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 v14.9.5 / 2017-10-21
46 .\" If not ~/.mailrc, it breaks POSIX compatibility. And adjust main.c.
51 .ds OU [no v15-compat]
52 .ds ID [v15 behaviour may differ]
53 .ds NQ [Only new quoting rules]
64 .Nd send and receive Internet mail
70 .\" Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"SYNOPSIS, main()
79 .Op : Ns Fl a Ar attachment Ns \&:
80 .Op : Ns Fl b Ar bcc-addr Ns \&:
81 .Op : Ns Fl c Ar cc-addr Ns \&:
82 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
85 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
88 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
90 .Pf : Ar to-addr Ns \&:
91 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
100 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
102 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
105 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
106 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
115 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
117 .Fl S Ar var Ns Op Ns = Ns Ar value Ns
119 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
121 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
127 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
130 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
133 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
134 .Sy Compatibility note:
135 S-nail (\*(UA) will wrap up into \%S-mailx in v15.0 (circa 2020).
136 Backward incompatibility has to be expected \(en
139 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
140 rules, for example, and shell metacharacters will become meaningful.
141 New and old behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU, and setting
144 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
145 will choose new behaviour when applicable.
146 \*(OB flags what will vanish, and enabling
150 enables obsoletion warnings.
154 \*(UA provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
156 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
158 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
159 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3, among others.
160 \*(UA divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows
161 the user to deal with them in any order.
165 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
166 for manipulating messages and sending mail.
167 It provides the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
168 of outgoing messages, and increasingly powerful and reliable
169 non-interactive scripting capabilities.
171 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
174 .Bl -tag -width ".It Fl BaNg"
177 Explicitly control which of the
181 d (loaded): if the letter
183 is (case-insensitively) part of the
187 is sourced, likewise the letter
189 controls sourcing of the user's personal
191 file, whereas the letters
195 explicitly forbid sourcing of any resource files.
196 Scripts should use this option: to avoid environmental noise they should
198 from any configuration and create a script-specific environment, setting
200 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
203 and running configurating commands via
205 This option overrides
212 command for the given user email
214 after program startup is complete (all resource files are loaded, any
216 setting is being established; only
218 commands have not been evaluated yet).
219 Being a special incarnation of
221 macros for the purpose of bundling longer-lived
223 tings, activating such an email account also switches to the accounts
225 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
230 .It Fl a Ar file Ns Op Ar =input-charset Ns Op Ar #output-charset
233 to the message (for compose mode opportunities refer to
237 .Sx "Filename transformations"
240 will be performed, except that shell variables are not expanded.
243 not be accessible but contain a
245 character, then anything before the
247 will be used as the filename, anything thereafter as a character set
250 If an input character set is specified,
251 .Mx -ix "character set specification"
252 but no output character set, then the given input character set is fixed
253 as-is, and no conversion will be applied;
254 giving the empty string or the special string hyphen-minus
256 will be treated as if
258 has been specified (the default).
260 If an output character set has also been given then the conversion will
261 be performed exactly as specified and on-the-fly, not considering the
262 file's type and content.
263 As an exception, if the output character set is specified as the empty
264 string or hyphen-minus
266 then the default conversion algorithm (see
267 .Sx "Character sets" )
268 is applied (therefore no conversion is performed on-the-fly,
270 will be MIME-classified and its contents will be inspected first) \(em
271 without support for character set conversions
273 does not include the term
275 only this argument is supported.
278 (\*(OB: \*(UA will always use line-buffered output, to gain
279 line-buffered input even in batch mode enable batch mode via
284 Send a blind carbon copy to
291 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
293 The option may be used multiple times.
295 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
299 Send carbon copies to the given receiver, if so allowed by
301 May be used multiple times.
306 the internal variable
308 which enables debug messages and disables message delivery,
309 among others; effectively turns almost any operation into a dry-run.
315 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body.
316 This command line option is \*(OB.
320 Just check if mail is present (in the system
322 or the one specified via
324 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
325 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
326 specification can be added with the option
331 Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of the
332 first recipient's address (instead of in
337 Read in the contents of the user's
339 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
341 (or the specified file) for processing;
342 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
348 argument will undergo some special
349 .Sx "Filename transformations"
354 is not an argument to the flag
356 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
360 that starts with a hyphen-minus, prefix with a relative path, as in
361 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
367 and exit; a configurable summary view is available via the
373 Show a short usage summary.
379 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
385 of all messages that match the given
389 .Sx "Specifying messages"
394 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
395 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
401 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
402 be enabled explicitly (e.g., by using the option
407 Special send mode that will flag standard input with the MIME
411 and use it as the main message body.
412 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
413 .Va message-inject-head
415 .Va message-inject-tail .
421 Special send mode that will MIME classify the specified
423 and use it as the main message body.
424 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
425 .Va message-inject-head
427 .Va message-inject-tail .
433 inhibit the initial display of message headers when reading mail or
438 for the internal variable
443 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
448 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
449 .Sx "Resource files" .
453 Special send mode that will initialize the message body with the
454 contents of the specified
456 which may be standard input
458 only in non-interactive context.
466 opened will be in read-only mode.
470 .It Fl r Ar from-addr
471 Whereas the source address that appears in the
473 header of a message (or in the
475 header if the former contains multiple addresses) is honoured by the
476 builtin SMTP transport, it is not used by a file-based
478 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) for the RFC 5321 reverse-path used for relaying
479 and delegating a message to its destination(s), for delivery errors
480 etc., but it instead uses the local identity of the initiating user.
483 When this command line option is used the given
485 will be assigned to the internal variable
487 but in addition the command line option
488 .Fl \&\&f Ar from-addr
489 will be passed to a file-based
491 whenever a message is sent.
494 include a user name the address components will be separated and
495 the name part will be passed to a file-based
501 If an empty string is passed as
503 then the content of the variable
505 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
507 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the file-based
516 command line options are used when contacting a file-based MTA, unless
517 this automatic deduction is enforced by
519 ing the internal variable
520 .Va r-option-implicit .
523 Remarks: many default installations and sites disallow overriding the
524 local user identity like this unless either the MTA has been configured
525 accordingly or the user is member of a group with special privileges.
529 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Op = Ns value
531 (or, with a prefix string
534 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
537 iable and optionally assign
540 If the operation fails the program will exit if any of
545 Settings established via
547 cannot be changed from within
549 or an account switch initiated by
551 They will become mutable again before commands registered via
557 Specify the subject of the message to be sent.
558 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
559 normalized to space (SP) characters.
563 The message given (on standard input) is expected to contain, separated
564 from the message body by an empty line, a message header with
569 fields giving its recipients, which will be added to any recipients
570 specified on the command line.
571 If a message subject is specified via
573 then it will be used in favour of one given on the command line.
589 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
590 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
591 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
593 Any other custom header field (also see
597 is passed through entirely
598 unchanged, and in conjunction with the options
602 it is possible to embed
603 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
611 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
614 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
615 .Ql Fl \&\&f Ns \0%user .
624 will also show the list of
626 .Ql $ \*(uA -Xversion -Xx .
631 ting the internal variable
633 enables display of some informational context messages.
634 Using it twice increases the level of verbosity.
638 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
640 to the list of commands to be executed,
641 as a last step of program startup, before normal operation starts.
642 This is the only possibility to execute commands in non-interactive mode
643 when reading startup files is actively prohibited.
644 The commands will be evaluated as a unit, just as via
654 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
655 in compose mode even in non-interactive use cases.
656 This can be used to, e.g., automatically format the composed message
657 text before sending the message:
658 .Bd -literal -offset indent
659 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.';\e
660 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
661 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d~:/ -Sttycharset=utf-8 bob@exam.ple
666 Enables batch mode: standard input is made line buffered, the complete
667 set of (interactive) commands is available, processing of
668 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
669 is enabled in compose mode, and diverse
670 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
671 are adjusted for batch necessities, exactly as if done via
687 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
688 .Bd -literal -offset indent
689 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'm bob\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\enx\en' |\e
690 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d#:/ -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
695 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
698 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
699 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
705 arguments and all receivers established via
709 are subject to the checks established by
712 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
715 allows their recognition all
717 arguments given at the end of the command line after a
719 separator will be passed through to a file-based
721 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for the entire session.
723 constraints do not apply to the content of
727 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{
730 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
732 Mail, itself a successor of the Research
735 .Dq was there from the start
738 It thus represents the user side of the
740 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
741 traditionally taken by
743 and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility purposes.
748 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
752 Because \*(UA strives for compliance with POSIX
754 it is likely that some configuration settings have to be adjusted before
755 using it is a smooth experience.
756 (Rather complete configuration examples can be found in the section
761 .Sx "Resource files" ,
762 bends those standard imposed settings of the
763 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
764 a bit towards more user friendliness and safety already.
772 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to the
774 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
776 that would otherwise occur (see
777 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
780 to not remove empty system MBOX mailbox files in order not to mangle
781 file permissions when files eventually get recreated (all empty (MBOX)
782 mailbox files will be removed unless this variable is set whenever
784 .Pf a.k.a.\0 Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
785 mode has been enabled).
790 in order to synchronize \*(UA with the exit status report of the used
797 to enter interactive startup even if the initial mailbox is empty,
799 to allow editing of headers as well as
801 to not strip down addresses in compose mode, and
803 to include the message that is being responded to when
809 The file mode creation mask can be explicitly managed via the variable
811 Sufficient system support provided symbolic links will not be followed
812 when files are opened for writing.
813 Files and shell pipe output can be
815 d for evaluation, also during startup from within the
816 .Sx "Resource files" .
819 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
820 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
822 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or built-in
824 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
825 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
826 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
830 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
832 .Bd -literal -offset indent
834 $ \*(uA -s ubject -a ttach.txt bill@exam.ple
836 # But... try it in an isolated dry-run mode (-d) first
837 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
838 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple \e
840 '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
843 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
844 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=none \e
845 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
851 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
852 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
853 In this compose mode \*(UA treats lines beginning with the character
855 special \(en these are so-called
856 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
857 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
858 attachments and more; e.g., the command escape
860 will start the text editor to revise the message in its current state,
862 allows editing of the most important message headers, with
864 custom headers can be created (more specifically than with
867 gives an overview of most other available command escapes.
870 will leave compose mode and send the message once it is completed.
874 at the beginning of an empty line has the same effect, whereas typing
877 twice will abort the current letter (saving its contents in the file
888 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
889 can be used to alter default behavior.
890 E.g., messages are sent asynchronously, without supervision, unless the
893 is set, therefore send errors will not be recognizable until then.
898 will automatically startup a text editor when compose mode is entered,
900 allows editing of headers additionally to plain body content,
904 will cause the user to be prompted actively for (blind) carbon-copy
905 recipients, respectively, and (the default)
907 will request confirmation whether the message shall be sent.
910 The envelope sender address is defined by
912 explicitly defining an originating
914 may be desirable, especially with the builtin SMTP Mail-Transfer-Agent
917 for outgoing message and MIME part content are configurable via
919 whereas input data is assumed to be in
921 Message data will be passed over the wire in a
923 MIME parts a.k.a. attachments need to be assigned a
926 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
927 Saving a copy of sent messages in a
929 mailbox may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox
931 targets the value will undergo
932 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
937 sandbox dry-run tests will prove correctness.
940 Message recipients (as specified on the command line or defined in
945 may not only be email addressees but can also be names of mailboxes and
946 even complete shell command pipe specifications.
949 is not set then only network addresses (see
951 for a description of mail addresses) and plain user names (including MTA
952 aliases) may be used, other types will be filtered out, giving a warning
956 can be used to generate standard compliant network addresses.
958 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
959 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
963 is set then extended recipient addresses will optionally be accepted:
964 Any name which starts with a vertical bar
966 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
968 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
969 Likewise, any name that starts with the character solidus
971 or the character sequence dot solidus
973 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content;
974 likewise a name that solely consists of a hyphen-minus
976 Any other name which contains a commercial at
978 character is treated as a network address;
979 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
981 character specifies a mailbox name;
982 Any other name which contains a solidus
984 character but no exclamation mark
988 character before also specifies a mailbox name;
989 What remains is treated as a network address.
991 .Bd -literal -offset indent
992 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
993 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
994 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
995 \*(uA -:/ -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
996 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,+addr,failinvaddr -s test \e
1001 It is possible to create personal distribution lists via the
1003 command, so that, for instance, the user can send mail to
1005 and have it go to a group of people.
1006 These aliases have nothing in common with the system wide aliases that
1007 may be used by the MTA, which are subject to the
1011 and are often tracked in a file
1017 Personal aliases will be expanded by \*(UA before the message is sent,
1018 and are thus a convenient alternative to specifying each addressee by
1019 itself; they correlate with the active set of
1026 .Dl alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/mail/cohorts.mbox
1029 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
1031 .Va on-compose-cleanup
1032 hook variables may be set to
1034 d macros to automatically adjust some settings dependent
1035 on receiver, sender or subject contexts, and via the
1036 .Va on-compose-splice
1038 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
1039 variables, the former also to be set to a
1041 d macro, increasingly powerful mechanisms to perform automated message
1042 adjustments, including signature creation, are available.
1043 (\*(ID These hooks work for commands which newly create messages, namely
1044 .Ic forward , mail , reply
1049 for now provide only the hooks
1052 .Va on-resend-cleanup . )
1055 For the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
1056 be switched to with a single command or command line option there are
1058 Alternatively it is also possible to use a flat configuration, making use
1059 of so-called variable chains which automatically pick
1063 context-dependend variable variants: for example addressing
1064 .Ql Ic File Ns \& pop3://yaa@exam.ple
1066 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-yaa@exam.ple ,
1067 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-exam.ple
1072 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1074 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
1077 To avoid environmental noise scripts should
1079 \*(UA from any configuration files and create a script-local
1080 environment, ideally with the command line options
1082 to disable any configuration file in conjunction with repetitions of
1084 to specify variables:
1086 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1087 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
1088 -Sv15-compat -Ssendwait -Sttycharset=utf-8 \e
1089 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,failinvaddr \e
1090 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
1091 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
1092 -s 'Subject to go' -a attachment_file \e
1094 'Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>' rec2@exam.ple \e
1099 As shown, scripts can
1101 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
1104 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
1106 In interactive mode, which is introduced in the next section, messages
1107 can be sent by calling the
1109 command with a list of recipient addresses:
1111 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1112 $ \*(uA -d -Squiet -Semptystart
1113 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
1114 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
1116 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
1117 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
1121 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode" {{{
1122 .Ss "On reading mail, and interactive mode"
1124 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
1126 When used like that the user's system
1128 (for more on mailbox types please see the command
1130 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed if
1134 The visual style of this summary of
1136 can be adjusted through the variable
1138 and the possible sorting criterion via
1144 can be performed with the command
1146 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
1147 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
1156 will give a listing of all available commands and
1158 will give a summary of some common ones.
1159 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available one can type
1162 and see the actual expansion of
1164 and what its purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
1165 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
1166 order of commands does not necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1167 however possible to define overwrites with
1168 .Ic commandalias ) .
1169 These commands can also produce a more
1174 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1175 messages; the current message \(en the
1177 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1178 or the first message of the mailbox; the internal variable
1180 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1185 ful of header summaries containing the
1189 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1193 Message content can be displayed with the command
1200 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1202 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1204 the sole difference to the command
1206 which will always use the
1210 will instead only show the first
1212 of a message (maybe even compressed if
1215 Message display experience may improve by setting and adjusting
1216 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
1218 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" .
1221 By default the current message
1223 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1224 a fancy message specification (see
1225 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1228 will display all unread messages,
1233 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1235 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1239 will display the last and the next message, respectively.
1242 (a more substantial alias for
1244 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1245 instead of their content, e.g., the following will search for subjects:
1248 .Dl ? from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1251 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1253 d, but fields can be white- or blacklisted for a variety of
1254 applications by using the command
1256 e.g., to restrict their display to a very restricted set for
1258 .Ql Ic \:headerpick Cd \:type retain Ar \:from to cc subject .
1259 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1260 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1265 will show the raw message content.
1266 Note that historically the global
1268 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1272 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1273 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1274 aims at making the user experience with the many
1277 When reading the system
1283 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1285 modifier (propagating the mailbox to a
1287 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ) ,
1288 then messages which have been read will be automatically moved to a
1290 .Sx "secondary mailbox" ,
1293 file, when the mailbox is left, either by changing the
1294 active mailbox or by quitting \*(UA (also see
1295 .Sx "Message states" )
1296 \(en this automatic moving from a system or primary to the secondary
1297 mailbox is not performed when the variable
1300 Messages can also be explicitly
1302 d to other mailboxes, whereas
1304 keeps the original message.
1306 can be used to write out data content of specific parts of messages.
1309 After examining a message the user can
1311 to the sender and all recipients (which will also be placed in
1314 .Va recipients-in-cc
1317 exclusively to the sender(s).
1319 ing a message will allow editing the new message: the original message
1320 will be contained in the message body, adjusted according to
1326 messages: the former will add a series of
1328 headers, whereas the latter will not; different to newly created
1329 messages editing is not possible and no copy will be saved even with
1331 unless the additional variable
1334 When sending, replying or forwarding messages comments and full names
1335 will be stripped from recipient addresses unless the internal variable
1338 Of course messages can be
1340 and they can spring into existence again via
1342 or when the \*(UA session is ended via the
1347 To end a mail processing session one may either issue
1349 to cause a full program exit, which possibly includes
1350 automatic moving of read messages to the
1352 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1354 as well as updating the \*(OPal line editor
1358 instead in order to prevent any of these actions.
1361 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{
1362 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1364 Messages which are HTML-only become more and more common and of course
1365 many messages come bundled with a bouquet of MIME (Multipurpose Internet
1366 Mail Extensions) parts for, e.g., attachments.
1367 To get a notion of MIME types, \*(UA will first read
1368 .Sx "The mime.types files"
1369 (as configured and allowed by
1370 .Va mimetypes-load-control ) ,
1371 and then add onto that types registered directly with
1373 It (normally) has a default set of types built-in, too.
1374 To improve interaction with faulty MIME part declarations which are
1375 often seen in real-life messages, setting
1376 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1377 will allow \*(UA to verify the given assertion and possibly provide
1378 an alternative MIME type.
1381 Whereas \*(UA \*(OPally supports a simple HTML-to-text converter for
1382 HTML messages, it cannot handle MIME types other than plain text itself.
1383 Instead programs need to become registered to deal with specific MIME
1384 types or file extensions.
1385 These programs may either prepare plain text versions of their input in
1386 order to enable \*(UA to integrate their output neatlessly in its own
1387 message visualization (a mode which is called
1388 .Cd copiousoutput ) ,
1389 or display the content themselves, for example in an external graphical
1390 window: such handlers will only be considered by and for the command
1394 To install a handler program for a specific MIME type an according
1395 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1396 variable needs to be set; to instead define a handler for a specific
1397 file extension the respective
1399 variable can be used \(en these handlers take precedence.
1400 \*(OPally \*(UA supports mail user agent configuration as defined in
1401 RFC 1524; this mechanism (see
1402 .Sx "The Mailcap files" )
1403 will be queried for display or quote handlers if none of the former two
1404 .\" TODO v15-compat "will be" -> "is"
1405 did; it will be the sole source for handlers of other purpose.
1406 A last source for handlers is the MIME type definition itself, when
1407 a (\*(UA specific) type-marker was registered with the command
1409 (which many built-in MIME types do).
1412 E.g., to display a HTML message inline (that is, converted to a more
1413 fancy plain text representation than the built-in converter is capable to
1414 produce) with either of the text-mode browsers
1418 teach \*(UA about MathML documents and make it display them as plain
1419 text, and to open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer,
1420 asynchronously and with some other magic attached:
1422 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1423 ? if [ "$features" !% +filter-html-tagsoup ]
1424 ? #set pipe-text/html='@* elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1425 ? set pipe-text/html='@* lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1426 ? # Display HTML as plain text instead
1427 ? #set pipe-text/html=@
1429 ? mimetype @ application/mathml+xml mathml
1430 ? wysh set pipe-application/pdf='@&=@ \e
1431 trap "rm -f \e"${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1432 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1433 mupdf "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1437 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1440 \*(UA offers some support to ease handling of mailing lists.
1443 promotes all given arguments to known mailing lists, and
1445 sets their subscription attribute, creating them first as necessary.
1450 automatically, but only resets the subscription attribute.)
1451 Using the commands without arguments will show (a subset of) all
1452 currently defined mailing lists.
1457 can be used to mark out messages with configured list addresses
1458 in the header display.
1461 \*(OPally mailing lists may also be specified as (extended) regular
1462 expressions, which allows matching of many addresses with a single
1464 However, all fully qualified list addresses are matched via a fast
1465 dictionary, whereas expressions are placed in (a) list(s) which is
1466 (are) matched sequentially.
1468 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1469 ? set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
1470 reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1471 ? wysh mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1472 ? mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1477 .Va followup-to-honour
1479 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1480 header is honoured when the message is being replied to (via
1486 controls whether this header is created when sending mails; it will be
1487 created automatically for a couple of reasons, too, like when the
1489 .Dq mailing list specific
1494 is used to respond to a message with its
1495 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1499 A difference in between the handling of known and subscribed lists is
1500 that the address of the sender is usually not part of a generated
1501 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1502 when addressing the latter, whereas it is for the former kind of lists.
1503 Usually because there are exceptions: say, if multiple lists are
1504 addressed and not all of them are subscribed lists.
1506 For convenience \*(UA will, temporarily, automatically add a list
1507 address that is presented in the
1509 header of a message that is being responded to to the list of known
1511 Shall that header have existed \*(UA will instead, dependent on the
1513 .Va reply-to-honour ,
1516 for this purpose in order to accept a list administrators' wish that
1517 is supposed to have been manifested like that (but only if it provides
1518 a single address which resides on the same domain as what is stated in
1522 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
1523 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
1525 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
1526 message signing and message encryption.
1527 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
1528 The data can be used to verify that the message was sent using a valid
1529 certificate, that the sender's address in the message header matches
1530 that in the certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
1531 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
1532 it can be read regardless of whether the recipient's software is able to
1534 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
1537 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
1538 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
1539 To encrypt a message, the specific recipient's public encryption key
1541 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
1542 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
1544 A message should always be signed before it is encrypted.
1545 Otherwise, it is still possible that the encrypted message text is
1549 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
1550 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
1551 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
1552 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
1554 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered with OpenSSL and installed
1556 If you trust the source of your OpenSSL software installation,
1557 this offers reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet.
1559 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults
1560 to avoid using the default certificates and point
1564 to a trusted pool of certificates.
1565 In general, a certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA
1566 certificate has been retrieved with.
1569 This trusted pool of certificates is used by the command
1571 to ensure that the given S/MIME messages can be trusted.
1572 If so, verified sender certificates that were embedded in signed
1573 messages can be saved locally with the command
1575 and used by \*(UA to encrypt further communication with these senders:
1577 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1579 ? set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
1580 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
1584 To sign outgoing messages in order to allow receivers to verify the
1585 origin of these messages a personal S/MIME certificate is required.
1586 \*(UA supports password-protected personal certificates (and keys),
1587 for more on this, and its automatization, please see the section
1588 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
1590 .Sx "S/MIME step by step"
1591 shows examplarily how such a private certificate can be obtained.
1592 In general, if such a private key plus certificate
1594 is available, all that needs to be done is to set some variables:
1596 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1597 ? set smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
1598 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
1603 Variables of interest for S/MIME in general are
1606 .Va smime-ca-flags ,
1607 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
1609 .Va smime-crl-file .
1610 For S/MIME signing of interest are
1612 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
1613 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
1615 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
1616 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
1619 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
1622 \*(ID Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to
1623 message subjects or other header fields yet.
1624 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
1625 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
1626 When sending signed messages,
1627 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
1631 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{
1632 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1634 \*(IN For accessing protocol-specific resources usage of Uniform
1635 Resource Locators (URL, RFC 1738) has become omnipresent.
1636 \*(UA expects and understands URLs in the following form;
1639 denote optional parts, optional either because there also exist other
1640 ways to define the information in question or because support of the
1641 part is protocol-specific (e.g.,
1643 is used by the local maildir and the IMAP protocol, but not by POP3);
1648 are specified they must be given in URL percent encoded form (RFC 3986;
1654 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
1657 Note that these \*(UA URLs most often do not conform to any real
1658 standard, but instead represent a normalized variant of RFC 1738 \(en
1659 they are not used in data exchange but only meant as a compact,
1660 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in
1661 a well-known notation.
1664 Many internal variables of \*(UA exist in multiple versions, called
1665 variable chains for the rest of this document: the plain
1670 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
1677 had been specified in the respective URL, otherwise it refers to the plain
1683 that had been found when doing the user chain lookup as is described
1686 will never be in URL percent encoded form, whether it came from an URL
1687 or not; i.e., variable chain name extensions of
1688 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1689 must not be URL percent encoded.
1692 For example, whether an hypothetical URL
1693 .Ql smtp://hey%3Ayou@our.house
1694 had been given that includes a user, or whether the URL was
1695 .Ql smtp://our.house
1696 and the user had been found differently, to lookup the variable chain
1697 .Va smtp-use-starttls
1698 \*(UA first looks for whether
1699 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:hey:you@our.house
1700 is defined, then whether
1701 .Ql smtp-\:use-\:starttls-\:our.house
1702 exists before finally ending up looking at the plain variable itself.
1705 \*(UA obeys the following logic scheme when dealing with the
1706 necessary credential information of an account:
1712 has been given in the URL the variables
1716 are looked up; if no such variable(s) can be found then \*(UA will,
1717 when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
1718 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
1725 specific entry which provides a
1727 name: this lookup will only succeed if unambiguous (one possible matching
1730 It is possible to load encrypted
1735 If there is still no
1737 then \*(UA will fall back to the user who is supposed to run \*(UA,
1738 the identity of which has been fixated during \*(UA startup and is
1739 known to be a valid user on the current host.
1742 Authentication: unless otherwise noted this will lookup the
1743 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
1744 variable chain, falling back to a protocol-specific default should this
1750 has been given in the URL, then if the
1752 has been found through the \*(OPal
1754 that may have already provided the password, too.
1755 Otherwise the variable chain
1756 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
1757 is looked up and used if existent.
1759 Afterwards the complete \*(OPal variable chain
1760 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
1764 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
1765 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
1766 but with a password).
1768 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
1769 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
1770 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
1775 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
1779 header field(s), which means that the values of
1780 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
1782 .Va smime-sign-message-digest
1783 will not be looked up using the
1787 chains from above but instead use the corresponding values from the
1788 message that is being worked on.
1789 In unusual cases multiple and different
1793 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
1794 unusual cases become possible.
1795 The usual case is as short as:
1797 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1798 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
1799 smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair
1805 contains complete example configurations.
1808 .\" .Ss "Encrypted network communication" {{{
1809 .Ss "Encrypted network communication"
1811 SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) a.k.a. its successor TLS (Transport Layer
1812 Security) are protocols which aid in securing communication by providing
1813 a safely initiated and encrypted network connection.
