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 v14.9.10 / 2018-03-25
44 .ds VD \\%~/dead.letter
48 .ds vS /etc/mime.types
56 .ds OU [no v15-compat]
57 .ds ID [v15 behaviour may differ]
58 .ds NQ [Only new quoting rules]
62 .if !d str-Lb-libterminfo \
63 .ds str-Lb-libterminfo Terminal Information Library (libterminfo, \-lterminfo)
72 .Nd send and receive Internet mail
78 .\" Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"SYNOPSIS, main()
84 .Op : Ns Fl a Ar attachment Ns \&:
85 .Op : Ns Fl b Ar bcc-addr Ns \&:
86 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """custom:\0header""" Ns \&:
87 .Op : Ns Fl c Ar cc-addr Ns \&:
88 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
91 .Fl S\0 Ns Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
94 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
96 .Pf : Ar to-addr Ns \&:
97 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
105 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """custom:\0header""" Ns \&:
107 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
109 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
112 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
113 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
120 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """custom:\0header""" Ns \&:
123 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
125 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
127 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
129 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
135 .Fl V | Fl Fl version
140 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
143 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
146 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
147 .Sy Compatibility note:
148 S-nail (\*(UA) will wrap up into \%S-mailx in v15.0 (circa 2020).
149 Backward incompatibility has to be expected \(en
152 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
153 rules, for example, and shell metacharacters will become meaningful.
154 New and old behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU, and setting
157 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
158 will choose new behaviour when applicable.
159 \*(OB flags what will vanish, and enabling
163 enables obsoletion warnings.
167 \*(UA provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
169 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
171 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
172 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3, among others.
173 \*(UA divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows
174 the user to deal with them in any order.
178 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
179 for manipulating messages and sending mail.
180 It provides the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
181 of outgoing messages, and increasingly powerful and reliable
182 non-interactive scripting capabilities.
184 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
187 .Bl -tag -width ".It Fl BaNg"
190 Explicitly control which of the
194 d (loaded): if the letter
196 is (case-insensitively) part of the
200 is sourced, likewise the letter
202 controls sourcing of the user's personal
204 file, whereas the letters
208 explicitly forbid sourcing of any resource files.
209 Scripts should use this option: to avoid environmental noise they should
211 from any configuration and create a script-specific environment, setting
213 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
216 and running configurating commands via
218 This option overrides
225 command for the given user email
227 after program startup is complete (all resource files are loaded, any
229 setting is being established; only
231 commands have not been evaluated yet).
232 Being a special incarnation of
234 macros for the purpose of bundling longer-lived
236 tings, activating such an email account also switches to the accounts
238 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
241 If the operation fails the program will exit if it is used
242 non-interactively, or if any of
249 .It Fl a Ar file Ns Op Ar =input-charset Ns Op Ar #output-charset
252 to the message (for compose mode opportunities refer to
256 .Sx "Filename transformations"
259 will be performed, except that shell variables are not expanded.
262 not be accessible but contain a
264 character, then anything before the last
266 will be used as the filename, anything thereafter as a character set
269 If an input character set is specified,
270 .Mx -ix "character set specification"
271 but no output character set, then the given input character set is fixed
272 as-is, and no conversion will be applied;
273 giving the empty string or the special string hyphen-minus
275 will be treated as if
277 has been specified (the default).
279 If an output character set has also been given then the conversion will
280 be performed exactly as specified and on-the-fly, not considering the
281 file type and content.
282 As an exception, if the output character set is specified as the empty
283 string or hyphen-minus
285 then the default conversion algorithm (see
286 .Sx "Character sets" )
287 is applied (therefore no conversion is performed on-the-fly,
289 will be MIME-classified and its contents will be inspected first) \(em
290 without support for character set conversions
292 does not include the term
294 only this argument is supported.
297 (\*(OB: \*(UA will always use line-buffered output, to gain
298 line-buffered input even in batch mode enable batch mode via
303 Send a blind carbon copy to
310 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
315 The option may be used multiple times.
317 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
320 .It Fl C Ar """field: body"""
321 Create a custom header which persists for an entire session.
322 A custom header consists of the field name followed by a colon
324 and the field content body, e.g.,
325 .Ql -C """Blah: Neminem laede; imo omnes, quantum potes, juva""" .
326 Standard header field names cannot be overwritten by custom headers.
327 Runtime adjustable custom headers are available via the variable
332 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
333 is the most flexible and powerful option to manage message headers.
334 This option may be used multiple times.
340 except it places the argument in the list of carbon copies.
350 Almost enable a sandbox mode with the internal variable
352 the same can be achieved via
353 .Ql Fl S Va \&\&debug
355 .Ql Ic set Va \&\&debug .
361 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body.
365 Just check if mail is present (in the system
367 or the one specified via
369 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
370 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
371 specification can be added with the option
376 Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of the
377 first recipient's address (instead of in
382 Read in the contents of the user's
384 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
386 (or the specified file) for processing;
387 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
393 argument will undergo some special
394 .Sx "Filename transformations"
399 is not an argument to the flag
401 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
405 that starts with a hyphen-minus, prefix with a relative path, as in
406 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
421 A configurable summary view is available via the option
423 This mode does not honour
428 Show a short usage summary.
434 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
440 of all messages that match the given
444 found by the same algorithm used by
448 .Sx "Specifying messages"
451 This mode does not honour
456 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
457 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
463 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
464 be enabled explicitly (e.g., by using the option
469 Special send mode that will flag standard input with the MIME
473 and use it as the main message body.
474 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
475 .Va message-inject-head
477 .Va message-inject-tail .
483 Special send mode that will MIME classify the specified
485 and use it as the main message body.
486 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
487 .Va message-inject-head
489 .Va message-inject-tail .
495 inhibit the initial display of message headers when reading mail or
500 for the internal variable
505 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
510 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
511 .Sx "Resource files" .
515 Special send mode that will initialize the message body with the
516 contents of the specified
518 which may be standard input
520 only in non-interactive context.
530 opened will be in read-only mode.
534 .It Fl r Ar from-addr
535 Whereas the source address that appears in the
537 header of a message (or in the
539 header if the former contains multiple addresses) is honoured by the
540 built-in SMTP transport, it is not used by a file-based
542 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) for the RFC 5321 reverse-path used for relaying
543 and delegating a message to its destination(s), for delivery errors
544 etc., but it instead uses the local identity of the initiating user.
547 When this command line option is used the given
549 will be assigned to the internal variable
551 but in addition the command line option
552 .Fl \&\&f Ar from-addr
553 will be passed to a file-based
555 whenever a message is sent.
558 include a user name the address components will be separated and
559 the name part will be passed to a file-based
565 If an empty string is passed as
567 then the content of the variable
569 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
571 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the file-based
580 command line options are used when contacting a file-based MTA, unless
581 this automatic deduction is enforced by
583 ing the internal variable
584 .Va r-option-implicit .
587 Remarks: many default installations and sites disallow overriding the
588 local user identity like this unless either the MTA has been configured
589 accordingly or the user is member of a group with special privileges.
590 Passing an invalid address will cause an error.
594 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Op = Ns value
596 (or, with a prefix string
599 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
602 iable and optionally assign
604 if supported; \*(ID the entire expression is evaluated as if specified
605 within dollar-single-quotes (see
606 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
607 if the internal variable
610 If the operation fails the program will exit if any of
615 Settings established via
617 cannot be changed from within
619 or an account switch initiated by
621 They will become mutable again before commands registered via
627 Specify the subject of the message to be sent.
628 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
629 normalized to space (SP) characters.
633 The message given (on standard input) is expected to contain, separated
634 from the message body by an empty line, one or multiple message headers.
635 Headers can span multiple consecutive lines if follow lines start with
636 any amount of whitespace.
637 A line starting with the number sign
639 in the first column is ignored.
640 Message recipients can be given via the message headers
646 they will be added to any recipients specified on the command line,
647 and are likewise subject to
650 If a message subject is specified via
652 then it will be used in favour of one given on the command line.
654 More optional headers are
668 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
669 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
670 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
672 Any other custom header field (also see
677 is passed through entirely
678 unchanged, and in conjunction with the options
682 it is possible to embed
683 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
691 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
694 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
695 .Ql Fl \&\&f Ns \0%user .
704 will also show the list of
706 .Ql $ \*(uA -Xversion -Xx .
711 ting the internal variable
713 enables display of some informational context messages.
714 Using it twice increases the level of verbosity.
718 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
720 to the list of commands to be executed,
721 as a last step of program startup, before normal operation starts.
722 This is the only possibility to execute commands in non-interactive mode
723 when reading startup files has been disabled.
724 The commands will be evaluated as a unit, just as via
734 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
735 in compose mode even in non-interactive use cases.
736 This can be used to, e.g., automatically format the composed message
737 text before sending the message:
738 .Bd -literal -offset indent
739 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.';\e
740 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
741 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d~:/ -Sttycharset=utf-8 bob@exam.ple
746 Enables batch mode: standard input is made line buffered, the complete
747 set of (interactive) commands is available, processing of
748 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
749 is enabled in compose mode, and diverse
750 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
751 are adjusted for batch necessities, exactly as if done via
767 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
768 .Bd -literal -offset indent
769 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'm bob\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\enx\en' |\e
770 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d#:/ -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
775 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
778 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
779 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
785 arguments and all receivers established via
789 are subject to the checks established by
792 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ;
793 they all support the flag
797 allows their recognition all
799 arguments given at the end of the command line after a
801 separator will be passed through to a file-based
803 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for the entire session.
805 constraints do not apply to the content of
809 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{
812 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
814 Mail, itself a successor to the Research
817 .Dq was there from the start
820 It thus represents the user side of the
822 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
823 traditionally taken by
825 and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility purposes.
830 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
834 Because \*(UA strives for compliance with POSIX
836 it is likely that some configuration settings have to be adjusted before
837 using it is a smooth experience.
838 (Rather complete configuration examples can be found in the section
843 .Sx "Resource files" )
844 template bends those standard imposed settings of the
845 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
846 a bit towards more user friendliness and safety, however.
854 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to the
856 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
858 that would otherwise occur (see
859 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
862 to not remove empty system MBOX mailbox files (or all empty such files if
864 .Pf a.k.a.\0 Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
865 mode has been enabled) to avoid mangling of file permissions when files
866 eventually get recreated.
870 in order to synchronize \*(UA with the exit status report of the used
877 to enter interactive startup even if the initial mailbox is empty,
879 to allow editing of headers as well as
881 to not strip down addresses in compose mode, and
883 to include the message that is being responded to when
885 ing, which is indented by an
887 that also deviates from standard imposed settings.
888 .Va mime-counter-evidence
889 is fully enabled, too.
893 The file mode creation mask can be managed explicitly via the variable
895 Sufficient system support provided symbolic links will not be followed
896 when files are opened for writing.
897 Files and shell pipe output can be
899 d for evaluation, also during startup from within the
900 .Sx "Resource files" .
903 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
904 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
906 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or built-in
908 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
909 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
910 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
914 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
916 .Bd -literal -offset indent
918 $ \*(uA -s ubject -a ttach.txt bill@exam.ple
920 # But... try it in an isolated dry-run mode (-d) first
921 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
922 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple \e
924 '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
927 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
928 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=none \e
929 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
931 -. eric@exam.ple < /tmp/letter.txt
935 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
936 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
937 In this compose mode \*(UA treats lines beginning with the character
939 special \(en these are so-called
940 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
941 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
942 attachments and more; e.g.,
950 respectively, to revise the message in its current state,
952 allows editing of the most important message headers, with the potent
954 custom headers can be created, for example (more specifically than with
960 gives an overview of most other available command escapes.
965 will leave compose mode and send the message once it is completed.
966 Aborting letter composition is possible with either of
970 the latter of which will save the message in the file denoted by
979 can also be achieved by typing end-of-transmission (EOT) via
982 at the beginning of an empty line, and
984 is always reachable by typing end-of-text (ETX) twice via
992 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
993 can be used to alter default behavior.
994 E.g., messages are sent asynchronously, without supervision, unless the
997 is set, therefore send errors will not be recognizable until then.
1002 will automatically startup an editor when compose mode is entered, and
1003 editing of headers additionally to plain body content can be enabled via
1005 \*(ID some, but not all headers can be created, edited or deleted in an
1010 will cause the user to be prompted actively for (blind) carbon-copy
1011 recipients, respectively, and (the default)
1013 will request confirmation whether the message shall be sent.
1016 The envelope sender address is defined by
1018 explicitly defining an originating
1020 may be desirable, especially with the built-in SMTP Mail-Transfer-Agent
1022 .Sx "Character sets"
1023 for outgoing message and MIME part content are configurable via
1025 whereas input data is assumed to be in
1027 Message data will be passed over the wire in a
1029 MIME parts a.k.a. attachments need to be assigned a
1031 usually taken out of
1032 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
1033 Saving a copy of sent messages in a
1035 mailbox may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox
1037 targets the value will undergo
1038 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
1043 sandbox dry-run tests will prove correctness.
1046 Message recipients (as specified on the command line or defined in
1053 filtering, and may not only be email addressees but can also be names of
1054 mailboxes and even complete shell command pipe specifications.
1057 is not set then only network addresses (see
1059 for a description of mail addresses) and plain user names (including MTA
1060 aliases) may be used, other types will be filtered out, giving a warning
1062 A network address that contains no domain-, but only a valid local user
1064 in angle brackets will be automatically expanded to a valid address when
1066 is set to a non-empty value; setting it to the empty value instructs
1069 will perform the necessary expansion.
1072 may help to generate standard compliant network addresses.
1074 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
1075 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
1079 is set then an extended set of recipient addresses will be accepted:
1080 Any name that starts with a vertical bar
1082 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
1084 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
1085 Likewise, any name that consists only of hyphen-minus
1087 or starts with the character solidus
1089 or the character sequence dot solidus
1091 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content.
1092 Any other name which contains a commercial at
1094 character is a network address;
1095 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
1097 character is a mailbox name;
1098 Any other name which contains a solidus
1100 character but no exclamation mark
1104 character before is also a mailbox name;
1105 What remains is treated as a network address.
1107 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1108 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
1109 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
1110 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
1111 \*(uA -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
1112 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr,failinvaddr -s test \e
1117 To create file-carbon-copies the special recipient header
1119 may be used as often as desired.
1120 Its entire value (or body in standard terms) is interpreted as a
1122 target, after having been subject to
1123 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
1124 Beside using the command escape
1128 header) this is the only way to create a file-carbon-copy without
1129 introducing an ambiguity regarding the interpretation of the address,
1130 e.g., to use file names with leading vertical bars or commercial ats.
1131 Like all other recipients
1133 is subject to the checks of
1137 It is possible to create personal distribution lists via the
1139 command, so that, for instance, the user can send mail to
1141 and have it go to a group of people.
1142 Different to the alias mechanism of a local
1144 which is often tracked in a file
1148 and the names of which are subject to the
1152 personal aliases will be expanded by \*(UA before the message is sent.
1153 They are thus a convenient alternative to specifying each addressee by
1154 itself, correlate with the active set of
1160 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1161 ? alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/cohorts.mbox
1162 ? alias mark mark@exam.ple
1166 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
1168 .Va on-compose-cleanup
1169 hook variables may be set to
1171 d macros to automatically adjust some settings dependent
1172 on receiver, sender or subject contexts, and via the
1173 .Va on-compose-splice
1175 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
1176 variables, the former also to be set to a
1178 d macro, increasingly powerful mechanisms to perform automated message
1179 adjustments, including signature creation, are available.
1180 (\*(ID These hooks work for commands which newly create messages, namely
1181 .Ic forward , mail , reply
1186 for now provide only the hooks
1189 .Va on-resend-cleanup . )
1192 For the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
1193 be switched to with a single command or command line option there are
1195 Alternatively it is also possible to use a flat configuration, making use
1196 of so-called variable chains which automatically pick
1200 context-dependent variable variants: for example addressing
1201 .Ql Ic File Ns \& pop3://yaa@exam.ple
1203 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-yaa@exam.ple ,
1204 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-exam.ple
1209 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1211 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
1214 To avoid environmental noise scripts should
1216 \*(UA from any configuration files and create a script-local
1217 environment, ideally with the command line options
1219 to disable any configuration file in conjunction with repetitions of
1221 to specify variables:
1223 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1224 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
1225 -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf-8 \e
1226 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,failinvaddr \e
1227 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
1228 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
1229 -s 'Subject to go' -a attachment_file \e
1231 'Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>' rec2@exam.ple \e
1236 As shown, scripts can
1238 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
1241 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
1243 In interactive mode, which is introduced in the next section, messages
1244 can be sent by calling the
1246 command with a list of recipient addresses:
1248 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1249 $ \*(uA -d -Squiet -Semptystart
1250 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
1251 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
1253 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
1254 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
1258 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode" {{{
1259 .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode"
1261 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
1263 When used like that the user's system
1265 (for more on mailbox types please see the command
1267 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed if
1271 The visual style of this summary of
1273 can be adjusted through the variable
1275 and the possible sorting criterion via
1281 can be performed with the command
1283 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
1284 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
1293 will give a listing of all available commands and
1295 will \*(OPally give a summary of some common ones.
1296 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available (see
1301 and see the actual expansion of
1303 and what its purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
1304 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
1305 order of commands does not necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1306 however possible to define overwrites with
1307 .Ic commandalias ) .
1308 These commands can also produce a more
1313 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1314 messages; the current message \(en the
1316 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1317 or the first message of the mailbox; the internal variable
1319 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1324 ful of header summaries containing the
1328 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1332 Message content can be displayed with the command
1339 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1341 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1343 the sole difference to the command
1345 which will always use the
1349 will instead only show the first
1351 of a message (maybe even compressed if
1354 Message display experience may improve by setting and adjusting
1355 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
1357 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" .
1360 By default the current message
1362 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1363 a fancy message specification (see
1364 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1367 will display all unread messages,
1372 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1374 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1378 will display the previous and the next message, respectively.
1381 (a more substantial alias for
1383 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1384 instead of their content, e.g., the following will search for subjects:
1387 .Dl ? from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1390 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1392 d, but fields can be white- or blacklisted for a variety of
1393 applications by using the command
1395 e.g., to restrict their display to a very restricted set for
1397 .Ql Ic \:headerpick Cd \:type retain Ar \:from to cc subject .
1398 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1399 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1404 will show the raw message content.
1405 Note that historically the global
1407 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1409 (\*(ID A yet somewhat restricted) Reliable scriptable message
1410 inspection is available via
1414 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1415 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1416 aims at making the user experience with the many
1419 When reading the system
1425 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1427 modifier (to propagate it to a
1429 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ) ,
1430 then messages which have been read
1431 .Pf (see\0 Sx "Message states" )
1432 will be automatically moved to a
1434 .Sx "secondary mailbox" ,
1437 file, when the mailbox is left, either by changing the active mailbox or
1438 by quitting \*(UA \(en this automatic moving from a system- or primary-
1439 to the secondary mailbox is not performed when the variable
1442 Messages can also be explicitly
1444 d to other mailboxes, whereas
1446 keeps the original message.
1448 can be used to write out data content of specific parts of messages.
1451 After examining a message the user can
1453 to the sender and all recipients (which will also be placed in
1456 .Va recipients-in-cc
1459 exclusively to the sender(s).
1462 knows how to apply a special addressee massage, see
1463 .Sx "Mailing lists" .
1464 Dependent on the presence and value of
1466 the message being replied to will be included in a quoted form.
1468 ing a message will allow editing the new message: the original message
1469 will be contained in the message body, adjusted according to
1475 messages: the former will add a series of
1477 headers, whereas the latter will not; different to newly created
1478 messages editing is not possible and no copy will be saved even with
1480 unless the additional variable
1483 When sending, replying or forwarding messages comments and full names
1484 will be stripped from recipient addresses unless the internal variable
1489 Of course messages can be
1491 and they can spring into existence again via
1493 or when the \*(UA session is ended via the
1497 commands to perform a quick program termation.
1498 To end a mail processing session regulary and perform a full program
1499 exit one may issue the command
1501 It will, among others, move read messages to the
1503 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1505 as necessary, discard deleted messages in the current mailbox,
1506 and update the \*(OPal (see
1512 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{
1513 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1515 Messages which are HTML-only become more and more common, and of course
1516 many messages come bundled with a bouquet of MIME (Multipurpose Internet
1517 Mail Extensions) parts.
1518 To get a notion of MIME types \*(UA has a default set of types built-in,
1519 onto which the content of
1520 .Sx "The mime.types files"
1521 will be added (as configured and allowed by
1522 .Va mimetypes-load-control ) .
1523 Types can also become registered with the command
1525 To improve interaction with faulty MIME part declarations which are
1526 often seen in real-life messages, setting
1527 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1528 will allow verification of the given assertion, and possible provision
1529 of an alternative, better MIME type.
1532 Whereas \*(UA \*(OPally supports a simple HTML-to-text filter for
1533 displaying HTML messages, it cannot handle MIME types other than plain
1535 Instead programs need to become registered to deal with specific MIME
1536 types or file extensions.
1537 These programs may either prepare plain text versions of their input in
1538 order to enable \*(UA to integrate their output neatlessly in its own
1539 message visualization (a mode which is called
1540 .Cd copiousoutput ) ,
1541 or display the content themselves, for example in an external graphical
1542 window: such handlers will only be considered by and for the command
1546 To install a handler program for a specific MIME type an according
1547 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1548 variable needs to be set; to instead define a handler for a specific
1549 file extension the respective
1551 variable can be used \(en these handlers take precedence.
1552 \*(OPally \*(UA supports mail user agent configuration as defined in
1553 RFC 1524; this mechanism (see
1554 .Sx "The Mailcap files" )
1555 will be queried for display or quote handlers if none of the former two
1556 .\" TODO v15-compat "will be" -> "is"
1557 did; it will be the sole source for handlers of other purpose.
1558 A last source for handlers is the MIME type definition itself, if
1559 a type-marker has been registered with the command
1561 which many of the built-in MIME types do.
1564 For example, to display a HTML message inline (converted to a more fancy
1565 plain text representation than the built-in filter is capable to produce)
1566 with either of the text-mode browsers
1570 teach \*(UA about MathML documents and make it display them as plain
1571 text, and to open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer,
1572 asynchronously and with some other magic attached:
1574 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1575 ? if [ "$features" !% +filter-html-tagsoup ]
1576 ? #set pipe-text/html='@* elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1577 ? set pipe-text/html='@* lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1578 ? # Display HTML as plain text instead
1579 ? #set pipe-text/html=@
1581 ? mimetype @ application/mathml+xml mathml
1582 ? wysh set pipe-application/pdf='@&=@ \e
1583 trap "rm -f \e"${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1584 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1585 mupdf "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1589 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1592 \*(UA offers some support to ease handling of mailing lists.
1595 promotes all given arguments to known mailing lists, and
1597 sets their subscription attribute, creating them first as necessary.
1602 automatically, but only resets the subscription attribute.)
1603 Using the commands without arguments will show (a subset of) all
1604 currently defined mailing lists.
1609 can be used to mark out messages with configured list addresses
1614 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available a mailing list
1615 specification that contains any of the
1617 regular expression characters
1621 will be interpreted as one, which allows matching of many addresses with
1622 a single expression.
1623 However, all fully qualified list addresses are matched via a fast
1624 dictionary, whereas expressions are placed in (a) list(s) which is
1625 (are) matched sequentially.
1627 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1628 ? set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
1629 reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1630 ? wysh mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1631 ? mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1636 .Va followup-to-honour
1638 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1639 header is honoured when the message is being replied to (via
1645 controls whether this header is created when sending mails; it will be
1646 created automatically for a couple of reasons, too, like when the
1648 .Dq mailing list specific
1653 is used to respond to a message with its
1654 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1658 A difference in between the handling of known and subscribed lists is
1659 that the address of the user is usually not part of a generated
1660 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1661 when addressing the latter, whereas it is for the former kind of lists.
1662 Usually because there are exceptions: say, if multiple lists are
1663 addressed and not all of them are subscribed lists.
1665 For convenience \*(UA will, temporarily, automatically add a list
1666 address that is presented in the
1668 header of a message that is being responded to to the list of known
1670 Shall that header have existed \*(UA will instead, dependent on the
1672 .Va reply-to-honour ,
1675 for this purpose (if it provides a single address which resides on the
1676 same domain as what is stated in
1678 in order to accept a list administrator's wish that is supposed to have
1679 been manifested like that.
1682 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
1683 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
1685 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
1686 message signing and message encryption.
1687 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
1688 The data can be used to verify that the message has been sent using
1689 a valid certificate, that the sender address matches that in the
1690 certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
1691 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
1692 it can be read regardless of whether the recipients software is able to
1694 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
1697 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
1698 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
1699 To encrypt a message, the specific recipients public encryption key
1701 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
1702 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
1704 Because signing is performed with private keys, and encryption with
1705 public keys, messages should always be signed before becoming encrypted.
1708 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
1709 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
1710 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
1711 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
1713 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered and installed together
1714 with the cryptographical library that is used on the local system.
1715 Therefore reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet is provided if
1716 the source that provides that library installation is trusted.
1717 It is also possible to use a specific pool of trusted certificates.
1719 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults
1720 should be set to avoid using the default certificate pool, and
1724 should be pointed to a trusted pool of certificates.
1725 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
1726 has been retrieved with.
1729 This trusted pool of certificates is used by the command
1731 to ensure that the given S/MIME messages can be trusted.
1732 If so, verified sender certificates that were embedded in signed
1733 messages can be saved locally with the command
1735 and used by \*(UA to encrypt further communication with these senders:
1737 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1739 ? set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
1740 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
1744 To sign outgoing messages, in order to allow receivers to verify the
1745 origin of these messages, a personal S/MIME certificate is required.
1746 \*(UA supports password-protected personal certificates (and keys), see
1747 .Va smime-sign-cert .
1749 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1750 gives an overview of the possible sources of user credentials, and
1751 .Sx "S/MIME step by step"
1752 shows examplarily how a private S/MIME certificate can be obtained.
1753 In general, if such a private key plus certificate
1755 is available, all that needs to be done is to set some variables:
1757 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1758 ? set smime-sign-cert=ME@exam.ple.paired \e
1759 smime-sign-digest=SHA512 \e
1764 Variables of interest for S/MIME in general are
1767 .Va smime-ca-flags ,
1768 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
1770 .Va smime-crl-file .
1771 For S/MIME signing of interest are
1773 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
1774 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
1776 .Va smime-sign-digest .
1777 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
1780 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
1783 \*(ID Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to
1784 message subjects or other header fields yet.
1785 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
1786 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
1787 When sending signed messages,
1788 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
1792 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{
1793 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1795 \*(IN For accessing protocol-specific resources usage of Uniform
1796 Resource Locators (URL, RFC 1738) has become omnipresent.
1797 \*(UA expects and understands URLs in the following form;
1800 denote optional parts, optional either because there also exist other
1801 ways to define the information in question or because support of the
1802 part is protocol-specific, e.g.,
1804 is used by the \*(OPal Maildir directory and the IMAP protocol, but not
1809 are specified they must be given in URL percent encoded form (RFC 3986;
1815 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
1818 Note that these \*(UA URLs most often do not conform to any real
1819 standard, but instead represent a normalized variant of RFC 1738 \(en
1820 they are not used in data exchange but only meant as a compact,
1821 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in
1822 a well-known notation.
1825 Many internal variables of \*(UA exist in multiple versions, called
1826 variable chains for the rest of this document: the plain
1831 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
1838 had been specified in the respective URL, otherwise it refers to the plain
1844 that had been found when doing the user chain lookup as is described
1847 will never be in URL percent encoded form, whether it came from an URL
1848 or not; i.e., variable chain name extensions of
1849 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1850 must not be URL percent encoded.
1853 For example, whether an hypothetical URL
1854 .Ql smtp://hey%3Ayou@our.house
1855 had been given that includes a user, or whether the URL was
1856 .Ql smtp://our.house
1857 and the user had been found differently, to lookup the variable chain
1858 .Va smtp-use-starttls
1859 \*(UA first looks for whether
1860 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:hey:you@our.house
1861 is defined, then whether
1862 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:our.house
1863 exists before finally ending up looking at the plain variable itself.
1866 \*(UA obeys the following logic scheme when dealing with the
1867 necessary credential information of an account:
1873 has been given in the URL the variables
1878 If no such variable(s) can be found then \*(UA will,
1879 when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
1880 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
1884 .Sx "The .netrc file"
1887 specific entry which provides a
1889 name: this lookup will only succeed if unambiguous (one possible matching
1893 If there is still no
1895 then \*(UA will fall back to the user who is supposed to run \*(UA,
1896 the identity of which has been fixated during \*(UA startup and is
1897 known to be a valid user on the current host.
1900 Authentication: unless otherwise noted this will lookup the
1901 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
1902 variable chain, falling back to a protocol-specific default should this
1908 has been given in the URL, then if the
1910 has been found through the \*(OPal
1912 that may have already provided the password, too.
1913 Otherwise the variable chain
1914 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
1915 is looked up and used if existent.
1917 Afterwards the complete \*(OPal variable chain
1918 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
1922 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
1923 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
1924 but with a password).
