virtual RDONLY option!
12223 (\*(UA makes it a configuration option, however.)
12224 Note this is not a search path, but a path search.
12228 Is used as a startup file instead of
12231 In order to avoid side-effects from configuration files scripts should
12232 either set this variable to
12236 command line option should be used.
12239 .It Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
12240 If this variable is set then reading of
12242 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
12243 had been started up with the option
12245 (and according argument) or
12247 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12251 The name of the users
12253 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
12255 A logical subset of the special
12256 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12262 Traditionally this MBOX is used as the file to save messages from the
12264 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12265 that have been read.
12267 .Sx "Message states" .
12271 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
12277 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
12281 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
12282 The default paginator is
12284 (path search through
12287 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
12289 then a non-existing environment variable
12296 will optionally be set to
12303 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
12304 looking for commands, e.g.,
12305 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
12308 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
12309 This variable is automatically looked for upon startup, see
12315 The shell to use for the commands
12320 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
12321 and when starting subprocesses.
12322 A default shell is used if this environment variable is not defined.
12325 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
12326 Specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01) to be
12327 used in place of the current time.
12328 This variable is looked up upon program startup, and its existence will
12329 switch \*(UA to a reproducable mode
12330 .Pf ( Lk https://reproducible-builds.org )
12331 which uses deterministic random numbers, a special fixated pseudo
12334 This operation mode is used for development and by software packagers.
12335 \*(ID Currently an invalid setting is only ignored, rather than causing
12336 a program abortion.
12338 .Dl $ SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=`date +%s` \*(uA
12342 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
12343 For extended colour and font control please refer to
12344 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
12345 and for terminal management in general to
12346 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
12350 Except for the root user this variable defines the directory for
12351 temporary files to be used instead of
12353 (or the given compile-time constant) if set, existent, accessible as
12354 well as read- and writable.
12355 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment,
12356 but \*(UA will ensure at startup that this environment variable is
12357 updated to contain a usable temporary directory.
12363 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
12364 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
12368 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
12372 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12382 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
12384 File giving initial commands, one of the
12385 .Sx "Resource files" .
12388 System wide initialization file, one of the
12389 .Sx "Resource files" .
12393 \*(OP Personal MIME type handler definition file, see
12394 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
12395 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
12396 a configuration option and can be overridden via
12400 .It Pa /etc/mailcap
12401 \*(OP System wide MIME type handler definition file, see
12402 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
12403 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
12404 a configuration option and can be overridden via
12408 The default value for
12410 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12413 .It Pa ~/.mime.types
12414 Personal MIME types, see
12415 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
12416 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12419 .It Pa /etc/mime.types
12420 System wide MIME types, see
12421 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
12422 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12426 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the users
12428 file \(en the section
12429 .Sx "The .netrc file"
12430 documents the file format.
12431 The actually used path is a configuration option and can be overridden via
12438 The actually used path is a compile-time constant.
12442 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
12443 .Ss "Resource files"
12445 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files:
12447 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
12450 System wide initialization file.
12451 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
12453 (and according argument) or
12455 command line options, or by setting the
12458 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
12462 File giving initial commands.
12463 A different file can be chosen by setting the
12467 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
12469 command line option.
12471 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
12472 Defines a startup file to be read after all other resource files.
12473 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
12475 implementations, for example.
12476 This variable is only honoured when defined in a resource file, e.g.,
12478 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
12482 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
12485 .Bl -bullet -compact
12487 The whitespace characters space, tabulator and newline,
12488 as well as those defined by the variable
12490 are removed from the beginning and end of input lines.
12492 Empty lines are ignored.
12494 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
12495 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
12497 by placing a reverse solidus character
12499 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
12500 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
12501 remains in the input.
12503 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
12505 then it is a comment-command and also ignored.
12506 (The comment-command is a real command, which does nothing, and
12507 therefore the usual follow lines mechanism applies!)