1814 A central concept of SSL/TLS is that of certificates: as part of each
1815 network connection setup a (set of) certificates will be exchanged, and
1816 by using those the identity of the network peer can be cryptographically
1818 SSL/TLS works by using a locally installed pool of trusted certificates,
1819 and verifying the connection peer succeeds if that provides
1820 a certificate which has been issued or is trusted by any certificate in
1821 the trusted local pool.
1824 The local pool of trusted so-called CA (Certification Authority)
1825 certificates is usually delivered with the used SSL/TLS library, and
1826 will be selected automatically, but it is also possible to create and
1827 use an own pool of trusted certificates.
1828 If this is desired, set
1829 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults
1830 to avoid using the default certificate pool, and point
1834 to a trusted pool of certificates.
1835 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
1836 has been retrieved with.
1839 It depends on the used protocol whether encrypted communication is
1840 possible, and which configuration steps have to be taken to enable it.
1841 Some protocols, e.g., POP3S, are implicitly encrypted, others, like
1842 POP3, can upgrade a plain text connection if so requested: POP3 offers
1844 which will be used if the variable (chain)
1845 .Va pop3-use-starttls
1848 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1849 shortcut encpop1 pop3s://pop1.exam.ple
1851 shortcut encpop2 pop3://pop2.exam.ple
1852 set pop3-use-starttls-pop2.exam.ple
1854 set mta=smtps://smtp.exam.ple:465
1855 set mta=smtp://smtp.exam.ple smtp-use-starttls
1859 Normally that is all there is to do, given that SSL/TLS libraries try to
1860 provide safe defaults, plenty of knobs however exist to adjust settings.
1861 For example certificate verification settings can be fine-tuned via
1863 and the SSL/TLS configuration basics are accessible via
1864 .Va ssl-config-pairs ,
1865 e.g., to specify the allowed protocols or cipher lists that
1866 a communication channel may use.
1867 In the past hints of how to restrict the set of protocols to highly
1868 secure ones were indicated, as of the time of this writing the allowed
1869 protocols or cipher list may need to become relaxed in order to be able
1870 to connect to some servers; the following example allows connecting to a
1872 that uses OpenSSL 0.9.8za from June 2014 (refer to
1873 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1874 for more on variable chains):
1876 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1877 wysh set ssl-config-pairs-lion@exam.ple='MinProtocol=TLSv1.1,\e
1878 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:\e
1879 ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:\e
1880 DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:@STRENGTH'
1886 can be used and should be referred to when creating a custom cipher list.
1887 Variables of interest for SSL/TLS in general are
1891 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ,
1892 .Va ssl-config-file ,
1893 .Va ssl-config-module ,
1894 .Va ssl-config-pairs
1902 .\" .Ss "Character sets" {{{
1903 .Ss "Character sets"
1905 \*(OP \*(UA detects the character set of the terminal by using
1906 mechanisms that are controlled by the
1908 environment variable
1913 in that order, see there).
1914 The internal variable
1916 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly,
1917 and will thus show up in the output of commands like, e.g.,
1923 However, the user may give a value for
1925 during startup, so that it is possible to send mail in a completely
1927 locale environment, an option which can be used to generate and send,
1928 e.g., 8-bit UTF-8 input data in a pure 7-bit US-ASCII
1930 environment (an example of this can be found in the section
1931 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
1932 Changing the value does not mean much beside that, because several
1933 aspects of the real character set are implied by the locale environment
1934 of the system, which stays unaffected by
1938 Messages and attachments which consist of 7-bit clean data will be
1939 classified as consisting of
1942 This is a problem if the
1944 character set is a multibyte character set that is also 7-bit clean.
1945 For example, the Japanese character set ISO-2022-JP is 7-bit clean but
1946 capable to encode the rich set of Japanese Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana
1947 characters: in order to notify receivers of this character set the mail
1948 message must be MIME encoded so that the character set ISO-2022-JP can
1950 To achieve this, the variable
1952 must be set to ISO-2022-JP.
1953 (Today a better approach regarding email is the usage of UTF-8, which
1954 uses 8-bit bytes for non-US-ASCII data.)
1957 If the \*(OPal character set conversion capabilities are not available
1959 does not include the term
1963 will be the only supported character set,
1964 it is simply assumed that it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages
1965 (over the wire an intermediate, configurable
1968 and the rest of this section does not apply;
1969 it may however still be necessary to explicitly set it if automatic
1970 detection fails, since in that case it defaults to
1971 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"Character sets", ./config.h:CHARSET_*!)
1972 LATIN1 a.k.a. ISO-8859-1.
1975 \*(OP When reading messages, their text is converted into
1977 as necessary in order to display them on the users terminal.
1978 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
1979 and replaced by proper substitution characters.
1980 Character set mappings for source character sets can be established with
1983 which may be handy to work around faulty character set catalogues (e.g.,
1984 to add a missing LATIN1 to ISO-8859-1 mapping), or to enforce treatment
1985 of one character set as another one (e.g., to interpret LATIN1 as CP1252).
1987 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
1988 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
1991 When sending messages all their parts and attachments are classified.
1992 Whereas no character set conversion is performed on those parts which
1993 appear to be binary data,
1994 the character set being used must be declared within the MIME header of
1995 an outgoing text part if it contains characters that do not conform to
1996 the set of characters that are allowed by the email standards.
1997 Permissible values for character sets used in outgoing messages can be
2002 which defines a catch-all last-resort fallback character set that is
2003 implicitly appended to the list of character sets in
2007 When replying to a message and the variable
2008 .Va reply-in-same-charset
2009 is set, then the character set of the message being replied to
2010 is tried first (still being a subject of
2011 .Ic charsetalias ) .
2012 And it is also possible to make \*(UA work even more closely related to
2013 the current locale setting automatically by using the variable
2014 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset ,
2015 please see there for more information.
2018 All the specified character sets are tried in order unless the
2019 conversion of the part or attachment succeeds.
2020 If none of the tried (8-bit) character sets is capable to represent the
2021 content of the part or attachment,
2022 then the message will not be sent and its text will optionally be
2026 In general, if a message saying
2027 .Dq cannot convert from a to b
2028 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
2029 selected (terminal) character set,
2030 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
2031 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
2033 locale and/or the variable
2037 The best results are usually achieved when \*(UA is run in a UTF-8
2038 locale on an UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
2039 spectrum of characters is available.
2040 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
2041 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
2042 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
2045 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
2046 .Dq portable character set
2047 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
2048 restricted subset named
2049 .Dq portable filename character set
2050 consists of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
2058 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
2059 .Ss "Message states"
2061 \*(UA differentiates in between several different message states;
2062 the current state will be reflected in header summary displays if
2064 is configured to do so (via the internal variable
2066 and messages can also be selected and be acted upon depending on their
2068 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) .
2069 When operating on the system
2073 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
2074 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the
2076 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2078 may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly via
2079 a successful exit of \*(UA, but not if the special command
2081 is used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
2084 mail-user-agents, the default global
2090 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
2092 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ql new"
2094 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
2095 Such messages are retained even in the
2097 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2100 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
2101 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
2102 Such messages are retained even in the
2104 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2107 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2126 will always try to automatically
2132 logical message, and may thus mark multiple messages as read, the
2134 command will do so if the internal variable
2139 command is used, messages that are in a
2141 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2144 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in the
2146 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2148 unless the internal variable
2153 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2159 can be used to access such messages.
2162 The message has been processed by a
2164 command and it will be retained in its current location.
2167 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2173 command is used, messages that are in a
2175 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2178 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in the
2180 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2182 when the internal variable
2188 In addition to these message states, flags which otherwise have no
2189 technical meaning in the mail system except allowing special ways of
2190 addressing them when
2191 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2192 can be set on messages.
2193 These flags are saved with messages and are thus persistent, and are
2194 portable between a set of widely used MUAs.
2196 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ic answered"
2198 Mark messages as having been answered.
2200 Mark messages as being a draft.
2202 Mark messages which need special attention.
2206 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
2207 .Ss "Specifying messages"
2214 can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a number
2215 of messages at once.
2218 deletes messages 1 and 2,
2221 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
2222 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
2226 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
2227 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
2230 The following special message names exist:
2233 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar BaNg"
2235 The current message, the so-called
2239 The message that was previously the current message.
2242 The parent message of the current message,
2243 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
2245 field or the last entry of the
2247 field of the current message.
2250 The next previous undeleted message,
2251 or the next previous deleted message for the
2254 In sorted/threaded mode,
2255 the next previous such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2258 The next undeleted message,
2259 or the next deleted message for the
2262 In sorted/threaded mode,
2263 the next such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2266 The first undeleted message,
2267 or the first deleted message for the
2270 In sorted/threaded mode,
2271 the first such message in the sorted/threaded order.
2275 In sorted/threaded mode,
2276 the last message in the sorted/threaded order.
2280 selects the message addressed with
2284 is any other message specification,
2285 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
2286 Otherwise it is identical to
2291 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
2296 All messages that were included in the
2297 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2298 of the previous command.
2301 An inclusive range of message numbers.
2302 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
2307 .Dq any substring matches
2310 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
2312 is set (and POSIX says
2313 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
2316 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
2317 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
2319 is completely ignored.
2320 For finer control and match boundaries use the
2324 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
2325 All messages that contain
2327 in the subject field (case ignored).
2334 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
2336 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
2339 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
2341 ession; if the \*(OPal regular expression (see
2343 support is available
2345 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
2347 (extended) regular expression characters is seen: in this case this
2348 should match strings correctly which are in the locale
2352 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
2353 part is missing, the search is restricted to the subject field body,
2356 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, as in
2358 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
2360 In order to search for a string that includes a
2362 (commercial at) character the
2364 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
2365 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
2379 respectively and case-insensitively.
2384 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
2393 can be used to perform full text searches \(en whereas the former
2394 searches only the body, the latter also searches the message header.
2396 This message specification performs full text comparison, but even with
2397 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
2398 expression that savely matches only a specific address domain.
2399 To request that the content of the header is treated as a list of
2400 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
2401 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the header name
2402 (abbreviation) with a tilde
2405 .Dl @~f@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$
2408 All messages of state or with matching condition
2412 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
2414 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
2417 messages (cf. the variable
2418 .Va markanswered ) .
2430 Messages with receivers that match
2434 Messages with receivers that match
2441 Old messages (any not in state
2449 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification (see
2450 .Sx "Handling spam" ) .
2452 \*(OP Messages classified as spam.
2464 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
2465 This addressing mode is available with all types of mailbox
2467 s; \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
2468 Strings must be enclosed by double quotes
2470 in their entirety if they contain whitespace or parentheses;
2471 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
2473 is recognized as an escape character.
2474 All string searches are case-insensitive.
2475 When the description indicates that the
2477 representation of an address field is used,
2478 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
2481 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2482 (\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)
2487 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
2488 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
2492 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
2493 .It Ar ( criterion )
2494 All messages that satisfy the given
2496 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
2497 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
2499 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
2500 All messages that satisfy either
2505 To connect more than two criteria using
2507 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
2509 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
2513 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
2516 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
2517 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
2521 .It Ar ( not criterion )
2522 All messages that do not satisfy
2524 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2525 All messages that contain
2527 in the envelope representation of the
2530 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2531 All messages that contain
2533 in the envelope representation of the
2536 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2537 All messages that contain
2539 in the envelope representation of the
2542 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2543 All messages that contain
2548 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2549 All messages that contain
2551 in the envelope representation of the
2554 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2555 All messages that contain
2560 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2561 All messages that contain
2564 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2565 All messages that contain
2567 in their header or body.
2568 .It Ar ( larger size )
2569 All messages that are larger than
2572 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2573 All messages that are smaller than
2577 .It Ar ( before date )
2578 All messages that were received before
2580 which must be in the form
2584 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2586 is the name of the month \(en one of
2587 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2590 is the year as four digits, e.g.,
2594 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2595 .It Ar ( since date )
2596 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2597 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2598 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2599 .It Ar ( senton date )
2600 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2601 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2602 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2604 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2605 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2606 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2607 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2611 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{
2612 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2614 \*(OP Terminal control will be realized through one of the standard
2616 libraries, either the
2618 or, alternatively, the
2620 both of which will be initialized to work with the environment variable
2622 Terminal control will enhance or enable interactive usage aspects, e.g.,
2623 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2624 and extend behaviour of the Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE), which may learn the
2625 byte-sequences of keys like the cursor and function keys.
2628 The internal variable
2630 can be used to overwrite settings or to learn (correct(ed)) keycodes.
2631 \*(UA may also become a fullscreen application by entering the
2632 so-called ca-mode and switching to an alternative exclusive screen
2633 (content) shall the terminal support it and the internal variable
2635 has been set explicitly.
2636 Actual interaction with the chosen library can be disabled completely by
2637 setting the internal variable
2638 .Va termcap-disable ;
2640 will be queried regardless, which is true even if the \*(OPal library
2641 support has not been enabled at configuration time as long as some other
2642 \*(OP which (may) query terminal control sequences has been enabled.
2645 \*(OP The built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2646 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2648 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2649 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2651 Prevent usage of a line editor in interactive mode by setting the
2653 .Va line-editor-disable .
2654 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2655 entries in the internal variable
2657 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2658 The MLE can support a little bit of
2664 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2665 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2666 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2668 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2669 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2673 .Va history-gabby-persist
2678 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2679 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2680 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2681 be generated by holding the
2683 key while pressing the key of desire, e.g.,
2687 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2688 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2689 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2691 to establish its built-in key bindings
2692 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2693 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2694 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2695 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2696 notation is used in the following;
2697 combinations not mentioned either cause job control signals or do not
2698 generate a (unique) keycode:
2702 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql \eBa"
2704 Go to the start of the line
2706 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2709 Move the cursor backward one character
2711 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2714 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2715 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the internal variable
2719 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2722 Go to the end of the line
2724 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2727 Move the cursor forward one character
2729 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2732 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2733 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2734 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2735 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2737 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2740 Backspace: backward delete one character
2742 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
2746 Horizontal tabulator:
2747 try to expand the word before the cursor, supporting the usual
2748 .Sx "Filename transformations"
2750 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ) .
2752 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
2756 commit the current line
2758 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
2761 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
2763 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
2768 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
2771 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
2773 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
2776 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2780 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
2782 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
2785 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
2788 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
2789 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
2790 is committed; also see
2794 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
2796 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
2799 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
2801 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
2804 Paste the snarf buffer
2806 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
2814 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
2817 Prompts for a Unicode character (its hexadecimal number) to be inserted
2819 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
2820 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
2821 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
2822 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
2823 that shortcut purpose); this control code is special-treated and cannot
2824 be part of any other sequence, because any occurrence will perform the
2826 function immediately.
2829 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
2832 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
2835 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
2837 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
2840 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
2842 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
2845 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
2846 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
2848 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
2849 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
2850 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
2851 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
2853 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
2854 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
2855 expected input, then it will first be consumed by the active sequence.
2858 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2862 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2866 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
2870 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
2873 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
2884 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
2889 ring the audible bell.
2893 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{
2894 .Ss "Coloured display"
2896 \*(OP \*(UA can be configured to support a coloured display and font
2897 attributes by emitting ANSI a.k.a. ISO 6429 SGR (select graphic
2898 rendition) escape sequences.
2899 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
2900 capability of the detected terminal type that is defined by the
2901 environment variable
2903 and which can be fine-tuned by the user via the internal variable
2907 On top of what \*(UA knows about the terminal the boolean variable
2909 defines whether the actually applicable colour and font attribute
2910 sequences should also be generated when output is going to be paged
2911 through the external program defined by the environment variable
2916 This is not enabled by default because different pager programs need
2917 different command line switches or other configuration in order to
2918 support those sequences.
2919 \*(UA however knows about some widely used pagers and in a clean
2920 environment it is often enough to simply set
2922 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
2927 is set then any active usage of colour and font attribute sequences
2928 is suppressed, but without affecting possibly established
2933 To define and control colours and font attributes a single multiplexer
2934 command family exists:
2936 shows or defines colour mappings for the given colour type (e.g.,
2939 can be used to remove mappings of a given colour type.
2940 Since colours are only available in interactive mode, it may make
2941 sense to conditionalize the colour setup by encapsulating it with
2944 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2945 if terminal && [ "$features" =% +colour ]
2946 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
2947 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red from,subject
2948 colour iso view-header fg=red
2950 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
2951 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
2952 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 "subject,from"
2953 colour mono view-header ft=bold
2954 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
2959 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
2962 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
2963 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
2964 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
2966 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
2967 Once messages have been identified as spam their (volatile)
2969 state can be prompted: the
2973 message specifications will address respective messages and their
2975 entries will be used when displaying the
2977 in the header display.
2982 rates the given messages and sets their
2985 If the spam interface offers spam scores those can also be displayed in
2986 the header display by including the
2996 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
2997 the given messages as
3001 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
3003 of messages; it adheres to their current
3005 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
3010 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
3012 message flag, without any interface interaction.
3021 requires a running instance of the
3023 server in order to function, started with the option
3025 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
3027 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3028 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
3029 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
3030 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
3034 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
3036 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3037 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3038 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3039 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
3041 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3042 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3043 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
3047 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
3049 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
3052 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3053 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3054 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
3055 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
3056 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
3057 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
3058 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
3059 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
3063 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
3064 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
3065 perform the local spam check last.
3066 Spam can be checked automatically when opening specific folders by
3067 setting a specialized form of the internal variable
3070 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3071 define spamdelhook {
3073 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
3074 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
3075 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
3076 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
3082 set folder-hook-SOMEFOLDER=spamdelhook
3086 See also the documentation for the variables
3087 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
3088 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
3089 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
3092 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
3095 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
3098 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
3101 \*(UA reads input in lines.
3102 An unquoted reverse solidus
3104 at the end of a command line
3106 the newline character: it is discarded and the next line of input is
3107 used as a follow-up line, with all leading whitespace removed;
3108 once an entire line is completed, the whitespace characters
3109 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3110 as well as those defined by the variable
3112 are removed from the beginning and end.
3113 Placing any whitespace characters at the beginning of a line will
3114 prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
3118 The beginning of such input lines is then scanned for the name of
3119 a known command: command names may be abbreviated, in which case the
3120 first command that matches the given prefix will be used.
3121 .Sx "Command modifiers"
3122 may prefix a command in order to modify its behaviour.
3123 A name may also be a
3125 which will become expanded until no more expansion is possible.
3126 Once the command that shall be executed is known, the remains of the
3127 input line will be interpreted according to command-specific rules,
3128 documented in the following.
3131 This behaviour is different to the
3133 ell, which is a programming language with syntactic elements of clearly
3134 defined semantics, and therefore capable to sequentially expand and
3135 evaluate individual elements of a line.
3136 \*(UA will never be able to handle
3137 .Ql ? set one=value two=$one
3138 in a single statement, because the variable assignment is performed by
3146 can be used to show the list of all commands, either alphabetically
3147 sorted or in prefix search order (these do not match, also because the
3148 POSIX standard prescribes a set of abbreviations).
3149 \*(OPally the command
3153 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
3154 command matching the expanded argument, as in
3156 which should be a shorthand of
3158 with these documentation strings both commands support a more
3160 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command and other
3161 information which applies; a handy suggestion might thus be:
3163 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3165 # Before v15: need to enable sh(1)ell-style on _entire_ line!
3166 localopts 1;wysh set verbose;ignerr eval "${@}";return ${?}
3168 ? commandalias xv '\ecall __xv'
3172 .\" .Ss "Command modifiers" {{{
3173 .Ss "Command modifiers"
3175 Commands may be prefixed by one or multiple command modifiers.
3179 The modifier reverse solidus
3182 to be placed first, prevents
3184 expansions on the remains of the line, e.g.,
3186 will always evaluate the command
3188 even if an (command)alias of the same name exists.
3190 content may itself contain further command modifiers, including
3191 an initial reverse solidus to prevent further expansions.
3197 indicates that any error generated by the following command should be
3198 ignored by the state machine and not cause a program exit with enabled
3200 or for the standardized exit cases in
3205 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3206 will be set to the real exit status of the command regardless.
3211 does yet not implement any functionality.
3216 does yet not implement any functionality.
3219 Some commands support the
3222 modifier: if used, they expect the name of a variable, which can itself
3223 be a variable, i.e., shell expansion is applied, as their first
3224 argument, and will place their computation result in it instead of the
3225 default location (it is usually written to standard output).
3227 The given name will be tested for being a valid
3229 variable name, and may therefore only consist of upper- and lowercase
3230 characters, digits, and the underscore; the hyphen-minus may be used as
3231 a non-portable extension; digits may not be used as first, hyphen-minus
3232 may not be used as last characters.
3233 In addition the name may either not be one of the known
3234 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3235 or must otherwise refer to a writable (non-boolean) value variable.
3236 The actual put operation may fail nonetheless, e.g., if the variable
3237 expects a number argument only a number will be accepted.
3238 Any error during these operations causes the command as such to fail,
3239 and the error number
3242 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTSUP ,
3247 but some commands deviate from the latter, which is documented.
3250 Last, but not least, the modifier
3253 can be used for some old and established commands to choose the new
3254 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3255 rules over the traditional
3256 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting" .
3260 .\" .Ss "Message list arguments" {{{
3261 .Ss "Message list arguments"
3263 Some commands expect arguments that represent messages (actually
3264 their symbolic message numbers), as has been documented above under
3265 .Sx "Specifying messages"
3267 If no explicit message list has been specified, the next message
3268 forward that satisfies the command's requirements will be used,
3269 and if there are no messages forward of the current message,
3270 the search proceeds backwards;
3271 if there are no good messages at all to be found, an error message is
3272 shown and the command is aborted.
3275 .\" .Ss "Old-style argument quoting" {{{
3276 .Ss "Old-style argument quoting"
3278 \*(ID This section documents the old, traditional style of quoting
3279 non-message-list arguments to commands which expect this type of
3280 arguments: whereas still used by the majority of such commands, the new
3281 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3282 may be available even for those via
3285 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
3286 Nonetheless care must be taken, because only new commands have been
3287 designed with all the capabilities of the new quoting rules in mind,
3288 which can, e.g., generate control characters.
3291 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3293 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
3298 any whitespace, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
3299 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
3300 part of the argument.
3301 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
3303 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
3304 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
3310 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
3311 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
3315 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
3316 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
3320 .\" .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting" {{{
3321 .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting"
3323 Commands which don't expect message-list arguments use
3325 ell-style, and therefore POSIX standardized, argument parsing and
3327 \*(ID Most new commands only support these new rules and are flagged
3328 \*(NQ, some elder ones can use them with the command modifier
3330 in the future only this type of argument quoting will remain.
3333 A command line is parsed from left to right and an input token is
3334 completed whenever an unquoted, otherwise ignored, metacharacter is seen.
3335 Metacharacters are vertical bar
3341 as well as all characters from the variable
3344 .Cm space , tabulator , newline .
3345 The additional metacharacters left and right parenthesis
3347 and less-than and greater-than signs
3351 supports are not used, and are treated as ordinary characters: for one
3352 these characters are a vivid part of email addresses, and it seems
3353 highly unlikely that their function will become meaningful to \*(UA.
3355 .Bd -filled -offset indent
3356 .Sy Compatibility note:
3357 \*(ID Please note that even many new-style commands do not yet honour
3359 to parse their arguments: whereas the
3361 ell is a language with syntactic elements of clearly defined semantics,
3362 \*(UA parses entire input lines and decides on a per-command base what
3363 to do with the rest of the line.
3364 This also means that whenever an unknown command is seen all that \*(UA
3365 can do is cancellation of the processing of the remains of the line.
3367 It also often depends on an actual subcommand of a multiplexer command
3368 how the rest of the line should be treated, and until v15 we are not
3369 capable to perform this deep inspection of arguments.
3370 Nonetheless, at least the following commands which work with positional
3371 parameters fully support
3373 for an almost shell-compatible field splitting:
3374 .Ic call , call_if , read , vpospar , xcall .
3378 Any unquoted number sign
3380 at the beginning of a new token starts a comment that extends to the end
3381 of the line, and therefore ends argument processing.
3382 An unquoted dollar sign
3384 will cause variable expansion of the given name, which must be a valid
3386 ell-style variable name (see
3388 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3391 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
3392 enclosing the name is supported (i.e., to subdivide a token).
3395 Whereas the metacharacters
3396 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3397 only complete an input token, vertical bar
3403 also act as control operators and perform control functions.
3404 For now supported is semicolon
3406 which terminates a single command, therefore sequencing the command line
3407 and making the remainder of the line a subject to reevaluation.
3408 With sequencing, multiple command argument types and quoting rules may
3409 therefore apply to a single line, which can become problematic before
3410 v15: e.g., the first of the following will cause surprising results.
3413 .Dl ? echo one; set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3414 .Dl ? echo one; wysh set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3417 Quoting is a mechanism that will remove the special meaning of
3418 metacharacters and reserved words, and will prevent expansion.
3419 There are four quoting mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes,
3420 double-quotes and dollar-single-quotes:
3423 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3425 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
3426 with the escape character reverse solidus
3430 Arguments which are enclosed in
3431 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
3432 retain their literal value.
3433 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
3436 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
3437 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
3438 is retained, with the exception of dollar sign
3440 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
3442 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
3444 which will escape any of the characters dollar sign
3446 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
3450 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
3452 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
3453 but has no special meaning otherwise.
3456 Arguments enclosed in
3457 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
3458 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
3459 expanded as follows:
3461 .Bl -tag -compact -width "Ql \eNNN"
3463 bell control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BEL).
3465 backspace control characer (ASCII and ISO-10646 BS).
3467 escape control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 ESC).
3471 form feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 FF).
3473 line feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 LF).
3475 carriage return control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 CR).
3477 horizontal tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 HT).
3479 vertical tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 VT).
3481 emits a reverse solidus character.
3485 double quote (escaping is optional).
3487 eight-bit byte with the octal value
3489 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
3491 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3493 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
3495 (one or two hexadecimal characters).
3496 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3498 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
3500 (one to eight hexadecimal digits) \(em note that Unicode defines the
3501 maximum codepoint ever to be supported as
3506 This escape is only supported in locales that support Unicode (see
3507 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3508 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
3509 point is ASCII compatible or (if the \*(OPal character set conversion is
3510 available) can be represented in the current locale.
3511 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3515 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal digits.
3517 Emits the non-printable (ASCII and compatible) C0 control codes
3518 0 (NUL) to 31 (US), and 127 (DEL).
3519 Printable representations of ASCII control codes can be created by
3520 mapping them to a different part of the ASCII character set, which is
3521 possible by adding the number 64 for the codes 0 to 31, e.g., 7 (BEL) is
3522 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
3523 The real operation is a bitwise logical XOR with 64 (bit 7 set, see
3525 thus also covering code 127 (DEL), which is mapped to 63 (question mark):
3526 .Ql ? vexpr ^ 127 64 .
3528 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
3529 visualization purposes of control codes, e.g.,
3531 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
3533 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO-10646, ISO C) aliases,
3534 as shown above (e.g.,
3538 whenever such an alias exists it will be used for display purposes.
