1 .\"@ nail.1 - S-nail(1) reference manual.
3 .\" Copyright (c) 2000-2008 Gunnar Ritter, Freiburg i. Br., Germany.
4 .\" Copyright (c) 2012 - 2017 Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso <steffen@sdaoden.eu>.
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34 .\"@ S-nail v14.9.1 / 2017-07-31
46 .\" If not ~/.mailrc, it breaks POSIX compatibility. And adjust main.c.
51 .ds OU [no v15-compat]
52 .ds ID [v15 behaviour may differ]
53 .ds NQ [Only new quoting rules]
64 .Nd send and receive Internet mail
70 .\" Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"SYNOPSIS, main()
79 .Op : Ns Fl a Ar attachment Ns \&:
80 .Op : Ns Fl b Ar bcc-addr Ns \&:
81 .Op : Ns Fl c Ar cc-addr Ns \&:
82 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
85 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
88 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
90 .Pf : Ar to-addr Ns \&:
91 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
100 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
102 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
105 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
106 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
115 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
117 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
119 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
121 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
127 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
130 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
133 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
134 .Sy Compatibility note:
135 S-nail (\*(UA) will wrap up into \%S-mailx in v15.0 (circa 2019).
136 Backward incompatibility has to be expected \(en
139 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
140 rules, for example, and shell metacharacters will become meaningful.
141 New and old behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU, and setting
144 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
145 will choose new behaviour when applicable.
146 \*(OB flags what will vanish, and enabling
150 enables obsoletion warnings.
154 \*(UA provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
156 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
158 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
159 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3, among others.
160 \*(UA divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows
161 the user to deal with them in any order.
165 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
166 for manipulating messages and sending mail.
167 It provides the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
168 of outgoing messages, and increasingly powerful and reliable
169 non-interactive scripting capabilities.
171 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
174 .Bl -tag -width ".It Fl BaNg"
177 Explicitly control which of the
179 shall be loaded: if the letter
181 is (case-insensitively) part of the
185 is loaded, likewise the letter
187 controls loading of the user's personal
189 file, whereas the letters
193 explicitly forbid loading of any resource files.
194 This option should be used by scripts: to avoid environmental noise they
197 from any configuration files and create a script-local environment,
198 explicitly setting any of the desired
199 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
202 This option overrides
209 command for the given user email
211 after program startup is complete (all resource files are loaded, any
213 setting is being established; only
215 commands have not been evaluated yet).
216 Being a special incarnation of
218 macros for the purpose of bundling longer-lived
220 tings, activating such an email account also switches to the accounts
222 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
227 .It Fl a Ar file Ns Op Ar =input-charset Ns Op Ar #output-charset
230 to the message (for compose mode opportunities refer to
234 .Sx "Filename transformations"
237 will be performed, but shell word expansion is restricted to the tilde
241 not be accessible but contain a
243 character, then anything before the
245 will be used as the filename, anything thereafter as a character set
248 If an input character set is specified,
249 .Mx -ix "character set specification"
250 but no output character set, then the given input character set is fixed
251 as-is, and no conversion will be applied;
252 giving the empty string or the special string hyphen-minus
254 will be treated as if
256 has been specified (the default).
258 If an output character set has also been given then the conversion will
259 be performed exactly as specified and on-the-fly, not considering the
260 file's type and content.
261 As an exception, if the output character set is specified as the empty
262 string or hyphen-minus
264 then the default conversion algorithm (see
265 .Sx "Character sets" )
266 is applied (therefore no conversion is performed on-the-fly,
268 will be MIME-classified and its contents will be inspected first) \(em
269 without support for character set conversions
271 does not include the term
273 only this argument is supported.
276 (\*(OB: \*(UA will always use line-buffered output, to gain
277 line-buffered input even in batch mode enable batch mode via
282 Send a blind carbon copy to
289 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
291 The option may be used multiple times.
293 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
297 Send carbon copies to the given receiver, if so allowed by
299 May be used multiple times.
304 the internal variable
306 which enables debug messages and disables message delivery,
307 among others; effectively turns almost any operation into a dry-run.
313 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body.
314 This command line option is \*(OB.
318 Just check if mail is present (in the system
320 or the one specified via
322 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
323 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
324 specification can be added with the option
329 Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of the
330 first recipient's address (instead of in
335 Read in the contents of the user's
337 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
339 (or the specified file) for processing;
340 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
346 argument will undergo some special
347 .Sx "Filename transformations"
352 is not an argument to the flag
354 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
358 that starts with a hyphen-minus, prefix with a relative path, as in
359 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
365 and exit; a configurable summary view is available via the
371 Show a short usage summary.
377 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
383 of all messages that match the given
387 .Sx "Specifying messages"
392 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
393 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
399 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
400 be enabled explicitly (e.g., by using the option
405 Special send mode that will flag standard input with the MIME
409 and use it as the main message body.
410 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
411 .Va message-inject-head ,
414 .Va message-inject-tail .
420 Special send mode that will MIME classify the specified
422 and use it as the main message body.
423 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
424 .Va message-inject-head ,
427 .Va message-inject-tail .
433 inhibit the initial display of message headers when reading mail or
438 for the internal variable
443 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
448 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
449 .Sx "Resource files" .
453 Special send mode that will initialize the message body with the
454 contents of the specified
456 which may be standard input
458 only in non-interactive context.
466 opened will be in read-only mode.
470 .It Fl r Ar from-addr
471 Whereas the source address that appears in the
473 header of a message (or in the
475 header if the former contains multiple addresses) is honoured by the
476 builtin SMTP transport, it is not used by a file-based
478 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) for the RFC 5321 reverse-path used for relaying
479 and delegating a message to its destination(s), for delivery errors
480 etc., but it instead uses the local identity of the initiating user.
483 When this command line option is used the given
485 will be assigned to the internal variable
487 but in addition the command line option
488 .Fl \&\&f Ar from-addr
489 will be passed to a file-based
491 whenever a message is sent.
494 include a user name the address components will be separated and
495 the name part will be passed to a file-based
501 If an empty string is passed as
503 then the content of the variable
505 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
507 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the file-based
516 command line options are used when contacting a file-based MTA, unless
517 this automatic deduction is enforced by
519 ing the internal variable
520 .Va r-option-implicit .
523 Remarks: many default installations and sites disallow overriding the
524 local user identity like this unless either the MTA has been configured
525 accordingly or the user is member of a group with special privileges.
529 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Op = Ns value
533 iable and, in case of a non-boolean variable which has a value, assign
537 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
541 may be overwritten from within resource files,
542 the command line setting will be reestablished after all resource files
544 (\*(ID In the future such a setting may instead become
546 until the startup is complete.)
550 Specify the subject of the message to be sent.
551 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
552 normalized to space (SP) characters.
556 The message given (on standard input) is expected to contain, separated
557 from the message body by an empty line, a message header with
562 fields giving its recipients, which will be added to any recipients
563 specified on the command line.
564 If a message subject is specified via
566 then it will be used in favour of one given on the command line.
582 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
583 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
584 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
586 Any other custom header field (also see
590 is passed through entirely
591 unchanged, and in conjunction with the options
595 it is possible to embed
596 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
604 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
607 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
608 .Ql Fl \&\&f Ns \0%user .
617 will also show the list of
619 .Ql $ \*(uA -Xversion -Xx .
624 ting the internal variable
626 enables display of some informational context messages.
627 Using it twice increases the level of verbosity.
631 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
633 to the list of commands to be executed,
634 as a last step of program startup, before normal operation starts.
635 This is the only possibility to execute commands in non-interactive mode
636 when reading startup files is actively prohibited.
637 The commands will be evaluated as a unit, just as via
647 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
648 in compose mode even in non-interactive use cases.
649 This can be used to, e.g., automatically format the composed message
650 text before sending the message:
651 .Bd -literal -offset indent
652 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.';\e
653 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
654 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d~:/ -Sttycharset=utf-8 bob@exam.ple
659 Enables batch mode: standard input is made line buffered, the complete
660 set of (interactive) commands is available, processing of
661 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
662 is enabled in compose mode, and diverse
663 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
664 are adjusted for batch necessities, exactly as if done via
680 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
681 .Bd -literal -offset indent
682 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'm bob\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\enx\en' |\e
683 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d#:/ -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
688 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
691 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
692 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
698 arguments and all receivers established via
702 are subject to the checks established by
705 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
708 allows their recognition all
710 arguments given at the end of the command line after a
712 separator will be passed through to a file-based
714 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for the entire session.
716 constraints do not apply to the content of
720 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{
723 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
725 Mail, itself a successor of the Research
728 .Dq was there from the start
731 It thus represents the user side of the
733 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
734 traditionally taken by
736 and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility purposes.
741 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
745 Because \*(UA strives for compliance with POSIX
747 it is likely that some configuration settings have to be adjusted before
748 using it is a smooth experience.
749 (Rather complete configuration examples can be found in the section
753 resource file bends those standard imposed settings of the
754 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
755 a bit towards more user friendliness and safety already.
763 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to the
765 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
767 that would otherwise occur (see
768 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
771 to not remove empty system MBOX mailbox files in order not to mangle
772 file permissions when files eventually get recreated (all empty (MBOX)
773 mailbox files will be removed unless this variable is set whenever
775 mode has been enabled).
780 in order to synchronize \*(UA with the exit status report of the used
787 to enter interactive startup even if the initial mailbox is empty,
789 to allow editing of headers as well as
791 to not strip down addresses in compose mode, and
793 to include the message that is being responded to when
798 It should be remarked that the file mode creation mask can be
799 explicitly managed via the variable
801 \*(UA will not follow symbolic links when opening files for writing,
802 sufficient system support provided.
805 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
806 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
808 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or a built-in
810 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
811 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
812 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
816 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
818 .Bd -literal -offset indent
820 $ \*(uA -s ubject -a ttach.txt bill@exam.ple
822 # But... try it in an isolated dry-run mode (-d) first
823 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
824 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple \e
825 -. '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
828 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
829 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=none \e
830 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
836 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
837 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
838 In this compose mode \*(UA treats lines beginning with the character
840 special \(en these are so-called
841 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
842 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
843 attachments and more; e.g., the command escape
845 will start the text editor to revise the message in its current state,
847 allows editing of the most important message headers, with
849 custom headers can be created (more specifically than with
852 gives an overview of most other available command escapes.
856 at the beginning of an empty line leaves compose mode and causes the
857 message to be sent, whereas typing
860 twice will abort the current letter (saving its contents in the file
871 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
872 can be used to alter default behavior.
873 E.g., messages are sent asynchronously, without supervision, unless the
876 is set, therefore send errors will not be recognizable until then.
881 will automatically startup a text editor when compose mode is entered,
883 allows editing of headers additionally to plain body content, whereas
887 will cause the user to be prompted actively for (blind) carbon-copy
888 recipients, respectively, if the given list is empty.
891 Especially when using public mail provider accounts with the SMTP
893 it is often necessary to set
897 (even finer control via
898 .Va smtp-hostname ) ,
899 which (even if empty) also causes creation of
906 Saving a copy of sent messages in a
908 mailbox may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox
910 targets the value will undergo
911 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
914 for the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
915 be switched to with a single command or command line option may be
918 has example configurations for some of the well-known public mail
919 providers, and also gives a compact overview on how to setup a secure
920 SSL/TLS environment.)
925 sandbox dry-run tests will prove correctness.
929 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
930 will spread light on the different ways of how to specify user email
931 account credentials, the
933 variable chains, and accessing protocol-specific resources,
936 goes into the details of character encodings, and how to use them for
937 interpreting the input data given in
939 and representing messages and MIME part contents in
941 and reading the section
942 .Sx "The mime.types files"
943 should help to understand how the MIME-type of outgoing attachments are
944 classified, and what can be done for fine-tuning.
945 Over the wire a configurable
947 .Pf ( Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding: )
948 may be applied to the message data.
951 Message recipients (as specified on the command line or defined in
956 may not only be email addressees but can also be names of mailboxes and
957 even complete shell command pipe specifications.
960 is not set then only network addresses (see
962 for a description of mail addresses) and plain user names (including MTA
963 aliases) may be used, other types will be filtered out, giving a warning
967 can be used to generate standard compliant network addresses.
969 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
970 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
974 is set then extended recipient addresses will optionally be accepted:
975 Any name which starts with a vertical bar
977 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
979 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
980 Likewise, any name that starts with the character solidus
982 or the character sequence dot solidus
984 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content;
985 likewise a name that solely consists of a hyphen-minus
987 Any other name which contains a commercial at
989 character is treated as a network address;
990 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
992 character specifies a mailbox name;
993 Any other name which contains a solidus
995 character but no exclamation mark
999 character before also specifies a mailbox name;
1000 What remains is treated as a network address.
1002 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1003 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
1004 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
1005 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
1006 \*(uA -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
1007 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr,failinvaddr -s test \e
1012 It is possible to create personal distribution lists via the
1014 command, so that, for instance, the user can send mail to
1016 and have it go to a group of people.
1017 These aliases have nothing in common with the system wide aliases that
1018 may be used by the MTA, which are subject to the
1022 and are often tracked in a file
1028 Personal aliases will be expanded by \*(UA before the message is sent,
1029 and are thus a convenient alternative to specifying each addressee by
1030 itself; they correlate with the active set of
1037 .Dl alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/mail/cohorts.mbox
1040 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
1042 .Va on-compose-cleanup
1043 hook variables may be set to
1045 d macros to automatically adjust some settings dependent
1046 on receiver, sender or subject contexts, and via the
1047 .Va on-compose-splice
1049 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
1050 variables, the former also to be set to a
1052 d macro, increasingly powerful mechanisms to perform automated message
1053 adjustments are available.
1054 (\*(ID These hooks work for commands which newly create messages, namely
1055 .Ic forward , mail , reply
1060 for now provide only the hooks
1063 .Va on-resend-cleanup . )
1066 To avoid environmental noise scripts should
1068 \*(UA from any configuration files and create a script-local
1069 environment, ideally with the command line options
1071 to disable any configuration file in conjunction with repetitions of
1073 to specify variables:
1075 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1076 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
1077 -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf-8 \e
1078 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,failinvaddr \e
1079 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
1080 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
1081 -s 'Subject to go' -a attachment_file \e
1082 -. 'Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>' rec2@exam.ple \e
1087 As shown, scripts can
1089 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
1092 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
1094 In interactive mode, which is introduced in the next section, messages
1095 can be sent by calling the
1097 command with a list of recipient addresses:
1099 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1100 $ \*(uA -d -Squiet -Semptystart
1101 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
1102 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
1104 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
1105 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
1109 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode" {{{
1110 .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode"
1112 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
1114 When used like that the user's system
1116 (for more on mailbox types please see the command
1118 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed if
1122 The visual style of this summary of
1124 can be adjusted through the variable
1126 and the possible sorting criterion via
1132 can be performed with the command
1134 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
1135 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
1144 will give a listing of all available commands and
1146 will give a summary of some common ones.
1147 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available one can type
1150 and see the actual expansion of
1152 and what its purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
1153 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
1154 order of commands does not necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1155 however possible to define overwrites with
1156 .Ic commandalias ) .
1157 These commands can also produce a more
1162 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1163 messages; the current message \(en the
1165 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1166 or the first message of the mailbox; the internal variable
1168 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1173 ful of header summaries containing the
1177 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1181 Message content can be displayed with the command
1188 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1190 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1192 the sole difference to the command
1194 which will always use the
1198 will instead only show the first
1200 of a message (maybe even compressed if
1203 Message display experience may improve by setting and adjusting
1204 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
1206 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" .
1209 By default the current message
1211 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1212 a fancy message specification (see
1213 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1216 will display all unread messages,
1221 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1223 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1227 will display the last and the next message, respectively.
1230 (a more substantial alias for
1232 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1233 instead of their content, e.g., the following will search for subjects:
1236 .Dl ? from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1239 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1241 d, but fields can be white- or blacklisted for a variety of
1242 applications by using the command
1244 e.g., to restrict their display to a very restricted set for
1246 .Ql Ic \:headerpick Cd \:type retain Ar \:from to cc subject .
1247 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1248 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1253 will show the raw message content.
1254 Note that historically the global
1256 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1260 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1261 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1262 aims at making the user experience with the many
1265 When reading the system
1271 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1273 modifier (propagating the mailbox to a
1275 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ) ,
1276 then messages which have been read will be automatically moved to a
1278 .Sx "secondary mailbox" ,
1281 file, when the mailbox is left, either by changing the
1282 active mailbox or by quitting \*(UA (also see
1283 .Sx "Message states" )
1284 \(en this automatic moving from a system or primary to the secondary
1285 mailbox is not performed when the variable
1288 Messages can also be explicitly
1290 d to other mailboxes, whereas
1292 keeps the original message.
1294 can be used to write out data content of specific parts of messages.
1297 After examining a message the user can
1299 to the sender and all recipients (which will also be placed in
1302 .Va recipients-in-cc
1305 exclusively to the sender(s).
1307 ing a message will allow editing the new message: the original message
1308 will be contained in the message body, adjusted according to
1310 When replying to or forwarding a message recipient addresses will be
1311 stripped from comments and names unless the internal variable
1318 messages: the former will add a series of
1320 headers, whereas the latter will not; different to newly created
1321 messages editing is not possible and no copy will be saved even with
1323 unless the additional variable
1326 Of course messages can be
1328 and they can spring into existence again via
1330 or when the \*(UA session is ended via the
1335 To end a mail processing session one may either issue
1337 to cause a full program exit, which possibly includes
1338 automatic moving of read messages to the
1340 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1342 as well as updating the \*(OPal line editor
1346 instead in order to prevent any of these actions.
1349 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{
1350 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1352 Messages which are HTML-only become more and more common and of course
1353 many messages come bundled with a bouquet of MIME (Multipurpose Internet
1354 Mail Extensions) parts for, e.g., attachments.
1355 To get a notion of MIME types, \*(UA will first read
1356 .Sx "The mime.types files"
1357 (as configured and allowed by
1358 .Va mimetypes-load-control ) ,
1359 and then add onto that types registered directly with
1361 It (normally) has a default set of types built-in, too.
1362 To improve interaction with faulty MIME part declarations which are
1363 often seen in real-life messages, setting
1364 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1365 will allow \*(UA to verify the given assertion and possibly provide
1366 an alternative MIME type.
1369 Whereas \*(UA \*(OPally supports a simple HTML-to-text converter for
1370 HTML messages, it cannot handle MIME types other than plain text itself.
1371 Instead programs need to become registered to deal with specific MIME
1372 types or file extensions.
1373 These programs may either prepare plain text versions of their input in
1374 order to enable \*(UA to integrate their output neatlessly in its own
1375 message visualization (a mode which is called
1376 .Cd copiousoutput ) ,
1377 or display the content themselves, for example in an external graphical
1378 window: such handlers will only be considered by and for the command
1382 To install a handler program for a specific MIME type an according
1383 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1384 variable needs to be set; to instead define a handler for a specific
1385 file extension the respective
1387 variable can be used \(en these handlers take precedence.
1388 \*(OPally \*(UA supports mail user agent configuration as defined in
1389 RFC 1524; this mechanism (see
1390 .Sx "The Mailcap files" )
1391 will be queried for display or quote handlers if none of the former two
1392 .\" TODO v15-compat "will be" -> "is"
1393 did; it will be the sole source for handlers of other purpose.
1394 A last source for handlers is the MIME type definition itself, when
1395 a (\*(UA specific) type-marker was registered with the command
1397 (which many built-in MIME types do).
1400 E.g., to display a HTML message inline (that is, converted to a more
1401 fancy plain text representation than the built-in converter is capable to
1402 produce) with either of the text-mode browsers
1406 teach \*(UA about MathML documents and make it display them as plain
1407 text, and to open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer,
1408 asynchronously and with some other magic attached:
1410 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1411 ? if [ "$features" !% +filter-html-tagsoup ]
1412 ? #set pipe-text/html='@* elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1413 ? set pipe-text/html='@* lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1414 ? # Display HTML as plain text instead
1415 ? #set pipe-text/html=@
1417 ? mimetype @ application/mathml+xml mathml
1418 ? wysh set pipe-application/pdf='@&=@ \e
1419 trap "rm -f \e"${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1420 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1421 mupdf "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1425 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1428 \*(UA offers some support to ease handling of mailing lists.
1431 promotes all given arguments to known mailing lists, and
1433 sets their subscription attribute, creating them first as necessary.
1438 automatically, but only resets the subscription attribute.)
1439 Using the commands without arguments will show (a subset of) all
1440 currently defined mailing lists.
1445 can be used to mark out messages with configured list addresses
1446 in the header display.
1449 \*(OPally mailing lists may also be specified as (extended) regular
1450 expressions, which allows matching of many addresses with a single
1452 However, all fully qualified list addresses are matched via a fast
1453 dictionary, whereas expressions are placed in (a) list(s) which is
1454 (are) matched sequentially.
1456 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1457 ? set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
1458 reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1459 ? wysh mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1460 ? mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1465 .Va followup-to-honour
1467 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1468 header is honoured when the message is being replied to (via
1474 controls whether this header is created when sending mails; it will be
1475 created automatically for a couple of reasons, too, like when the
1477 .Dq mailing list specific
1482 is used to respond to a message with its
1483 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1487 A difference in between the handling of known and subscribed lists is
1488 that the address of the sender is usually not part of a generated
1489 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1490 when addressing the latter, whereas it is for the former kind of lists.
1491 Usually because there are exceptions: say, if multiple lists are
1492 addressed and not all of them are subscribed lists.
1494 For convenience \*(UA will, temporarily, automatically add a list
1495 address that is presented in the
1497 header of a message that is being responded to to the list of known
1499 Shall that header have existed \*(UA will instead, dependent on the
1501 .Va reply-to-honour ,
1504 for this purpose in order to accept a list administrators' wish that
1505 is supposed to have been manifested like that (but only if it provides
1506 a single address which resides on the same domain as what is stated in
1510 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
1511 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
1513 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
1514 message signing and message encryption.
1515 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
1516 The data can be used to verify that the message was sent using a valid
1517 certificate, that the sender's address in the message header matches
1518 that in the certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
1519 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
1520 it can be read regardless of whether the recipient's software is able to
1522 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
1525 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
1526 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
1527 To encrypt a message, the specific recipient's public encryption key
1529 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
1530 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
1532 A message should always be signed before it is encrypted.
1533 Otherwise, it is still possible that the encrypted message text is
1537 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
1538 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
1539 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
1540 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
1542 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered with OpenSSL and installed
1544 If you trust the source of your OpenSSL software installation,
1545 this offers reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet.
1547 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults
1548 to avoid using the default certificates and point
1552 to a trusted pool of certificates.
1553 In general, a certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA
1554 certificate has been retrieved with.
1557 This trusted pool of certificates is used by the command
1559 to ensure that the given S/MIME messages can be trusted.
1560 If so, verified sender certificates that were embedded in signed
1561 messages can be saved locally with the command
1563 and used by \*(UA to encrypt further communication with these senders:
1565 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1567 ? set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
1568 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
1572 To sign outgoing messages in order to allow receivers to verify the
1573 origin of these messages a personal S/MIME certificate is required.
1574 \*(UA supports password-protected personal certificates (and keys),
1575 for more on this, and its automatization, please see the section
1576 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
1578 .Sx "S/MIME step by step"
1579 shows examplarily how such a private certificate can be obtained.
1580 In general, if such a private key plus certificate
1582 is available, all that needs to be done is to set some variables:
1584 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1585 ? set smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
1586 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
1591 Variables of interest for S/MIME in general are
1594 .Va smime-ca-flags ,
1595 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
1597 .Va smime-crl-file .
1598 For S/MIME signing of interest are
1600 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
1601 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
1603 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
1604 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
1607 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
1610 \*(ID Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to
1611 message subjects or other header fields yet.
1612 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
1613 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
1614 When sending signed messages,
1615 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
1619 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{
1620 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1622 \*(IN For accessing protocol-specific resources usage of Uniform
1623 Resource Locators (URL, RFC 1738) has become omnipresent.
1624 \*(UA expects and understands URLs in the following form;
1627 denote optional parts, optional either because there also exist other
1628 ways to define the information in question or because support of the
1629 part is protocol-specific (e.g.,
1631 is used by the local maildir and the IMAP protocol, but not by POP3);
1636 are specified they must be given in URL percent encoded form (RFC 3986;
1642 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
1645 Note that these \*(UA URLs most often do not conform to any real
1646 standard, but instead represent a normalized variant of RFC 1738 \(en
1647 they are not used in data exchange but only meant as a compact,
1648 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in
1649 a well-known notation.
1652 Many internal variables of \*(UA exist in multiple versions, called
1653 variable chains for the rest of this document: the plain
1658 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
1665 had been specified in the respective URL, otherwise it refers to the plain
1671 that had been found when doing the user chain lookup as is described
1674 will never be in URL percent encoded form, whether it came from an URL
1675 or not; i.e., variable chain name extensions of
1676 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1677 must not be URL percent encoded.
1680 For example, whether an hypothetical URL
1681 .Ql smtp://hey%3Ayou@our.house
1682 had been given that includes a user, or whether the URL was
1683 .Ql smtp://our.house
1684 and the user had been found differently, to lookup the variable chain
1685 .Va smtp-use-starttls
1686 \*(UA first looks for whether
1687 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:hey:you@our.house
1688 is defined, then whether
1689 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:our.house
1690 exists before finally ending up looking at the plain variable itself.