12511 Unless \*(UA is about to enter interactive mode syntax errors that occur
12512 while loading these files are treated as errors and cause program exit.
12513 More files with syntactically equal content can be
12515 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
12517 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12518 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
12519 es, it is really continued here.
12526 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
12527 .Ss "The mime.types files"
12530 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
12531 \*(UA needs to learn about MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
12532 media types in order to classify message and attachment content.
12533 One source for them are
12535 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
12536 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
12537 Another is the command
12539 which also offers access to \*(UAs MIME type cache.
12541 files have the following syntax:
12543 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12544 type/subtype extension [extension ...]
12545 # E.g., text/html html htm
12551 define the MIME media type, as standardized in RFC 2046:
12553 is used to declare the general type of data, while the
12555 specifies a specific format for that type of data.
12556 One or multiple filename
12558 s, separated by whitespace, can be bound to the media type format.
12559 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
12561 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
12563 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in especially
12564 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
12565 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
12566 and prepends an optional
12570 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
12573 The following type markers are supported:
12576 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
12578 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
12583 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
12584 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
12585 the content as plain text instead.
12589 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
12590 handler to be defined.
12592 If no handler can be found a text message is displayed which says so.
12593 This can be annoying, for example signatures serve a contextual purpose,
12594 their content is of no use by itself.
12595 This marker will avoid displaying the text message.
12600 for sending messages:
12602 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
12603 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
12604 For reading etc. messages:
12605 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
12606 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
12608 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
12609 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
12610 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
12611 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
12614 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{
12615 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
12617 .\" TODO MAILCAP DISABLED
12618 .Sy This feature is not available in v14.9.0, sorry!
12620 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
12621 which \*(UA \*(OPally supports (see
12622 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
12623 It defines a file format to be used to inform mail user agent programs
12624 about the locally-installed facilities for handling various data
12625 formats, i.e., about commands and how they can be used to display, edit
12626 et cetera MIME part contents, as well as a default path search that
12627 includes multiple possible locations of
12631 environment variable that can be used to overwrite that (repeating here
12632 that it is not a search path, but instead a path search specification).
12633 Any existing files will be loaded in sequence, appending any content to
12634 the list of MIME type handler directives.
12638 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
12639 Comment lines start with a number sign
12641 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
12642 Empty lines are also ignored.
12643 All other lines form individual entries that must adhere to the syntax
12645 To extend a single entry (not comment) its line can be continued on
12646 follow lines if newline characters are
12648 by preceding them with the reverse solidus character
12650 The standard does not specify how leading whitespace of follow lines
12651 is to be treated, therefore \*(UA retains it.
12655 entries consist of a number of semicolon
12657 separated fields, and the reverse solidus
12659 character can be used to escape any following character including
12660 semicolon and itself.
12661 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
12662 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
12663 Leading and trailing whitespace of content is ignored (removed).
12666 The first field defines the MIME
12668 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively, and no reverse solidus
12669 escaping is possible in this field).
12670 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
12672 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
12674 would match any audio type.
12675 The second field defines the shell command which shall be used to
12677 MIME parts of the given type; it is implicitly called the
12684 shell commands message (MIME part) data is passed via standard input
12685 unless the given shell command includes one or more instances of the
12688 in which case these instances will be replaced with a temporary filename
12689 and the data will have been stored in the file that is being pointed to.
12692 shell commands data is assumed to be generated on standard output unless
12693 the given command includes (one ore multiple)
12695 In any case any given
12697 format is replaced with a(n already) properly quoted filename.
12698 Note that when a command makes use of a temporary file via
12700 then \*(UA will remove it again, as if the
12701 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ,
12702 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
12704 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12705 flags had been set; see below for more.
12708 The optional fields either define a shell command or an attribute (flag)
12709 value, the latter being a single word and the former being a keyword
12710 naming the field followed by an equals sign
12712 succeeded by a shell command, and as usual for any
12714 content any whitespace surrounding the equals sign will be removed, too.