3539 The control code NUL
3541 a non-standard extension) will suppress further output for the remains
3542 of the token (which may extend beyond the current quote), or, depending
3543 on the context, the remains of all arguments for the current command.
3545 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
3546 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
3548 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
3555 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3556 ? echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
3557 ? echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
3558 ? echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
3562 .\" .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands" {{{
3563 .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands"
3565 A special set of commands, which all have the string
3567 in their name, e.g.,
3571 take raw string data as input, which means that the content of the
3572 command input line is passed completely unexpanded and otherwise
3573 unchanged: like this the effect of the actual codec is visible without
3574 any noise of possible shell quoting rules etc., i.e., the user can input
3575 one-to-one the desired or questionable data.
3576 To gain a level of expansion, the entire command line can be
3580 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3581 ? vput shcodec res encode /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3583 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3585 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3586 ? eval shcodec d $res
3587 /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3591 .\" .Ss "Filename transformations" {{{
3592 .Ss "Filename transformations"
3594 Filenames, where expected, and unless documented otherwise, are
3595 subsequently subject to the following filename transformations, in
3598 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3600 If the given name is a registered
3602 it will be replaced with the expanded shortcut.
3605 The filename is matched against the following patterns or strings:
3607 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".Ar %user"
3609 (Number sign) is expanded to the previous file.
3611 (Percent sign) is replaced by the invoking
3612 .Mx -ix "primary system mailbox"
3613 user's primary system mailbox, which either is the (itself expandable)
3615 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3617 if that is set, or a built-in compile-time default otherwise.
3619 Expands to the primary system mailbox of
3621 (and never the value of
3623 regardless of its actual setting).
3625 (Ampersand) is replaced with the invoking users
3626 .Mx -ix "secondary mailbox"
3627 secondary mailbox, the
3634 directory (if that variable is set).
3636 Expands to the same value as
3638 but has special meaning when used with, e.g., the command
3640 the file will be treated as a primary system mailbox by, e.g., the
3644 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3645 session will be moved to the
3647 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3651 Meta expansions may be applied to the resulting filename, as allowed by
3652 the operation and applicable to the resulting access protocol (also see
3653 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
3654 For the file-protocol, a leading tilde
3656 character will be replaced by the expansion of
3658 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
3659 directory of the given user is used instead.
3661 A shell expansion as if specified in double-quotes (see
3662 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
3663 may be applied, so that any occurrence of
3667 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible;
3668 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3671 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism.
3673 Shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
3675 may be applied as documented.
3676 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
3677 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
3679 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
3681 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, e.g., a file
3682 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
3684 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
3688 .\" .Ss "Commands" {{{
3691 The following commands are available:
3693 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
3700 command which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the
3701 previously executed command if the internal variable
3704 This command supports
3707 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
3708 and manages the error number
3710 A 0 or positive exit status
3712 reflects the exit status of the command, negative ones that
3713 an error happened before the command was executed, or that the program
3714 did not exit cleanly, but, e.g., due to a signal: the error number is
3715 .Va ^ERR Ns -CHILD ,
3719 In conjunction with the
3721 modifier the following special cases exist:
3722 a negative exit status occurs if the collected data could not be stored
3723 in the given variable, which is a
3725 error that should otherwise not occur.
3726 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
3727 indicates that no temporary file could be created to collect the command
3728 output at first glance.
3729 In case of catchable out-of-memory situations
3731 will occur and \*(UA will try to store the empty string, just like with
3732 all other detected error conditions.
3737 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
3739 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
3742 indicating special character, which means that, e.g., trailing comments
3743 on a line are not possible.
3747 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
3753 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
3754 a numeric argument n.
3758 Show the current message number (the
3763 Show a brief summary of commands.
3764 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
3765 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
3766 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
3767 synopsis, try, e.g.,
3772 and see how the output changes.
3773 This mode also supports a more
3775 output, which will provide the informations documented for
3786 .It Ic account , unaccount
3787 (ac, una) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
3788 Accounts are special incarnations of
3790 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
3791 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
3792 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
3794 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
3799 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted by the
3800 latter command, and in one operation with the special name
3802 Also for all but it a possibly set
3803 .Va on-account-cleanup
3804 hook is called once they are left.
3806 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
3807 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
3809 of that account will be activated (as via
3811 a possibly installed
3813 will be run, and the internal variable
3816 The two argument form is identical to defining a macro as via
3818 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3820 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
3821 set from='(My Name) myname@myisp.example'
3822 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
3829 Perform email address codec transformations on raw-data argument, rather
3830 according to email standards (RFC 5322; \*(ID will furtherly improve).
3834 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
3835 and manages the error number
3837 The first argument must be either
3838 .Ar [+[+[+]]]e[ncode] ,
3843 and specifies the operation to perform on the rest of the line.
3846 Decoding will show how a standard-compliant MUA will display the given
3847 argument, which should be an email address.
3848 Please be aware that most MUAs have difficulties with the address
3849 standards, and vary wildly when (comments) in parenthesis,
3851 strings, or quoted-pairs, as below, become involved.
3852 \*(ID \*(UA currently does not perform decoding when displaying addresses.
3855 Skinning is identical to decoding but only outputs the plain address,
3856 without any string, comment etc. components.
3857 Another difference is that it may fail with the error number
3861 if decoding fails to find a(n) (valid) email address, in which case the
3862 unmodified input will be output again.
3866 first performs a skin operation, and thereafter checks a valid
3867 address for whether it is a registered mailing-list (see
3871 eventually reporting that state in the error number
3874 .Va ^ERR Ns -EXIST .
3875 (This state could later become overwritten by an I/O error, though.)
3878 Encoding supports four different modes, lesser automated versions can be
3879 chosen by prefixing one, two or three plus signs: the standard imposes
3880 a special meaning on some characters, which thus have to be transformed
3881 to so-called quoted-pairs by pairing them with a reverse solidus
3883 in order to remove the special meaning; this might change interpretation
3884 of the entire argument from what has been desired, however!
3885 Specify one plus sign to remark that parenthesis shall be left alone,
3886 two for not turning double quotation marks into quoted-pairs, and three
3887 for also leaving any user-specified reverse solidus alone.
3888 The result will always be valid, if a successful exit status is reported.
3889 \*(ID Addresses need to be specified in between angle brackets
3892 if the construct becomes more difficult, otherwise the current parser
3893 will fail; it is not smart enough to guess right.
3895 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3896 ? addrc enc "Hey, you",<diet@exam.ple>\e out\e there
3897 "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3898 ? addrc d "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3899 "Hey, you", \e out\e there <diet@exam.ple>
3900 ? addrc s "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
3907 .It Ic alias , unalias
3908 (a, una) Aliases are a method of creating personal distribution lists
3909 that map a single alias name to none to multiple real receivers;
3910 these aliases become expanded after message composing is completed.
3911 The latter command removes the given list of aliases, the special name
3913 will discard all existing aliases.
3915 The former command shows all currently defined aliases when used without
3916 arguments, and with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
3917 With more than one argument, creates or appends to the alias name given
3918 as the first argument the remaining arguments.
3919 Alias names adhere to the Postfix MTA
3921 rules and are thus restricted to alphabetic characters, digits, the
3922 underscore, hyphen-minus, the number sign, colon and commercial at,
3923 the last character can also be the dollar sign; the regular expression:
3924 .Ql [[:alnum:]_#:@-]+$? .
3925 As extensions the exclamation mark
3930 .Dq any character that has the high bit set
3935 .It Ic alternates , unalternates
3936 \*(NQ (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses or names of the active user,
3937 members of which will be removed from recipient lists.
3938 The latter command removes the given list of alternates, the special name
3940 will discard all existing aliases.
3941 The former command manages the error number
3943 and shows the current set of alternates when used without arguments; in
3944 this mode it supports
3947 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
3948 Otherwise the given arguments (after being checked for validity) are
3949 appended to the list of alternate names; in
3951 mode they replace that list instead.
3952 There is a set of implicit alternates which is formed of the values of
3961 .It Ic answered , unanswered
3962 Take a message lists and mark each message as having been answered,
3963 having not been answered, respectively.
3964 Messages will be marked answered when being
3966 to automatically if the
3970 .Sx "Message states" .
3975 .It Ic bind , unbind
3976 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
3977 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
3978 with freely configurable key bindings.
3979 The latter command removes from the given context the given key binding,
3980 both of which may be specified as a wildcard
3984 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
3985 Due to initialization order unbinding will not work for built-in key
3986 bindings upon program startup, however: please use
3987 .Va line-editor-no-defaults
3988 for this purpose instead.
3991 With one argument the former command shows all key bindings for the
3992 given context, specifying an asterisk
3994 will show the bindings of all contexts; a more verbose listing will be
3995 produced if either of
4000 With two or more arguments a binding is (re)established:
4001 the first argument is the context to which the binding shall apply,
4002 the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
4004 which form the binding, and any remaining arguments form the expansion.
4005 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
4006 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, a commercial at
4008 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
4009 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
4010 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
4013 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding will not be seen
4014 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
4015 This is not true for the shared binding
4017 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
4018 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
4019 The available contexts are the shared
4023 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
4025 which applies to compose mode only.
4029 which form the binding are specified as a comma-separated list of
4030 byte-sequences, where each list entry corresponds to one key(press).
4031 A list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
4033 also refer to the name of a terminal capability; several dozen names
4034 will be compiled in and may be specified either by their
4036 or, if existing, by their
4038 name, regardless of the actually used \*(OPal terminal control library.
4039 It is possible to use any capability, as long as the name is resolvable
4040 by the \*(OPal control library or was defined via the internal variable
4042 Input sequences are not case-normalized, so that an exact match is
4043 required to update or remove a binding.
4046 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4047 ? bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
4048 ? bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc, Delete
4049 ? bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo An editable binding@'
4050 ? bind default a,b,c rm -irf / @ # Another editable binding
4051 ? bind default :kf1 File %
4052 ? bind compose :kf1 ~e
4056 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
4057 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, before being parsed
4058 and expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
4059 whitespace needs to be properly quoted, see
4060 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
4061 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
4062 defunctional if the locale does not support Unicode (see
4063 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
4064 and using terminal capabilities does so if no (corresponding) terminal
4065 control support is (currently) available.
4068 The following terminal capability names are built-in and can be used in
4070 or (if available) the two-letter
4073 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
4076 can be used to show all the capabilities of
4078 or the given terminal type;
4081 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
4084 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
4085 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
4087 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
4089 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
4090 \(em shifted variant.
4091 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
4092 Clear to end of line.
4093 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
4095 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
4097 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
4098 \(em shifted variant.
4099 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
4101 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
4102 \(em shifted variant.
4103 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
4105 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
4107 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
4109 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
4110 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
4111 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
4112 \(em shifted variant.
4113 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
4114 Right cursor (ditto).
4115 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
4116 \(em shifted variant.
4117 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
4118 Down cursor (ditto).
4120 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4121 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
4124 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4125 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
4127 Add one for each function key up to
4132 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
4134 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
4136 Add one for each function key up to
4144 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
4146 For example, the delete key,
4148 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
4150 then a number is appended for the states
4162 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
4164 The same for the left cursor key,
4166 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
4169 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (e.g.,
4171 for bindings which describe user key combinations (as opposed to purely
4172 terminal capability based ones), in order to avoid ambiguities whether
4173 input belongs to key sequences or not; it also reduces search time.
4176 may help shall keys and sequences be falsely recognized.
4181 \*(NQ Calls the given macro, which must have been created via
4186 Parameters given to macros are implicitly local to the macro's scope, and
4187 may be accessed via special (positional) parameters, e.g.,
4192 The positional parameters may be removed by
4194 ing them off the stack (exceeding the supported number of arguments
4196 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW ) ,
4197 and are otherwise controllable via
4202 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4203 can be reverted before the current level regains control by setting
4205 for called macro(s) (or in them, of course).
4206 Macro execution can be terminated at any time by calling
4210 Calling macros recursively will at some time excess the stack size
4211 limit, causing a hard program abortion; if recursively calling a macro
4212 is the last command of the current macro, consider to use the command
4214 which will first release all resources of the current macro before
4215 replacing the current macro with the called one.
4216 Numeric and string operations can be performed via
4220 may be helpful to recreate argument lists.
4222 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4224 echo Parameter 1 of ${#} is ${1}, all: ${*} / ${@}
4227 call exmac Hello macro exmac!
4235 if the given macro has been created via
4237 but doesn't fail nor warn if the macro doesn't exist.
4241 (ch) Change the working directory to
4243 or the given argument.
4249 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
4250 Takes a message list and a filename and saves the certificates
4251 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
4252 human-readable and PEM format.
4253 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
4254 respective message senders by setting
4255 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
4260 .It Ic charsetalias , uncharsetalias
4261 \*(NQ Manage (character set conversion) character set alias mappings,
4262 as documented in the section
4263 .Sx "Character sets" .
4264 Character set aliases are expanded recursively, but no expansion is
4265 performed on values of the user-settable variables, e.g.,
4267 These are effectively no-operations if character set conversion
4268 is not available (i.e., no
4272 Without arguments the list of all currently defined aliases is shown,
4273 with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
4274 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of character sets and
4275 their desired target alias name, creating new or changing already
4276 existing aliases, as necessary.
4278 The latter deletes all aliases given as arguments, the special argument
4280 will remove all aliases.
4284 (ch) Change the working directory to
4286 or the given argument.
4292 .It Ic collapse , uncollapse
4293 Only applicable to threaded mode.
4294 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
4295 in header summaries, except for
4299 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4300 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4301 The latter command undoes collapsing.
4306 .It Ic colour , uncolour
4307 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings of and for a
4308 .Sx "Coloured display" .
4309 The type of colour is given as the (case-insensitive) first argument,
4310 which must be one of
4312 for 256-colour terminals,
4317 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 color palette and
4321 for monochrome terminals.
4322 Monochrome terminals cannot deal with colours, but only (some) font
4326 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
4327 for the given colour type is shown (as a special case giving
4331 will show the mappings of all types).
4332 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, and the third
4333 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
4334 specification(s), and the optional fourth argument can be used to
4335 specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are tested in
4336 (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been found, and
4337 the default mapping (if any has been established) will only be chosen as
4339 The types of precondition available depend on the mappable slot (see
4340 .Sx "Coloured display"
4341 for some examples), the following of which exist:
4344 Mappings prefixed with
4346 are used for the \*(OPal built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
4347 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4348 and do not support preconditions.
4350 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4352 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
4353 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
4360 Mappings prefixed with
4362 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
4364 (the current message) and
4366 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
4367 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
4369 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4371 This mapping is used for the
4373 that can be created with the
4377 formats of the variable
4380 For the complete header summary line except the
4382 and the thread structure.
4384 For the thread structure which can be created with the
4386 format of the variable
4391 Mappings prefixed with
4393 are used when displaying messages.
4395 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4397 This mapping is used for so-called
4399 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines.
4402 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
4403 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
4404 available then if any of the
4406 (extended) regular expression characters is seen the precondition will
4407 be evaluated as (an extended) one.
4409 For the introductional message info line.
4410 .It Ar view-partinfo
4411 For MIME part info lines.
4415 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
4416 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
4426 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
4427 attributes for a single mapping.
4430 foreground colour attribute:
4440 To specify a 256-color mode a decimal number colour specification in
4441 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
4443 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
4445 the standard ISO 6429 colors, as above.
4447 high intensity variants of the standard colors.
4449 216 colors in tuples of 6.
4451 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
4453 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4455 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4456 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4458 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4459 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4461 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4462 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4466 background colour attribute (see
4468 for possible values).
4474 will remove for the given colour type (the special type
4476 selects all) the given mapping; if the optional precondition argument is
4477 given only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4480 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed), thus
4482 will remove all established mappings.
4487 .It Ic commandalias , uncommandalias
4488 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, command aliases.
4489 An (command)alias can be used everywhere a normal command can be used,
4490 but always takes precedence: any arguments that are given to the command
4491 alias are joined onto the alias expansion, and the resulting string
4492 forms the command line that is, in effect, executed.
4493 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name
4495 will remove all existing aliases.
4496 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4497 known aliases, with one argument only the expansion of the given one.
4499 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
4500 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
4501 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
4502 An alias may itself expand to another alias, but to avoid expansion loops
4503 further expansion will be prevented if an alias refers to itself or if
4504 an expansion depth limit is reached.
4505 Explicit expansion prevention is available via reverse solidus
4508 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
4509 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4511 \*(uA: `commandalias': no such alias: xx
4512 ? commandalias xx echo hello,
4514 commandalias xx 'echo hello,'
4523 (C) Copy messages to files whose names are derived from the author of
4524 the respective message and do not mark them as being saved;
4525 otherwise identical to
4530 (c) Copy messages to the named file and do not mark them as being saved;
4531 otherwise identical to
4536 Show the name of the current working directory, as reported by
4541 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4542 The return status is tracked via
4547 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4549 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4553 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
4555 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
4559 .It Ic define , undefine
4560 Without arguments the current list of macros, including their content,
4561 is shown, otherwise a macro is defined, replacing an existing macro of
4563 A macro definition is a sequence of commands in the following form:
4564 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4573 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
4578 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, e.g., a
4580 It is possible to localize adjustments, like creation, deletion and
4582 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
4585 command; the scope which is localized depends on how (i.e.,
4587 normal macro, folder hook, hook,
4589 switch) the macro is invoked.
4590 Execution of a macro body can be stopped from within by calling
4594 ed macro, given positional parameters can be
4596 ed, or become completely replaced, removed etc. via
4599 The latter command deletes the given macro, the special name
4601 will discard all existing macros.
4602 Creation and deletion of (a) macro(s) can be performed from within
4607 .It Ic delete , undelete
4608 (d, u) Marks the given message list as being or not being
4610 respectively; if no argument has been specified then the usual search
4611 for a visible message is performed, as documented for
4612 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
4613 showing only the next input prompt if the search fails.
4614 Deleted messages will neither be saved in the
4616 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4618 nor will they be available for most other commands.
4621 variable is set, the new
4623 or the last message restored, respectively, is automatically
4633 Superseded by the multiplexer
4639 Delete the given messages and automatically
4643 if one exists, regardless of the setting of
4650 up or down by one message when given
4654 argument, respectively.
4658 .It Ic draft , undraft
4659 Take message lists and mark each given message as being draft, or not
4660 being draft, respectively, as documented in the section
4661 .Sx "Message states" .
4665 \*(NQ (ec) Echoes arguments to standard output and writes a trailing
4666 newline, whereas the otherwise identical
4669 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
4671 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4672 are applied to the expanded arguments.
4673 This command also supports
4676 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
4677 and manages the error number
4679 if data is stored in a variable then the return value reflects the
4680 length of the result string in case of success and is
4688 except that is echoes to standard error.
4691 In interactive sessions the \*(OPal message ring queue for
4693 will be used instead, if available and
4701 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
4707 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
4711 (e) Point the text editor (as defined in
4713 at each message from the given list in turn.
4714 Modified contents are discarded unless the
4716 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
4717 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
4722 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4723 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
4725 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
4726 if it evaluates true.
4731 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4732 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
4736 commands was true, the
4742 (en) Marks the end of an
4743 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
4744 conditional execution block.
4749 \*(NQ \*(UA has a strict notion about which variables are
4750 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4751 and which are managed in the program
4753 Since some of the latter are a vivid part of \*(UAs functioning,
4754 however, they are transparently integrated into the normal handling of
4755 internal variables via
4759 To integrate other environment variables of choice into this
4760 transparent handling, and also to export internal variables into the
4761 process environment where they normally are not, a
4763 needs to become established with this command, as in, e.g.,
4766 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB TZ
4769 Afterwards changing such variables with
4771 will cause automatic updates of the program environment, and therefore
4772 be inherited by newly created child processes.
4773 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
4774 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
4776 will remove them also from the program environment, but in any way
4777 the knowledge they ever have been
4780 Note that this implies that
4782 may cause loss of such links.
4787 will remove an existing link, but leaves the variables as such intact.
4788 Additionally the subcommands
4792 are provided, which work exactly the same as the documented commands
4796 but (additionally un)link the variable(s) with the program environment
4797 and thus immediately export them to, or remove them from (if possible),
4798 respectively, the program environment.
4803 \*(OP Since \*(UA uses the console as a user interface it can happen
4804 that messages scroll by too fast to become recognized.
4805 An error message ring queue is available which stores duplicates of any
4806 error message and notifies the user in interactive sessions whenever
4807 a new error has occurred.
4808 The queue is finite: if its maximum size is reached any new message
4809 replaces the eldest.
4812 can be used to manage this message queue: if given
4814 or no argument the queue will be displayed and cleared,
4816 will only clear all messages from the queue.
4820 \*(NQ Construct a command by concatenating the arguments, separated with
4821 a single space character, and then evaluate the result.
4822 This command passes through the exit status
4826 of the evaluated command; also see
4828 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4839 call yyy '\ecall xxx' "b\e$'\et'u ' "
4847 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
4848 any saving of messages in the
4850 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
4852 as well as a possibly tracked line editor
4854 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
4856 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
4857 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
4858 otherwise success indicating status.
4864 but open the mailbox read-only.
4869 (fi) The file command switches to a new mailbox.
4870 Without arguments it shows status information of the current mailbox.
4871 If an argument is given, it will write out changes (such as deletions)
4872 the user has made, open a new mailbox, update the internal variables
4873 .Va mailbox-resolved
4875 .Va mailbox-display ,
4876 and optionally display a summary of
4883 .Sx "Filename transformations"
4884 will be applied to the
4888 prefixes are, i.e., URL syntax is understood, e.g.,
4889 .Ql maildir:///tmp/mdirbox :
4890 if a protocol prefix is used the mailbox type is fixated and neither
4891 the auto-detection (read on) nor the
4894 \*(OPally URLs can also be used to access network resources, which may
4895 be accessed securely via
4896 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
4897 if so supported, and it is possible to proxy all network traffic over
4898 a SOCKS5 server given via
4902 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
4903 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
4906 \*(OPally supported network protocols are
4910 (POP3 with SSL/TLS encrypted transport),
4916 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
4918 Network URLs require a special encoding as documented in the section
4919 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
4922 If the resulting file protocol (MBOX database)
4924 is located on a local filesystem then the list of all registered
4926 s is traversed in order to see whether a transparent intermediate
4927 conversion step is necessary to handle the given mailbox, in which case
4928 \*(UA will use the found hook to load and save data into and from
4929 a temporary file, respectively.
4930 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes.
4931 For example, the following creates hooks for the
4933 compression tool and a combined compressed and encrypted format:
4935 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4937 gzip 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' \e
4938 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
4942 MBOX database files are generally locked during file operations in order
4943 to avoid inconsistencies due to concurrent modifications.
4944 \*(OPal Mailbox files which \*(UA treats as the system
4949 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
4950 es in general will also be protected by so-called dotlock files, the
4951 traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
4955 will be created for the duration of the synchronization \(em
4956 as necessary a privilege-separated dotlock child process will be used
4957 to accommodate for necessary privilege adjustments in order to create
4958 the dotlock file in the same directory
4959 and with the same user and group identities as the file of interest.
4962 \*(UA by default uses tolerant POSIX rules when reading MBOX database
4963 files, but it will detect invalid message boundaries in this mode and
4964 complain (even more with
4966 if any is seen: in this case
4968 can be used to create a valid MBOX database from the invalid input.
4971 If no protocol has been fixated, and
4973 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
4978 then it is treated as a folder in
4981 The maildir format stores each message in its own file, and has been
4982 designed so that file locking is not necessary when reading or writing
4986 \*(ID If no protocol has been fixated and no existing file has
4987 been found, the variable
4989 controls the format of mailboxes yet to be created.
4994 .It Ic filetype , unfiletype
4995 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, file handler hooks,
4996 which provide (shell) commands that enable \*(UA to load and save MBOX
4997 files from and to files with the registered file extensions;
4998 it will use an intermediate temporary file to store the plain data.
4999 The latter command removes the hooks for all given extensions,
5001 will remove all existing handlers.
5003 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
5004 defined file hooks, with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
5005 Otherwise three arguments are expected, the first specifying the file
5006 extension for which the hook is meant, and the second and third defining
5007 the load- and save commands, respectively, to deal with the file type,
5008 both of which must read from standard input and write to standard
5010 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes (\*(ID except below).
5011 \*(ID For now too much work is done, and files are oftened read in twice
5012 where once would be sufficient: this can cause problems if a filetype is
5013 changed while such a file is opened; this was already so with the
5014 built-in support of .gz etc. in Heirloom, and will vanish in v15.
5015 \*(ID For now all handler strings are passed to the
5016 .Ev SHELL for evaluation purposes; in the future a
5018 prefix to load and save commands may mean to bypass this shell instance:
5019 placing a leading space will avoid any possible misinterpretations.
5020 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5021 ? filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
5022 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
5023 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
5024 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5025 ? set record=+sent.zst.pgp
5030 .It Ic flag , unflag
5031 Take message lists and mark the messages as being flagged, or not being
5032 flagged, respectively, for urgent/special attention.
5034 .Sx "Message states" .
5043 With no arguments, list the names of the folders in the folder directory.
5044 With an existing folder as an argument,
5045 lists the names of folders below the named folder.
5051 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5052 recipient's address (instead of in
5059 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5060 recipient's address (instead of in
5067 but responds to all recipients regardless of the
5072 .It Ic followupsender
5075 but responds to the sender only regardless of the
5083 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
5084 recipient's address (instead of in
5089 Takes a message and the address of a recipient
5090 and forwards the message to him.
5091 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
5092 with the value of the
5093 .Va forward-inject-head
5094 variable preceding it.
5095 To filter the included header fields to the desired subset use the
5097 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
5099 Only the first part of a multipart message is included unless
5100 .Va forward-as-attachment ,
5101 and recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names
5102 etc. unless the internal variable
5106 This may generate the errors
5107 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5108 if no receiver has been specified,
5110 if some addressees where rejected by
5113 if no applicable messages have been given,
5115 if multiple messages have been specified,
5117 if an I/O error occurs,
5119 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5125 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
5126 their message headers, exactly as via
5128 An alias of this command is
5131 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
5142 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5146 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5149 .It Ic ghost , unghost
5152 .Ic uncommandalias .
5156 .It Ic headerpick , unheaderpick
5157 \*(NQ Multiplexer command to manage white- and blacklisting
5158 selections of header fields for a variety of applications.
5159 Without arguments the set of contexts that have settings is displayed.
5160 When given arguments, the first argument is the context to which the
5161 command applies, one of (case-insensitive)
5163 for display purposes (via, e.g.,
5166 for selecting which headers shall be stored persistently when
5172 ing messages (note that MIME related etc. header fields should not be
5173 ignored in order to not destroy usability of the message in this case),
5175 for stripping down messages when
5177 ing message (has no effect if
5178 .Va forward-as-attachment
5181 for defining user-defined set of fields for the command
5184 The current settings of the given context are displayed if it is the
5186 A second argument denotes the type of restriction that is to be chosen,
5187 it may be (a case-insensitive prefix of)
5191 for white- and blacklisting purposes, respectively.