1693 \*(UA obeys the following logic scheme when dealing with the
1694 necessary credential information of an account:
1700 has been given in the URL the variables
1704 are looked up; if no such variable(s) can be found then \*(UA will,
1705 when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
1706 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
1713 specific entry which provides a
1715 name: this lookup will only succeed if unambiguous (one possible matching
1718 It is possible to load encrypted
1723 If there is still no
1725 then \*(UA will fall back to the user who is supposed to run \*(UA,
1726 the identity of which has been fixated during \*(UA startup and is
1727 known to be a valid user on the current host.
1730 Authentication: unless otherwise noted this will lookup the
1731 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
1732 variable chain, falling back to a protocol-specific default should this
1738 has been given in the URL, then if the
1740 has been found through the \*(OPal
1742 that may have already provided the password, too.
1743 Otherwise the variable chain
1744 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
1745 is looked up and used if existent.
1747 Afterwards the complete \*(OPal variable chain
1748 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
1752 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
1753 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
1754 but with a password).
1756 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
1757 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
1758 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
1763 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
1767 header field(s), which means that the values of
1768 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
1770 .Va smime-sign-message-digest
1771 will not be looked up using the
1775 chains from above but instead use the corresponding values from the
1776 message that is being worked on.
1777 In unusual cases multiple and different
1781 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
1782 unusual cases become possible.
1783 The usual case is as short as:
1786 .Dl set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
1787 .Dl \ \ \ \ smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair
1792 contains complete example configurations.
1795 .\" .Ss "Character sets" {{{
1796 .Ss "Character sets"
1798 \*(OP \*(UA detects the character set of the terminal by using
1799 mechanisms that are controlled by the
1801 environment variable
1806 in that order, see there).
1807 The internal variable
1809 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly,
1810 and will thus show up in the output of commands like, e.g.,
1816 However, the user may give a value for
1818 during startup, so that it is possible to send mail in a completely
1820 locale environment, an option which can be used to generate and send,
1821 e.g., 8-bit UTF-8 input data in a pure 7-bit US-ASCII
1823 environment (an example of this can be found in the section
1824 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
1825 Changing the value does not mean much beside that, because several
1826 aspects of the real character set are implied by the locale environment
1827 of the system, which stays unaffected by
1831 If the \*(OPal character set conversion capabilities are not available
1833 does not include the term
1837 will be the only supported character set,
1838 it is simply assumed that it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages
1839 (over the wire an intermediate, configurable
1842 and the rest of this section does not apply;
1843 it may however still be necessary to explicitly set it if automatic
1844 detection fails, since in that case it defaults to
1845 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"Character sets", ./config.h:CHARSET_*!)
1846 LATIN1 a.k.a. ISO-8859-1.
1849 \*(OP When reading messages, their text is converted into
1851 as necessary in order to display them on the users terminal.
1852 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
1853 and replaced by proper substitution characters.
1854 Character set mappings for source character sets can be established with
1857 which may be handy to work around faulty character set catalogues (e.g.,
1858 to add a missing LATIN1 to ISO-8859-1 mapping), or to enforce treatment
1859 of one character set as another one (e.g., to interpret LATIN1 as CP1252).
1861 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
1862 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
1865 When sending messages all their parts and attachments are classified.
1866 Whereas no character set conversion is performed on those parts which
1867 appear to be binary data,
1868 the character set being used must be declared within the MIME header of
1869 an outgoing text part if it contains characters that do not conform to
1870 the set of characters that are allowed by the email standards.
1871 Permissible values for character sets used in outgoing messages can be
1876 which defines a catch-all last-resort fallback character set that is
1877 implicitly appended to the list of character sets in
1881 When replying to a message and the variable
1882 .Va reply-in-same-charset
1883 is set, then the character set of the message being replied to
1884 is tried first (still being a subject of
1885 .Ic charsetalias ) .
1886 And it is also possible to make \*(UA work even more closely related to
1887 the current locale setting automatically by using the variable
1888 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset ,
1889 please see there for more information.
1892 All the specified character sets are tried in order unless the
1893 conversion of the part or attachment succeeds.
1894 If none of the tried (8-bit) character sets is capable to represent the
1895 content of the part or attachment,
1896 then the message will not be sent and its text will optionally be
1900 In general, if a message saying
1901 .Dq cannot convert from a to b
1902 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
1903 selected (terminal) character set,
1904 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
1905 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
1907 locale and/or the variable
1911 The best results are usually achieved when \*(UA is run in a UTF-8
1912 locale on an UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
1913 spectrum of characters is available.
1914 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
1915 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
1916 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
1919 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
1920 .Dq portable character set
1921 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
1922 restricted subset named
1923 .Dq portable filename character set
1924 consists of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
1932 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
1933 .Ss "Message states"
1935 \*(UA differentiates in between several different message states;
1936 the current state will be reflected in header summary displays if
1938 is configured to do so (via the internal variable
1940 and messages can also be selected and be acted upon depending on their
1942 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) .
1943 When operating on the system
1947 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
1948 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the
1950 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1952 may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly via
1953 a successful exit of \*(UA, but not if the special command
1955 is used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
1958 mail-user-agents, the default global
1964 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
1966 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ql new"
1968 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
1969 Such messages are retained even in the
1971 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
1974 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
1975 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
1976 Such messages are retained even in the
1978 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
1981 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2000 will always try to automatically
2006 logical message, and may thus mark multiple messages as read, the
2008 command will do so if the internal variable
2013 command is used, messages that are in a
2015 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2018 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in the
2020 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2022 unless the internal variable
2027 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2033 can be used to access such messages.
2036 The message has been processed by a
2038 command and it will be retained in its current location.
2041 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2047 command is used, messages that are in a
2049 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2052 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in the
2054 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2056 when the internal variable
2062 In addition to these message states, flags which otherwise have no
2063 technical meaning in the mail system except allowing special ways of
2064 addressing them when
2065 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2066 can be set on messages.
2067 These flags are saved with messages and are thus persistent, and are
2068 portable between a set of widely used MUAs.
2070 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ic answered"
2072 Mark messages as having been answered.
2074 Mark messages as being a draft.
2076 Mark messages which need special attention.
2080 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
2081 .Ss "Specifying messages"
2088 can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a number
2089 of messages at once.
2092 deletes messages 1 and 2,
2095 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
2096 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
2100 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
2101 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
2104 The following special message names exist:
2107 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar BaNg"
2109 The current message, the so-called
2113 The message that was previously the current message.
2116 The parent message of the current message,
2117 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
2119 field or the last entry of the
2121 field of the current message.
2124 The next previous undeleted message,
2125 or the next previous deleted message for the
2128 In sorted/threaded mode,
2129 the next previous such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2132 The next undeleted message,
2133 or the next deleted message for the
2136 In sorted/threaded mode,
2137 the next such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2140 The first undeleted message,
2141 or the first deleted message for the
2144 In sorted/threaded mode,
2145 the first such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2149 In sorted/threaded mode,
2150 the last message in the sorted/threaded order.
2154 selects the message addressed with
2158 is any other message specification,
2159 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
2160 Otherwise it is identical to
2165 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
2170 All messages that were included in the
2171 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2172 of the previous command.
2175 An inclusive range of message numbers.
2176 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
2181 .Dq any substring matches
2184 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
2186 is set (and POSIX says
2187 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
2190 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
2191 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
2193 is completely ignored.
2194 For finer control and match boundaries use the
2198 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
2199 All messages that contain
2201 in the subject field (case ignored).
2208 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
2210 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
2213 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
2215 ession; if the \*(OPal regular expression (see
2217 support is available
2219 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
2221 (extended) regular expression characters is seen: in this case this
2222 should match strings correctly which are in the locale
2226 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
2227 part is missing, the search is restricted to the subject field body,
2230 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, as in
2232 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
2234 In order to search for a string that includes a
2236 (commercial at) character the
2238 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
2239 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
2253 respectively and case-insensitively.
2258 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
2267 can be used to perform full text searches \(en whereas the former
2268 searches only the body, the latter also searches the message header.
2270 This message specification performs full text comparison, but even with
2271 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
2272 expression that savely matches only a specific address domain.
2273 To request that the content of the header is treated as a list of
2274 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
2275 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the header name
2276 (abbreviation) with a tilde
2279 .Dl @~f@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$
2282 All messages of state
2286 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
2288 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
2293 Old messages (any not in state
2315 messages (cf. the variable
2316 .Va markanswered ) .
2321 \*(OP Messages classified as spam (see
2322 .Sx "Handling spam" . )
2324 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification.
2330 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
2331 This addressing mode is available with all types of mailbox
2333 s; \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
2334 Strings must be enclosed by double quotes
2336 in their entirety if they contain whitespace or parentheses;
2337 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
2339 is recognized as an escape character.
2340 All string searches are case-insensitive.
2341 When the description indicates that the
2343 representation of an address field is used,
2344 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
2347 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2348 (\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)
2353 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
2354 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
2358 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
2359 .It Ar ( criterion )
2360 All messages that satisfy the given
2362 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
2363 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
2365 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
2366 All messages that satisfy either
2371 To connect more than two criteria using
2373 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
2375 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
2379 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
2382 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
2383 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
2387 .It Ar ( not criterion )
2388 All messages that do not satisfy
2390 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2391 All messages that contain
2393 in the envelope representation of the
2396 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2397 All messages that contain
2399 in the envelope representation of the
2402 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2403 All messages that contain
2405 in the envelope representation of the
2408 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2409 All messages that contain
2414 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2415 All messages that contain
2417 in the envelope representation of the
2420 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2421 All messages that contain
2426 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2427 All messages that contain
2430 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2431 All messages that contain
2433 in their header or body.
2434 .It Ar ( larger size )
2435 All messages that are larger than
2438 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2439 All messages that are smaller than
2443 .It Ar ( before date )
2444 All messages that were received before
2446 which must be in the form
2450 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2452 is the name of the month \(en one of
2453 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2456 is the year as four digits, e.g.,
2460 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2461 .It Ar ( since date )
2462 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2463 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2464 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2465 .It Ar ( senton date )
2466 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2467 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2468 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2470 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2471 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2472 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2473 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2477 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{
2478 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2480 \*(OP Terminal control will be realized through one of the standard
2482 libraries, either the
2484 or, alternatively, the
2486 both of which will be initialized to work with the environment variable
2488 Terminal control will enhance or enable interactive usage aspects, e.g.,
2489 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2490 and extend behaviour of the Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE), which may learn the
2491 byte-sequences of keys like the cursor and function keys.
2494 The internal variable
2496 can be used to overwrite settings or to learn (correct(ed)) keycodes.
2497 \*(UA may also become a fullscreen application by entering the
2498 so-called ca-mode and switching to an alternative exclusive screen
2499 (content) shall the terminal support it and the internal variable
2501 has been set explicitly.
2502 Actual interaction with the chosen library can be disabled completely by
2503 setting the internal variable
2504 .Va termcap-disable ;
2506 will be queried regardless, which is true even if the \*(OPal library
2507 support has not been enabled at configuration time as long as some other
2508 \*(OP which (may) query terminal control sequences has been enabled.
2511 \*(OP The built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2512 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2514 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2515 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2517 Prevent usage of a line editor in interactive mode by setting the
2519 .Va line-editor-disable .
2520 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2521 entries in the internal variable
2523 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2524 The MLE can support a little bit of
2530 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2531 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2532 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2534 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2535 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2539 .Va history-gabby-persist
2544 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2545 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2546 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2547 be generated by holding the
2549 key while pressing the key of desire, e.g.,
2553 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2554 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2555 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2557 to establish its built-in key bindings
2558 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2559 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2560 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2561 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2562 notation is used in the following;
2563 combinations not mentioned either cause job control signals or do not
2564 generate a (unique) keycode:
2568 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql \eBa"
2570 Go to the start of the line
2572 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2575 Move the cursor backward one character
2577 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2580 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2581 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the internal variable
2585 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2588 Go to the end of the line
2590 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2593 Move the cursor forward one character
2595 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2598 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2599 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2600 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2601 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2603 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2606 Backspace: backward delete one character
2608 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
2612 Horizontal tabulator:
2613 try to expand the word before the cursor, supporting the usual
2614 .Sx "Filename transformations"
2616 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ) .
2618 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
2622 commit the current line
2624 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
2627 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
2629 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
2634 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
2637 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
2639 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
2642 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2646 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
2648 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
2651 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
2654 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2655 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
2656 is committed; also see
2660 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
2662 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
2665 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
2667 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
2670 Paste the snarf buffer
2672 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
2680 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
2683 Prompts for a Unicode character (its hexadecimal number) to be inserted
2685 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
2686 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
2687 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
2688 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
2689 that shortcut purpose); this control code is special-treated and cannot
2690 be part of any other sequence, because any occurrence will perform the
2692 function immediately.
2695 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
2698 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
2701 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
2703 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
2706 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
2708 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
2711 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
2712 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
2714 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
2715 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
2716 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
2717 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
2719 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
2720 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
2721 expected input, then it will first be consumed by the active sequence.
2724 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2728 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2732 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2736 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
2739 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
2750 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
2755 ring the audible bell.
2759 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{
2760 .Ss "Coloured display"
2762 \*(OP \*(UA can be configured to support a coloured display and font
2763 attributes by emitting ANSI a.k.a. ISO 6429 SGR (select graphic
2764 rendition) escape sequences.
2765 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
2766 capability of the detected terminal type that is defined by the
2767 environment variable
2769 and which can be fine-tuned by the user via the internal variable
2773 On top of what \*(UA knows about the terminal the boolean variable
2775 defines whether the actually applicable colour and font attribute
2776 sequences should also be generated when output is going to be paged
2777 through the external program defined by the environment variable
2782 This is not enabled by default because different pager programs need
2783 different command line switches or other configuration in order to
2784 support those sequences.
2785 \*(UA however knows about some widely used pagers and in a clean
2786 environment it is often enough to simply set
2788 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
2793 is set then any active usage of colour and font attribute sequences
2794 is suppressed, but without affecting possibly established
2799 To define and control colours and font attributes a single multiplexer
2800 command family exists:
2802 shows or defines colour mappings for the given colour type (e.g.,
2805 can be used to remove mappings of a given colour type.
2806 Since colours are only available in interactive mode, it may make
2807 sense to conditionalize the colour setup by encapsulating it with
2810 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2811 if terminal && [ "$features" =% +colour ]
2812 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
2813 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red from,subject
2814 colour iso view-header fg=red
2816 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
2817 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
2818 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 "subject,from"
2819 colour mono view-header ft=bold
2820 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
2825 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
2828 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
2829 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
2830 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
2832 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
2833 Once messages have been identified as spam their (volatile)
2835 state can be prompted: the
2839 message specifications will address respective messages and their
2841 entries will be used when displaying the
2843 in the header display.
2848 rates the given messages and sets their
2851 If the spam interface offers spam scores those can also be displayed in
2852 the header display by including the
2862 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
2863 the given messages as
2867 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
2869 of messages; it adheres to their current
2871 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
2876 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
2878 message flag, without any interface interaction.
2887 requires a running instance of the
2889 server in order to function, started with the option
2891 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
2893 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2894 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
2895 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
2896 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
2900 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
2902 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2903 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
2904 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
2905 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
2907 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
2908 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
2909 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
2913 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
2915 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
2918 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2919 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
2920 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
2921 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
2922 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
2923 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
2924 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
2925 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
2929 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
2930 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
2931 perform the local spam check last:
2933 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2934 define spamdelhook {
2936 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
2937 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
2938 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
2939 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
2945 set folder-hook-FOLDER=spamdelhook
2949 See also the documentation for the variables
2950 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
2951 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
2952 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
2955 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
2958 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
2961 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
2964 \*(UA reads input in lines.
2965 An unquoted reverse solidus
2967 at the end of a command line
2969 the newline character: it is discarded and the next line of input is
2970 used as a follow-up line, with all leading whitespace removed;
2971 once an entire line is completed, the whitespace characters
2972 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
2973 as well as those defined by the variable
2975 are removed from the beginning and end.
2976 Placing any whitespace characters at the beginning of a line will
2977 prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
2981 The beginning of such input lines is then scanned for the name of
2982 a known command: command names may be abbreviated, in which case the
2983 first command that matches the given prefix will be used.
2984 .Sx "Command modifiers"
2985 may prefix a command in order to modify its behaviour.
2986 A name may also be a
2988 which will become expanded until no more expansion is possible.
2989 Once the command that shall be executed is known, the remains of the
2990 input line will be interpreted according to command-specific rules:
2991 (\*(ID) some commands use
2992 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ,
2993 so that a single input line may actually consist of multiple commands,
2994 but others pass it unchanged as
2995 .Sx "Raw data arguments for codec commands" .
3000 can be used to show the list of all commands, either alphabetically
3001 sorted or in prefix search order (these do not match, also because the
3002 POSIX standard prescribes a set of abbreviations).
3003 \*(OPally the command
3007 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
3008 command matching the expanded argument, as in
3010 which should be a shorthand of
3012 with these documentation strings both commands support a more
3014 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command and other
3015 information which applies; a handy suggestion might thus be:
3017 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3019 # Before v15: need to enable sh(1)ell-style on _entire_ line!
3020 localopts 1;wysh set verbose;ignerr eval "${@}";return ${?}
3022 ? commandalias xv '\ecall __xv'
3026 .\" .Ss "Command modifiers" {{{
3027 .Ss "Command modifiers"
3029 Commands may be prefixed by one or multiple command modifiers.
3033 The modifier reverse solidus
3036 to be placed first, prevents
3038 expansions on the remains of the line, e.g.,
3040 will always evaluate the command
3042 even if an (command)alias of the same name exists.
3044 content may itself contain further command modifiers, including
3045 an initial reverse solidus to prevent further expansions.
3051 indicates that any error generated by the following command should be
3052 ignored by the state machine and not cause a program exit with enabled
3054 or for the standardized exit cases in
3059 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3060 will be set to the real exit status of the command regardless.
3063 Some commands support the
3066 modifier: if used, they expect the name of a variable, which can itself
3067 be a variable, i.e., shell expansion is applied, as their first
3068 argument, and will place their computation result in it instead of the
3069 default location (it is usually written to standard output).
3071 The given name will be tested for being a valid
3073 variable name, and may therefore only consist of upper- and lowercase
3074 characters, digits, and the underscore; the hyphen-minus may be used as
3075 a non-portable extension; digits may not be used as first, hyphen-minus
3076 may not be used as last characters.
3077 In addition the name may either not be one of the known
3078 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3079 or must otherwise refer to a writable (non-boolean) value variable.
3080 The actual put operation may fail nonetheless, e.g., if the variable
3081 expects a number argument only a number will be accepted.
3082 Any error during these operations causes the command as such to fail,
3083 and the error number
3086 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTSUP ,
3093 Last, but not least, the modifier
3096 can be used for some old and established commands to choose the new
3097 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3098 rules over the traditional
3099 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting" .
3103 .\" .Ss "Message list arguments" {{{
3104 .Ss "Message list arguments"
3106 Some commands expect arguments that represent messages (actually
3107 their symbolic message numbers), as has been documented above under
3108 .Sx "Specifying messages"
3110 If no explicit message list has been specified, the next message
3111 forward that satisfies the command's requirements will be used,
3112 and if there are no messages forward of the current message,
3113 the search proceeds backwards;
3114 if there are no good messages at all to be found, an error message is
3115 shown and the command is aborted.
3118 .\" .Ss "Old-style argument quoting" {{{
3119 .Ss "Old-style argument quoting"
3121 \*(ID This section documents the old, traditional style of quoting
3122 non-message-list arguments to commands which expect this type of
3123 arguments: whereas still used by the majority of such commands, the new
3124 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3125 may be available even for those via
3128 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
3129 Nonetheless care must be taken, because only new commands have been
3130 designed with all the capabilities of the new quoting rules in mind,
3131 which can, e.g., generate control characters.
3134 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3136 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
3141 any whitespace, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
3142 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
3143 part of the argument.
3144 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
3146 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
3147 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
3153 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
3154 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
3158 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
3159 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
3163 .\" .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting" {{{
3164 .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting"
3166 Commands which don't expect message-list arguments use
3168 ell-style, and therefore POSIX standardized, argument parsing and
3170 \*(ID Most new commands only support these new rules and are flagged
3171 \*(NQ, some elder ones can use them with the command modifier
3173 in the future only this type of argument quoting will remain.
3176 A command line is parsed from left to right and an input token is
3177 completed whenever an unquoted, otherwise ignored, metacharacter is seen.
3178 Metacharacters are vertical bar
3184 as well as all characters from the variable
3187 .Cm space , tabulator , newline .
3188 The additional metacharacters left and right parenthesis
3190 and less-than and greater-than signs
3194 supports are not used, and are treated as ordinary characters: for one
3195 these characters are a vivid part of email addresses, and it seems
3196 highly unlikely that their function will become meaningful to \*(UA.
3198 .Bd -filled -offset indent
3199 .Sy Compatibility note:
3200 \*(ID Please note that even many new-style commands do not yet honour
3202 to parse their arguments: whereas the
3204 ell is a language with syntactic elements of clearly defined semantics,
3205 \*(UA parses entire input lines and decides on a per-command base what
3206 to do with the rest of the line.
3207 This also means that whenever an unknown command is seen all that \*(UA
3208 can do is cancellation of the processing of the remains of the line.
3210 It also often depends on an actual subcommand of a multiplexer command
3211 how the rest of the line should be treated, and until v15 we are not
3212 capable to perform this deep inspection of arguments.
3213 Nonetheless, at least the following commands which work with positional
3214 parameters fully support
3216 for an almost shell-compatible field splitting:
3217 .Ic call , call_if , read , vpospar , xcall .
3221 Any unquoted number sign
3223 at the beginning of a new token starts a comment that extends to the end
3224 of the line, and therefore ends argument processing.
3225 An unquoted dollar sign
3227 will cause variable expansion of the given name, which must be a valid
3229 ell-style variable name (see
3231 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3234 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
3235 enclosing the name is supported (i.e., to subdivide a token).
3238 Whereas the metacharacters
3239 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3240 only complete an input token, vertical bar
3246 also act as control operators and perform control functions.
3247 For now supported is semicolon
3249 which terminates a single command, therefore sequencing the command line
3250 and making the remainder of the line a subject to reevaluation.
3251 With sequencing, multiple command argument types and quoting rules may
3252 therefore apply to a single line, which can become problematic before
3253 v15: e.g., the first of the following will cause surprising results.
3256 .Dl ? echo one; set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3257 .Dl ? echo one; wysh set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3260 Quoting is a mechanism that will remove the special meaning of
3261 metacharacters and reserved words, and will prevent expansion.
3262 There are four quoting mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes,
3263 double-quotes and dollar-single-quotes:
3266 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3268 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
3269 with the escape character reverse solidus
3273 Arguments which are enclosed in
3274 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
3275 retain their literal value.
3276 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
3279 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
3280 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
3281 is retained, with the exception of dollar sign
3283 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
3285 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
3287 which will escape any of the characters dollar sign
3289 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
3293 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
3295 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
3296 but has no special meaning otherwise.
3299 Arguments enclosed in
3300 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
3301 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
3302 expanded as follows:
3304 .Bl -tag -compact -width "Ql \eNNN"
3306 bell control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BEL).
3308 backspace control characer (ASCII and ISO-10646 BS).
3310 escape control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 ESC).
3314 form feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 FF).
3316 line feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 LF).
3318 carriage return control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 CR).
3320 horizontal tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 HT).
3322 vertical tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 VT).
3324 emits a reverse solidus character.
3328 double quote (escaping is optional).
3330 eight-bit byte with the octal value
3332 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
3334 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3336 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
3338 (one or two hexadecimal characters).
3339 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3341 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
3343 (one to eight hexadecimal digits) \(em note that Unicode defines the
3344 maximum codepoint ever to be supported as
3349 This escape is only supported in locales that support Unicode (see
3350 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3351 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
3352 point is ASCII compatible or (if the \*(OPal character set conversion is
3353 available) can be represented in the current locale.
3354 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3358 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal digits.
3360 Emits the non-printable (ASCII and compatible) C0 control codes
3361 0 (NUL) to 31 (US), and 127 (DEL).
3362 Printable representations of ASCII control codes can be created by
3363 mapping them to a different part of the ASCII character set, which is
3364 possible by adding the number 64 for the codes 0 to 31, e.g., 7 (BEL) is
3365 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
3366 The real operation is a bitwise logical XOR with 64 (bit 7 set, see
3368 thus also covering code 127 (DEL), which is mapped to 63 (question mark):
3369 .Ql ? vexpr ^ 127 64 .
3371 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
3372 visualization purposes of control codes, e.g.,
3374 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
3376 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO-10646, ISO C) aliases,
3377 as shown above (e.g.,
3381 whenever such an alias exists it will be used for display purposes.
3382 The control code NUL
3384 a non-standard extension) will suppress further output for the remains
3385 of the token (which may extend beyond the current quote), or, depending
3386 on the context, the remains of all arguments for the current command.
3388 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
3389 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
3391 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
3398 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3399 ? echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
3400 ? echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
3401 ? echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
3405 .\" .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands" {{{
3406 .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands"
3408 A special set of commands, which all have the string
3410 in their name, e.g.,
3414 take raw string data as input, which means that the content of the
3415 command input line is passed completely unexpanded and otherwise
3416 unchanged: like this the effect of the actual codec is visible without
3417 any noise of possible shell quoting rules etc., i.e., the user can input
3418 one-to-one the desired or questionable data.
