GIT_SILENT made messages (after extraction)

[trojita.git] / docs / index.docbook

<?xml version="1.0" ?>
<!DOCTYPE book PUBLIC "-//KDE//DTD DocBook XML V4.5-Based Variant V1.1//EN"
"dtd/kdedbx45.dtd" [
  <!ENTITY trojita "<application>Trojitá</application>">
  <!ENTITY % addindex "IGNORE">
  <!ENTITY % English "INCLUDE">
]>
<book id="trojita" lang="&language;">

<bookinfo>
<title>The &trojita; Handbook</title>

<authorgroup>
<author>
<personname>
<firstname>Randall</firstname>
<surname>Wood</surname>
</personname>
<email>randall+kde@woodbriceno.net</email>
</author>
<!-- TRANS:ROLES_OF_TRANSLATORS -->
</authorgroup>

<copyright>
<year>2013</year>
<holder>Randall Wood</holder>
</copyright>
<legalnotice>&FDLNotice;</legalnotice>

<date>2013-01-31</date>

<releaseinfo>0.3.92 (&kde; 4.9)</releaseinfo>

<abstract>
<para>
&trojita; is an email program ("client") for IMAP accounts.  It is a
stand-alone program not associated with any Information Suites or equivalent.
It prioritizes efficient and fast data transfer, taking care not to re-download
any information that has already been downloaded, and being conservative about
network usage when you are paying by the minute.   Currently
under intensive development, it is lacking some features but is evolving fast.
</para>
</abstract>

<keywordset>
<keyword>KDE</keyword>
<keyword>extragear</keyword>
<keyword>email</keyword>
<keyword>IMAP</keyword>
</keywordset>

</bookinfo>

<chapter id="introduction">
<title>Introduction</title>

<para>
&trojita; is an email program ("client") focused on IMAP email accounts,
where the mail remains on the server but is manipulated by the software you run
on the computer under your fingertips.  It is designed to be simple (it can be
built using only one single dependent library), and fast and efficient over the
network, economizing resources and limiting data transfer.  Its GUI is intended
to be uncluttered and efficient, and it provides "expensive mode" data transfer,
that reduces the length of its
conversation with the server to a minimum.  It is a stand-alone program, not
part of a bigger or more complex suite.  As it is under development, some
features are still missing.
</para>
</chapter>

<chapter id="using-kapp">
<title>Using &trojita;</title>

<para>
&trojita; allows you to read, write, organize, search for, and send
email.  If you've got an IMAP email account, &trojita; will allow you to
access and use it.  IMAP is a protocol that allows
your mail to stay on the server, rather than downloading it to your local
machine.  However, &trojita; does in fact download parts of your
messages &ndash; even all of your messages &ndash; for convenience.  In the
1990s, most people used POP3 mailboxes, and their email software downloaded
all their messages, removing them from the server.  The disadvantage was that
if you used any other computer, your messages were not available.  IMAP solves
that problem by keeping the mail on the server.  The software you use on your
local computer/cellphone simply issues instructions ("reply to this email,"
"display this email," &etc;) for the server to execute.</para>

<para>First you need an IMAP account.  There are many providers;
<ulink url="http://fastmail.fm">FastMail</ulink> is one;
<ulink url="http://tuffmail.com">Tuffmail</ulink> and
<ulink url="http://pobox.com">Pobox</ulink> are others.
Google's Gmail service provides IMAP access to your Gmail account (Outlook and
others do not). And if the manager of your &Microsoft; <application>Exchange</application> server has
configured it, you can access <application>Exchange</application> through IMAP as well.  If you have
got an IMAP account, a user name and password, that is all you should
need to use &trojita; to access it.</para>

<para>Note that not all IMAP providers are equal and some offer service
that is frustratingly slow.  &Microsoft;'s <application>Exchange</application> server too is
reported to be somewhat slow.  If you choose a good provider and use fast
software, you'll be surprised how pleasant an experience it can be.</para>

<sect1 id="configure-account">
<title>Configuring your IMAP Account</title>
<para>First, click on the <guilabel>General</guilabel> tab of the Settings box.  Add your IMAP
account as a new account, using these parameters:

<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Real Name: the name you want to show on your
emails (your own first and last name)</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Email: your email address</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Organisation: your company name (optional)</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Signature: any text you want to appear at the
bottom of your emails, like your website name or a slogan</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>