5192 Establishing a whitelist suppresses inspection of the corresponding
5195 If no further argument is given the current settings of the given type
5196 will be displayed, otherwise the remaining arguments specify header
5197 fields, which \*(OPally may be given as regular expressions, to be added
5199 The special wildcard field (asterisk,
5201 will establish a (fast) shorthand setting which covers all fields.
5203 The latter command always takes three or more arguments and can be used
5204 to remove selections, i.e., from the given context, the given type of
5205 list, all the given headers will be removed, the special argument
5207 will remove all headers.
5211 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
5214 and the style of which can be adjusted with the variable
5216 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
5217 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
5230 (this mode also supports a more
5234 the list of history entries;
5237 argument selects and evaluates the respective history entry,
5238 which will become the new history top; a negative number is used as an
5239 offset to the current command, e.g.,
5241 will select the last command, the history top.
5242 The default mode if no arguments are given is
5245 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
5246 for more on this topic.
5252 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
5257 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5259 Does not override the
5262 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
5264 command issued after
5266 will display the following message, not the current one.
5271 (i) Part of the nestable
5272 .Ic if Ns \0/\: Ic elif Ns \0/\: Ic else Ns \0/\: Ic endif
5273 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
5274 the encapsulated block is executed.
5275 The POSIX standards supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
5280 end, all remaining conditions are non-portable extensions.
5281 \*(ID These commands do not yet use
5282 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5283 and therefore do not know about input tokens, so that syntax
5284 elements have to be surrounded by whitespace; in v15 \*(UA will inspect
5285 all conditions bracket group wise and consider the tokens, representing
5286 values and operators, therein, which also means that variables will
5287 already have been expanded at that time (just like in the shell).
5289 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5298 The (case-insensitive) condition
5300 erminal will evaluate to true if the standard input is a terminal, i.e.,
5301 in interactive sessions.
5302 Another condition can be any boolean value (see the section
5303 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5304 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
5307 .Dq always execute .
5308 (It shall be remarked that a faulty condition skips all branches until
5313 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5314 will be used, and this command will simply interpret expanded tokens.)
5315 It is possible to check
5316 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5319 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
5320 value or another variable by using the
5322 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
5323 conditional trigger character;
5324 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
5326 Variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
5327 When this mode has been triggered, several operators are available:
5330 Integer operators treat the arguments on the left and right hand side of
5331 the operator as integral numbers and compare them arithmetically.
5332 It is an error if any of the operands is not a valid integer, an empty
5333 argument (which implies it had been quoted) is treated as if it were 0.
5334 Available operators are
5338 (less than or equal to),
5344 (greater than or equal to), and
5349 String data operators compare the left and right hand side according to
5350 their textual content.
5351 Unset variables are treated as the empty string.
5352 The behaviour of string operators can be adjusted by prefixing the
5353 operator with the modifier trigger commercial at
5355 followed by none to multiple modifiers: for now supported is
5357 which turns the comparison into a case-insensitive one: this is
5358 implied if no modifier follows the trigger.
5361 Available string operators are
5365 (less than or equal to),
5371 (greater than or equal to),
5375 (is substring of) and
5377 (is not substring of).
5378 By default these operators work on bytes and (therefore) do not take
5379 into account character set specifics.
5380 If the case-insensitivity modifier has been used, case is ignored
5381 according to the rules of the US-ASCII encoding, i.e., bytes are
5385 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
5391 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
5392 matched according to the active locale (see
5393 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
5394 i.e., character sets should be honoured correctly.
5397 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
5399 and the OR operator is
5401 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
5402 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
5404 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
5405 them in pairs of brackets
5406 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
5407 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
5411 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
5412 via unary operators: the unary operator
5414 will reverse the result.
5416 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5417 # (This not in v15, there [ -n "$debug"]!)
5421 if [ "$ttycharset" == UTF-8 ] || [ "$ttycharset" @i== UTF8 ]
5422 echo *ttycharset* is UTF-8, the former case-sensitive!
5425 if [ "${t1}" == "${t2}" ]
5426 echo These two variables are equal
5428 if [ "$features" =% +regex ] && [ "$TERM" @i=~ "^xterm\&.*" ]
5429 echo ..in an X terminal
5431 if [ [ true ] && [ [ "${debug}" != '' ] || \e
5432 [ "$verbose" != '' ] ] ]
5435 if true && [ "$debug" != '' ] || [ "${verbose}" != '' ]
5436 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
5445 Superseded by the multiplexer
5450 Shows the names of all available commands, alphabetically sorted.
5451 If given any non-whitespace argument the list will be shown in the order
5452 in which command prefixes are searched.
5453 \*(OP In conjunction with a set variable
5455 additional information will be provided for each command: the argument
5456 type will be indicated, the documentation string will be shown,
5457 and the set of command flags will show up:
5459 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql BaNg"
5460 .It Ql "vput modifier"
5461 command supports the command modifier
5463 .It Ql "errno in *!*"
5464 the error number is tracked in
5467 commands needs an active mailbox, a
5469 .It Ql "ok: batch or interactive"
5470 command may only be used in interactive or
5473 .It Ql "ok: send mode"
5474 command can be used in send mode.
5475 .It Ql "not ok: compose mode"
5476 command is not available when in compose mode.
5477 .It Ql "not ok: during startup"
5478 command cannot be used during program startup, e.g., while loading
5479 .Sx "Resource files" .
5480 .It Ql "ok: in subprocess"
5481 command is allowed to be used when running in a subprocess instance,
5482 e.g., from within a macro that is called via
5483 .Va on-compose-splice .
5489 This command can be used to localize changes to (linked)
5492 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
5493 meaning that their state will be reverted to the former one once the
5496 \*(ID Note in the future the coverage may be extended to none or any of
5506 It can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
5510 The covered scope of an
5512 is left once a different account is activated, and some macros, notably
5513 .Va folder-hook Ns s ,
5514 use their own specific notion of covered scope, here it will be extended
5515 until the folder is left again.
5518 This setting stacks up: i.e., if
5520 enables change localization and calls
5522 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
5524 will still be reverted when the scope of
5527 (Caveats: if in this example
5529 changes to a different
5531 which sets some variables that are already covered by localizations,
5532 their scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
5534 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
5535 were defined in a local, macro private context!)
5538 This command takes one or two arguments, the optional first one
5539 specifies an attribute that may be one of
5541 which refers to the current scope and is thus the default,
5543 which causes any macro that is being
5545 ed to be started with localization enabled by default, as well as
5547 which (if enabled) disallows any called macro to turn off localization:
5548 like this it can be ensured that once the current scope regains control,
5549 any changes made in deeper levels have been reverted.
5550 The latter two are mutually exclusive.
5551 The (second) argument is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
5552 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
5553 and states whether the given attribute shall be turned on or off.
5555 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5556 define temporary_settings {
5557 set possibly_global_option1
5562 set possibly_global_option2
5569 Reply to messages that come in via known
5572 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
5573 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
5574 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
5577 functionality this will actively resort and even remove message
5578 recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be sent to
5580 For example it will also implicitly generate a
5581 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
5582 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
5584 For more documentation please refer to
5585 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5587 This may generate the errors
5588 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5589 if no receiver has been specified,
5591 if some addressees where rejected by
5594 if no applicable messages have been given,
5596 if an I/O error occurs,
5598 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5601 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5607 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
5608 recipient's address (instead of in
5613 (m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
5614 or asks on standard input if none were given;
5615 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
5616 Unless the internal variable
5618 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
5619 For more documentation please refer to
5620 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
5622 This may generate the errors
5623 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5624 if no receiver has been specified,
5626 if some addressees where rejected by
5629 if no applicable messages have been given,
5631 if multiple messages have been specified,
5633 if an I/O error occurs,
5635 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5641 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to the
5643 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5645 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the variable
5648 \*(ID This command can only be used in a
5650 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5654 .It Ic mimetype , unmimetype
5655 Without arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed;
5656 a more verbose listing will be produced if either of
5661 When given arguments they will be joined, interpreted as shown in
5662 .Sx "The mime.types files"
5664 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) ,
5665 and the resulting entry will be added (prepended) to the cache.
5666 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
5667 .Va mimetypes-load-control
5668 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
5670 The latter command deletes all specifications of the given MIME type, thus
5671 .Ql ? unmimetype text/plain
5672 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
5676 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
5678 but which also reenables cache initialization via
5679 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
5683 .It Ic mlist , unmlist
5684 The latter command removes all given mailing-lists, the special name
5686 can be used to remove all registered lists.
5687 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists (and their
5688 attributes, if any) when used without arguments; a more verbose listing
5689 will be produced if either of
5694 Otherwise all given arguments will be added and henceforth be recognized
5696 If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available then mailing
5697 lists may also be specified as (extended) regular expressions (see
5702 pair of commands manages subscription attributes of mailing-lists.
5706 \*(ID Only available in interactive mode, this command allows to display
5707 MIME parts which require external MIME handler programs to run which do
5708 not integrate in \*(UAs normal
5711 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
5712 (\*(ID No syntax to directly address parts, this restriction may vanish.)
5713 The user will be asked for each non-text part of the given message in
5714 turn whether the registered handler shall be used to display the part.
5718 .It Ic mlsubscribe , unmlsubscribe
5719 The latter command removes the subscription attribute from all given
5720 mailing-lists, the special name
5722 can be used to do so for any registered list.
5723 The former will list all currently defined mailing lists which have
5724 a subscription attribute when used without arguments; a more verbose
5725 listing will be produced if either of
5730 Otherwise this attribute will be set for all given mailing lists,
5731 newly creating them as necessary (as via
5740 but moves the messages to a file named after the local part of the
5741 sender address of the first message (instead of in
5748 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
5755 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5757 selection, and all MIME parts.
5765 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5766 standard output is a terminal.
5772 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
5774 has been given the content of the
5776 cache is shown, loading it first as necessary.
5779 then the cache will only be initialized and
5781 will remove its contents.
5782 Note that \*(UA will try to load the file only once, use
5783 .Ql Ic \&\&netrc Ns \:\0\:clear
5784 to unlock further attempts.
5789 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
5791 .Sx "The .netrc file"
5792 documents the file format in detail.
5796 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
5798 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
5802 the headers of each new message are also shown.
5803 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
5811 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
5812 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
5826 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
5828 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
5834 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
5836 selection, and all MIME parts.
5844 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
5845 standard output is a terminal.
5853 but also pipes header fields which would not pass the
5855 selection, and all parts of MIME
5856 .Ql multipart/alternative
5861 (pi) Takes a message list and a shell command
5862 and pipes the messages through the command.
5863 Without an argument the current message is piped through the command
5870 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
5891 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
5894 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5896 preserving all messages marked with
5900 or never referenced in the system
5902 and removing all other messages from the
5904 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
5905 If new mail has arrived during the session,
5907 .Dq You have new mail
5909 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line option
5911 then the edit file is rewritten.
5912 A return to the shell is effected,
5913 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
5914 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
5915 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
5917 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
5918 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
5919 otherwise success indicating status.
5923 \*(NQ Read a line from standard input, or the channel set active via
5925 and assign the data, which will be splitted as indicated by
5927 to the given variables.
5928 The variable names are checked by the same rules as documented for
5930 and the same error codes will be seen in
5934 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
5936 with the error number
5940 in case of I/O errors, or
5943 If there are more fields than variables, assigns successive fields to the
5944 last given variable.
5945 If there are less fields than variables, assigns the empty string to the
5947 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5950 ? echo "<$a> <$b> <$c>"
5952 ? wysh set ifs=:; read a b c;unset ifs
5953 hey2.0,:"'you ",:world!:mars.:
5954 ? echo $?/$^ERRNAME / <$a><$b><$c>
5955 0/NONE / <hey2.0,><"'you ",><world!:mars.:><><>
5960 \*(NQ Read anything from standard input, or the channel set active via
5962 and assign the data to the given variable.
5963 The variable name is checked by the same rules as documented for
5965 and the same error codes will be seen in
5969 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
5971 with the error number
5975 in case of I/O errors, or
5978 \*(ID The input data length is restricted to 31-bits.
5982 \*(NQ Manages input channels for
5986 to be used to avoid complicated or impracticable code, like calling
5988 from within a macro in non-interactive mode.
5989 Without arguments, or when the first argument is
5991 a listing of all known channels is printed.
5992 Channels can otherwise be
5994 d, and existing channels can be
5998 d by giving the string used for creation.
6000 The channel name is expected to be a file descriptor number, or,
6001 if parsing the numeric fails, an input file name that undergoes
6002 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
6003 E.g. (this example requires a modern shell):
6004 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6005 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enyou\enecho $a' |\e
6008 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enecho $a' |\e
6009 LC_ALL=C 6<<< 'you' \*(uA -R#X'readctl create 6'
6023 Removes the named files or directories.
6024 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6025 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6027 are performed on the arguments.
6028 If a name refer to a mailbox, e.g., a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
6029 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
6030 The user is asked for confirmation in interactive mode.
6034 Takes the name of an existing folder
6035 and the name for the new folder
6036 and renames the first to the second one.
6037 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6038 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6040 are performed on both arguments.
6041 Both folders must be of the same type.
6045 (R) Replies to only the sender of each message of the given message
6046 list, by using the first message as the template to quote, for the
6050 will exchange this command with
6052 Unless the internal variable
6054 is set the recipient address will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6056 headers will be inspected if
6060 This may generate the errors
6061 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6062 if no receiver has been specified,
6064 if some addressees where rejected by
6067 if no applicable messages have been given,
6069 if an I/O error occurs,
6071 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6077 (r) Take a message and group-responds to it by addressing the sender
6078 and all recipients, subject to
6082 .Va followup-to-honour ,
6085 .Va recipients-in-cc
6086 influence response behaviour.
6087 Unless the internal variable
6089 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6099 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
6100 For more documentation please refer to
6101 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6103 This may generate the errors
6104 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6105 if no receiver has been specified,
6107 if some addressees where rejected by
6110 if no applicable messages have been given,
6112 if an I/O error occurs,
6114 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6117 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6123 but initiates a group-reply regardless of the value of
6130 but responds to the sender only regardless of the value of
6137 but does not add any header lines.
6138 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
6139 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
6143 Takes a list of messages and a user name
6144 and sends each message to the named user.
6146 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
6149 is only performed if
6153 This may generate the errors
6154 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6155 if no receiver has been specified,
6157 if some addressees where rejected by
6160 if no applicable messages have been given,
6162 if an I/O error occurs,
6164 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6167 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6185 .It Ic respondsender
6191 (ret) Superseded by the multiplexer
6196 Only available inside the scope of a
6200 this will stop evaluation of any further macro content, and return
6201 execution control to the caller.
6202 The two optional parameters must be specified as positive decimal
6203 numbers and default to the value 0:
6204 the first argument specifies the signed 32-bit return value (stored in
6206 \*(ID and later extended to signed 64-bit),
6207 the second the signed 32-bit error number (stored in
6211 a non-0 exit status may cause the program to exit.
6217 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
6218 sender of the first message instead of (in
6220 and) taking a filename argument; the variable
6222 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
6226 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
6227 to the end of the file.
6228 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6229 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6231 is performed on the filename.
6232 If no filename is given, the
6234 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6237 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
6238 is echoed on the user's terminal.
6241 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
6242 the messages are marked for deletion.
6243 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6245 To filter the saved header fields to the desired subset use the
6247 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
6251 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6255 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6259 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6264 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
6265 all matching messages, as via
6267 This command is an alias of
6270 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6274 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
6280 (se, \*(NQ uns) The latter command will delete all given variables,
6281 the former, when used without arguments, will show all variables which
6282 are currently known to \*(UA.
6283 A more verbose listing will be produced if
6289 Remarks: the list mode will not automatically link-in known
6291 variables, but only explicit addressing will, e.g., via
6293 using a variable in an
6295 condition or a string passed to
6299 ting, as well as some program-internal use cases.
6302 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
6303 Arguments are of the form
6305 (no space before or after
6309 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
6310 \*(ID In conjunction with the
6313 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
6314 can be used to quote arguments as necessary.
6315 \*(ID Otherwise quotation marks may be placed around any part of the
6316 assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs.
6319 .Dl ? wysh set indentprefix=' -> '
6322 If an argument begins with
6326 the effect is the same as invoking the
6328 command with the remaining part of the variable
6329 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
6334 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
6335 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
6336 environment requires corresponding system support) \(em use the command
6338 for further environmental control.
6343 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6350 Apply shell quoting rules to the given raw-data arguments.
6354 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6355 The first argument specifies the operation:
6359 cause shell quoting to be applied to the remains of the line, and
6360 expanded away thereof, respectively.
6361 If the former is prefixed with a plus-sign, the quoted result will not
6362 be roundtrip enabled, and thus can be decoded only in the very same
6363 environment that was used to perform the encode; also see
6364 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
6365 If the coding operation fails the error number
6368 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6369 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6370 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6374 \*(NQ (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell,
6375 and returns its exit status.
6379 .It Ic shortcut , unshortcut
6380 Without arguments the list of all currently defined shortcuts is
6381 shown, with one argument the expansion of the given shortcut.
6382 Otherwise all given arguments are treated as pairs of shortcuts and
6383 their expansions, creating new or changing already existing shortcuts,
6385 The latter command will remove all given shortcuts, the special name
6387 will remove all registered shortcuts.
6391 \*(NQ Shift the positional parameter stack (starting at
6393 by the given number (which must be a positive decimal),
6394 or 1 if no argument has been given.
6395 It is an error if the value exceeds the number of positional parameters.
6396 If the given number is 0, no action is performed, successfully.
6397 The stack as such can be managed via
6399 Note this command will fail in
6401 and hook macros unless the positional parameter stack has been
6402 explicitly created in the current context via
6409 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
6410 message text is shown.
6414 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
6419 \*(NQ Sleep for the specified number of seconds (and optionally
6420 milliseconds), by default interruptably.
6421 If a third argument is given the sleep will be uninterruptible,
6422 otherwise the error number
6426 if the sleep has been interrupted.
6427 The command will fail and the error number will be
6428 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
6429 if the given duration(s) overflow the time datatype, and
6431 if the given durations are no valid integers.
6436 .It Ic sort , unsort
6437 The latter command disables sorted or threaded mode, returns to normal
6438 message order and, if the
6441 displays a header summary.
6442 The former command shows the current sorting criterion when used without
6443 an argument, but creates a sorted representation of the current folder
6444 otherwise, and changes the
6446 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
6448 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
6452 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
6453 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
6455 variable, as in, e.g.,
6456 .Ql set autosort=thread .
6457 Possible sorting criterions are:
6460 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
6462 Sort the messages by their
6464 field, that is by the time they were sent.
6466 Sort messages by the value of their
6468 field, that is by the address of the sender.
6471 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
6473 Sort the messages by their size.
6475 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
6478 Sort the messages by their message status.
6480 Sort the messages by their subject.
6482 Create a threaded display.
6484 Sort messages by the value of their
6486 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
6489 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
6495 \*(NQ (so) The source command reads commands from the given file.
6496 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6498 If the given expanded argument ends with a vertical bar
6500 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
6501 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
6502 Dependent on the settings of
6506 and also dependent on whether the command modifier
6508 had been used, encountering errors will stop sourcing of the given input.
6511 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
6512 .Va folder-hook Ns s
6515 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
6520 \*(NQ The difference to
6522 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
6523 this command will not generate an error nor warn if the given file
6524 argument cannot be opened successfully.
6528 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
6534 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
6536 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
6537 Unless otherwise noted the
6539 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
6547 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6551 This also clears the
6553 flag of the messages in question.
6557 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
6558 .Va spam-interface ,
6559 without modifying the messages, but setting their
6561 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
6562 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
6563 Refer to the manual section
6565 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
6569 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
6575 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
6581 flag of the messages in question.
6597 slot for white- and blacklisting header fields.
6601 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
6603 lines of each message on the users' terminal.
6604 Unless a special selection has been established for the
6608 command, the only header fields that are displayed are
6619 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
6621 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6626 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in the
6628 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6630 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
6633 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
6639 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6641 selection, and all visualizable parts of MIME
6642 .Ql multipart/alternative
6647 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the users terminal.
6648 The display of message headers is selectable via
6650 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
6652 all parts which have a registered MIME type handler (see
6653 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
6654 which produces plain text output, and all
6656 parts are shown, others are hidden except for their headers.
6657 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
6661 can be used to display parts which are not displayable as plain text.
6704 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6708 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6713 Superseded by the multiplexer
6724 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
6735 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
6739 Superseded by the multiplexer
6743 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6747 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6769 Perform URL percent codec operations on the raw-data argument, rather
6770 according to RFC 3986.
6774 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
6775 and manages the error number
6777 This is a character set agnostic and thus locale dependent operation,
6778 and it may decode bytes which are invalid in the current
6780 \*(ID This command does not know about URLs beside that.
6782 The first argument specifies the operation:
6786 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
6790 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
6791 pathnames: it does not allow a tilde
6793 and will neither accept hyphen-minus
6797 as an initial character.
6798 The remains of the line form the URL data which is to be converted.
6799 If the coding operation fails the error number
6802 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
6803 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
6804 change again due to output or result storage errors.
6808 \*(NQ Edit the values of or create the given variable(s) in the
6810 Boolean variables cannot be edited, and variables can also not be
6816 \*(NQ This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
6820 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
6824 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
6825 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
6826 verification will fail for it.
6827 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
6829 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
6830 within the certificate,
6831 and if the message content has been altered.
6844 \*(NQ Evaluate arguments according to a given operator.
6845 This is a multiplexer command which can be used to perform signed 64-bit
6846 numeric calculations as well as byte string and string operations.
6847 It uses polish notation, i.e., the operator is the first argument and
6848 defines the number and type, and the meaning of the remaining arguments.
6849 An empty argument is replaced with a 0 if a number is expected.
6853 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6856 The result that is shown in case of errors is always
6858 for usage errors and numeric operations, and the empty string for byte
6859 string and string operations;
6860 if the latter two fail to provide result data for
6862 errors, e.g., when a search operation failed, they also set the
6865 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
6866 Except when otherwise noted numeric arguments are parsed as signed 64-bit
6867 numbers, and errors will be reported in the error number
6869 as the numeric error
6870 .Va ^ERR Ns -RANGE .
6873 Numeric operations work on one or two signed 64-bit integers.
6874 One integer is expected by assignment (equals sign
6876 which does nothing but parsing the argument, thus detecting validity and
6877 possible overflow conditions, and unary not (tilde
6879 which creates the bitwise complement.
6880 Two integers are used by addition (plus sign
6882 subtraction (hyphen-minus
6884 multiplication (asterisk
6888 and modulo (percent sign
6890 as well as for the bitwise operators logical or (vertical bar
6893 bitwise and (ampersand
6896 bitwise xor (circumflex
6898 the bitwise signed left- and right shifts
6901 as well as for the unsigned right shift
6905 All numeric operators can be suffixed with a commercial at
6909 this will turn the operation into a saturated one, which means that
6910 overflow errors and division and modulo by zero are no longer reported
6911 via the exit status, but the result will linger at the minimum or
6912 maximum possible value, instead of overflowing (or trapping).
6913 This is true also for the argument parse step.
6914 For the bitwise shifts, the saturated maximum is 63.
6915 Any catched overflow will be reported via the error number
6918 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
6919 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6920 ? vexpr -@ +1 -9223372036854775808
6921 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME
6925 Character set agnostic string functions have no notion of locale
6926 settings and character sets.
6928 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
6931 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6934 Generates a random string of the given length, or of
6936 bytes (a constant from
6938 if the value 0 is given; the random string will be base64url encoded
6939 according to RFC 4648, and thus be usable as a (portable) filename.
6943 Byte string operations work on 8-bit bytes and have no notion of locale
6944 settings and character sets, effectively assuming ASCII data.
6947 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm length"
6949 Queries the length of the given argument.
6952 Calculates the Chris Torek hash of the given argument.
6955 Byte-searches in the first for the second argument.
6956 Shows the resulting 0-based offset shall it have been found.
6961 but works case-insensitively according to the rules of the ASCII
6965 Creates a substring of its first argument.
6966 The second argument is the 0-based starting offset, a negative one
6967 counts from the end;
6968 the optional third argument specifies the length of the desired result,
6969 a negative length leaves off the given number of bytes at the end of the
6970 original string, by default the entire string is used;
6971 this operation tries to work around faulty arguments (set
6973 for error logs), but reports them via the error number
6976 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
6979 Trim away whitespace characters from both ends of the argument.
6982 Trim away whitespace characters from the begin of the argument.
6985 Trim away whitespace characters from the end of the argument.
6990 String operations work, sufficient support provided, according to the
6991 active user's locale encoding and character set (see
6992 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
6995 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm regex"
6997 (One-way) Converts the argument to something safely printable on the
7001 \*(OP A string operation that will try to match the first argument with
7002 the regular expression given as the second argument.
7003 If the optional third argument has been given then instead of showing
7004 the match offset a replacement operation is performed: the third
7005 argument is treated as if specified via dollar-single-quote (see
7006 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) ,
7007 and any occurrence of a positional parameter, e.g.,
7009 is replaced by the corresponding match group of the regular expression:
7010 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7011 ? vput vexpr res regex bananarama \e
7012 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7013 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7017 On otherwise identical case-insensitive equivalent to
7019 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7020 ? vput vexpr res ire bananarama \e
7021 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7022 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $res
7029 \*(NQ Manage the positional parameter stack (see
7033 If the first argument is
7035 then the positional parameter stack of the current context, or the
7036 global one, if there is none, is cleared.
7039 then the remaining arguments will be used to (re)create the stack,
7040 if the parameter stack size limit is excessed an
7041 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
7045 If the first argument is
7047 a round-trip capable representation of the stack contents is created,
7048 with each quoted parameter separated from each other with the first
7051 and followed by the first character of
7053 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
7054 If that results in no separation at all a
7060 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7061 I.e., the subcommands
7065 can be used (in conjunction with
7067 to (re)create an argument stack from and to a single variable losslessly.
7069 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7070 ? vpospar set hey, "'you ", world!
7071 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7072 ? vput vpospar x quote
7074 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7075 ? eval vpospar set ${x}
7076 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7082 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor on each message.
7083 Modified contents are discarded unless the
7085 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
7086 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
7090 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
7091 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
7093 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
7094 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
7095 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
7096 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
7097 depends on the execution mode.
7098 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
7100 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
7101 the processed parts.
7102 For convience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
7103 value, the same result as writing it to
7105 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
7107 character for the filename is supported.
7108 Other user input undergoes the usual
7109 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7110 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
7112 and shell variable expansion for the message as such, not the individual
7113 parts, and contents of the destination file are overwritten if the file
7116 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
7117 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
7118 URL percent encoded (as via
7120 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
7121 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
7122 Existing files will not be overwritten, instead the part number or
7123 a dot are appended after a number sign
7125 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
7130 \*(NQ The sole difference to
7132 is that the new macro is executed in place of the current one, which
7133 will not regain control: all resources of the current macro will be
7135 This implies that any setting covered by
7137 will be forgotten and covered variables will become cleaned up.