1926 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
1927 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
1928 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
1933 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
1937 header field(s), which means that the values of
1938 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
1940 .Va smime-sign-digest
1941 will not be looked up using the
1945 chains from above but instead use the corresponding values from the
1946 message that is being worked on.
1947 In unusual cases multiple and different
1951 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
1952 unusual cases become possible.
1953 The usual case is as short as:
1955 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1956 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
1957 smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair
1963 contains complete example configurations.
1966 .\" .Ss "Encrypted network communication" {{{
1967 .Ss "Encrypted network communication"
1969 SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) a.k.a. its successor TLS (Transport Layer
1970 Security) are protocols which aid in securing communication by providing
1971 a safely initiated and encrypted network connection.
1972 A central concept of TLS is that of certificates: as part of each
1973 network connection setup a (set of) certificates will be exchanged, and
1974 by using those the identity of the network peer can be cryptographically
1975 verified; if possible the TLS/SNI (ServerNameIndication) extension will
1976 be enabled in order to allow servers fine-grained control over the
1977 certificates being used.
1978 TLS works by using a locally installed pool of trusted certificates,
1979 and verifying the connection peer succeeds if that provides
1980 a certificate which has been issued or is trusted by any certificate in
1981 the trusted local pool.
1984 The local pool of trusted so-called CA (Certification Authority)
1985 certificates is usually delivered with the used TLS library, and
1986 will be selected automatically.
1987 It is also possible to use a specific pool of trusted certificates.
1989 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults
1990 should be set to avoid using the default certificate pool, and
1992 and/or (with special preparation)
1994 should be pointed to a trusted pool of certificates.
1995 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
1996 has been retrieved with.
1997 For inspection or other purposes, the certificate of a server (as seen
1998 when connecting to it) can be fetched like this:
2000 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2001 $ </dev/null openssl s_client -showcerts -connect \e
2002 the-server.example:pop3s 2>&1 | tee log.txt
2006 \*(UA also supports a mode of operation in which certificates are not
2007 at all matched against a local pool of CA certificates.
2008 Instead a message digest will be calculated for the certificate
2009 presented by the connection peer, and be compared against
2011 (a variable chain that picks up
2015 context-dependent variable variants), and the connection will succeed if
2016 the calculated digest equals the expected one.
2017 The used message digest can be configured via (the chain)
2018 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest .
2024 It depends on the used protocol whether encrypted communication is
2025 possible, and which configuration steps have to be taken to enable it.
2026 Some protocols, e.g., POP3S, are implicitly encrypted, others, like
2027 POP3, can upgrade a plain text connection if so requested.
2028 For example, to use the
2030 that POP3 offers (a member of) the variable (chain)
2031 .Va pop3-use-starttls
2034 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2035 shortcut encpop1 pop3s://pop1.exam.ple
2037 shortcut encpop2 pop3://pop2.exam.ple
2038 set pop3-use-starttls-pop2.exam.ple
2040 set mta=smtps://smtp.exam.ple:465
2041 set mta=smtp://smtp.exam.ple smtp-use-starttls
2045 Normally that is all there is to do, given that TLS libraries try to
2046 provide safe defaults, plenty of knobs however exist to adjust settings.
2047 For example certificate verification settings can be fine-tuned via
2049 and the TLS configuration basics are accessible via
2050 .Va tls-config-pairs ,
2051 for example to specify the allowed protocols or cipher lists that
2052 a communication channel may use.
2053 In the past hints on how to restrict the set of protocols to highly
2054 secure ones were indicated, but as of the time of this writing the list
2055 of protocols or ciphers may need to become relaxed in order to be able
2056 to connect to some servers; the following example allows connecting to a
2058 that uses OpenSSL 0.9.8za from June 2014 (refer to
2059 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2060 for more on variable chains):
2062 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2063 wysh set tls-config-pairs-lion@exam.ple='MinProtocol=TLSv1.1,\e
2064 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:\e
2065 ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:\e
2066 DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:@STRENGTH'
2072 can be used and should be referred to when creating a custom cipher list.
2073 Variables of interest for TLS in general are
2077 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ,
2078 .Va tls-config-file ,
2079 .Va tls-config-module ,
2080 .Va tls-config-pairs ,
2088 .\" .Ss "Character sets" {{{
2089 .Ss "Character sets"
2091 \*(OP \*(UA detects the character set of the terminal by using
2092 mechanisms that are controlled by the
2094 environment variable
2099 in that order, see there).
2100 The internal variable
2102 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly,
2103 and will thus show up in the output of commands like, e.g.,
2109 However, the user may give
2111 a value during startup, making it possible to send mail in a completely
2113 locale environment, an option which can be used to generate and send,
2114 e.g., 8-bit UTF-8 input data in a pure 7-bit US-ASCII
2116 environment (an example of this can be found in the section
2117 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
2118 Changing the value does not mean much beside that, because several
2119 aspects of the real character set are implied by the locale environment
2120 of the system, which stays unaffected by
2124 Messages and attachments which consist of 7-bit clean data will be
2125 classified as consisting of
2128 This is a problem if the
2130 character set is a multibyte character set that is also 7-bit clean.
2131 For example, the Japanese character set ISO-2022-JP is 7-bit clean but
2132 capable to encode the rich set of Japanese Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana
2133 characters: in order to notify receivers of this character set the mail
2134 message must be MIME encoded so that the character set ISO-2022-JP can
2136 To achieve this, the variable
2138 must be set to ISO-2022-JP.
2139 (Today a better approach regarding email is the usage of UTF-8, which
2140 uses 8-bit bytes for non-US-ASCII data.)
2143 If the \*(OPal character set conversion capabilities are not available
2145 does not include the term
2149 will be the only supported character set,
2150 it is simply assumed that it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages
2151 (over the wire an intermediate, configurable
2154 and the rest of this section does not apply;
2155 it may however still be necessary to explicitly set it if automatic
2156 detection fails, since in that case it defaults to
2157 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"Character sets", ./config.h:CHARSET_*!)
2158 LATIN1 a.k.a. ISO-8859-1 unless the operating system environment is
2159 known to always and exclusively support UTF-8 locales.
2162 \*(OP When reading messages, their text is converted into
2164 as necessary in order to display them on the user's terminal.
2165 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
2166 and replaced by proper substitution characters.
2167 Character set mappings for source character sets can be established with
2170 which may be handy to work around faulty character set catalogues (e.g.,
2171 to add a missing LATIN1 to ISO-8859-1 mapping), or to enforce treatment
2172 of one character set as another one (e.g., to interpret LATIN1 as CP1252).
2174 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
2175 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
2178 When sending messages their parts and attachments are classified.
2179 Whereas no character set conversion is performed on those parts which
2180 appear to be binary data,
2181 the character set being used must be declared within the MIME header of
2182 an outgoing text part if it contains characters that do not conform to
2183 the set of characters that are allowed by the email standards.
2184 Permissible values for character sets used in outgoing messages can be
2189 which defines a catch-all last-resort fallback character set that is
2190 implicitly appended to the list of character sets in
2194 When replying to a message and the variable
2195 .Va reply-in-same-charset
2196 is set, then the character set of the message being replied to
2197 is tried first (still being a subject of
2198 .Ic charsetalias ) .
2199 And it is also possible to make \*(UA work even more closely related to
2200 the current locale setting automatically by using the variable
2201 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset ,
2202 please see there for more information.
2205 All the specified character sets are tried in order unless the
2206 conversion of the part or attachment succeeds.
2207 If none of the tried (8-bit) character sets is capable to represent the
2208 content of the part or attachment,
2209 then the message will not be send and its text will optionally be
2213 In general, if a message saying
2214 .Dq cannot convert from a to b
2215 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
2216 selected (terminal) character set,
2217 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
2218 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
2220 locale and/or the variable
2224 The best results are usually achieved when \*(UA is run in a UTF-8
2225 locale on an UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
2226 spectrum of characters is available.
2227 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
2228 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
2229 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
2232 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
2233 .Dq portable character set
2234 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
2235 restricted subset named
2236 .Dq portable filename character set
2237 consists of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
2245 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
2246 .Ss "Message states"
2248 \*(UA differentiates in between several message states; the current
2249 state will be reflected in the summary of
2256 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2257 dependent on their state is possible.
2258 When operating on the system
2262 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
2263 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the
2265 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2267 may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly by program
2268 termination, unless the command
2270 was used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
2273 mail-user-agents, the provided global
2275 template sets the internal
2279 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
2281 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ql new"
2283 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
2284 Such messages are retained even in the
2286 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2289 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
2290 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
2291 Such messages are retained even in the
2293 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2296 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2315 will always try to automatically
2321 logical message, and may thus mark multiple messages as read, the
2323 command will do so if the internal variable
2329 command is used, messages that are in a
2331 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2334 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in the
2336 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2338 unless the internal variable
2343 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2349 can be used to access such messages.
2352 The message has been processed by a
2354 command and it will be retained in its current location.
2357 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2363 command is used, messages that are in a
2365 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2368 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in the
2370 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2372 when the internal variable
2378 In addition to these message states, flags which otherwise have no
2379 technical meaning in the mail system except allowing special ways of
2380 addressing them when
2381 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2382 can be set on messages.
2383 These flags are saved with messages and are thus persistent, and are
2384 portable between a set of widely used MUAs.
2386 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ic answered"
2388 Mark messages as having been answered.
2390 Mark messages as being a draft.
2392 Mark messages which need special attention.
2396 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
2397 .Ss "Specifying messages"
2399 \*(NQ Commands which take
2400 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
2408 can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a number
2409 of messages at once.
2412 deletes messages 1 and 2,
2415 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
2416 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
2420 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
2421 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
2424 The following special message names exist:
2427 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar BaNg"
2429 The current message, the so-called
2433 The message that was previously the current message; needs to be quoted.
2436 The parent message of the current message,
2437 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
2439 field or the last entry of the
2441 field of the current message.
2444 The previous undeleted message, or the previous deleted message for the
2450 ed mode, the previous such message in the according order.
2453 The next undeleted message, or the next deleted message for the
2459 ed mode, the next such message in the according order.
2462 The first undeleted message,
2463 or the first deleted message for the
2469 ed mode, the first such message in the according order.
2472 The last message; In
2476 ed mode, the last such message in the according order.
2484 mode, selects the message addressed with
2488 is any other message specification,
2489 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
2490 Otherwise it is identical to
2495 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
2501 All messages that were included in the
2502 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2503 of the previous command; needs to be quoted.
2506 An inclusive range of message numbers.
2507 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
2512 .Dq any substring matches
2515 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
2517 is set (and POSIX says
2518 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
2521 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
2522 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
2524 is completely ignored.
2525 For finer control and match boundaries use the
2529 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
2530 All messages that contain
2532 in the subject field (case ignored according to locale).
2539 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
2542 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
2545 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
2547 ession; If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available
2549 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
2551 regular expression characters
2556 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
2557 part is missing the search is restricted to the subject field body,
2560 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, e.g.,
2563 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
2566 In order to search for a string that includes a
2568 (commercial at) character the
2570 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
2571 Also, specifying an empty search
2573 ession will effectively test for existence of the given header fields.
2574 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
2588 respectively and case-insensitively.
2589 \*(OPally, and just like
2592 will be interpreted as (an extended) regular expression if any of the
2594 regular expression characters is seen.
2601 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
2610 will perform full text searches \(en whereas the former searches only
2611 the body, the latter also searches the message header (\*(ID this mode
2612 yet brute force searches over the entire decoded content of messages,
2613 including administrativa strings).
2616 This specification performs full text comparison, but even with
2617 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
2618 expression that safely matches only a specific address domain.
2619 To request that the body content of the header is treated as a list of
2620 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
2621 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the effective
2627 .Dl '@~f,c@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$'
2631 All messages of state or with matching condition
2635 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
2637 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
2640 messages (cf. the variable
2641 .Va markanswered ) .
2653 Messages with receivers that match
2657 Messages with receivers that match
2664 Old messages (any not in state
2672 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification (see
2673 .Sx "Handling spam" ) .
2675 \*(OP Messages classified as spam.
2687 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
2688 These consist of keywords and criterions, and because
2689 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2690 are split into tokens according to
2691 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2692 it is necessary to quote the entire IMAP search expression in order to
2693 ensure that it remains a single token.
2694 This addressing mode is available with all types of mailbox
2696 s; \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
2697 Strings must be enclosed by double quotes
2699 in their entirety if they contain whitespace or parentheses;
2700 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
2702 is recognized as an escape character.
2703 All string searches are case-insensitive.
2704 When the description indicates that the
2706 representation of an address field is used,
2707 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
2710 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2711 \&'(\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)'
2716 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
2717 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
2721 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
2722 .It Ar ( criterion )
2723 All messages that satisfy the given
2725 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
2726 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
2728 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
2729 All messages that satisfy either
2734 To connect more than two criteria using
2736 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
2738 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
2742 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
2745 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
2746 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
2750 .It Ar ( not criterion )
2751 All messages that do not satisfy
2753 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2754 All messages that contain
2756 in the envelope representation of the
2759 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2760 All messages that contain
2762 in the envelope representation of the
2765 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2766 All messages that contain
2768 in the envelope representation of the
2771 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2772 All messages that contain
2777 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2778 All messages that contain
2780 in the envelope representation of the
2783 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2784 All messages that contain
2789 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2790 All messages that contain
2793 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2794 All messages that contain
2796 in their header or body.
2797 .It Ar ( larger size )
2798 All messages that are larger than
2801 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2802 All messages that are smaller than
2806 .It Ar ( before date )
2807 All messages that were received before
2809 which must be in the form
2813 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2815 is the name of the month \(en one of
2816 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2819 is the year as four digits, e.g.,
2823 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2824 .It Ar ( since date )
2825 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2826 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2827 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2828 .It Ar ( senton date )
2829 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2830 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2831 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2833 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2834 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2835 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2836 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2840 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{
2841 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2843 \*(OP Terminal control will be realized through one of the standard
2845 libraries, either the
2847 or, alternatively, the
2849 both of which will be initialized to work with the environment variable
2851 Terminal control will enhance or enable interactive usage aspects, e.g.,
2852 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2853 and extend behaviour of the Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE), which may learn the
2854 byte-sequences of keys like the cursor- and function-keys.
2857 The internal variable
2859 can be used to overwrite settings or to learn (correct(ed)) keycodes.
2860 Actual library interaction can be disabled completely by setting
2861 .Va termcap-disable ;
2863 will be queried regardless, which is true even if the \*(OPal library
2864 support has not been enabled at configuration time as long as some other
2865 \*(OP which (may) query terminal control sequences has been enabled.
2866 \*(UA can be told to enter an alternative exclusive screen, the
2867 so-called ca-mode, by setting
2868 .Va termcap-ca-mode ;
2869 this requires sufficient terminal support, and the used
2871 may also need special configuration, dependent on the value of
2875 \*(OP The built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2876 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2878 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2879 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2881 Usage of a line editor in interactive mode can be prevented by setting
2882 .Va line-editor-disable .
2883 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2884 entries in the internal variable
2886 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2887 The MLE can support a little bit of
2893 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2894 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2895 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2897 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2898 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2902 .Va history-gabby-persist
2907 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2908 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2909 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2910 be generated by holding the
2912 key while pressing the key of desire, e.g.,
2916 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2917 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2918 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2920 to establish its built-in key bindings
2921 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2922 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2923 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2924 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2925 notation is used in the following;
2926 combinations not mentioned either cause job control signals or do not
2927 generate a (unique) keycode:
2931 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql \eBa"
2933 Go to the start of the line
2935 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2938 Move the cursor backward one character
2940 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2943 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2944 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the internal variable
2948 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2951 Go to the end of the line
2953 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2956 Move the cursor forward one character
2958 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2961 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2962 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2963 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2964 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2966 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2969 Backspace: backward delete one character
2971 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
2975 Horizontal tabulator:
2976 try to expand the word before the cursor, supporting the usual
2977 .Sx "Filename transformations"
2979 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ;
2981 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2985 commit the current line
2987 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
2990 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
2992 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
2997 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
3000 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
3002 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
3005 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3009 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
3011 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
3014 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
3017 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
3018 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
3019 is committed; also see
3023 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
3025 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
3028 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
3030 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
3033 Paste the snarf buffer
3035 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
3043 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
3046 Prompts for a Unicode character (hexadecimal number without prefix, see
3050 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
3051 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
3052 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
3053 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
3054 that shortcut purpose); this control code is then special-treated and
3055 thus cannot be part of any other sequence (because it will trigger the
3057 function immediately).
3060 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
3063 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
3066 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
3068 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
3071 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
3073 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
3076 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
3077 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
3079 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
3080 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
3081 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
3082 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
3084 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
3085 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
3086 expected input, then the active sequence takes precedence and will
3087 consume the control code.
3090 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3094 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3098 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3102 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
3105 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
3112 Move the cursor forward one screen width
3114 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-screen-fwd ) .
3117 Move the cursor backward one screen width
3119 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-screen-bwd ) .
3122 \*(OP Move the cursor home and clear the screen
3124 .Pf ( Cd mle-clear-screen ) .
3131 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
3136 ring the audible bell.
3140 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{
3141 .Ss "Coloured display"
3143 \*(OP \*(UA can be configured to support a coloured display and font
3144 attributes by emitting ANSI a.k.a. ISO 6429 SGR (select graphic
3145 rendition) escape sequences.
3146 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
3147 capability of the detected terminal type that is defined by the
3148 environment variable
3150 and which can be fine-tuned by the user via the internal variable
3154 On top of what \*(UA knows about the terminal the boolean variable
3156 defines whether the actually applicable colour and font attribute
3157 sequences should also be generated when output is going to be paged
3158 through the external program defined by the environment variable
3163 This is not enabled by default because different pager programs need
3164 different command line switches or other configuration in order to
3165 support those sequences.
3166 \*(UA however knows about some widely used pagers and in a clean
3167 environment it is often enough to simply set
3169 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
3172 Colours and font attributes can be managed with the multiplexer command
3176 can be used to remove mappings of a given colour type.
3179 is set then any active usage of colour and font attribute sequences
3180 is suppressed without affecting possibly established
3183 Since colours are only available in interactive mode, it may make
3184 sense to conditionalize the colour setup by encapsulating it with
3187 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3188 if terminal && [ "$features" =% +colour ]
3189 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
3190 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red from,subject
3191 colour iso view-header fg=red
3193 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
3194 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
3195 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 "subject,from"
3196 colour mono view-header ft=bold
3197 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
3202 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
3205 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
3206 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
3207 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
3209 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
3210 .Sx "Specifying messages"
3211 that have been identified as spam is possible via their (volatile)
3217 specifications, and their
3219 entries will be used when displaying the
3227 rates the given messages and sets their
3230 If the spam interface offers spam scores these can be shown in
3239 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
3240 the given messages as
3244 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
3246 of messages; it adheres to their current
3248 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
3253 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
3255 message flag, without any interface interaction.
3264 requires a running instance of the
3266 server in order to function, started with the option
3268 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
3270 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3271 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
3272 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
3273 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
3277 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
3279 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3280 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3281 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3282 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
3284 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3285 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3286 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
3290 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
3292 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
3295 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3296 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3297 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
3298 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
3299 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
3300 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
3301 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
3302 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
3306 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
3307 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
3308 perform the local spam check last.
3309 Spam can be checked automatically when opening specific folders by
3310 setting a specialized form of the internal variable
3313 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3314 define spamdelhook {
3316 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
3317 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
3318 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
3319 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
3325 set folder-hook-SOMEFOLDER=spamdelhook
3329 See also the documentation for the variables
3330 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
3331 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
3332 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
3335 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
3338 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
3341 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
3344 \*(UA reads input in lines.
3345 An unquoted reverse solidus
3347 at the end of a command line
3349 the newline character: it is discarded and the next line of input is
3350 used as a follow-up line, with all leading whitespace removed;
3351 once an entire line is completed, the whitespace characters
3352 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3353 as well as those defined by the variable
3355 are removed from the beginning and end.
3356 Placing any whitespace characters at the beginning of a line will
3357 prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
3361 The beginning of such input lines is then scanned for the name of
3362 a known command: command names may be abbreviated, in which case the
3363 first command that matches the given prefix will be used.
3364 .Sx "Command modifiers"
3365 may prefix a command in order to modify its behaviour.
3366 A name may also be a
3368 which will become expanded until no more expansion is possible.
3369 Once the command that shall be executed is known, the remains of the
3370 input line will be interpreted according to command-specific rules,
3371 documented in the following.
3374 This behaviour is different to the
3376 ell, which is a programming language with syntactic elements of clearly
3377 defined semantics, and therefore capable to sequentially expand and
3378 evaluate individual elements of a line.
3379 \*(UA will never be able to handle
3380 .Ql ? set one=value two=$one
3381 in a single statement, because the variable assignment is performed by
3389 can be used to show the list of all commands, either alphabetically
3390 sorted or in prefix search order (these do not match, also because the
3391 POSIX standard prescribes a set of abbreviations).
3392 \*(OPally the command
3396 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
3397 command matching the expanded argument, as in
3399 which should be a shorthand of
3401 with these documentation strings both commands support a more
3403 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command and other
3404 information which applies; a handy suggestion might thus be:
3406 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3408 # Before v15: need to enable sh(1)ell-style on _entire_ line!
3409 localopts yes;wysh set verbose;ignerr eval "${@}";return ${?}
3411 ? commandalias xv '\ecall __xv'
3415 .\" .Ss "Command modifiers" {{{
3416 .Ss "Command modifiers"
3418 Commands may be prefixed by one or multiple command modifiers.
3419 Some command modifiers can be used with a restricted set of commands
3424 will (\*(OPally) show which modifiers apply.
3428 The modifier reverse solidus
3431 to be placed first, prevents
3433 expansions on the remains of the line, e.g.,
3435 will always evaluate the command
3437 even if an (command)alias of the same name exists.
3439 content may itself contain further command modifiers, including
3440 an initial reverse solidus to prevent further expansions.
3446 indicates that any error generated by the following command should be
3447 ignored by the state machine and not cause a program exit with enabled
3449 or for the standardized exit cases in
3454 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3455 will be set to the real exit status of the command regardless.
3460 will alter the called command to apply changes only temporarily,
3461 local to block-scope, and can thus only be used inside of a
3466 Specifying it implies the modifier
3468 Block-scope settings will not be inherited by macros deeper in the
3470 chain, and will be garbage collected once the current block is left.
3471 To record and unroll changes in the global scope use the command
3477 does yet not implement any functionality.
3482 does yet not implement any functionality.
3485 Some commands support the
3488 modifier: if used, they expect the name of a variable, which can itself
3489 be a variable, i.e., shell expansion is applied, as their first
3490 argument, and will place their computation result in it instead of the
3491 default location (it is usually written to standard output).
3493 The given name will be tested for being a valid
3495 variable name, and may therefore only consist of upper- and lowercase
3496 characters, digits, and the underscore; the hyphen-minus may be used as
3497 a non-portable extension; digits may not be used as first, hyphen-minus
3498 may not be used as last characters.
3499 In addition the name may either not be one of the known
3500 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3501 or must otherwise refer to a writable (non-boolean) value variable.
3502 The actual put operation may fail nonetheless, e.g., if the variable
3503 expects a number argument only a number will be accepted.
3504 Any error during these operations causes the command as such to fail,
3505 and the error number
3508 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTSUP ,
3513 but some commands deviate from the latter, which is documented.
3516 Last, but not least, the modifier
3519 can be used for some old and established commands to choose the new
3520 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3521 rules over the traditional
3522 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting" .
3526 .\" .Ss "Old-style argument quoting" {{{
3527 .Ss "Old-style argument quoting"
3529 \*(ID This section documents the old, traditional style of quoting
3530 non-message-list arguments to commands which expect this type of
3531 arguments: whereas still used by the majority of such commands, the new
3532 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3533 may be available even for those via
3536 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
3537 Nonetheless care must be taken, because only new commands have been
3538 designed with all the capabilities of the new quoting rules in mind,
3539 which can, e.g., generate control characters.
3542 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3544 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
3549 any whitespace, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
3550 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
3551 part of the argument.
3552 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
3554 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
3555 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
3561 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
3562 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
3566 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
3567 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
3571 .\" .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting" {{{
3572 .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting"
3575 ell-style, and therefore POSIX standardized, argument parsing and
3576 quoting rules are used by most commands.
3577 \*(ID Most new commands only support these new rules and are flagged
3578 \*(NQ, some elder ones can use them with the command modifier
3580 in the future only this type of argument quoting will remain.
3583 A command line is parsed from left to right and an input token is
3584 completed whenever an unquoted, otherwise ignored, metacharacter is seen.
3585 Metacharacters are vertical bar
3591 as well as all characters from the variable
3594 .Cm space , tabulator , newline .
3595 The additional metacharacters left and right parenthesis
3597 and less-than and greater-than signs
3601 supports are not used, and are treated as ordinary characters: for one
3602 these characters are a vivid part of email addresses, and it seems
3603 highly unlikely that their function will become meaningful to \*(UA.
3605 .Bd -filled -offset indent
3606 .Sy Compatibility note:
3607 \*(ID Please note that even many new-style commands do not yet honour
3609 to parse their arguments: whereas the
3611 ell is a language with syntactic elements of clearly defined semantics,
3612 \*(UA parses entire input lines and decides on a per-command base what
3613 to do with the rest of the line.
3614 This also means that whenever an unknown command is seen all that \*(UA
3615 can do is cancellation of the processing of the remains of the line.
3617 It also often depends on an actual subcommand of a multiplexer command
3618 how the rest of the line should be treated, and until v15 we are not
3619 capable to perform this deep inspection of arguments.
3620 Nonetheless, at least the following commands which work with positional
3621 parameters fully support
3623 for an almost shell-compatible field splitting:
3624 .Ic call , call_if , read , vpospar , xcall .
3628 Any unquoted number sign
3630 at the beginning of a new token starts a comment that extends to the end
3631 of the line, and therefore ends argument processing.
3632 An unquoted dollar sign
3634 will cause variable expansion of the given name, which must be a valid
3636 ell-style variable name (see
3638 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3641 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
3642 enclosing the name is supported (i.e., to subdivide a token).
3645 Whereas the metacharacters
3646 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3647 only complete an input token, vertical bar
3653 also act as control operators and perform control functions.
3654 For now supported is semicolon
3656 which terminates a single command, therefore sequencing the command line
3657 and making the remainder of the line a subject to reevaluation.
3658 With sequencing, multiple command argument types and quoting rules may
3659 therefore apply to a single line, which can become problematic before
3660 v15: e.g., the first of the following will cause surprising results.
3663 .Dl ? echo one; set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3664 .Dl ? echo one; wysh set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3667 Quoting is a mechanism that will remove the special meaning of
3668 metacharacters and reserved words, and will prevent expansion.
3669 There are four quoting mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes,
3670 double-quotes and dollar-single-quotes:
3673 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3675 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
3676 with the escape character reverse solidus
3680 Arguments which are enclosed in
3681 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
3682 retain their literal value.
3683 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
3686 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
3687 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
3688 is retained, with the exception of dollar sign
3690 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
3692 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
3694 which will escape any of the characters dollar sign
3696 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
3700 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
3702 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
3703 but has no special meaning otherwise.
3706 Arguments enclosed in
3707 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
3708 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
3709 expanded as follows:
3711 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".Ql \eNNN"
3713 bell control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BEL).
3715 backspace control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BS).
3717 escape control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 ESC).
3721 form feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 FF).
3723 line feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 LF).
3725 carriage return control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 CR).
3727 horizontal tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 HT).
3729 vertical tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 VT).
3731 emits a reverse solidus character.
3735 double quote (escaping is optional).
3737 eight-bit byte with the octal value
3739 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
3741 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3743 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
3745 (one or two hexadecimal characters, no prefix, see
3747 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3749 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
3751 (one to eight hexadecimal characters) \(em note that Unicode defines the
3752 maximum codepoint ever to be supported as
3757 This escape is only supported in locales that support Unicode (see
3758 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3759 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
3760 point is ASCII compatible or (if the \*(OPal character set conversion is
3761 available) can be represented in the current locale.
3762 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3766 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal characters.
3768 Emits the non-printable (ASCII and compatible) C0 control codes
3769 0 (NUL) to 31 (US), and 127 (DEL).
3770 Printable representations of ASCII control codes can be created by
3771 mapping them to a different, visible part of the ASCII character set.
3772 Adding the number 64 achieves this for the codes 0 to 31, e.g., 7 (BEL):
3773 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
3774 The real operation is a bitwise logical XOR with 64 (bit 7 set, see
3776 thus also covering code 127 (DEL), which is mapped to 63 (question mark):
3777 .Ql ? vexpr ^ 127 64 .
3779 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
3780 visualization purposes of control codes, e.g.,
3782 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
3784 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO-10646, ISO C) aliases,
3785 as shown above (e.g.,
3789 whenever such an alias exists it will be used for display purposes.
3790 The control code NUL
3792 a non-standard extension) will suppress further output for the remains
3793 of the token (which may extend beyond the current quote), or, depending
3794 on the context, the remains of all arguments for the current command.