3419 To gain a level of expansion, the entire command line can be
3423 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3424 ? vput shcodec res encode /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3426 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3428 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3429 ? eval shcodec d $res
3430 /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3434 .\" .Ss "Filename transformations" {{{
3435 .Ss "Filename transformations"
3437 Filenames, where expected, and unless documented otherwise, are
3438 subsequently subject to the following filename transformations, in
3441 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3443 If the given name is a registered
3445 it will be replaced with the expanded shortcut.
3448 The filename is matched against the following patterns or strings:
3450 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".Ar %user"
3452 (Number sign) is expanded to the previous file.
3454 (Percent sign) is replaced by the invoking
3455 .Mx -ix "primary system mailbox"
3456 user's primary system mailbox, which either is the (itself expandable)
3458 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3460 if that is set, or a built-in compile-time default otherwise.
3462 Expands to the primary system mailbox of
3464 (and never the value of
3466 regardless of its actual setting).
3468 (Ampersand) is replaced with the invoking users
3469 .Mx -ix "secondary mailbox"
3470 secondary mailbox, the
3477 directory (if that variable is set).
3479 Expands to the same value as
3481 but has special meaning when used with, e.g., the command
3483 the file will be treated as a primary system mailbox by, e.g., the
3487 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3488 session will be moved to the
3490 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3494 Meta expansions are applied to the resulting filename, as applicable to
3495 the resulting file access protocol (also see
3496 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
3497 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
3498 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
3500 For the file-protocol, a leading tilde
3502 character will be replaced by the expansion of
3504 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
3505 directory of the given user is used instead.
3507 In addition a shell expansion as if specified in double-quotes (see
3508 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
3509 is applied, so that any occurrence of
3513 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible;
3514 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3517 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism.
3519 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
3521 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, e.g., a file
3522 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
3524 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
3528 .\" .Ss "Commands" {{{
3531 The following commands are available:
3533 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
3540 command which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the
3541 previously executed command if the internal variable
3544 This command supports
3547 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
3548 and manages the error number
3550 A 0 or positive exit status
3552 reflects the exit status of the command, negative ones that
3553 an error happened before the command was executed, or that the program
3554 did not exit cleanly, but, e.g., due to a signal: the error number is
3555 .Va ^ERR Ns -CHILD ,
3559 In conjunction with the
3561 modifier the following special cases exist:
3562 a negative exit status occurs if the collected data could not be stored
3563 in the given variable, which is a
3565 error that should otherwise not occur.
3566 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
3567 indicates that no temporary file could be created to collect the command
3568 output at first glance.
3569 In case of catchable out-of-memory situations
3571 will occur and \*(UA will try to store the empty string, just like with
3572 all other detected error conditions.
3577 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
3579 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
3582 indicating special character, which means that, e.g., trailing comments
3583 on a line are not possible.
3587 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
3593 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
3594 a numeric argument n.
3598 Show the current message number (the
3603 Show a brief summary of commands.
3604 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
3605 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
3606 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
3607 synopsis, try, e.g.,
3612 and see how the output changes.
3613 This mode also supports a more
3615 output, which will provide the informations documented for
3626 .It Ic account , unaccount
3627 (ac, una) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
3628 Accounts are special incarnations of
3630 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
3631 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
3632 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
3634 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
3639 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted by the
3640 latter command, and in one operation with the special name
3643 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
3644 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
3646 of that account will be activated (as via
3648 a possibly installed
3650 will be run, and the internal variable
3653 The two argument form is identical to defining a macro as via
3655 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3657 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
3658 set from='(My Name) myname@myisp.example'
3659 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
3666 Perform email address codec transformations on raw-data argument, rather
3667 according to email standards (RFC 5322; \*(ID will furtherly improve).
3671 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
3672 and manages the error number
3674 The first argument must be either
3675 .Ar [+[+[+]]]e[ncode] ,
3679 and specifies the operation to perform on the rest of the line.
3682 Decoding will show how a standard-compliant MUA will display the given
3683 argument, which should be an email address.
3684 Please be aware that most MUAs have difficulties with the address
3685 standards, and vary wildly when (comments) in parenthesis,
3687 strings, or quoted-pairs, as below, become involved.
3688 \*(ID \*(UA currently does not perform decoding when displaying addresses.
3691 Skinning is identical to decoding but only outputs the plain address,
3692 without any string, comment etc. components.
3693 Another difference is that it may fail with the error number
3697 if decoding fails to find a(n) (valid) email address, in which case the
3698 unmodified input will be output again.
3701 Encoding supports four different modes, lesser automated versions can be
3702 chosen by prefixing one, two or three plus signs: the standard imposes
3703 a special meaning on some characters, which thus have to be transformed
3704 to so-called quoted-pairs by pairing them with a reverse solidus
3706 in order to remove the special meaning; this might change interpretation
3707 of the entire argument from what has been desired, however!
3708 Specify one plus sign to remark that parenthesis shall be left alone,
3709 two for not turning double quotation marks into quoted-pairs, and three
3710 for also leaving any user-specified reverse solidus alone.
3711 The result will always be valid, if a successful exit status is reported.
3712 \*(ID Addresses need to be specified in between angle brackets
3715 if the construct becomes more difficult, otherwise the current parser
3716 will fail; it is not smart enough to guess right.
3718 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3719 ? addrc enc "Hey, you",<diet@exam.ple>\e out\e there
3720 "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3721 ? addrc d "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3722 "Hey, you", \e out\e there <diet@exam.ple>
3723 ? addrc s "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3730 .It Ic alias , unalias
3731 (a, una) Aliases are a method of creating personal distribution lists
3732 that map a single alias name to none to multiple real receivers;
3733 these aliases become expanded after message composing is completed.
3734 The latter command removes the given list of aliases, the special name
3736 will discard all existing aliases.
3737 The former command shows all currently defined aliases when used without
3738 arguments, and with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
3739 With more than one argument, creates or appends to the alias name given
3740 as the first argument the remaining arguments.
3741 Alias names are restricted to alphabetic characters, digits, the
3742 underscore, hyphen-minus, the number sign, colon, commercial at and
3743 period, the last character can also be the dollar sign:
3744 .Ql [[:alnum:]_#:@.-]+$? .
3748 .It Ic alternates , unalternates
3749 \*(NQ (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses or names of the active user,
3750 members of which will be removed from recipient lists.
3751 The latter command removes the given list of alternates, the special name
3753 will discard all existing aliases.
3754 The former command manages the error number
3756 and shows the current set of alternates when used without arguments; in
3757 this mode it supports
3760 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
3761 Otherwise the given arguments (after being checked for validity) are
3762 appended to the list of alternate names; in
3764 mode they replace that list instead.
3765 There is a set of implicit alternates which is formed of the values of
3774 .It Ic answered , unanswered
3775 Take a message lists and mark each message as having been answered,
3776 having not been answered, respectively.
3777 Messages will be marked answered when being
3779 to automatically if the
3783 .Sx "Message states" .
3788 .It Ic bind , unbind
3789 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
3790 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
3791 with freely configurable key bindings.
3792 The latter command removes from the given context the given key binding,
3793 both of which may be specified as a wildcard
3797 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
3798 Due to initialization order unbinding will not work for built-in key
3799 bindings upon program startup, however: please use
3800 .Va line-editor-no-defaults
3801 for this purpose instead.
3804 With one argument the former command shows all key bindings for the
3805 given context, specifying an asterisk
3807 will show the bindings of all contexts; a more verbose listing will be
3808 produced if either of
3813 With two or more arguments a binding is (re)established:
3814 the first argument is the context to which the binding shall apply,
3815 the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
3817 which form the binding, and any remaining arguments form the expansion.
3818 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
3819 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, a commercial at
3821 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
3822 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
3823 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
3826 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding will not be seen
3827 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
3828 This is not true for the shared binding
3830 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
3831 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
3832 The available contexts are the shared
3836 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
3838 which applies to compose mode only.
3842 which form the binding are specified as a comma-separated list of
3843 byte-sequences, where each list entry corresponds to one key(press).
3844 A list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
3846 also refer to the name of a terminal capability; several dozen names
3847 will be compiled in and may be specified either by their
3849 or, if existing, by their
3851 name, regardless of the actually used \*(OPal terminal control library.
3852 It is possible to use any capability, as long as the name is resolvable
3853 by the \*(OPal control library or was defined via the internal variable
3855 Input sequences are not case-normalized, so that an exact match is
3856 required to update or remove a binding.
3859 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3860 ? bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
3861 ? bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc, Delete
3862 ? bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo An editable binding@'
3863 ? bind default a,b,c rm -irf / @ # Another editable binding
3864 ? bind default :kf1 File %
3865 ? bind compose :kf1 ~e
3869 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
3870 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, before being parsed
3871 and expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
3872 whitespace needs to be properly quoted, see
3873 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
3874 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
3875 defunctional if the locale does not support Unicode (see
3876 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3877 and using terminal capabilities does so if no (corresponding) terminal
3878 control support is (currently) available.
3881 The following terminal capability names are built-in and can be used in
3883 or (if available) the two-letter
3886 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
3889 can be used to show all the capabilities of
3891 or the given terminal type;
3894 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
3897 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
3898 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
3900 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
3902 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
3903 \(em shifted variant.
3904 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
3905 Clear to end of line.
3906 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
3908 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
3910 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
3911 \(em shifted variant.
3912 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
3914 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
3915 \(em shifted variant.
3916 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
3918 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
3920 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
3922 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
3923 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
3924 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
3925 \(em shifted variant.
3926 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
3927 Right cursor (ditto).
3928 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
3929 \(em shifted variant.
3930 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
3931 Down cursor (ditto).
3933 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
3934 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
3937 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
3938 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
3940 Add one for each function key up to
3945 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
3947 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
3949 Add one for each function key up to
3957 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
3959 For example, the delete key,
3961 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
3963 then a number is appended for the states
3975 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
3977 The same for the left cursor key,
3979 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
3982 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (e.g.,
3984 for bindings which describe user key combinations (as opposed to purely
3985 terminal capability based ones), in order to avoid ambiguities whether
3986 input belongs to key sequences or not; it also reduces search time.
3989 may help shall keys and sequences be falsely recognized.
3994 \*(NQ Calls the given macro, which must have been created via
3999 Parameters given to macros are implicitly local to the macro's scope, and
4000 may be accessed via special (positional) parameters, e.g.,
4005 The positional parameters may be removed by
4007 ing them off the stack (exceeding the supported number of arguments
4009 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW ) ,
4010 and are otherwise controllable via
4015 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4016 can be reverted before the current level regains control by setting
4018 for called macro(s) (or in them, of course).
4019 Macro execution can be terminated at any time by calling
4023 Calling macros recursively will at some time excess the stack size
4024 limit, causing a hard program abortion; if recursively calling a macro
4025 is the last command of the current macro, consider to use the command
4027 which will first release all resources of the current macro before
4028 replacing the current macro with the called one.
4029 Numeric and string operations can be performed via
4033 may be helpful to recreate argument lists.
4035 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4037 echo Parameter 1 of ${#} is ${1}, all: ${*} / ${@}
4040 call exmac Hello macro exmac!
4048 if the given macro has been created via
4050 but doesn't fail nor warn if the macro doesn't exist.
4054 (ch) Change the working directory to
4056 or the given argument.
4062 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
4063 Takes a message list and a filename and saves the certificates
4064 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
4065 human-readable and PEM format.
4066 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
4067 respective message senders by setting
4068 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
4073 .It Ic charsetalias , uncharsetalias
4074 \*(NQ Manage (character set conversion) character set alias mappings,
4075 as documented in the section
4076 .Sx "Character sets" .
4077 Character set aliases are expanded recursively, but no expansion is
4078 performed on values of the user-settable variables, e.g.,
4080 These are effectively no-operations if character set conversion
4081 is not available (i.e., no
4085 Without arguments the list of all currently defined aliases is shown,
4086 with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
4087 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of character sets and
4088 their desired target alias name, creating new or changing already
4089 existing aliases, as necessary.
4091 The latter deletes all aliases given as arguments, the special argument
4093 will remove all aliases.
4097 (ch) Change the working directory to
4099 or the given argument.
4105 .It Ic collapse , uncollapse
4106 Only applicable to threaded mode.
4107 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
4108 in header summaries, except for
4112 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4113 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4114 The latter command undoes collapsing.
4119 .It Ic colour , uncolour
4120 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings of and for a
4121 .Sx "Coloured display" .
4122 The type of colour is given as the (case-insensitive) first argument,
4123 which must be one of
4125 for 256-colour terminals,
4130 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 color palette and
4134 for monochrome terminals.
4135 Monochrome terminals cannot deal with colours, but only (some) font
4139 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
4140 for the given colour type is shown (as a special case giving
4144 will show the mappings of all types).
4145 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, and the third
4146 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
4147 specification(s), and the optional fourth argument can be used to
4148 specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are tested in
4149 (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been found, and
4150 the default mapping (if any has been established) will only be chosen as
4152 The types of precondition available depend on the mappable slot (see
4153 .Sx "Coloured display"
4154 for some examples), the following of which exist:
4157 Mappings prefixed with
4159 are used for the \*(OPal built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
4160 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4161 and do not support preconditions.
4163 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4165 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
4166 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
4173 Mappings prefixed with
4175 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
4177 (the current message) and
4179 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
4180 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
4182 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4184 This mapping is used for the
4186 that can be created with the
4190 formats of the variable
4193 For the complete header summary line except the
4195 and the thread structure.
4197 For the thread structure which can be created with the
4199 format of the variable
4204 Mappings prefixed with
4206 are used when displaying messages.
4208 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4210 This mapping is used for so-called
4212 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines.
4215 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
4216 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
4217 available then if any of the
4219 (extended) regular expression characters is seen the precondition will
4220 be evaluated as (an extended) one.
4222 For the introductional message info line.
4223 .It Ar view-partinfo
4224 For MIME part info lines.
4228 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
4229 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
4239 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
4240 attributes for a single mapping.
4243 foreground colour attribute:
4253 To specify a 256-color mode a decimal number colour specification in
4254 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
4256 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
4258 the standard ISO 6429 colors, as above.
4260 high intensity variants of the standard colors.
4262 216 colors in tuples of 6.
4264 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
4266 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4268 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4269 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4271 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4272 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4274 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4275 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4279 background colour attribute (see
4281 for possible values).
4287 will remove for the given colour type (the special type
4289 selects all) the given mapping; if the optional precondition argument is
4290 given only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4293 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed), thus
4295 will remove all established mappings.
4300 .It Ic commandalias , uncommandalias
4301 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, command aliases.
4302 An (command)alias can be used everywhere a normal command can be used,
4303 but always takes precedence: any arguments that are given to the command
4304 alias are joined onto the alias expansion, and the resulting string
4305 forms the command line that is, in effect, executed.
4306 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name
4308 will remove all existing aliases.
4309 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4310 known aliases, with one argument only the expansion of the given one.
4312 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
4313 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
4314 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
4315 An alias may itself expand to another alias, but to avoid expansion loops
4316 further expansion will be prevented if an alias refers to itself or if
4317 an expansion depth limit is reached.
4318 Explicit expansion prevention is available via reverse solidus
4321 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
4322 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4324 \*(uA: `commandalias': no such alias: xx
4325 ? commandalias xx echo hello,
4327 commandalias xx 'echo hello,'
4336 (C) Copy messages to files whose names are derived from the author of
4337 the respective message and do not mark them as being saved;
4338 otherwise identical to
4343 (c) Copy messages to the named file and do not mark them as being saved;
4344 otherwise identical to
4349 Show the name of the current working directory, as reported by
4354 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4355 The return status is tracked via
4360 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4362 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4366 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4368 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4372 .It Ic define , undefine
4373 Without arguments the current list of macros, including their content,
4374 is shown, otherwise a macro is defined, replacing an existing macro of
4376 A macro definition is a sequence of commands in the following form:
4377 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4386 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
4391 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, e.g., a
4393 It is possible to localize adjustments, like creation, deletion and
4395 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
4398 command; the scope which is localized depends on how (i.e.,
4400 normal macro, folder hook, hook,
4402 switch) the macro is invoked.
4403 Execution of a macro body can be stopped from within by calling
4407 ed macro, given positional parameters can be
4409 ed, or become completely replaced, removed etc. via
4412 The latter command deletes the given macro, the special name
4414 will discard all existing macros.
4415 Creation and deletion of (a) macro(s) can be performed from within
4420 .It Ic delete , undelete
4421 (d, u) Marks the given message list as being or not being
4423 respectively; if no argument has been specified then the usual search
4424 for a visible message is performed, as documented for
4425 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
4426 showing only the next input prompt if the search fails.
4427 Deleted messages will neither be saved in the
4429 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4431 nor will they be available for most other commands.
4434 variable is set, the new
4436 or the last message restored, respectively, is automatically
4446 Superseded by the multiplexer
4452 Delete the given messages and automatically
4456 if one exists, regardless of the setting of
4463 up or down by one message when given
4467 argument, respectively.
4471 .It Ic draft , undraft
4472 Take message lists and mark each given message as being draft, or not
4473 being draft, respectively, as documented in the section
4474 .Sx "Message states" .
4478 \*(NQ (ec) Echoes arguments to standard output and writes a trailing
4479 newline, whereas the otherwise identical
4482 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
4484 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4485 are applied to the expanded arguments.
4491 except that is echoes to standard error.
4494 In interactive sessions the \*(OPal message ring queue for
4496 will be used instead, if available.
4502 but does not write a trailing newline.
4508 but does not write a trailing newline.
4512 (e) Point the text editor (as defined in
4514 at each message from the given list in turn.
4515 Modified contents are discarded unless the
4517 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
4518 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
4523 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4524 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
4526 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
4527 if it evaluates true.
4532 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4533 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
4537 commands was true, the
4543 (en) Marks the end of an
4544 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4545 conditional execution block.
4550 \*(NQ \*(UA has a strict notion about which variables are
4551 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4552 and which are managed in the program
4554 Since some of the latter are a vivid part of \*(UAs functioning,
4555 however, they are transparently integrated into the normal handling of
4556 internal variables via
4560 To integrate other environment variables of choice into this
4561 transparent handling, and also to export internal variables into the
4562 process environment where they normally are not, a
4564 needs to become established with this command, as in, e.g.,
4567 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB TZ
4570 Afterwards changing such variables with
4572 will cause automatic updates of the program environment, and therefore
4573 be inherited by newly created child processes.
4574 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
4575 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
4577 will remove them also from the program environment, but in any way
4578 the knowledge they ever have been
4581 Note that this implies that
4583 may cause loss of such links.
4588 will remove an existing link, but leaves the variables as such intact.
4589 Additionally the subcommands
4593 are provided, which work exactly the same as the documented commands
4597 but (additionally un)link the variable(s) with the program environment
4598 and thus immediately export them to, or remove them from (if possible),
4599 respectively, the program environment.
4604 \*(OP Since \*(UA uses the console as a user interface it can happen
4605 that messages scroll by too fast to become recognized.
4606 An error message ring queue is available which stores duplicates of any
4607 error message and notifies the user in interactive sessions whenever
4608 a new error has occurred.
4609 The queue is finite: if its maximum size is reached any new message
4610 replaces the eldest.
4613 can be used to manage this message queue: if given
4615 or no argument the queue will be displayed and cleared,
4617 will only clear all messages from the queue.
4621 \*(NQ Construct a command by concatenating the arguments, separated with
4622 a single space character, and then evaluate the result.
4623 This command passes through the exit status
4627 of the evaluated command; also see
4629 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4640 call yyy '\ecall xxx' "b\e$'\et'u ' "
4648 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
4649 any saving of messages in the
4651 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4653 as well as a possibly tracked line editor
4655 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
4657 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
4658 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
4659 otherwise success indicating status.
4665 but open the mailbox read-only.
4670 (fi) The file command switches to a new mailbox.
4671 Without arguments it shows status information of the current mailbox.
4672 If an argument is given, it will write out changes (such as deletions)
4673 the user has made, open a new mailbox, update the internal variables
4674 .Va mailbox-resolved
4676 .Va mailbox-display ,
4677 and optionally display a summary of
4684 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4685 will be applied to the
4689 prefixes are, i.e., URL syntax is understood, e.g.,
4690 .Ql maildir:///tmp/mdirbox :
4691 if a protocol prefix is used the mailbox type is fixated and neither
4692 the auto-detection (read on) nor the
4695 \*(OPally URLs can also be used to access network resources, and it is
4696 possible to proxy all network traffic over a SOCKS5 server given via
4700 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
4701 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
4704 \*(OPally supported network protocols are
4708 (POP3 with SSL/TLS encrypted transport),
4714 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
4716 Network URLs require a special encoding as documented in the section
4717 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
4720 If the resulting file protocol (MBOX database)
4722 is located on a local filesystem then the list of all registered
4724 s is traversed in order to see whether a transparent intermediate
4725 conversion step is necessary to handle the given mailbox, in which case
4726 \*(UA will use the found hook to load and save data into and from
4727 a temporary file, respectively.
4728 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes.
4729 For example, the following creates hooks for the
4731 compression tool and a combined compressed and encrypted format:
4733 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4735 gzip 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' \e
4736 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
4740 MBOX database files are generally locked during file operations in order
4741 to avoid inconsistencies due to concurrent modifications.
4742 \*(OPal Mailbox files which \*(UA treats as the system
4747 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
4748 es in general will also be protected by so-called dotlock files, the
4749 traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
4753 will be created for the duration of the synchronization \(em
4754 as necessary a privilege-separated dotlock child process will be used
4755 to accommodate for necessary privilege adjustments in order to create
4756 the dotlock file in the same directory
4757 and with the same user and group identities as the file of interest.
4760 \*(UA by default uses tolerant POSIX rules when reading MBOX database
4761 files, but it will detect invalid message boundaries in this mode and
4762 complain (even more with
4764 if any is seen: in this case
4766 can be used to create a valid MBOX database from the invalid input.
4769 If no protocol has been fixated, and
4771 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
4776 then it is treated as a folder in
4779 The maildir format stores each message in its own file, and has been
4780 designed so that file locking is not necessary when reading or writing
4784 \*(ID If no protocol has been fixated and no existing file has
4785 been found, the variable
4787 controls the format of mailboxes yet to be created.
4792 .It Ic filetype , unfiletype
4793 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, file handler hooks,
4794 which provide (shell) commands that enable \*(UA to load and save MBOX
4795 files from and to files with the registered file extensions;
4796 it will use an intermediate temporary file to store the plain data.
4797 The latter command removes the hooks for all given extensions,
4799 will remove all existing handlers.
4801 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4802 defined file hooks, with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
4803 Otherwise three arguments are expected, the first specifying the file
4804 extension for which the hook is meant, and the second and third defining
4805 the load- and save commands, respectively, to deal with the file type,
4806 both of which must read from standard input and write to standard
4808 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes (\*(ID except below).
4809 \*(ID For now too much work is done, and files are oftened read in twice
4810 where once would be sufficient: this can cause problems if a filetype is
4811 changed while such a file is opened; this was already so with the
4812 built-in support of .gz etc. in Heirloom, and will vanish in v15.
4813 \*(ID For now all handler strings are passed to the
4814 .Ev SHELL for evaluation purposes; in the future a
4816 prefix to load and save commands may mean to bypass this shell instance:
4817 placing a leading space will avoid any possible misinterpretations.
4818 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4819 ? filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
4820 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
4821 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
4822 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
4823 ? set record=+sent.zst.pgp
4828 .It Ic flag , unflag
4829 Take message lists and mark the messages as being flagged, or not being
4830 flagged, respectively, for urgent/special attention.
4832 .Sx "Message states" .
4841 With no arguments, list the names of the folders in the folder directory.
4842 With an existing folder as an argument,
4843 lists the names of folders below the named folder.
4849 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
4850 recipient's address (instead of in
4857 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
4858 recipient's address (instead of in
4865 but responds to all recipients regardless of the
4870 .It Ic followupsender
4873 but responds to the sender only regardless of the
4881 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
4882 recipient's address (instead of in
4887 Takes a message and the address of a recipient
4888 and forwards the message to him.
4889 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
4890 with the value of the
4891 .Va forward-inject-head
4892 variable preceding it.
4893 To filter the included header fields to the desired subset use the
4895 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
4897 Only the first part of a multipart message is included unless
4898 .Va forward-as-attachment ,
4899 and recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
4900 unless the internal variable
4904 This may generate the errors
4905 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
4906 if no receiver has been specified,
4908 if some addressees where rejected by
4911 if no applicable messages have been given,
4913 if multiple messages have been specified,
4915 if an I/O error occurs,
4917 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
4923 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
4924 their message headers, exactly as via
4926 An alias of this command is
4929 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
4940 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
4944 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
4947 .It Ic ghost , unghost
4950 .Ic uncommandalias .
4954 .It Ic headerpick , unheaderpick
4955 \*(NQ Multiplexer command to manage white- and blacklisting
4956 selections of header fields for a variety of applications.
4957 Without arguments the set of contexts that have settings is displayed.
4958 When given arguments, the first argument is the context to which the
4959 command applies, one of (case-insensitive)
4961 for display purposes (via, e.g.,
4964 for selecting which headers shall be stored persistently when
4970 ing messages (note that MIME related etc. header fields should not be
4971 ignored in order to not destroy usability of the message in this case),
4973 for stripping down messages when
4975 ing message (has no effect if
4976 .Va forward-as-attachment
4979 for defining user-defined set of fields for the command
4982 The current settings of the given context are displayed if it is the
4984 A second argument denotes the type of restriction that is to be chosen,
4985 it may be (a case-insensitive prefix of)
4989 for white- and blacklisting purposes, respectively.