12715 Optional fields include the following:
12718 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
12720 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
12722 (Currently unused.)
12724 .It Cd composetyped
12727 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
12729 header field to be applied to the composed data.
12730 (Currently unused.)
12733 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
12735 (Currently unused.)
12738 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
12740 (Currently unused.)
12743 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, e.g., the machine
12744 architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether or not
12745 this mailcap entry applies.
12746 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
12747 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
12750 .It Cd needsterminal
12751 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
12752 an interactive terminal.
12753 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
12754 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
12755 ignored; this flag implies
12756 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
12759 .It Cd copiousoutput
12760 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
12762 command will be an extended stream of textual output that can be
12763 (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
12764 It is mutually exclusive with
12765 .Cd needsterminal .
12767 .It Cd textualnewlines
12768 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
12769 that, if encoded in
12771 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
12772 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
12773 (Currently unused.)
12775 .It Cd nametemplate
12776 This field gives a filename format, in which
12778 will be replaced by a random string, the joined combination of which
12779 will be used as the filename denoted by
12780 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12781 One could specify that a GIF file being passed to an image viewer should
12782 have a name ending in
12785 .Ql nametemplate=%s.gif .
12786 Note that \*(UA ignores the name template unless that solely specifies
12787 a filename suffix that consists of (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
12788 characters, the underscore and dot only.
12791 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
12792 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
12793 This field is not used by \*(UA.
12796 A textual description that describes this type of data.
12799 .It Cd x-mailx-even-if-not-interactive
12800 An extension flag test field \(em by default handlers without
12802 are entirely ignored in non-interactive mode, but if this flag is set
12803 then their use will be considered.
12804 It is an error if this flag is set for commands that use the flag
12805 .Cd needsterminal .
12808 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
12809 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
12812 command shall not be used to generate message quotes
12813 (as it would be by default).
12816 .It Cd x-mailx-async
12817 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
12819 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
12820 Cannot be used in conjunction with
12821 .Cd needsterminal .
12824 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
12825 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
12827 command shall be evaluated once only and the (boolean) result be cached.
12828 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
12829 .Dq running under the X Window System .
12832 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12833 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
12834 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
12835 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12836 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12841 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
12842 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
12843 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
12845 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
12846 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
12847 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12849 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12854 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12855 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
12856 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
12857 (Do not use this for asynchronous handlers.)
12858 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12860 format, or in conjunction with
12861 .Cd x-mailx-async ,
12862 or without also setting
12863 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12865 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill .
12868 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12871 implies the three tmpfile related flags above, but if you want, e.g.,
12873 and deal with the temporary file yourself, you can add in this flag to
12875 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
12880 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
12881 entry fields, prefixed by
12883 Flag fields apply to the entire
12885 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
12886 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
12887 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
12888 one does not provide enough information.
12891 command needs to specify the
12895 command shall not, the following will help out the latter (with enabled
12899 level \*(UA will show information about handler evaluation):
12901 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12902 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
12903 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
12907 In fields any occurrence of the format string
12909 will be replaced by the
12912 Named parameters from the
12914 field may be placed in the command execution line using
12916 followed by the parameter name and a closing
12919 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
12920 regardless of embedded spaces; thus:
12922 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12924 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
12927 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
12928 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
12930 # Executed shell command
12931 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
12935 .\" TODO v15: Mailcap: %n,%F
12936 Note that \*(UA does not support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
12937 shown in this example (as of today).
12938 \*(UA does not support the additional formats
12942 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
12944 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
12945 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
12946 in additional user-provided quotes:
12948 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12950 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
12952 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s
12954 application/pdf; \e
12956 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
12957 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
12959 x-mailx-async; x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12961 application/*; echo "This is \e"%t\e" but \e
12962 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 1024 | cat -vET; \e
12963 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote
12968 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
12969 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
12972 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
12973 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
12974 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
12977 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{
12978 .Ss "The .netrc file"
12982 file contains user credentials for machine accounts.