3796 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
3797 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
3799 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
3806 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3807 ? echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
3808 ? echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
3809 ? echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
3813 .\" .Ss "Message list arguments" {{{
3814 .Ss "Message list arguments"
3816 Many commands operate on message list specifications, as documented in
3817 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
3818 The argument input is first split into individual tokens via
3819 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ,
3820 which are then interpreted as the mentioned specifications.
3821 If no explicit message list has been specified, many commands will
3822 search for and use the next message forward that satisfies the commands'
3823 requirements, and if there are no messages forward of the current
3824 message, the search proceeds backwards;
3825 if there are no good messages at all to be found, an error message is
3826 shown and the command is aborted.
3829 output of the command
3831 will indicate whether a command searches for a default message, or not.
3834 .\" .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands" {{{
3835 .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands"
3837 A special set of commands, which all have the string
3839 in their name, e.g.,
3843 take raw string data as input, which means that the content of the
3844 command input line is passed completely unexpanded and otherwise
3845 unchanged: like this the effect of the actual codec is visible without
3846 any noise of possible shell quoting rules etc., i.e., the user can input
3847 one-to-one the desired or questionable data.
3848 To gain a level of expansion, the entire command line can be
3852 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3853 ? vput shcodec res encode /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3855 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3857 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3858 ? eval shcodec d $res
3859 /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3863 .\" .Ss "Filename transformations" {{{
3864 .Ss "Filename transformations"
3866 Filenames, where expected, and unless documented otherwise, are
3867 subsequently subject to the following filename transformations, in
3870 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3872 If the given name is a registered
3874 it will be replaced with the expanded shortcut.
3877 The filename is matched against the following patterns or strings:
3879 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".Ar %user"
3881 (Number sign) is expanded to the previous file.
3883 (Percent sign) is replaced by the invoking
3884 .Mx -ix "primary system mailbox"
3885 user's primary system mailbox, which either is the (itself expandable)
3887 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3889 if that is set, or a built-in compile-time default otherwise.
3891 Expands to the primary system mailbox of
3893 (and never the value of
3895 regardless of its actual setting).
3897 (Ampersand) is replaced with the invoking user's
3898 .Mx -ix "secondary mailbox"
3899 secondary mailbox, the
3906 directory (if that variable is set).
3908 Expands to the same value as
3910 but has special meaning when used with, e.g., the command
3912 the file will be treated as a primary system mailbox by, e.g., the
3916 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3917 session will be moved to the
3919 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3923 Meta expansions may be applied to the resulting filename, as allowed by
3924 the operation and applicable to the resulting access protocol (also see
3925 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
3926 For the file-protocol, a leading tilde
3928 character will be replaced by the expansion of
3930 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
3931 directory of the given user is used instead.
3933 A shell expansion as if specified in double-quotes (see
3934 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
3935 may be applied, so that any occurrence of
3939 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible;
3940 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3943 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism.
3945 Shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
3947 may be applied as documented.
3948 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
3949 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
3951 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
3953 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, e.g., a file
3954 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
3956 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
3960 .\" .Ss "Commands" {{{
3963 The following commands are available:
3965 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
3972 command which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the
3973 previously executed command if the internal variable
3976 This command supports
3979 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
3980 and manages the error number
3982 A 0 or positive exit status
3984 reflects the exit status of the command, negative ones that
3985 an error happened before the command was executed, or that the program
3986 did not exit cleanly, but, e.g., due to a signal: the error number is
3987 .Va ^ERR Ns -CHILD ,
3991 In conjunction with the
3993 modifier the following special cases exist:
3994 a negative exit status occurs if the collected data could not be stored
3995 in the given variable, which is a
3997 error that should otherwise not occur.
3998 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
3999 indicates that no temporary file could be created to collect the command
4000 output at first glance.
4001 In case of catchable out-of-memory situations
4003 will occur and \*(UA will try to store the empty string, just like with
4004 all other detected error conditions.
4009 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
4011 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
4014 indicating special character, which means that, e.g., trailing comments
4015 on a line are not possible (except for commands which use
4016 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
4020 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
4026 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
4027 a numeric argument n.
4031 Shows the message number of the current message (the
4033 when used without arguments, that of the given list otherwise.
4034 Output numbers will be separated from each other with the first
4037 and followed by the first character of
4039 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
4040 If that results in no separation at all a
4043 This command supports
4046 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
4047 and manages the error number
4052 \*(OP Show a brief summary of commands.
4053 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
4054 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
4055 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
4056 synopsis, try, e.g.,
4061 and see how the output changes.
4062 This mode also supports a more
4064 output, which will provide the information documented for
4075 .It Ic account , unaccount
4076 (ac, una) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
4077 Accounts are special incarnations of
4079 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
4080 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
4081 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
4083 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
4088 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted by the
4089 latter command, and in one operation with the special name
4091 Also for all but it a possibly set
4092 .Va on-account-cleanup
4093 hook is called once they are left.
4095 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
4096 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
4098 of that account will be activated (as via
4100 a possibly installed
4102 will be run, and the internal variable
4105 The two argument form is identical to defining a macro as via
4107 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4109 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
4110 set from='(My Name) myname@myisp.example'
4111 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
4118 Perform email address codec transformations on raw-data argument, rather
4119 according to email standards (RFC 5322; \*(ID will furtherly improve).
4123 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
4124 and manages the error number
4126 The first argument must be either
4127 .Ar [+[+[+]]]e[ncode] ,
4132 and specifies the operation to perform on the rest of the line.
4135 Decoding will show how a standard-compliant MUA will display the given
4136 argument, which should be an email address.
4137 Please be aware that most MUAs have difficulties with the address
4138 standards, and vary wildly when (comments) in parenthesis,
4140 strings, or quoted-pairs, as below, become involved.
4141 \*(ID \*(UA currently does not perform decoding when displaying addresses.
4144 Skinning is identical to decoding but only outputs the plain address,
4145 without any string, comment etc. components.
4146 Another difference is that it may fail with the error number
4150 if decoding fails to find a(n) (valid) email address, in which case the
4151 unmodified input will be output again.
4155 first performs a skin operation, and thereafter checks a valid
4156 address for whether it is a registered mailing list (see
4160 eventually reporting that state in the error number
4163 .Va ^ERR Ns -EXIST .
4164 (This state could later become overwritten by an I/O error, though.)
4167 Encoding supports four different modes, lesser automated versions can be
4168 chosen by prefixing one, two or three plus signs: the standard imposes
4169 a special meaning on some characters, which thus have to be transformed
4170 to so-called quoted-pairs by pairing them with a reverse solidus
4172 in order to remove the special meaning; this might change interpretation
4173 of the entire argument from what has been desired, however!
4174 Specify one plus sign to remark that parenthesis shall be left alone,
4175 two for not turning double quotation marks into quoted-pairs, and three
4176 for also leaving any user-specified reverse solidus alone.
4177 The result will always be valid, if a successful exit status is reported
4178 (\*(ID the current parser fails this assertion for some constructs).
4179 \*(ID Addresses need to be specified in between angle brackets
4182 if the construct becomes more difficult, otherwise the current parser
4183 will fail; it is not smart enough to guess right.
4185 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4186 ? addrc enc "Hey, you",<diet@exam.ple>\e out\e there
4187 "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4188 ? addrc d "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4189 "Hey, you", \e out\e there <diet@exam.ple>
4190 ? addrc s "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4197 .It Ic alias , unalias
4198 (a, una) Aliases are a method of creating personal distribution lists
4199 that map a single alias name to none to multiple real receivers;
4200 these aliases become expanded after message composing is completed.
4201 The latter command removes the given list of aliases, the special name
4203 will discard all existing aliases.
4205 The former command shows all currently defined aliases when used without
4206 arguments, and with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
4207 With more than one argument, creates or appends to the alias name given
4208 as the first argument the remaining arguments.
4209 Alias names adhere to the Postfix MTA
4211 rules and are thus restricted to alphabetic characters, digits, the
4212 underscore, hyphen-minus, the number sign, colon and commercial at,
4213 a dollar sign is allowed but in the first position;
4214 As extensions the exclamation mark
4219 .Dq any haracter that has the high bit set
4221 .Ql [[:alnum:]_#:@-][[:alnum:]_#:@$;.-]* .
4223 .\" ALIASCOLON next sentence
4224 \*(ID Unfortunately the colon is currently not supported, as it
4225 interferes with normal address parsing rules.
4226 .\" ALIASCOLON next sentence
4227 \*(ID Such high bit characters will likely cause warnings at the moment
4228 for the same reasons why colon is unsupported; also, in the future
4229 locale dependent character set validity checks will be performed.
4233 .It Ic alternates , unalternates
4234 \*(NQ (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses or names of the active
4235 user, members of which will be removed from recipient lists (except one).
4236 There is a set of implicit alternates which is formed of the values of
4246 The latter command removes the given list of alternates, the special name
4248 will discard all existing alternate names.
4250 The former command manages the error number
4252 It shows the current set of alternates when used without arguments; in
4253 this mode only it also supports
4256 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4257 Otherwise the given arguments (after being checked for validity) are
4258 appended to the list of alternate names; in
4260 mode they replace that list instead.
4264 .It Ic answered , unanswered
4265 Take a message lists and mark each message as (not) having been answered.
4266 Messages will be marked answered when being
4268 to automatically if the
4272 .Sx "Message states" .
4277 .It Ic bind , unbind
4278 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
4279 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4280 with freely configurable key bindings.
4281 The latter command removes from the given context the given key binding,
4282 both of which may be specified as a wildcard
4286 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
4287 Due to initialization order unbinding will not work for built-in key
4288 bindings upon program startup, however: please use
4289 .Va line-editor-no-defaults
4290 for this purpose instead.
4293 With one argument the former command shows all key bindings for the
4294 given context, specifying an asterisk
4296 will show the bindings of all contexts; a more verbose listing will be
4297 produced if either of
4302 With two or more arguments a binding is (re)established:
4303 the first argument is the context to which the binding shall apply,
4304 the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
4306 which form the binding, and any remaining arguments form the expansion.
4307 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
4308 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, a commercial at
4310 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
4311 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
4312 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
4315 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding will not be seen
4316 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
4317 This is not true for the shared binding
4319 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
4320 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
4321 The available contexts are the shared
4325 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
4327 which applies to compose mode only.
4331 which form the binding are specified as a comma-separated list of
4332 byte-sequences, where each list entry corresponds to one key(press).
4333 A list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
4335 also refer to the name of a terminal capability; several dozen names
4336 will be compiled in and may be specified either by their
4338 or, if existing, by their
4340 name, regardless of the actually used \*(OPal terminal control library.
4341 It is possible to use any capability, as long as the name is resolvable
4342 by the \*(OPal control library or was defined via the internal variable
4344 Input sequences are not case-normalized, so that an exact match is
4345 required to update or remove a binding.
4348 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4349 ? bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
4350 ? bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc,Delete
4351 ? bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo Editable binding@'
4352 ? bind default a,b,c rm -irf / @ # Also editable
4353 ? bind default :kf1 File %
4354 ? bind compose :kf1 ~v
4358 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
4359 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, before being parsed
4360 and expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
4361 whitespace needs to be properly quoted, see
4362 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
4363 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
4364 defunctional if the locale does not support Unicode (see
4365 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
4366 and using terminal capabilities does so if no (corresponding) terminal
4367 control support is (currently) available.
4370 The following terminal capability names are built-in and can be used in
4372 or (if available) the two-letter
4375 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
4378 can be used to show all the capabilities of
4380 or the given terminal type;
4383 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
4386 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
4387 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
4389 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
4391 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
4392 \(em shifted variant.
4393 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
4394 Clear to end of line.
4395 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
4397 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
4399 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
4400 \(em shifted variant.
4401 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
4403 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
4404 \(em shifted variant.
4405 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
4407 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
4409 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
4411 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
4412 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
4413 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
4414 \(em shifted variant.
4415 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
4416 Right cursor (ditto).
4417 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
4418 \(em shifted variant.
4419 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
4420 Down cursor (ditto).
4422 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4423 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
4426 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4427 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
4429 Add one for each function key up to
4434 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
4436 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
4438 Add one for each function key up to
4446 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
4448 For example, the delete key,
4450 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
4452 then a number is appended for the states
4464 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
4466 The same for the left cursor key,
4468 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
4471 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (e.g.,
4473 for bindings which describe user key combinations (as opposed to purely
4474 terminal capability based ones), in order to avoid ambiguities whether
4475 input belongs to key sequences or not; it also reduces search time.
4478 may help shall keys and sequences be falsely recognized.
4483 \*(NQ Calls the given macro, which must have been created via
4485 (see there for more), otherwise an
4488 Calling macros recursively will at some time excess the stack size
4489 limit, causing a hard program abortion; if recursively calling a macro
4490 is the last command of the current macro, consider to use the command
4492 which will first release all resources of the current macro before
4493 replacing the current macro with the called one.
4500 if the given macro has been created via
4502 but does not fail nor warn if the macro does not exist.
4506 (ch) Change the working directory to
4508 or the given argument.
4514 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
4515 Takes an optional message list and a filename and saves the certificates
4516 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
4517 human-readable and PEM format.
4518 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
4519 respective message senders by setting
4520 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
4525 .It Ic charsetalias , uncharsetalias
4526 \*(NQ Manage alias mappings for (conversion of)
4527 .Sx "Character sets" .
4528 Mappings are ineffective if character set conversion is not available
4532 Expansion happens recursively, but expansion is not performed for
4533 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
4537 The latter command deletes all aliases given as arguments,
4538 all aliases can be deleted at once with the special argument
4540 The former shows the list of all currently defined aliases if used
4541 without arguments, the expansion of the given alias with one argument.
4542 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of character sets and
4543 their desired target alias name, creating new or changing already
4544 existing aliases, as necessary.
4548 (ch) Change the working directory to
4550 or the given argument.
4556 .It Ic collapse , uncollapse
4562 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
4563 in header summaries, except for
4567 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4568 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4569 The latter command undoes collapsing.
4572 .\" FIXME review until this point
4575 .It Ic colour , uncolour
4576 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings of and for a
4577 .Sx "Coloured display" .
4578 The type of colour is given as the (case-insensitive) first argument,
4579 which must be one of
4581 for 256-colour terminals,
4586 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 colour palette and
4590 for monochrome terminals.
4591 Monochrome terminals cannot deal with colours, but only (some) font
4595 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
4596 for the given colour type is shown (as a special case giving
4600 will show the mappings of all types).
4601 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, and the third
4602 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
4603 specification(s), and the optional fourth argument can be used to
4604 specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are tested in
4605 (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been found, and
4606 the default mapping (if any has been established) will only be chosen as
4608 The types of precondition available depend on the mappable slot (see
4609 .Sx "Coloured display"
4610 for some examples), the following of which exist:
4613 Mappings prefixed with
4615 are used for the \*(OPal built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
4616 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4617 and do not support preconditions.
4619 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4621 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
4622 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
4629 Mappings prefixed with
4631 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
4633 (the current message) and
4635 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
4636 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
4638 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4640 This mapping is used for the
4642 that can be created with the
4646 formats of the variable
4649 For the complete header summary line except the
4651 and the thread structure.
4653 For the thread structure which can be created with the
4655 format of the variable
4660 Mappings prefixed with
4662 are used when displaying messages.
4664 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4666 This mapping is used for so-called
4668 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines.
4671 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
4672 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
4673 available then if any of the
4675 (extended) regular expression characters is seen the precondition will
4676 be evaluated as (an extended) one.
4678 For the introductional message info line.
4679 .It Ar view-partinfo
4680 For MIME part info lines.
4684 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
4685 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
4695 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
4696 attributes for a single mapping.
4699 foreground colour attribute:
4709 To specify a 256-colour mode a decimal number colour specification in
4710 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
4712 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
4714 the standard ISO 6429 colours, as above.
4716 high intensity variants of the standard colours.
4718 216 colours in tuples of 6.
4720 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
4722 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4724 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4725 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4727 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4728 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4730 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4731 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4735 background colour attribute (see
4737 for possible values).
4743 will remove for the given colour type (the special type
4745 selects all) the given mapping; if the optional precondition argument is
4746 given only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4749 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed), thus
4751 will remove all established mappings.
4756 .It Ic commandalias , uncommandalias
4757 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, command aliases.
4758 An (command)alias can be used everywhere a normal command can be used,
4759 but always takes precedence: any arguments that are given to the command
4760 alias are joined onto the alias expansion, and the resulting string
4761 forms the command line that is, in effect, executed.
4762 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name
4764 will remove all existing aliases.
4765 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4766 known aliases, with one argument only the expansion of the given one.
4768 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
4769 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
4770 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
4771 An alias may itself expand to another alias, but to avoid expansion loops
4772 further expansion will be prevented if an alias refers to itself or if
4773 an expansion depth limit is reached.
4774 Explicit expansion prevention is available via reverse solidus
4777 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
4778 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4780 \*(uA: `commandalias': no such alias: xx
4781 ? commandalias xx echo hello,
4783 commandalias xx 'echo hello,'
4792 (C) Copy messages to files whose names are derived from the author of
4793 the respective message and do not mark them as being saved;
4794 otherwise identical to
4799 (c) Copy messages to the named file and do not mark them as being saved;
4800 otherwise identical to
4805 Show the name of the current working directory, as reported by
4810 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4811 The return status is tracked via
4816 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4818 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4822 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4824 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4829 .It Ic define , undefine
4830 The latter command deletes the given macro, the special name
4832 will discard all existing macros.
4833 Deletion of (a) macro(s) can be performed from within running (a)
4834 macro(s), including self-deletion.
4835 Without arguments the former command prints the current list of macros,
4836 including their content, otherwise it defines a macro, replacing an
4837 existing one of the same name as applicable.
4840 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
4845 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, e.g., a
4847 Execution of a macro body can be stopped from within by calling
4851 Temporary macro block-scope variables can be created or deleted with the
4853 command modifier in conjunction with the commands
4858 To enforce unrolling of changes made to (global)
4859 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4862 can be used instead; its covered scope depends on how (i.e.,
4864 normal macro, folder hook, hook,
4866 switch) the macro is invoked.
4871 ed macro, the given positional parameters are implicitly local
4872 to the macro's scope, and may be accessed via the variables
4878 and any other positive unsigned decimal number less than or equal to
4880 Positional parameters can be
4882 ed, or become completely replaced, removed etc. via
4884 A helpful command to perform many sorts of number and string evaluations is
4887 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4897 echo Parameter 1 of ${#} is ${1}, all: ${*} / ${@}
4900 call exmac Hello macro exmac!
4901 echo ${?}/${!}/${^ERRNAME}
4907 .It Ic delete , undelete
4908 (d, u) Marks the given message list as being or not being
4910 respectively; if no argument has been specified then the usual search
4911 for a visible message is performed, as documented for
4912 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
4913 showing only the next input prompt if the search fails.
4914 Deleted messages will neither be saved in the
4916 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4918 nor will they be available for most other commands.
4921 variable is set, the new
4923 or the last message restored, respectively, is automatically
4932 \*(NQ Digging (information out of) messages is possible through
4934 objects, which can be
4936 d for the given message number; in compose mode the hyphen-minus
4938 will instead open the message that is being composed.
4939 If a hyphen-minus is given as the optional third argument then output
4940 will be generated on the standard output channel instead of being
4941 subject to consumation by the
4949 d again by giving the same identifier used for creation;
4950 this step could be omitted: objects will be automatically closed
4951 when the active mailbox or the compose mode is left, respectively.
4952 In all other cases the second argument is an object identifier,
4953 and the third and all following arguments are interpreted as via
4956 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) :
4957 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4958 ? vput = msgno; digmsg create $msgno
4959 ? digmsg $msgno header list; readall x; echon $x
4960 210 Subject From To Message-ID References In-Reply-To Status
4961 ? digmsg $msgno header show Status;readall x;echon $x
4965 ? digmsg remove $msgno
4973 Superseded by the multiplexer
4979 Delete the given messages and automatically
4983 if one exists, regardless of the setting of
4990 up or down by one message when given
4994 argument, respectively.
4998 .It Ic draft , undraft
4999 Take message lists and mark each given message as being draft, or not
5000 being draft, respectively, as documented in the section
5001 .Sx "Message states" .
5005 \*(NQ (ec) Echoes arguments to standard output and writes a trailing
5006 newline, whereas the otherwise identical
5009 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5011 .Sx "Filename transformations"
5012 are applied to the expanded arguments.
5013 This command also supports
5016 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
5017 and manages the error number
5019 if data is stored in a variable then the return value reflects the
5020 length of the result string in case of success and is
5028 except that is echoes to standard error.
5031 In interactive sessions the \*(OPal message ring queue for
5033 will be used instead, if available and
5041 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
5047 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
5053 at each message from the given list in turn.
5054 Modified contents are discarded unless the
5056 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
5057 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
5059 can be used instead for a more display oriented editor.
5065 (see there for more),
5066 .Ic elif , else , endif
5067 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
5069 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
5070 if it evaluates true.
5076 (see there for more),
5077 .Ic elif , else , endif
5078 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
5082 commands was true, the
5088 (en) Marks the end of an
5090 (see there for more),
5091 .Ic elif , else , endif
5092 conditional execution block.
5097 \*(NQ \*(UA has a strict notion about which variables are
5098 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5099 and which are managed in the program
5101 Since some of the latter are a vivid part of \*(UAs functioning,
5102 however, they are transparently integrated into the normal handling of
5103 internal variables via
5107 To integrate other environment variables of choice into this
5108 transparent handling, and also to export internal variables into the
5109 process environment where they normally are not, a
5111 needs to become established with this command, as in, e.g.,
5114 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB TZ
5117 Afterwards changing such variables with
5119 will cause automatic updates of the program environment, and therefore
5120 be inherited by newly created child processes.
5121 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
5122 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
5124 will remove them also from the program environment, but in any way
5125 the knowledge they ever have been
5128 Note that this implies that
5130 may cause loss of such links.
5135 will remove an existing link, but leaves the variables as such intact.
5136 Additionally the subcommands
5140 are provided, which work exactly the same as the documented commands
5144 but (additionally un)link the variable(s) with the program environment
5145 and thus immediately export them to, or remove them from (if possible),
5146 respectively, the program environment.
5151 \*(OP Since \*(UA uses the console as a user interface it can happen
5152 that messages scroll by too fast to become recognized.
5153 An error message ring queue is available which stores duplicates of any
5154 error message and notifies the user in interactive sessions whenever
5155 a new error has occurred.
5156 The queue is finite: if its maximum size is reached any new message
5157 replaces the eldest.
5160 can be used to manage this message queue: if given
5162 or no argument the queue will be displayed and cleared,
5164 will only clear all messages from the queue.
5168 \*(NQ Construct a command by concatenating the arguments, separated with
5169 a single space character, and then evaluate the result.
5170 This command passes through the exit status
5174 of the evaluated command; also see
5176 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5187 call yyy '\ecall xxx' "b\e$'\et'u ' "
5195 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
5196 any saving of messages in the
5198 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5200 as well as a possibly tracked line editor
5202 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
5204 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
5205 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
5206 otherwise success indicating status.
5212 but open the mailbox read-only.
5217 (fi) The file command switches to a new mailbox.
5218 Without arguments it shows status information of the current mailbox.
5219 If an argument is given, it will write out changes (such as deletions)
5220 the user has made, open a new mailbox, update the internal variables
5221 .Va mailbox-resolved
5223 .Va mailbox-display ,
5224 execute an according
5226 if one is installed, and optionally display a summary of
5233 .Sx "Filename transformations"
5234 will be applied to the
5238 prefixes are, i.e., URL syntax is understood, e.g.,
5239 .Ql mbox:///tmp/mdirbox :
5240 if a protocol prefix is used the mailbox type is fixated and neither
5241 the auto-detection (read on) nor the
5244 \*(OPally URLs can also be used to access network resources, which may
5245 be accessed securely via
5246 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
5247 if so supported, and it is possible to proxy all network traffic over
5248 a SOCKS5 server given via
5252 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
5253 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
5256 \*(OPally supported network protocols are
5260 (POP3 with TLS encrypted transport),
5266 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
5268 Network URLs require a special encoding as documented in the section
5269 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
5272 If the resulting file protocol (MBOX database)
5274 is located on a local filesystem then the list of all registered
5276 s is traversed in order to see whether a transparent intermediate
5277 conversion step is necessary to handle the given mailbox, in which case
5278 \*(UA will use the found hook to load and save data into and from
5279 a temporary file, respectively.
5280 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes.
5281 For example, the following creates hooks for the
5283 compression tool and a combined compressed and encrypted format:
5285 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5287 gzip 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' \e
5288 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5292 MBOX databases will always be protected via file-region locks
5294 during file operations in order to avoid inconsistencies due to
5295 concurrent modifications.
5296 .Mx -ix "dotlock files"
5297 \*(OP In addition mailbox files treated as the system
5302 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
5303 es in general will also be protected by so-called dotlock files,
5304 the traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
5308 will be created for the duration of the synchronization \(em
5309 as necessary an external privileged dotlock helper will be used
5310 to create the dotlock file in the same directory and with the same user
5311 and group identities as the file of interest.
5313 can be used to turn off additional dotlock files, shall the need arise.
5316 \*(UA by default uses tolerant POSIX rules when reading MBOX database
5317 files, but it will detect invalid message boundaries in this mode and
5318 complain (even more with
5320 if any is seen: in this case
5322 can be used to create a valid MBOX database from the invalid input.
5325 \*(OP If no protocol has been fixated, and
5327 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
5332 then it is treated as a folder in
5335 The maildir format stores each message in its own file, and has been
5336 designed so that file locking is not necessary when reading or writing
5340 \*(ID If no protocol has been fixated and no existing file has
5341 been found, the variable
5343 controls the format of mailboxes yet to be created.
5348 .It Ic filetype , unfiletype
5349 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, file handler hooks,
5350 which provide (shell) commands that enable \*(UA to load and save MBOX
5351 files from and to files with the registered file extensions;
5352 it will use an intermediate temporary file to store the plain data.
5353 The latter command removes the hooks for all given extensions,
5355 will remove all existing handlers.
5357 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
5358 defined file hooks, with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
5359 Otherwise three arguments are expected, the first specifying the file
5360 extension for which the hook is meant, and the second and third defining
5361 the load- and save commands, respectively, to deal with the file type,
5362 both of which must read from standard input and write to standard
5364 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes (\*(ID except below).
5365 \*(ID For now too much work is done, and files are oftened read in twice
5366 where once would be sufficient: this can cause problems if a filetype is
5367 changed while such a file is opened; this was already so with the
5368 built-in support of .gz etc. in Heirloom, and will vanish in v15.
5369 \*(ID For now all handler strings are passed to the
5370 .Ev SHELL for evaluation purposes; in the future a
5372 prefix to load and save commands may mean to bypass this shell instance:
5373 placing a leading space will avoid any possible misinterpretations.
5374 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5375 ? filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
5376 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
5377 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
5378 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5379 ? set record=+sent.zst.pgp
5384 .It Ic flag , unflag
5385 Take message lists and mark the messages as being flagged, or not being
5386 flagged, respectively, for urgent/special attention.
5388 .Sx "Message states" .
5397 With no arguments, list the names of the folders in the folder directory.
5398 With an existing folder as an argument,
5399 lists the names of folders below the named folder.
5405 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5406 recipient's address (instead of in
5413 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5414 recipient's address (instead of in
5421 but responds to all recipients regardless of the
5426 .It Ic followupsender
5429 but responds to the sender only regardless of the
5437 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
5438 recipient's address (instead of in
5443 Takes a message and the address of a recipient
5444 and forwards the message to him.
5445 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
5446 with the value of the
5447 .Va forward-inject-head
5448 variable preceding, and the value of
5449 .Va forward-inject-tail
5451 To filter the included header fields to the desired subset use the
5453 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
5455 Only the first part of a multipart message is included unless
5456 .Va forward-as-attachment ,
5457 and recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names
5458 etc. unless the internal variable
5462 This may generate the errors
5463 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5464 if no receiver has been specified,
5466 if some addressees where rejected by
5469 if no applicable messages have been given,
5471 if multiple messages have been specified,
5473 if an I/O error occurs,
5475 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5481 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
5482 their message headers, exactly as via
5484 making the first message of the result the new
5486 (the last message if
5489 An alias of this command is
5492 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
5503 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5507 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5510 .It Ic ghost , unghost
5513 .Ic uncommandalias .
5517 .It Ic headerpick , unheaderpick
5518 \*(NQ Multiplexer command to manage white- and blacklisting
5519 selections of header fields for a variety of applications.
5520 Without arguments the set of contexts that have settings is displayed.
5521 When given arguments, the first argument is the context to which the
5522 command applies, one of (case-insensitive)
5524 for display purposes (via, e.g.,
5527 for selecting which headers shall be stored persistently when
5533 ing messages (note that MIME related etc. header fields should not be
5534 ignored in order to not destroy usability of the message in this case),
5536 for stripping down messages when
5538 ing message (has no effect if
5539 .Va forward-as-attachment
5542 for defining user-defined set of fields for the command
5545 The current settings of the given context are displayed if it is the
5547 A second argument denotes the type of restriction that is to be chosen,
5548 it may be (a case-insensitive prefix of)
5552 for white- and blacklisting purposes, respectively.