7138 If this command is not used from within a
7140 ed macro it will silently be (a more expensive variant of)
7150 \*(NQ \*(UA presents message headers in
7152 fuls as described under the
7155 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
7156 likewise if the argument is
7160 scrolls to the last,
7162 scrolls to the first, and
7167 A number argument prefixed by
7171 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
7172 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
7178 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
7189 .\" .Sh COMMAND ESCAPES {{{
7190 .Sh "COMMAND ESCAPES"
7192 Here is a summary of the command escapes available in compose mode,
7193 which are used to perform special functions when composing messages.
7194 Command escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines, and
7195 consist of a trigger (escape) and a command character.
7196 The actual escape character can be set via the internal variable
7198 it defaults to the tilde
7200 Otherwise ignored whitespace characters following the escape character
7201 will prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
7205 Unless otherwise noted all compose mode command escapes ensure proper
7206 updates of the variables which represent the error number
7212 is set they will, unless stated otherwise, error out message compose
7213 mode and cause a progam exit if an operation fails.
7214 It is however possible to place the character hyphen-minus
7216 after (possible whitespace following) the escape character, which has an
7217 effect equivalent to the command modifier
7219 If the \*(OPal key bindings are available it is possible to create
7221 ings specifically for the compose mode.
7224 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
7227 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
7229 (If the escape character has been changed,
7230 that character must be doubled instead.)
7233 .It Ic ~! Ar command
7234 Execute the indicated shell
7236 which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the previously
7237 executed command if the internal variable
7239 is set, then return to the message.
7243 Same effect as typing the end-of-file character.
7246 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
7247 Execute the given \*(UA command.
7248 Not all commands, however, are allowed.
7251 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
7256 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
7258 is executed using the shell.
7259 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
7263 Write a summary of command escapes.
7266 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
7267 Append or edit the list of attachments.
7268 Does not manage the error number
7274 instead if this is a concern).
7277 arguments is expected as shell tokens (see
7278 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ;
7279 token-separating commas are ignored, too), to be
7280 interpreted as documented for the command line option
7282 with the message number exception as below.
7286 arguments the attachment list is edited, entry by entry;
7287 if a filename is left empty, that attachment is deleted from the list;
7288 once the end of the list is reached either new attachments may be
7289 entered or the session can be quit by committing an empty
7293 For all mode, if a given filename solely consists of the number sign
7295 followed by a valid message number of the currently active mailbox, then
7296 the given message is attached as a
7299 As the shell comment character the number sign must be quoted.
7302 .It Ic ~| Ar command
7303 Pipe the message through the specified filter command.
7304 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
7305 retain the original text of the message.
7308 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
7312 .It Ic ~^ Ar cmd Op Ar subcmd Op Ar arg3 Op Ar arg4
7313 Low-level command meant for scripted message access, i.e., for
7314 .Va on-compose-splice
7316 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
7317 The used protocol is likely subject to changes, and therefore the
7318 mentioned hooks receive the used protocol version as an initial line.
7319 In general the first field of a response line represents a status code
7320 which specifies whether a command was successful or not, whether result
7321 data is to be expected, and if, the format of the result data.
7322 Does not manage the error number
7326 because errors are reported via the protocol
7327 (hard errors like I/O failures cannot be handled).
7328 This command has read-only access to several virtual pseudo headers in
7329 the \*(UA private namespace, which may not exist (except for the first):
7333 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
7334 .It Ql Mailx-Command:
7335 The name of the command that generates the message, one of
7343 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-To:
7344 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Cc:
7345 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Bcc:
7346 Represent the frozen initial state of these headers before any
7347 transformation (e.g.,
7350 .Va recipients-in-cc
7353 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-From:
7354 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-To:
7355 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Cc:
7356 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Bcc:
7357 The values of said headers of the original message which has been
7359 .Ic reply , forward , resend .
7363 The status codes are:
7367 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql 210"
7369 Status ok; the remains of the line are the result.
7372 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7373 What follows are lines of result addresses, terminated by an empty line.
7374 The address lines consist of two fields, the first of which is the
7375 plain address, e.g.,
7377 separated by a single ASCII SP space from the second which contains the
7378 unstripped address, even if that is identical to the first field, e.g.,
7379 .Ql (Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple> .
7380 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7381 commands can be issued.
7384 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
7385 What follows are lines of furtherly unspecified string content,
7386 terminated by an empty line.
7387 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
7388 commands can be issued.
7391 Syntax error; invalid command.
7394 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
7397 Error: an argument fails verification.
7398 For example an invalid address has been specified, or an attempt was
7399 made to modify anything in \*(UA's own namespace.
7402 Error: an otherwise valid argument is rendered invalid due to context.
7403 For example, a second address is added to a header which may consist of
7404 a single address only.
7409 If a command indicates failure then the message will have remained
7411 Most commands can fail with
7413 if required arguments are missing (false command usage).
7414 The following (case-insensitive) commands are supported:
7417 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm header"
7419 This command allows listing, inspection, and editing of message headers.
7420 Header name case is not normalized, and case-insensitive comparison
7421 should be used when matching names.
7422 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7424 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7426 Without a third argument a list of all yet existing headers is given via
7428 this command is the default command of
7430 if no second argument has been given.
7431 A third argument restricts output to the given header only, which may
7434 if no such field is defined.
7437 Shows the content of the header given as the third argument.
7438 Dependent on the header type this may respond with
7442 any failure results in
7446 This will remove all instances of the header given as the third
7451 if no such header can be found, and
7453 on \*(UA namespace violations.
7456 This will remove from the header given as the third argument the
7457 instance at the list position (counting from one!) given with the fourth
7462 if the list position argument is not a number or on \*(UA namespace
7465 if no such header instance exists.
7468 Create a new or an additional instance of the header given in the third
7469 argument, with the header body content as given in the fourth argument
7470 (the remains of the line).
7473 if the third argument specifies a free-form header field name that is
7474 invalid, or if body content extraction fails to succeed,
7476 if any extracted address does not pass syntax and/or security checks or
7477 on \*(UA namespace violations, and
7479 to indicate prevention of excessing a single-instance header \(em note that
7481 can be appended to (a space separator will be added automatically first).
7484 is returned upon success, followed by the name of the header and the list
7485 position of the newly inserted instance.
7486 The list position is always 1 for single-instance header fields.
7487 All free-form header fields are managed in a single list.
7492 This command allows listing, removal and addition of message attachments.
7493 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
7495 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
7497 List all attachments via
7501 if no attachments exist.
7502 This command is the default command of
7504 if no second argument has been given.
7507 This will remove the attachment given as the third argument, and report
7511 if no such attachment can be found.
7512 If there exists any path component in the given argument, then an exact
7513 match of the path which has been used to create the attachment is used
7514 directly, but if only the basename of that path matches then all
7515 attachments are traversed to find an exact match first, and the removal
7516 occurs afterwards; if multiple basenames match, a
7519 Message attachments are treated as absolute pathnames.
7521 If no path component exists in the given argument, then all attachments
7522 will be searched for
7524 parameter matches as well as for matches of the basename of the path
7525 which has been used when the attachment has been created; multiple
7530 This will interpret the third argument as a number and remove the
7531 attachment at that list position (counting from one!), reporting
7535 if the argument is not a number or
7537 if no such attachment exists.
7540 Adds the attachment given as the third argument, specified exactly as
7541 documented for the command line option
7543 and supporting the message number extension as documented for
7547 upon success, with the index of the new attachment following,
7549 if the given file cannot be opened,
7551 if an on-the-fly performed character set conversion fails, otherwise
7553 is reported; this is also reported if character set conversion is
7554 requested but not available.
7557 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7559 and prints any known attributes of the first found attachment via
7563 if no such attachment can be found.
7564 The attributes are written as lines of keyword and value tuples, the
7565 keyword being separated from the rest of the line with an ASCII SP space
7569 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7571 and is otherwise identical to
7574 .It Cm attribute-set
7575 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7577 and will assign the attribute given as the fourth argument, which is
7578 expected to be a value tuple of keyword and other data, separated by
7579 a ASCII SP space or TAB tabulator character.
7580 If the value part is empty, then the given attribute is removed, or
7581 reset to a default value if existence of the attribute is crucial.
7585 upon success, with the index of the found attachment following,
7587 for message attachments or if the given keyword is invalid, and
7589 if no such attachment can be found.
7590 The following keywords may be used (case-insensitively):
7592 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".It Ql filename"
7594 Sets the filename of the MIME part, i.e., the name that is used for
7595 display and when (suggesting a name for) saving (purposes).
7596 .It Ql content-description
7597 Associate some descriptive information to the attachment's content, used
7598 in favour of the plain filename by some MUAs.
7600 May be used for uniquely identifying MIME entities in several contexts;
7601 this expects a special reference address format as defined in RFC 2045
7604 upon address content verification failure.
7606 Defines the media type/subtype of the part, which is managed
7607 automatically, but can be overwritten.
7608 .It Ql content-disposition
7609 Automatically set to the string
7613 .It Cm attribute-set-at
7614 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
7616 and is otherwise identical to
7625 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va Sign .
7630 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va sign .
7633 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
7634 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
7637 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
7638 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
7642 Read the file specified by the
7644 variable into the message.
7648 Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far.
7649 After the editing session is finished,
7650 the user may continue appending text to the message.
7653 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
7654 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
7655 message headers and MIME parts.
7656 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7660 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
7661 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
7662 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
7664 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7666 white- and blacklist selection of
7668 For MIME multipart messages,
7669 only the first displayable part is included.
7673 Edit the message header fields
7678 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7679 The default values for these fields originate from the
7687 Edit the message header fields
7693 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
7696 .It Ic ~I Ar variable
7697 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message.
7698 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
7699 Any embedded character sequences
7701 horizontal tabulator and
7703 line feed are expanded in
7705 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
7707 time by using the command modifier
7711 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
7712 Insert the value of the specified variable followed by a newline
7713 character into the message.
7714 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
7715 Any embedded character sequences
7717 horizontal tabulator and
7719 line feed are expanded in
7721 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
7723 time by using the command modifier
7727 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
7728 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7731 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7735 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
7736 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
7739 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
7741 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
7743 white- and blacklist selection of
7745 For MIME multipart messages,
7746 only the first displayable part is included.
7750 Display the message collected so far,
7751 prefaced by the message header fields
7752 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
7756 Abort the message being sent,
7757 copying it to the file specified by the
7764 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
7767 but indent each line that has been read by
7771 .It Ic ~r Ar filename Op Ar HERE-delimiter
7772 Read the named file, object to the usual
7773 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7774 into the message; if (the expanded)
7778 then standard input is used, e.g., for pasting purposes.
7779 Only in this latter mode
7781 may be given: if it is data will be read in until the given
7783 is seen on a line by itself, and encountering EOF is an error; the
7785 is a required argument in non-interactive mode; if it is single-quote
7786 quoted then the pasted content will not be expanded, \*(ID otherwise
7787 a future version of \*(UA may perform shell-style expansion on the content.
7791 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
7792 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
7793 normalized to space (SP) characters.
7796 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
7797 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
7800 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
7801 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
7805 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
7806 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
7810 Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the
7812 environment variable) on the message collected so far.
7813 Usually, the alternate editor will be a screen editor.
7814 After the editor is quit,
7815 the user may resume appending text to the end of the message.
7818 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
7819 Write the message onto the named file, which is object to the usual
7820 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
7822 the message is appended to it.
7828 except that the message is not saved at all.
7834 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
7835 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
7837 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
7841 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
7845 has the same effect as using
7851 Creation or editing of variables can be performed in the
7856 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
7858 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
7859 Both commands support a more
7862 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
7865 implicitly, others can be imported explicitly with the command
7867 and henceforth share said properties.
7870 Two different kinds of internal variables exist, and both of which can
7872 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
7876 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
7877 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
7878 introduction of the section
7880 documents the supported quoting rules.
7882 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7883 ? wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
7884 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''; \e
7885 varshow one two three four; \e
7886 unset one two three four
7890 Dependent upon the actual option the string values will be interpreted
7891 as numbers, colour names, normal text etc., but there also exists
7892 a special kind of string value, the
7893 .Dq boolean string ,
7894 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
7898 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
7904 for a false boolean and
7910 for a true boolean; a special kind of boolean string is the
7912 which is a boolean string that can optionally be prefixed with the
7913 (case-insensitive) term
7917 which causes prompting of the user in interactive mode, with the given
7918 boolean as the default value.
7921 Variable chains extend a plain
7926 .Ql variable-USER@HOST
7934 had been specified in the contextual Uniform Resource Locator URL (see
7935 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
7936 Even though this mechanism is based on URLs no URL percent encoding may
7937 be applied to neither of
7941 variable chains need to be specified using raw data.
7942 Variables which support chains are explicitly documented as such.
7944 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
7945 .\" (Keep in SYNC: ./nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
7946 .Ss "Initial settings"
7948 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
7954 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
7968 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
7970 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
7972 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
7980 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
7989 Notes: \*(UA does not support the
7991 variable \(en use command line options or
7993 to pass options through to a
7995 And the default global
7997 file, which is loaded unless the
7999 (with according argument) or
8001 command line options have been used, or the
8002 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
8003 environment variable is set (see
8004 .Sx "Resource files" )
8005 bends those initial settings a bit, e.g., it sets the variables
8010 to name a few, establishes a default
8012 selection etc., and should thus be taken into account.
8015 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
8018 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
8022 \*(RO The exit status of the last command, or the
8027 This status has a meaning in the state machine: in conjunction with
8029 any non-0 exit status will cause a program exit, and in
8031 mode any error while loading (any of the) resource files will have the
8035 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
8036 can be used to instruct the state machine to ignore errors.
8040 \*(RO The current error number
8041 .Pf ( Xr errno 3 ) ,
8042 which is set after an error occurred; it is also available via
8044 and the error name and documentation string can be queried via
8048 \*(ID This machinery is new and the error number is only really usable
8049 if a command explicitly states that it manages the variable
8051 for others errno will be used in case of errors, or
8053 if that is 0: it thus may or may not reflect the real error.
8054 The error number may be set with the command
8060 \*(RO This is a multiplexer variable which performs dynamic expansion of
8061 the requested state or condition, of which there are:
8064 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
8068 .It Va ^ERR , ^ERRDOC , ^ERRNAME
8069 The number, documentation, and name of the current
8071 respectively, which is usually set after an error occurred.
8072 \*(ID This machinery is new and is usually reliable only if a command
8073 explicitly states that it manages the variable
8075 which is effectively identical to
8077 Each of those variables can be suffixed with a hyphen minus followed by
8078 a name or number, in which case the expansion refers to the given error.
8079 Note this is a direct mapping of (a subset of) the system error values:
8080 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8082 eval echo \e$1: \e$^ERR-$1: \e$^ERRNAME-$1: \e$^ERRDOC-$1
8083 vput vexpr i + "$1" 1
8095 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8097 separated by a space character.
8098 \*(ID The special semantics of the equally named special parameter of the
8100 are not yet supported.
8104 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
8106 separated by a space character.
8107 If placed in double quotation marks, each positional parameter is
8108 properly quoted to expand to a single parameter again.
8112 \*(RO Expands to the number of positional parameters, i.e., the size of
8113 the positional parameter stack in decimal.
8117 \*(RO Inside the scope of a
8121 ed macro this expands to the name of the calling macro, or to the empty
8122 string if the macro is running from top-level.
8123 For the \*(OPal regular expression search and replace operator of
8125 this expands to the entire matching expression.
8126 It represents the program name in global context.
8130 \*(RO Access of the positional parameter stack.
8131 All further parameters can be accessed with this syntax, too, e.g.,
8134 etc.; positional parameters can be shifted off the stack by calling
8136 The parameter stack contains, e.g., the arguments of a
8140 d macro, the matching groups of the \*(OPal regular expression search
8141 and replace expression of
8143 and can be explicitly created or overwritten with the command
8148 \*(RO Is set to the active
8152 .It Va add-file-recipients
8153 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
8154 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
8155 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
8156 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
8160 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
8161 when comparing addresses.
8165 \*(BO Causes messages saved in the
8167 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
8169 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
8170 This should always be set.
8174 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
8178 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
8182 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks for files to attach at the end of each message.
8183 An empty line finalizes the list.
8187 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for carbon copy recipients
8188 (at the end of each message if
8196 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
8197 recipients (at the end of each message if
8205 \*(BO Causes the user to be prompted for confirmation to send the
8206 message or reenter compose mode after having been shown an envelope
8208 This is by default enabled.
8212 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the user to be prompted if the message is to be
8213 signed at the end of each message.
8216 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
8220 .\" The alternative *ask* is not documented on purpose
8221 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt for the subject upon entering compose mode
8222 unless a subject already exists.
8226 A sequence of characters to display in the
8230 as shown in the display of
8232 each for one type of messages (see
8233 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
8234 with the default being
8237 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
8240 variable is set, in the following order:
8242 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
8264 start of a collapsed thread.
8266 an uncollapsed thread (TODO ignored for now).
8270 classified as possible spam.
8276 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
8277 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
8281 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
8282 message will be sent automatically.
8286 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when threaded mode
8293 \*(BO Enable automatic
8295 ing of a(n existing)
8301 commands, e.g., the message that becomes the new
8303 is shown automatically, as via
8310 Causes sorted mode (see the
8312 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this variable as
8313 sorting method when a folder is opened, e.g.,
8314 .Ql set autosort=thread .
8318 \*(BO Enables the substitution of all not (reverse-solidus) escaped
8321 characters by the contents of the last executed command for the
8323 shell escape command and
8325 one of the compose mode
8326 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8327 If this variable is not set no reverse solidus stripping is performed.
8331 \*(OP Terminals generate multi-byte sequences for certain forms of
8332 input, for example for function and other special keys.
8333 Some terminals however do not write these multi-byte sequences as
8334 a whole, but byte-by-byte, and the latter is what \*(UA actually reads.
8335 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
8336 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
8337 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
8343 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
8344 has the same affect as setting
8346 and all other variables prefixed with
8348 it also changes the behaviour of
8350 (which does not exist in BSD).
8354 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
8355 summary to traditional BSD style.
8359 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
8364 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
8370 field to appear immediately after the
8372 field in message headers and with the
8374 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
8378 .It Va build-os , build-osenv
8379 \*(RO The operating system \*(UA has been build for, usually taken from
8385 respectively, the former being lowercased.
8389 The value that should appear in the
8393 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
8395 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
8396 US-ASCII compatible.
8400 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
8401 member of the variable
8403 This defaults to UTF-8 if character set conversion capabilities are
8404 available, and to ISO-8859-1 otherwise, in which case the only supported
8407 and this variable is effectively ignored.
8408 Refer to the section
8409 .Sx "Character sets"
8410 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
8413 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
8414 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
8416 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
8418 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
8419 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
8420 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
8422 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
8423 otherwise the (final) value of
8425 is used for this purpose.
8427 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
8428 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
8429 of a MIME message part that uses the
8431 character set is forcefully treated as text.
8435 The default value for the
8440 .It Va colour-disable
8441 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
8442 Also see the section
8443 .Sx "Coloured display" .
8447 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
8449 Note that pagers may need special command line options, e.g.,
8457 in order to support colours.
8458 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
8459 adjustments dependent on the value of the environment variable
8461 (see there for more).
8465 .It Va contact-mail , contact-web
8466 \*(RO Addresses for contact per email and web, respectively, e.g., for
8467 bug reports, suggestions, or help regarding \*(UA.
8468 The former can be used directly:
8469 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
8473 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued variable is
8474 set it will be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
8475 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
8479 can be forced by setting this to the value
8481 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
8482 terminal screen to compute the treshold (see
8487 \*(ID At the moment this uses the count of lines of the message in wire
8488 format, which, dependent on the
8490 of the message, is unrelated to the number of display lines.
8491 (The software is old and historically the relation was a given thing.)
8495 Define a set of custom headers to be injected into newly composed or
8496 forwarded messages; it is also possible to create custom headers in
8499 which can be automated by setting one of the hooks
8500 .Va on-compose-splice
8502 .Va on-compose-splice-shell .
8503 The value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of custom headers to
8504 be injected, to include commas in the header bodies escape them with
8506 \*(ID Overwriting of automatically managed headers is neither supported
8509 .Dl ? set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
8513 Controls the appearance of the
8515 date and time format specification of the
8517 variable, that is used, for example, when viewing the summary of
8519 If unset, then the local receiving date is used and displayed
8520 unformatted, otherwise the message sending
8522 It is possible to assign a
8524 format string and control formatting, but embedding newlines via the
8526 format is not supported, and will result in display errors.
8528 .Ql %Y-%m-%d %H:%M ,
8530 .Va datefield-markout-older .
8533 .It Va datefield-markout-older
8534 Only used in conjunction with
8536 Can be used to create a visible distinction of messages dated more than
8537 a day in the future, or older than six months, a concept comparable to the
8539 option of the POSIX utility
8541 If set to the empty string, then the plain month, day and year of the
8543 will be displayed, but a
8545 format string to control formatting can be assigned.
8551 \*(BO Enables debug messages and obsoletion warnings, disables the
8552 actual delivery of messages and also implies
8558 .It Va disposition-notification-send
8560 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
8561 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
8565 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
8567 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8568 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
8569 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
8571 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
8572 .\"for a specific account.
8576 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
8578 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive or batch
8580 compose mode will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the
8581 normal end-of-file condition).
8582 This behaviour is implied in
8588 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
8589 \*(BO\*(OP Synchronization of mailboxes which \*(UA treats as
8591 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
8592 es (see, e.g., the notes on
8593 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
8594 as well as the documentation of
8596 will be protected with so-called dotlock files\(emthe traditional mail
8597 spool file locking method\(emin addition to system file locking.
8598 Because \*(UA ships with a privilege-separated dotlock creation program
8599 that should always be able to create such a dotlock file there is no
8600 good reason to ignore dotlock file creation errors, and thus these are
8601 fatal unless this variable is set.
8605 \*(BO If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically
8606 when a message is composed in interactive mode, as if the
8608 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8612 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
8616 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
8617 its header is included in the editable text.
8621 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
8622 .Dq \&No mail for user
8623 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or does not exist.
8624 If this variable is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or non-existent
8625 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
8631 \*(BO Let each command with a non-0 exit status, including every
8635 s a non-0 status, cause a program exit unless prefixed by
8638 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
8640 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
8641 but which use a different modifier for ignoring the error.
8642 Please refer to the variable
8644 for more on this topic.
8648 The first character of this value defines the escape character for
8649 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
8651 The default value is the character tilde
8653 If set to the empty string, command escapes are disabled.
8657 If not set then file and command pipeline targets are not allowed,
8658 and any such address will be filtered out, giving a warning message.
8659 If set without a value then all possible recipient address
8660 specifications will be accepted \(en see the section
8661 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
8663 To accept them, but only in interactive mode, or when tilde commands
8664 were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8668 set this to the (case-insensitive) value
8670 (it actually acts like
8671 .Ql restrict,-all,+name,+addr ,
8672 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8674 In fact the value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of values.
8677 then the existence of disallowed specifications is treated as a hard
8678 send error instead of only filtering them out.
8679 The remaining values specify whether a specific type of recipient
8680 address specification is allowed (optionally indicated by a plus sign
8682 prefix) or disallowed (prefixed with a hyphen-minus
8686 addresses all possible address specifications,
8690 command pipeline targets,
8692 plain user names and (MTA) aliases and
8695 These kind of values are interpreted in the given order, so that
8696 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
8697 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
8698 unless \*(UA is in interactive mode or has been started with the
8702 command line option; in the latter case(s) any address may be used, then.
8704 Historically invalid network addressees are silently stripped off.
8705 To change this so that any encountered invalid email address causes
8706 a hard error it must be ensured that
8708 is an entry in the above list.
8709 Setting this automatically enables network addressees
8710 (it actually acts like
8711 .Ql failinvaddr,+addr ,
8712 so that care for ordering issues must be taken) .
8716 Unless this variable is set additional
8718 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
8719 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
8721 separator, are ignored due to safety reasons.
8722 However, if set to the special (case-insensitive) value
8724 then the presence of additional MTA arguments is treated as a hard
8725 error that causes \*(UA to exit with failure status.
8726 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
8728 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
8729 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
8736 \*(RO String giving a list of optional features, preceded with a plus sign
8738 if it is available, and a hyphen-minus
8741 The output of the command
8743 will include this information in a more pleasant output.
8747 \*(BO This setting reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
8748 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
8749 included in the header of a message
8750 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
8751 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
8752 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
8755 .Ic replysender , respondsender , followupsender
8757 .Ic replyall , respondall , followupall
8758 are not affected by the current setting of
8763 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
8764 filenames that begin with the plus sign
8766 will have the plus sign replaced with the value of this variable if set,
8767 otherwise the plus sign will remain unchanged when doing
8768 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
8771 for more on this topic.
8772 The value supports a subset of transformations itself, and if the
8773 non-empty value does not start with a solidus
8777 will be prefixed automatically.
8778 Once the actual value is evaluated first, the internal variable
8780 will be updated for caching purposes.
8783 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER , Va folder-hook
8786 macro which will be called whenever a
8789 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
8790 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
8791 only include newly arrived messages then.
8793 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
8794 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
8796 The specialized form will override the generic one if
8798 matches the file that is opened.
8799 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
8800 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
8801 However, if the mailbox resides under
8805 specification is tried in addition, e.g., if
8809 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
8810 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
8812 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
8813 first, but then followed by
8814 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
8817 .It Va folder-resolved
8818 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
8820 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
8824 \*(BO Controls whether a
8825 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8826 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
8828 .Va followup-to-honour
8830 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
8835 .It Va followup-to-honour
8837 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
8838 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
8842 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
8852 .It Va forward-as-attachment
8853 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
8856 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
8857 With this setting enabled messages are sent as unmodified MIME
8859 attachments with all of their parts included.
8862 .It Va forward-inject-head
8863 The string to put before the text of a message with the
8865 command instead of the default
8866 .Dq -------- Original Message -------- .
8867 No heading is put if it is set to the empty string.
8868 This variable is ignored if the
8869 .Va forward-as-attachment
8875 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
8877 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
8878 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
8879 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
8880 According to that RFC setting the
8882 variable is required if
8884 contains more than one address.
8887 ing to messages these addresses are handled as if they were in the
8892 If a file-based MTA is used, then
8894 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
8896 can nonetheless be enforced to appear as the envelope sender address at
8897 the MTA protocol level (the RFC 5321 reverse-path), either by using the
8899 command line option (with an empty argument; see there for the complete
8900 picture on this topic), or by setting the internal variable
8901 .Va r-option-implicit .
8904 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
8905 a dialup machine) then either this variable or
8909 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities with
8910 .Va smtp-hostname ) ,
8911 have to be set; if so the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
8915 will be created (except when disallowed by
8916 .Va message-id-disable
8923 \*(BO Due to historical reasons comments and name parts of email
8924 addresses are removed by default when sending mail, replying to or
8925 forwarding a message.
8926 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed.
8929 \*(OB Predecessor of
8930 .Va forward-inject-head .
8934 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
8935 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
8940 mode a header summary will also be displayed on folder changes.