4990 Establishing a whitelist suppresses inspection of the corresponding
4993 If no further argument is given the current settings of the given type
4994 will be displayed, otherwise the remaining arguments specify header
4995 fields, which \*(OPally may be given as regular expressions, to be added
4997 The special wildcard field (asterisk,
4999 will establish a (fast) shorthand setting which covers all fields.
5001 The latter command always takes three or more arguments and can be used
5002 to remove selections, i.e., from the given context, the given type of
5003 list, all the given headers will be removed, the special argument
5005 will remove all headers.
5009 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
5012 and the style of which can be adjusted with the variable
5014 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
5015 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
5028 (this mode also supports a more
5032 the list of history entries;
5035 argument selects and evaluates the respective history entry,
5036 which will become the new history top; a negative number is used as an
5037 offset to the current command, e.g.,
5039 will select the last command, the history top.
5040 The default mode if no arguments are given is
5043 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
5044 for more on this topic.
5050 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
5055 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5057 Does not override the
5060 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
5062 command issued after
5064 will display the following message, not the current one.
5069 (i) Part of the nestable
5070 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
5071 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
5072 the encapsulated block is executed.
5073 The POSIX standards supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
5078 end, all remaining conditions are non-portable extensions.
5079 \*(ID These commands do not yet use
5080 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5081 and therefore do not know about input tokens, so that syntax
5082 elements have to be surrounded by whitespace; in v15 \*(UA will inspect
5083 all conditions bracket group wise and consider the tokens, representing
5084 values and operators, therein, which also means that variables will
5085 already have been expanded at that time (just like in the shell).
5087 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5096 The (case-insensitive) condition
5098 erminal will evaluate to true if the standard input is a terminal, i.e.,
5099 in interactive sessions.
5100 Another condition can be any boolean value (see the section
5101 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5102 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
5105 .Dq always execute .
5106 (It shall be remarked that a faulty condition skips all branches until
5111 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5112 will be used, and this command will simply interpret expanded tokens.)
5113 It is possible to check
5114 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5117 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
5118 value or another variable by using the
5120 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
5121 conditional trigger character;
5122 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
5124 Variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
5125 When this mode has been triggered, several operators are available:
5128 Integer operators treat the arguments on the left and right hand side of
5129 the operator as integral numbers and compare them arithmetically.
5130 It is an error if any of the operands is not a valid integer, an empty
5131 argument (which implies it had been quoted) is treated as if it were 0.
5132 Available operators are
5136 (less than or equal to),
5142 (greater than or equal to), and
5147 String data operators compare the left and right hand side according to
5148 their textual content.
5149 Unset variables are treated as the empty string.
5150 The behaviour of string operators can be adjusted by prefixing the
5151 operator with the modifier trigger commercial at
5153 followed by none to multiple modifiers: for now supported is
5155 which turns the comparison into a case-insensitive one: this is
5156 implied if no modifier follows the trigger.
5159 Available string operators are
5163 (less than or equal to),
5169 (greater than or equal to),
5173 (is substring of) and
5175 (is not substring of).
5176 By default these operators work on bytes and (therefore) do not take
5177 into account character set specifics.
5178 If the case-insensitivity modifier has been used, case is ignored
5179 according to the rules of the US-ASCII encoding, i.e., bytes are
5183 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
5189 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
5190 matched according to the active locale (see
5191 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
5192 i.e., character sets should be honoured correctly.
5195 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
5197 and the OR operator is
5199 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
5200 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
5202 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
5203 them in pairs of brackets
5204 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
5205 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
5209 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
5210 via unary operators: the unary operator
5212 will reverse the result.
5214 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5215 # (This not in v15, there [ -n "$debug"]!)
5219 if [ "$ttycharset" == UTF-8 ] || [ "$ttycharset" @i== UTF8 ]
5220 echo *ttycharset* is UTF-8, the former case-sensitive!
5223 if [ "${t1}" == "${t2}" ]
5224 echo These two variables are equal
5226 if [ "$features" =% +regex ] && [ "$TERM" @i=~ "^xterm\&.*" ]
5227 echo ..in an X terminal
5229 if [ [ true ] && [ [ "${debug}" != '' ] || \e
5230 [ "$verbose" != '' ] ] ]
5233 if true && [ "$debug" != '' ] || [ "${verbose}" != '' ]
5234 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
5243 Superseded by the multiplexer
5248 Shows the names of all available commands, alphabetically sorted.
5249 If given any non-whitespace argument the list will be shown in the order
5250 in which command prefixes are searched.
5251 \*(OP In conjunction with a set variable
5253 additional information will be provided for each command: the argument
5254 type will be indicated, the documentation string will be shown,
5255 and the set of command flags will show up:
5257 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql BaNg"
5258 .It Ql "vput modifier"
5259 command supports the command modifier
5261 .It Ql "errno in *!*"
5262 the error number is tracked in
5265 commands needs an active mailbox, a
5267 .It Ql "ok: batch or interactive"
5268 command may only be used in interactive or
5271 .It Ql "ok: send mode"
5272 command can be used in send mode.
5273 .It Ql "not ok: compose mode"
5274 command is not available when in compose mode.
5275 .It Ql "not ok: during startup"
5276 command cannot be used during program startup, e.g., while loading
5277 .Sx "Resource files" .
5278 .It Ql "ok: in subprocess"
5279 command is allowed to be used when running in a subprocess instance,
5280 e.g., from within a macro that is called via
5281 .Va on-compose-splice .
5287 This command can be used to localize changes to (linked)
5290 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
5291 meaning that their state will be reverted to the former one once the
5294 It can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
5298 The covered scope of an
5300 is left once a different account is activated, and some macros, notably
5301 .Va folder-hook Ns s ,
5302 use their own specific notion of covered scope, here it will be extended
5303 until the folder is left again.
5306 This setting stacks up: i.e., if
5308 enables change localization and calls
5310 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
5312 will still be reverted when the scope of
5315 (Caveats: if in this example
5317 changes to a different
5319 which sets some variables that are already covered by localizations,
5320 their scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
5322 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
5323 were defined in a local, macro private context!)
5326 This command takes one or two arguments, the optional first one
5327 specifies an attribute that may be one of
5329 which refers to the current scope and is thus the default,
5331 which causes any macro that is being
5333 ed to be started with localization enabled by default, as well as
5335 which (if enabled) disallows any called macro to turn off localization:
5336 like this it can be ensured that once the current scope regains control,
5337 any changes made in deeper levels have been reverted.
5338 The latter two are mutually exclusive.
5339 The (second) argument is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
5340 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
5341 and states whether the given attribute shall be turned on or off.
5343 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5344 define temporary_settings {
5345 set possibly_global_option1
5350 set possibly_global_option2
5357 Reply to messages that come in via known
5360 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
5361 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
5362 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
5365 functionality this will actively resort and even remove message
5366 recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be sent to
5368 For example it will also implicitly generate a
5369 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
5370 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
5372 For more documentation please refer to
5373 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5375 This may generate the errors
5376 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5377 if no receiver has been specified,
5379 if some addressees where rejected by
5382 if no applicable messages have been given,
5384 if an I/O error occurs,
5386 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5389 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5395 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5396 recipient's address (instead of in
5401 (m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
5402 or asks on standard input if none were given;
5403 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
5404 For more documentation please refer to
5405 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5407 This may generate the errors
5408 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5409 if no receiver has been specified,
5411 if some addressees where rejected by
5414 if no applicable messages have been given,
5416 if multiple messages have been specified,
5418 if an I/O error occurs,
5420 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5426 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to the
5428 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5430 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the variable
5433 \*(ID This command can only be used in a
5435 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5439 .It Ic mimetype , unmimetype
5440 Without arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed;
5441 a more verbose listing will be produced if either of
5446 When given arguments they will be joined, interpreted as shown in
5447 .Sx "The mime.types files"
5449 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) ,
5450 and the resulting entry will be added (prepended) to the cache.
5451 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
5452 .Va mimetypes-load-control
5453 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
5455 The latter command deletes all specifications of the given MIME type, thus
5456 .Ql ? unmimetype text/plain
5457 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
5461 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
5463 but which also reenables cache initialization via
5464 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
5468 .It Ic mlist , unmlist
5469 The latter command removes all given mailing-lists, the special name
5471 can be used to remove all registered lists.
5472 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists (and their
5473 attributes, if any) when used without arguments; a more verbose listing
5474 will be produced if either of
5479 Otherwise all given arguments will be added and henceforth be recognized
5481 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available then mailing
5482 lists may also be specified as (extended) regular expressions (see
5488 \*(ID Only available in interactive mode, this command allows to display
5489 MIME parts which require external MIME handler programs to run which do
5490 not integrate in \*(UAs normal
5493 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
5494 (\*(ID No syntax to directly address parts, this restriction may vanish.)
5495 The user will be asked for each non-text part of the given message in
5496 turn whether the registered handler shall be used to display the part.
5500 .It Ic mlsubscribe , unmlsubscribe
5501 The latter command removes the subscription attribute from all given
5502 mailing-lists, the special name
5504 can be used to do so for any registered list.
5505 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists which have
5506 a subscription attribute when used without arguments; a more verbose
5507 listing will be produced if either of
5512 Otherwise this attribute will be set for all given mailing lists,
5513 newly creating them as necessary (as via
5522 but moves the messages to a file named after the local part of the
5523 sender address of the first message (instead of in
5530 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
5537 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5539 selection, and all MIME parts.
5547 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5548 standard output is a terminal.
5554 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
5556 has been given the content of the
5558 cache is shown, loading it first as necessary.
5561 then the cache will only be initialized and
5563 will remove its contents.
5564 Note that \*(UA will try to load the file only once, use
5565 .Ql Ic \&\&netrc Ns \:\0\:clear
5566 to unlock further attempts.
5571 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
5573 .Sx "The .netrc file"
5574 documents the file format in detail.
5578 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
5580 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
5584 the headers of each new message are also shown.
5585 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
5593 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
5594 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
5608 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
5610 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
5616 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5618 selection, and all MIME parts.
5626 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5627 standard output is a terminal.
5635 but also pipes header fields which would not pass the
5637 selection, and all parts of MIME
5638 .Ql multipart/alternative
5643 (pi) Takes a message list and a shell command
5644 and pipes the messages through the command.
5645 Without an argument the current message is piped through the command
5652 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
5673 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
5676 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5678 preserving all messages marked with
5682 or never referenced in the system
5684 and removing all other messages from the
5686 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5687 If new mail has arrived during the session,
5689 .Dq You have new mail
5691 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line option
5693 then the edit file is rewritten.
5694 A return to the shell is effected,
5695 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
5696 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
5697 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
5699 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
5700 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
5701 otherwise success indicating status.
5705 \*(NQ Read a line from standard input, or the channel set active via
5707 and assign the data, which will be splitted as indicated by
5709 to the given variables.
5710 The variable names are checked by the same rules as documented for
5712 and the same error codes will be seen in
5716 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
5718 with the error number
5722 in case of I/O errors, or
5725 If there are more fields than variables, assigns successive fields to the
5726 last given variable.
5727 If there are less fields than variables, assigns the empty string to the
5729 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5732 ? echo "<$a> <$b> <$c>"
5734 ? wysh set ifs=:; read a b c;unset ifs
5735 hey2.0,:"'you ",:world!:mars.:
5736 ? echo $?/$^ERRNAME / <$a><$b><$c>
5737 0/NONE / <hey2.0,><"'you ",><world!:mars.:><><>
5742 \*(NQ Manages input channels for
5744 to be used to avoid complicated or impracticable code, like calling
5746 from within a macro in non-interactive mode.
5747 Without arguments, or when the first argument is
5749 a listing of all known channels is printed.
5750 Channels can otherwise be
5752 d, and existing channels can be
5756 d by giving the string used for creation.
5758 The channel name is expected to be a file descriptor number, or,
5759 if parsing the numeric fails, an input file name that undergoes
5760 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
5761 E.g. (this example requires a modern shell):
5762 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5763 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enyou\enecho $a' |\e
5766 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enecho $a' |\e
5767 LC_ALL=C 6<<< 'you' \*(uA -R#X'readctl create 6'
5781 Removes the named files or directories.
5782 If a name refer to a mailbox, e.g., a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
5783 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
5784 The user is asked for confirmation in interactive mode.
5788 Takes the name of an existing folder
5789 and the name for the new folder
5790 and renames the first to the second one.
5791 Both folders must be of the same type.
5795 (R) Replies to only the sender of each message of the given message
5796 list, by using the first message as the template to quote, for the
5800 will exchange this command with
5802 Unless the internal variable
5804 is set the recipient address will be stripped from comments, names etc.
5806 headers will be inspected if
5810 This may generate the errors
5811 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5812 if no receiver has been specified,
5814 if some addressees where rejected by
5817 if no applicable messages have been given,
5819 if an I/O error occurs,
5821 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5827 (r) Take a message and group-responds to it by addressing the sender
5828 and all recipients, subject to
5832 .Va followup-to-honour ,
5835 .Va recipients-in-cc
5836 influence response behaviour.
5837 Unless the internal variable
5839 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
5849 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
5850 For more documentation please refer to
5851 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5853 This may generate the errors
5854 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5855 if no receiver has been specified,
5857 if some addressees where rejected by
5860 if no applicable messages have been given,
5862 if an I/O error occurs,
5864 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5867 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5873 but initiates a group-reply regardless of the value of
5880 but responds to the sender only regardless of the value of
5887 but does not add any header lines.
5888 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
5889 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
5893 Takes a list of messages and a user name
5894 and sends each message to the named user.
5896 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
5899 is only performed if
5903 This may generate the errors
5904 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5905 if no receiver has been specified,
5907 if some addressees where rejected by
5910 if no applicable messages have been given,
5912 if an I/O error occurs,
5914 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5917 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5935 .It Ic respondsender
5941 (ret) Superseded by the multiplexer
5946 Only available inside the scope of a
5950 this will stop evaluation of any further macro content, and return
5951 execution control to the caller.
5952 The two optional parameters must be specified as positive decimal
5953 numbers and default to the value 0:
5954 the first argument specifies the signed 32-bit return value (stored in
5956 \*(ID and later extended to signed 64-bit),
5957 the second the signed 32-bit error number (stored in
5961 a non-0 exit status may cause the program to exit.
5967 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
5968 sender of the first message instead of (in
5970 and) taking a filename argument; the variable
5972 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
5976 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
5977 to the end of the file.
5978 If no filename is given, the
5980 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5983 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
5984 is echoed on the user's terminal.
5987 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
5988 the messages are marked for deletion.
5989 .Sx "Filename transformations"
5993 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5997 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6001 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6006 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
6007 all matching messages, as via
6009 This command is an alias of
6012 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6016 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
6022 (se, \*(NQ uns) The latter command will delete all given variables,
6023 the former, when used without arguments, will show all variables which
6024 are currently known to \*(UA.
6025 A more verbose listing will be produced if
6031 Remarks: the list mode will not automatically link-in known
6033 variables, but only explicit addressing will, e.g., via
6035 using a variable in an
6037 condition or a string passed to
6041 ting, as well as some program-internal use cases.
6044 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
6045 Arguments are of the form
6047 (no space before or after
6051 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
6052 \*(ID In conjunction with the
6055 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
6056 can be used to quote arguments as necessary.
6057 \*(ID Otherwise quotation marks may be placed around any part of the
6058 assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs.
6061 .Dl ? wysh set indentprefix=' -> '
6064 If an argument begins with
6068 the effect is the same as invoking the
6070 command with the remaining part of the variable
6071 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
6076 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
6077 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
6078 environment requires corresponding system support) \(em use the command
6080 for further environmental control.
6085 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6092 Apply shell quoting rules to the given raw-data arguments.
6096 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6097 The first argument specifies the operation:
6101 cause shell quoting to be applied to the remains of the line, and
6102 expanded away thereof, respectively.
6103 If the former is prefixed with a plus-sign, the quoted result will not
6104 be roundtrip enabled, and thus can be decoded only in the very same
6105 environment that was used to perform the encode; also see
6106 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
6107 If the coding operation fails the error number
6110 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6111 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6112 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6116 \*(NQ (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell,
6117 and returns its exit status.
6121 .It Ic shortcut , unshortcut
6122 Without arguments the list of all currently defined shortcuts is
6123 shown, with one argument the expansion of the given shortcut.
6124 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of shortcuts and
6125 their expansions, creating new or changing already existing shortcuts,
6127 The latter command will remove all given shortcuts, the special name
6129 will remove all registered shortcuts.
6133 \*(NQ Shift the positional parameter stack (starting at
6135 by the given number (which must be a positive decimal),
6136 or 1 if no argument has been given.
6137 It is an error if the value exceeds the number of positional parameters.
6138 If the given number is 0, no action is performed, successfully.
6139 The stack as such can be managed via
6141 Note this command will fail in
6143 and hook macros unless the positional parameter stack has been
6144 explicitly created in the current context via
6151 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
6152 message text is shown.
6156 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
6161 \*(NQ Sleep for the specified number of seconds (and optionally
6162 milliseconds), by default interruptably.
6163 If a third argument is given the sleep will be uninterruptible,
6164 otherwise the error number
6168 if the sleep has been interrupted.
6169 The command will fail and the error number will be
6170 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
6171 if the given duration(s) overflow the time datatype, and
6173 if the given durations are no valid integers.
6178 .It Ic sort , unsort
6179 The latter command disables sorted or threaded mode, returns to normal
6180 message order and, if the
6183 displays a header summary.
6184 The former command shows the current sorting criterion when used without
6185 an argument, but creates a sorted representation of the current folder
6186 otherwise, and changes the
6188 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
6190 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
6194 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
6195 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
6197 variable, as in, e.g.,
6198 .Ql set autosort=thread .
6199 Possible sorting criterions are:
6202 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
6204 Sort the messages by their
6206 field, that is by the time they were sent.
6208 Sort messages by the value of their
6210 field, that is by the address of the sender.
6213 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
6215 Sort the messages by their size.
6217 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
6220 Sort the messages by their message status.
6222 Sort the messages by their subject.
6224 Create a threaded display.
6226 Sort messages by the value of their
6228 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
6231 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
6237 \*(NQ (so) The source command reads commands from the given file.
6238 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6240 If the given expanded argument ends with a vertical bar
6242 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
6243 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
6244 Interpretation of commands read is stopped when an error is encountered.
6247 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
6248 .Va folder-hook Ns s
6251 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
6256 \*(NQ The difference to
6258 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
6259 this command will not generate an error nor warn if the given file
6260 argument cannot be opened successfully.
6264 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
6270 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
6272 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
6273 Unless otherwise noted the
6275 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
6283 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6287 This also clears the
6289 flag of the messages in question.
6293 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
6294 .Va spam-interface ,
6295 without modifying the messages, but setting their
6297 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
6298 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
6299 Refer to the manual section
6301 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
6305 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
6311 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6317 flag of the messages in question.
6333 slot for white- and blacklisting header fields.
6337 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
6339 lines of each message on the users' terminal.
6340 Unless a special selection has been established for the
6344 command, the only header fields that are displayed are
6355 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
6357 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6362 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in the
6364 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6366 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
6369 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
6375 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6377 selection, and all visualizable parts of MIME
6378 .Ql multipart/alternative
6383 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the users terminal.
6384 The display of message headers is selectable via
6386 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
6388 all parts which have a registered MIME type handler (see
6389 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
6390 which produces plain text output, and all
6392 parts are shown, others are hidden except for their headers.
6393 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6397 can be used to display parts which are not displayable as plain text.
6440 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6444 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6449 Superseded by the multiplexer
6460 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
6471 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
6475 Superseded by the multiplexer
6479 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6483 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6505 Perform URL percent codec operations on the raw-data argument, rather
6506 according to RFC 3986.
6510 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
6511 and manages the error number
6513 This is a character set agnostic and thus locale dependent operation,
6514 and it may decode bytes which are invalid in the current
6516 \*(ID This command does not know about URLs beside that.
6518 The first argument specifies the operation:
6522 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
6526 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
6527 pathnames: it does not allow a tilde
6529 and will neither accept hyphen-minus
6533 as an initial character.
6534 The remains of the line form the URL data which is to be converted.
6535 If the coding operation fails the error number
6538 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6539 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6540 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6544 \*(NQ Edit the values of or create the given variable(s) in the
6546 Boolean variables cannot be edited, and variables can also not be
6552 \*(NQ This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
6556 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
6560 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
6561 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
6562 verification will fail for it.
6563 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
6565 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
6566 within the certificate,
6567 and if the message content has been altered.
6580 \*(NQ Evaluate arguments according to a given operator.
6581 This is a multiplexer command which can be used to perform signed 64-bit
6582 numeric calculations as well as byte string and string operations.
6583 It uses polish notation, i.e., the operator is the first argument and
6584 defines the number and type, and the meaning of the remaining arguments.
6585 An empty argument is replaced with a 0 if a number is expected.
6589 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6592 The result that is shown in case of errors is always
6594 for usage errors and numeric operations, and the empty string for byte
6595 string and string operations;
6596 if the latter two fail to provide result data for
6598 errors, e.g., when a search operation failed, they also set the
6601 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
6602 Except when otherwise noted numeric arguments are parsed as signed 64-bit
6603 numbers, and errors will be reported in the error number
6605 as the numeric error
6606 .Va ^ERR Ns -RANGE .
6609 Numeric operations work on one or two signed 64-bit integers.
6610 One integer is expected by assignment (equals sign
6612 which does nothing but parsing the argument, thus detecting validity and
6613 possible overflow conditions, and unary not (tilde
6615 which creates the bitwise complement.
6616 Two integers are used by addition (plus sign
6618 subtraction (hyphen-minus
6620 multiplication (asterisk
6624 and modulo (percent sign
6626 as well as for the bitwise operators logical or (vertical bar
6629 bitwise and (ampersand
6632 bitwise xor (circumflex
6634 the bitwise signed left- and right shifts
6637 as well as for the unsigned right shift
6641 All numeric operators can be suffixed with a commercial at
6645 this will turn the operation into a saturated one, which means that
6646 overflow errors and division and modulo by zero are no longer reported
6647 via the exit status, but the result will linger at the minimum or
6648 maximum possible value, instead of overflowing (or trapping).
6649 This is true also for the argument parse step.
6650 For the bitwise shifts, the saturated maximum is 63.
6651 Any catched overflow will be reported via the error number
6654 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
6657 Character set agnostic string functions have no notion of locale
6658 settings and character sets.
6661 which performs the usual
6662 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6663 on its argument, and
6665 which generates a random string of the given length, or of
6667 bytes (a constant from
6669 if the value 0 is given; the random string will be base64url encoded
6670 according to RFC 4648, and thus be usable as a (portable) filename.
6673 Byte string operations work on 8-bit bytes and have no notion of locale
6674 settings and character sets, effectively assuming ASCII data.
6675 Operations that take one argument are
6677 which queries the length of the given argument, and
6679 which calculates the Chris Torek hash of the given argument.
6682 Byte string operations with two or more arguments are
6684 which byte-searches in the first for the second argument, and shows the
6685 resulting 0-based offset shall it have been found,
6687 which is identical to
6689 but works case-insensitively according to the rules of the ASCII
6692 will show a substring of its first argument:
6693 the second argument is the 0-based starting offset, the optional third
6694 argument can be used to specify the length of the desired substring,
6695 by default the entire string is used;
6696 this operation tries to work around faulty arguments (set
6698 for error logs), but reports them via the error number
6701 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
6704 String operations work, sufficient support provided, according to the
6705 active user's locale encoding and character set (see
6706 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
6707 There is the one argument operation
6709 which (one-way) converts the argument to something safely printable on
6715 is a string operation that will try to match the first argument with the
6716 regular expression given as the second argument, as does
6718 but which is case-insensitive.
6719 If the optional third argument has been given then instead of showing
6720 the match offset a replacement operation is performed:
6721 the third argument is treated as if specified via dollar-single-quote
6723 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) ,
6724 and any occurrence of a positional parameter, e.g.,
6726 is replaced by the corresponding match group of the regular expression.
6728 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6729 ? vexpr -@ +1 -9223372036854775808
6730 ? vput vexpr res ir bananarama (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
6737 \*(NQ Manage the positional parameter stack (see
6741 If the first argument is
6743 then the positional parameter stack of the current context, or the
6744 global one, if there is none, is cleared.
6747 then the remaining arguments will be used to (re)create the stack,
6748 if the parameter stack size limit is excessed an
6749 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
6753 If the first argument is
6755 a round-trip capable representation of the stack contents is created,
6756 with each quoted parameter separated from each other with the first
6759 and followed by the first character of
6761 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
6762 If that results in no separation at all a
6768 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6769 I.e., the subcommands
6773 can be used (in conjunction with
6775 to (re)create an argument stack from and to a single variable losslessly.
6777 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6778 ? vpospar set hey, "'you ", world!
6779 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
6780 ? vput vpospar x quote
6782 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
6783 ? eval vpospar set ${x}
6784 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
6790 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor on each message.
6791 Modified contents are discarded unless the
6793 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
6794 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
6798 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
6799 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
6801 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
6802 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
6803 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
6804 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
6805 depends on the execution mode.
6806 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
6808 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
6809 the processed parts.
6810 For convience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
6811 value, the same result as writing it to
6813 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
6815 character for the filename is supported.
6816 Other user input undergoes the usual
6817 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
6818 and contents of the destination file are overwritten if the file
6821 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
6822 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
6823 URL percent encoded (as via
6825 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
6826 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
6827 Existing files will not be overwritten, instead the part number or
6828 a dot are appended after a number sign
6830 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
6835 \*(NQ The sole difference to
6837 is that the new macro is executed in place of the current one, which
6838 will not regain control: all resources of the current macro will be
6840 This implies that any setting covered by
6842 will be forgotten and covered variables will become cleaned up.