5553 Establishing a whitelist suppresses inspection of the corresponding
5556 If no further argument is given the current settings of the given type
5557 will be displayed, otherwise the remaining arguments specify header
5558 fields, which \*(OPally may be given as regular expressions, to be added
5560 The special wildcard field (asterisk,
5562 will establish a (fast) shorthand setting which covers all fields.
5564 The latter command always takes three or more arguments and can be used
5565 to remove selections, i.e., from the given context, the given type of
5566 list, all the given headers will be removed, the special argument
5568 will remove all headers.
5572 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
5575 in interactive mode, and the format of which can be defined with
5577 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
5578 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
5581 the last message is targeted if
5592 \*(OP Without arguments or when given
5594 all history entries are shown (this mode also supports a more
5598 will replace the list of entries with the content of
5602 will dump the current list to said file, replacing former content.
5604 will delete all history entries.
5605 The argument can also be a signed decimal
5607 which will select and evaluate the respective history entry, and move it
5608 to the top of the history; a negative number is used as an offset to the
5609 current command, e.g.,
5611 will select the last command, the history top.
5613 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
5614 for more on this topic.
5620 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
5625 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5627 Does not override the
5630 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
5632 command issued after
5634 will display the following message, not the current one.
5640 .Ic \&\&if , Ic elif , else , endif
5641 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
5642 the encapsulated block is executed.
5643 The POSIX standard only supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
5648 end, the remaining are non-portable extensions.
5649 \*(ID These commands do not yet use
5650 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5651 and therefore do not know about input tokens, so that syntax
5652 elements have to be surrounded by whitespace; in v15 \*(UA will inspect
5653 all conditions bracket group wise and consider the tokens, representing
5654 values and operators, therein, which also means that variables will
5655 already have been expanded at that time (just like in the shell).
5657 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5666 The (case-insensitive) condition
5668 erminal will evaluate to true if the standard input is a terminal, i.e.,
5669 in interactive sessions.
5670 Another condition can be any boolean value (see the section
5671 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5672 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
5675 .Dq always execute .
5676 (It shall be remarked that a faulty condition skips all branches until
5681 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5682 will be used, and this command will simply interpret expanded tokens.)
5683 It is possible to check
5684 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5687 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
5688 value or another variable by using the
5690 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
5691 conditional trigger character;
5692 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
5694 Variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
5695 When this mode has been triggered, several operators are available:
5698 Integer operators treat the arguments on the left and right hand side of
5699 the operator as integral numbers and compare them arithmetically.
5700 It is an error if any of the operands is not a valid integer, an empty
5701 argument (which implies it had been quoted) is treated as if it were 0.
5702 Available operators are
5706 (less than or equal to),
5712 (greater than or equal to), and
5717 String data operators compare the left and right hand side according to
5718 their textual content.
5719 Unset variables are treated as the empty string.
5720 The behaviour of string operators can be adjusted by prefixing the
5721 operator with the modifier trigger commercial at
5723 followed by none to multiple modifiers: for now supported is
5725 which turns the comparison into a case-insensitive one: this is
5726 implied if no modifier follows the trigger.
5729 Available string operators are
5733 (less than or equal to),
5739 (greater than or equal to),
5743 (is substring of) and
5745 (is not substring of).
5746 By default these operators work on bytes and (therefore) do not take
5747 into account character set specifics.
5748 If the case-insensitivity modifier has been used, case is ignored
5749 according to the rules of the US-ASCII encoding, i.e., bytes are
5753 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
5759 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
5760 matched according to the active locale (see
5761 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
5762 i.e., character sets should be honoured correctly.
5765 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
5767 and the OR operator is
5769 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
5770 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
5772 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
5773 them in pairs of brackets
5774 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
5775 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
5779 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
5780 via unary operators: the unary operator
5782 will reverse the result.
5784 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5785 # (This not in v15, there [ -n "$debug"]!)
5789 if [ "$ttycharset" == UTF-8 ] || \e
5790 [ "$ttycharset" @i== UTF8 ]
5791 echo *ttycharset* is UTF-8, the former case-sensitive!
5794 if [ "${t1}" == "${t2}" ]
5795 echo These two variables are equal
5797 if [ "$features" =% +regex ] && \e
5798 [ "$TERM" @i=~ "^xterm\&.*" ]
5799 echo ..in an X terminal
5801 if [ [ true ] && [ [ "${debug}" != '' ] || \e
5802 [ "$verbose" != '' ] ] ]
5805 if true && [ "$debug" != '' ] || [ "${verbose}" != '' ]
5806 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
5815 Superseded by the multiplexer
5820 Shows the names of all available commands, alphabetically sorted.
5821 If given any non-whitespace argument the list will be shown in the order
5822 in which command prefixes are searched.
5823 \*(OP In conjunction with a set variable
5825 additional information will be provided for each command: the argument
5826 type will be indicated, the documentation string will be shown,
5827 and the set of command flags will show up:
5829 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql NEEDS_BOX"
5831 command supports the command modifier
5834 command supports the command modifier
5837 the error number is tracked in
5840 whether the command needs an active mailbox, a
5843 indicators whether command is \&.\h'.3m'.\h'.3m'.
5844 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql SUBPROCESS"
5845 .It Ql batch/interactive
5846 usable in interactive or batch mode
5849 usable in send mode.
5851 allowed to be used when running in a subprocess instance,
5852 e.g., from within a macro that is called via
5853 .Va on-compose-splice .
5856 indicators whether command is not \&.\h'.3m'.\h'.3m'.
5857 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql COMPOSE_MODE"
5859 available in compose mode.
5861 available during program startup, e.g., in
5862 .Sx "Resource files" .
5865 The command produces
5874 This command can be used to localize changes to (linked)
5877 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
5878 meaning that their state will be reverted to the former one once the
5881 Just like the command modifier
5883 which provides block-scope localization for some commands (instead),
5884 it can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
5888 The covered scope of an
5890 is left once a different account is activated, and some macros, notably
5891 .Va folder-hook Ns s ,
5892 use their own specific notion of covered scope, here it will be extended
5893 until the folder is left again.
5896 This setting stacks up: i.e., if
5898 enables change localization and calls
5900 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
5902 will still be reverted when the scope of
5905 (Caveats: if in this example
5907 changes to a different
5909 which sets some variables that are already covered by localizations,
5910 their scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
5912 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
5913 were defined in a local, macro private context!)
5916 This command takes one or two arguments, the optional first one
5917 specifies an attribute that may be one of
5919 which refers to the current scope and is thus the default,
5921 which causes any macro that is being
5923 ed to be started with localization enabled by default, as well as
5925 which (if enabled) disallows any called macro to turn off localization:
5926 like this it can be ensured that once the current scope regains control,
5927 any changes made in deeper levels have been reverted.
5928 The latter two are mutually exclusive, and neither affects
5930 The (second) argument is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
5931 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
5932 and states whether the given attribute shall be turned on or off.
5934 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5935 define temporary_settings {
5936 set possibly_global_option1
5938 set localized_option1
5939 set localized_option2
5941 set possibly_global_option2
5948 Reply to messages that come in via known
5951 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
5952 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
5953 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
5956 functionality this will actively resort and even remove message
5957 recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be sent to
5959 For example it will also implicitly generate a
5960 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
5961 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
5963 For more documentation please refer to
5964 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5966 This may generate the errors
5967 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5968 if no receiver has been specified,
5970 if some addressees where rejected by
5973 if no applicable messages have been given,
5975 if an I/O error occurs,
5977 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5980 Occurance of some of the errors depend on the value of
5982 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5988 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5989 recipient's address (instead of in
5994 (m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
5995 or asks on standard input if none were given;
5996 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
5997 Unless the internal variable
5999 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6000 For more documentation please refer to
6001 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6003 This may generate the errors
6004 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6005 if no receiver has been specified,
6007 if some addressees where rejected by
6010 if no applicable messages have been given,
6012 if multiple messages have been specified,
6014 if an I/O error occurs,
6016 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6019 Occurance of some of the errors depend on the value of
6024 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to the
6026 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6028 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the variable
6031 \*(ID This command can only be used in a
6033 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
6037 .It Ic mimetype , unmimetype
6038 Without arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed;
6039 a more verbose listing will be produced if either of
6044 When given arguments they will be joined, interpreted as shown in
6045 .Sx "The mime.types files"
6047 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) ,
6048 and the resulting entry will be added (prepended) to the cache.
6049 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
6050 .Va mimetypes-load-control
6051 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
6053 The latter command deletes all specifications of the given MIME type, thus
6054 .Ql ? unmimetype text/plain
6055 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
6059 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
6061 but which also reenables cache initialization via
6062 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
6066 .It Ic mlist , unmlist
6067 The latter command removes all given mailing lists, the special name
6069 can be used to remove all registered lists.
6070 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists (and their
6071 attributes, if any) when used without arguments; a more verbose listing
6072 will be produced if either of
6077 Otherwise all given arguments will be added and henceforth be recognized
6079 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available then any argument
6080 which contains any of the
6082 regular expression characters
6086 will be interpreted as one, which allows matching of many addresses with
6087 a single expression.
6090 pair of commands manages subscription attributes of mailing lists.
6094 \*(ID Only available in interactive mode, this command allows one to
6095 display MIME parts which require external MIME handler programs to run
6096 which do not integrate in \*(UAs normal
6099 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
6100 (\*(ID No syntax to directly address parts, this restriction may vanish.)
6101 The user will be asked for each non-text part of the given message in
6102 turn whether the registered handler shall be used to display the part.
6106 .It Ic mlsubscribe , unmlsubscribe
6107 The latter command removes the subscription attribute from all given
6108 mailing lists, the special name
6110 can be used to do so for any registered list.
6111 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists which have
6112 a subscription attribute when used without arguments; a more verbose
6113 listing will be produced if either of
6118 Otherwise this attribute will be set for all given mailing lists,
6119 newly creating them as necessary (as via
6128 but moves the messages to a file named after the local part of the
6129 sender address of the first message (instead of in
6136 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
6143 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6145 selection, and all MIME parts.
6153 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
6154 standard output is a terminal.
6160 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
6162 has been given the content of the
6164 cache is shown, loading it first as necessary.
6167 then the cache will only be initialized and
6169 will remove its contents.
6170 Note that \*(UA will try to load the file only once, use
6171 .Ql Ic \&\&netrc Ns \:\0\:clear
6172 to unlock further attempts.
6177 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
6179 .Sx "The .netrc file"
6180 documents the file format in detail.
6184 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
6186 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
6190 the headers of each new message are also shown.
6191 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
6199 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
6200 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
6214 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
6216 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
6222 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6224 selection, and all MIME parts.
6232 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
6233 standard output is a terminal.
6241 but also pipes header fields which would not pass the
6243 selection, and all parts of MIME
6244 .Ql multipart/alternative
6249 (pi) Takes an optional message list and shell command (that defaults to
6251 and pipes the messages through the command.
6255 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
6276 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
6279 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6281 preserving all messages marked with
6285 or never referenced in the system
6287 and removing all other messages from the
6289 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
6290 If new mail has arrived during the session,
6292 .Dq You have new mail
6294 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line option
6296 then the edit file is rewritten.
6297 A return to the shell is effected,
6298 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
6299 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
6300 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
6302 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
6303 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
6304 otherwise success indicating status.
6308 \*(NQ Read a line from standard input, or the channel set active via
6310 and assign the data, which will be split as indicated by
6312 to the given variables.
6313 The variable names are checked by the same rules as documented for
6315 and the same error codes will be seen in
6319 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6321 with the error number
6325 in case of I/O errors, or
6328 If there are more fields than variables, assigns successive fields to the
6329 last given variable.
6330 If there are less fields than variables, assigns the empty string to the
6332 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6335 ? echo "<$a> <$b> <$c>"
6337 ? wysh set ifs=:; read a b c;unset ifs
6338 hey2.0,:"'you ",:world!:mars.:
6339 ? echo $?/$^ERRNAME / <$a><$b><$c>
6340 0/NONE / <hey2.0,><"'you ",><world!:mars.:><><>
6345 \*(NQ Read anything from standard input, or the channel set active via
6347 and assign the data to the given variable.
6348 The variable name is checked by the same rules as documented for
6350 and the same error codes will be seen in
6354 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6356 with the error number
6360 in case of I/O errors, or
6363 \*(ID The input data length is restricted to 31-bits.
6367 \*(NQ Manages input channels for
6371 to be used to avoid complicated or impracticable code, like calling
6373 from within a macro in non-interactive mode.
6374 Without arguments, or when the first argument is
6376 a listing of all known channels is printed.
6377 Channels can otherwise be
6379 d, and existing channels can be
6383 d by giving the string used for creation.
6385 The channel name is expected to be a file descriptor number, or,
6386 if parsing the numeric fails, an input file name that undergoes
6387 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
6388 E.g. (this example requires a modern shell):
6389 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6390 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enyou\enecho $a' |\e
6393 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enecho $a' |\e
6394 LC_ALL=C 6<<< 'you' \*(uA -R#X'readctl create 6'
6400 Removes the named files or directories.
6401 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6402 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6404 are performed on the arguments.
6405 If a name refer to a mailbox, e.g., a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
6406 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
6407 The user is asked for confirmation in interactive mode.
6411 Takes the name of an existing folder
6412 and the name for the new folder
6413 and renames the first to the second one.
6414 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6415 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6417 are performed on both arguments.
6418 Both folders must be of the same type.
6424 except that it replies to only the sender of each message of the given
6425 list, by using the first message as the template to quote, for the
6429 will exchange this command with
6434 (r) Take a message and group-responds to it by addressing the sender
6435 and all recipients, subject to
6439 .Va followup-to-honour ,
6442 .Va recipients-in-cc
6443 influence response behaviour.
6444 Unless the internal variable
6446 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6449 .Va quote-as-attachment
6450 configure whether responded-to message shall be quoted etc.; setting
6452 will exchange this command with
6456 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
6457 For more documentation please refer to
6458 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6460 This may generate the errors
6461 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6462 if no receiver has been specified,
6464 if some addressees where rejected by
6467 if no applicable messages have been given,
6469 if an I/O error occurs,
6471 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6474 Occurance of some of the errors depend on the value of
6476 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6482 but initiates a group-reply regardless of the value of
6489 but responds to the sender only regardless of the value of
6496 but does not add any header lines.
6497 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
6498 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
6502 Takes a list of messages and a user name
6503 and sends each message to the named user.
6505 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
6508 is only performed if
6512 This may generate the errors
6513 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6514 if no receiver has been specified,
6516 if some addressees where rejected by
6519 if no applicable messages have been given,
6521 if an I/O error occurs,
6523 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6526 Occurance of some of the errors depend on the value of
6528 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6546 .It Ic respondsender
6552 (ret) Superseded by the multiplexer
6557 Only available inside the scope of a
6561 this will stop evaluation of any further macro content, and return
6562 execution control to the caller.
6563 The two optional parameters must be specified as positive decimal
6564 numbers and default to the value 0:
6565 the first argument specifies the signed 32-bit return value (stored in
6567 \*(ID and later extended to signed 64-bit),
6568 the second the signed 32-bit error number (stored in
6572 a non-0 exit status may cause the program to exit.
6578 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
6579 sender of the first message instead of (in
6581 and) taking a filename argument; the variable
6583 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
6587 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
6588 to the end of the file.
6589 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6590 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6592 is performed on the filename.
6593 If no filename is given, the
6595 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6598 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
6599 is echoed on the user's terminal.
6602 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
6603 the messages are marked for deletion.
6604 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6606 To filter the saved header fields to the desired subset use the
6608 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
6612 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6616 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6620 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6625 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
6626 all matching messages, as via
6628 This command is an alias of
6631 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6635 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
6641 (se, \*(NQ uns) The latter command will delete all given global
6642 variables, or only block-scope local ones if the
6644 command modifier has been used.
6645 The former, when used without arguments, will show all
6646 currently known variables, being more verbose if either of
6651 Remarks: this list mode will not automatically link-in known
6653 variables, but only explicit addressing will, e.g., via
6655 using a variable in an
6657 condition or a string passed to
6661 ting, as well as some program-internal use cases.
6664 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
6665 Arguments are of the form
6667 (no space before or after
6671 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
6672 If a name begins with
6676 the effect is the same as invoking the
6678 command with the remaining part of the variable
6679 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
6680 \*(ID In conjunction with the
6682 .Pf (or\0 Cm local )
6684 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
6685 can be used to quote arguments as necessary.
6686 \*(ID Otherwise quotation marks may be placed around any part of the
6687 assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs.
6690 When operating in global scope any
6692 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
6693 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
6694 environment requires corresponding system support) \(em use the command
6696 for further environmental control.
6697 If the command modifier
6699 has been used to alter the command to work in block-scope all variables
6700 have values (may they be empty), and creation of names which shadow
6701 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6702 is actively prevented (\*(ID shadowing of linked
6704 variables and free-form versions of variable chains is not yet detected).
6708 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6712 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6713 ? wysh set indentprefix=' -> '
6714 ? wysh set atab=$'\t' aspace=' ' zero=0
6720 Apply shell quoting rules to the given raw-data arguments.
6724 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6725 The first argument specifies the operation:
6729 cause shell quoting to be applied to the remains of the line, and
6730 expanded away thereof, respectively.
6731 If the former is prefixed with a plus-sign, the quoted result will not
6732 be roundtrip enabled, and thus can be decoded only in the very same
6733 environment that was used to perform the encode; also see
6734 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
6735 If the coding operation fails the error number
6738 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6739 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6740 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6744 \*(NQ (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell,
6745 and returns its exit status.
6749 .It Ic shortcut , unshortcut
6750 Without arguments the list of all currently defined shortcuts is
6751 shown, with one argument the expansion of the given shortcut.
6752 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of shortcuts and
6753 their expansions, creating new or changing already existing shortcuts,
6755 The latter command will remove all given shortcuts, the special name
6757 will remove all registered shortcuts.
6761 \*(NQ Shift the positional parameter stack (starting at
6763 by the given number (which must be a positive decimal),
6764 or 1 if no argument has been given.
6765 It is an error if the value exceeds the number of positional parameters.
6766 If the given number is 0, no action is performed, successfully.
6767 The stack as such can be managed via
6769 Note this command will fail in
6771 and hook macros unless the positional parameter stack has been
6772 explicitly created in the current context via
6779 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
6780 message text is shown.
6784 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
6789 \*(NQ Sleep for the specified number of seconds (and optionally
6790 milliseconds), by default interruptably.
6791 If a third argument is given the sleep will be uninterruptible,
6792 otherwise the error number
6796 if the sleep has been interrupted.
6797 The command will fail and the error number will be
6798 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
6799 if the given duration(s) overflow the time datatype, and
6801 if the given durations are no valid integers.
6806 .It Ic sort , unsort
6807 The latter command disables sorted or threaded mode, returns to normal
6808 message order and, if the
6811 displays a header summary.
6812 The former command shows the current sorting criterion when used without
6813 an argument, but creates a sorted representation of the current folder
6814 otherwise, and changes the
6816 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
6818 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
6822 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
6823 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
6825 variable, as in, e.g.,
6826 .Ql set autosort=thread .
6827 Possible sorting criterions are:
6830 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
6832 Sort the messages by their
6834 field, that is by the time they were sent.
6836 Sort messages by the value of their
6838 field, that is by the address of the sender.
6841 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
6843 Sort the messages by their size.
6845 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
6848 Sort the messages by their message status.
6850 Sort the messages by their subject.
6852 Create a threaded display.
6854 Sort messages by the value of their
6856 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
6859 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
6865 \*(NQ (so) The source command reads commands from the given file.
6866 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6868 If the given expanded argument ends with a vertical bar
6870 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
6871 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
6872 Dependent on the settings of
6876 and also dependent on whether the command modifier
6878 had been used, encountering errors will stop sourcing of the given input.
6881 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
6882 .Va folder-hook Ns s
6885 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
6890 \*(NQ The difference to
6892 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
6893 this command will not generate an error nor warn if the given file
6894 argument cannot be opened successfully.
6898 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
6904 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
6906 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
6907 Unless otherwise noted the
6909 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
6917 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6921 This also clears the
6923 flag of the messages in question.
6927 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
6928 .Va spam-interface ,
6929 without modifying the messages, but setting their
6931 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
6932 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
6933 Refer to the manual section
6935 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
6939 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
6945 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6951 flag of the messages in question.
6963 \*(NQ TLS information and management command multiplexer to aid in
6964 .Sx "Encrypted network communication" .
6967 if so documented (see
6968 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6969 The result that is shown in case of errors is always the empty string,
6970 errors can be identified via the error number
6972 For example, string length overflows are catched and set
6975 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
6976 Note this command of course honours the overall TLS configuration.
6977 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6978 ? vput tls result fingerprint pop3s://ex.am.ple
6979 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $result
6982 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
6985 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest Ns
6986 ed fingerprint of the certificate of the given HOST
6987 .Pf ( Ql server:port ,
6988 where the port defaults to the HTTPS port, 443).
6990 is actively ignored for the runtime of this command.
6991 Only available if the term
7005 slot for white- and blacklisting header fields.
7009 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
7011 lines of each message on the user's terminal.
7012 Unless a special selection has been established for the
7016 command, the only header fields that are displayed are
7027 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
7029 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
7034 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in the
7036 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
7038 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
7041 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
7047 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
7049 selection, and all visualizable parts of MIME
7050 .Ql multipart/alternative
7055 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the user's terminal.
7056 The display of message headers is selectable via
7058 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
7060 all parts which have a registered MIME type handler (see
7061 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
7062 which produces plain text output, and all
7064 parts are shown, others are hidden except for their headers.
7065 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
7069 can be used to display parts which are not displayable as plain text.
7112 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7116 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7121 Superseded by the multiplexer
7132 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
7143 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
7147 Superseded by the multiplexer
7151 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7155 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7177 Perform URL percent codec operations on the raw-data argument, rather
7178 according to RFC 3986.
7182 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
7183 and manages the error number
7185 This is a character set agnostic and thus locale dependent operation,
7186 and it may decode bytes which are invalid in the current
7188 \*(ID This command does not know about URLs beside that.
7190 The first argument specifies the operation:
7194 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
7198 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
7199 pathnames: it does not allow a tilde
7201 and will neither accept hyphen-minus
7205 as an initial character.
7206 The remains of the line form the URL data which is to be converted.
7207 If the coding operation fails the error number
7210 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
7211 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
7212 change again due to output or result storage errors.
7216 \*(NQ This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
7220 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
7224 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
7225 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
7226 verification will fail for it.
7227 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
7229 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
7230 within the certificate,
7231 and if the message content has been altered.
7239 of \*(UA, as well as the build and running system environment.
7240 This command can produce a more
7242 output, and supports
7245 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7250 \*(NQ Evaluate arguments according to a given operator.
7251 This is a multiplexer command which can be used to perform signed 64-bit
7252 numeric calculations as well as byte string and string operations.
7253 It uses polish notation, i.e., the operator is the first argument and
7254 defines the number and type, and the meaning of the remaining arguments.
7255 An empty argument is replaced with a 0 if a number is expected.
7259 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7262 The result that is shown in case of errors is always
7264 for usage errors and numeric operations, and the empty string for byte
7265 string and string operations;
7266 if the latter two fail to provide result data for
7268 errors, e.g., when a search operation failed, they also set the
7271 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
7272 Except when otherwise noted numeric arguments are parsed as signed 64-bit
7273 numbers, and errors will be reported in the error number
7275 as the numeric error
7276 .Va ^ERR Ns -RANGE .
7279 Numeric operations work on one or two signed 64-bit integers.
7280 Numbers prefixed with
7284 are interpreted as hexadecimal (base 16) numbers, whereas
7286 indicates octal (base 8), and
7290 denote binary (base 2) numbers.
7291 It is possible to use any base in between 2 and 36, inclusive, with the
7293 notation, where the base is given as an unsigned decimal number, e.g.,
7295 is a different way of specifying a hexadecimal number.
7296 Unsigned interpretation of a number can be enforced by prefixing an
7298 (case-insensitively), e.g.,
7300 this is not necessary for power-of-two bases (2, 4, 8, 16 and 32),
7301 which will be interpreted as unsigned by default, but it still makes
7302 a difference regarding overflow detection and overflow constant.
7303 It is possible to enforce signed interpretation by (instead) prefixing a
7305 (case-insensitively).
7308 One integer is expected by assignment (equals sign
7310 which does nothing but parsing the argument, thus detecting validity and
7311 possible overflow conditions, and unary not (tilde
7313 which creates the bitwise complement.
7314 Two integers are used by addition (plus sign
7316 subtraction (hyphen-minus
7318 multiplication (asterisk
7322 and modulo (percent sign
7324 as well as for the bitwise operators logical or (vertical bar
7327 bitwise and (ampersand
7330 bitwise xor (circumflex
7332 the bitwise signed left- and right shifts
7335 as well as for the unsigned right shift
7339 Another numeric operation is
7341 which takes a number base in between 2 and 36, inclusive, and will act
7342 on the second number given just the same as what equals sign
7344 does, but the number result will be formatted in the base given.
7347 All numeric operators can be prefixed with a commercial at
7351 this will turn the operation into a saturated one, which means that
7352 overflow errors and division and modulo by zero are no longer reported
7353 via the exit status, but the result will linger at the minimum or
7354 maximum possible value, instead of overflowing (or trapping).
7355 This is true also for the argument parse step.
7356 For the bitwise shifts, the saturated maximum is 63.
7357 Any catched overflow will be reported via the error number
7360 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7361 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7362 ? vexpr @- +1 -9223372036854775808
7363 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME
7367 Character set agnostic string functions have no notion of locale
7368 settings and character sets.
7370 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
7373 .Sx "Filename transformations"
7376 Generates a random string of the given length, or of
7378 bytes (a constant from
7380 if the value 0 is given; the random string will be base64url encoded
7381 according to RFC 4648, and thus be usable as a (portable) filename.
7385 Byte string operations work on 8-bit bytes and have no notion of locale
7386 settings and character sets, effectively assuming ASCII data.
7389 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm length"
7391 Queries the length of the given argument.
7394 Calculates the Chris Torek hash of the given argument.
7397 Byte-searches in the first for the second argument.
7398 Shows the resulting 0-based offset shall it have been found.
7403 but works case-insensitively according to the rules of the ASCII
7407 Creates a substring of its first argument.
7408 The second argument is the 0-based starting offset, a negative one
7409 counts from the end;
7410 the optional third argument specifies the length of the desired result,
7411 a negative length leaves off the given number of bytes at the end of the
7412 original string, by default the entire string is used;
7413 this operation tries to work around faulty arguments (set
7415 for error logs), but reports them via the error number
7418 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7421 Trim away whitespace characters from both ends of the argument.
7424 Trim away whitespace characters from the begin of the argument.
7427 Trim away whitespace characters from the end of the argument.
7432 String operations work, sufficient support provided, according to the
7433 active user's locale encoding and character set (see
7434 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
7437 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm regex"
7439 (One-way) Converts the argument to something safely printable on the
7443 \*(OP A string operation that will try to match the first argument with
7444 the regular expression given as the second argument.
7445 If the optional third argument has been given then instead of showing
7446 the match offset a replacement operation is performed: the third
7447 argument is treated as if specified within dollar-single-quote (see
7448 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) ,
7449 and any occurrence of a positional parameter, e.g.,
7451 is replaced by the corresponding match group of the regular expression:
7452 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7453 ? vput vexpr res regex bananarama \e
7454 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7455 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7459 On otherwise identical case-insensitive equivalent to
7461 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7462 ? vput vexpr res ire bananarama \e
7463 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7464 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7471 \*(NQ Manage the positional parameter stack (see
7475 If the first argument is
7477 then the positional parameter stack of the current context, or the
7478 global one, if there is none, is cleared.
7481 then the remaining arguments will be used to (re)create the stack,
7482 if the parameter stack size limit is excessed an
7483 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
7487 If the first argument is
7489 a round-trip capable representation of the stack contents is created,
7490 with each quoted parameter separated from each other with the first
7493 and followed by the first character of
7495 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
7496 If that results in no separation at all a
7502 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7503 I.e., the subcommands
7507 can be used (in conjunction with
7509 to (re)create an argument stack from and to a single variable losslessly.
7511 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7512 ? vpospar set hey, "'you ", world!
7513 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7514 ? vput vpospar x quote
7516 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7517 ? eval vpospar set ${x}
7518 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7524 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the
7526 display editor on each message.
7527 Modified contents are discarded unless the
7529 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
7530 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
7532 can be used instead for a less display oriented editor.
7536 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
7537 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
7539 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
7540 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
7541 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
7542 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
7543 depends on the execution mode.
7544 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
7546 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
7547 the processed parts.
7548 For convience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
7549 value, the same result as writing it to
7551 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
7553 character for the filename is supported.
7554 Other user input undergoes the usual
7555 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7556 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
7558 and shell variable expansion for the message as such, not the individual
7559 parts, and contents of the destination file are overwritten if the file
7562 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
7563 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
7564 URL percent encoded (as via
7566 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
7567 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
7568 Existing files will not be overwritten, instead the part number or
7569 a dot are appended after a number sign
7571 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
7576 \*(NQ The sole difference to
7578 is that the new macro is executed in place of the current one, which
7579 will not regain control: all resources of the current macro will be
7581 This implies that any setting covered by
7583 will be forgotten and covered variables will become cleaned up.