8941 The command line option
8949 A format string to use for the summary of
8951 similar to the ones used for
8954 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent sign
8956 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
8957 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
8958 Valid format specifiers are:
8961 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
8963 A plain percent sign.
8966 a space character but for the current message
8968 for which it expands to
8972 a space character but for the current message
8974 for which it expands to
8977 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
8980 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
8982 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
8986 The date found in the
8988 header of the message when
8990 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
8991 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
8996 The indenting level in threaded mode.
8998 The address of the message sender.
9000 The message thread tree structure.
9001 (Note that this format does not support a field width.)
9003 The number of lines of the message, if available.
9007 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
9009 Message subject (if any).
9011 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
9013 Message recipient flags: is the addressee of the message a known or
9014 subscribed mailing list \(en see
9019 The position in threaded/sorted order.
9023 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
9025 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
9036 .It Va headline-bidi
9037 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
9038 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
9039 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
9040 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
9041 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
9042 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
9044 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
9045 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
9046 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
9048 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
9049 fields that may occur when displaying
9051 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
9053 with special Unicode control sequences;
9054 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
9056 no value (or any value other than
9061 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
9062 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
9063 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
9065 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
9067 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
9069 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
9070 sequences onto the line).
9075 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
9076 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
9080 \*(OP If a line editor is available then this can be set to
9081 name the (expandable) path of the location of a permanent history file.
9086 .It Va history-gabby
9087 \*(BO\*(OP Add more entries to the history as is normally done.
9090 .It Va history-gabby-persist
9091 \*(BO\*(OP \*(UA's own MLE will not save the additional
9093 entries in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
9094 On the other hand it will not loose the knowledge of whether
9095 a persistent entry was gabby or not.
9101 \*(OP Setting this variable imposes a limit on the number of concurrent
9103 If set to the value 0 then no further history entries will be added, and
9104 loading and incorporation of the
9106 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
9107 Runtime changes will not be reflected, but will affect the number of
9108 entries saved to permanent storage.
9112 \*(BO This setting controls whether messages are held in the system
9114 and it is set by default.
9118 Used instead of the value obtained from
9122 as the hostname when expanding local addresses, e.g., in
9126 or this variable Is set the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9130 will be created (except when disallowed by
9131 .Va message-id-disable
9134 Setting it to the empty string will cause the normal hostname to be
9135 used, but nonetheless enables creation of said ID fields.
9136 \*(IN in conjunction with the built-in SMTP
9139 also influences the results:
9140 one should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
9149 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
9150 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
9152 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
9154 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
9155 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
9159 The input field separator that is used (\*(ID by some functions) to
9160 determine where to split input data.
9162 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9164 Unsetting is treated as assigning the default value,
9167 If set to the empty value, no field splitting will be performed.
9169 If set to a non-empty value, all whitespace characters are extracted
9170 and assigned to the variable
9174 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
9177 will be ignored at the beginning and end of input.
9178 Diverging from POSIX shells default whitespace is removed in addition,
9179 which is owed to the entirely different line content extraction rules.
9181 Each occurrence of a character of
9183 will cause field-splitting, any adjacent
9185 characters will be skipped.
9190 \*(RO Automatically deduced from the whitespace characters in
9195 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
9196 messages; instead echo them as
9198 characters and discard the current line.
9202 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
9203 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
9204 in compose mode on message input and in interactive command input.
9205 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
9206 explicitly using one of the commands
9210 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
9213 on a line by itself or by using the
9215 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ;
9216 Setting this implies the behaviour that
9224 If this is set to a non-empty string it will specify the users
9226 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
9229 and the system-dependent default, and (thus) be used to replace
9232 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
9235 for more on this topic.
9236 The value supports a subset of transformations itself.
9244 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9247 option for indenting messages,
9248 in place of the normal tabulator character
9250 which is the default.
9251 Be sure to quote the value if it contains spaces or tabs.
9255 \*(BO If set, an empty
9257 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
9258 file is not removed.
9259 Note that, in conjunction with
9261 mode any empty file will be removed unless this variable is set.
9262 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
9263 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
9264 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
9265 \*(ID Only local regular (MBOX) files are covered, Maildir or other
9266 mailbox types will never be removed, even if empty.
9269 .It Va keep-content-length
9270 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing MBOX mailbox files \*(UA can
9275 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
9276 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
9277 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
9278 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
9279 work with with same mailbox files.
9280 Note that, if this is not set but
9281 .Va writebackedited ,
9282 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
9283 fields already marks the message as being modified.
9284 \*(ID At some future time \*(UA will be capable to rewrite and apply an
9286 to modified messages, and then those fields will be stripped silently.
9290 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
9291 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
9292 This setting causes all saved message to be retained.
9295 .It Va line-editor-disable
9296 \*(BO Turn off any enhanced line editing capabilities (see
9297 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
9301 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
9302 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
9306 Error log message prefix string
9307 .Pf ( Ql "\*(uA: " ) .
9310 .It Va mailbox-display
9311 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
9313 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
9316 .It Va mailbox-resolved
9317 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
9320 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
9321 An additional startup file that is loaded as the last of the
9322 .Sx "Resource files" .
9323 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
9325 implementations, i.e., mostly anything which is not covered by
9326 .Sx "Initial settings" .
9330 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
9331 it is marked as having been
9334 .Sx "Message states" .
9338 \*(BO When opening MBOX mailbox databases \*(UA by default uses tolerant
9339 POSIX rules for detecting message boundaries (so-called
9341 lines) due to compatibility reasons, instead of the stricter rules that
9342 have been standardized in RFC 4155.
9343 This behaviour can be switched to the stricter RFC 4155 rules by
9344 setting this variable.
9345 (This is never necessary for any message newly generated by \*(UA,
9346 it only applies to messages generated by buggy or malicious MUAs, or may
9347 occur in old MBOX databases: \*(UA itself will choose a proper
9349 to avoid false interpretation of
9351 content lines in the MBOX database.)
9353 This may temporarily be handy when \*(UA complains about invalid
9355 lines when opening a MBOX: in this case setting this variable and
9356 re-opening the mailbox in question may correct the result.
9357 If so, copying the entire mailbox to some other file, as in
9358 .Ql copy * SOME-FILE ,
9359 will perform proper, all-compatible
9361 quoting for all detected messages, resulting in a valid MBOX mailbox.
9362 Finally the variable can be unset again:
9363 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9365 localopts yes; wysh set mbox-rfc4155;\e
9366 wysh File "${1}"; eval copy * "${2}"
9368 call mboxfix /tmp/bad.mbox /tmp/good.mbox
9373 \*(BO Internal development variable.
9376 .It Va message-id-disable
9377 \*(BO By setting this variable the generation of
9381 message and MIME part headers can be completely suppressed, effectively
9382 leaving this task up to the
9384 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
9385 Note that according to RFC 5321 a SMTP server is not required to add this
9386 field by itself, so it should be ensured that it accepts messages without
9390 .It Va message-inject-head
9391 A string to put at the beginning of each new message, followed by a newline.
9392 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9396 are understood (use the
9400 ting the variable(s) instead).
9403 .It Va message-inject-tail
9404 A string to put at the end of each new message, followed by a newline.
9405 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
9409 are understood (use the
9413 ting the variable(s) instead).
9417 \*(BO Usually, when an
9419 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
9420 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
9425 option to be passed through to the
9427 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
9428 this flag, no MTA is known which does not support it (for historical
9432 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
9433 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
9434 in order to classify the
9437 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
9440 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
9441 a computation rather similar to what the
9443 command produces when used with the
9447 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
9448 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
9449 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
9454 .Ql application/octet-stream :
9455 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
9457 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
9458 interpret the contents of the part.
9460 If this variable is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as
9461 text data at first glance (by a
9465 file extension), then the original
9467 will not be overwritten.
9470 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
9471 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
9472 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
9473 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
9474 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
9475 (E.g., at the time of this writing some newsletters ship their full
9476 content only in the rich HTML part, whereas the plain text part only
9477 contains topic subjects.)
9480 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
9483 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
9484 Some MUAs, however, do not use
9485 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9487 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
9488 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but specify an
9489 unspecific MIME type
9490 .Pf ( Ql application/octet-stream )
9491 even for plain text attachments.
9492 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to re-classify such MIME
9493 message parts, if possible, for example via a possibly existing
9494 attachment filename.
9495 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
9496 actually a carrier of bits.
9497 Creating the bit-carrying number is a simple addition:
9498 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9499 ? !echo Value should be set to $((2 + 4 + 8))
9500 Value should be set to 14
9503 .Bl -bullet -compact
9505 If bit two is set (2) then the detected
9507 will be carried along with the message and be used for deciding which
9508 MIME handler is to be used, for example;
9509 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
9510 overridden content-type by showing a plus sign
9513 If bit three is set (4) then the counter-evidence is always produced
9514 and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even forcefully
9515 overriding the parts given MIME type.
9517 If bit four is set (8) then as a last resort the actual content of
9518 .Ql application/octet-stream
9519 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
9524 .It Va mime-encoding
9526 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
9527 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable.
9528 (7-bit clean text messages are sent as-is, without a transfer encoding.)
9531 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
9534 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
9535 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
9536 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
9537 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
9538 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
9539 .It Ql quoted-printable
9541 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
9542 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
9543 be read as-is; it is also acceptible for other single-byte locales that
9544 share many characters with ASCII, like, e.g., ISO-8859-1.
9545 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
9546 sets: e.g., it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode a single
9547 UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
9549 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
9550 The default encoding, it is 7-bit clean and will always be used for
9552 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
9553 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
9554 to four bytes of output.
9555 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
9560 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
9561 Can be used to control which of
9562 .Sx "The mime.types files"
9563 are loaded: if the letter
9565 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
9567 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
9569 controls loading of the system wide
9570 .Pa /etc/mime.types ;
9571 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
9573 If this variable is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
9574 Incorporation of the \*(UA-built-in MIME types cannot be suppressed,
9575 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
9578 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
9579 value string contains an equals sign
9581 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
9584 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
9585 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
9586 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
9587 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
9588 the MIME type cache).
9593 To choose an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent, set this option to either
9594 the full pathname of an executable (optionally prefixed with a
9596 protocol indicator), or \*(OPally a SMTP protocol URL, e.g., \*(IN
9598 .Dl smtps?://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9601 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
9602 The default has been chosen at compile time.
9603 All supported data transfers are executed in child processes, which
9604 run asynchronously and without supervision unless either the
9609 If such a child receives a TERM signal, it will abort and
9616 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
9618 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
9621 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
9624 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
9627 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
9632 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
9633 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean variable
9634 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
9635 (which will also disable passing
9639 (for not treating a line with only a dot
9641 character as the end of input),
9649 variable is set); in conjunction with the
9651 command line option \*(UA will also (not) pass
9657 \*(OPally \*(UA can send mail over SMTP network connections to a single
9658 defined SMTP smart host by specifying a SMTP URL as the value (see
9659 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
9660 Encrypted network connections are \*(OPally available, the section
9661 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
9662 should give an overview and provide links to more information on this.
9663 \*(UA also supports forwarding of all network traffic over a specified
9665 Note that with some mail providers it may be necessary to set the
9667 variable in order to use a specific combination of
9672 The following SMTP variants may be used:
9676 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
9677 server port 25 and requires setting the
9678 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9679 variable to enter a SSL/TLS encrypted session state.
9680 Assign a value like \*(IN
9681 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9683 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
9684 to choose this protocol.
9686 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
9687 and is automatically SSL/TLS secured.
9688 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
9689 be supported by your hosts network service database
9690 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
9693 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
9694 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
9695 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9697 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
9698 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
9703 Finally there is the SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409), which usually
9704 lives on server port 587 and is practically identically to the SMTP
9705 protocol from \*(UA's point of view beside that; it requires setting the
9706 .Va smtp-use-starttls
9707 variable to enter a SSL/TLS secured session state.
9708 Assign a value like \*(IN
9709 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
9711 .Ql submission://server[:port] ) .
9716 .It Va mta-arguments
9717 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
9719 can be given via this variable, which is parsed according to
9720 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
9721 into an array of arguments, and which will be joined onto MTA options
9722 from other sources, and then passed individually to the MTA:
9723 .Ql ? wysh set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"' .
9726 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
9727 \*(BO Unless this variable is set \*(UA will pass some well known
9728 standard command line options to a file-based
9730 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), see there for more.
9733 .It Va mta-no-receiver-arguments
9734 \*(BO By default a file-based
9736 will be passed all receiver addresses on the command line.
9737 This variable can be set to suppress any such argument.
9741 Many systems use a so-called
9743 environment to ensure compatibility with
9745 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
9747 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
9748 actually executed when calling the file-based
9750 will treat its contents as that name.
9753 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
9754 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the users
9756 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
9757 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
9761 .Sx "The .netrc file"
9762 documents the file format.
9774 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the users
9776 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
9777 This can be used to, e.g., store
9780 .Ql ? set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp' .
9784 If this variable has the value
9786 newly created local folders will be in Maildir instead of MBOX format.
9790 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
9791 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
9792 If this variable is set to the special value
9794 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
9795 timestamp changes are detected.
9799 \*(BO Causes the filename given in the
9802 and the sender-based filenames for the
9806 commands to be interpreted relative to the directory given in the
9808 variable rather than to the current directory,
9809 unless it is set to an absolute pathname.
9811 .Mx Va on-account-cleanup
9812 .It Va on-account-cleanup-ACCOUNT , Va on-account-cleanup
9813 Macro hook which will be called once an
9815 is left, as the very last step before unrolling per-account
9817 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
9818 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
9821 The specialized form is used in favour of the generic one if found.
9824 .It Va on-compose-cleanup
9825 Macro hook which will be called after the message has been sent (or not,
9826 in case of failures), as the very last step before unrolling compose mode
9828 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
9829 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
9833 For compose mode hooks that may affect the message content please see
9834 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave , on-compose-splice .
9835 \*(ID This hook exists because
9836 .Ic alias , alternates , commandalias , shortcut ,
9837 to name a few, are not covered by
9839 changes applied in compose mode will continue to be in effect thereafter.
9844 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
9845 Macro hooks which will be called once compose mode is entered,
9846 and after composing has been finished, but before a set
9847 .Va message-inject-tail
9848 has been injected etc., respectively.
9850 are enabled for these hooks, and changes on variables will be forgotten
9851 after the message has been sent.
9852 .Va on-compose-cleanup
9853 can be used to perform other necessary cleanup steps.
9855 The following (read-only) variables will be set temporarily during
9856 execution of the macros to represent respective message headers, to
9857 the empty string otherwise; most of them correspond to according virtual
9858 message headers that can be accessed via
9861 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9863 .Va on-compose-splice
9867 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va mailx_subject"
9868 .It Va mailx-command
9869 The command that generates the message.
9870 .It Va mailx-subject
9876 .It Va mailx-to , mailx-cc , mailx-bcc
9877 The list of receiver addresses as a space-separated list.
9878 .It Va mailx-raw-to , mailx-raw-cc , mailx-raw-bcc
9879 The list of receiver addresses before any mangling (due to, e.g.,
9882 .Va recipients-in-cc )
9883 as a space-separated list.
9884 .It Va mailx-orig-from
9885 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
9887 of the given message.
9888 .It Va mailx-orig-to , mailx-orig-cc , mailx-orig-bcc
9889 When replying, forwarding or resending, this will be set to the
9890 receivers of the given message.
9894 Here is am example that injects a signature via
9895 .Va message-inject-tail ;
9897 .Va on-compose-splice
9898 to simply inject the file of desire via
9902 may be a better approach.
9904 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9906 vput ! i cat ~/.mysig
9908 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
9912 readctl create ~/.mysig
9916 vput vexpr message-inject-tail trim-end $i
9918 readctl remove ~/.mysig
9921 set on-compose-leave=t_ocl
9927 .It Va on-compose-splice , on-compose-splice-shell
9928 These hooks run once the normal compose mode is finished, but before the
9929 .Va on-compose-leave
9930 macro hook is called, the
9931 .Va message-inject-tail
9933 Both hooks will be executed in a subprocess, with their input and output
9934 connected to \*(UA such that they can act as if they would be an
9936 The difference in between them is that the latter is a
9938 command, whereas the former is a normal \*(UA macro, but which is
9939 restricted to a small set of commands (the
9943 will indicate said capability).
9945 are enabled for these hooks (in the parent process), causing any setting
9946 to be forgotten after the message has been sent;
9947 .Va on-compose-cleanup
9948 can be used to perform other cleanup as necessary.
9951 During execution of these hooks \*(UA will temporarily forget whether it
9952 has been started in interactive mode, (a restricted set of)
9953 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9954 will always be available, and for guaranteed reproducibilities sake
9958 will be set to their defaults.
9959 The compose mode command
9961 has been especially designed for scriptability (via these hooks).
9962 The first line the hook will read on its standard input is the protocol
9963 version of said command escape, currently
9965 backward incompatible protocol changes have to be expected.
9968 Care must be taken to avoid deadlocks and other false control flow:
9969 if both involved processes wait for more input to happen at the
9970 same time, or one does not expect more input but the other is stuck
9971 waiting for consumption of its output, etc.
9972 There is no automatic synchronization of the hook: it will not be
9973 stopped automatically just because it, e.g., emits
9975 The hooks will however receive a termination signal if the parent enters
9977 \*(ID Protection against and interaction with signals is not yet given;
9978 it is likely that in the future these scripts will be placed in an
9979 isolated session, which is signalled in its entirety as necessary.
9981 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9982 define ocs_signature {
9984 echo '~< ~/.mysig' # '~<! fortune pathtofortunefile'
9986 set on-compose-splice=ocs_signature
9988 wysh set on-compose-splice-shell=$'\e
9990 printf "hello $version! Headers: ";\e
9991 echo \e'~^header list\e';\e
9992 read status result;\e
9993 echo "status=$status result=$result";\e
9998 echo Splice protocol version is $version
9999 echo '~^h l'; read hl; vput vexpr es substring "${hl}" 0 1
10001 echoerr 'Cannot read header list'; echo '~x'; xit
10003 if [ "$hl" @i!% ' cc' ]
10004 echo '~^h i cc Diet is your <mirr.or>'; read es;\e
10005 vput vexpr es substring "${es}" 0 1
10007 echoerr 'Cannot insert Cc: header'; echo '~x'
10008 # (no xit, macro finishs anyway)
10012 set on-compose-splice=ocsm
10017 .It Va on-resend-cleanup
10019 .Va on-compose-cleanup ,
10020 but is only triggered by
10024 .It Va on-resend-enter
10026 .Va on-compose-enter ,
10027 but is only triggered by
10032 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
10034 is followed by a formfeed character
10038 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
10039 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
10040 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
10041 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
10042 the authentication method requires a password.
10043 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10044 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10046 .It Va password-USER@HOST
10047 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
10048 Set the password for
10052 If no such variable is defined for a host,
10053 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
10054 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
10055 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
10059 \*(BO Send messages to the
10061 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
10065 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10066 When a MIME message part of type
10068 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
10069 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
10071 Note that only parts which can be displayed inline as plain text (see
10072 .Cd copiousoutput )
10073 are displayed unless otherwise noted, other MIME parts will only be
10074 considered by and for the command
10078 The special value commercial at
10080 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, e.g.,
10081 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=@
10082 will henceforth display XML
10084 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
10087 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
10088 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
10089 \(em these directives,
10091 has already been used, should be referred to for further documentation.
10096 can in fact be used as a trigger character to adjust usage and behaviour
10097 of a following shell command specification more thoroughly by appending
10098 more special characters which refer to further mailcap directives, e.g.,
10099 the following hypothetical command specification could be used:
10101 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10102 ? set pipe-X/Y='@!++=@vim ${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
10106 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
10108 The command produces plain text to be integrated in \*(UAs output:
10109 .Cd copiousoutput .
10112 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
10113 but only when it will be displayed:
10114 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
10117 Run the command asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA:
10118 .Cd x-mailx-async .
10121 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
10122 temporarily release the terminal to it:
10123 .Cd needsterminal .
10126 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
10127 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
10128 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY :
10129 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
10130 If given twice then the file will be unlinked automatically by \*(UA
10131 when the command loop is entered again at latest:
10132 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
10135 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
10136 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
10137 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10138 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
10139 the creation of which is implied; note however that in order to cause
10140 deletion of the temporary file you still have to use two plus signs
10145 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content you can use
10146 another commercial at to forcefully terminate interpretation of
10147 remaining characters.
10148 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
10152 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
10153 the environment of the shell command:
10156 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
10158 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT
10159 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
10162 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
10164 .Va mime-counter-evidence
10165 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
10166 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
10167 .Ev \&\&MAILX_CONTENT
10171 .It Ev MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL
10173 .Ql message/external-body access-type=url
10174 will store the access URL in this variable, it is empty otherwise.
10177 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME
10178 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
10181 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
10185 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
10186 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
10187 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
10193 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
10194 This is identical to
10195 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
10198 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
10199 names a file extension, e.g.,
10201 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
10204 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
10205 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
10206 The only possible value as of now is
10208 which is thus the default.
10210 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
10211 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
10212 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
10213 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
10214 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
10216 If this variable is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
10217 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
10219 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
10220 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
10221 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
10222 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
10223 but practical experience may vary.
10224 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
10228 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
10230 .Mx Va pop3-no-apop
10231 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
10232 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the
10234 authentication method will be used when connecting to a POP3 server that
10235 advertises support.
10238 is that the password is not sent in clear text over the wire and that
10239 only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
10241 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
10244 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
10245 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
10246 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
10248 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session SSL/TLS encrypted.
10249 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
10250 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
10252 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
10258 \*(BO This flag enables POSIX mode, which changes behaviour of \*(UA
10259 where that deviates from standardized behaviour.
10260 It will be set implicitly before the
10261 .Sx "Resource files"
10262 are loaded if the environment variable
10263 .Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
10264 is set, and adjusting any of those two will be reflected by the other
10266 The following behaviour is covered and enforced by this mechanism:
10269 .Bl -bullet -compact
10271 In non-interactive mode, any error encountered while loading resource
10272 files during program startup will cause a program exit, whereas in
10273 interactive mode such errors will stop loading of the currently loaded
10274 (stack of) file(s, i.e., recursively).
10275 These exits can be circumvented on a per-command base by using
10278 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
10279 for each command which shall be allowed to fail.
10283 will replace the list of alternate addresses instead of appending to it.
10286 The variable inserting
10287 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10293 will expand embedded character sequences
10295 horizontal tabulator and
10298 \*(ID For compatibility reasons this step will always be performed.
10301 Upon changing the active
10305 will be displayed even if
10312 implies the behaviour described by
10318 is extended to cover any empty mailbox, not only empty
10320 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
10321 es: they will be removed when they are left in empty state otherwise.
10326 .It Va print-alternatives
10327 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
10328 .Ql multipart/alternative
10329 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
10331 other parts are normally discarded.
10332 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
10333 just as if the surrounding part was of type
10334 .Ql multipart/mixed .
10338 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
10339 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is expanded as via
10340 dollar-single-quote expansion (see
10341 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
10342 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
10343 status information, for example
10348 .Va mailbox-display .
10350 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
10351 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
10352 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
10354 a slot for coloured prompts is also available with the \*(OPal command
10356 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
10358 .Ql set noprompt ) .
10362 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
10369 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
10373 If set, \*(UA starts a replying message with the original message
10374 prefixed by the value of the variable
10376 Normally, a heading consisting of
10377 .Dq Fromheaderfield wrote:
10378 is put before the quotation.
10383 variable, this heading is omitted.
10386 is assigned, only the headers selected by the
10389 selection are put above the message body,
10392 acts like an automatic
10394 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10398 is assigned, all headers are put above the message body and all MIME
10399 parts are included, making
10401 act like an automatic
10404 .Va quote-as-attachment .
10407 .It Va quote-as-attachment
10408 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
10410 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
10411 Note this works regardless of the setting of
10416 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
10418 Setting this turns on a more fancy quotation algorithm in that leading
10419 quotation characters are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
10421 can be set to either one or two (space separated) numeric values,
10422 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
10423 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
10425 program, but line-, not paragraph-based.
10426 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
10427 The goal cannot be smaller than the length of
10429 plus some additional pad.
10430 Necessary adjustments take place silently.
10433 .It Va r-option-implicit
10434 \*(BO Setting this option evaluates the contents of
10436 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10438 and passes the results onto the used (file-based) MTA as described for the
10440 option (empty argument case).
10443 .It Va recipients-in-cc
10450 are by default merged into the new
10452 If this variable is set, only the original
10456 the rest is merged into
10461 Unless this variable is defined, no copies of outgoing mail will be saved.
10462 If defined it gives the pathname, subject to the usual
10463 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
10464 of a folder where all new, replied-to or forwarded messages are saved:
10465 when saving to this folder fails the message is not sent, but instead
10469 The standard defines that relative (fully expanded) paths are to be
10470 interpreted relative to the current directory
10472 to force interpretation relative to
10475 needs to be set in addition.
10478 .It Va record-files
10479 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10481 will be extended to cover messages which target only file and pipe
10484 These address types will not appear in recipient lists unless
10485 .Va add-file-recipients
10489 .It Va record-resent
10490 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
10492 will be extended to also cover the
10499 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
10500 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
10501 character set of the original message for replies.
10502 If this fails, the mechanism described in
10503 .Sx "Character sets"
10504 is evaluated as usual.
10507 .It Va reply-strings
10508 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
10509 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
10510 built-in strings as
10512 reply message indicators \(en built-in are
10514 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
10519 which often has been seen in the wild;
10520 I.e., the separating colon has to be specified explicitly.
10524 A list of addresses to put into the
10526 field of the message header.
10527 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
10536 .It Va reply-to-honour
10539 header is honoured when replying to a message via
10543 This is a quadoption; if set without a value it defaults to
10547 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
10548 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
10550 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
10552 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience.
10556 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
10558 upon interrupt or delivery error.
10562 The number of lines that represents a
10571 line display and scrolling via
10573 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
10574 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
10575 terminal, the more will be shown.
10576 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
10577 environment variables
10585 .It Va searchheaders
10586 \*(BO Expand message-list specifiers in the form
10588 to all messages containing the substring
10590 in the header field
10592 The string search is case insensitive.
10595 .It Va sendcharsets
10596 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
10597 outgoing internet mail.
10598 The value of the variable
10600 is automatically appended to this list of character sets.
10601 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
10602 the only supported charset is
10605 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10606 and refer to the section
10607 .Sx "Character sets"
10608 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
10611 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
10612 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
10614 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
10616 had been set to the value of the variable
10618 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
10619 character set of the current locale encoding:
10620 therefore mail message text will be (assumed to be) in ISO-8859-1
10621 encoding when send from within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8
10622 encoding when send from within an UTF-8 locale.
10626 never comes into play as
10628 is implicitly assumed to be 8-bit and capable to represent all files the
10629 user may specify (as is the case when no character set conversion
10630 support is available in \*(UA and the only supported character set is
10632 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
10633 This might be a problem for scripts which use the suggested
10635 setting, since in this case the character set is US-ASCII by definition,
10636 so that it is better to also override
10642 An address that is put into the
10644 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
10645 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
10646 This field should normally not be used unless the
10648 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
10651 address is handled as if it were in the
10655 .Va r-option-implicit .