12983 The default location in the user's
12985 directory may be overridden by the
12987 environment variable.
12988 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
12989 \*(UA implements a parser that supports a superset of the original BSD
12990 syntax, but users should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches
12991 of that file format, shall their
12993 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
12996 .Bl -bullet -compact
12998 BSD does not support single, but only double quotation marks, e.g.,
12999 .Ql password="pass with spaces" .
13001 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
13002 (e.g., a space can be escaped via
13004 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
13006 BSD does not require a final quotation mark of the last user input token.
13008 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
13009 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
13010 still seems to support this syntax, \*(UA does not!
13012 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
13013 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
13014 whitespace, with a number sign
13016 then the rest of the line is ignored.
13018 Whereas other programs may require that the
13020 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
13022 token for any other
13026 \*(UA will always require these strict permissions.
13030 Of the following list of supported tokens \*(UA only uses (and caches)
13035 At runtime the command
13037 can be used to control \*(UA's
13041 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
13042 .It Cd machine Ar name
13043 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized by \*(UA
13045 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
13050 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
13053 As an extension that should not be the cause of any worries
13054 \*(UA supports a single wildcard prefix for
13056 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13057 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
13058 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
13059 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
13065 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
13069 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
13070 Note that in the example neither
13071 .Ql pop3.example.com
13073 .Ql smtp.example.com
13074 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
13075 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
13078 This is the same as
13080 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
13081 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
13082 and it must be the last first-class token.
13084 .It Cd login Ar name
13085 The user name on the remote machine.
13087 .It Cd password Ar string
13088 The user's password on the remote machine.
13090 .It Cd account Ar string
13091 Supply an additional account password.
13092 This is merely for FTP purposes.
13094 .It Cd macdef Ar name
13096 A macro is defined with the specified
13098 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
13099 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
13102 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
13103 defined following the
13105 they are intended to be used with.)
13108 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
13109 This is merely for FTP purposes.
13116 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
13119 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
13120 .Ss "An example configuration"
13122 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13123 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
13126 # Request strict SSL/TLS transport security checks
13127 set ssl-verify=strict
13129 # Where are the up-to-date SSL/TLS certificates?
13130 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, do not use any,
13131 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
13132 #set ssl-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
13133 set ssl-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
13134 set ssl-ca-no-defaults
13135 #set ssl-ca-flags=partial-chain
13136 wysh set smime-ca-file="${ssl-ca-file}" \e
13137 smime-ca-no-defaults #smime-ca-flags="${ssl-ca-flags}"
13139 # This could be outsourced to a central configuration file via
13140 # ssl-config-file plus ssl-config-module if the used library allows.
13141 # CipherList: explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may
13142 # improve security, especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2.
13143 # See ciphers(1). Possibly best to only use ssl-cipher-list-HOST
13144 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
13145 # Curves: especially with TLSv1.3 curves selection may be desired.
13146 # MinProtocol,MaxProtocol: do not use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
13147 # Change this only when the remote server does not support it:
13148 # maybe use chain support via ssl-config-pairs-HOST / -USER@HOST
13149 # to define such explicit exceptions, then, e.g.
13150 # MinProtocol=TLSv1.1
13151 if [ "$ssl-features" =% +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ]
13152 wysh set ssl-config-pairs='\e
13153 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13154 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13155 MinProtocol=TLSv1.1'
13157 wysh set ssl-config-pairs='\e
13158 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13159 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13160 Protocol=-ALL\e,+TLSv1.1 \e, +TLSv1.2'
13163 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
13164 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
13166 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
13167 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
13168 set reply-in-same-charset
13170 # When replying, do not merge From: and To: of the original message
13171 # into To:. Instead old From: -> new To:, old To: -> merge Cc:.