7584 If this command is not used from within a
7586 ed macro it will silently be (a more expensive variant of)
7596 \*(NQ \*(UA presents message headers in
7598 fuls as described under the
7601 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
7602 likewise if the argument is
7606 scrolls to the last,
7608 scrolls to the first, and
7613 A number argument prefixed by
7617 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
7618 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
7624 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
7635 .\" .Sh COMMAND ESCAPES {{{
7636 .Sh "COMMAND ESCAPES"
7638 Command escapes are available in compose mode, and are used to perform
7639 special functions when composing messages.
7640 Command escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines, and
7641 consist of a trigger (escape), and a command character.
7642 The actual escape character can be set via the internal variable
7644 it defaults to the tilde
7646 Otherwise ignored whitespace characters following the escape character
7647 will prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
7651 Unless otherwise noted all compose mode command escapes ensure proper
7652 updates of the variables which represent the error number
7658 is set they will, unless stated otherwise, error out message compose mode
7659 and cause a program exit if an operation fails;
7660 an effect equivalent to the command modifier
7662 can however be achieved by placing a hyphen-minus
7664 after (possible whitespace following) the escape character.
7665 If the \*(OPal key bindings are available it is possible to create
7667 ings specifically for the compose mode.
7670 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
7673 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
7675 (If the escape character has been changed,
7676 that character must be doubled instead.)
7679 .It Ic ~! Ar command
7680 Execute the indicated shell
7682 which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the previously
7683 executed command if the internal variable
7685 is set, then return to the message.
7689 End compose mode and send the message.
7691 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
7693 .Va on-compose-splice ,
7694 in order, will be called when set, after which
7696 will be checked, a set
7697 .Va on-compose-leave
7698 hook will be called,
7702 will be joined in if set,
7704 will be honoured in interactive mode, finally a given
7705 .Va message-inject-tail
7706 will be incorporated, after which the compose mode is left.
7709 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
7710 Execute the given \*(UA command.
7711 Not all commands, however, are allowed.
7714 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
7719 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
7721 is executed using the shell.
7722 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
7726 \*(OP Write a summary of command escapes.
7729 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
7730 Append or edit the list of attachments.
7731 Does not manage the error number
7737 instead if this is a concern).
7738 The append mode expects a list of
7740 arguments as shell tokens (see
7741 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ;
7742 token-separating commas are ignored, too), to be
7743 interpreted as documented for the command line option
7745 with the message number exception as below.
7749 arguments the attachment list is edited, entry by entry;
7750 if a filename is left empty, that attachment is deleted from the list;
7751 once the end of the list is reached either new attachments may be
7752 entered or the session can be quit by committing an empty
7755 In non-interactive mode or in batch mode
7757 the list of attachments is effectively not edited but instead recreated;
7758 again, an empty input ends list creation.
7760 For all modes, if a given filename solely consists of the number sign
7762 followed by either a valid message number of the currently active
7763 mailbox, or by a period
7765 referring to the current message of the active mailbox, the so-called
7767 then the given message is attached as a
7770 The number sign must be quoted to avoid misinterpretation with the shell
7774 .It Ic ~| Ar command
7775 Pipe the message text through the specified filter command.
7776 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
7777 retain the original text of the message.
7780 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
7782 If the first character of the command is a vertical bar, then the entire
7783 message including header fields is subject to the filter command, e.g.,
7784 .Ql ~|| echo Fcc: /tmp/test; cat
7785 will prepend a file-carbon-copy message header.
7791 .It Ic ~^ Ar cmd Op Ar subcmd Op Ar arg3 Op Ar arg4
7792 Low-level compose mode command which shares the semantic with
7794 and is meant for scripted message access, i.e., for
7795 .Va on-compose-splice
7797 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
7798 The used protocol is likely subject to changes, and therefore the
7799 mentioned hooks receive the used protocol version as an initial line.
7800 In general the first field of a response line represents a status code
7801 which specifies whether a command was successful or not, whether result
7802 data is to be expected, and if, the format of the result data.
7803 Does not manage the error number
7807 because errors are reported via the protocol
7808 (hard errors like I/O failures cannot be handled).
7811 This command has read-only access to several virtual pseudo headers in
7812 the \*(UA private namespace which optionally (except for the
7813 non-optional first) exist in compose mode:
7817 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
7818 .It Ql Mailx-Command:
7819 The name of the command that generates the message, one of
7827 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-To:
7828 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Cc:
7829 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Bcc:
7830 Represent the frozen initial state of these headers before any
7831 transformation (e.g.,
7834 .Va recipients-in-cc
7837 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-From:
7838 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-To:
7839 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Cc:
7840 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Bcc:
7841 The values of said headers of the original message which has been
7843 .Ic reply , forward , resend .
7848 Error status code lines may optionally contain additional context.
7849 The status codes are:
7853 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql 210"
7855 Status ok; the remains of the line are the result.
7858 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7859 What follows are lines of result addresses, terminated by an empty line.
7860 The address lines consist of two fields, the first of which is the
7861 plain address, e.g.,
7863 separated by a single ASCII SP space from the second which contains the
7864 unstripped address, even if that is identical to the first field, e.g.,
7865 .Ql (Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple> .
7866 Non-network addressees, however, place a single-letter indicating
7867 the address type in the first field (hyphen-minus
7869 for files, vertical bar
7871 for pipes, and number sign
7873 for names: what is supposed to become expanded via
7875 ), and only the second field contains a value.
7876 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7877 commands can be issued.
7880 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7881 What follows are lines of furtherly unspecified string content,
7882 terminated by an empty line.
7883 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7884 commands can be issued.
7887 Syntax error; invalid command.
7890 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
7893 Error: an argument fails verification.
7894 For example an invalid address has been specified (also see
7896 or an attempt was made to modify anything in \*(UA's own namespace,
7897 or a modifying subcommand has been used on a read-only message.
7900 Error: an otherwise valid argument is rendered invalid due to context.
7901 For example, a second address is added to a header which may consist of
7902 a single address only.
7907 If a command indicates failure then the message will have remained
7909 Most commands can fail with
7911 if required arguments are missing (false command usage).
7912 The following (case-insensitive) commands are supported:
7915 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm version"
7917 This command will print the protocol version via 210.
7920 This command allows listing, inspection, and editing of message headers.
7921 Header name case is not normalized, and case-insensitive comparison
7922 should be used when matching names.
7923 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7925 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7927 Without a third argument a list of all yet existing headers is given via
7929 this command is the default command of
7931 if no second argument has been given.
7932 A third argument restricts output to the given header only, which may
7935 if no such field is defined.
7938 Shows the content of the header given as the third argument.
7939 Dependent on the header type this may respond with
7943 any failure results in
7947 This will remove all instances of the header given as the third
7952 if no such header can be found, and
7954 on \*(UA namespace violations.
7957 This will remove from the header given as the third argument the
7958 instance at the list position (counting from one!) given with the fourth
7963 if the list position argument is not a number or on \*(UA namespace
7966 if no such header instance exists.
7969 Create a new or an additional instance of the header given in the third
7970 argument, with the header body content as given in the fourth argument
7971 (the remains of the line).
7974 if the third argument specifies a free-form header field name that is
7975 invalid, or if body content extraction fails to succeed,
7977 if any extracted address does not pass syntax and/or security checks or
7978 on \*(UA namespace violations, and
7980 to indicate prevention of excessing a single-instance header \(em note that
7982 can be appended to (a space separator will be added automatically first).
7985 is returned upon success, followed by the name of the header and the list
7986 position of the newly inserted instance.
7987 The list position is always 1 for single-instance header fields.
7988 All free-form header fields are managed in a single list.
7993 This command allows listing, removal and addition of message attachments.
7994 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7996 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7998 List all attachments via
8002 if no attachments exist.
8003 This command is the default command of
8005 if no second argument has been given.
8008 This will remove the attachment given as the third argument, and report
8012 if no such attachment can be found.
8013 If there exists any path component in the given argument, then an exact
8014 match of the path which has been used to create the attachment is used
8015 directly, but if only the basename of that path matches then all
8016 attachments are traversed to find an exact match first, and the removal
8017 occurs afterwards; if multiple basenames match, a
8020 Message attachments are treated as absolute pathnames.
8022 If no path component exists in the given argument, then all attachments
8023 will be searched for
8025 parameter matches as well as for matches of the basename of the path
8026 which has been used when the attachment has been created; multiple
8031 This will interpret the third argument as a number and remove the
8032 attachment at that list position (counting from one!), reporting
8036 if the argument is not a number or
8038 if no such attachment exists.
8041 Adds the attachment given as the third argument, specified exactly as
8042 documented for the command line option
8044 and supporting the message number extension as documented for
8048 upon success, with the index of the new attachment following,
8050 if the given file cannot be opened,
8052 if an on-the-fly performed character set conversion fails, otherwise
8054 is reported; this is also reported if character set conversion is
8055 requested but not available.
8058 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8060 and prints any known attributes of the first found attachment via
8064 if no such attachment can be found.
8065 The attributes are written as lines of keyword and value tuples, the
8066 keyword being separated from the rest of the line with an ASCII SP space
8070 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8072 and is otherwise identical to
8075 .It Cm attribute-set
8076 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8078 and will assign the attribute given as the fourth argument, which is
8079 expected to be a value tuple of keyword and other data, separated by
8080 a ASCII SP space or TAB tabulator character.
8081 If the value part is empty, then the given attribute is removed, or
8082 reset to a default value if existence of the attribute is crucial.
8086 upon success, with the index of the found attachment following,
8088 for message attachments or if the given keyword is invalid, and
8090 if no such attachment can be found.
8091 The following keywords may be used (case-insensitively):
8093 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".It Ql filename"
8095 Sets the filename of the MIME part, i.e., the name that is used for
8096 display and when (suggesting a name for) saving (purposes).
8097 .It Ql content-description
8098 Associate some descriptive information to the attachment's content, used
8099 in favour of the plain filename by some MUAs.
8101 May be used for uniquely identifying MIME entities in several contexts;
8102 this expects a special reference address format as defined in RFC 2045
8105 upon address content verification failure.
8107 Defines the media type/subtype of the part, which is managed
8108 automatically, but can be overwritten.
8109 .It Ql content-disposition
8110 Automatically set to the string
8114 .It Cm attribute-set-at
8115 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8117 and is otherwise identical to
8126 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va Sign .
8131 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va sign .
8134 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
8135 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
8138 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
8139 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
8143 Read the file specified by the
8145 variable into the message.
8151 on the message collected so far, then return to compose mode.
8153 can be used for a more display oriented editor, and
8155 offers a pipe-based editing approach.
8158 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
8159 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
8160 message headers and MIME parts.
8161 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
8165 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
8166 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
8167 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
8169 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
8171 white- and blacklist selection of
8173 For MIME multipart messages,
8174 only the first displayable part is included.
8178 Edit the message header fields
8183 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
8184 The default values for these fields originate from the
8192 Edit the message header fields
8198 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
8201 .It Ic ~I Ar variable
8202 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message.
8203 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
8204 Any embedded character sequences
8206 horizontal tabulator and
8208 line feed are expanded in
8210 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
8212 time (\*(ID by using the command modifier
8216 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
8219 but appends a newline character.
8222 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
8223 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
8226 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
8230 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
8231 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
8234 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
8236 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
8238 white- and blacklist selection of
8240 For MIME multipart messages,
8241 only the first displayable part is included.
8245 Display the message collected so far,
8246 prefaced by the message header fields
8247 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
8251 Read in the given / current message(s) according to the algorithm of
8256 Abort the message being sent,
8257 copying it to the file specified by the
8264 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
8267 but indent each line that has been read by
8271 .It Ic ~r Ar filename Op Ar HERE-delimiter
8272 Read the named file, object to the usual
8273 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
8274 into the message; if (the expanded)
8278 then standard input is used, e.g., for pasting purposes.
8279 Only in this latter mode
8281 may be given: if it is data will be read in until the given
8283 is seen on a line by itself, and encountering EOF is an error; the
8285 is a required argument in non-interactive mode; if it is single-quote
8286 quoted then the pasted content will not be expanded, \*(ID otherwise
8287 a future version of \*(UA may perform shell-style expansion on the content.
8291 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
8292 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
8293 normalized to space (SP) characters.
8296 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
8297 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
8300 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
8301 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
8305 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
8306 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
8312 editor on the message collected so far, then return to compose mode.
8314 can be used for a less display oriented editor, and
8316 offers a pipe-based editing approach.
8319 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
8320 Write the message onto the named file, which is object to the usual
8321 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
8323 the message is appended to it.
8329 except that the message is not saved at all.
8335 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
8336 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
8338 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
8342 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
8346 has the same effect as using
8353 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
8355 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
8356 Both commands support a more
8359 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
8362 implicitly, others can be imported explicitly with the command
8364 and henceforth share said properties.
8367 Two different kinds of internal variables exist, and both of which can
8369 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
8373 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
8374 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
8375 introduction of the section
8377 documents the supported quoting rules.
8379 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8380 ? wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
8381 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''; \e
8382 varshow one two three four; \e
8383 unset one two three four
8387 Dependent upon the actual option string values may become interpreted as
8388 colour names, command specifications, normal text, etc.
8389 They may be treated as numbers, in which case decimal values are
8390 expected if so documented, but otherwise any numeric format and
8391 base that is valid and understood by the
8393 command may be used, too.
8396 There also exists a special kind of string value, the
8397 .Dq boolean string ,
8398 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
8402 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
8408 for a false boolean and
8414 for a true boolean; a special kind of boolean string is the
8416 which is a boolean string that can optionally be prefixed with the
8417 (case-insensitive) term
8421 which causes prompting of the user in interactive mode, with the given
8422 boolean as the default value.
8425 Variable chains extend a plain
8430 .Ql variable-USER@HOST
8434 will be converted to all lowercase when looked up (but not when the
8435 variable is set or unset!), \*(OPally IDNA converted, and indeed means
8439 had been specified in the contextual Uniform Resource Locator URL, see
8440 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
8441 Even though this mechanism is based on URLs no URL percent encoding may
8442 be applied to neither of
8446 variable chains need to be specified using raw data;
8447 the mentioned section contains examples.
8448 Variables which support chains are explicitly documented as such, and
8449 \*(UA treats the base name of any such variable special, meaning that
8450 users should not create custom names like
8452 in order to avoid false classifications and treatment of such variables.
8454 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
8455 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
8456 .Ss "Initial settings"
8458 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
8464 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
8478 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
8480 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
8482 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
8490 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
8499 Notes: \*(UA does not support the
8501 variable \(en use command line options or
8503 to pass options through to a
8505 And the default global
8507 file, which is loaded unless the
8509 (with according argument) or
8511 command line options have been used, or the
8512 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
8513 environment variable is set (see
8514 .Sx "Resource files" )
8515 bends those initial settings a bit, e.g., it sets the variables
8520 to name a few, establishes a default
8522 selection etc., and should thus be taken into account.
8525 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
8528 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
8532 \*(RO The exit status of the last command, or the
8537 This status has a meaning in the state machine: in conjunction with
8539 any non-0 exit status will cause a program exit, and in
8541 mode any error while loading (any of the) resource files will have the
8545 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
8546 can be used to instruct the state machine to ignore errors.
8550 \*(RO The current error number
8551 .Pf ( Xr errno 3 ) ,
8552 which is set after an error occurred; it is also available via
8554 and the error name and documentation string can be queried via
8558 \*(ID This machinery is new and the error number is only really usable
8559 if a command explicitly states that it manages the variable
8561 for others errno will be used in case of errors, or
8563 if that is 0: it thus may or may not reflect the real error.
8564 The error number may be set with the command
8570 \*(RO This is a multiplexer variable which performs dynamic expansion of
8571 the requested state or condition, of which there are:
8574 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
8578 .It Va ^ERR , ^ERRDOC , ^ERRNAME
8579 The number, documentation, and name of the current
8581 respectively, which is usually set after an error occurred.
8582 The documentation is an \*(OP, the name is used if not available.
8583 \*(ID This machinery is new and is usually reliable only if a command
8584 explicitly states that it manages the variable
8586 which is effectively identical to
8588 Each of those variables can be suffixed with a hyphen minus followed by
8589 a name or number, in which case the expansion refers to the given error.
8590 Note this is a direct mapping of (a subset of) the system error values:
8591 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8593 eval echo \e$1: \e$^ERR-$1:\e
8594 \e$^ERRNAME-$1: \e$^ERRDOC-$1
8595 vput vexpr i + "$1" 1
8607 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8609 separated by the first character of the value of
8611 \*(ID The special semantics of the equally named special parameter of the
8613 are not yet supported.
8617 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8619 separated by a space character.
8620 If placed in double quotation marks, each positional parameter is
8621 properly quoted to expand to a single parameter again.
8625 \*(RO Expands to the number of positional parameters, i.e., the size of
8626 the positional parameter stack in decimal.
8630 \*(RO Inside the scope of a
8634 ed macro this expands to the name of the calling macro, or to the empty
8635 string if the macro is running from top-level.
8636 For the \*(OPal regular expression search and replace operator of
8638 this expands to the entire matching expression.
8639 It represents the program name in global context.
8643 \*(RO Access of the positional parameter stack.
8644 All further parameters can be accessed with this syntax, too, e.g.,
8647 etc.; positional parameters can be shifted off the stack by calling
8649 The parameter stack contains, e.g., the arguments of a
8653 d macro, the matching groups of the \*(OPal regular expression search
8654 and replace expression of
8656 and can be explicitly created or overwritten with the command
8661 \*(RO Is set to the active
8665 .It Va add-file-recipients
8666 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
8667 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
8668 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
8669 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
8673 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
8674 when comparing addresses.
8678 \*(BO Causes messages saved in the
8680 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
8682 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
8683 This should always be set.
8687 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
8691 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
8695 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks for files to attach at the end of each message.
8696 An empty line finalizes the list.
8700 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for carbon copy recipients
8701 (at the end of each message if
8709 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
8710 recipients (at the end of each message if
8718 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for confirmation to send the
8719 message or reenter compose mode after having been shown an envelope
8721 This is by default enabled.
8725 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the user to be prompted if the message is to be
8726 signed at the end of each message.
8729 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
8733 .\" The alternative *ask* is not documented on purpose
8734 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt for the subject upon entering compose mode
8735 unless a subject already exists.
8739 A sequence of characters to display in the
8743 as shown in the display of
8745 each for one type of messages (see
8746 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
8747 with the default being
8750 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
8753 variable is set, in the following order:
8755 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
8777 \*(ID start of a (collapsed) thread in threaded mode (see
8781 \*(ID an uncollapsed thread in threaded mode; only used in conjunction with
8786 classified as possible spam.
8792 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
8793 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
8797 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
8798 message will be sent automatically.
8802 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when .Ql thread Ns
8805 mode is entered (see the
8811 \*(BO Enable automatic
8813 ing of a(n existing)
8819 commands, e.g., the message that becomes the new
8821 is shown automatically, as via
8828 Causes sorted mode (see the
8830 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this variable as
8831 sorting method when a folder is opened, e.g.,
8832 .Ql set autosort=thread .
8836 \*(BO Enables the substitution of all not (reverse-solidus) escaped
8839 characters by the contents of the last executed command for the
8841 shell escape command and
8843 one of the compose mode
8844 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8845 If this variable is not set no reverse solidus stripping is performed.
8849 \*(OP Terminals generate multi-byte sequences for certain forms of
8850 input, for example for function and other special keys.
8851 Some terminals however do not write these multi-byte sequences as
8852 a whole, but byte-by-byte, and the latter is what \*(UA actually reads.
8853 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
8854 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
8855 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
8861 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
8862 has the same affect as setting
8864 and all other variables prefixed with
8866 it also changes the behaviour of
8868 (which does not exist in BSD).
8872 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
8873 summary to traditional BSD style.
8877 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
8882 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
8888 field to appear immediately after the
8890 field in message headers and with the
8892 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8898 .It Va build-cc , build-ld , build-os , build-rest
8899 \*(RO The build environment, including the compiler, the linker, the
8900 operating system \*(UA has been build for, usually taken from
8904 and then lowercased, as well as all the rest that may possibly be useful
8905 to include in a bug report, respectively.
8909 The value that should appear in the
8913 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
8915 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
8916 US-ASCII compatible.
8920 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
8921 member of the variable
8923 This defaults to UTF-8 if character set conversion capabilities are
8924 available, and to ISO-8859-1 otherwise (unless the operating system
8925 environment is known to always and exclusively support UTF-8 locales),
8926 in which case the only supported character set is
8928 and this variable is effectively ignored.
8929 Refer to the section
8930 .Sx "Character sets"
8931 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
8934 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
8935 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
8937 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
8939 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
8940 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
8941 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
8943 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
8944 otherwise the (final) value of
8946 is used for this purpose.
8948 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
8949 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
8950 of a MIME message part that uses the
8952 character set is forcefully treated as text.
8956 The default value for the
8961 .It Va colour-disable
8962 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
8963 Also see the section
8964 .Sx "Coloured display" .
8968 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
8970 Note that pagers may need special command line options, e.g.,
8978 in order to support colours.
8979 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
8980 adjustments dependent on the value of the environment variable
8982 (see there for more).
8986 .It Va contact-mail , contact-web
8987 \*(RO Addresses for contact per email and web, respectively, e.g., for
8988 bug reports, suggestions, or help regarding \*(UA.
8989 The former can be used directly:
8990 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
8994 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued variable is
8995 set it will be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
8996 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
9000 can be forced by setting this to the value
9002 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
9003 terminal screen to compute the threshold (see
9008 \*(ID At the moment this uses the count of lines of the message in wire
9009 format, which, dependent on the
9011 of the message, is unrelated to the number of display lines.
9012 (The software is old and historically the relation was a given thing.)
9016 Define a set of custom headers to be injected into newly composed or
9018 A custom header consists of the field name followed by a colon
9020 and the field content body.
9021 Standard header field names cannot be overwritten by a custom header.
9022 Different to the command line option
9024 the variable value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of custom
9025 headers: to include commas in header bodies they need to become escaped
9026 with reverse solidus
9028 Headers can be managed more freely in compose mode via
9031 .Dl ? set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
9035 Controls the appearance of the
9037 date and time format specification of the
9039 variable, that is used, for example, when viewing the summary of
9041 If unset, then the local receiving date is used and displayed
9042 unformatted, otherwise the message sending
9044 It is possible to assign a
9046 format string and control formatting, but embedding newlines via the
9048 format is not supported, and will result in display errors.
9050 .Ql %Y-%m-%d %H:%M ,
9052 .Va datefield-markout-older .
9055 .It Va datefield-markout-older
9056 Only used in conjunction with
9058 Can be used to create a visible distinction of messages dated more than
9059 a day in the future, or older than six months, a concept comparable to the
9061 option of the POSIX utility
9063 If set to the empty string, then the plain month, day and year of the
9065 will be displayed, but a
9067 format string to control formatting can be assigned.
9073 \*(BO Enables debug messages and obsoletion warnings, disables the
9074 actual delivery of messages and also implies
9080 .It Va disposition-notification-send
9082 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
9083 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
9087 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
9089 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
9090 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
9091 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
9093 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
9094 .\"for a specific account.
9098 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
9100 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive or batch
9102 compose mode will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the
9103 normal end-of-file condition).
9104 This behaviour is implied in
9110 .It Va dotlock-disable
9111 \*(BO\*(OP Disable creation of
9116 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
9117 \*(OB\*(BO\*(OP Ignore failures when creating
9119 .Sx "dotlock files" .
9126 If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically when
9127 a message is composed in interactive mode.
9128 If the value starts with the letter
9130 then this acts as if
9134 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" )
9138 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
9142 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
9143 its header is included in the editable text.
9147 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
9148 .Dq \&No mail for user
9149 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or does not exist.
9150 If this variable is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or non-existent
9151 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
9157 \*(BO Let each command with a non-0 exit status, including every
9161 s a non-0 status, cause a program exit unless prefixed by
9164 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
9166 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
9167 but which use a different modifier for ignoring the error.
9168 Please refer to the variable
9170 for more on this topic.
9174 The first character of this value defines the escape character for
9175 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9177 The default value is the character tilde
9179 If set to the empty string, command escapes are disabled.
9183 If unset then file and command pipeline address targets are not allowed,
9184 and any such address will be filtered out, giving a warning message.
9185 If set then all possible recipient address specifications will be
9186 accepted unless a possible value content is more specific (also see
9187 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) ;
9188 if desired so only in interactive mode, or when tilde commands were
9189 enabled explicitly via
9193 the (case-insensitive) value
9195 can be used (this really acts like
9196 .Ql restrict,-all,+name,+addr ,
9197 so that care for ordering issues must be taken).
9199 The value is actually interpreted as a comma-separated list.
9202 the existence of disallowed addressees is treated as a hard send error
9203 instead of only causing them to be filtered out.
9204 Address targets can be added and subtracted by prefixing with a plus sign
9210 addresses all possible address specifications,
9214 command pipeline targets,
9216 plain user names and (MTA) aliases and
9219 Targets are interpreted in the given order, so that
9220 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
9221 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
9222 unless \*(UA is in interactive mode or has been started with the
9226 command line option; in the latter case(s) any address may be used, then.
9228 Historically invalid network addressees were silently stripped off.
9229 To change this so that any encountered invalid email address causes
9230 a hard error it must be ensured that
9232 is an entry in the above list, which automatically enables network
9233 addressees; it really acts like
9234 .Ql failinvaddr,+addr ,
9235 so that care for ordering issues must be taken.
9238 is present a few address providers (for example
9240 and all recipients given on the command line) will be will evaluated as
9241 if specified within dollar-single-quotes (see
9242 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
9246 Unless this variable is set additional
9248 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
9249 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
9251 separator, results in a program termination with failure status.
9252 The same can be accomplished by using the special (case-insensitive) value
9254 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
9256 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
9257 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
9261 The empty value will allow unconditional usage.
9265 \*(RO String giving a list of optional features.
9266 Features are preceded with a plus sign
9268 if they are available, with a hyphen-minus
9271 The output of the command
9273 will include this information in a more pleasant output.
9277 \*(BO This setting reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
9278 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
9279 included in the header of a message
9280 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
9281 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
9282 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
9285 .Ic replysender , respondsender , followupsender
9287 .Ic replyall , respondall , followupall
9288 are not affected by the current setting of
9293 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
9294 filenames that begin with the plus sign
9296 will have the plus sign replaced with the value of this variable if set,
9297 otherwise the plus sign will remain unchanged when doing
9298 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
9301 for more on this topic, and know about standard imposed implications of
9303 The value supports a subset of transformations itself, and if the
9304 non-empty value does not start with a solidus
9308 will be prefixed automatically.
9309 Once the actual value is evaluated first, the internal variable
9311 will be updated for caching purposes.
9314 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER , Va folder-hook
9317 macro which will be called whenever a
9320 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
9321 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
9322 only include newly arrived messages then.
9324 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
9325 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
9327 The specialized form will override the generic one if
9329 matches the file that is opened.
9330 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
9331 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
9332 However, if the mailbox resides under
9336 specification is tried in addition, e.g., if
9340 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
9341 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
9343 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
9344 first, but then followed by
9345 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
9348 .It Va folder-resolved
9349 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
9351 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
9355 \*(BO Controls whether a
9356 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
9357 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
9359 .Va followup-to-honour
9361 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
9366 .It Va followup-to-honour
9368 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
9369 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
9373 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
9383 .It Va forward-as-attachment
9384 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
9387 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
9388 With this setting enabled messages are sent as unmodified MIME
9390 attachments with all of their parts included.
9394 .It Va forward-inject-head , forward-inject-tail
9395 The strings to put before and after the text of a message with the
9397 command, respectively.
9398 The former defaults to
9399 .Ql -------- Original Message --------\en .
9400 Special format directives in these strings will be expanded if possible,
9401 and if so configured the output will be folded according to
9403 for more please refer to
9404 .Va quote-inject-head .
9405 These variables are ignored if the
9406 .Va forward-as-attachment
9412 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
9414 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
9415 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
9416 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
9417 According to that RFC setting the
9419 variable is required if
9421 contains more than one address.
9422 Dependent on the context these addresses are handled as if they were in
9427 If a file-based MTA is used, then
9429 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
9431 can nonetheless be enforced to appear as the envelope sender address at
9432 the MTA protocol level (the RFC 5321 reverse-path), either by using the
9434 command line option (with an empty argument; see there for the complete
9435 picture on this topic), or by setting the internal variable
9436 .Va r-option-implicit .
9439 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
9440 a dialup machine) then either this variable or
9444 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities with
9446 have to be set: if so the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9450 will be created (except when disallowed by
9451 .Va message-id-disable
9458 \*(BO Due to historical reasons comments and name parts of email
9459 addresses are removed by default when sending mail, replying to or
9460 forwarding a message.
9461 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed.
9464 \*(OB Predecessor of
9465 .Va forward-inject-head .
9469 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
9470 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
9475 mode a header summary will also be displayed on folder changes.