6843 If this command is not used from within a
6845 ed macro it will silently be (a more expensive variant of)
6855 \*(NQ \*(UA presents message headers in
6857 fuls as described under the
6860 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
6861 likewise if the argument is
6865 scrolls to the last,
6867 scrolls to the first, and
6872 A number argument prefixed by
6876 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
6877 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
6883 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
6894 .\" .Sh COMMAND ESCAPES {{{
6895 .Sh "COMMAND ESCAPES"
6897 Here is a summary of the command escapes available in compose mode,
6898 which are used to perform special functions when composing messages.
6899 Command escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines, and
6900 consist of a trigger (escape) and a command character.
6901 The actual escape character can be set via the internal variable
6903 it defaults to the tilde
6905 Otherwise ignored whitespace characters following the escape character
6906 will prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
6910 Unless otherwise noted all compose mode command escapes ensure proper
6911 updates of the variables which represent the error number
6917 is set they will, unless stated otherwise, error out message compose
6918 mode if an operation fails.
6919 It is however possible to place the character hyphen-minus
6921 after (possible whitespace following) the escape character, which has an
6922 effect equivalent to the command modifier
6924 If the \*(OPal key bindings are available it is possible to create
6926 ings specifically for the compose mode.
6929 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
6932 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
6934 (If the escape character has been changed,
6935 that character must be doubled instead.)
6938 .It Ic ~! Ar command
6939 Execute the indicated shell
6941 which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the previously
6942 executed command if the internal variable
6944 is set, then return to the message.
6948 Same effect as typing the end-of-file character.
6951 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
6952 Execute the given \*(UA command.
6953 Not all commands, however, are allowed.
6957 Write a summary of command escapes.
6960 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
6965 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
6967 is executed using the shell.
6968 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
6971 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
6972 Append or edit the list of attachments.
6973 Does not manage the error number
6979 instead if this is a concern).
6982 arguments is expected as shell tokens (see
6983 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ;
6984 token-separating commas are ignored, too), to be
6985 interpreted as documented for the command line option
6987 with the message number exception as below.
6991 arguments the attachment list is edited, entry by entry;
6992 if a filename is left empty, that attachment is deleted from the list;
6993 once the end of the list is reached either new attachments may be
6994 entered or the session can be quit by committing an empty
6998 For all mode, if a given filename solely consists of the number sign
7000 followed by a valid message number of the currently active mailbox, then
7001 the given message is attached as a
7004 As the shell comment character the number sign must be quoted.
7008 Inserts the string contained in the
7011 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \0Sign ) .
7012 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
7016 are understood (use the
7020 ting the variable(s) instead).
7024 Inserts the string contained in the
7027 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \0sign ) .
7028 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
7032 are understood (use the
7036 ting the variable(s) instead).
7039 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
7040 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
7043 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
7044 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
7048 Read the file specified by the
7050 variable into the message.
7054 Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far.
7055 After the editing session is finished,
7056 the user may continue appending text to the message.
7059 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
7060 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
7061 message headers and MIME parts.
7062 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7066 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
7067 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
7068 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7070 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7072 white- and blacklist selection of
7074 For MIME multipart messages,
7075 only the first displayable part is included.
7079 Edit the message header fields
7084 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7085 The default values for these fields originate from the
7093 Edit the message header fields
7099 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7102 .It Ic ~I Ar variable
7103 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message.
7104 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
7105 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
7109 are understood (use the
7113 ting the variable(s) instead).
7116 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
7119 but adds a newline character at the end of a successful insertion.
7122 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
7123 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7126 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7130 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
7131 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7134 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7136 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7138 white- and blacklist selection of
7140 For MIME multipart messages,
7141 only the first displayable part is included.
7145 Display the message collected so far,
7146 prefaced by the message header fields
7147 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
7151 Abort the message being sent,
7152 copying it to the file specified by the
7159 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
7162 but indent each line that has been read by
7166 .It Ic ~r Ar filename Op Ar HERE-delimiter
7167 Read the named file, object to the usual
7168 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7169 into the message; if (the expanded)
7173 then standard input is used, e.g., for pasting purposes.
7174 Only in this latter mode
7176 may be given: if it is data will be read in until the given
7178 is seen on a line by itself, and encountering EOF is an error; the
7180 is a required argument in non-interactive mode; if it is single-quote
7181 quoted then the pasted content will not be expanded, \*(ID otherwise
7182 a future version of \*(UA may perform shell-style expansion on the content.
7186 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
7187 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
7188 normalized to space (SP) characters.
7191 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
7192 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
7195 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
7196 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
7200 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
7201 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
7205 Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the
7207 environment variable) on the message collected so far.
7208 Usually, the alternate editor will be a screen editor.
7209 After the editor is quit,
7210 the user may resume appending text to the end of the message.
7213 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
7214 Write the message onto the named file, which is object to the usual
7215 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
7217 the message is appended to it.
7223 except that the message is not saved at all.
7226 .It Ic ~| Ar command
7227 Pipe the message through the specified filter command.
7228 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
7229 retain the original text of the message.
7232 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
7236 .It Ic ~^ Ar cmd Op Ar subcmd Op Ar arg3 Op Ar arg4
7237 Low-level command meant for scripted message access, i.e., for
7238 .Va on-compose-splice
7240 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
7241 The used protocol is likely subject to changes, and therefore the
7242 mentioned hooks receive the used protocol version as an initial line.
7243 In general the first field of a response line represents a status code
7244 which specifies whether a command was successful or not, whether result
7245 data is to be expected, and if, the format of the result data.
7246 Does not manage the error number
7250 because errors are reported via the protocol
7251 (hard errors like I/O failures cannot be handled).
7252 This command has read-only access to several virtual pseudo headers in
7253 the \*(UA private namespace, which may not exist (except for the first):
7257 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
7258 .It Ql Mailx-Command:
7259 The name of the command that generates the message, one of
7267 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-To:
7268 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Cc:
7269 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Bcc:
7270 Represent the frozen initial state of these headers before any
7271 transformation (e.g.,
7274 .Va recipients-in-cc
7277 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-From:
7278 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-To:
7279 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Cc:
7280 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Bcc:
7281 The values of said headers of the original message which has been
7283 .Ic reply , forward , resend .
7287 The status codes are:
7291 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql 210"
7293 Status ok; the remains of the line are the result.
7296 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7297 What follows are lines of result addresses, terminated by an empty line.
7298 The address lines consist of two fields, the first of which is the
7299 plain address, e.g.,
7301 separated by a single ASCII SP space from the second which contains the
7302 unstripped address, even if that is identical to the first field, e.g.,
7303 .Ql (Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple> .
7304 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7305 commands can be issued.
7308 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7309 What follows are lines of furtherly unspecified string content,
7310 terminated by an empty line.
7311 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7312 commands can be issued.
7315 Syntax error; invalid command.
7318 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
7321 Error: an argument fails verification.
7322 For example an invalid address has been specified, or an attempt was
7323 made to modify anything in \*(UA's own namespace.
7326 Error: an otherwise valid argument is rendered invalid due to context.
7327 For example, a second address is added to a header which may consist of
7328 a single address only.
7333 If a command indicates failure then the message will have remained
7335 Most commands can fail with
7337 if required arguments are missing (false command usage).
7338 The following (case-insensitive) commands are supported:
7341 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm header"
7343 This command allows listing, inspection, and editing of message headers.
7344 Header name case is not normalized, and case-insensitive comparison
7345 should be used when matching names.
7346 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7348 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7350 Without a third argument a list of all yet existing headers is given via
7352 this command is the default command of
7354 if no second argument has been given.
7355 A third argument restricts output to the given header only, which may
7358 if no such field is defined.
7361 Shows the content of the header given as the third argument.
7362 Dependent on the header type this may respond with
7366 any failure results in
7370 This will remove all instances of the header given as the third
7375 if no such header can be found, and
7377 on \*(UA namespace violations.
7380 This will remove from the header given as the third argument the
7381 instance at the list position (counting from one!) given with the fourth
7386 if the list position argument is not a number or on \*(UA namespace
7389 if no such header instance exists.
7392 Create a new or an additional instance of the header given in the third
7393 argument, with the header body content as given in the fourth argument
7394 (the remains of the line).
7397 if the third argument specifies a free-form header field name that is
7398 invalid, or if body content extraction fails to succeed,
7400 if any extracted address does not pass syntax and/or security checks or
7401 on \*(UA namespace violations, and
7403 to indicate prevention of excessing a single-instance header \(em note that
7405 can be appended to (a space separator will be added automatically first).
7408 is returned upon success, followed by the name of the header and the list
7409 position of the newly inserted instance.
7410 The list position is always 1 for single-instance header fields.
7411 All free-form header fields are managed in a single list.
7416 This command allows listing, removal and addition of message attachments.
7417 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7419 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7421 List all attachments via
7425 if no attachments exist.
7426 This command is the default command of
7428 if no second argument has been given.
7431 This will remove the attachment given as the third argument, and report
7435 if no such attachment can be found.
7436 If there exists any path component in the given argument, then an exact
7437 match of the path which has been used to create the attachment is used
7438 directly, but if only the basename of that path matches then all
7439 attachments are traversed to find an exact match first, and the removal
7440 occurs afterwards; if multiple basenames match, a
7443 Message attachments are treated as absolute pathnames.
7445 If no path component exists in the given argument, then all attachments
7446 will be searched for
7448 parameter matches as well as for matches of the basename of the path
7449 which has been used when the attachment has been created; multiple
7454 This will interpret the third argument as a number and remove the
7455 attachment at that list position (counting from one!), reporting
7459 if the argument is not a number or
7461 if no such attachment exists.
7464 Adds the attachment given as the third argument, specified exactly as
7465 documented for the command line option
7467 and supporting the message number extension as documented for
7471 upon success, with the index of the new attachment following,
7473 if the given file cannot be opened,
7475 if an on-the-fly performed character set conversion fails, otherwise
7477 is reported; this is also reported if character set conversion is
7478 requested but not available.
7481 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7483 and prints any known attributes of the first found attachment via
7487 if no such attachment can be found.
7488 The attributes are written as lines of keyword and value tuples, the
7489 keyword being separated from the rest of the line with an ASCII SP space
7493 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7495 and is otherwise identical to
7498 .It Cm attribute-set
7499 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7501 and will assign the attribute given as the fourth argument, which is
7502 expected to be a value tuple of keyword and other data, separated by
7503 a ASCII SP space or TAB tabulator character.
7504 If the value part is empty, then the given attribute is removed, or
7505 reset to a default value if existence of the attribute is crucial.
7509 upon success, with the index of the found attachment following,
7511 for message attachments or if the given keyword is invalid, and
7513 if no such attachment can be found.
7514 The following keywords may be used (case-insensitively):
7516 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".It Ql filename"
7518 Sets the filename of the MIME part, i.e., the name that is used for
7519 display and when (suggesting a name for) saving (purposes).
7520 .It Ql content-description
7521 Associate some descriptive information to the attachment's content, used
7522 in favour of the plain filename by some MUAs.
7524 May be used for uniquely identifying MIME entities in several contexts;
7525 this expects a special reference address format as defined in RFC 2045
7528 upon address content verification failure.
7530 Defines the media type/subtype of the part, which is managed
7531 automatically, but can be overwritten.
7532 .It Ql content-disposition
7533 Automatically set to the string
7537 .It Cm attribute-set-at
7538 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7540 and is otherwise identical to
7551 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
7552 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
7554 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
7558 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
7562 has the same effect as using
7568 Creation or editing of variables can be performed in the
7573 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
7575 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
7576 Both commands support a more
7579 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
7582 implicitly, others can be imported explicitly with the command
7584 and henceforth share said properties.
7587 Two different kinds of internal variables exist.
7588 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
7592 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
7593 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
7594 introduction of the section
7596 documents the supported quoting rules.
7598 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7599 ? wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
7600 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''; \e
7601 varshow one two three four; \e
7602 unset one two three four
7606 Dependent upon the actual option the string values will be interpreted
7607 as numbers, colour names, normal text etc., but there also exists
7608 a special kind of string value, the
7609 .Dq boolean string ,
7610 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
7614 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
7620 for a false boolean and
7626 for a true boolean; a special kind of boolean string is the
7628 which is a boolean string that can optionally be prefixed with the
7629 (case-insensitive) term
7633 which causes prompting of the user in interactive mode, with the given
7634 boolean as the default value.
7636 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
7637 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
7638 .Ss "Initial settings"
7640 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
7646 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
7660 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
7662 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
7664 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
7672 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
7681 Notes: \*(UA does not support the
7683 variable \(en use command line options or
7685 to pass options through to a
7687 And the default global
7689 file, which is loaded unless the
7691 (with according argument) or
7693 command line options have been used, or the
7694 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
7695 environment variable is set (see
7696 .Sx "Resource files" )
7697 bends those initial settings a bit, e.g., it sets the variables
7702 to name a few, establishes a default
7704 selection etc., and should thus be taken into account.
7707 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
7710 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
7714 \*(RO The exit status of the last command, or the
7719 This status has a meaning in the state machine: in conjunction with
7721 any non-0 exit status will cause a program exit, and in
7723 mode any error while loading (any of the) resource files will have the
7727 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
7728 can be used to instruct the state machine to ignore errors.
7732 \*(RO The current error number
7733 .Pf ( Xr errno 3 ) ,
7734 which is set after an error occurred; it is also available via
7736 and the error name and documentation string can be queried via
7740 \*(ID This machinery is new and the error number is only really usable
7741 if a command explicitly states that it manages the variable
7743 for others errno will be used in case of errors, or
7745 if that is 0: it thus may or may not reflect the real error.
7746 The error number may be set with the command
7752 \*(RO This is a multiplexer variable which performs dynamic expansion of
7753 the requested state or condition, of which there are:
7756 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
7760 .It Va ^ERR , ^ERRDOC , ^ERRNAME
7761 The number, documentation, and name of the current
7763 respectively, which is usually set after an error occurred.
7764 \*(ID This machinery is new and is usually reliable only if a command
7765 explicitly states that it manages the variable
7767 which is effectively identical to
7769 Each of those variables can be suffixed with a hyphen minus followed by
7770 a name or number, in which case the expansion refers to the given error.
7771 Note this is a direct mapping of (a subset of) the system error values:
7772 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7774 eval echo \e$1: \e$^ERR-$1: \e$^ERRNAME-$1: \e$^ERRDOC-$1
7775 vput vexpr i + "$1" 1
7787 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
7789 separated by a space character.
7790 \*(ID The special semantics of the equally named special parameter of the
7792 are not yet supported.
7796 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
7798 separated by a space character.
7799 If placed in double quotation marks, each positional parameter is
7800 properly quoted to expand to a single parameter again.
7804 \*(RO Expands to the number of positional parameters, i.e., the size of
7805 the positional parameter stack in decimal.
7809 \*(RO Inside the scope of a
7813 ed macro this expands to the name of the calling macro, or to the empty
7814 string if the macro is running from top-level.
7815 For the \*(OPal regular expression search and replace operator of
7817 this expands to the entire matching expression.
7818 It represents the program name in global context.
7822 \*(RO Access of the positional parameter stack.
7823 All further parameters can be accessed with this syntax, too, e.g.,
7826 etc.; positional parameters can be shifted off the stack by calling
7828 The parameter stack contains, e.g., the arguments of a
7832 d macro, the matching groups of the \*(OPal regular expression search
7833 and replace expression of
7835 and can be explicitly created or overwritten with the command
7840 \*(RO Is set to the active
7844 .It Va add-file-recipients
7845 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
7846 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
7847 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
7848 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
7852 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
7853 when comparing addresses.
7857 \*(BO Causes messages saved in the
7859 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
7861 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
7862 This should always be set.
7866 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt for the subject of each message sent.
7867 If the user responds with simply a newline,
7868 no subject field will be sent.
7872 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
7876 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
7880 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks for files to attach at the end of each message,
7881 shall the list be found empty at that time.
7882 An empty line finalizes the list.
7886 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for carbon copy recipients
7887 (at the end of each message if
7891 are set) shall the list be found empty (at that time).
7892 An empty line finalizes the list.
7896 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
7897 recipients (at the end of each message if
7901 are set) shall the list be found empty (at that time).
7902 An empty line finalizes the list.
7906 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the user to be prompted if the message is to be
7907 signed at the end of each message.
7910 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
7914 \*(BO Alternative name for
7919 A sequence of characters to display in the
7923 as shown in the display of
7925 each for one type of messages (see
7926 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
7927 with the default being
7930 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
7933 variable is set, in the following order:
7935 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
7957 start of a collapsed thread.
7959 an uncollapsed thread (TODO ignored for now).
7963 classified as possible spam.
7969 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
7970 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
7974 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
7975 message will be sent automatically.
7979 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when threaded mode
7986 \*(BO Enable automatic
7988 ing of a(n existing)
7994 commands, e.g., the message that becomes the new
7996 is shown automatically, as via
8003 Causes sorted mode (see the
8005 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this variable as
8006 sorting method when a folder is opened, e.g.,
8007 .Ql set autosort=thread .
8011 \*(BO Enables the substitution of all not (reverse-solidus) escaped
8014 characters by the contents of the last executed command for the
8016 shell escape command and
8018 one of the compose mode
8019 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8020 If this variable is not set no reverse solidus stripping is performed.
8024 \*(OP Terminals generate multi-byte sequences for certain forms of
8025 input, for example for function and other special keys.
8026 Some terminals however do not write these multi-byte sequences as
8027 a whole, but byte-by-byte, and the latter is what \*(UA actually reads.
8028 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
8029 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
8030 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
8036 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
8037 has the same affect as setting
8039 and all other variables prefixed with
8041 it also changes the behaviour of
8043 (which does not exist in BSD).
8047 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
8048 summary to traditional BSD style.
8052 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
8057 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
8063 field to appear immediately after the
8065 field in message headers and with the
8067 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8071 .It Va build-os , build-osenv
8072 \*(RO The operating system \*(UA has been build for, usually taken from
8078 respectively, the former being lowercased.
8082 The value that should appear in the
8086 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
8088 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
8089 US-ASCII compatible.
8093 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
8094 member of the variable
8096 This defaults to UTF-8 if character set conversion capabilities are
8097 available, and to ISO-8859-1 otherwise, in which case the only supported
8100 and this variable is effectively ignored.
8101 Refer to the section
8102 .Sx "Character sets"
8103 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
8106 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
8107 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
8109 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
8111 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
8112 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
8113 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
8115 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
8116 otherwise the (final) value of
8118 is used for this purpose.
8120 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
8121 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
8122 of a MIME message part that uses the
8124 character set is forcefully treated as text.
8128 The default value for the
8133 .It Va colour-disable
8134 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
8135 Also see the section
8136 .Sx "Coloured display" .
8140 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
8142 Note that pagers may need special command line options, e.g.,
8150 in order to support colours.
8151 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
8152 adjustments dependent on the value of the environment variable
8154 (see there for more).
8158 .It Va contact-mail , contact-web
8159 \*(RO Addresses for contact per email and web, respectively, e.g., for
8160 bug reports, suggestions, or help regarding \*(UA.
8161 The former can be used directly:
8162 .Ql ? eval mail $contact-mail .
8166 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued variable is
8167 set it will be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
8168 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
8172 can be forced by setting this to the value
8174 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
8175 terminal screen to compute the treshold (see
8180 \*(ID At the moment this uses the count of lines of the message in wire
8181 format, which, dependent on the
8183 of the message, is unrelated to the number of display lines.
8184 (The software is old and historically the relation was a given thing.)
8188 Define a set of custom headers to be injected into newly composed or
8189 forwarded messages; it is also possible to create custom headers in
8192 which can be automated by setting one of the hooks
8193 .Va on-compose-splice
8195 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
8196 The value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of custom headers to
8197 be injected, to include commas in the header bodies escape them with
8199 \*(ID Overwriting of automatically managed headers is neither supported
8202 .Dl ? set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
8206 Controls the appearance of the
8208 date and time format specification of the
8210 variable, that is used, for example, when viewing the summary of
8212 If unset, then the local receiving date is used and displayed
8213 unformatted, otherwise the message sending
8215 It is possible to assign a
8217 format string and control formatting, but embedding newlines via the
8219 format is not supported, and will result in display errors.
8221 .Ql %Y-%m-%d %H:%M ,
8223 .Va datefield-markout-older .
8226 .It Va datefield-markout-older
8227 Only used in conjunction with
8229 Can be used to create a visible distinction of messages dated more than
8230 a day in the future, or older than six months, a concept comparable to the
8232 option of the POSIX utility
8234 If set to the empty string, then the plain month, day and year of the
8236 will be displayed, but a
8238 format string to control formatting can be assigned.
8244 \*(BO Enables debug messages and obsoletion warnings, disables the
8245 actual delivery of messages and also implies
8251 .It Va disposition-notification-send
8253 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
8254 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
8258 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
8260 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8261 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
8262 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
8264 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8265 .\"for a specific account.
8269 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
8271 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive or batch
8273 compose mode will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the
8274 normal end-of-file condition).
8275 This behaviour is implied in
8281 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
8282 \*(BO\*(OP Synchronization of mailboxes which \*(UA treats as
8284 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
8285 es (see, e.g., the notes on
8286 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
8287 as well as the documentation of
8289 will be protected with so-called dotlock files\(emthe traditional mail
8290 spool file locking method\(emin addition to system file locking.
8291 Because \*(UA ships with a privilege-separated dotlock creation program
8292 that should always be able to create such a dotlock file there is no
8293 good reason to ignore dotlock file creation errors, and thus these are
8294 fatal unless this variable is set.
8298 \*(BO If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically
8299 when a message is composed in interactive mode, as if the
8301 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8305 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
8309 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
8310 its header is included in the editable text.
8314 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
8315 .Dq \&No mail for user
8316 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or does not exist.
8317 If this variable is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or non-existent
8318 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
8324 \*(BO Let each command with a non-0 exit status, including every
8328 s a non-0 status, cause a program exit unless prefixed by
8331 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
8333 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
8334 but which use a different modifier for ignoring the error.
8335 Please refer to the variable
8337 for more on this topic.
8341 The first character of this value defines the escape character for
8342 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8344 The default value is the character tilde
8346 If set to the empty string, command escapes are disabled.
8350 If not set then file and command pipeline targets are not allowed,
8351 and any such address will be filtered out, giving a warning message.
8352 If set without a value then all possible recipient address
8353 specifications will be accepted \(en see the section
8354 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
8356 To accept them, but only in interactive mode, or when tilde commands
8357 were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8361 set this to the (case-insensitive) value
8363 (it actually acts like
8364 .Ql restrict,-all,+name,+addr ,
8365 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8367 In fact the value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of values.
8370 then the existence of disallowed specifications is treated as a hard
8371 send error instead of only filtering them out.
8372 The remaining values specify whether a specific type of recipient
8373 address specification is allowed (optionally indicated by a plus sign
8375 prefix) or disallowed (prefixed with a hyphen-minus
8379 addresses all possible address specifications,
8383 command pipeline targets,
8385 plain user names and (MTA) aliases and
8388 These kind of values are interpreted in the given order, so that
8389 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
8390 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
8391 unless \*(UA is in interactive mode or has been started with the
8395 command line option; in the latter case(s) any address may be used, then.
8397 Historically invalid network addressees are silently stripped off.
8398 To change this so that any encountered invalid email address causes
8399 a hard error it must be ensured that
8401 is an entry in the above list.
8402 Setting this automatically enables network addressees
8403 (it actually acts like
8404 .Ql failinvaddr,+addr ,
8405 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8409 Unless this variable is set additional
8411 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
8412 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
8414 separator, are ignored due to safety reasons.
8415 However, if set to the special (case-insensitive) value
8417 then the presence of additional MTA arguments is treated as a hard
8418 error that causes \*(UA to exit with failure status.
8419 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
8421 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
8422 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8429 \*(RO String giving a list of features \*(UA, preceded with a plus sign
8431 if the feature is available, and a hyphen-minus
8434 The output of the command
8436 will include this information in a more pleasant output.
8440 \*(BO This setting reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
8441 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
8442 included in the header of a message
8443 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
8444 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
8445 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
8448 .Ic replysender , respondsender , followupsender
8450 .Ic replyall , respondall , followupall
8451 are not affected by the current setting of
8456 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
8457 filenames that begin with the plus sign
8459 will have the plus sign replaced with the value of this variable if set,
8460 otherwise the plus sign will remain unchanged when doing
8461 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
8464 for more on this topic.
8465 The value supports a subset of transformations itself, and if the
8466 non-empty value does not start with a solidus
8470 will be prefixed automatically.
8471 Once the actual value is evaluated first, the internal variable
8473 will be updated for caching purposes.
8477 This variable can be set to the name of a
8479 macro which will be called whenever a
8482 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
8483 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
8484 only include newly arrived messages then.
8486 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
8487 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
8490 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER
8495 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
8496 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
8497 However, if the mailbox resides under
8501 specification is tried in addition, e.g., if
8505 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
8506 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
8508 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
8509 first, but then followed by
8510 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
8513 .It Va folder-resolved
8514 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
8516 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
8520 \*(BO Controls whether a
8521 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8522 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
8524 .Va followup-to-honour
8526 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
8531 .It Va followup-to-honour
8533 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8534 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
8538 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
8548 .It Va forward-as-attachment
8549 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
8552 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
8553 With this setting enabled messages are sent as unmodified MIME
8555 attachments with all of their parts included.