13172 set recipients-in-cc
13174 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
13175 # Only like this you will be able to see errors reported through the
13176 # exit status of the MTA (including the built-in SMTP one)!
13179 # Only use built-in MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
13180 set mimetypes-load-control
13182 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
13184 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
13185 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
13186 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt \e
13187 record=+sent.mbox record-files record-resent
13189 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
13190 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
13192 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
13193 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13195 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
13196 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from do not match.
13197 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
13198 set mta=(smtps?|submission)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
13199 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
13202 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
13204 colour-pager crt= \e
13205 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes fullnames \e
13206 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
13207 mime-counter-evidence=0b1111 \e
13208 prompt='?\e$?!\e$!/\e$^ERRNAME[\e$account#\e$mailbox-display]? ' \e
13209 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
13212 # Only include the selected header fields when typing messages
13213 headerpick type retain from_ date from to cc subject \e
13214 message-id mail-followup-to reply-to
13215 # ...when forwarding messages
13216 headerpick forward retain subject date from to cc
13217 # ...when saving message, etc.
13218 #headerpick save ignore ^Original-.*$ ^X-.*$
13220 # Some mailing lists
13221 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
13222 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
13224 # Handle a few file extensions (to store MBOX databases)
13225 filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
13226 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
13227 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
13228 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
13230 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
13231 # Instead of directly placing content inside `account',
13232 # we `define' a macro: like that we can switch "accounts"
13233 # from within *on-compose-splice*, for example!
13235 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13236 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
13238 set pop3-no-apop-pop.gmXil.com
13239 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.gmXil.com
13240 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.gmXil.com
13241 #set record="+[Gmail]/Sent Mail"
13242 # Select: File imaps://imap.gmXil.com/[Gmail]/Sent\e Mail
13244 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
13246 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.gmail.com:465
13252 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
13253 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
13254 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
13255 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
13256 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
13257 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
13259 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13260 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13262 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.yaXXex.com
13263 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.yaXXex.com
13265 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.com:465 \e
13266 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
13272 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
13273 commandalias lls '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
13274 commandalias llS '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlS'
13276 set pipe-message/external-body='@* echo $MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL'
13278 # We do not support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
13279 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
13282 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'@*#++=@\e
13283 < "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
13284 -v TMPFILE="${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
13286 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/ {\e
13289 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13290 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
13291 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13295 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
13296 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
13303 commandalias V '\e'call V
13307 When storing passwords in
13309 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
13310 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
13313 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
13315 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
13316 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
13318 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13320 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13321 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13323 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
13324 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
13326 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
13327 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
13328 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
13329 commandalias xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
13341 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13342 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
13346 This configuration should now work just fine:
13349 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -dvv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
13352 .\" .Ss "S/MIME step by step" {{{
13353 .Ss "S/MIME step by step"
13355 \*(OP The first thing you need for participating in S/MIME message
13356 exchange is your personal certificate, including a private key.
13357 The certificate contains public information, in particular your name and
13358 your email address(es), and the public key that is used by others to
13359 encrypt messages for you,
13360 and to verify signed messages they supposedly received from you.
13361 The certificate is included in each signed message you send.
13362 The private key must be kept secret.
13363 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with your
13364 public key, and to sign messages.
13367 For personal use it is recommended that you get a S/MIME certificate
13368 from one of the major CAs on the Internet using your WWW browser.
13369 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
13371 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
13372 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
13373 community for free; their root certificate
13374 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
13375 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
13376 which means you will have to download their root certificate separately
13377 and ensure it is part of our S/MIME certificate validation chain by
13380 or as a vivid member of the
13381 .Va smime-ca-file .
13382 But let us take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
13383 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
13386 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
13387 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
13388 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
13389 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
13390 entries of the web interface.