9476 The command line option
9484 A format string to use for the summary of
9486 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent sign
9488 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
9489 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
9490 Names and addresses are subject to modifications according to
9494 Valid format specifiers are:
9497 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
9499 A plain percent sign.
9502 a space character but for the current message
9504 for which it expands to
9507 .Va headline-plain ) .
9510 a space character but for the current message
9512 for which it expands to
9515 .Va headline-plain ) .
9517 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
9520 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
9522 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
9526 The date found in the
9528 header of the message when
9530 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
9531 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
9536 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
9538 The indenting level in
9544 The address of the message sender.
9546 The message thread tree structure.
9547 (Note that this format does not support a field width, and honours
9548 .Va headline-plain . )
9550 The number of lines of the message, if available.
9554 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
9556 Message subject (if any).
9558 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
9560 Message recipient flags: is the addressee of the message a known or
9561 subscribed mailing list \(en see
9566 The position in threaded/sorted order.
9568 The value 0 except in an IMAP mailbox,
9569 where it expands to the UID of the message.
9573 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
9575 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
9587 .It Va headline-bidi
9588 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
9589 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
9590 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
9591 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
9592 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
9593 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
9595 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
9596 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
9597 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
9599 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
9600 fields that may occur when displaying
9602 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
9604 with special Unicode control sequences;
9605 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
9607 no value (or any value other than
9612 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
9613 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
9614 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
9616 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
9618 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
9620 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
9621 sequences onto the line).
9626 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
9627 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
9630 .It Va headline-plain
9631 \*(BO On Unicode (UTF-8) aware terminals enhanced graphical symbols are
9632 used by default for certain entries of
9634 If this variable is set only basic US-ASCII symbols will be used.
9638 \*(OP If a line editor is available then this can be set to
9639 name the (expandable) path of the location of a permanent
9645 .It Va history-gabby
9646 \*(BO\*(OP Add more entries to the
9648 as is normally done.
9651 .It Va history-gabby-persist
9652 \*(BO\*(OP \*(UA's own MLE will not save the additional
9654 entries in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
9655 On the other hand it will not loose the knowledge of whether
9656 a persistent entry was gabby or not.
9662 \*(OP Setting this variable imposes a limit on the number of concurrent
9665 If set to the value 0 then no further history entries will be added,
9666 and loading and incorporation of the
9668 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
9669 Runtime changes will not be reflected before the
9671 is saved or loaded (again).
9675 \*(BO This setting controls whether messages are held in the system
9677 and it is set by default.
9681 Used instead of the value obtained from
9685 as the hostname when expanding local addresses, e.g., in
9688 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ,
9689 especially for expansion of network addresses that contain domain-less
9690 valid user names in angle brackets).
9693 or this variable Is set the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9697 will be created (except when disallowed by
9698 .Va message-id-disable
9701 If the \*(OPal IDNA support is available (see
9703 variable assignment is aborted when a necessary conversion fails.
9705 Setting it to the empty string will cause the normal hostname to be
9706 used, but nonetheless enables creation of said ID fields.
9707 \*(IN in conjunction with the built-in SMTP
9710 also influences the results:
9711 one should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
9720 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
9721 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
9723 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
9725 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
9726 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
9730 The input field separator that is used (\*(ID by some functions) to
9731 determine where to split input data.
9733 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9735 Unsetting is treated as assigning the default value,
9738 If set to the empty value, no field splitting will be performed.
9740 If set to a non-empty value, all whitespace characters are extracted
9741 and assigned to the variable
9745 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9748 will be ignored at the beginning and end of input.
9749 Diverging from POSIX shells default whitespace is removed in addition,
9750 which is owed to the entirely different line content extraction rules.
9752 Each occurrence of a character of
9754 will cause field-splitting, any adjacent
9756 characters will be skipped.
9761 \*(RO Automatically deduced from the whitespace characters in
9766 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
9767 messages; instead echo them as
9769 characters and discard the current line.
9773 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
9774 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
9775 in compose mode on message input and in interactive command input.
9776 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
9777 explicitly using one of the commands
9781 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
9784 on a line by itself or by using the
9786 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ;
9787 Setting this implies the behaviour that
9795 If this is set to a non-empty string it will specify the user's
9797 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
9800 and the system-dependent default, and (thus) be used to replace
9803 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
9806 for more on this topic.
9807 The value supports a subset of transformations itself.
9815 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9818 option for indenting messages,
9819 in place of the POSIX mandated default tabulator character
9826 \*(BO If set, an empty
9828 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
9829 file is not removed.
9830 Note that, in conjunction with
9832 mode any empty file will be removed unless this variable is set.
9833 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
9834 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
9835 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
9836 \*(ID Only local regular (MBOX) files are covered, Maildir and other
9837 mailbox types will never be removed, even if empty.
9840 .It Va keep-content-length
9841 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing MBOX mailbox files \*(UA can
9846 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
9847 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
9848 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
9849 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
9850 work with with same mailbox files.
9851 Note that, if this is not set but
9852 .Va writebackedited ,
9853 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
9854 fields already marks the message as being modified.
9855 \*(ID At some future time \*(UA will be capable to rewrite and apply an
9857 to modified messages, and then those fields will be stripped silently.
9861 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
9862 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
9863 This setting causes all saved message to be retained.
9866 .It Va line-editor-disable
9867 \*(BO Turn off any enhanced line editing capabilities (see
9868 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
9872 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
9873 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
9877 Error log message prefix string
9878 .Pf ( Ql "\*(uA: " ) .
9881 .It Va mailbox-display
9882 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
9884 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
9887 .It Va mailbox-resolved
9888 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
9891 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
9892 An additional startup file that is loaded as the last of the
9893 .Sx "Resource files" .
9894 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
9896 implementations, i.e., mostly anything which is not covered by
9897 .Sx "Initial settings" .
9901 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
9902 it is marked as having been
9905 .Sx "Message states" .
9909 \*(BO When opening MBOX mailbox databases \*(UA by default uses tolerant
9910 POSIX rules for detecting message boundaries (so-called
9912 lines) due to compatibility reasons, instead of the stricter rules that
9913 have been standardized in RFC 4155.
9914 This behaviour can be switched to the stricter RFC 4155 rules by
9915 setting this variable.
9916 (This is never necessary for any message newly generated by \*(UA,
9917 it only applies to messages generated by buggy or malicious MUAs, or may
9918 occur in old MBOX databases: \*(UA itself will choose a proper
9920 to avoid false interpretation of
9922 content lines in the MBOX database.)
9924 This may temporarily be handy when \*(UA complains about invalid
9926 lines when opening a MBOX: in this case setting this variable and
9927 re-opening the mailbox in question may correct the result.
9928 If so, copying the entire mailbox to some other file, as in
9929 .Ql copy * SOME-FILE ,
9930 will perform proper, all-compatible
9932 quoting for all detected messages, resulting in a valid MBOX mailbox.
9933 Finally the variable can be unset again:
9934 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9936 localopts yes; wysh set mbox-rfc4155;\e
9937 wysh File "${1}"; eval copy * "${2}"
9939 call mboxfix /tmp/bad.mbox /tmp/good.mbox
9944 \*(BO Internal development variable.
9947 .It Va message-id-disable
9948 \*(BO By setting this variable the generation of
9952 message and MIME part headers can be completely suppressed, effectively
9953 leaving this task up to the
9955 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
9956 Note that according to RFC 5321 a SMTP server is not required to add this
9957 field by itself, so it should be ensured that it accepts messages without
9961 .It Va message-inject-head
9962 A string to put at the beginning of each new message, followed by a newline.
9963 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9967 are understood (use the
9971 ting the variable(s) instead).
9974 .It Va message-inject-tail
9975 A string to put at the end of each new message, followed by a newline.
9976 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9980 are understood (use the
9984 ting the variable(s) instead).
9988 \*(BO Usually, when an
9990 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
9991 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
9996 option to be passed through to the
9998 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
9999 this flag, no MTA is known which does not support it (for historical
10003 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
10004 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
10005 in order to classify the
10008 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
10010 .Va mime-encoding )
10011 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
10012 a computation rather similar to what the
10014 command produces when used with the
10018 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
10019 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
10020 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
10025 .Ql application/octet-stream :
10026 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
10028 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
10029 interpret the contents of the part.
10031 If this variable is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as
10032 text data at first glance (by a
10036 file extension), then the original
10038 will not be overwritten.
10041 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
10042 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
10043 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
10044 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
10045 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
10046 (E.g., at the time of this writing some newsletters ship their full
10047 content only in the rich HTML part, whereas the plain text part only
10048 contains topic subjects.)
10051 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
10054 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
10055 Some MUAs, however, do not use
10056 .Sx "The mime.types files"
10058 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
10059 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but specify an
10060 unspecific MIME type
10061 .Pf ( Ql application/octet-stream )
10062 even for plain text attachments.
10063 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to re-classify such MIME
10064 message parts, if possible, for example via a possibly existing
10065 attachment filename.
10066 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
10067 actually a carrier of bits, best specified as a binary value, e.g.,
10070 .Bl -bullet -compact
10072 If bit two is set (counting from 1, decimal 2) then the detected
10074 will be carried along with the message and be used for deciding which
10075 MIME handler is to be used, for example;
10076 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
10077 overridden content-type by showing a plus sign
10080 If bit three is set (decimal 4) then the counter-evidence is always
10081 produced and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even
10082 forcefully overriding the parts given MIME type.
10084 If bit four is set (decimal 8) as a last resort the actual content of
10085 .Ql application/octet-stream
10086 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
10088 This mode is even more relaxed when data is to be displayed to the user
10089 or used as a message quote (data consumers which mangle data for display
10090 purposes, which includes masking of control characters, for example).
10094 .It Va mime-encoding
10096 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
10097 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable.
10098 (7-bit clean text messages are sent as-is, without a transfer encoding.)
10101 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
10103 .Pf (Or\0 Ql 8b . )
10104 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
10105 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
10106 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
10107 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
10108 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
10109 .It Ql quoted-printable
10110 .Pf (Or\0 Ql qp . )
10111 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
10112 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
10113 be read as-is; it is also acceptable for other single-byte locales that
10114 share many characters with ASCII, like, e.g., ISO-8859-1.
10115 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
10116 sets: e.g., it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode a single
10117 UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
10118 It is the default encoding.
10120 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
10121 This encoding is 7-bit clean and will always be used for binary data.
10122 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
10123 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
10124 to four bytes of output.
10125 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
10130 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
10131 Can be used to control which of
10132 .Sx "The mime.types files"
10133 are loaded: if the letter
10135 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
10137 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
10139 controls loading of the system wide
10141 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
10143 If this variable is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
10144 Incorporation of the \*(UA-built-in MIME types cannot be suppressed,
10145 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
10148 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
10149 value string contains an equals sign
10151 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
10154 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
10155 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
10156 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
10157 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
10158 the MIME type cache).
10163 To choose an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent, set this option to either
10164 the full pathname of an executable (optionally prefixed with the protocol
10166 or \*(OPally a SMTP a.k.a. SUBMISSION protocol URL, e.g., \*(IN
10168 .Dl submissions://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10171 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
10172 The default has been chosen at compile time.
10173 All supported data transfers are executed in child processes, which
10174 run asynchronously and without supervision unless either the
10179 If such a child receives a TERM signal, it will abort and
10186 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
10188 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
10191 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
10194 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
10197 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
10202 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
10203 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean variable
10204 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
10205 (which will also disable passing
10209 (for not treating a line with only a dot
10211 character as the end of input),
10213 (shall the variable
10219 variable is set); in conjunction with the
10221 command line option \*(UA will also (not) pass
10223 as well as possibly
10227 \*(OPally \*(UA can send mail over SMTP a.k.a. SUBMISSION network
10228 connections to a single defined smart host by setting this variable to
10229 a SMTP or SUBMISSION URL (see
10230 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
10231 An authentication scheme can be specified via the variable chain
10233 Encrypted network connections are \*(OPally available, the section
10234 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
10235 should give an overview and provide links to more information on this.
10236 Note that with some mail providers it may be necessary to set the
10238 variable in order to use a specific combination of
10243 \*(UA also supports forwarding of all network traffic over a specified
10245 The following SMTP variants may be used:
10249 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
10250 server port 25 and requires setting the
10251 .Va smtp-use-starttls
10252 variable to enter a TLS encrypted session state.
10253 Assign a value like \*(IN
10254 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10256 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
10257 to choose this protocol.
10259 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
10260 and is automatically TLS secured.
10261 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
10262 be supported by your hosts network service database
10263 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
10266 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
10267 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
10268 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10270 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
10271 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
10272 specify the port as
10276 The SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409) lives on server port 587 and
10277 is identically to the SMTP protocol from \*(UA's point of view;
10278 it requires setting
10279 .Va smtp-use-starttls
10280 to enter a TLS secured session state; e.g., \*(IN
10281 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port] .
10283 The SUBMISSIONS protocol (RFC 8314) that lives on server port 465 and is
10284 TLS secured by default.
10285 It can be chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
10286 .Ql submissions://[user[:password]@]server[:port] .
10287 Due to the problems mentioned for SMTPS above and the fact that
10288 SUBMISSIONS is new and a successor that lives on the same port as the
10289 historical engineering mismanagement named SMTPS, it is usually
10290 necessary to explicitly specify the port as
10296 .It Va mta-arguments
10297 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
10299 can be given via this variable, which is parsed according to
10300 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
10301 into an array of arguments, and which will be joined onto MTA options
10302 from other sources, and then passed individually to the MTA:
10303 .Ql ? wysh set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"' .
10306 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
10307 \*(BO Unless this variable is set \*(UA will pass some well known
10308 standard command line options to a file-based
10310 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), see there for more.
10313 .It Va mta-no-receiver-arguments
10314 \*(BO By default a file-based
10316 will be passed all receiver addresses on the command line.
10317 This variable can be set to suppress any such argument.
10321 Many systems use a so-called
10323 environment to ensure compatibility with
10325 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
10327 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
10328 actually executed when calling the file-based
10330 will treat its contents as that name.
10332 .Mx Va netrc-lookup
10333 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
10334 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the user's
10336 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
10337 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
10338 and for the command
10341 .Sx "The .netrc file"
10342 documents the file format.
10354 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the user's
10356 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
10357 This can be used to, e.g., store
10360 .Ql ? set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp' .
10364 \*(OP If this variable has the value
10366 newly created local folders will be in Maildir instead of MBOX format.
10370 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
10371 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
10372 If this variable is set to the special value
10374 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
10375 timestamp changes are detected.
10376 Maildir folders are \*(OPal.
10380 \*(BO Unless specified as absolute pathnames, causes the filename given
10384 and the sender-based filenames for the
10388 commands to be interpreted relative to the directory given in the
10390 variable rather than relative to the current directory.
10392 .Mx Va on-account-cleanup
10393 .It Va on-account-cleanup-ACCOUNT , Va on-account-cleanup
10394 Macro hook which will be called once an
10396 is left, as the very last step before unrolling per-account
10398 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
10399 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
10402 The specialized form is used in favour of the generic one if found.
10405 .It Va on-compose-cleanup
10406 Macro hook which will be called after the message has been sent (or not,
10407 in case of failures), as the very last step before unrolling compose mode
10409 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
10410 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
10414 For compose mode hooks that may affect the message content please see
10415 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave , on-compose-splice .
10416 \*(ID This hook exists because
10417 .Ic alias , alternates , commandalias , shortcut ,
10418 to name a few, are not covered by
10420 changes applied in compose mode will continue to be in effect thereafter.
10425 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
10426 Macro hooks which will be called once compose mode is entered,
10427 and after composing has been finished, but before a set
10428 .Va message-inject-tail
10429 has been injected etc., respectively.
10431 are enabled for these hooks, and changes on variables will be forgotten
10432 after the message has been sent.
10433 .Va on-compose-cleanup
10434 can be used to perform other necessary cleanup steps.
10436 The following (read-only) variables will be set temporarily during
10437 execution of the macros to represent respective message headers, to
10438 the empty string otherwise; most of them correspond to according virtual
10439 message headers that can be accessed via
10442 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10444 .Va on-compose-splice
10448 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va mailx_subject"
10449 .It Va mailx-command
10450 The command that generates the message.
10451 .It Va mailx-subject
10455 .It Va mailx-sender
10457 .It Va mailx-to , mailx-cc , mailx-bcc
10458 The list of receiver addresses as a space-separated list.
10459 .It Va mailx-raw-to , mailx-raw-cc , mailx-raw-bcc
10460 The list of receiver addresses before any mangling (due to, e.g.,
10463 .Va recipients-in-cc )
10464 as a space-separated list.
10465 .It Va mailx-orig-from
10466 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
10468 of the given message.
10469 .It Va mailx-orig-to , mailx-orig-cc , mailx-orig-bcc
10470 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
10471 receivers of the given message.
10475 Here is am example that injects a signature via
10476 .Va message-inject-tail ;
10478 .Va on-compose-splice
10479 to simply inject the file of desire via
10483 may be a better approach.
10485 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10487 vput ! i cat ~/.mysig
10489 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
10493 readctl create ~/.mysig
10497 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
10499 readctl remove ~/.mysig
10502 set on-compose-leave=t_ocl
10508 .It Va on-compose-splice , on-compose-splice-shell
10509 These hooks run once the normal compose mode is finished, but before the
10510 .Va on-compose-leave
10511 macro hook is called, the
10512 .Va message-inject-tail
10514 Both hooks will be executed in a subprocess, with their input and output
10515 connected to \*(UA such that they can act as if they would be an
10517 The difference in between them is that the latter is a
10519 command, whereas the former is a normal \*(UA macro, but which is
10520 restricted to a small set of commands (the
10524 will indicate said capability).
10526 are enabled for these hooks (in the parent process), causing any setting
10527 to be forgotten after the message has been sent;
10528 .Va on-compose-cleanup
10529 can be used to perform other cleanup as necessary.
10532 During execution of these hooks \*(UA will temporarily forget whether it
10533 has been started in interactive mode, (a restricted set of)
10534 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10535 will always be available, and for guaranteed reproducibilities sake
10539 will be set to their defaults.
10540 The compose mode command
10542 has been especially designed for scriptability (via these hooks).
10543 The first line the hook will read on its standard input is the protocol
10544 version of said command escape, currently
10546 backward incompatible protocol changes have to be expected.
10549 Care must be taken to avoid deadlocks and other false control flow:
10550 if both involved processes wait for more input to happen at the
10551 same time, or one does not expect more input but the other is stuck
10552 waiting for consumption of its output, etc.
10553 There is no automatic synchronization of the hook: it will not be
10554 stopped automatically just because it, e.g., emits
10556 The hooks will however receive a termination signal if the parent enters
10557 an error condition.
10558 \*(ID Protection against and interaction with signals is not yet given;
10559 it is likely that in the future these scripts will be placed in an
10560 isolated session, which is signalled in its entirety as necessary.
10562 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10563 define ocs_signature {
10565 echo '~< ~/.mysig' # '~<! fortune pathtofortunefile'
10567 set on-compose-splice=ocs_signature
10569 wysh set on-compose-splice-shell=$'\e
10571 printf "hello $version! Headers: ";\e
10572 echo \e'~^header list\e';\e
10573 read status result;\e
10574 echo "status=$status result=$result";\e
10579 echo Splice protocol version is $version
10580 echo '~^h l'; read hl; vput vexpr es substring "${hl}" 0 1
10582 echoerr 'Cannot read header list'; echo '~x'; xit
10584 if [ "$hl" @i!% ' cc' ]
10585 echo '~^h i cc Diet is your <mirr.or>'; read es;\e
10586 vput vexpr es substring "${es}" 0 1
10588 echoerr 'Cannot insert Cc: header'; echo '~x'
10589 # (no xit, macro finishs anyway)
10593 set on-compose-splice=ocsm
10598 .It Va on-resend-cleanup
10600 .Va on-compose-cleanup ,
10601 but is only triggered by
10605 .It Va on-resend-enter
10607 .Va on-compose-enter ,
10608 but is only triggered by
10613 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
10615 is followed by a formfeed character
10619 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
10620 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
10621 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
10622 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
10623 the authentication method requires a password.
10624 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10625 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10627 .It Va password-USER@HOST
10628 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
10629 Set the password for
10633 If no such variable is defined for a host,
10634 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
10635 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10636 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10640 \*(BO Send messages to the
10642 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
10646 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10647 When a MIME message part of type
10649 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
10650 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
10652 Note that only parts which can be displayed inline as plain text (see
10653 .Cd copiousoutput )
10654 are displayed unless otherwise noted, other MIME parts will only be
10655 considered by and for the command
10659 The special value commercial at
10661 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, e.g.,
10662 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=@
10663 will henceforth display XML
10665 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
10668 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
10669 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
10670 \(em these directives,
10672 has already been used, should be referred to for further documentation.
10677 can in fact be used as a trigger character to adjust usage and behaviour
10678 of a following shell command specification more thoroughly by appending
10679 more special characters which refer to further mailcap directives, e.g.,
10680 the following hypothetical command specification could be used:
10682 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10683 ? set pipe-X/Y='@!++=@vim ${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
10687 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
10689 The command produces plain text to be integrated in \*(UAs output:
10690 .Cd copiousoutput .
10693 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
10694 but only when it will be displayed:
10695 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
10698 Run the command asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA:
10699 .Cd x-mailx-async .
10702 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
10703 temporarily release the terminal to it:
10704 .Cd needsterminal .
10707 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
10708 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
10709 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY :
10710 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
10711 If given twice then the file will be unlinked automatically by \*(UA
10712 when the command loop is entered again at latest:
10713 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
10716 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
10717 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
10718 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10719 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
10720 the creation of which is implied; note however that in order to cause
10721 deletion of the temporary file you still have to use two plus signs
10726 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content you can use
10727 another commercial at to forcefully terminate interpretation of
10728 remaining characters.
10729 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
10733 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
10734 the environment of the shell command:
10737 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
10739 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT
10740 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
10743 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
10745 .Va mime-counter-evidence
10746 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
10747 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
10748 .Ev \&\&MAILX_CONTENT
10752 .It Ev MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL
10754 .Ql message/external-body access-type=url
10755 will store the access URL in this variable, it is empty otherwise.
10756 URL targets should not be activated automatically, without supervision.
10759 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME
10760 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
10763 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
10767 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10768 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
10769 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
10775 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
10776 This is identical to
10777 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10780 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
10781 names a file extension, e.g.,
10783 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
10786 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
10787 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
10788 The only possible value as of now is
10790 which is thus the default.
10792 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
10793 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
10794 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
10795 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
10796 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
10798 If this variable is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
10799 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
10801 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
10802 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
10803 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
10804 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
10805 but practical experience may vary.
10806 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
10810 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
10812 .Mx Va pop3-no-apop
10813 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
10814 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the
10816 authentication method will be used when connecting to a POP3 server that
10817 advertises support.
10820 is that the password is not sent in clear text over the wire and that
10821 only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
10823 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
10826 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
10827 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
10828 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
10830 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session TLS encrypted.
10831 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
10832 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
10834 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
10840 \*(BO This flag enables POSIX mode, which changes behaviour of \*(UA
10841 where that deviates from standardized behaviour.
10842 It will be set implicitly before the
10843 .Sx "Resource files"
10844 are loaded if the environment variable
10845 .Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
10846 is set, and adjusting any of those two will be reflected by the other
10848 The following behaviour is covered and enforced by this mechanism:
10851 .Bl -bullet -compact
10853 In non-interactive mode, any error encountered while loading resource
10854 files during program startup will cause a program exit, whereas in
10855 interactive mode such errors will stop loading of the currently loaded
10856 (stack of) file(s, i.e., recursively).
10857 These exits can be circumvented on a per-command base by using
10860 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
10861 for each command which shall be allowed to fail.
10865 will replace the list of alternate addresses instead of appending to it.
10866 In addition alternates will only be honoured for any sort of message
10871 The variable inserting
10872 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10878 will expand embedded character sequences
10880 horizontal tabulator and
10883 \*(ID For compatibility reasons this step will always be performed.
10886 Upon changing the active
10890 will be displayed even if
10897 implies the behaviour described by
10903 is extended to cover any empty mailbox, not only empty
10905 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
10906 es: they will be removed when they are left in empty state otherwise.
10911 .It Va print-alternatives
10912 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
10913 .Ql multipart/alternative
10914 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
10916 other parts are normally discarded.
10917 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
10918 just as if the surrounding part was of type
10919 .Ql multipart/mixed .
10923 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
10924 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is treated as if specified
10925 within dollar-single-quotes (see
10926 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
10927 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
10928 status information, for example
10933 .Va mailbox-display .
10935 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
10936 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
10937 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
10939 a slot for coloured prompts is also available with the \*(OPal command
10941 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
10943 .Ql set noprompt ) .
10947 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
10954 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
10960 message is started with the quoted original message,
10961 the lines of which are prefixed by the value of the variable
10963 taking into account
10967 If set to the empty value, the quoted message will be preceded and
10968 followed by the expansions of the values of
10969 .Va quote-inject-head
10971 .Va quote-inject-tail ,
10973 None of the headers of the quoted message is included in the quote if
10976 and only the headers selected by the
10979 selection are put above the message body for
10981 whereas all headers and all MIME parts are included for
10984 .Va quote-as-attachment
10988 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
10991 .It Va quote-as-attachment
10992 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
10994 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
10995 Note this works regardless of the setting of
11000 Can be set to a string consisting of non-whitespace ASCII characters
11001 which shall be treated as quotation leaders, the default being
11006 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
11008 and creates a more fancy quotation in that leading quotation characters
11009 .Pf ( Va quote-chars )
11010 are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
11012 can be set to either one, two or three (space separated) numeric values,
11013 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
11014 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
11016 program, but line- instead of paragraph-based.
11017 The third value is used as the maximum line length instead of the first
11018 if no better break point can be found; it is ignored unless it is larger
11019 than the minimum and smaller than the maximum.
11020 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
11021 The goal cannot be smaller than the length of
11023 plus some additional pad; necessary adjustments take place silently.
11028 .It Va quote-inject-head , quote-inject-tail
11029 The strings to put before and after the text of a
11031 d message, respectively.
11032 The former defaults to
11033 .Ql %f wrote:\en\en .
11034 Special format directives will be expanded if possible, and if so
11035 configured the output will be folded according to
11037 Format specifiers in the given strings start with a percent sign
11039 and expand values of the original message, unless noted otherwise.
11040 Note that names and addresses are not subject to the setting of
11042 Valid format specifiers are:
11045 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
11047 A plain percent sign.
11049 The address(es) of the sender(s).
11051 The date found in the
11053 header of the message when
11055 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
11056 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
11061 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
11063 The full name(s) (name and address, as given) of the sender(s).
11068 The real name(s) of the sender(s) if there is one and
11070 allows usage, the address(es) otherwise.
11072 The senders real name(s) if there is one, the address(es) otherwise.
11077 .It Va r-option-implicit
11078 \*(BO Setting this option evaluates the contents of
11080 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11082 and passes the results onto the used (file-based) MTA as described for the
11084 option (empty argument case).
11087 .It Va recipients-in-cc
11094 are by default merged into the new
11096 If this variable is set, only the original
11100 the rest is merged into
11105 Unless this variable is defined, no copies of outgoing mail will be saved.
11106 If defined it gives the pathname, subject to the usual
11107 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
11108 of a folder where all new, replied-to or forwarded messages are saved:
11109 when saving to this folder fails the message is not sent, but instead
11113 The standard defines that relative (fully expanded) paths are to be
11114 interpreted relative to the current directory
11116 to force interpretation relative to
11119 needs to be set in addition.
11122 .It Va record-files
11123 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
11125 will be extended to cover messages which target only file and pipe
11128 These address types will not appear in recipient lists unless
11129 .Va add-file-recipients
11133 .It Va record-resent
11134 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
11136 will be extended to also cover the
11143 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
11144 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
11145 character set of the original message for replies.
11146 If this fails, the mechanism described in
11147 .Sx "Character sets"
11148 is evaluated as usual.
11151 .It Va reply-strings
11152 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
11153 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
11154 built-in strings as
11156 reply message indicators \(en built-in are
11158 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
11163 which often has been seen in the wild;
11164 I.e., the separating colon has to be specified explicitly.
11168 A list of addresses to put into the
11170 field of the message header.
11171 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
11180 .It Va reply-to-honour
11183 header is honoured when replying to a message via
11187 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
11191 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
11192 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
11194 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
11196 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience.
11200 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
11202 upon interrupt or delivery error.
11206 The number of lines that represents a
11215 line display and scrolling via
11217 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
11218 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
11219 terminal, the more will be shown.
11220 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
11221 environment variables
11229 .It Va searchheaders
11230 \*(BO Expand message-list specifiers in the form
11232 to all messages containing the substring
11234 in the header field
11236 The string search is case insensitive.
11239 .It Va sendcharsets
11240 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
11241 outgoing internet mail.
11242 The value of the variable
11244 is automatically appended to this list of character sets.
11245 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
11246 the only supported charset is
11249 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
11250 and refer to the section
11251 .Sx "Character sets"
11252 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
11255 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
11256 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
11258 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
11260 had been set to the value of the variable
11262 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
11263 character set of the current locale encoding:
11264 therefore mail message text will be (assumed to be) in ISO-8859-1
11265 encoding when send from within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8
11266 encoding when send from within an UTF-8 locale.