8558 .It Va forward-inject-head
8559 The string to put before the text of a message with the
8561 command instead of the default
8562 .Dq -------- Original Message -------- .
8563 No heading is put if it is set to the empty string.
8564 This variable is ignored if the
8565 .Va forward-as-attachment
8570 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
8572 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
8573 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
8574 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
8577 ing to messages these addresses are handled as if they were in the
8581 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
8582 a dialup machine) then either this variable or
8584 (\*(IN and with a defined SMTP protocol in
8587 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities),
8591 contains more than one address,
8594 variable is required (according to the standard RFC 5322).
8596 If a file-based MTA is used, then
8598 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
8600 can nonetheless be enforced to appear as the envelope sender address at
8601 the MTA protocol level (the RFC 5321 reverse-path), either by using the
8603 command line option (with an empty argument; see there for the complete
8604 picture on this topic), or by setting the internal variable
8605 .Va r-option-implicit .
8609 \*(BO When replying to or forwarding a message \*(UA normally removes
8610 the comment and name parts of email addresses.
8611 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed,
8612 and comments, names etc. are retained.
8615 \*(OB Predecessor of
8616 .Va forward-inject-head .
8620 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
8621 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
8626 mode a header summary will also be displayed on folder changes.
8627 The command line option
8635 A format string to use for the summary of
8637 similar to the ones used for
8640 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent sign
8642 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
8643 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
8644 Valid format specifiers are:
8647 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
8649 A plain percent sign.
8652 a space character but for the current message
8654 for which it expands to
8658 a space character but for the current message
8660 for which it expands to
8663 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
8666 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
8668 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
8672 The date found in the
8674 header of the message when
8676 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
8677 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
8682 The indenting level in threaded mode.
8684 The address of the message sender.
8686 The message thread tree structure.
8687 (Note that this format does not support a field width.)
8689 The number of lines of the message, if available.
8693 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
8695 Message subject (if any).
8697 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
8699 Message recipient flags: is the addressee of the message a known or
8700 subscribed mailing list \(en see
8705 The position in threaded/sorted order.
8709 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
8711 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
8722 .It Va headline-bidi
8723 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
8724 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
8725 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
8726 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
8727 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
8728 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
8730 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
8731 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
8732 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
8734 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
8735 fields that may occur when displaying
8737 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
8739 with special Unicode control sequences;
8740 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
8742 no value (or any value other than
8747 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
8748 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
8749 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
8751 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
8753 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
8755 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
8756 sequences onto the line).
8761 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
8762 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
8766 \*(OP If a line editor is available then this can be set to
8767 name the (expandable) path of the location of a permanent history file.
8772 .It Va history-gabby
8773 \*(BO\*(OP Add more entries to the history as is normally done.
8776 .It Va history-gabby-persist
8777 \*(BO\*(OP \*(UA's own MLE will not save the additional
8779 entries in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
8780 On the other hand it will not loose the knowledge of whether
8781 a persistent entry was gabby or not.
8787 \*(OP Setting this variable imposes a limit on the number of concurrent
8789 If set to the value 0 then no further history entries will be added, and
8790 loading and incorporation of the
8792 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
8793 Runtime changes will not be reflected, but will affect the number of
8794 entries saved to permanent storage.
8798 \*(BO This setting controls whether messages are held in the system
8800 and it is set by default.
8804 Use this string as hostname when expanding local addresses instead of
8805 the value obtained from
8809 It is used, e.g., in
8813 fields, as well as when generating
8815 MIME part related unique ID fields.
8816 Setting it to the empty string will cause the normal hostname to be
8817 used, but nonetheless enables creation of said ID fields.
8818 \*(IN in conjunction with the built-in SMTP
8821 also influences the results:
8822 one should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
8831 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
8832 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
8834 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
8836 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
8837 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
8841 The input field separator that is used (\*(ID by some functions) to
8842 determine where to split input data.
8844 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
8846 Unsetting is treated as assigning the default value,
8849 If set to the empty value, no field splitting will be performed.
8851 If set to a non-empty value, all whitespace characters are extracted
8852 and assigned to the variable
8856 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
8859 will be ignored at the beginning and end of input.
8860 Diverging from POSIX shells default whitespace is removed in addition,
8861 which is owed to the entirely different line content extraction rules.
8863 Each occurrence of a character of
8865 will cause field-splitting, any adjacent
8867 characters will be skipped.
8872 \*(RO Automatically deduced from the whitespace characters in
8877 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
8878 messages; instead echo them as
8880 characters and discard the current line.
8884 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
8885 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
8886 in compose mode on message input and in interactive command input.
8887 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
8888 explicitly using one of the commands
8892 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
8895 on a line by itself or by using the
8897 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ;
8898 Setting this implies the behaviour that
8906 If this is set to a non-empty string it will specify the users
8908 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
8911 and the system-dependent default, and (thus) be used to replace
8914 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
8917 for more on this topic.
8918 The value supports a subset of transformations itself.
8926 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8929 option for indenting messages,
8930 in place of the normal tabulator character
8932 which is the default.
8933 Be sure to quote the value if it contains spaces or tabs.
8937 \*(BO If set, an empty
8939 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
8940 file is not removed.
8941 Note that, in conjunction with
8943 any empty file will be removed unless this variable is set.
8944 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
8945 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
8946 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
8947 \*(ID Only local regular (MBOX) files are covered, Maildir or other
8948 mailbox types will never be removed, even if empty.
8951 .It Va keep-content-length
8952 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing MBOX mailbox files \*(UA can
8957 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
8958 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
8959 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
8960 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
8961 work with with same mailbox files.
8962 Note that, if this is not set but
8963 .Va writebackedited ,
8964 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
8965 fields already marks the message as being modified.
8966 \*(ID At some future time \*(UA will be capable to rewrite and apply an
8968 to modified messages, and then those fields will be stripped silently.
8972 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
8973 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
8974 This setting causes all saved message to be retained.
8977 .It Va line-editor-disable
8978 \*(BO Turn off any enhanced line editing capabilities (see
8979 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
8983 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
8984 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
8988 Error log message prefix string
8989 .Pf ( Ql "\*(uA: " ) .
8992 .It Va mailbox-display
8993 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
8995 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
8998 .It Va mailbox-resolved
8999 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
9002 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
9003 An additional startup file that is loaded as the last of the
9004 .Sx "Resource files" .
9005 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
9007 implementations, i.e., mostly anything which is not covered by
9008 .Sx "Initial settings" .
9012 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
9013 it is marked as having been
9016 .Sx "Message states" .
9020 \*(BO When opening MBOX mailbox databases \*(UA by default uses tolerant
9021 POSIX rules for detecting message boundaries (so-called
9023 lines) due to compatibility reasons, instead of the stricter rules that
9024 have been standardized in RFC 4155.
9025 This behaviour can be switched to the stricter RFC 4155 rules by
9026 setting this variable.
9027 (This is never necessary for any message newly generated by \*(UA,
9028 it only applies to messages generated by buggy or malicious MUAs, or may
9029 occur in old MBOX databases: \*(UA itself will choose a proper
9031 to avoid false interpretation of
9033 content lines in the MBOX database.)
9035 This may temporarily be handy when \*(UA complains about invalid
9037 lines when opening a MBOX: in this case setting this variable and
9038 re-opening the mailbox in question may correct the result.
9039 If so, copying the entire mailbox to some other file, as in
9040 .Ql copy * SOME-FILE ,
9041 will perform proper, all-compatible
9043 quoting for all detected messages, resulting in a valid MBOX mailbox.
9044 Finally the variable can be unset again:
9045 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9047 localopts yes; wysh set mbox-rfc4155;\e
9048 wysh File "${1}"; eval copy * "${2}"
9050 call mboxfix /tmp/bad.mbox /tmp/good.mbox
9055 \*(BO Internal development variable.
9058 .It Va message-id-disable
9059 \*(BO By setting this variable the generation of
9061 can be completely suppressed, effectively leaving this task up to the
9063 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
9064 (According to RFC 5321 a SMTP server is not required to add this
9065 field by itself, so it should be ensured that it accepts messages without
9067 This variable also affects automatic generation of
9072 .It Va message-inject-head
9073 A string to put at the beginning of each new message.
9074 The escape sequences tabulator
9081 .It Va message-inject-tail
9082 A string to put at the end of each new message.
9083 The escape sequences tabulator
9091 \*(BO Usually, when an
9093 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
9094 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
9099 option to be passed through to the
9101 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
9102 this flag, no MTA is known which does not support it (for historical
9106 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
9107 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
9108 in order to classify the
9111 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
9114 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
9115 a computation rather similar to what the
9117 command produces when used with the
9121 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
9122 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
9123 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
9128 .Ql application/octet-stream :
9129 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
9131 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
9132 interpret the contents of the part.
9134 If this variable is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as
9135 text data at first glance (by a
9139 file extension), then the original
9141 will not be overwritten.
9144 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
9145 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
9146 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
9147 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
9148 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
9149 (E.g., at the time of this writing some newsletters ship their full
9150 content only in the rich HTML part, whereas the plain text part only
9151 contains topic subjects.)
9154 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
9157 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
9158 Some MUAs, however, do not use
9159 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9161 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
9162 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but specify an
9163 unspecific MIME type
9164 .Pf ( Ql application/octet-stream )
9165 even for plain text attachments.
9166 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to re-classify such MIME
9167 message parts, if possible, for example via a possibly existing
9168 attachment filename.
9169 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
9170 actually a carrier of bits.
9171 Creating the bit-carrying number is a simple addition:
9172 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9173 ? !echo Value should be set to $((2 + 4 + 8))
9174 Value should be set to 14
9177 .Bl -bullet -compact
9179 If bit two is set (2) then the detected
9181 will be carried along with the message and be used for deciding which
9182 MIME handler is to be used, for example;
9183 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
9184 overridden content-type by showing a plus sign
9187 If bit three is set (4) then the counter-evidence is always produced
9188 and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even forcefully
9189 overriding the parts given MIME type.
9191 If bit four is set (8) then as a last resort the actual content of
9192 .Ql application/octet-stream
9193 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
9198 .It Va mime-encoding
9200 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
9201 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable.
9202 (7-bit clean text messages are sent as-is, without a transfer encoding.)
9205 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
9208 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
9209 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
9210 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
9211 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
9212 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
9213 .It Ql quoted-printable
9215 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
9216 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
9217 be read as-is; it is also acceptible for other single-byte locales that
9218 share many characters with ASCII, like, e.g., ISO-8859-1.
9219 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
9220 sets: e.g., it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode a single
9221 UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
9223 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
9224 The default encoding, it is 7-bit clean and will always be used for
9226 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
9227 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
9228 to four bytes of output.
9229 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
9234 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
9235 Can be used to control which of
9236 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9237 are loaded: if the letter
9239 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
9241 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
9243 controls loading of the system wide
9244 .Pa /etc/mime.types ;
9245 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
9247 If this variable is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
9248 Incorporation of the \*(UA-built-in MIME types cannot be suppressed,
9249 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
9252 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
9253 value string contains an equals sign
9255 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
9258 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
9259 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
9260 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
9261 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
9262 the MIME type cache).
9267 To choose an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent, set this option to either
9268 the full pathname of an executable (optionally prefixed with a
9270 protocol indicator), or \*(OPally a SMTP protocol URL, e.g., \*(IN
9272 .Dl smtps?://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9275 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
9276 The default has been chosen at compile time.
9277 All supported data transfers are executed in child processes, which
9278 run asynchronously and without supervision unless either the
9283 If such a child receives a TERM signal, it will abort and
9290 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
9292 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
9295 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
9298 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
9301 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
9306 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
9307 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean variable
9308 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
9309 (which will also disable passing
9313 (for not treating a line with only a dot
9315 character as the end of input),
9323 variable is set); in conjunction with the
9325 command line option \*(UA will also (not) pass
9331 \*(OPally \*(UA can send mail over SMTP network connections to a single
9332 defined SMTP smart host by specifying a SMTP URL as the value (see
9333 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
9334 Note that with some mail providers it may be necessary to set the
9336 variable in order to use a specific combination of
9341 \*(UA also supports forwarding of all network traffic over a specified
9343 The following SMTP variants may be used:
9347 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
9348 server port 25 and requires setting the
9349 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9350 variable to enter a SSL/TLS encrypted session state.
9351 Assign a value like \*(IN
9352 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9354 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
9355 to choose this protocol.
9357 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
9358 and is automatically SSL/TLS secured.
9359 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
9360 be supported by your hosts network service database
9361 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
9364 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
9365 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
9366 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9368 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
9369 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
9374 Finally there is the SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409), which usually
9375 lives on server port 587 and is practically identically to the SMTP
9376 protocol from \*(UA's point of view beside that; it requires setting the
9377 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9378 variable to enter a SSL/TLS secured session state.
9379 Assign a value like \*(IN
9380 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9382 .Ql submission://server[:port] ) .
9387 .It Va mta-arguments
9388 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
9390 can be given via this variable, which is parsed according to
9391 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
9392 into an array of arguments, and which will be joined onto MTA options
9393 from other sources, and then passed individually to the MTA:
9394 .Ql ? wysh set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"' .
9397 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
9398 \*(BO Unless this variable is set \*(UA will pass some well known
9399 standard command line options to a file-based
9401 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), see there for more.
9405 Many systems use a so-called
9407 environment to ensure compatibility with
9409 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
9411 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
9412 actually executed when calling the file-based
9414 will treat its contents as that name.
9417 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
9418 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the users
9420 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
9421 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
9425 .Sx "The .netrc file"
9426 documents the file format.
9438 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the users
9440 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
9441 This can be used to, e.g., store
9444 .Ql ? set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp' .
9448 If this variable has the value
9450 newly created local folders will be in Maildir instead of MBOX format.
9454 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
9455 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
9456 If this variable is set to the special value
9458 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
9459 timestamp changes are detected.
9463 \*(BO Causes the filename given in the
9466 and the sender-based filenames for the
9470 commands to be interpreted relative to the directory given in the
9472 variable rather than to the current directory,
9473 unless it is set to an absolute pathname.
9476 .It Va on-compose-cleanup
9477 Macro hook which will be called after the message has been sent (or not,
9478 in case of failures), as the very last step before unrolling compose mode
9480 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
9481 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
9484 For compose mode hooks that may affect the message content please see
9485 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave , on-compose-splice .
9486 \*(ID This hook exists only because
9487 .Ic alias , alternates , commandalias , shortcut ,
9488 to name a few, are currently not covered by
9490 or a similar mechanism: any changes applied in compose mode will
9491 continue to be in effect thereafter.
9495 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
9496 Macro hooks which will be called before compose mode is entered,
9497 and after composing has been finished (but before the
9499 is injected, etc.), respectively.
9501 are enabled for these hooks, causing any setting to be forgotten after
9502 the message has been sent;
9503 .Va on-compose-cleanup
9504 can be used to perform any other necessary cleanup.
9505 The following (read-only) variables will be set temporarily during
9506 execution of the macros to represent the according message headers, or
9507 the empty string for non-existent; they correspond to accoding virtual
9508 temporary message headers that can be accessed via
9511 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" :
9513 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va mailx_subject"
9514 .It Va mailx-command
9515 The command that generates the message.
9516 .It Va mailx-subject
9522 .It Va mailx-to , mailx-cc , mailx-bcc
9523 The list of receiver addresses as a space-separated list.
9524 .It Va mailx-raw-to , mailx-raw-cc , mailx-raw-bcc
9525 The list of receiver addresses before any mangling (due to, e.g.,
9528 .Va recipients-in-cc )
9529 as a space-separated list.
9530 .It Va mailx-orig-from
9531 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
9533 of the given message.
9534 .It Va mailx-orig-to , mailx-orig-cc , mailx-orig-bcc
9535 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
9536 receivers of the given message.
9542 .It Va on-compose-splice , on-compose-splice-shell
9543 These hooks run once the normal compose mode is finished, but before the
9544 .Va on-compose-leave
9545 macro hook is called, the
9548 Both hooks will be executed in a subprocess, with their input and output
9549 connected to \*(UA such that they can act as if they would be an
9551 The difference in between them is that the latter is a
9553 command, whereas the former is a normal \*(UA macro, but which is
9554 restricted to a small set of commands (the
9558 will indicate said capability).
9560 are enabled for these hooks (in the parent process), causing any setting
9561 to be forgotten after the message has been sent;
9562 .Va on-compose-cleanup
9563 can be used to perform other cleanup as necessary.
9566 During execution of these hooks \*(UA will temporarily forget whether it
9567 has been started in interactive mode, (a restricted set of)
9568 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9569 will always be available, and for guaranteed reproducibilities sake
9573 will be set to their defaults.
9574 The compose mode command
9576 has been especially designed for scriptability (via these hooks).
9577 The first line the hook will read on its standard input is the protocol
9578 version of said command escape, currently
9580 backward incompatible protocol changes have to be expected.
9583 Care must be taken to avoid deadlocks and other false control flow:
9584 if both involved processes wait for more input to happen at the
9585 same time, or one does not expect more input but the other is stuck
9586 waiting for consumption of its output, etc.
9587 There is no automatic synchronization of the hook: it will not be
9588 stopped automatically just because it, e.g., emits
9590 The hooks will however receive a termination signal if the parent enters
9592 \*(ID Protection against and interaction with signals is not yet given;
9593 it is likely that in the future these scripts will be placed in an
9594 isolated session, which is signalled in its entirety as necessary.
9596 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9597 wysh set on-compose-splice-shell=$'\e
9599 printf "hello $version! Headers: ";\e
9600 echo \e'~^header list\e';\e
9601 read status result;\e
9602 echo "status=$status result=$result";\e
9605 set on-compose-splice=ocsm
9608 echo Splice protocol version is $ver
9609 echo '~^h l'; read hl; vput vexpr es substring "${hl}" 0 1
9611 echoerr 'Cannot read header list'; echo '~x'; xit
9613 if [ "$hl" @i!% ' cc' ]
9614 echo '~^h i cc Diet is your <mirr.or>'; read es;\e
9615 vput vexpr es substring "${es}" 0 1
9617 echoerr 'Cannot insert Cc: header'; echo '~x'
9625 .It Va on-resend-cleanup
9627 .Va on-compose-cleanup ,
9628 but is only triggered by
9632 .It Va on-resend-enter
9634 .Va on-compose-enter ,
9635 but is only triggered by
9640 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
9642 is followed by a formfeed character
9646 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
9647 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
9648 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
9649 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
9650 the authentication method requires a password.
9651 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
9652 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
9654 .It Va password-USER@HOST
9655 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
9656 Set the password for
9660 If no such variable is defined for a host,
9661 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
9662 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
9663 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
9667 \*(BO Send messages to the
9669 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
9673 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
9674 When a MIME message part of type
9676 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
9677 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
9679 Note that only parts which can be displayed inline as plain text (see
9681 are displayed unless otherwise noted, other MIME parts will only be
9682 considered by and for the command
9686 The special value commercial at
9688 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, e.g.,
9689 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=@
9690 will henceforth display XML
9692 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
9695 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
9696 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
9697 \(em these directives,
9699 has already been used, should be referred to for further documentation.
9704 can in fact be used as a trigger character to adjust usage and behaviour
9705 of a following shell command specification more thoroughly by appending
9706 more special characters which refer to further mailcap directives, e.g.,
9707 the following hypothetical command specification could be used:
9709 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9710 ? set pipe-X/Y='@!++=@vim ${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
9714 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
9716 The command produces plain text to be integrated in \*(UAs output:
9720 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
9721 but only when it will be displayed:
9722 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
9725 Run the command asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA:
9729 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
9730 temporarily release the terminal to it:
9734 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
9735 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
9736 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY :
9737 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
9738 If given twice then the file will be unlinked automatically by \*(UA
9739 when the command loop is entered again at latest:
9740 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
9743 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
9744 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
9745 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
9746 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
9747 the creation of which is implied; note however that in order to cause
9748 deletion of the temporary file you still have to use two plus signs
9753 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content you can use
9754 another commercial at to forcefully terminate interpretation of
9755 remaining characters.
9756 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
9760 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
9761 the environment of the shell command:
9764 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
9766 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT
9767 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
9770 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
9772 .Va mime-counter-evidence
9773 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
9774 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
9775 .Ev \&\&MAILX_CONTENT
9779 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME
9780 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
9783 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
9787 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
9788 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
9789 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
9795 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
9796 This is identical to
9797 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
9800 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
9801 names a file extension, e.g.,
9803 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
9806 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
9807 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
9808 The only possible value as of now is
9810 which is thus the default.
9813 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
9814 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
9815 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
9816 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
9817 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
9819 If this variable is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
9820 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
9822 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
9823 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
9824 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
9825 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
9826 but practical experience may vary.
9827 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
9831 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
9834 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
9835 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the
9837 authentication method will be used when connecting to a POP3 server that
9841 is that the password is not sent in clear text over the wire and that
9842 only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
9844 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
9847 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
9848 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
9849 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
9851 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session SSL/TLS encrypted.
9852 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
9853 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
9855 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
9861 \*(BO This flag enables POSIX mode, which changes behaviour of \*(UA
9862 where that deviates from standardized behaviour.
9863 It will be set implicitly before the
9864 .Sx "Resource files"
9865 are loaded if the environment variable
9867 is set, and adjusting any of those two will be reflected by the other
9869 The following behaviour is covered and enforced by this mechanism:
9872 .Bl -bullet -compact
9874 In non-interactive mode, any error encountered while loading resource
9875 files during program startup will cause a program exit, whereas in
9876 interactive mode such errors will stop loading of the currently loaded
9877 (stack of) file(s, i.e., recursively).
9878 These exits can be circumvented on a per-command base by using
9881 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
9882 for each command which shall be allowed to fail.
9886 will replace the list of alternate addresses instead of appending to it.
9889 Upon changing the active
9893 will be displayed even if
9900 implies the behaviour described by
9906 is extended to cover any empty mailbox, not only empty
9908 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
9909 es: they will be removed when they are left in empty state otherwise.
9914 .It Va print-alternatives
9915 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
9916 .Ql multipart/alternative
9917 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
9919 other parts are normally discarded.
9920 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
9921 just as if the surrounding part was of type
9922 .Ql multipart/mixed .
9926 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
9927 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is expanded as via
9928 dollar-single-quote expansion (see
9929 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
9930 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
9931 status information, for example
9936 .Va mailbox-display .
9938 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
9939 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
9940 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
9942 a slot for coloured prompts is also available with the \*(OPal command
9944 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
9946 .Ql set noprompt ) .
9950 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
9957 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
9961 If set, \*(UA starts a replying message with the original message
9962 prefixed by the value of the variable
9964 Normally, a heading consisting of
9965 .Dq Fromheaderfield wrote:
9966 is put before the quotation.
9971 variable, this heading is omitted.
9974 is assigned, only the headers selected by the
9977 selection are put above the message body,
9980 acts like an automatic
9982 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9986 is assigned, all headers are put above the message body and all MIME
9987 parts are included, making
9989 act like an automatic
9992 .Va quote-as-attachment .
9995 .It Va quote-as-attachment
9996 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
9998 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
9999 Note this works regardless of the setting of
10004 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
10006 Setting this turns on a more fancy quotation algorithm in that leading
10007 quotation characters are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
10009 can be set to either one or two (space separated) numeric values,
10010 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
10011 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
10013 program, but line-, not paragraph-based.
10014 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
10015 The goal cannot be smaller than the length of
10017 plus some additional pad.
10018 Necessary adjustments take place silently.
10021 .It Va r-option-implicit
10022 \*(BO Setting this option evaluates the contents of
10024 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10026 and passes the results onto the used (file-based) MTA as described for the
10028 option (empty argument case).
10031 .It Va recipients-in-cc
10038 are by default merged into the new
10040 If this variable is set, only the original
10044 the rest is merged into
10049 Unless this variable is defined, no copies of outgoing mail will be saved.
10050 If defined it gives the pathname, subject to the usual
10051 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
10052 of a folder where all new, replied-to or forwarded messages are saved:
10053 when saving to this folder fails the message is not sent, but instead
10057 The standard defines that relative (fully expanded) paths are to be
10058 interpreted relative to the current directory
10060 to force interpretation relative to
10063 needs to be set in addition.
10066 .It Va record-files
10067 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10069 will be extended to cover messages which target only file and pipe
10072 These address types will not appear in recipient lists unless
10073 .Va add-file-recipients
10077 .It Va record-resent
10078 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10080 will be extended to also cover the
10087 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
10088 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
10089 character set of the original message for replies.
10090 If this fails, the mechanism described in
10091 .Sx "Character sets"
10092 is evaluated as usual.
10095 .It Va reply-strings
10096 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
10097 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
10098 built-in strings as
10100 reply message indicators \(en built-in are
10102 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
10107 which often has been seen in the wild;
10108 I.e., the separating colon has to be specified explicitly.
10112 A list of addresses to put into the
10114 field of the message header.
10115 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
10120 .It Va reply-to-honour
10123 header is honoured when replying to a message via
10127 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
10131 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
10132 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
10134 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
10136 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience.
10140 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
10142 upon interrupt or delivery error.
10146 The number of lines that represents a
10155 line display and scrolling via
10157 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
10158 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
10159 terminal, the more will be shown.
10160 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
10161 environment variables
10169 .It Va searchheaders
10170 \*(BO Expand message-list specifiers in the form
10172 to all messages containing the substring
10174 in the header field
10176 The string search is case insensitive.
10179 .It Va sendcharsets
10180 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
10181 outgoing internet mail.