13391 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let us create a new
13392 .Dq client certificate ,
13393 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
13394 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
13398 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
13399 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
13400 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
13403 .Dl $ openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
13406 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
13408 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
13409 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
13410 .Dq advanced options
13411 to see the corresponding text field).
13412 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
13413 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
13414 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
13415 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
13416 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
13421 In order to use your new S/MIME setup a combined private key/public key
13422 (certificate) file has to be created:
13425 .Dl $ cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
13428 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
13429 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
13430 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted.
13431 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
13433 is of interest for verification only):
13435 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13436 ? set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
13437 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
13438 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
13444 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS" {{{
13445 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS"
13447 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
13448 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
13449 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
13450 declared invalid after they have been issued.
13451 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
13453 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
13454 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
13455 To seriously use S/MIME or SSL/TLS verification,
13456 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
13457 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
13458 invalidated certificates.
13459 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
13460 the Internet, so they have to be retrieved by some external mechanism.
13463 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
13464 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
13467 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
13470 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
13471 (and no other files) must be created.
13476 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
13477 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
13478 to verify a certificate.
13487 In general it is a good idea to turn on
13493 twice) if something does not work well.
13494 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
13495 problems' solution.
13497 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
13498 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
13500 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
13501 and cannot be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
13503 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
13504 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
13506 One may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
13510 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
13513 return the expected value?
13514 Does this local hostname have a domain suffix?
13515 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
13517 try again after adding an (additional) entry with this extension.
13520 .\" .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail" {{{
13521 .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail"
13523 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
13525 unless they use a special authentification method (OAuth 2.0) which
13526 was not standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
13527 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
13530 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
13531 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
13532 her- and himself with the locally installed
13534 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
13535 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
13536 local cache this query would have to be performed whenever \*(UA is
13537 invoked (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
13540 \*(UA does not support OAuth.
13541 Because of this it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
13542 .Dq less secure app
13543 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
13544 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
13549 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
13552 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
13554 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
13556 use that special password instead of the real Google account password in
13557 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
13558 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
13562 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" {{{
13563 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work"
13565 It can happen that the terminal library (see
13566 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
13569 reports different codes than the terminal really sends, in which case
13570 \*(UA will tell that a key binding is functional, but will not be able to
13571 recognize it because the received data does not match anything expected.
13572 Especially without the \*(OPal terminal capability library support one
13573 reason for this may be that the (possibly even non-existing) keypad
13574 is not turned on and the resulting layout reports the keypad control
13575 codes for the normal keyboard keys.
13580 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
13583 To overcome the situation, use, e.g., the program
13585 in conjunction with the command line option
13587 if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
13588 by keypresses, and use the variable
13590 to make \*(UA aware of them.
13591 E.g., the terminal this is typed on produces some false sequences, here
13592 an example showing the shifted home key:
13594 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13597 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
13602 ? \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
13609 .\" .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?" {{{
13610 .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?"
13613 Put (at least parts of) the following in your
13616 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13618 smtpserver = /usr/bin/s-mailx
13619 smtpserveroption = -t
13620 #smtpserveroption = -Sexpandaddr
13621 smtpserveroption = -Athe-account-you-need
13624 suppressfrom = false
13625 assume8bitEncoding = UTF-8
13628 chainreplyto = true
13639 .\" .Sh "IMAP CLIENT" {{{
13642 \*(OPally there is IMAP client support available.
13643 This part of the program is obsolete and will vanish in v15 with the
13644 large MIME and I/O layer rewrite, because it uses old-style blocking I/O
13645 and makes excessive use of signal based long code jumps.
13646 Support can hopefully be readded later based on a new-style I/O, with
13647 SysV signal handling.
13648 In fact the IMAP support had already been removed from the codebase, but
13649 was reinstantiated on user demand: in effect the IMAP code is at the
13650 level of \*(UA v14.8.16 (with
13652 being the sole exception), and should be treated with some care.