11270 never comes into play as
11272 is implicitly assumed to be 8-bit and capable to represent all files the
11273 user may specify (as is the case when no character set conversion
11274 support is available in \*(UA and the only supported character set is
11276 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
11277 This might be a problem for scripts which use the suggested
11279 setting, since in this case the character set is US-ASCII by definition,
11280 so that it is better to also override
11286 An address that is put into the
11288 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
11289 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
11290 This field should normally not be used unless the
11292 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
11293 Dependent on the context this address is handled as if it were in
11298 .Va r-option-implicit .
11301 \*(OB Predecessor of
11304 .It Va sendmail-arguments
11305 \*(OB Predecessor of
11306 .Va mta-arguments .
11308 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
11309 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
11310 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
11312 .It Va sendmail-progname
11313 \*(OB Predecessor of
11318 \*(BO When sending a message wait until the
11320 (including the built-in SMTP one) exits before accepting further commands.
11322 with this variable set errors reported by the MTA will be recognizable!
11323 If the MTA returns a non-zero exit status,
11324 the exit status of \*(UA will also be non-zero.
11328 \*(BO This setting causes \*(UA to start at the last message
11329 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder, as well as with
11336 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
11337 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
11341 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
11342 summary if the message was sent by the user.
11349 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11351 .Va message-inject-tail ,
11352 .Va on-compose-leave
11354 .Va on-compose-splice .
11361 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11363 .Va message-inject-tail ,
11364 .Va on-compose-leave
11366 .Va on-compose-splice .
11371 .Va on-compose-splice
11373 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
11375 .Va on-compose-leave
11377 .Va message-inject-tail
11381 .It Va skipemptybody
11382 \*(BO If an outgoing message does not contain any text in its first or
11383 only message part, do not send it but discard it silently (see also the
11384 command line option
11389 .It Va smime-ca-dir , smime-ca-file
11390 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
11391 Enhanced Mail) for the purpose of verification of S/MIME signed messages.
11393 documents the necessary preparation steps to use the former.
11394 The set of CA certificates which are built into the TLS library can
11395 be explicitly turned off by setting
11396 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
11397 and further fine-tuning is possible via
11398 .Va smime-ca-flags .
11401 .It Va smime-ca-flags
11402 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
11403 storage, and the certificate verification that is used.
11404 The actual values and their meanings are documented for
11408 .It Va smime-ca-no-defaults
11409 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
11410 used to TLS library to verify S/MIME signed messages.
11412 .Mx Va smime-cipher
11413 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
11414 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
11415 messages (for the specified account).
11416 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
11419 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
11427 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
11429 is not available) and
11431 (DES CBC, 56 bits).
11433 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
11434 library that \*(UA uses.
11435 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
11436 dynamic loading via, e.g.,
11437 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
11438 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
11441 .It Va smime-crl-dir
11442 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
11443 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
11446 .It Va smime-crl-file
11447 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
11448 verifying S/MIME messages.
11451 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
11452 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
11453 encrypted before sending.
11454 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
11455 contains a certificate in PEM format.
11457 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
11458 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
11459 individually encrypted message;
11460 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
11462 .Va smime-force-encryption
11464 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
11469 .It Va smime-force-encryption
11470 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
11474 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's private key
11475 and include the user's certificate as a MIME attachment.
11476 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
11477 a valid certificate,
11478 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
11479 header and that the message content has not been altered.
11480 It does not change the message text,
11481 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
11483 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
11485 .Va smime-sign-digest .
11487 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
11488 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
11489 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
11490 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
11491 user's private key, followed by his certificate.
11493 For message signing
11495 is always derived from the value of
11497 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11499 For the purpose of encryption the recipient's public encryption key
11500 (certificate) is expected; the command
11502 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
11503 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
11504 gives some details).
11505 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
11507 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
11512 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
11514 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
11515 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user's addresses
11516 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
11518 For signing and decryption purposes it is possible to use encrypted
11519 keys, and the pseudo-host(s)
11520 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-key
11521 for the private key
11523 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-cert
11524 for the certificate stored in the same file)
11525 will be used for performing any necessary password lookup,
11526 therefore the lookup can be automated via the mechanisms described in
11527 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
11528 For example, the hypothetical address
11530 could be driven with a private key / certificate pair path defined in
11531 .Va \&\&smime-sign-cert-bob@exam.ple ,
11532 and needed passwords would then be looked up via the pseudo hosts
11533 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-key
11535 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-cert ) .
11536 To include intermediate certificates, use
11537 .Va smime-sign-include-certs .
11539 .Mx Va smime-sign-digest
11540 .It Va smime-sign-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-digest
11541 \*(OP Specifies the message digestto use when signing S/MIME messages.
11542 Please remember that for this use case
11544 refers to the variable
11546 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11548 The available algorithms depend on the used cryptographic library, but
11549 at least one usable builtin algorithm is ensured as a default.
11550 If possible the standard RFC 5751 will be violated by using
11552 instead of the mandated
11554 due to security concerns.
11556 \*(UA will try to add built-in support for the following message
11557 digests, names are case-insensitive:
11564 as well as the widely available
11569 and the proposed insecure
11573 More digests may \*(OPally be available through dynamic loading via,
11574 e.g., the OpenSSL function
11575 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3 .
11577 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
11578 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
11579 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
11580 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
11581 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
11582 .Va smime-sign-cert
11584 This can be used to include intermediate certificates of the certificate
11585 authority, in order to allow the receiver's S/MIME implementation to
11586 perform a verification of the entire certificate chain, starting from
11587 a local root certificate, over the intermediate certificates, down to the
11588 .Va smime-sign-cert .
11589 Even though top level certificates may also be included in the chain,
11590 they won't be used for the verification on the receiver's side.
11592 For the purpose of the mechanisms involved here,
11594 refers to the content of the internal variable
11596 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11599 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-include-certs
11600 will be used for performing password lookups for these certificates,
11601 shall they have been given one, therefore the lookup can be automated
11602 via the mechanisms described in
11603 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
11605 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
11606 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor(s) of
11607 .Va smime-sign-digest .
11610 \*(OB\*(OP To use the built-in SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
11612 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
11614 is used in preference of
11618 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
11619 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
11621 authentication method, possible values are
11627 as well as the \*(OPal methods
11633 method does not need any user credentials,
11635 requires a user name and all other methods require a user name and
11643 .Va smtp-auth-password
11645 .Va smtp-auth-user ) .
11650 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
11651 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
11654 .It Va smtp-auth-password
11655 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
11656 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
11657 .Va smtp-auth-password
11659 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11661 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
11663 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11665 .Va smtp-auth-password
11666 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11669 .It Va smtp-auth-user
11670 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
11671 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
11674 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11676 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
11678 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11681 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11685 .It Va smtp-hostname
11686 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
11688 to derive the necessary
11690 information in order to issue a
11697 can be used to use the
11699 from the SMTP account
11706 from the content of this variable (or, if that is the empty string,
11708 or the local hostname as a last resort).
11709 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
11710 a provider other than which (in
11712 is about to send the message.
11713 Setting this variable also influences generated
11718 If the \*(OPal IDNA support is available (see
11720 variable assignment is aborted when a necessary conversion fails.
11722 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
11723 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
11724 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
11726 command to make an SMTP
11728 session TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
11731 .It Va socks-proxy-USER@HOST , socks-proxy-HOST , socks-proxy
11732 \*(OP If this is set to the hostname (SOCKS URL) of a SOCKS5 server then
11733 \*(UA will proxy all of its network activities through it.
11734 This can be used to proxy SMTP, POP3 etc. network traffic through the
11735 Tor anonymizer, for example.
11736 The following would create a local SOCKS proxy on port 10000 that
11737 forwards to the machine
11739 and from which the network traffic is actually instantiated:
11740 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11741 # Create local proxy server in terminal 1 forwarding to HOST
11742 $ ssh -D 10000 USER@HOST
11743 # Then, start a client that uses it in terminal 2
11744 $ \*(uA -Ssocks-proxy-USER@HOST=localhost:10000
11748 .It Va spam-interface
11749 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like, e.g.,
11751 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
11752 Please refer to the manual section
11753 .Sx "Handling spam"
11754 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
11755 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
11757 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
11763 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
11765 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
11766 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
11767 knowledge to parse the program's output.
11768 A default value for
11770 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
11774 during compilation.
11775 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
11776 using a configuration file for that), the variable
11777 .Va spamc-arguments
11778 can be used as in, e.g.,
11779 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11780 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
11782 Note that this interface does not inspect the
11784 flag of a message for the command
11788 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
11789 This interface is meant for programs like
11791 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
11792 status for at least the command
11795 meaning a message is spam,
11799 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
11800 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
11801 can be intercepted as necessary.
11803 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
11806 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
11808 .Sx "Handling spam"
11809 contains examples for some programs.
11810 The process environment of the hooks will have the variable
11811 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
11813 Note that spam score support for
11815 is not supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
11817 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11823 .It Va spam-maxsize
11824 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size will not be passed through to the
11826 .Va spam-interface .
11827 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
11830 .It Va spamc-command
11831 \*(OP The path to the
11835 .Va spam-interface .
11836 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
11838 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
11839 executable had been found during compilation.
11842 .It Va spamc-arguments
11843 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
11846 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
11847 connection-related ones via this variable, e.g.,
11848 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11852 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
11854 .Va spam-interface .
11855 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
11864 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
11865 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
11866 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
11868 .Va spam-interface .
11870 .Sx "Handling spam"
11871 contains examples for some programs.
11874 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11875 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
11878 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPnal
11879 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
11880 be used to overcome this restriction.
11881 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
11882 must be followed by a semicolon
11884 and an extended regular expression.
11885 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
11886 .Va spamfilter-rate
11887 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
11888 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
11890 .It Va ssl-ca-dir-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-dir-HOST , ssl-ca-dir ,\
11891 ssl-ca-file-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-file-HOST , ssl-ca-file
11892 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessors of
11896 .It Va ssl-ca-flags-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-flags-HOST , ssl-ca-flags
11897 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11900 .It Va ssl-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
11902 \*(OB\*(BO\*(OP Predecessor of
11903 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults .
11905 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
11906 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11909 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11911 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
11912 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11915 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11917 .It Va ssl-config-file
11918 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11919 .Va tls-config-file .
11921 .It Va ssl-config-module-USER@HOST , ssl-config-module-HOST ,\
11923 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11924 .Va tls-config-module .
11926 .It Va ssl-config-pairs-USER@HOST , ssl-config-pairs-HOST , ssl-config-pairs
11927 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11928 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11930 .It Va ssl-crl-dir , ssl-crl-file
11931 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessors of
11935 .It Va ssl-curves-USER@HOST , ssl-curves-HOST , ssl-curves
11936 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11939 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11941 .It Va ssl-features
11942 \*(OB\*(OP\*(RO Predecessor of
11945 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
11946 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11949 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11951 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
11952 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11955 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11957 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
11958 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11961 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11963 .It Va ssl-rand-file
11964 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11965 .Va tls-rand-file .
11967 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
11968 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
11973 If only set without an assigned value, then this setting inhibits the
11979 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
11980 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
11981 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
11982 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
11983 to track down the originating mail user agent.
11984 If set to the value
11990 suppression does not occur.
11993 .It Va system-mailrc
11994 \*(RO The compiled in path of the system wide initialization file
11996 .Sx "Resource files" :
12002 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
12007 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
12008 escape commas with reverse solidus) to be used to overwrite or define
12011 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
12012 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
12015 String capabilities form
12017 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
12018 Numerics have to be notated as
12020 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
12021 Finally, booleans do not have any value but indicate a true or false
12022 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
12023 does not support undefining an existing boolean.
12024 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
12025 for one notations like
12028 .Ql control-LETTER ,
12029 and for clarification purposes
12031 can be used to specify
12033 (the control notation
12035 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
12036 the standard CSI sequence);
12037 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
12040 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
12041 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
12043 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12044 ? set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
12048 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
12049 operation of the built-in line editor or \*(UA in general:
12052 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd yay"
12054 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
12056 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
12057 Note that \*(UA does not actually care about the terminal beside that,
12058 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences.
12061 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
12064 .Cd enter_ca_mode ,
12065 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen ca-mode,
12066 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
12067 This must be enabled explicitly by setting
12068 .Va termcap-ca-mode .
12070 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
12074 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
12075 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
12076 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
12077 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
12079 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
12083 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
12085 clear the screen and home cursor.
12086 (Will be simulated via
12091 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
12096 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
12098 clear to the end of line.
12099 (Will be simulated via
12101 plus repetitions of space characters.)
12103 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
12104 .Cd column_address :
12105 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
12106 (Will be simulated via
12112 .Cd carriage_return :
12113 move to the first column in the current row.
12114 The default built-in fallback is
12117 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
12119 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
12120 The default built-in fallback is
12123 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
12125 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
12126 The default built-in fallback is
12128 which is used by most terminals.
12136 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
12141 .It Va termcap-ca-mode
12142 \*(OP Allow usage of the
12146 terminal capabilities, see
12149 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
12150 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
12153 .It Va termcap-disable
12154 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
12155 If set only some generic fallback built-ins and possibly the content of
12157 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
12159 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
12160 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
12164 .It Va tls-ca-dir-USER@HOST , tls-ca-dir-HOST , tls-ca-dir ,\
12165 tls-ca-file-USER@HOST , tls-ca-file-HOST , tls-ca-file
12166 \*(OP Directory and file, respectively, for pools of trusted CA
12167 certificates in PEM (Privacy Enhanced Mail) format, for the purpose of
12168 verification of TLS server certificates.
12169 Concurrent use is possible, the file is loaded once needed first, the
12170 directory lookup is performed anew as a last resort whenever necessary.
12171 The CA certificate pool built into the TLS library can be disabled via
12172 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ,
12173 further fine-tuning is possible via
12175 Note the directory search variant requires the certificate files to
12176 adhere special filename conventions, please see
12177 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
12184 .Mx Va tls-ca-flags
12185 .It Va tls-ca-flags-USER@HOST , tls-ca-flags-HOST , tls-ca-flags
12186 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
12187 storage, and the certificate verification that is used (also see
12189 The value is expected to consist of a comma-separated list of
12190 configuration directives, with any intervening whitespace being ignored.
12191 The directives directly map to flags that can be passed to
12192 .Xr X509_STORE_set_flags 3 ,
12193 which are usually defined in a file
12194 .Pa openssl/x509_vfy.h ,
12195 and the availability of which depends on the used TLS library
12196 version: a directive without mapping is ignored (error log subject to
12198 Directives currently understood (case-insensitively) include:
12201 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd BaNg"
12202 .It Cd no-alt-chains
12203 If the initial chain is not trusted, do not attempt to build an
12205 Setting this flag will make OpenSSL certificate verification match that
12206 of older OpenSSL versions, before automatic building and checking of
12207 alternative chains has been implemented; also see
12208 .Cd trusted-first .
12209 .It Cd no-check-time
12210 Do not check certificate/CRL validity against current time.
12211 .It Cd partial-chain
12212 By default partial, incomplete chains which cannot be verified up to the
12213 chain top, a self-signed root certificate, will not verify.
12214 With this flag set, a chain succeeds to verify if at least one signing
12215 certificate of the chain is in any of the configured trusted stores of
12217 The OpenSSL manual page
12218 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
12219 gives some advise how to manage your own trusted store of CA certificates.
12221 Disable workarounds for broken certificates.
12222 .It Cd trusted-first
12223 Try building a chain using issuers in the trusted store first to avoid
12224 problems with server-sent legacy intermediate certificates.
12225 Newer versions of OpenSSL support alternative chain checking and enable
12226 it by default, resulting in the same behaviour; also see
12227 .Cd no-alt-chains .
12231 .Mx Va tls-ca-no-defaults
12232 .It Va tls-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , tls-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
12234 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
12235 used to TLS library to verify TLS server certificates.
12238 .It Va tls-config-file
12239 \*(OP If this variable is set
12240 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
12242 .Ql +modules-load-file
12245 is used to allow resource file based configuration of the TLS library.
12246 This happens once the library is used first, which may also be early
12247 during startup (logged with
12249 If a non-empty value is given then the given file, after performing
12250 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
12251 will be used instead of the TLS libraries global default, and it is an
12252 error if the file cannot be loaded.
12253 The application name will always be passed as
12255 Some TLS libraries support application-specific configuration via
12256 resource files loaded like this, please see
12257 .Va tls-config-module .
12259 .Mx Va tls-config-module
12260 .It Va tls-config-module-USER@HOST , tls-config-module-HOST ,\
12262 \*(OP If file based application-specific configuration via
12263 .Va tls-config-file
12264 is available, announced as
12268 indicating availability of
12269 .Xr SSL_CTX_config 3 ,
12270 then, it becomes possible to use a central TLS configuration file
12271 for all programs, including \*(uA, e.g.:
12272 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12273 # Register a configuration section for \*(uA
12274 \*(uA = mailx_master
12275 # The top configuration section creates a relation
12276 # in between dynamic SSL configuration and an actual
12277 # program specific configuration section
12279 ssl_conf = mailx_tls_config
12280 # Well that actual program specific configuration section
12281 # now can map individual tls-config-module names to sections,
12282 # e.g., tls-config-module=account_xy
12284 account_xy = mailx_account_xy
12285 account_yz = mailx_account_yz
12287 MinProtocol = TLSv1.2
12290 CipherString = TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:
12291 MinProtocol = TLSv1.1
12296 .Mx Va tls-config-pairs
12297 .It Va tls-config-pairs-USER@HOST , tls-config-pairs-HOST , tls-config-pairs
12298 \*(OP The value of this variable chain will be interpreted as
12299 a comma-separated list of directive/value pairs.
12300 Directives and values need to be separated by equals signs
12302 any whitespace surrounding pair members is removed.
12303 Keys are (usually) case-insensitive.
12304 Different to when placing these pairs in a
12305 .Va tls-config-module
12307 .Va tls-config-file ,
12310 need to be escaped with a reverse solidus
12312 when included in pairs; also different: if the equals sign
12314 is preceded with an asterisk
12316 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12317 will be performed on the value; it is an error if these fail.
12318 Unless proper support is announced by
12320 .Pf ( Ql +conf-ctx )
12321 only the keys below are supported, otherwise the pairs will be used
12322 directly as arguments to the function
12323 .Xr SSL_CONF_cmd 3 .
12326 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd C_rtificate_"
12328 Filename of a TLS client certificate (chain) required by some servers.
12329 Fallback support via
12330 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_certificate_chain_file 3 .
12331 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12333 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
12335 if you use this you need to specify the private key via
12340 .It Cd CipherString
12341 A list of ciphers for TLS connections, see
12343 By default no list of ciphers is set, resulting in a
12344 .Cd Protocol Ns - Ns
12345 specific list of ciphers (the protocol standards define lists of
12346 acceptable ciphers; possibly cramped by the used TLS library).
12347 Fallback support via
12348 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_cipher_list 3 .
12350 .It Cd Ciphersuites
12351 A list of ciphers used for TLSv1.3 connections, see
12353 These will be joined onto the list of ciphers from
12358 .Ql +ctx-set-ciphersuites ,
12360 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_ciphersuites 3 .
12363 A list of supported elliptic curves, if applicable.
12364 By default no curves are set.
12365 Fallback support via
12366 .Xr SSL_CTX_set1_curves_list 3 ,
12369 .It Cd MaxProtocol , MinProtocol
12370 The maximum and minimum supported TLS versions, respectively.
12374 .Ql +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ,
12376 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_max_proto_version 3
12378 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_min_proto_version 3 ;
12379 these fallbacks use an internal parser which understands the strings
12385 and the special value
12387 which disables the given limit.
12390 Various flags to set.
12392 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
12393 in which case any other value but (exactly)
12395 results in an error.
12398 Filename of the private key in PEM format of a TLS client certificate.
12399 If unset, the name of the certificate file is used.
12400 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12403 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file 3 .
12404 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
12406 if you use this you need to specify the certificate (chain) via
12412 The used TLS protocol.
12418 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
12425 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
12426 driven via an internal parser which understands the strings
12432 and the special value
12434 Multiple protocols may be given as a comma-separated list, any
12435 whitespace is ignored, an optional plus sign
12437 prefix enables, a hyphen-minus
12439 prefix disables a protocol, so that
12441 enables only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
12447 .It Va tls-crl-dir , tls-crl-file
12448 \*(OP Specify a directory / a file, respectively, that contains a CRL in
12449 PEM format to use when verifying TLS server certificates.
12452 .It Va tls-features
12453 \*(OP\*(RO This expands to a comma separated list of the TLS library
12454 identity and optional SSL library features.
12455 Currently supported identities are
12459 (OpenSSL v1.1.x series)
12462 (elder OpenSSL series, other clones).
12463 Optional features are preceded with a plus sign
12465 when available, and with a hyphen-minus
12469 Currently known features are
12470 .Ql modules-load-file
12471 .Pf ( Va tls-config-file ) ,
12473 .Pf ( Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
12475 .Pf ( Va tls-config-module ) ,
12476 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
12477 .Pf ( Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
12478 .Ql ctx-set-ciphersuites
12482 .Va tls-config-pairs ) .
12484 .Mx Va tls-fingerprint
12485 .It Va tls-fingerprint-USER@HOST , tls-fingerprint-HOST , tls-fingerprint
12486 \*(OP It is possible to replace the verification of the connection
12487 peer certificate against the entire local pool of CAs (for more see
12488 .Sx "Encrypted network communication" )
12489 with the comparison against a precalculated certificate message digest,
12490 the so-called fingerprint, to be specified as the used
12491 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest .
12492 This fingerprint can be calculated with, e.g.,
12493 .Ql Ic tls Ns \:\0\:fingerprint HOST .
12495 .Mx Va tls-fingerprint-digest
12496 .It Va tls-fingerprint-digest-USER@HOST , tls-fingerprint-digest-HOST , \
12497 tls-fingerprint-digest
12498 \*(OP The message digest to be used when creating TLS certificate
12499 fingerprints, the defaults, if available, in test order, being
12502 For the complete list of digest algorithms refer to
12503 .Va smime-sign-digest .
12506 .It Va tls-rand-file
12507 \*(OP Gives the filename to a file with random entropy data, see
12508 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
12509 If this variable is not set, or set to the empty string, or if the
12510 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12512 .Xr RAND_file_name 3
12513 will be used to create the filename.
12514 If the SSL PRNG was seeded successfully
12515 The file will be updated
12516 .Pf ( Xr RAND_write_file 3 )
12517 if and only if seeding and buffer stirring succeeds.
12520 .It Va tls-verify-USER@HOST , tls-verify-HOST , tls-verify
12521 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
12522 occurs during TLS server certificate validation against the
12523 specified or default trust stores
12526 or the TLS library built-in defaults (unless usage disallowed via
12527 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ) ,
12528 and as fine-tuned via
12530 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
12532 (fail and close connection immediately),
12534 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
12536 (show a warning and continue),
12538 (do not perform validation).
12543 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
12546 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
12549 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for
12550 unsigned right shifting (see
12558 \*(BO If set then the
12560 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
12564 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
12565 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
12566 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
12567 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1.
12568 Otherwise it defaults to UTF-8.
12569 Sufficient locale support provided the default will be preferably
12570 deduced from the locale environment if that is set (e.g.,
12572 see there for more); runtime locale changes will be reflected by
12574 except during the program startup phase and if
12576 had been used to freeze the given value.
12577 Refer to the section
12578 .Sx "Character sets"
12579 for the complete picture about character sets.
12582 .It Va typescript-mode
12583 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
12584 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
12587 .Va colour-disable ,
12588 .Va line-editor-disable
12589 and (before startup completed only)
12590 .Va termcap-disable .
12591 Unsetting it does not restore the former state of the covered settings.
12595 For a safe-by-default policy the process file mode creation mask
12599 on program startup by default.
12600 Child processes inherit the file mode creation mask of their parent, and
12601 by setting this variable to an empty value no change will be applied,
12602 and the inherited value will be used.
12603 Otherwise the given value will be made the new file mode creation mask.
12606 .It Va user-HOST , user
12607 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, which is
12608 used in case none has been given in the protocol and account-specific
12610 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
12614 \*(BO Setting this enables upward compatibility with \*(UA
12615 version 15.0 in respect to which configuration options are available and
12616 how they are handled.
12617 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
12618 doing things, respectively.
12622 \*(BO This setting, also controllable via the command line option
12624 causes \*(UA to be more verbose, e.g., it will display obsoletion
12625 warnings and TLS certificate chains.
12626 Even though marked \*(BO this option may be set twice in order to
12627 increase the level of verbosity even more, in which case even details of
12628 the actual message delivery and protocol conversations are shown.
12631 is sufficient to disable verbosity as such.
12638 .It Va version , version-date , \
12639 version-hexnum , version-major , version-minor , version-update
12640 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable is a string with
12641 the complete version identification, the second the release date in ISO
12642 8601 notation without time.
12643 The third is a 32-bit hexadecimal number with the upper 8 bits storing
12644 the major, followed by the minor and update version numbers which occupy
12646 The latter three variables contain only decimal digits: the major, minor
12647 and update version numbers.
12648 The output of the command
12650 will include this information.
12653 .It Va writebackedited
12654 If this variable is set messages modified using the
12658 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
12659 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
12660 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
12661 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
12662 performed, and proper RFC 4155
12664 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an exercise to
12667 .\" }}} (Variables)
12669 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
12672 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
12676 .Dq environment variable
12677 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
12678 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
12679 commonly found in there.
12680 The process environment is inherited from the
12682 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
12683 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
12684 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
12685 from \*(UA's point of view.
12686 This means that, e.g., they can be managed via
12690 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
12691 newly created child processes).
12694 In order to integrate other environment variables equally they need to
12695 be imported (linked) with the command
12697 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
12698 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
12699 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
12701 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
12703 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
12705 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12706 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
12708 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
12711 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev BaNg"
12714 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen
12716 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
12717 processes and the MLE (see
12718 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
12719 in interactive mode thereafter.
12720 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 80 columns, unless in
12726 The name of the (mailbox)
12728 to use for saving aborted messages if
12730 is set; this defaults to
12734 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
12739 Pathname of the text editor to use for the
12743 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) ;
12745 is used for a more display oriented editor.
12749 The user's home directory.
12750 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12751 The calling user's home directory will be used instead if this directory
12752 does not exist, is not accessible or cannot be read;
12753 it will always be used for the root user.
12754 (No test for being writable is performed to allow usage by
12755 non-privileged users within read-only jails, but dependent on the
12756 variable settings this directory is a default write target, e.g. for
12764 .It Ev LC_ALL , LC_CTYPE , LANG
12765 \*(OP The (names in lookup order of the)
12769 which indicates the used
12770 .Sx "Character sets" .
12771 Runtime changes trigger automatic updates of the entire locale system,
12772 which includes updating
12774 (except during startup if the variable has been frozen via
12779 The user's preferred number of lines on a page or the vertical screen
12780 or window size in lines.
12781 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
12782 processes in interactive mode thereafter.
12783 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 24 lines, unless in
12789 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
12791 command when operating on local mailboxes.
12794 (path search through
12799 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
12800 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
12801 name to any newly created child process.
12805 Is used as the user's
12807 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12811 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
12812 If this environmental fallback is also not set, a built-in compile-time
12817 \*(OP Overrides the default path search for
12818 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
12819 which is defined in the standard RFC 1524 as
12820 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
12821 .\" TODO we should have a mailcaps-default virtual RDONLY option!
12822 (\*(UA makes it a configuration option, however.)
12823 Note this is not a search path, but a path search.
12827 Is used as a startup file instead of
12830 In order to avoid side-effects from configuration files scripts should
12831 either set this variable to
12835 command line option should be used.
12838 .It Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
12839 If this variable is set then reading of
12842 .Va system-mailrc )
12843 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
12844 had been started up with the option
12846 (and according argument) or
12848 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12852 The name of the user's
12854 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
12856 A logical subset of the special
12857 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12863 Traditionally this MBOX is used as the file to save messages from the
12865 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12866 that have been read.
12868 .Sx "Message states" .
12872 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
12878 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
12882 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
12883 The default paginator is
12885 (path search through
12888 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
12890 then a non-existing environment variable
12897 will optionally be set to
12904 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
12905 looking for commands, e.g.,
12906 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
12909 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
12910 This variable is automatically looked for upon startup, see
12916 The shell to use for the commands
12921 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
12922 and when starting subprocesses.
12923 A default shell is used if this environment variable is not defined.
12926 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
12927 Specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01) to be
12928 used in place of the current time.
12929 This variable is looked up upon program startup, and its existence will
12930 switch \*(UA to a reproducible mode
12931 .Pf ( Lk https://reproducible-builds.org )
12932 which uses deterministic random numbers, a special fixated pseudo
12935 This operation mode is used for development and by software packagers.
12936 \*(ID Currently an invalid setting is only ignored, rather than causing
12937 a program abortion.
12939 .Dl $ SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=`date +%s` \*(uA
12943 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
12944 For extended colour and font control please refer to
12945 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
12946 and for terminal management in general to
12947 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
12951 Except for the root user this variable defines the directory for
12952 temporary files to be used instead of
12954 (or the given compile-time constant) if set, existent, accessible as
12955 well as read- and writable.