10182 The value of the variable
10184 is automatically appended to this list of character sets.
10185 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
10186 the only supported charset is
10189 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10190 and refer to the section
10191 .Sx "Character sets"
10192 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
10195 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10196 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
10198 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
10200 had been set to the value of the variable
10202 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
10203 character set of the current locale encoding:
10204 therefore mail message text will be (assumed to be) in ISO-8859-1
10205 encoding when send from within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8
10206 encoding when send from within an UTF-8 locale.
10210 never comes into play as
10212 is implicitly assumed to be 8-bit and capable to represent all files the
10213 user may specify (as is the case when no character set conversion
10214 support is available in \*(UA and the only supported character set is
10216 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
10217 This might be a problem for scripts which use the suggested
10219 setting, since in this case the character set is US-ASCII by definition,
10220 so that it is better to also override
10226 An address that is put into the
10228 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
10229 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
10230 This field should normally not be used unless the
10232 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
10235 address is handled as if it were in the
10239 .Va r-option-implicit .
10242 \*(OB Predecessor of
10245 .It Va sendmail-arguments
10246 \*(OB Predecessor of
10247 .Va mta-arguments .
10249 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
10250 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
10251 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
10253 .It Va sendmail-progname
10254 \*(OB Predecessor of
10259 \*(BO When sending a message wait until the
10261 (including the built-in SMTP one) exits before accepting further commands.
10263 with this variable set errors reported by the MTA will be recognizable!
10264 If the MTA returns a non-zero exit status,
10265 the exit status of \*(UA will also be non-zero.
10269 \*(BO This setting causes \*(UA to start at the last message
10270 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder.
10274 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
10275 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
10279 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
10280 summary if the message was sent by the user.
10284 The string to expand
10287 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) .
10291 The string to expand
10294 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) .
10298 Must correspond to the name of a readable file if set.
10299 The file's content is then appended to each singlepart message
10300 and to the first part of each multipart message.
10301 Be warned that there is no possibility to edit the signature for an
10302 individual message.
10305 .It Va skipemptybody
10306 \*(BO If an outgoing message does not contain any text in its first or
10307 only message part, do not send it but discard it silently (see also the
10308 command line option
10313 .It Va smime-ca-dir , smime-ca-file
10314 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
10315 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
10316 purpose of verification of S/MIME signed messages.
10317 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
10318 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
10319 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
10320 be explicitly turned off by setting
10321 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
10322 and further fine-tuning is possible via
10323 .Va smime-ca-flags .
10326 .It Va smime-ca-flags
10327 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
10328 storage, and the certificate verification that is used.
10329 The actual values and their meanings are documented for
10333 .It Va smime-ca-no-defaults
10334 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
10335 used to SSL/TLS library to verify S/MIME signed messages.
10337 .Mx Va smime-cipher
10338 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
10339 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
10340 messages (for the specified account).
10341 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
10344 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
10352 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
10354 is not available) and
10356 (DES CBC, 56 bits).
10358 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
10359 library that \*(UA uses.
10360 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
10361 dynamic loading via, e.g.,
10362 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
10363 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
10366 .It Va smime-crl-dir
10367 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
10368 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
10371 .It Va smime-crl-file
10372 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
10373 verifying S/MIME messages.
10376 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
10377 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
10378 encrypted before sending.
10379 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
10380 contains a certificate in PEM format.
10382 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
10383 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
10384 individually encrypted message;
10385 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
10387 .Va smime-force-encryption
10389 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
10394 .It Va smime-force-encryption
10395 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
10399 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's private key
10400 and include the user's certificate as a MIME attachment.
10401 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
10402 a valid certificate,
10403 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
10404 header and that the message content has not been altered.
10405 It does not change the message text,
10406 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
10408 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
10410 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
10412 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
10413 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
10414 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
10415 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
10416 user's private key, followed by his certificate.
10418 For message signing
10420 is always derived from the value of
10422 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10424 For the purpose of encryption the recipient's public encryption key
10425 (certificate) is expected; the command
10427 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
10428 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
10429 gives some details).
10430 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
10432 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
10437 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
10439 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
10440 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user's addresses
10441 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
10443 For signing and decryption purposes it is possible to use encrypted
10444 keys, and the pseudo-host(s)
10445 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-key
10446 for the private key
10448 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-cert
10449 for the certificate stored in the same file)
10450 will be used for performing any necessary password lookup,
10451 therefore the lookup can be automatized via the mechanisms described in
10452 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
10453 For example, the hypothetical address
10455 could be driven with a private key / certificate pair path defined in
10456 .Va \&\&smime-sign-cert-bob@exam.ple ,
10457 and needed passwords would then be looked up via the pseudo hosts
10458 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-key
10460 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-cert ) .
10461 To include intermediate certificates, use
10462 .Va smime-sign-include-certs .
10464 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
10465 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
10466 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
10467 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
10468 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
10469 .Va smime-sign-cert
10471 This can be used to include intermediate certificates of the certificate
10472 authority, in order to allow the receiver's S/MIME implementation to
10473 perform a verification of the entire certificate chain, starting from
10474 a local root certificate, over the intermediate certificates, down to the
10475 .Va smime-sign-cert .
10476 Even though top level certificates may also be included in the chain,
10477 they won't be used for the verification on the receiver's side.
10479 For the purpose of the mechanisms involved here,
10481 refers to the content of the internal variable
10483 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10486 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-include-certs
10487 will be used for performing password lookups for these certificates,
10488 shall they have been given one, therefore the lookup can be automatized
10489 via the mechanisms described in
10490 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
10492 .Mx Va smime-sign-message-digest
10493 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
10494 \*(OP Specifies the message digest to use when signing S/MIME messages.
10495 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
10497 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
10505 The actually available message digest algorithms depend on the
10506 cryptographic library that \*(UA uses.
10507 \*(OP Support for more message digest algorithms may be available
10508 through dynamic loading via, e.g.,
10509 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3
10510 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
10511 Remember that for this
10513 refers to the variable
10515 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10519 \*(OB\*(OP To use the built-in SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
10521 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
10523 is used in preference of
10527 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
10528 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
10530 authentication method, possible values are
10536 as well as the \*(OPal methods
10542 method does not need any user credentials,
10544 requires a user name and all other methods require a user name and
10552 .Va smtp-auth-password
10554 .Va smtp-auth-user ) .
10559 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
10560 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
10563 .It Va smtp-auth-password
10564 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
10565 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
10566 .Va smtp-auth-password
10568 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
10570 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
10572 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
10574 .Va smtp-auth-password
10575 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
10578 .It Va smtp-auth-user
10579 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
10580 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
10583 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
10585 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
10587 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
10590 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
10594 .It Va smtp-hostname
10595 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
10597 to derive the necessary
10599 information in order to issue a
10606 can be used to use the
10608 from the SMTP account
10615 from the content of this variable (or, if that is the empty string,
10617 or the local hostname as a last resort).
10618 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
10619 a provider other than which (in
10621 is about to send the message.
10622 Setting this variable also influences generated
10628 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
10629 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
10630 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
10632 command to make an SMTP
10634 session SSL/TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
10637 .It Va socks-proxy-USER@HOST , socks-proxy-HOST , socks-proxy
10638 \*(OP If this is set to the hostname (SOCKS URL) of a SOCKS5 server then
10639 \*(UA will proxy all of its network activities through it.
10640 This can be used to proxy SMTP, POP3 etc. network traffic through the
10641 Tor anonymizer, for example.
10642 The following would create a local SOCKS proxy on port 10000 that
10643 forwards to the machine
10645 and from which the network traffic is actually instantiated:
10646 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10647 # Create local proxy server in terminal 1 forwarding to HOST
10648 $ ssh -D 10000 USER@HOST
10649 # Then, start a client that uses it in terminal 2
10650 $ \*(uA -Ssocks-proxy-USER@HOST=localhost:10000
10654 .It Va spam-interface
10655 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like, e.g.,
10657 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
10658 Please refer to the manual section
10659 .Sx "Handling spam"
10660 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
10661 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
10663 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
10669 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
10671 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
10672 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
10673 knowledge to parse the program's output.
10674 A default value for
10676 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
10680 during compilation.
10681 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
10682 using a configuration file for that), the variable
10683 .Va spamc-arguments
10684 can be used as in, e.g.,
10685 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
10686 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
10688 Note that this interface does not inspect the
10690 flag of a message for the command
10694 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
10695 This interface is meant for programs like
10697 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
10698 status for at least the command
10701 meaning a message is spam,
10705 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
10706 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
10707 can be intercepted as necessary.
10709 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
10712 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
10714 .Sx "Handling spam"
10715 contains examples for some programs.
10716 The process environment of the hooks will have the variable
10717 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
10719 Note that spam score support for
10721 is not supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
10723 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
10729 .It Va spam-maxsize
10730 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size will not be passed through to the
10732 .Va spam-interface .
10733 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
10736 .It Va spamc-command
10737 \*(OP The path to the
10741 .Va spam-interface .
10742 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
10744 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
10745 executable had been found during compilation.
10748 .It Va spamc-arguments
10749 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
10752 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
10753 connection-related ones via this variable, e.g.,
10754 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
10758 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
10760 .Va spam-interface .
10761 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
10770 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
10771 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
10772 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
10774 .Va spam-interface .
10776 .Sx "Handling spam"
10777 contains examples for some programs.
10780 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
10781 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
10784 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPnal
10785 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
10786 be used to overcome this restriction.
10787 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
10788 must be followed by a semicolon
10790 and an extended regular expression.
10791 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
10792 .Va spamfilter-rate
10793 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
10794 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
10798 .It Va ssl-ca-dir , ssl-ca-file
10799 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
10800 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
10801 purpose of verification of SSL/TLS server certificates.
10802 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
10803 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
10804 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
10805 be explicitly turned off by setting
10806 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ,
10807 and further fine-tuning is possible via
10810 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
10811 for more information.
10812 \*(UA will try to use the TLS/SNI (ServerNameIndication) extension when
10813 establishing TLS connections to servers identified with hostnames.
10817 .It Va ssl-ca-flags
10818 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
10819 storage, and the certificate verification that is used (also see
10821 The value is expected to consist of a comma-separated list of
10822 configuration directives, with any intervening whitespace being ignored.
10823 The directives directly map to flags that can be passed to
10824 .Xr X509_STORE_set_flags 3 ,
10825 which are usually defined in a file
10826 .Pa openssl/x509_vfy.h ,
10827 and the availability of which depends on the used SSL/TLS library
10828 version: a directive without mapping is ignored (error log subject to
10830 Directives currently understood (case-insensitively) include:
10833 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd BaNg"
10834 .It Cd no-alt-chains
10835 If the initial chain is not trusted, do not attempt to build an
10837 Setting this flag will make OpenSSL certificate verification match that
10838 of older OpenSSL versions, before automatic building and checking of
10839 alternative chains has been implemented; also see
10840 .Cd trusted-first .
10841 .It Cd no-check-time
10842 Do not check certificate/CRL validity against current time.
10843 .It Cd partial-chain
10844 By default partial, incomplete chains which cannot be verified up to the
10845 chain top, a self-signed root certificate, will not verify.
10846 With this flag set, a chain succeeds to verify if at least one signing
10847 certificate of the chain is in any of the configured trusted stores of
10849 The OpenSSL manual page
10850 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
10851 gives some advise how to manage your own trusted store of CA certificates.
10853 Disable workarounds for broken certificates.
10854 .It Cd trusted-first
10855 Try building a chain using issuers in the trusted store first to avoid
10856 problems with server-sent legacy intermediate certificates.
10857 Newer versions of OpenSSL support alternative chain checking and enable
10858 it by default, resulting in the same behaviour; also see
10859 .Cd no-alt-chains .
10864 .It Va ssl-ca-no-defaults
10865 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
10866 used to SSL/TLS library to verify SSL/TLS server certificates.
10869 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
10870 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the filename for a SSL/TLS client
10871 certificate required by some servers.
10872 This is a direct interface to the
10876 function of the OpenSSL library, if available.
10878 .Mx Va ssl-cipher-list
10879 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
10880 \*(OP Specifies a list of ciphers for SSL/TLS connections.
10881 This is a direct interface to the
10885 function of the OpenSSL library, if available; see
10888 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_cipher_list 3
10889 for more information.
10890 By default \*(UA does not set a list of ciphers, in effect using a
10892 specific cipher (protocol standards ship with a list of acceptable
10893 ciphers), possibly cramped to what the actually used SSL/TLS library
10894 supports \(en the manual section
10895 .Sx "An example configuration"
10896 also contains a SSL/TLS use case.
10899 .It Va ssl-config-file
10900 \*(OP If this variable is set \*(UA will call
10901 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
10902 to allow OpenSSL to be configured according to the host system wide
10904 If a non-empty value is given then this will be used to specify the
10905 configuration file to be used instead of the global OpenSSL default;
10906 note that in this case it is an error if the file cannot be loaded.
10907 The application name will always be passed as
10911 .It Va ssl-curves-USER@HOST , ssl-curves-HOST , ssl-curves
10912 \*(OP Specifies a list of supported curves for SSL/TLS connections.
10913 This is a direct interface to the
10917 function of the OpenSSL library, if available; see
10918 .Xr SSL_CTX_set1_curves_list 3
10919 for more information.
10920 By default \*(UA does not set a list of curves.
10924 .It Va ssl-crl-dir , ssl-crl-file
10925 \*(OP Specify a directory / a file, respectively that contains a CRL in
10926 PEM format to use when verifying SSL/TLS server certificates.
10929 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
10930 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the filename for the private key of
10931 a SSL/TLS client certificate.
10932 If unset, the name of the certificate file is used.
10933 The file is expected to be in PEM format.
10934 This is a direct interface to the
10938 function of the OpenSSL library, if available.
10940 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
10941 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the newer and more flexible
10943 instead: if both values are set,
10945 will take precedence!
10946 Can be set to the following values, the actually used
10948 specification to which it is mapped is shown in parenthesis:
10950 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1.2 ) ,
10952 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1.1 ) ,
10954 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, TLSv1 )
10957 .Pf ( Ql -ALL, SSLv3 ) ;
10962 and thus includes the SSLv3 protocol.
10963 Note that SSLv2 is no longer supported at all.
10965 .Mx Va ssl-protocol
10966 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
10967 \*(OP Specify the used SSL/TLS protocol.
10968 This is a direct interface to the
10972 function of the OpenSSL library, if available;
10973 otherwise an \*(UA internal parser is used which understands the
10974 following subset of (case-insensitive) command strings:
10980 as well as the special value
10982 Multiple specifications may be given via a comma-separated list which
10983 ignores any whitespace.
10986 plus sign prefix will enable a protocol, a
10988 hyphen-minus prefix will disable it, so that
10990 will enable only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
10992 It depends upon the used TLS/SSL library which protocols are actually
10993 supported and which protocols are used if
10995 is not set, but note that SSLv2 is no longer supported at all and
10997 Especially for older protocols explicitly securing
10998 .Va ssl-cipher-list
10999 may be worthwile, see
11000 .Sx "An example configuration" .
11003 .It Va ssl-rand-egd
11004 \*(OP Gives the pathname to an entropy daemon socket, see
11006 Not all SSL/TLS libraries support this.
11009 .It Va ssl-rand-file
11010 \*(OP Gives the filename to a file with random entropy data, see
11011 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
11012 If this variable is not set, or set to the empty string, or if the
11013 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11015 .Xr RAND_file_name 3
11016 will be used to create the filename if, and only if,
11018 documents that the SSL PRNG is not yet sufficiently seeded.
11019 If \*(UA successfully seeded the SSL PRNG then it will update the file
11020 .Pf ( Xr RAND_write_file 3 ) .
11021 This variable is only used if
11023 is not set (or not supported by the SSL/TLS library).
11026 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
11027 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
11028 occurs during SSL/TLS server certificate validation against the
11029 specified or default trust stores
11032 or the SSL/TLS library built-in defaults (unless usage disallowed via
11033 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ) ,
11034 and as fine-tuned via
11036 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
11038 (fail and close connection immediately),
11040 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
11042 (show a warning and continue),
11044 (do not perform validation).
11050 If only set without an assigned value, then this setting inhibits the
11056 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
11057 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
11058 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
11059 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
11060 to track down the originating mail user agent.
11061 If set to the value
11067 suppression does not occur.
11072 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
11077 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
11078 escape commas with reverse solidus) to be used to overwrite or define
11081 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11082 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11085 String capabilities form
11087 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
11088 Numerics have to be notated as
11090 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
11091 Finally, booleans do not have any value but indicate a true or false
11092 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
11093 does not support undefining an existing boolean.
11094 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
11095 for one notations like
11098 .Ql control-LETTER ,
11099 and for clarification purposes
11101 can be used to specify
11103 (the control notation
11105 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
11106 the standard CSI sequence);
11107 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
11110 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
11111 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
11113 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11114 ? set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
11118 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
11119 operation of the built-in line editor or \*(UA in general:
11122 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd yay"
11124 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
11126 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
11127 Note that \*(UA does not actually care about the terminal beside that,
11128 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences.
11131 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
11134 .Cd enter_ca_mode ,
11135 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen ca-mode,
11136 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
11137 This must be enabled explicitly by setting
11138 .Va termcap-ca-mode .
11140 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
11144 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
11145 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
11146 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
11147 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
11149 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
11153 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
11155 clear the screen and home cursor.
11156 (Will be simulated via
11161 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
11166 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
11168 clear to the end of line.
11169 (Will be simulated via
11171 plus repetitions of space characters.)
11173 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
11174 .Cd column_address :
11175 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
11176 (Will be simulated via
11182 .Cd carriage_return :
11183 move to the first column in the current row.
11184 The default built-in fallback is
11187 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
11189 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
11190 The default built-in fallback is
11193 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
11195 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
11196 The default built-in fallback is
11198 which is used by most terminals.
11206 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
11211 .It Va termcap-ca-mode
11212 \*(OP Allow usage of the
11216 terminal capabilities, effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen
11217 application, as documented for
11220 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11221 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11224 .It Va termcap-disable
11225 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
11226 If set only some generic fallback built-ins and possibly the content of
11228 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
11230 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11231 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11235 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
11238 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
11241 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for
11242 unsigned right shifting (see
11250 \*(BO If set then the
11252 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
11256 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
11257 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
11258 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
11259 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1 unless it can deduce a value
11260 from the locale specified in the
11262 environment variable (if supported, see there for more).
11263 It defaults to UTF-8 if conversion is available.
11264 Refer to the section
11265 .Sx "Character sets"
11266 for the complete picture about character sets.
11269 .It Va typescript-mode
11270 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
11271 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
11274 .Va colour-disable ,
11275 .Va line-editor-disable
11276 and (before startup completed only)
11277 .Va termcap-disable .
11278 Unsetting it does not restore the former state of the covered settings.
11282 For a safety-by-default policy \*(UA sets its process
11286 but this variable can be used to override that:
11287 set it to an empty value to do not change the (current) setting (on
11288 startup), otherwise the process file mode creation mask is updated to
11290 Child processes inherit the process file mode creation mask.
11293 .It Va user-HOST , user
11294 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, which is
11295 used in case none has been given in the protocol and account-specific
11297 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
11301 \*(BO Setting this enables upward compatibility with \*(UA
11302 version 15.0 in respect to which configuration options are available and
11303 how they are handled.
11304 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
11305 doing things, respectively.
11309 \*(BO This setting, also controllable via the command line option
11311 causes \*(UA to be more verbose, e.g., it will display obsoletion
11312 warnings and SSL/TLS certificate chains.
11313 Even though marked \*(BO this option may be set twice in order to
11314 increase the level of verbosity even more, in which case even details of
11315 the actual message delivery and protocol conversations are shown.
11318 is sufficient to disable verbosity as such.
11325 .It Va version , version-date , version-major , version-minor , version-update
11326 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable contains a string
11327 containing the complete version identification, the latter three contain
11328 only digits: the major, minor and update version numbers.
11329 The date is in ISO 8601 notation.
11330 The output of the command
11332 will include this information.
11335 .It Va writebackedited
11336 If this variable is set messages modified using the
11340 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
11341 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
11342 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
11343 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
11344 performed, and proper RFC 4155
11346 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an excercise to
11349 .\" }}} (Variables)
11351 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
11354 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
11358 .Dq environment variable
11359 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
11360 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
11361 commonly found in there.
11362 The process environment is inherited from the
11364 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
11365 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
11366 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
11367 from \*(UA's point of view.
11368 This means that, e.g., they can be managed via
11372 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
11373 newly created child processes).
11376 In order to transparently integrate other environment variables equally
11377 they need to be imported (linked) with the command
11379 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
11380 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
11381 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
11383 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
11385 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
11387 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11388 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
11390 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
11393 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev BaNg"
11396 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen
11398 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
11399 processes and the MLE (see
11400 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
11401 in interactive mode thereafter.
11402 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 80 columns, unless in
11408 The name of the (mailbox)
11410 to use for saving aborted messages if
11412 is set; this defaults to
11419 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
11424 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
11428 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11429 A default editor is used if this value is not defined.
11433 The user's home directory.
11434 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
11435 The calling user's home directory will be used instead if this directory
11436 does not exist, is not accessible or cannot be read.
11437 (No test for being writable is performed to allow usage by
11438 non-privileged users within read-only jails, but dependent on the
11439 variable settings this directory is a default write target, e.g. for
11447 .It Ev LC_ALL , LC_CTYPE , LANG
11448 \*(OP The (names in lookup order of the)
11452 which indicates the used
11453 .Sx "Character sets" .
11454 Runtime changes trigger automatic updates of the entire locale system,
11455 updating and overwriting also a
11461 The user's preferred number of lines on a page or the vertical screen
11462 or window size in lines.
11463 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
11464 processes in interactive mode thereafter.
11465 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 24 lines, unless in
11471 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
11473 command when operating on local mailboxes.
11476 (path search through
11481 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
11482 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
11483 name to any newly created child process.
11487 Is used as the users
11489 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
11493 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
11497 \*(OP Overrides the default path search for
11498 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
11499 which is defined in the standard RFC 1524 as
11500 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
11501 .\" TODO we should have a mailcaps-default virtual RDONLY option!
11502 (\*(UA makes it a configuration option, however.)
11503 Note this is not a search path, but a path search.
11507 Is used as a startup file instead of
11510 When \*(UA scripts are invoked on behalf of other users,
11511 either this variable should be set to
11515 command line option should be used in order to avoid side-effects from
11516 reading their configuration files.
11517 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
11520 .It Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
11521 If this variable is set then reading of
11523 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
11524 had been started up with the option
11526 (and according argument) or
11528 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
11532 The name of the users
11534 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
11536 A logical subset of the special
11537 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11543 Traditionally this MBOX is used as the file to save messages from the
11545 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
11546 that have been read.
11548 .Sx "Message states" .
11552 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
11558 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
11562 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
11563 The default paginator is
11565 (path search through
11568 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
11570 then a non-existing environment variable
11577 dependent on whether terminal control support is available and whether
11578 that supports full (alternative) screen mode or not (also see
11579 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ) .
11583 will optionally be set to
11590 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
11591 looking for commands, e.g.,
11592 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
11595 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
11596 This variable is automatically looked for upon startup, see
11602 The shell to use for the commands
11607 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
11608 and when starting subprocesses.
11609 A default shell is used if this environment variable is not defined.
11612 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
11613 This specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01) to be
11614 used in place of the current time.
11615 This variable is looked up upon program startup, and its existence will
11616 switch \*(UA to a completely reproducible mode which causes
11617 deterministic random numbers, a special fixed (non-existent?)
11619 and more to be used and set.
11620 It is to be used during development or by software packagers.
11621 \*(ID Currently an invalid setting is only ignored, rather than causing
11622 a program abortion.
11624 .Dl $ SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=`date +%s` \*(uA
11628 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
11629 For extended colour and font control please refer to
11630 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
11631 and for terminal management in general to
11632 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
11636 Used as directory for temporary files instead of
11638 if set, existent, accessible as well as read- and writable.
11639 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment,
11640 but \*(UA will ensure at startup that this environment variable is
11641 updated to contain a usable temporary directory.
11647 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
11648 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
11652 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
11656 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11666 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
11668 File giving initial commands, one of the
11669 .Sx "Resource files" .
11672 System wide initialization file, one of the
11673 .Sx "Resource files" .
11677 \*(OP Personal MIME type handler definition file, see
11678 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
11679 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
11680 a configuration option and can be overridden via
11684 .It Pa /etc/mailcap
11685 \*(OP System wide MIME type handler definition file, see
11686 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
11687 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
11688 a configuration option and can be overridden via
11692 The default value for
11694 The actually used path is a configuration option.
11697 .It Pa ~/.mime.types
11698 Personal MIME types, see
11699 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
11700 The actually used path is a configuration option.
11703 .It Pa /etc/mime.types
11704 System wide MIME types, see
11705 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
11706 The actually used path is a configuration option.
11710 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the users
11712 file \(en the section
11713 .Sx "The .netrc file"
11714 documents the file format.
11715 The actually used path is a configuration option and can be overridden via
11722 The actually used path is a compile-time constant.
11726 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
11727 .Ss "Resource files"
11729 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files:
11731 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
11734 System wide initialization file.
11735 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
11737 (and according argument) or
11739 command line options, or by setting the
11742 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
11746 File giving initial commands.
11747 A different file can be chosen by setting the
11751 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
11753 command line option.
11755 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
11756 Defines a startup file to be read after all other resource files.
11757 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
11759 implementations, for example.