10658 \*(OB Predecessor of
10661 .It Va sendmail-arguments
10662 \*(OB Predecessor of
10663 .Va mta-arguments .
10665 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
10666 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
10667 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
10669 .It Va sendmail-progname
10670 \*(OB Predecessor of
10675 \*(BO When sending a message wait until the
10677 (including the built-in SMTP one) exits before accepting further commands.
10679 with this variable set errors reported by the MTA will be recognizable!
10680 If the MTA returns a non-zero exit status,
10681 the exit status of \*(UA will also be non-zero.
10685 \*(BO This setting causes \*(UA to start at the last message
10686 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder.
10690 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
10691 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
10695 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
10696 summary if the message was sent by the user.
10703 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
10705 .Va message-inject-tail ,
10706 .Va on-compose-leave
10708 .Va on-compose-splice .
10715 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
10717 .Va message-inject-tail ,
10718 .Va on-compose-leave
10720 .Va on-compose-splice .
10725 .Va on-compose-splice
10727 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
10729 .Va on-compose-leave
10731 .Va message-inject-tail
10735 .It Va skipemptybody
10736 \*(BO If an outgoing message does not contain any text in its first or
10737 only message part, do not send it but discard it silently (see also the
10738 command line option
10743 .It Va smime-ca-dir , smime-ca-file
10744 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
10745 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
10746 purpose of verification of S/MIME signed messages.
10747 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
10748 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
10749 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
10750 be explicitly turned off by setting
10751 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
10752 and further fine-tuning is possible via
10753 .Va smime-ca-flags .
10756 .It Va smime-ca-flags
10757 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
10758 storage, and the certificate verification that is used.
10759 The actual values and their meanings are documented for
10763 .It Va smime-ca-no-defaults
10764 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
10765 used to SSL/TLS library to verify S/MIME signed messages.
10767 .Mx Va smime-cipher
10768 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
10769 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
10770 messages (for the specified account).
10771 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
10774 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
10782 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
10784 is not available) and
10786 (DES CBC, 56 bits).
10788 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
10789 library that \*(UA uses.
10790 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
10791 dynamic loading via, e.g.,
10792 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
10793 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
10796 .It Va smime-crl-dir
10797 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
10798 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
10801 .It Va smime-crl-file
10802 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
10803 verifying S/MIME messages.
10806 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
10807 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
10808 encrypted before sending.
10809 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
10810 contains a certificate in PEM format.
10812 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
10813 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
10814 individually encrypted message;
10815 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
10817 .Va smime-force-encryption
10819 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
10824 .It Va smime-force-encryption
10825 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
10829 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's private key
10830 and include the user's certificate as a MIME attachment.
10831 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
10832 a valid certificate,
10833 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
10834 header and that the message content has not been altered.
10835 It does not change the message text,
10836 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
10838 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
10840 .Va smime-sign-message-digest .
10842 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
10843 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
10844 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
10845 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
10846 user's private key, followed by his certificate.
10848 For message signing
10850 is always derived from the value of
10852 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10854 For the purpose of encryption the recipient's public encryption key
10855 (certificate) is expected; the command
10857 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
10858 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
10859 gives some details).
10860 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
10862 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
10867 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
10869 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
10870 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user's addresses
10871 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
10873 For signing and decryption purposes it is possible to use encrypted
10874 keys, and the pseudo-host(s)
10875 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-key
10876 for the private key
10878 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-cert
10879 for the certificate stored in the same file)
10880 will be used for performing any necessary password lookup,
10881 therefore the lookup can be automatized via the mechanisms described in
10882 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
10883 For example, the hypothetical address
10885 could be driven with a private key / certificate pair path defined in
10886 .Va \&\&smime-sign-cert-bob@exam.ple ,
10887 and needed passwords would then be looked up via the pseudo hosts
10888 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-key
10890 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-cert ) .
10891 To include intermediate certificates, use
10892 .Va smime-sign-include-certs .
10894 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
10895 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
10896 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
10897 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
10898 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
10899 .Va smime-sign-cert
10901 This can be used to include intermediate certificates of the certificate
10902 authority, in order to allow the receiver's S/MIME implementation to
10903 perform a verification of the entire certificate chain, starting from
10904 a local root certificate, over the intermediate certificates, down to the
10905 .Va smime-sign-cert .
10906 Even though top level certificates may also be included in the chain,
10907 they won't be used for the verification on the receiver's side.
10909 For the purpose of the mechanisms involved here,
10911 refers to the content of the internal variable
10913 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10916 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-include-certs
10917 will be used for performing password lookups for these certificates,
10918 shall they have been given one, therefore the lookup can be automatized
10919 via the mechanisms described in
10920 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
10922 .Mx Va smime-sign-message-digest
10923 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
10924 \*(OP Specifies the message digest to use when signing S/MIME messages.
10925 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
10927 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
10935 The actually available message digest algorithms depend on the
10936 cryptographic library that \*(UA uses.
10937 \*(OP Support for more message digest algorithms may be available
10938 through dynamic loading via, e.g.,
10939 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3
10940 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
10941 Remember that for this
10943 refers to the variable
10945 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
10949 \*(OB\*(OP To use the built-in SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
10951 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
10953 is used in preference of
10957 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
10958 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
10960 authentication method, possible values are
10966 as well as the \*(OPal methods
10972 method does not need any user credentials,
10974 requires a user name and all other methods require a user name and
10982 .Va smtp-auth-password
10984 .Va smtp-auth-user ) .
10989 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
10990 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
10993 .It Va smtp-auth-password
10994 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
10995 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
10996 .Va smtp-auth-password
10998 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11000 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
11002 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
11004 .Va smtp-auth-password
11005 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11008 .It Va smtp-auth-user
11009 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
11010 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
11013 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11015 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
11017 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
11020 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
11024 .It Va smtp-hostname
11025 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
11027 to derive the necessary
11029 information in order to issue a
11036 can be used to use the
11038 from the SMTP account
11045 from the content of this variable (or, if that is the empty string,
11047 or the local hostname as a last resort).
11048 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
11049 a provider other than which (in
11051 is about to send the message.
11052 Setting this variable also influences generated
11058 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
11059 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
11060 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
11062 command to make an SMTP
11064 session SSL/TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
11067 .It Va socks-proxy-USER@HOST , socks-proxy-HOST , socks-proxy
11068 \*(OP If this is set to the hostname (SOCKS URL) of a SOCKS5 server then
11069 \*(UA will proxy all of its network activities through it.
11070 This can be used to proxy SMTP, POP3 etc. network traffic through the
11071 Tor anonymizer, for example.
11072 The following would create a local SOCKS proxy on port 10000 that
11073 forwards to the machine
11075 and from which the network traffic is actually instantiated:
11076 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11077 # Create local proxy server in terminal 1 forwarding to HOST
11078 $ ssh -D 10000 USER@HOST
11079 # Then, start a client that uses it in terminal 2
11080 $ \*(uA -Ssocks-proxy-USER@HOST=localhost:10000
11084 .It Va spam-interface
11085 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like, e.g.,
11087 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
11088 Please refer to the manual section
11089 .Sx "Handling spam"
11090 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
11091 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
11093 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
11099 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
11101 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
11102 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
11103 knowledge to parse the program's output.
11104 A default value for
11106 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
11110 during compilation.
11111 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
11112 using a configuration file for that), the variable
11113 .Va spamc-arguments
11114 can be used as in, e.g.,
11115 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11116 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
11118 Note that this interface does not inspect the
11120 flag of a message for the command
11124 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
11125 This interface is meant for programs like
11127 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
11128 status for at least the command
11131 meaning a message is spam,
11135 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
11136 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
11137 can be intercepted as necessary.
11139 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
11142 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
11144 .Sx "Handling spam"
11145 contains examples for some programs.
11146 The process environment of the hooks will have the variable
11147 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
11149 Note that spam score support for
11151 is not supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
11153 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11159 .It Va spam-maxsize
11160 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size will not be passed through to the
11162 .Va spam-interface .
11163 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
11166 .It Va spamc-command
11167 \*(OP The path to the
11171 .Va spam-interface .
11172 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
11174 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
11175 executable had been found during compilation.
11178 .It Va spamc-arguments
11179 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
11182 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
11183 connection-related ones via this variable, e.g.,
11184 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
11188 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
11190 .Va spam-interface .
11191 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
11200 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
11201 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
11202 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
11204 .Va spam-interface .
11206 .Sx "Handling spam"
11207 contains examples for some programs.
11210 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
11211 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
11214 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPnal
11215 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
11216 be used to overcome this restriction.
11217 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
11218 must be followed by a semicolon
11220 and an extended regular expression.
11221 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
11222 .Va spamfilter-rate
11223 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
11224 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
11228 .It Va ssl-ca-dir-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-dir-HOST , ssl-ca-dir ,\
11229 ssl-ca-file-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-file-HOST , ssl-ca-file
11230 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
11231 Enhanced Mail) format as a directory and a file, respectively, for the
11232 purpose of verification of SSL/TLS server certificates.
11233 It is possible to set both, the file will be loaded immediately, the
11234 directory will be searched whenever no match has yet been found.
11235 The set of CA certificates which are built into the SSL/TLS library can
11236 be explicitly turned off by setting
11237 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ,
11238 and further fine-tuning is possible via
11241 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
11242 for more information.
11243 \*(UA will try to use the TLS/SNI (ServerNameIndication) extension when
11244 establishing TLS connections to servers identified with hostnames.
11247 .Mx Va ssl-ca-flags
11248 .It Va ssl-ca-flags-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-flags-HOST , ssl-ca-flags
11249 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
11250 storage, and the certificate verification that is used (also see
11252 The value is expected to consist of a comma-separated list of
11253 configuration directives, with any intervening whitespace being ignored.
11254 The directives directly map to flags that can be passed to
11255 .Xr X509_STORE_set_flags 3 ,
11256 which are usually defined in a file
11257 .Pa openssl/x509_vfy.h ,
11258 and the availability of which depends on the used SSL/TLS library
11259 version: a directive without mapping is ignored (error log subject to
11261 Directives currently understood (case-insensitively) include:
11264 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd BaNg"
11265 .It Cd no-alt-chains
11266 If the initial chain is not trusted, do not attempt to build an
11268 Setting this flag will make OpenSSL certificate verification match that
11269 of older OpenSSL versions, before automatic building and checking of
11270 alternative chains has been implemented; also see
11271 .Cd trusted-first .
11272 .It Cd no-check-time
11273 Do not check certificate/CRL validity against current time.
11274 .It Cd partial-chain
11275 By default partial, incomplete chains which cannot be verified up to the
11276 chain top, a self-signed root certificate, will not verify.
11277 With this flag set, a chain succeeds to verify if at least one signing
11278 certificate of the chain is in any of the configured trusted stores of
11280 The OpenSSL manual page
11281 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
11282 gives some advise how to manage your own trusted store of CA certificates.
11284 Disable workarounds for broken certificates.
11285 .It Cd trusted-first
11286 Try building a chain using issuers in the trusted store first to avoid
11287 problems with server-sent legacy intermediate certificates.
11288 Newer versions of OpenSSL support alternative chain checking and enable
11289 it by default, resulting in the same behaviour; also see
11290 .Cd no-alt-chains .
11294 .Mx Va ssl-ca-no-defaults
11295 .It Va ssl-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
11297 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
11298 used to SSL/TLS library to verify SSL/TLS server certificates.
11301 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
11302 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11305 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11307 .Mx Va ssl-cipher-list
11308 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
11309 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11312 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11315 .It Va ssl-config-file
11316 \*(OP If this variable is set
11317 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
11319 .Ql +modules-load-file
11322 is used to allow resource file based configuration of the SSL/TLS library.
11323 This happens once the library is used first, which may also be early
11324 during startup (logged with
11326 If a non-empty value is given then the given file, after performing
11327 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
11328 will be used instead of the global OpenSSL default, and it is an error
11329 if the file cannot be loaded.
11330 The application name will always be passed as
11332 Some SSL/TLS libraries support application-specific configuration via
11333 resource files loaded like this, please see
11334 .Va ssl-config-module .
11336 .Mx Va ssl-config-module
11337 .It Va ssl-config-module-USER@HOST , ssl-config-module-HOST ,\
11339 \*(OP If file based application-specific configuration via
11340 .Va ssl-config-file
11341 is available, announced as
11345 indicating availability of
11346 .Xr SSL_CTX_config 3 ,
11347 then, it becomes possible to use a central SSL/TLS configuration file
11348 for all programs, including \*(uA, e.g.:
11349 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11350 # Register a configuration section for \*(uA
11351 \*(uA = mailx_master
11352 # The top configuration section creates a relation
11353 # in between dynamic SSL configuration and an actual
11354 # program specific configuration section
11356 ssl_conf = mailx_ssl_config
11357 # Well that actual program specific configuration section
11358 # now can map individual ssl-config-module names to sections,
11359 # e.g., ssl-config-module=account_xy
11361 account_xy = mailx_account_xy
11362 account_yz = mailx_account_yz
11364 MinProtocol = TLSv1.2
11367 CipherString = TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:
11368 MinProtocol = TLSv1.1
11373 .Mx Va ssl-config-pairs
11374 .It Va ssl-config-pairs-USER@HOST , ssl-config-pairs-HOST , ssl-config-pairs
11375 \*(OP The value of this variable chain will be interpreted as
11376 a comma-separated list of directive/value pairs.
11377 Different to when placing these pairs in a
11378 .Va ssl-config-module
11380 .Va ssl-config-file
11383 need to be escaped with a reverse solidus
11385 when included in pairs.
11386 Just likewise directives and values need to be separated by equals signs
11388 any whitespace surrounding pair members is removed.
11389 Keys are (usually) case-insensitive.
11390 Unless proper support is announced by
11392 .Pf ( Ql +conf-ctx )
11393 only the keys below are supported, otherwise the pairs will be used
11394 directly as arguments to the function
11395 .Xr SSL_CONF_cmd 3 .
11398 may be preceded with an asterisk
11401 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11402 shall be performed on the value; it is an error if these fail.
11405 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd C_rtificate"
11407 Filename of a SSL/TLS client certificate (chain) required by some servers.
11408 Fallback support via
11409 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_certificate_chain_file 3 .
11410 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11412 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
11414 if you use this you need to specify the private key via
11420 A list of ciphers for SSL/TLS connections, see
11422 By default no list of ciphers is set, resulting in a
11423 .Cd Protocol Ns - Ns
11424 specific list of ciphers (the protocol standards define lists of
11425 acceptable ciphers; possibly cramped by the used SSL/TLS library).
11426 Fallback support via
11427 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_cipher_list 3 .
11430 A list of supported elliptic curves, if applicable.
11431 By default no curves are set.
11432 Fallback support via
11433 .Xr SSL_CTX_set1_curves_list 3 ,
11436 .It Cd MaxProtocol , MinProtocol
11437 The maximum and minimum supported SSL/TLS versions, respectively.
11438 Optional fallback support via
11439 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_max_proto_version 3
11441 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_min_proto_version 3
11445 .Ql +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ,
11446 otherwise this directive results in an error.
11447 The fallback uses an internal parser which understands the strings
11452 and the special value
11454 which disables the given limit.
11457 Various flags to set.
11459 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
11460 in which case any other value but (exactly)
11462 results in an error.
11465 Filename of the private key in PEM format of a SSL/TLS client certificate.
11466 If unset, the name of the certificate file is used.
11467 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11470 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file 3 .
11471 .\" v15compat: remove the next sentence
11473 if you use this you need to specify the certificate (chain) via
11479 The used SSL/TLS protocol.
11485 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
11492 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
11493 driven via an internal parser which understands the strings
11498 and the special value
11500 Multiple protocols may be given as a comma-separated list, any
11501 whitespace is ignored, an optional plus sign
11503 prefix enables, a hyphen-minus
11505 prefix disables a protocol, so that
11507 enables only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
11513 .It Va ssl-crl-dir , ssl-crl-file
11514 \*(OP Specify a directory / a file, respectively that contains a CRL in
11515 PEM format to use when verifying SSL/TLS server certificates.
11518 .It Va ssl-curves-USER@HOST , ssl-curves-HOST , ssl-curves
11519 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11522 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11525 .It Va ssl-features
11526 \*(OP\*(RO This expands to a comma separated list of the TLS/SSL library
11527 identity and optional TLS/SSL library features.
11528 Currently supported identities are
11532 (OpenSSL v1.1.x series)
11535 (elder OpenSSL series, other clones).
11536 Optional features are preceded with a plus sign
11538 when available, and with a hyphen-minus
11541 .Ql modules-load-file
11542 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-file ) ,
11544 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-pairs ) ,
11546 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-module ) ,
11547 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
11548 .Pf ( Va ssl-config-pairs )
11551 .Pf ( Va ssl-rand-egd ) .
11554 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
11555 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11558 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11560 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
11561 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11564 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11566 .Mx Va ssl-protocol
11567 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
11568 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
11571 .Va ssl-config-pairs .
11574 .It Va ssl-rand-egd
11575 \*(OP Gives the pathname to an entropy daemon socket, see
11577 Not all SSL/TLS libraries support this,
11579 announces availability with
11583 .It Va ssl-rand-file
11584 \*(OP Gives the filename to a file with random entropy data, see
11585 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
11586 If this variable is not set, or set to the empty string, or if the
11587 .Sx "Filename transformations"
11589 .Xr RAND_file_name 3
11590 will be used to create the filename.
11591 If the SSL PRNG was seeded successfully
11592 The file will be updated
11593 .Pf ( Xr RAND_write_file 3 )
11594 if and only if seeding and buffer stirring succeeds.
11595 This variable is only used if
11597 is not set (or not supported by the SSL/TLS library).
11600 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
11601 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
11602 occurs during SSL/TLS server certificate validation against the
11603 specified or default trust stores
11606 or the SSL/TLS library built-in defaults (unless usage disallowed via
11607 .Va ssl-ca-no-defaults ) ,
11608 and as fine-tuned via
11610 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
11612 (fail and close connection immediately),
11614 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
11616 (show a warning and continue),
11618 (do not perform validation).
11624 If only set without an assigned value, then this setting inhibits the
11630 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
11631 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
11632 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
11633 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
11634 to track down the originating mail user agent.
11635 If set to the value
11641 suppression does not occur.
11646 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
11651 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
11652 escape commas with reverse solidus) to be used to overwrite or define
11655 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11656 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11659 String capabilities form
11661 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
11662 Numerics have to be notated as
11664 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
11665 Finally, booleans do not have any value but indicate a true or false
11666 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
11667 does not support undefining an existing boolean.
11668 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
11669 for one notations like
11672 .Ql control-LETTER ,
11673 and for clarification purposes
11675 can be used to specify
11677 (the control notation
11679 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
11680 the standard CSI sequence);
11681 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
11684 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
11685 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
11687 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11688 ? set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
11692 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
11693 operation of the built-in line editor or \*(UA in general:
11696 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd yay"
11698 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
11700 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
11701 Note that \*(UA does not actually care about the terminal beside that,
11702 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences.
11705 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
11708 .Cd enter_ca_mode ,
11709 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen ca-mode,
11710 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
11711 This must be enabled explicitly by setting
11712 .Va termcap-ca-mode .
11714 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
11718 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
11719 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
11720 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
11721 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
11723 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
11727 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
11729 clear the screen and home cursor.
11730 (Will be simulated via
11735 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
11740 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
11742 clear to the end of line.
11743 (Will be simulated via
11745 plus repetitions of space characters.)
11747 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
11748 .Cd column_address :
11749 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
11750 (Will be simulated via
11756 .Cd carriage_return :
11757 move to the first column in the current row.
11758 The default built-in fallback is
11761 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
11763 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
11764 The default built-in fallback is
11767 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
11769 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
11770 The default built-in fallback is
11772 which is used by most terminals.
11780 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
11785 .It Va termcap-ca-mode
11786 \*(OP Allow usage of the
11790 terminal capabilities, effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen
11791 application, as documented for
11794 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11795 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11798 .It Va termcap-disable
11799 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
11800 If set only some generic fallback built-ins and possibly the content of
11802 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
11804 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
11805 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
11809 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
11812 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
11815 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for
11816 unsigned right shifting (see
11824 \*(BO If set then the
11826 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
11830 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
11831 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
11832 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
11833 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1 unless it can deduce a value
11834 from the locale specified in the
11836 environment variable (if supported, see there for more).
11837 It defaults to UTF-8 if conversion is available.
11838 Refer to the section
11839 .Sx "Character sets"
11840 for the complete picture about character sets.
11843 .It Va typescript-mode
11844 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
11845 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
11848 .Va colour-disable ,
11849 .Va line-editor-disable
11850 and (before startup completed only)
11851 .Va termcap-disable .
11852 Unsetting it does not restore the former state of the covered settings.
11856 For a safety-by-default policy \*(UA sets its process
11860 but this variable can be used to override that:
11861 set it to an empty value to do not change the (current) setting (on
11862 startup), otherwise the process file mode creation mask is updated to
11864 Child processes inherit the process file mode creation mask.
11867 .It Va user-HOST , user
11868 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, which is
11869 used in case none has been given in the protocol and account-specific
11871 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
11875 \*(BO Setting this enables upward compatibility with \*(UA
11876 version 15.0 in respect to which configuration options are available and
11877 how they are handled.
11878 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
11879 doing things, respectively.
11883 \*(BO This setting, also controllable via the command line option
11885 causes \*(UA to be more verbose, e.g., it will display obsoletion
11886 warnings and SSL/TLS certificate chains.
11887 Even though marked \*(BO this option may be set twice in order to
11888 increase the level of verbosity even more, in which case even details of
11889 the actual message delivery and protocol conversations are shown.
11892 is sufficient to disable verbosity as such.
11899 .It Va version , version-date , version-major , version-minor , version-update
11900 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable contains a string
11901 containing the complete version identification, the latter three contain
11902 only digits: the major, minor and update version numbers.
11903 The date is in ISO 8601 notation.
11904 The output of the command
11906 will include this information.
11909 .It Va writebackedited
11910 If this variable is set messages modified using the
11914 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
11915 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
11916 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
11917 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
11918 performed, and proper RFC 4155
11920 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an excercise to
11923 .\" }}} (Variables)
11925 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
11928 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
11932 .Dq environment variable
11933 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
11934 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
11935 commonly found in there.
11936 The process environment is inherited from the
11938 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
11939 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
11940 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
11941 from \*(UA's point of view.
11942 This means that, e.g., they can be managed via
11946 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
11947 newly created child processes).
11950 In order to transparently integrate other environment variables equally
11951 they need to be imported (linked) with the command
11953 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
11954 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
11955 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
11957 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
11959 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
11961 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11962 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
11964 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
11967 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev BaNg"
11970 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen
11972 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
11973 processes and the MLE (see
11974 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
11975 in interactive mode thereafter.
11976 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 80 columns, unless in
11982 The name of the (mailbox)
11984 to use for saving aborted messages if
11986 is set; this defaults to
11993 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
11998 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
12002 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12003 A default editor is used if this value is not defined.
12007 The user's home directory.
12008 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12009 The calling user's home directory will be used instead if this directory
12010 does not exist, is not accessible or cannot be read.
12011 (No test for being writable is performed to allow usage by
12012 non-privileged users within read-only jails, but dependent on the
12013 variable settings this directory is a default write target, e.g. for
12021 .It Ev LC_ALL , LC_CTYPE , LANG
12022 \*(OP The (names in lookup order of the)
12026 which indicates the used
12027 .Sx "Character sets" .
12028 Runtime changes trigger automatic updates of the entire locale system,
12029 updating and overwriting also a
12035 The user's preferred number of lines on a page or the vertical screen
12036 or window size in lines.
12037 Queried and used once on program startup, actively managed for child
12038 processes in interactive mode thereafter.
12039 Ignored in non-interactive mode, which always uses 24 lines, unless in
12045 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
12047 command when operating on local mailboxes.
12050 (path search through
12055 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
12056 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
12057 name to any newly created child process.
12061 Is used as the users
12063 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12067 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
12071 \*(OP Overrides the default path search for
12072 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
12073 which is defined in the standard RFC 1524 as
12074 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
12075 .\" TODO we should have a mailcaps-default virtual RDONLY option!
12076 (\*(UA makes it a configuration option, however.)
12077 Note this is not a search path, but a path search.
12081 Is used as a startup file instead of
12084 In order to avoid side-effects from configuration files scripts should
12085 either set this variable to
12089 command line option should be used.
12092 .It Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
12093 If this variable is set then reading of
12095 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
12096 had been started up with the option
12098 (and according argument) or
12100 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
12104 The name of the users
12106 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
12108 A logical subset of the special
12109 .Sx "Filename transformations"
12115 Traditionally this MBOX is used as the file to save messages from the
12117 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
12118 that have been read.
12120 .Sx "Message states" .
12124 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
12130 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
12134 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
12135 The default paginator is
12137 (path search through
12140 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
12142 then a non-existing environment variable
12149 will optionally be set to
12156 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
12157 looking for commands, e.g.,
12158 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
12161 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
12162 This variable is automatically looked for upon startup, see
12168 The shell to use for the commands
12173 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
12174 and when starting subprocesses.
12175 A default shell is used if this environment variable is not defined.
12178 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
12179 This specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01) to be
12180 used in place of the current time.
12181 This variable is looked up upon program startup, and its existence will
12182 switch \*(UA to a completely reproducible mode which causes
12183 deterministic random numbers, a special fixed (non-existent?)
12185 and more to be used and set.
12186 It is to be used during development or by software packagers.
12187 \*(ID Currently an invalid setting is only ignored, rather than causing
12188 a program abortion.
12190 .Dl $ SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=`date +%s` \*(uA
12194 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
12195 For extended colour and font control please refer to
12196 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
12197 and for terminal management in general to
12198 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
12202 Used as directory for temporary files instead of
12204 if set, existent, accessible as well as read- and writable.
12205 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment,
12206 but \*(UA will ensure at startup that this environment variable is
12207 updated to contain a usable temporary directory.
12213 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
12214 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
12218 Pathname of the text editor to use in the
12222 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12232 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
12234 File giving initial commands, one of the
12235 .Sx "Resource files" .
12238 System wide initialization file, one of the
12239 .Sx "Resource files" .
12243 \*(OP Personal MIME type handler definition file, see
12244 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
12245 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
12246 a configuration option and can be overridden via
12250 .It Pa /etc/mailcap
12251 \*(OP System wide MIME type handler definition file, see
12252 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
12253 This location is part of the RFC 1524 standard search path, which is
12254 a configuration option and can be overridden via
12258 The default value for
12260 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12263 .It Pa ~/.mime.types
12264 Personal MIME types, see
12265 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
12266 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12269 .It Pa /etc/mime.types
12270 System wide MIME types, see
12271 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
12272 The actually used path is a configuration option.
12276 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the users
12278 file \(en the section
12279 .Sx "The .netrc file"
12280 documents the file format.