13659 protocol prefixes, and an IMAP-based
13662 IMAP URLs (paths) undergo inspections and possible transformations
13663 before use (and the command
13665 can be used to manually apply them to any given argument).
13666 Hierarchy delimiters are normalized, a step which is configurable via the
13668 variable chain, but defaults to the first seen delimiter otherwise.
13669 \*(UA supports internationalised IMAP names, and en- and decodes the
13670 names from and to the
13672 as necessary and possible.
13673 If a mailbox name is expanded (see
13674 .Sx "Filename transformations" )
13675 to an IMAP mailbox, all names that begin with `+' then refer to IMAP
13676 mailboxes below the
13678 target box, while folder names prefixed by `@' refer to folders below
13679 the hierarchy base, e.g., the following lists all folders below the
13680 current one when in an IMAP mailbox:
13684 Note: some IMAP servers do not accept the creation of mailboxes in
13685 the hierarchy base, but require that they are created as subfolders of
13686 `INBOX' \(en with such servers a folder name of the form
13688 .Dl imaps://mylogin@imap.myisp.example/INBOX.
13690 should be used (the last character is the server's hierarchy
13692 The following IMAP-specific commands exist:
13695 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
13698 Only applicable to cached IMAP mailboxes;
13699 takes a message list and reads the specified messages into the IMAP
13704 If operating in disconnected mode on an IMAP mailbox,
13705 switch to online mode and connect to the mail server while retaining
13706 the mailbox status.
13707 See the description of the
13709 variable for more information.
13713 If operating in online mode on an IMAP mailbox,
13714 switch to disconnected mode while retaining the mailbox status.
13715 See the description of the
13718 A list of messages may optionally be given as argument;
13719 the respective messages are then read into the cache before the
13720 connection is closed, thus
13722 makes the entire mailbox available for disconnected use.
13726 Sends command strings directly to the current IMAP server.
13727 \*(UA operates always in IMAP `selected state' on the current mailbox;
13728 commands that change this will produce undesirable results and should be
13730 Useful IMAP commands are:
13731 .Bl -tag -offset indent -width ".Ic getquotearoot"
13733 Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument and creates it.
13735 (RFC 2087) Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument
13736 and prints the quotas that apply to the mailbox.
13737 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
13739 (RFC 2342) Takes no arguments and prints the Personal Namespaces,
13740 the Other User's Namespaces and the Shared Namespaces.
13741 Each namespace type is printed in parentheses;
13742 if there are multiple namespaces of the same type,
13743 inner parentheses separate them.
13744 For each namespace a prefix and a hierarchy separator is listed.
13745 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
13750 Perform IMAP path transformations.
13754 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
13755 and manages the error number
13757 The first argument specifies the operation:
13759 normalizes hierarchy delimiters (see
13761 and converts the strings from the locale
13763 to the internationalized variant used by IMAP,
13765 performs the reverse operation.
13770 The following IMAP-specific internal variables exist:
13773 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
13775 .It Va disconnected
13776 \*(BO When an IMAP mailbox is selected and this variable is set,
13777 no connection to the server is initiated.
13778 Instead, data is obtained from the local cache (see
13781 Mailboxes that are not present in the cache
13782 and messages that have not yet entirely been fetched from the server
13784 to fetch all messages in a mailbox at once,
13786 .No ` Ns Li copy * /dev/null Ns '
13787 can be used while still in connected mode.
13788 Changes that are made to IMAP mailboxes in disconnected mode are queued
13789 and committed later when a connection to that server is made.
13790 This procedure is not completely reliable since it cannot be guaranteed
13791 that the IMAP unique identifiers (UIDs) on the server still match the
13792 ones in the cache at that time.
13795 when this problem occurs.
13797 .It Va disconnected-USER@HOST
13798 The specified account is handled as described for the
13801 but other accounts are not affected.