11760 This variable is only honoured when defined in a resource file, e.g.,
11762 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
11766 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
11769 .Bl -bullet -compact
11771 The whitespace characters space, tabulator and newline,
11772 as well as those defined by the variable
11774 are removed from the beginning and end of input lines.
11776 Empty lines are ignored.
11778 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
11779 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
11781 by placing a reverse solidus character
11783 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
11784 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
11785 remains in the input.
11787 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
11789 then it is a comment-command and also ignored.
11790 (The comment-command is a real command, which does nothing, and
11791 therefore the usual follow lines mechanism applies!)
11795 Unless \*(UA is about to enter interactive mode syntax errors that occur
11796 while loading these files are treated as errors and cause program exit.
11797 More files with syntactically equal content can be
11799 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
11801 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11802 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
11803 es, it is really continued here.
11810 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
11811 .Ss "The mime.types files"
11814 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
11815 \*(UA needs to learn about MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
11816 media types in order to classify message and attachment content.
11817 One source for them are
11819 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
11820 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
11821 Another is the command
11823 which also offers access to \*(UAs MIME type cache.
11825 files have the following syntax:
11827 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11828 type/subtype extension [extension ...]
11829 # E.g., text/html html htm
11835 define the MIME media type, as standardized in RFC 2046:
11837 is used to declare the general type of data, while the
11839 specifies a specific format for that type of data.
11840 One or multiple filename
11842 s, separated by whitespace, can be bound to the media type format.
11843 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
11845 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
11847 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in especially
11848 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
11849 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
11850 and prepends an optional
11854 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
11857 The following type markers are supported:
11860 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
11862 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
11867 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
11868 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
11869 the content as plain text instead.
11873 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
11874 handler to be defined.
11879 for sending messages:
11881 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
11882 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
11883 For reading etc. messages:
11884 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
11885 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
11887 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
11888 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
11889 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
11890 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
11893 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{
11894 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
11896 .\" TODO MAILCAP DISABLED
11897 .Sy This feature is not available in v14.9.0, sorry!
11899 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
11900 which \*(UA \*(OPally supports (see
11901 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
11902 It defines a file format to be used to inform mail user agent programs
11903 about the locally-installed facilities for handling various data
11904 formats, i.e., about commands and how they can be used to display, edit
11905 et cetera MIME part contents, as well as a default path search that
11906 includes multiple possible locations of
11910 environment variable that can be used to overwrite that (repeating here
11911 that it is not a search path, but instead a path search specification).
11912 Any existing files will be loaded in sequence, appending any content to
11913 the list of MIME type handler directives.
11917 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
11918 Comment lines start with a number sign
11920 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
11921 Empty lines are also ignored.
11922 All other lines form individual entries that must adhere to the syntax
11924 To extend a single entry (not comment) its line can be continued on
11925 follow lines if newline characters are
11927 by preceding them with the reverse solidus character
11929 The standard does not specify how leading whitespace of follow lines
11930 is to be treated, therefore \*(UA retains it.
11934 entries consist of a number of semicolon
11936 separated fields, and the reverse solidus
11938 character can be used to escape any following character including
11939 semicolon and itself.
11940 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
11941 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
11942 Leading and trailing whitespace of content is ignored (removed).
11945 The first field defines the MIME
11947 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively, and no reverse solidus
11948 escaping is possible in this field).
11949 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
11951 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
11953 would match any audio type.
11954 The second field defines the shell command which shall be used to
11956 MIME parts of the given type; it is implicitly called the
11963 shell commands message (MIME part) data is passed via standard input
11964 unless the given shell command includes one or more instances of the
11967 in which case these instances will be replaced with a temporary filename
11968 and the data will have been stored in the file that is being pointed to.
11971 shell commands data is assumed to be generated on standard output unless
11972 the given command includes (one ore multiple)
11974 In any case any given
11976 format is replaced with a(n already) properly quoted filename.
11977 Note that when a command makes use of a temporary file via
11979 then \*(UA will remove it again, as if the
11980 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ,
11981 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
11983 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
11984 flags had been set; see below for more.
11987 The optional fields either define a shell command or an attribute (flag)
11988 value, the latter being a single word and the former being a keyword
11989 naming the field followed by an equals sign
11991 succeeded by a shell command, and as usual for any
11993 content any whitespace surrounding the equals sign will be removed, too.
11994 Optional fields include the following:
11997 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
11999 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
12001 (Currently unused.)
12003 .It Cd composetyped
12006 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
12008 header field to be applied to the composed data.
12009 (Currently unused.)
12012 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
12014 (Currently unused.)
12017 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
12019 (Currently unused.)
12022 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, e.g., the machine
12023 architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether or not
12024 this mailcap entry applies.
12025 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
12026 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
12029 .It Cd needsterminal
12030 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
12031 an interactive terminal.
12032 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
12033 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
12034 ignored; this flag implies
12035 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
12038 .It Cd copiousoutput
12039 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
12041 command will be an extended stream of textual output that can be
12042 (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
12043 It is mutually exclusive with
12044 .Cd needsterminal .
12046 .It Cd textualnewlines
12047 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
12048 that, if encoded in
12050 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
12051 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
12052 (Currently unused.)
12054 .It Cd nametemplate
12055 This field gives a filename format, in which
12057 will be replaced by a random string, the joined combination of which
12058 will be used as the filename denoted by
12059 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12060 One could specify that a GIF file being passed to an image viewer should
12061 have a name ending in
12064 .Ql nametemplate=%s.gif .
12065 Note that \*(UA ignores the name template unless that solely specifies
12066 a filename suffix that consists of (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
12067 characters, the underscore and dot only.
12070 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
12071 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
12072 This field is not used by \*(UA.
12075 A textual description that describes this type of data.
12078 .It Cd x-mailx-even-if-not-interactive
12079 An extension flag test field \(em by default handlers without
12081 are entirely ignored in non-interactive mode, but if this flag is set
12082 then their use will be considered.
12083 It is an error if this flag is set for commands that use the flag
12084 .Cd needsterminal .
12087 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
12088 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
12091 command shall not be used to generate message quotes
12092 (as it would be by default).
12095 .It Cd x-mailx-async
12096 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
12098 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
12099 Cannot be used in conjunction with
12100 .Cd needsterminal .
12103 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
12104 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
12106 command shall be evaluated once only and the (boolean) result be cached.
12107 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
12108 .Dq running under the X Window System .
12111 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12112 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
12113 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
12114 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12115 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12120 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
12121 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
12122 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
12124 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
12125 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
12126 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12128 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12133 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12134 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
12135 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
12136 (Do not use this for asynchronous handlers.)
12137 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12139 format, or in conjunction with
12140 .Cd x-mailx-async ,
12141 or without also setting
12142 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12144 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill .
12147 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12150 implies the three tmpfile related flags above, but if you want, e.g.,
12152 and deal with the temporary file yourself, you can add in this flag to
12154 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
12159 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
12160 entry fields, prefixed by
12162 Flag fields apply to the entire
12164 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
12165 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
12166 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
12167 one does not provide enough information.
12170 command needs to specify the
12174 command shall not, the following will help out the latter (with enabled
12178 level \*(UA will show information about handler evaluation):
12180 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12181 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
12182 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
12186 In fields any occurrence of the format string
12188 will be replaced by the
12191 Named parameters from the
12193 field may be placed in the command execution line using
12195 followed by the parameter name and a closing
12198 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
12199 regardless of embedded spaces; thus:
12201 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12203 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
12206 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
12207 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
12209 # Executed shell command
12210 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
12214 .\" TODO v15: Mailcap: %n,%F
12215 Note that \*(UA does not support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
12216 shown in this example (as of today).
12217 \*(UA does not support the additional formats
12221 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
12223 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
12224 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
12225 in additional user-provided quotes:
12227 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12229 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
12231 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s
12233 application/pdf; \e
12235 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
12236 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
12238 x-mailx-async; x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12240 application/*; echo "This is \e"%t\e" but \e
12241 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 1024 | cat -vET; \e
12242 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote
12247 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
12248 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
12251 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
12252 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
12253 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
12256 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{
12257 .Ss "The .netrc file"
12261 file contains user credentials for machine accounts.
12262 The default location in the user's
12264 directory may be overridden by the
12266 environment variable.
12267 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
12268 \*(UA implements a parser that supports a superset of the original BSD
12269 syntax, but users should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches
12270 of that file format, shall their
12272 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
12275 .Bl -bullet -compact
12277 BSD does not support single, but only double quotation marks, e.g.,
12278 .Ql password="pass with spaces" .
12280 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
12281 (e.g., a space can be escaped via
12283 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
12285 BSD does not require a final quotation mark of the last user input token.
12287 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
12288 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
12289 still seems to support this syntax, \*(UA does not!
12291 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
12292 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
12293 whitespace, with a number sign
12295 then the rest of the line is ignored.
12297 Whereas other programs may require that the
12299 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
12301 token for any other
12305 \*(UA will always require these strict permissions.
12309 Of the following list of supported tokens \*(UA only uses (and caches)
12314 At runtime the command
12316 can be used to control \*(UA's
12320 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
12321 .It Cd machine Ar name
12322 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized by \*(UA
12324 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
12329 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
12332 As an extension that should not be the cause of any worries
12333 \*(UA supports a single wildcard prefix for
12335 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12336 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
12337 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
12338 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
12344 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
12348 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
12349 Note that in the example neither
12350 .Ql pop3.example.com
12352 .Ql smtp.example.com
12353 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
12354 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
12357 This is the same as
12359 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
12360 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
12361 and it must be the last first-class token.
12363 .It Cd login Ar name
12364 The user name on the remote machine.
12366 .It Cd password Ar string
12367 The user's password on the remote machine.
12369 .It Cd account Ar string
12370 Supply an additional account password.
12371 This is merely for FTP purposes.
12373 .It Cd macdef Ar name
12375 A macro is defined with the specified
12377 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
12378 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
12381 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
12382 defined following the
12384 they are intended to be used with.)
12387 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
12388 This is merely for FTP purposes.
12395 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
12398 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
12399 .Ss "An example configuration"
12401 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12402 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
12405 # Request strict transport security checks!
12406 set ssl-verify=strict
12408 # Where are the up-to-date SSL certificates?
12409 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, do not use any,
12410 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
12411 #set ssl-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
12412 set ssl-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
12413 set ssl-ca-no-defaults
12414 #set ssl-ca-flags=partial-chain
12415 wysh set smime-ca-file="${ssl-ca-file}" \e
12416 smime-ca-no-defaults #smime-ca-flags="${ssl-ca-flags}"
12418 # Do not use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
12419 # Change this only when the remote server does not support it:
12420 # maybe use ssl-protocol-HOST (or -USER@HOST) syntax to define
12421 # such explicit exceptions, then, e.g.
12422 # set ssl-protocol-exam.ple='-ALL,+TLSv1.1'
12423 set ssl-protocol='-ALL,+TLSv1.2'
12425 # Explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may improve security,
12426 # especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2. See ciphers(1).
12427 # Including "@STRENGTH" will sort the final list by algorithm strength.
12428 # In reality it is possibly best to only use ssl-cipher-list-HOST
12429 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
12430 set ssl-cipher-list=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH
12432 # - TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:\e
12433 # ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:\e
12434 # DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:@STRENGTH
12435 # -ALL:!aNULL:!eNULL:!MEDIUM:!LOW:!MD5:!RC4:!EXPORT:@STRENGTH
12436 # Especially with TLSv1.3 curves selection may be desired:
12437 #set ssl-curves=P-521:P-384:P-256
12439 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
12440 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
12442 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
12443 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
12444 set reply-in-same-charset
12446 # When replying, do not merge From: and To: of the original message
12447 # into To:. Instead old From: -> new To:, old To: -> merge Cc:.
12448 set recipients-in-cc
12450 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
12451 # Only like this you will be able to see errors reported through the
12452 # exit status of the MTA (including the built-in SMTP one)!
12455 # Only use built-in MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
12456 set mimetypes-load-control
12458 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
12460 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
12461 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
12462 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt \e
12463 record=+sent.mbox record-files record-resent
12465 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
12466 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
12468 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
12469 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
12471 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
12472 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from do not match.
12473 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
12474 set mta=(smtps?|submission)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
12475 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
12478 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
12480 colour-pager crt= \e
12481 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
12482 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
12483 mime-counter-evidence=0xE \e
12484 prompt='?\e?!\e![\e${account}#\e${mailbox-display}]? ' \e
12485 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
12488 # Only include the selected header fields when typing messages
12489 headerpick type retain from_ date from to cc subject \e
12490 message-id mail-followup-to reply-to
12491 # ...when forwarding messages
12492 headerpick forward retain subject date from to cc
12493 # ...when saving message, etc.
12494 #headerpick save ignore ^Original-.*$ ^X-.*$
12496 # Some mailing lists
12497 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
12498 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
12500 # Handle a few file extensions (to store MBOX databases)
12501 filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
12502 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
12503 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
12504 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
12506 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
12507 # Instead of directly placing content inside `account',
12508 # we `define' a macro: like that we can switch "accounts"
12509 # from within *on-compose-splice*, for example!
12511 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
12512 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
12513 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
12519 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
12520 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
12521 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
12522 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
12523 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
12524 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
12526 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
12527 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
12528 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.ru:465 \e
12529 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
12535 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
12536 commandalias lls '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
12537 commandalias llS '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlS'
12539 # We do not support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
12540 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
12543 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'@*#++=@\e
12544 < "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
12545 -v TMPFILE="${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
12547 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/ {\e
12550 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
12551 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
12552 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
12556 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
12557 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
12564 commandalias V '\e'call V
12568 When storing passwords in
12570 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
12571 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
12574 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
12576 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
12577 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
12579 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12581 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
12582 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
12584 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
12585 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
12587 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
12588 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
12589 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
12590 commandalias xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
12602 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12603 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
12607 This configuration should now work just fine:
12610 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -dvv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
12613 .\" .Ss "S/MIME step by step" {{{
12614 .Ss "S/MIME step by step"
12616 \*(OP The first thing you need for participating in S/MIME message
12617 exchange is your personal certificate, including a private key.
12618 The certificate contains public information, in particular your name and
12619 your email address(es), and the public key that is used by others to
12620 encrypt messages for you,
12621 and to verify signed messages they supposedly received from you.
12622 The certificate is included in each signed message you send.
12623 The private key must be kept secret.
12624 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with your
12625 public key, and to sign messages.
12628 For personal use it is recommended that you get a S/MIME certificate
12629 from one of the major CAs on the Internet using your WWW browser.
12630 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
12632 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
12633 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
12634 community for free; their root certificate
12635 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
12636 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
12637 which means you will have to download their root certificate separately
12638 and ensure it is part of our S/MIME certificate validation chain by
12641 or as a vivid member of the
12642 .Va smime-ca-file .
12643 But let us take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
12644 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
12647 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
12648 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
12649 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
12650 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
12651 entries of the web interface.
12652 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let us create a new
12653 .Dq client certificate ,
12654 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
12655 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
12659 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
12660 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
12661 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
12664 .Dl $ openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
12667 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
12669 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
12670 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
12671 .Dq advanced options
12672 to see the corresponding text field).
12673 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
12674 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
12675 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
12676 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
12677 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
12682 In order to use your new S/MIME setup a combined private key/public key
12683 (certificate) file has to be created:
12686 .Dl $ cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
12689 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
12690 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
12691 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted.
12692 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
12694 is of interest for verification only):
12696 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12697 ? set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
12698 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
12699 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
12705 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS" {{{
12706 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS"
12708 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
12709 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
12710 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
12711 declared invalid after they have been issued.
12712 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
12714 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
12715 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
12716 To seriously use S/MIME or SSL/TLS verification,
12717 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
12718 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
12719 invalidated certificates.
12720 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
12721 the Internet, so they have to be retrieved by some external mechanism.
12724 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
12725 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
12728 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
12731 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
12732 (and no other files) must be created.
12737 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
12738 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
12739 to verify a certificate.
12748 In general it is a good idea to turn on
12754 twice) if something does not work well.
12755 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
12756 problems' solution.
12758 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
12759 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
12761 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
12762 and cannot be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
12764 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
12765 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
12767 One may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
12771 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
12774 return the expected value?
12775 Does this local hostname have a domain suffix?
12776 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
12778 try again after adding an (additional) entry with this extension.
12781 .\" .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail" {{{
12782 .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail"
12784 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
12786 unless they use a special authentification method (OAuth 2.0) which
12787 was not standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
12788 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
12791 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
12792 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
12793 her- and himself with the locally installed
12795 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
12796 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
12797 local cache this query would have to be performed whenever \*(UA is
12798 invoked (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
12801 \*(UA does not support OAuth.
12802 Because of this it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
12803 .Dq less secure app
12804 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
12805 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
12810 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
12813 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
12815 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
12817 use that special password instead of the real Google account password in
12818 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
12819 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
12823 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" {{{
12824 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work"
12826 It can happen that the terminal library (see
12827 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
12830 reports different codes than the terminal really sends, in which case
12831 \*(UA will tell that a key binding is functional, but will not be able to
12832 recognize it because the received data does not match anything expected.
12833 Especially without the \*(OPal terminal capability library support one
12834 reason for this may be that the (possibly even non-existing) keypad
12835 is not turned on and the resulting layout reports the keypad control
12836 codes for the normal keyboard keys.
12841 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
12844 To overcome the situation, use, e.g., the program
12846 in conjunction with the command line option
12848 if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
12849 by keypresses, and use the variable
12851 to make \*(UA aware of them.
12852 E.g., the terminal this is typed on produces some false sequences, here
12853 an example showing the shifted home key:
12855 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12858 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
12863 ? \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
12873 .\" .Sh "IMAP CLIENT" {{{
12876 \*(OPally there is IMAP client support available.
12877 This part of the program is obsolete and will vanish in v15 with the
12878 large MIME and I/O layer rewrite, because it uses old-style blocking I/O
12879 and makes excessive use of signal based long code jumps.
12880 Support can hopefully be readded later based on a new-style I/O, with
12881 SysV signal handling.
12882 In fact the IMAP support had already been removed from the codebase, but
12883 was reinstantiated on user demand: in effect the IMAP code is at the
12884 level of \*(UA v14.8.16 (with
12886 being the sole exception), and should be treated with some care.
12893 protocol prefixes, and an IMAP-based
12896 IMAP URLs (paths) undergo inspections and possible transformations
12897 before use (and the command
12899 can be used to manually apply them to any given argument).
12900 Hierarchy delimiters are normalized, a step which is configurable via the
12902 variable chain, but defaults to the first seen delimiter otherwise.
12903 \*(UA supports internationalised IMAP names, and en- and decodes the
12904 names from and to the
12906 as necessary and possible.
12907 If a mailbox name is expanded (see
12908 .Sx "Filename transformations" )
12909 to an IMAP mailbox, all names that begin with `+' then refer to IMAP
12910 mailboxes below the
12912 target box, while folder names prefixed by `@' refer to folders below
12913 the hierarchy base.
12916 Note: some IMAP servers do not accept the creation of mailboxes in
12917 the hierarchy base, but require that they are created as subfolders of
12918 `INBOX' \(en with such servers a folder name of the form
12920 .Dl imaps://mylogin@imap.myisp.example/INBOX.
12922 should be used (the last character is the server's hierarchy
12924 The following IMAP-specific commands exist:
12927 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
12930 Only applicable to cached IMAP mailboxes;
12931 takes a message list and reads the specified messages into the IMAP
12936 If operating in disconnected mode on an IMAP mailbox,
12937 switch to online mode and connect to the mail server while retaining
12938 the mailbox status.
12939 See the description of the
12941 variable for more information.
12945 If operating in online mode on an IMAP mailbox,
12946 switch to disconnected mode while retaining the mailbox status.
12947 See the description of the
12950 A list of messages may optionally be given as argument;
12951 the respective messages are then read into the cache before the
12952 connection is closed, thus
12954 makes the entire mailbox available for disconnected use.
12958 Sends command strings directly to the current IMAP server.
12959 \*(UA operates always in IMAP `selected state' on the current mailbox;
12960 commands that change this will produce undesirable results and should be
12962 Useful IMAP commands are:
12963 .Bl -tag -offset indent -width ".Ic getquotearoot"
12965 Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument and creates it.
12967 (RFC 2087) Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument
12968 and prints the quotas that apply to the mailbox.
12969 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
12971 (RFC 2342) Takes no arguments and prints the Personal Namespaces,
12972 the Other User's Namespaces and the Shared Namespaces.
12973 Each namespace type is printed in parentheses;
12974 if there are multiple namespaces of the same type,
12975 inner parentheses separate them.
12976 For each namespace a prefix and a hierarchy separator is listed.
12977 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
12982 Perform IMAP path transformations.
12986 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
12987 and manages the error number
12989 The first argument specifies the operation:
12991 normalizes hierarchy delimiters (see
12993 and converts the strings from the locale
12995 to the internationalized variant used by IMAP,
12997 performs the reverse operation.
13002 The following IMAP-specific internal variables exist:
13005 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
13007 .It Va disconnected
13008 \*(BO When an IMAP mailbox is selected and this variable is set,
13009 no connection to the server is initiated.
13010 Instead, data is obtained from the local cache (see
13013 Mailboxes that are not present in the cache
13014 and messages that have not yet entirely been fetched from the server
13016 to fetch all messages in a mailbox at once,
13018 .No ` Ns Li copy * /dev/null Ns '
13019 can be used while still in connected mode.
13020 Changes that are made to IMAP mailboxes in disconnected mode are queued
13021 and committed later when a connection to that server is made.
13022 This procedure is not completely reliable since it cannot be guaranteed
13023 that the IMAP unique identifiers (UIDs) on the server still match the
13024 ones in the cache at that time.
13027 when this problem occurs.
13029 .It Va disconnected-USER@HOST
13030 The specified account is handled as described for the
13033 but other accounts are not affected.
13036 .It Va imap-auth-USER@HOST , imap-auth
13037 Sets the IMAP authentication method.
13038 Valid values are `login' for the usual password-based authentication
13040 `cram-md5', which is a password-based authentication that does not send
13041 the password over the network in clear text,
13042 and `gssapi' for GSS-API based authentication.
13046 Enables caching of IMAP mailboxes.
13047 The value of this variable must point to a directory that is either
13048 existent or can be created by \*(UA.
13049 All contents of the cache can be deleted by \*(UA at any time;
13050 it is not safe to make assumptions about them.
13053 .It Va imap-delim-USER@HOST , imap-delim-HOST , imap-delim
13054 The hierarchy separator used by the IMAP server.
13055 Whenever an IMAP path is specified it will undergo normalization.
13056 One of the normalization steps is the squeezing and adjustment of
13057 hierarchy separators.
13058 If this variable is set, any occurrence of any character of the given
13059 value that exists in the path will be replaced by the first member of
13060 the value; an empty value will cause the default to be used, it is
13062 If not set, we will reuse the first hierarchy separator character that
13063 is discovered in a user-given mailbox name.
13065 .Mx Va imap-keepalive
13066 .It Va imap-keepalive-USER@HOST , imap-keepalive-HOST , imap-keepalive
13067 IMAP servers may close the connection after a period of
13068 inactivity; the standard requires this to be at least 30 minutes,
13069 but practical experience may vary.
13070 Setting this variable to a numeric `value' greater than 0 causes
13071 a `NOOP' command to be sent each `value' seconds if no other operation
13075 .It Va imap-list-depth
13076 When retrieving the list of folders on an IMAP server, the
13078 command stops after it has reached a certain depth to avoid possible
13080 The value of this variable sets the maximum depth allowed.
13082 If the folder separator on the current IMAP server is a slash `/',
13083 this variable has no effect and the
13085 command does not descend to subfolders.
13087 .Mx Va imap-use-starttls
13088 .It Va imap-use-starttls-USER@HOST , imap-use-starttls-HOST , imap-use-starttls
13089 Causes \*(UA to issue a `STARTTLS' command to make an unencrypted
13090 IMAP session SSL/TLS encrypted.
13091 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
13092 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the IMAPS method.
13098 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
13108 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
13117 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
13123 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
13126 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
13127 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
13128 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
13131 command already appeared in First Edition
13135 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
13136 Electronic mail was there from the start.
13137 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
13138 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
13139 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
13140 freeloaders, or whatever.
13141 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
13142 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
13143 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
13149 Mail was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
13152 distribution until 1995.
13153 Mail has then seen further development in open source
13155 variants, noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
13157 Based upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
13158 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
13159 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso.
13160 This man page is derived from
13161 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
13162 that was originally written by Kurt Shoens.
13169 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
13170 .An "Edward Wang" ,
13171 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
13172 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
13173 .An "Gunnar Ritter" ,
13174 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" .
13181 provide contact addresses:
13183 .\" v15-compat: drop eval as `mail' will expand variable?
13184 .Dl ? echo $contact-web; eval mail $contact-mail
13187 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
13190 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
13194 from anywhere else but a command prompt is very problematic and likely
13195 to leave the program in an undefined state: many library functions
13196 cannot deal with the
13198 that this software (still) performs; even though efforts have been taken
13199 to address this, no sooner but in v15 it will have been worked out:
13200 interruptions have not been disabled in order to allow forceful breakage
13201 of hanging network connections, for example (all this is unrelated to
13205 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
13206 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
13207 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
13212 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
13213 that is capable of message queuing.
13220 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
13221 claims that there are no messages to display, one needs to perform
13222 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
13224 In threaded display a power user may encounter crashes very
13225 occasionally (this is may and very).
13229 in the source repository lists future directions.