12281 The actually used path is a configuration option and can be overridden via
12288 The actually used path is a compile-time constant.
12292 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
12293 .Ss "Resource files"
12295 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files:
12297 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
12300 System wide initialization file.
12301 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
12303 (and according argument) or
12305 command line options, or by setting the
12308 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
12312 File giving initial commands.
12313 A different file can be chosen by setting the
12317 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
12319 command line option.
12321 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
12322 Defines a startup file to be read after all other resource files.
12323 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
12325 implementations, for example.
12326 This variable is only honoured when defined in a resource file, e.g.,
12328 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
12332 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
12335 .Bl -bullet -compact
12337 The whitespace characters space, tabulator and newline,
12338 as well as those defined by the variable
12340 are removed from the beginning and end of input lines.
12342 Empty lines are ignored.
12344 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
12345 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
12347 by placing a reverse solidus character
12349 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
12350 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
12351 remains in the input.
12353 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
12355 then it is a comment-command and also ignored.
12356 (The comment-command is a real command, which does nothing, and
12357 therefore the usual follow lines mechanism applies!)
12361 Unless \*(UA is about to enter interactive mode syntax errors that occur
12362 while loading these files are treated as errors and cause program exit.
12363 More files with syntactically equal content can be
12365 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
12367 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12368 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
12369 es, it is really continued here.
12376 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
12377 .Ss "The mime.types files"
12380 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
12381 \*(UA needs to learn about MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
12382 media types in order to classify message and attachment content.
12383 One source for them are
12385 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
12386 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
12387 Another is the command
12389 which also offers access to \*(UAs MIME type cache.
12391 files have the following syntax:
12393 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12394 type/subtype extension [extension ...]
12395 # E.g., text/html html htm
12401 define the MIME media type, as standardized in RFC 2046:
12403 is used to declare the general type of data, while the
12405 specifies a specific format for that type of data.
12406 One or multiple filename
12408 s, separated by whitespace, can be bound to the media type format.
12409 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
12411 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
12413 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in especially
12414 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
12415 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
12416 and prepends an optional
12420 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
12423 The following type markers are supported:
12426 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
12428 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
12433 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
12434 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
12435 the content as plain text instead.
12439 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
12440 handler to be defined.
12442 If no handler can be found a text message is displayed which says so.
12443 This can be annoying, for example signatures serve a contextual purpose,
12444 their content is of no use by itself.
12445 This marker will avoid displaying the text message.
12450 for sending messages:
12452 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
12453 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
12454 For reading etc. messages:
12455 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
12456 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
12458 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
12459 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
12460 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
12461 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
12464 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{
12465 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
12467 .\" TODO MAILCAP DISABLED
12468 .Sy This feature is not available in v14.9.0, sorry!
12470 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
12471 which \*(UA \*(OPally supports (see
12472 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
12473 It defines a file format to be used to inform mail user agent programs
12474 about the locally-installed facilities for handling various data
12475 formats, i.e., about commands and how they can be used to display, edit
12476 et cetera MIME part contents, as well as a default path search that
12477 includes multiple possible locations of
12481 environment variable that can be used to overwrite that (repeating here
12482 that it is not a search path, but instead a path search specification).
12483 Any existing files will be loaded in sequence, appending any content to
12484 the list of MIME type handler directives.
12488 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
12489 Comment lines start with a number sign
12491 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
12492 Empty lines are also ignored.
12493 All other lines form individual entries that must adhere to the syntax
12495 To extend a single entry (not comment) its line can be continued on
12496 follow lines if newline characters are
12498 by preceding them with the reverse solidus character
12500 The standard does not specify how leading whitespace of follow lines
12501 is to be treated, therefore \*(UA retains it.
12505 entries consist of a number of semicolon
12507 separated fields, and the reverse solidus
12509 character can be used to escape any following character including
12510 semicolon and itself.
12511 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
12512 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
12513 Leading and trailing whitespace of content is ignored (removed).
12516 The first field defines the MIME
12518 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively, and no reverse solidus
12519 escaping is possible in this field).
12520 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
12522 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
12524 would match any audio type.
12525 The second field defines the shell command which shall be used to
12527 MIME parts of the given type; it is implicitly called the
12534 shell commands message (MIME part) data is passed via standard input
12535 unless the given shell command includes one or more instances of the
12538 in which case these instances will be replaced with a temporary filename
12539 and the data will have been stored in the file that is being pointed to.
12542 shell commands data is assumed to be generated on standard output unless
12543 the given command includes (one ore multiple)
12545 In any case any given
12547 format is replaced with a(n already) properly quoted filename.
12548 Note that when a command makes use of a temporary file via
12550 then \*(UA will remove it again, as if the
12551 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile ,
12552 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
12554 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12555 flags had been set; see below for more.
12558 The optional fields either define a shell command or an attribute (flag)
12559 value, the latter being a single word and the former being a keyword
12560 naming the field followed by an equals sign
12562 succeeded by a shell command, and as usual for any
12564 content any whitespace surrounding the equals sign will be removed, too.
12565 Optional fields include the following:
12568 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
12570 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
12572 (Currently unused.)
12574 .It Cd composetyped
12577 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
12579 header field to be applied to the composed data.
12580 (Currently unused.)
12583 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
12585 (Currently unused.)
12588 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
12590 (Currently unused.)
12593 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, e.g., the machine
12594 architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether or not
12595 this mailcap entry applies.
12596 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
12597 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
12600 .It Cd needsterminal
12601 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
12602 an interactive terminal.
12603 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
12604 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
12605 ignored; this flag implies
12606 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
12609 .It Cd copiousoutput
12610 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
12612 command will be an extended stream of textual output that can be
12613 (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
12614 It is mutually exclusive with
12615 .Cd needsterminal .
12617 .It Cd textualnewlines
12618 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
12619 that, if encoded in
12621 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
12622 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
12623 (Currently unused.)
12625 .It Cd nametemplate
12626 This field gives a filename format, in which
12628 will be replaced by a random string, the joined combination of which
12629 will be used as the filename denoted by
12630 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12631 One could specify that a GIF file being passed to an image viewer should
12632 have a name ending in
12635 .Ql nametemplate=%s.gif .
12636 Note that \*(UA ignores the name template unless that solely specifies
12637 a filename suffix that consists of (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
12638 characters, the underscore and dot only.
12641 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
12642 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
12643 This field is not used by \*(UA.
12646 A textual description that describes this type of data.
12649 .It Cd x-mailx-even-if-not-interactive
12650 An extension flag test field \(em by default handlers without
12652 are entirely ignored in non-interactive mode, but if this flag is set
12653 then their use will be considered.
12654 It is an error if this flag is set for commands that use the flag
12655 .Cd needsterminal .
12658 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
12659 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
12662 command shall not be used to generate message quotes
12663 (as it would be by default).
12666 .It Cd x-mailx-async
12667 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
12669 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
12670 Cannot be used in conjunction with
12671 .Cd needsterminal .
12674 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
12675 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
12677 command shall be evaluated once only and the (boolean) result be cached.
12678 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
12679 .Dq running under the X Window System .
12682 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12683 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
12684 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
12685 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
12686 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12691 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
12692 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
12693 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
12695 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
12696 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
12697 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12699 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12704 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
12705 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
12706 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
12707 (Do not use this for asynchronous handlers.)
12708 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
12710 format, or in conjunction with
12711 .Cd x-mailx-async ,
12712 or without also setting
12713 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
12715 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill .
12718 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12721 implies the three tmpfile related flags above, but if you want, e.g.,
12723 and deal with the temporary file yourself, you can add in this flag to
12725 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink .
12730 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
12731 entry fields, prefixed by
12733 Flag fields apply to the entire
12735 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
12736 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
12737 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
12738 one does not provide enough information.
12741 command needs to specify the
12745 command shall not, the following will help out the latter (with enabled
12749 level \*(UA will show information about handler evaluation):
12751 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12752 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
12753 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
12757 In fields any occurrence of the format string
12759 will be replaced by the
12762 Named parameters from the
12764 field may be placed in the command execution line using
12766 followed by the parameter name and a closing
12769 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
12770 regardless of embedded spaces; thus:
12772 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12774 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
12777 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
12778 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
12780 # Executed shell command
12781 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
12785 .\" TODO v15: Mailcap: %n,%F
12786 Note that \*(UA does not support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
12787 shown in this example (as of today).
12788 \*(UA does not support the additional formats
12792 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
12794 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
12795 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
12796 in additional user-provided quotes:
12798 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12800 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
12802 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s
12804 application/pdf; \e
12806 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
12807 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
12809 x-mailx-async; x-mailx-tmpfile-keep
12811 application/*; echo "This is \e"%t\e" but \e
12812 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 1024 | cat -vET; \e
12813 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote
12818 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
12819 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
12822 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
12823 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
12824 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
12827 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{
12828 .Ss "The .netrc file"
12832 file contains user credentials for machine accounts.
12833 The default location in the user's
12835 directory may be overridden by the
12837 environment variable.
12838 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
12839 \*(UA implements a parser that supports a superset of the original BSD
12840 syntax, but users should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches
12841 of that file format, shall their
12843 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
12846 .Bl -bullet -compact
12848 BSD does not support single, but only double quotation marks, e.g.,
12849 .Ql password="pass with spaces" .
12851 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
12852 (e.g., a space can be escaped via
12854 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
12856 BSD does not require a final quotation mark of the last user input token.
12858 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
12859 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
12860 still seems to support this syntax, \*(UA does not!
12862 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
12863 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
12864 whitespace, with a number sign
12866 then the rest of the line is ignored.
12868 Whereas other programs may require that the
12870 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
12872 token for any other
12876 \*(UA will always require these strict permissions.
12880 Of the following list of supported tokens \*(UA only uses (and caches)
12885 At runtime the command
12887 can be used to control \*(UA's
12891 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
12892 .It Cd machine Ar name
12893 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized by \*(UA
12895 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
12900 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
12903 As an extension that should not be the cause of any worries
12904 \*(UA supports a single wildcard prefix for
12906 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12907 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
12908 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
12909 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
12915 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
12919 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
12920 Note that in the example neither
12921 .Ql pop3.example.com
12923 .Ql smtp.example.com
12924 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
12925 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
12928 This is the same as
12930 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
12931 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
12932 and it must be the last first-class token.
12934 .It Cd login Ar name
12935 The user name on the remote machine.
12937 .It Cd password Ar string
12938 The user's password on the remote machine.
12940 .It Cd account Ar string
12941 Supply an additional account password.
12942 This is merely for FTP purposes.
12944 .It Cd macdef Ar name
12946 A macro is defined with the specified
12948 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
12949 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
12952 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
12953 defined following the
12955 they are intended to be used with.)
12958 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
12959 This is merely for FTP purposes.
12966 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
12969 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
12970 .Ss "An example configuration"
12972 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12973 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
12976 # Request strict SSL/TLS transport security checks
12977 set ssl-verify=strict
12979 # Where are the up-to-date SSL/TLS certificates?
12980 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, do not use any,
12981 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
12982 #set ssl-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
12983 set ssl-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
12984 set ssl-ca-no-defaults
12985 #set ssl-ca-flags=partial-chain
12986 wysh set smime-ca-file="${ssl-ca-file}" \e
12987 smime-ca-no-defaults #smime-ca-flags="${ssl-ca-flags}"
12989 # This could be outsourced to a central configuration file via
12990 # ssl-config-file plus ssl-config-module if the used library allows.
12991 # CipherList: explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may
12992 # improve security, especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2.
12993 # See ciphers(1). Possibly best to only use ssl-cipher-list-HOST
12994 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
12995 # Curves: especially with TLSv1.3 curves selection may be desired.
12996 # MinProtocol,MaxProtocol: do not use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
12997 # Change this only when the remote server does not support it:
12998 # maybe use chain support via ssl-config-pairs-HOST / -USER@HOST
12999 # to define such explicit exceptions, then, e.g.
13000 # MinProtocol=TLSv1.1
13001 if [ "$ssl-features" =% +ctx-set-maxmin-proto ]
13002 wysh set ssl-config-pairs='\e
13003 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13004 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13005 MinProtocol=TLSv1.1'
13007 wysh set ssl-config-pairs='\e
13008 CipherList=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
13009 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
13010 Protocol=-ALL\e,+TLSv1.1 \e, +TLSv1.2'
13013 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
13014 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
13016 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
13017 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
13018 set reply-in-same-charset
13020 # When replying, do not merge From: and To: of the original message
13021 # into To:. Instead old From: -> new To:, old To: -> merge Cc:.
13022 set recipients-in-cc
13024 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
13025 # Only like this you will be able to see errors reported through the
13026 # exit status of the MTA (including the built-in SMTP one)!
13029 # Only use built-in MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
13030 set mimetypes-load-control
13032 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
13034 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
13035 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
13036 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt \e
13037 record=+sent.mbox record-files record-resent
13039 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
13040 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
13042 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
13043 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13045 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
13046 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from do not match.
13047 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
13048 set mta=(smtps?|submission)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
13049 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
13052 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
13054 colour-pager crt= \e
13055 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes fullnames \e
13056 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
13057 mime-counter-evidence=0xE \e
13058 prompt='?\e$?!\e$!/\e$^ERRNAME[\e$account#\e$mailbox-display]? ' \e
13059 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
13062 # Only include the selected header fields when typing messages
13063 headerpick type retain from_ date from to cc subject \e
13064 message-id mail-followup-to reply-to
13065 # ...when forwarding messages
13066 headerpick forward retain subject date from to cc
13067 # ...when saving message, etc.
13068 #headerpick save ignore ^Original-.*$ ^X-.*$
13070 # Some mailing lists
13071 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
13072 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
13074 # Handle a few file extensions (to store MBOX databases)
13075 filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
13076 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
13077 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
13078 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
13080 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
13081 # Instead of directly placing content inside `account',
13082 # we `define' a macro: like that we can switch "accounts"
13083 # from within *on-compose-splice*, for example!
13085 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13086 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
13088 set pop3-no-apop-pop.gmXil.com
13089 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.gmXil.com
13090 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.gmXil.com
13091 #set record="+[Gmail]/Sent Mail"
13092 # Select: File imaps://imap.gmXil.com/[Gmail]/Sent\e Mail
13094 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
13096 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.gmail.com:465
13102 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
13103 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
13104 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
13105 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
13106 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
13107 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
13109 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13110 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13112 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.yaXXex.com
13113 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.yaXXex.com
13115 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.com:465 \e
13116 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
13122 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
13123 commandalias lls '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
13124 commandalias llS '!ls ${LS_COLOR_FLAG} -aFlS'
13126 wysh set pipe-message/external-body='@* echo $MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL'
13128 # We do not support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
13129 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
13132 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'@*#++=@\e
13133 < "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
13134 -v TMPFILE="${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
13136 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/ {\e
13139 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13140 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
13141 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
13145 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
13146 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
13153 commandalias V '\e'call V
13157 When storing passwords in
13159 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
13160 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
13163 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
13165 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
13166 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
13168 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13170 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
13171 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
13173 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
13174 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
13176 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
13177 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
13178 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
13179 commandalias xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
13191 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13192 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
13196 This configuration should now work just fine:
13199 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -dvv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
13202 .\" .Ss "S/MIME step by step" {{{
13203 .Ss "S/MIME step by step"
13205 \*(OP The first thing you need for participating in S/MIME message
13206 exchange is your personal certificate, including a private key.
13207 The certificate contains public information, in particular your name and
13208 your email address(es), and the public key that is used by others to
13209 encrypt messages for you,
13210 and to verify signed messages they supposedly received from you.
13211 The certificate is included in each signed message you send.
13212 The private key must be kept secret.
13213 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with your
13214 public key, and to sign messages.
13217 For personal use it is recommended that you get a S/MIME certificate
13218 from one of the major CAs on the Internet using your WWW browser.
13219 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
13221 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
13222 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
13223 community for free; their root certificate
13224 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
13225 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
13226 which means you will have to download their root certificate separately
13227 and ensure it is part of our S/MIME certificate validation chain by
13230 or as a vivid member of the
13231 .Va smime-ca-file .
13232 But let us take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
13233 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
13236 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
13237 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
13238 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
13239 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
13240 entries of the web interface.
13241 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let us create a new
13242 .Dq client certificate ,
13243 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
13244 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
13248 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
13249 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
13250 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
13253 .Dl $ openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
13256 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
13258 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
13259 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
13260 .Dq advanced options
13261 to see the corresponding text field).
13262 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
13263 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
13264 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
13265 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
13266 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
13271 In order to use your new S/MIME setup a combined private key/public key
13272 (certificate) file has to be created:
13275 .Dl $ cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
13278 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
13279 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
13280 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted.
13281 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
13283 is of interest for verification only):
13285 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13286 ? set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
13287 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
13288 smime-sign-message-digest=SHA256 \e
13294 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS" {{{
13295 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or SSL/TLS"
13297 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
13298 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
13299 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
13300 declared invalid after they have been issued.
13301 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
13303 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
13304 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
13305 To seriously use S/MIME or SSL/TLS verification,
13306 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
13307 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
13308 invalidated certificates.
13309 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
13310 the Internet, so they have to be retrieved by some external mechanism.
13313 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
13314 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
13317 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
13320 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
13321 (and no other files) must be created.
13326 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
13327 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
13328 to verify a certificate.
13337 In general it is a good idea to turn on
13343 twice) if something does not work well.
13344 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
13345 problems' solution.
13347 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
13348 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
13350 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
13351 and cannot be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
13353 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
13354 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
13356 One may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
13360 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
13363 return the expected value?
13364 Does this local hostname have a domain suffix?
13365 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
13367 try again after adding an (additional) entry with this extension.
13370 .\" .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail" {{{
13371 .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail aka GMail"
13373 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
13375 unless they use a special authentification method (OAuth 2.0) which
13376 was not standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
13377 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
13380 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
13381 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
13382 her- and himself with the locally installed
13384 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
13385 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
13386 local cache this query would have to be performed whenever \*(UA is
13387 invoked (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
13390 \*(UA does not support OAuth.
13391 Because of this it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
13392 .Dq less secure app
13393 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
13394 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
13399 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
13402 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
13404 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
13406 use that special password instead of the real Google account password in
13407 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
13408 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
13412 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" {{{
13413 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work"
13415 It can happen that the terminal library (see
13416 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
13419 reports different codes than the terminal really sends, in which case
13420 \*(UA will tell that a key binding is functional, but will not be able to
13421 recognize it because the received data does not match anything expected.
13422 Especially without the \*(OPal terminal capability library support one
13423 reason for this may be that the (possibly even non-existing) keypad
13424 is not turned on and the resulting layout reports the keypad control
13425 codes for the normal keyboard keys.
13430 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
13433 To overcome the situation, use, e.g., the program
13435 in conjunction with the command line option
13437 if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
13438 by keypresses, and use the variable
13440 to make \*(UA aware of them.
13441 E.g., the terminal this is typed on produces some false sequences, here
13442 an example showing the shifted home key:
13444 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13447 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
13452 ? \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
13462 .\" .Sh "IMAP CLIENT" {{{
13465 \*(OPally there is IMAP client support available.
13466 This part of the program is obsolete and will vanish in v15 with the
13467 large MIME and I/O layer rewrite, because it uses old-style blocking I/O
13468 and makes excessive use of signal based long code jumps.
13469 Support can hopefully be readded later based on a new-style I/O, with
13470 SysV signal handling.
13471 In fact the IMAP support had already been removed from the codebase, but
13472 was reinstantiated on user demand: in effect the IMAP code is at the
13473 level of \*(UA v14.8.16 (with
13475 being the sole exception), and should be treated with some care.
13482 protocol prefixes, and an IMAP-based
13485 IMAP URLs (paths) undergo inspections and possible transformations
13486 before use (and the command
13488 can be used to manually apply them to any given argument).
13489 Hierarchy delimiters are normalized, a step which is configurable via the
13491 variable chain, but defaults to the first seen delimiter otherwise.
13492 \*(UA supports internationalised IMAP names, and en- and decodes the
13493 names from and to the
13495 as necessary and possible.
13496 If a mailbox name is expanded (see
13497 .Sx "Filename transformations" )
13498 to an IMAP mailbox, all names that begin with `+' then refer to IMAP
13499 mailboxes below the
13501 target box, while folder names prefixed by `@' refer to folders below
13502 the hierarchy base, e.g., the following lists all folders below the
13503 current one when in an IMAP mailbox:
13507 Note: some IMAP servers do not accept the creation of mailboxes in
13508 the hierarchy base, but require that they are created as subfolders of
13509 `INBOX' \(en with such servers a folder name of the form
13511 .Dl imaps://mylogin@imap.myisp.example/INBOX.
13513 should be used (the last character is the server's hierarchy
13515 The following IMAP-specific commands exist:
13518 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
13521 Only applicable to cached IMAP mailboxes;
13522 takes a message list and reads the specified messages into the IMAP
13527 If operating in disconnected mode on an IMAP mailbox,
13528 switch to online mode and connect to the mail server while retaining
13529 the mailbox status.
13530 See the description of the
13532 variable for more information.
13536 If operating in online mode on an IMAP mailbox,
13537 switch to disconnected mode while retaining the mailbox status.
13538 See the description of the
13541 A list of messages may optionally be given as argument;
13542 the respective messages are then read into the cache before the
13543 connection is closed, thus
13545 makes the entire mailbox available for disconnected use.
13549 Sends command strings directly to the current IMAP server.
13550 \*(UA operates always in IMAP `selected state' on the current mailbox;
13551 commands that change this will produce undesirable results and should be
13553 Useful IMAP commands are:
13554 .Bl -tag -offset indent -width ".Ic getquotearoot"
13556 Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument and creates it.
13558 (RFC 2087) Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument
13559 and prints the quotas that apply to the mailbox.
13560 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
13562 (RFC 2342) Takes no arguments and prints the Personal Namespaces,
13563 the Other User's Namespaces and the Shared Namespaces.
13564 Each namespace type is printed in parentheses;
13565 if there are multiple namespaces of the same type,
13566 inner parentheses separate them.
13567 For each namespace a prefix and a hierarchy separator is listed.
13568 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
13573 Perform IMAP path transformations.
13577 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
13578 and manages the error number
13580 The first argument specifies the operation:
13582 normalizes hierarchy delimiters (see
13584 and converts the strings from the locale
13586 to the internationalized variant used by IMAP,
13588 performs the reverse operation.
13593 The following IMAP-specific internal variables exist:
13596 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
13598 .It Va disconnected
13599 \*(BO When an IMAP mailbox is selected and this variable is set,
13600 no connection to the server is initiated.
13601 Instead, data is obtained from the local cache (see
13604 Mailboxes that are not present in the cache
13605 and messages that have not yet entirely been fetched from the server
13607 to fetch all messages in a mailbox at once,
13609 .No ` Ns Li copy * /dev/null Ns '
13610 can be used while still in connected mode.
13611 Changes that are made to IMAP mailboxes in disconnected mode are queued
13612 and committed later when a connection to that server is made.
13613 This procedure is not completely reliable since it cannot be guaranteed
13614 that the IMAP unique identifiers (UIDs) on the server still match the
13615 ones in the cache at that time.
13618 when this problem occurs.
13620 .It Va disconnected-USER@HOST
13621 The specified account is handled as described for the
13624 but other accounts are not affected.
13627 .It Va imap-auth-USER@HOST , imap-auth
13628 Sets the IMAP authentication method.
13629 Valid values are `login' for the usual password-based authentication
13631 `cram-md5', which is a password-based authentication that does not send
13632 the password over the network in clear text,
13633 and `gssapi' for GSS-API based authentication.
13637 Enables caching of IMAP mailboxes.
13638 The value of this variable must point to a directory that is either
13639 existent or can be created by \*(UA.
13640 All contents of the cache can be deleted by \*(UA at any time;
13641 it is not safe to make assumptions about them.
13644 .It Va imap-delim-USER@HOST , imap-delim-HOST , imap-delim
13645 The hierarchy separator used by the IMAP server.
13646 Whenever an IMAP path is specified it will undergo normalization.
13647 One of the normalization steps is the squeezing and adjustment of
13648 hierarchy separators.
13649 If this variable is set, any occurrence of any character of the given
13650 value that exists in the path will be replaced by the first member of
13651 the value; an empty value will cause the default to be used, it is
13653 If not set, we will reuse the first hierarchy separator character that
13654 is discovered in a user-given mailbox name.
13656 .Mx Va imap-keepalive
13657 .It Va imap-keepalive-USER@HOST , imap-keepalive-HOST , imap-keepalive
13658 IMAP servers may close the connection after a period of
13659 inactivity; the standard requires this to be at least 30 minutes,
13660 but practical experience may vary.
13661 Setting this variable to a numeric `value' greater than 0 causes
13662 a `NOOP' command to be sent each `value' seconds if no other operation
13666 .It Va imap-list-depth
13667 When retrieving the list of folders on an IMAP server, the
13669 command stops after it has reached a certain depth to avoid possible
13671 The value of this variable sets the maximum depth allowed.
13673 If the folder separator on the current IMAP server is a slash `/',
13674 this variable has no effect and the
13676 command does not descend to subfolders.
13678 .Mx Va imap-use-starttls
13679 .It Va imap-use-starttls-USER@HOST , imap-use-starttls-HOST , imap-use-starttls
13680 Causes \*(UA to issue a `STARTTLS' command to make an unencrypted
13681 IMAP session SSL/TLS encrypted.
13682 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
13683 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the IMAPS method.
13689 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
13699 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
13708 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
13714 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
13717 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
13718 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
13719 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
13722 command already appeared in First Edition
13726 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
13727 Electronic mail was there from the start.
13728 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
13729 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
13730 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
13731 freeloaders, or whatever.
13732 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
13733 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
13734 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
13740 Mail was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
13743 distribution until 1995.
13744 Mail has then seen further development in open source
13746 variants, noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
13748 Based upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
13749 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
13750 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso.
13751 This man page is derived from
13752 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
13753 that was originally written by Kurt Shoens.
13761 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
13762 .An "Edward Wang" ,
13763 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
13764 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
13765 .An "Gunnar Ritter" .
13766 \*(UA is developed by
13767 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" Aq steffen@sdaoden.eu .
13770 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
13773 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
13777 from anywhere else but a command prompt is very problematic and likely
13778 to leave the program in an undefined state: many library functions
13779 cannot deal with the
13781 that this software (still) performs; even though efforts have been taken
13782 to address this, no sooner but in v15 it will have been worked out:
13783 interruptions have not been disabled in order to allow forceful breakage
13784 of hanging network connections, for example (all this is unrelated to
13788 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
13789 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
13790 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
13795 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
13796 that is capable of message queuing.
13803 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
13804 claims that there are no messages to display, one needs to perform
13805 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
13807 In threaded display a power user may encounter crashes very
13808 occasionally (this is may and very).
13812 in the source repository lists future directions.
13815 Please report bugs to the
13817 address, e.g., from within \*(uA:
13818 .\" v15-compat: drop eval as `mail' will expand variable?
13819 .Ql ? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
13820 More information is available on the web:
13821 .Ql $ \*(uA -X 'echo Ns \| $ Ns Va contact-web Ns ' -Xx .