13804 .It Va imap-auth-USER@HOST , imap-auth
13805 Sets the IMAP authentication method.
13806 Valid values are `login' for the usual password-based authentication
13808 `cram-md5', which is a password-based authentication that does not send
13809 the password over the network in clear text,
13810 and `gssapi' for GSS-API based authentication.
13814 Enables caching of IMAP mailboxes.
13815 The value of this variable must point to a directory that is either
13816 existent or can be created by \*(UA.
13817 All contents of the cache can be deleted by \*(UA at any time;
13818 it is not safe to make assumptions about them.
13821 .It Va imap-delim-USER@HOST , imap-delim-HOST , imap-delim
13822 The hierarchy separator used by the IMAP server.
13823 Whenever an IMAP path is specified it will undergo normalization.
13824 One of the normalization steps is the squeezing and adjustment of
13825 hierarchy separators.
13826 If this variable is set, any occurrence of any character of the given
13827 value that exists in the path will be replaced by the first member of
13828 the value; an empty value will cause the default to be used, it is
13830 If not set, we will reuse the first hierarchy separator character that
13831 is discovered in a user-given mailbox name.
13833 .Mx Va imap-keepalive
13834 .It Va imap-keepalive-USER@HOST , imap-keepalive-HOST , imap-keepalive
13835 IMAP servers may close the connection after a period of
13836 inactivity; the standard requires this to be at least 30 minutes,
13837 but practical experience may vary.
13838 Setting this variable to a numeric `value' greater than 0 causes
13839 a `NOOP' command to be sent each `value' seconds if no other operation
13843 .It Va imap-list-depth
13844 When retrieving the list of folders on an IMAP server, the
13846 command stops after it has reached a certain depth to avoid possible
13848 The value of this variable sets the maximum depth allowed.
13850 If the folder separator on the current IMAP server is a slash `/',
13851 this variable has no effect and the
13853 command does not descend to subfolders.
13855 .Mx Va imap-use-starttls
13856 .It Va imap-use-starttls-USER@HOST , imap-use-starttls-HOST , imap-use-starttls
13857 Causes \*(UA to issue a `STARTTLS' command to make an unencrypted
13858 IMAP session SSL/TLS encrypted.
13859 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
13860 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the IMAPS method.
13866 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
13876 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
13885 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
13891 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
13894 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
13895 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
13896 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
13899 command already appeared in First Edition
13903 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
13904 Electronic mail was there from the start.
13905 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
13906 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
13907 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
13908 freeloaders, or whatever.
13909 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
13910 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
13911 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
13917 Mail was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
13920 distribution until 1995.
13921 Mail has then seen further development in open source
13923 variants, noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
13925 Based upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
13926 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
13927 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso.
13928 This man page is derived from
13929 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
13930 that was originally written by Kurt Shoens.
13938 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
13939 .An "Edward Wang" ,
13940 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
13941 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
13942 .An "Gunnar Ritter" .
13943 \*(UA is developed by
13944 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" Aq steffen@sdaoden.eu .
13947 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
13950 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
13954 from anywhere else but a command prompt is very problematic and likely
13955 to leave the program in an undefined state: many library functions
13956 cannot deal with the
13958 that this software (still) performs; even though efforts have been taken
13959 to address this, no sooner but in v15 it will have been worked out:
13960 interruptions have not been disabled in order to allow forceful breakage
13961 of hanging network connections, for example (all this is unrelated to
13965 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
13966 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
13967 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
13972 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
13973 that is capable of message queuing.
13980 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
13981 claims that there are no messages to display, one needs to perform
13982 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
13984 In threaded display a power user may encounter crashes very
13985 occasionally (this is may and very).
13989 in the source repository lists future directions.
13992 Please report bugs to the
13994 address, e.g., from within \*(uA:
13995 .\" v15-compat: drop eval as `mail' will expand variable?
13996 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
13997 More information is available on the web:
13998 .Ql $ \*(uA -X 'echo Ns \| $ Ns Va contact-web Ns ' -Xx .