12956 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment,
12957 but \*(UA will ensure at startup that this environment variable is
12958 updated to contain a usable temporary directory.
12964 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
12965 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
12969 Pathname of the text editor to use for the
12973 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) ;
12975 is used for a less display oriented editor.
12985 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
12987 User-specific file giving initial commands, one of the
12988 .Sx "Resource files" .
12989 The actual value is read from
12993 System wide initialization file, one of the
12994 .Sx "Resource files" .
12995 The actual value is read from
12996 .Va system-mailrc .
13000 \*(OP Personal MIME type handler definition file, see
13001 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
13002 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
13003 a configuration option and can be overridden via
13007 .It Pa /etc/mailcap
13008 \*(OP System wide MIME type handler definition file, see
13009 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
13010 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
13011 a configuration option and can be overridden via
13015 The default value for
13020 Personal MIME types, see
13021 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
13025 System wide MIME types, see
13026 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
13030 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the user's
13032 file \(en the section
13033 .Sx "The .netrc file"
13034 documents the file format.
13035 The actually used path can be overridden via
13045 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
13046 .Ss "Resource files"
13048 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files, in order:
13050 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
13053 System wide initialization file
13054 .Pf ( Va system-mailrc ) .
13055 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
13057 (and according argument) or
13059 command line options, or by setting the
13062 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
13066 File giving initial commands.
13067 A different file can be chosen by setting the
13071 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
13073 command line option.
13075 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
13076 Defines a startup file to be read after all other resource files.
13077 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
13079 implementations, for example.
13080 This variable is only honoured when defined in a resource file, e.g.,
13082 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
13086 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
13089 .Bl -bullet -compact
13091 The whitespace characters space, tabulator and newline,
13092 as well as those defined by the variable
13094 are removed from the beginning and end of input lines.
13096 Empty lines are ignored.
13098 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
13099 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
13101 by placing a reverse solidus character
13103 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
13104 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
13105 remains in the input.
13107 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
13109 then it is a comment-command and also ignored.
13110 (The comment-command is a real command, which does nothing, and
13111 therefore the usual follow lines mechanism applies!)
13115 Unless \*(UA is about to enter interactive mode syntax errors that occur
13116 while loading these files are treated as errors and cause program exit.
13117 More files with syntactically equal content can be
13119 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
13121 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13122 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
13123 es, it is really continued here.
13130 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
13131 .Ss "The mime.types files"
13134 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
13135 \*(UA needs to learn about MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
13136 media types in order to classify message and attachment content.
13137 One source for them are
13139 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
13140 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
13141 Another is the command
13143 which also offers access to \*(UAs MIME type cache.
13145 files have the following syntax:
13147 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13148 type/subtype extension [extension ...]
13149 # E.g., text/html html htm
13155 define the MIME media type, as standardized in RFC 2046:
13157 is used to declare the general type of data, while the
13159 specifies a specific format for that type of data.
13160 One or multiple filename
13162 s, separated by whitespace, can be bound to the media type format.
13163 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
13165 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
13167 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in especially
13168 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
13169 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
13170 and prepends an optional
13174 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
13177 The following type markers are supported:
13180 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
13182 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
13187 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
13188 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
13189 the content as plain text instead.
13193 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
13194 handler to be defined.
13196 If no handler can be found a text message is displayed which says so.
13197 This can be annoying, for example signatures serve a contextual purpose,
13198 their content is of no use by itself.
13199 This marker will avoid displaying the text message.
13204 for sending messages:
13206 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
13207 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
13208 For reading etc. messages:
13209 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
13210 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
13212 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
13213 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
13214 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
13215 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
13218 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{
13219 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
13221 .\" TODO MAILCAP DISABLED
13222 .Sy This feature is not available in v14.9.0, sorry!
13224 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
13225 which \*(UA \*(OPally supports (see
13226 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
13227 It defines a file format to be used to inform mail user agent programs
13228 about the locally-installed facilities for handling various data
13229 formats, i.e., about commands and how they can be used to display, edit
13230 et cetera MIME part contents, as well as a default path search that
13231 includes multiple possible locations of
13235 environment variable that can be used to overwrite that (repeating here
13236 that it is not a search path, but instead a path search specification).
13237 Any existing files will be loaded in sequence, appending any content to
13238 the list of MIME type handler directives.
13242 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
13243 Comment lines start with a number sign
13245 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
13246 Empty lines are also ignored.
13247 All other lines form individual entries that must adhere to the syntax
13249 To extend a single entry (not comment) its line can be continued on
13250 follow lines if newline characters are
13252 by preceding them with the reverse solidus character
13254 The standard does not specify how leading whitespace of follow lines
13255 is to be treated, therefore \*(UA retains it.
13259 entries consist of a number of semicolon
13261 separated fields, and the reverse solidus
13263 character can be used to escape any following character including
13264 semicolon and itself.
13265 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
13266 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
13267 Leading and trailing whitespace of content is ignored (removed).
13270 The first field defines the MIME
13272 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively, and no reverse solidus
13273 escaping is possible in this field).
13274 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
13276 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
13278 would match any audio type.
13279 The second field defines the shell command which shall be used to
13281 MIME parts of the given type; it is implicitly called the
13288 shell commands message (MIME part) data is passed via standard input
13289 unless the given shell command includes one or more instances of the
13292 in which case these instances will be replaced with a temporary filename
13293 and the data will have been stored in the file that is being pointed to.
13296 shell commands data is assumed to be generated on standard output unless
13297 the given command includes (one ore multiple)
13299 In any case any given
13301 format is replaced with a(n already) properly quoted filename.
13302 Note that when a command makes use of a temporary file via
13304 then \*(UA will remove it again, as if the
13305 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ,
13306 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
13308 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
13309 flags had been set; see below for more.
13312 The optional fields either define a shell command or an attribute (flag)
13313 value, the latter being a single word and the former being a keyword
13314 naming the field followed by an equals sign
13316 succeeded by a shell command, and as usual for any
13318 content any whitespace surrounding the equals sign will be removed, too.
13319 Optional fields include the following:
13322 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
13324 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
13326 (Currently unused.)
13328 .It Cd composetyped
13331 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
13333 header field to be applied to the composed data.
13334 (Currently unused.)
13337 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
13339 (Currently unused.)
13342 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
13344 (Currently unused.)
13347 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, e.g., the machine
13348 architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether or not
13349 this mailcap entry applies.
13350 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
13351 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
13354 .It Cd needsterminal
13355 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
13356 an interactive terminal.
13357 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
13358 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
13359 ignored; this flag implies
13360 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
13363 .It Cd copiousoutput
13364 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
13366 command will be an extended stream of textual output that can be
13367 (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
13368 It is mutually exclusive with
13369 .Cd needsterminal .
13371 .It Cd textualnewlines
13372 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
13373 that, if encoded in
13375 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
13376 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
13377 (Currently unused.)
13379 .It Cd nametemplate
13380 This field gives a filename format, in which
13382 will be replaced by a random string, the joined combination of which
13383 will be used as the filename denoted by
13384 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
13385 One could specify that a GIF file being passed to an image viewer should
13386 have a name ending in
13389 .Ql nametemplate=%s.gif .
13390 Note that \*(UA ignores the name template unless that solely specifies
13391 a filename suffix that consists of (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
13392 characters, the underscore and dot only.
13395 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
13396 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
13397 This field is not used by \*(UA.
13400 A textual description that describes this type of data.
13403 .It Cd x-mailx-even-if-not-interactive
13404 An extension flag test field \(em by default handlers without
13406 are entirely ignored in non-interactive mode, but if this flag is set
13407 then their use will be considered.
13408 It is an error if this flag is set for commands that use the flag
13409 .Cd needsterminal .
13412 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
13413 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
13416 command shall not be used to generate message quotes
13417 (as it would be by default).
13420 .It Cd x-mailx-async
13421 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
13423 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
13424 Cannot be used in conjunction with
13425 .Cd needsterminal .
13428 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
13429 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
13431 command shall be evaluated once only and the (boolean) result be cached.
13432 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
13433 .Dq running under the X Window System .
13436 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
13437 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
13438 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
13439 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
13440 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
13445 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
13446 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
13447 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
13449 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
13450 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
13451 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
13453 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
13458 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
13459 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
13460 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
13461 (Do not use this for asynchronous handlers.)
13462 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
13464 format, or in conjunction with
13465 .Cd x-mailx-async ,
13466 or without also setting
13467 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
13469 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill .
13472 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
13475 implies the three tmpfile related flags above, but if you want, e.g.,
13477 and deal with the temporary file yourself, you can add in this flag to
13479 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
13484 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
13485 entry fields, prefixed by
13487 Flag fields apply to the entire
13489 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
13490 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
13491 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
13492 one does not provide enough information.
13495 command needs to specify the
13499 command shall not, the following will help out the latter (with enabled
13503 level \*(UA will show information about handler evaluation):
13505 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13506 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
13507 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
13511 In fields any occurrence of the format string
13513 will be replaced by the
13516 Named parameters from the
13518 field may be placed in the command execution line using
13520 followed by the parameter name and a closing
13523 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
13524 regardless of embedded spaces; thus:
13526 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13528 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
13531 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
13532 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
13534 # Executed shell command
13535 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
13539 .\" TODO v15: Mailcap: %n,%F
13540 Note that \*(UA does not support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
13541 shown in this example (as of today).
13542 \*(UA does not support the additional formats
13546 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
13548 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
13549 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
13550 in additional user-provided quotes:
13552 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13554 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
13556 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s
13558 application/pdf; \e
13560 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
13561 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
13563 x-mailx-async; x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
13565 application/*; echo "This is \e"%t\e" but \e
13566 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 1024 | cat -vet; \e
13567 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote
13572 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
13573 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
13576 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
13577 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
13578 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
13581 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{
13582 .Ss "The .netrc file"
13586 file contains user credentials for machine accounts.
13587 The default location
13589 may be overridden by the
13591 environment variable.
13592 It is possible to load encrypted
13594 files by using an appropriate value in
13598 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
13599 \*(UA implements a parser that supports a superset of the original BSD
13600 syntax, but users should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches
13601 of that file format, shall their
13603 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
13606 .Bl -bullet -compact
13608 BSD does not support single, but only double quotation marks, e.g.,
13609 .Ql password="pass with spaces" .
13611 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
13612 (e.g., a space can be escaped via
13614 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
13616 BSD does not require a final quotation mark of the last user input token.
13618 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
13619 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
13620 still seems to support this syntax, \*(UA does not!
13622 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
13623 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
13624 whitespace, with a number sign
13626 then the rest of the line is ignored.
13628 Whereas other programs may require that the
13630 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
13632 token for any other
13636 \*(UA will always require these strict permissions.
13640 Of the following list of supported tokens \*(UA only uses (and caches)
13645 At runtime the command
13647 can be used to control \*(UA's
13651 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
13652 .It Cd machine Ar name
13653 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized by \*(UA
13655 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
13660 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
13663 As an extension that should not be the cause of any worries
13664 \*(UA supports a single wildcard prefix for
13666 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13667 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
13668 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
13669 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
13675 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
13679 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
13680 Note that in the example neither
13681 .Ql pop3.example.com
13683 .Ql smtp.example.com
13684 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
13685 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
13688 This is the same as
13690 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
13691 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
13692 and it must be the last first-class token.
13694 .It Cd login Ar name
13695 The user name on the remote machine.
13697 .It Cd password Ar string
13698 The user's password on the remote machine.
13700 .It Cd account Ar string
13701 Supply an additional account password.
13702 This is merely for FTP purposes.
13704 .It Cd macdef Ar name
13706 A macro is defined with the specified
13708 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
13709 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
13712 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
13713 defined following the
13715 they are intended to be used with.)
13718 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
13719 This is merely for FTP purposes.
13726 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
13729 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
13730 .Ss "An example configuration"
13732 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13733 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
13736 # Request strict TLL transport layer security checks
13737 set tls-verify=strict
13739 # Where are the up-to-date TLS certificates?
13740 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, do not use any,
13741 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
13742 #set tls-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
13743 set tls-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
13744 set tls-ca-no-defaults
13745 #set tls-ca-flags=partial-chain
13746 wysh set smime-ca-file="${tls-ca-file}" \e
13747 smime-ca-no-defaults #smime-ca-flags="${tls-ca-flags}"
13749 # This could be outsourced to a central configuration file via
13750 # tls-config-file plus tls-config-module if the used library allows.
13751 # CipherString: explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may
13752 # improve security, especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2.
13753 # See ciphers(1). Possibly best to only use tls-config-pairs-HOST
13754 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
13755 # Note that TLSv1.3 uses Ciphersuites= instead, which will join
13756 # with CipherString (if protocols older than v1.3 are allowed)
13757 # Curves: especially with TLSv1.3 curves selection may be desired.
13758 # MinProtocol,MaxProtocol: do not use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
13759 # Change this only when the remote server does not support it:
13760 # maybe use chain support via tls-config-pairs-HOST / -USER@HOST
13761 # to define such explicit exceptions, then, e.g.
13762 # MinProtocol=TLSv1.1
13763 if [ "$tls-features" =% +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ]
13764 wysh set tls-config-pairs='\e
13765 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13766 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13767 MinProtocol=TLSv1.1'
13769 wysh set tls-config-pairs='\e
13770 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13771 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13772 Protocol=-ALL\e,+TLSv1.1 \e, +TLSv1.2\e, +TLSv1.3'
13775 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
13776 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
13778 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
13779 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
13780 set reply-in-same-charset
13782 # When replying, do not merge From: and To: of the original message
13783 # into To:. Instead old From: -> new To:, old To: -> merge Cc:.
13784 set recipients-in-cc
13786 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
13787 # Only like this you will be able to see errors reported through the
13788 # exit status of the MTA (including the built-in SMTP one)!
13791 # Only use built-in MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
13792 set mimetypes-load-control
13794 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
13796 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
13797 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
13798 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt \e
13799 record=+sent.mbox record-files record-resent
13801 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
13802 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
13804 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
13805 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13807 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
13808 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from do not match.
13809 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
13810 set mta=(smtps?|submissions?)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
13811 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
13814 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
13816 colour-pager crt= \e
13817 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes fullnames \e
13818 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
13819 mime-counter-evidence=0b1111 \e
13820 prompt='?\e$?!\e$!/\e$^ERRNAME[\e$account#\e$mailbox-display]? ' \e
13821 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
13824 # Only include the selected header fields when typing messages
13825 headerpick type retain from_ date from to cc subject \e
13826 message-id mail-followup-to reply-to
13827 # ...when forwarding messages
13828 headerpick forward retain subject date from to cc
13829 # ...when saving message, etc.
13830 #headerpick save ignore ^Original-.*$ ^X-.*$
13832 # Some mailing lists
13833 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
13834 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
13836 # Handle a few file extensions (to store MBOX databases)
13837 filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
13838 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
13839 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
13840 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
13842 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
13843 # Instead of directly placing content inside `account',
13844 # we `define' a macro: like that we can switch "accounts"
13845 # from within *on-compose-splice*, for example!
13847 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13848 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
13850 set pop3-no-apop-pop.gmXil.com
13851 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.gmXil.com
13852 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.gmXil.com
13853 # Or, entirely IMAP based setup
13854 #set folder=imaps://imap.gmail.com record="+[Gmail]/Sent Mail" \e
13855 # imap-cache=~/spool/cache
13857 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
13859 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.gmail.com:465
13865 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
13866 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
13867 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
13868 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
13869 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
13870 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
13872 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13873 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13875 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.yaXXex.com
13876 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.yaXXex.com
13878 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.com:465 \e
13879 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
13885 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
13886 commandalias lls '!ls ${LS_COLOUR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
13887 commandalias llS '!ls ${LS_COLOUR_FLAG} -aFlS'
13889 set pipe-message/external-body='@* echo $MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL'
13891 # We do not support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
13892 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
13895 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'@*#++=@\e
13896 < "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
13897 -v TMPFILE="${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
13899 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/ {\e
13902 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13903 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
13904 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13908 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
13909 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
13916 commandalias V '\e'call V
13920 When storing passwords in
13922 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
13923 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
13926 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
13928 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
13929 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
13931 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13933 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13934 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13936 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
13937 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
13939 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
13940 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
13941 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
13942 commandalias xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
13954 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13955 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
13959 This configuration should now work just fine:
13962 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -dvv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
13965 .\" .Ss "S/MIME step by step" {{{
13966 .Ss "S/MIME step by step"
13968 \*(OP The first thing that is needed for
13969 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
13970 is a personal certificate, and a private key.
13971 The certificate contains public information, in particular a name and
13972 email address(es), and the public key that can be used by others to
13973 encrypt messages for the certificate holder (the owner of the private
13976 signed messages generated with that certificate('s private key).
13977 Whereas the certificate is included in each signed message, the private
13978 key must be kept secret.
13979 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with the
13980 public key, and to sign messages.
13983 For personal use it is recommended that get a S/MIME certificate from
13984 one of the major CAs on the Internet.
13985 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
13986 Usually offered is a combined certificate and private key in PKCS#12
13987 format which \*(UA does not accept directly.
13988 To convert it to PEM format, the following shell command can be used;
13989 please read on for how to use these PEM files.
13991 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13992 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out certpem.pem -clcerts -nodes
13994 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out cert.pem -clcerts -nokeys
13995 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out key.pem -nocerts -nodes
14000 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
14001 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
14002 community for free; their root certificate
14003 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
14004 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
14005 which means their root certificate has to be downloaded separately,
14006 and needs to be part of the S/MIME certificate validation chain by
14009 or as a vivid member of the
14010 .Va smime-ca-file .
14011 But let us take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
14012 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
14015 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
14016 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
14017 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
14018 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
14019 entries of the web interface.
14020 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let us create a new
14021 .Dq client certificate ,
14022 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
14023 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
14027 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
14028 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
14029 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
14032 .Dl $ openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
14035 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
14037 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
14038 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
14039 .Dq advanced options
14040 to see the corresponding text field).
14041 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
14042 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
14043 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
14044 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
14045 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
14050 In order to use your new S/MIME setup a combined private key/public key
14051 (certificate) file has to be created:
14054 .Dl $ cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
14057 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
14058 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
14059 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted, unless this
14060 operation has been automatized as described in
14061 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" .
14062 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
14064 is of interest for verification only):
14066 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14067 ? set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
14068 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
14069 smime-sign-digest=SHA512 \e
14075 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or TLS" {{{
14076 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or TLS"
14078 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
14079 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
14080 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
14081 declared invalid after they have been issued.
14082 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
14084 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
14085 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
14086 To seriously use S/MIME or TLS verification,
14087 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
14088 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
14089 invalidated certificates.
14090 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
14091 the Internet, so they have to be retrieved by some external mechanism.
14094 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
14095 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
14098 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
14101 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
14102 (and no other files) must be created.
14107 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
14108 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
14109 to verify a certificate.
14118 In general it is a good idea to turn on
14124 twice) if something does not work well.
14125 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
14126 problems' solution.
14128 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
14129 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
14131 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
14132 and cannot be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
14134 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
14135 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
14137 One may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
14141 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
14144 return the expected value?
14145 Does this local hostname have a domain suffix?
14146 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
14148 try again after adding an (additional) entry with this extension.
14151 .\" .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail" {{{
14152 .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail"
14154 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
14156 unless they use a special authentication method (OAuth 2.0) which
14157 was not standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
14158 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
14161 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
14162 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
14163 her- and himself with the locally installed
14165 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
14166 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
14167 local cache this query would have to be performed whenever \*(UA is
14168 invoked (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
14171 \*(UA does not support OAuth.
14172 Because of this it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
14173 .Dq less secure app
14174 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
14175 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
14180 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
14183 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
14185 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
14187 use that special password instead of the real Google account password in
14188 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
14189 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
14193 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" {{{
14194 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work"
14196 It can happen that the terminal library (see
14197 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
14200 reports different codes than the terminal really sends, in which case
14201 \*(UA will tell that a key binding is functional, but will not be able to
14202 recognize it because the received data does not match anything expected.
14203 Especially without the \*(OPal terminal capability library support one
14204 reason for this may be that the (possibly even non-existing) keypad
14205 is not turned on and the resulting layout reports the keypad control
14206 codes for the normal keyboard keys.
14211 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
14214 To overcome the situation, use, e.g., the program
14216 in conjunction with the command line option
14218 if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
14219 by keypresses, and use the variable
14221 to make \*(UA aware of them.
14222 E.g., the terminal this is typed on produces some false sequences, here
14223 an example showing the shifted home key:
14225 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14228 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
14233 $ \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
14240 .\" .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?" {{{
14241 .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?"
14244 Put (at least parts of) the following in your
14247 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14249 smtpserver = /usr/bin/s-mailx
14250 smtpserveroption = -t
14251 #smtpserveroption = -Sexpandaddr
14252 smtpserveroption = -Athe-account-you-need
14255 suppressfrom = false
14256 assume8bitEncoding = UTF-8
14259 chainreplyto = true
14270 .\" .Sh "IMAP CLIENT" {{{
14273 \*(OPally there is IMAP client support available.
14274 This part of the program is obsolete and will vanish in v15 with the
14275 large MIME and I/O layer rewrite, because it uses old-style blocking I/O
14276 and makes excessive use of signal based long code jumps.
14277 Support can hopefully be readded later based on a new-style I/O, with
14278 SysV signal handling.
14279 In fact the IMAP support had already been removed from the codebase, but
14280 was reinstantiated on user demand: in effect the IMAP code is at the
14281 level of \*(UA v14.8.16 (with
14283 being the sole exception), and should be treated with some care.
14290 protocol prefixes, and an IMAP-based
14293 IMAP URLs (paths) undergo inspections and possible transformations
14294 before use (and the command
14296 can be used to manually apply them to any given argument).
14297 Hierarchy delimiters are normalized, a step which is configurable via the
14299 variable chain, but defaults to the first seen delimiter otherwise.
14300 \*(UA supports internationalised IMAP names, and en- and decodes the
14301 names from and to the
14303 as necessary and possible.
14304 If a mailbox name is expanded (see
14305 .Sx "Filename transformations" )
14306 to an IMAP mailbox, all names that begin with `+' then refer to IMAP
14307 mailboxes below the
14309 target box, while folder names prefixed by `@' refer to folders below
14310 the hierarchy base, e.g., the following lists all folders below the
14311 current one when in an IMAP mailbox:
14315 Note: some IMAP servers do not accept the creation of mailboxes in
14316 the hierarchy base, but require that they are created as subfolders of
14317 `INBOX' \(en with such servers a folder name of the form
14319 .Dl imaps://mylogin@imap.myisp.example/INBOX.
14321 should be used (the last character is the server's hierarchy
14323 The following IMAP-specific commands exist:
14326 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
14329 Only applicable to cached IMAP mailboxes;
14330 takes a message list and reads the specified messages into the IMAP
14335 If operating in disconnected mode on an IMAP mailbox,
14336 switch to online mode and connect to the mail server while retaining
14337 the mailbox status.
14338 See the description of the
14340 variable for more information.
14344 If operating in online mode on an IMAP mailbox,
14345 switch to disconnected mode while retaining the mailbox status.
14346 See the description of the
14349 A list of messages may optionally be given as argument;
14350 the respective messages are then read into the cache before the
14351 connection is closed, thus
14353 makes the entire mailbox available for disconnected use.
14357 Sends command strings directly to the current IMAP server.
14358 \*(UA operates always in IMAP `selected state' on the current mailbox;
14359 commands that change this will produce undesirable results and should be
14361 Useful IMAP commands are:
14362 .Bl -tag -offset indent -width ".Ic getquotearoot"
14364 Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument and creates it.
14366 (RFC 2087) Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument
14367 and prints the quotas that apply to the mailbox.
14368 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
14370 (RFC 2342) Takes no arguments and prints the Personal Namespaces,
14371 the Other User's Namespaces and the Shared Namespaces.
14372 Each namespace type is printed in parentheses;
14373 if there are multiple namespaces of the same type,
14374 inner parentheses separate them.
14375 For each namespace a prefix and a hierarchy separator is listed.
14376 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
14381 Perform IMAP path transformations.
14385 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
14386 and manages the error number
14388 The first argument specifies the operation:
14390 normalizes hierarchy delimiters (see
14392 and converts the strings from the locale
14394 to the internationalized variant used by IMAP,
14396 performs the reverse operation.
14401 The following IMAP-specific internal variables exist:
14404 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
14406 .It Va disconnected
14407 \*(BO When an IMAP mailbox is selected and this variable is set,
14408 no connection to the server is initiated.
14409 Instead, data is obtained from the local cache (see
14412 Mailboxes that are not present in the cache
14413 and messages that have not yet entirely been fetched from the server
14415 to fetch all messages in a mailbox at once,
14417 .No ` Ns Li copy * /dev/null Ns '
14418 can be used while still in connected mode.
14419 Changes that are made to IMAP mailboxes in disconnected mode are queued
14420 and committed later when a connection to that server is made.
14421 This procedure is not completely reliable since it cannot be guaranteed
14422 that the IMAP unique identifiers (UIDs) on the server still match the
14423 ones in the cache at that time.
14426 when this problem occurs.
14428 .It Va disconnected-USER@HOST
14429 The specified account is handled as described for the
14432 but other accounts are not affected.
14435 .It Va imap-auth-USER@HOST , imap-auth
14436 Sets the IMAP authentication method.
14437 Valid values are `login' for the usual password-based authentication
14439 `cram-md5', which is a password-based authentication that does not send
14440 the password over the network in clear text,
14441 and `gssapi' for GSS-API based authentication.
14445 Enables caching of IMAP mailboxes.
14446 The value of this variable must point to a directory that is either
14447 existent or can be created by \*(UA.
14448 All contents of the cache can be deleted by \*(UA at any time;
14449 it is not safe to make assumptions about them.
14452 .It Va imap-delim-USER@HOST , imap-delim-HOST , imap-delim
14453 The hierarchy separator used by the IMAP server.
14454 Whenever an IMAP path is specified it will undergo normalization.
14455 One of the normalization steps is the squeezing and adjustment of
14456 hierarchy separators.
14457 If this variable is set, any occurrence of any character of the given
14458 value that exists in the path will be replaced by the first member of
14459 the value; an empty value will cause the default to be used, it is
14461 If not set, we will reuse the first hierarchy separator character that
14462 is discovered in a user-given mailbox name.
14464 .Mx Va imap-keepalive
14465 .It Va imap-keepalive-USER@HOST , imap-keepalive-HOST , imap-keepalive
14466 IMAP servers may close the connection after a period of
14467 inactivity; the standard requires this to be at least 30 minutes,
14468 but practical experience may vary.
14469 Setting this variable to a numeric `value' greater than 0 causes
14470 a `NOOP' command to be sent each `value' seconds if no other operation
14474 .It Va imap-list-depth
14475 When retrieving the list of folders on an IMAP server, the
14477 command stops after it has reached a certain depth to avoid possible
14479 The value of this variable sets the maximum depth allowed.
14481 If the folder separator on the current IMAP server is a slash `/',
14482 this variable has no effect and the
14484 command does not descend to subfolders.
14486 .Mx Va imap-use-starttls
14487 .It Va imap-use-starttls-USER@HOST , imap-use-starttls-HOST , imap-use-starttls
14488 Causes \*(UA to issue a `STARTTLS' command to make an unencrypted
14489 IMAP session TLS encrypted.
14490 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
14491 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the IMAPS method.
14497 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
14507 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
14516 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
14522 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
14525 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
14526 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
14527 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
14530 command already appeared in First Edition
14534 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
14535 Electronic mail was there from the start.
14536 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
14537 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
14538 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
14539 freeloaders, or whatever.
14540 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
14541 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
14542 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
14548 Mail was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
14551 distribution until 1995.
14552 Mail has then seen further development in open source
14554 variants, noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
14556 Based upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
14557 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
14558 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso.
14559 This man page is derived from
14560 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
14561 that was originally written by Kurt Shoens.
14569 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
14570 .An "Edward Wang" ,
14571 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
14572 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
14573 .An "Gunnar Ritter" .
14574 \*(UA is developed by
14575 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" Aq s-mailx@lists.sdaoden.eu .
14578 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
14581 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
14585 from anywhere else but a command prompt is very problematic and likely
14586 to leave the program in an undefined state: many library functions
14587 cannot deal with the
14589 that this software (still) performs; even though efforts have been taken
14590 to address this, no sooner but in v15 it will have been worked out:
14591 interruptions have not been disabled in order to allow forceful breakage
14592 of hanging network connections, for example (all this is unrelated to
14596 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
14597 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
14598 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
14603 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
14604 that is capable of message queuing.
14611 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
14612 claims that there are no messages to display, one needs to perform
14613 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
14619 mode a power user may encounter crashes very occasionally (this is may
14624 in the source repository lists future directions.
14627 Please report bugs to the
14629 address, e.g., from within \*(uA:
14630 .\" v15-compat: drop eval as `mail' will expand variable?
14631 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
14634 output of the command
14636 may be helpful, e.g.,
14638 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14639 ? wysh set escape=! verbose; vput version xy; unset verbose;\e
14640 eval mail $contact-mail
14647 Information on the web at
14648 .Ql $ \*(uA -X 'echo Ns \| $ Ns Va contact-web Ns ' -Xx .