<para>These settings become an identity, and you can have several, if you
want, if for example, some of your mail is part of a mailing list where
your messages should look different (a different signature line, for
example).  Note however that at present, &trojita; does not yet permit
multiple IMAP accounts (that is, use with multiple servers).</para>

<para>Next, add the connection parameters necessary to access your
account.
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Method: choose SSL, if your provider requires
it.  Otherwise, choose "TCP" for a connection that starts
unencrypted and may be upgraded to encryption while connecting. And if your
provider requires you to perform that upgrade to encryption, check the "perform
STARTTLS command" to ensure it does. "Local process" is for advanced users who,
for example, are connecting to their provider over another SSH agent (in this
case you'd put something like <userinput>ssh imap.provider.org dovecot --exec-mail imap</userinput>).
Generally, TCP or SSL are your two most likely choices.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>IMAP Server: is your provider's server (&eg;
mail.host.com)</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Port: this parameter should change
automatically depending on what you enter for "IMAP Server."
Typically it is 143 for unencrypted connections and 993 for
SSL connections.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Username: your username</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Password: your password. At present, &trojita;
stores your user name
and password in a plain text file on your computer.  This
is not secure!  If that worries you, leave the password
field blank, and &trojita; will ask you once for your
password, and keep it in memory until the application exits.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Start in Offline Mode:</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Blacklisted Capabilities: &trojita;
strives to be standards compliant.  But some servers that
advertise standards compliance are not actually so.  If
you're aware of some features that your provider advertises
but does not actually provide, listing them here allows
&trojita; to politely ignore them.</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>

<para>The <guilabel>Offline</guilabel> mode tab is where you configure &trojita;'s
ability to store local copies of messages on your server.  The advantage
of saving a copy locally is obvious: you can access it later without
reconnecting.  The disadvantages include filling up your local hard disk,
and of course the security risk if anyone ever goes exploring on your
computer.  &trojita;'s default is to store local copies
indefinitely, but here you may choose if you prefer to store up to a
certain number of days, or to not store at all.  Note that the code to
clean the message cache has not yet been implemented, so at present you
should assume the message cache will not be pruned.</para>

<para>The <guilabel>SMTP</guilabel> tab is where you configure sending email.
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Method: choose SMTP for unencrypted
connections, or "secure SMTP" if you prefer (and your
provider accepts) mail sent over SSL.  If you choose
"local sendmail-compatible" &trojita; will simply
pass your mail to the sendmail app running on your local
computer (and if you haven't got one, it will fail).
Choosing this option requires you specify the sendmail
parameters for using your local sendmail.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>SMTP server: the name of the server to
which your mail should be sent.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Port: This parameter should change
automatically depending on what you choose for "Method."
Typically, it's 587 for unencrypted mail, and 465 for mail
sent over SSL.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Sendmail Executable: is only required if
you've chosen "local sendmail-compatible" as your method.  If
so, here you should put whatever command is required for your
message to be sent to your local sendmail app.  The default is
"sendmail -bm -oi" but if your local configuration is
non-standard, you'll have to adjust this parameter
appropriately.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>StartTLS: check this box if your provider
requires a TLS connection to send encrypted mail (this is not
the same as using SSL by choosing "Secure SMTP" as your method
above).</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>SMTP Auth: if you must input a user name and
password in order to send mail, check this box.  In the modern
age, you almost always have to do so, as otherwise spammers
send unwanted messages through the server.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Username: your user name.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Your password.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Save outgoing mail: if you check this box,
&trojita; will save a copy of every mail you send.
This has been the default setting for all email programs for
so long now that few people even know it's possible to not do
so!</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Sent folder name: If you do decide to keep a
local copy of your sent mail, choose in which folder you'd
like to keep it.</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Send with BURL:  The BURL extension is an extension to the IMAP
standard, implemented in 2006, so not all servers
make the service available.  Imagine you have a huge email in
your inbox with an attachment, and you'd like to forward that
message.  The normal way requires your IMAP client to download
that huge message, and then resend it (causing two large
network transfers).  The BURL extension allows you to send
that message without having to download it first.  If your
provider permits BURL, it's worth selecting this option.</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>

</para>
</sect1>


<sect1 id="reading-mail">
<title>Reading Mail with &trojita;</title>

<para>&trojita; presents a three paned interface that should be
anyone who has ever used email before.  On the left side is a list of all
your email folders, probably INBOX and some others.  On the right side
are two panes: the top pane shows the list of all messages in the current
folder, and the bottom pane shows the message selected in the top pane.
&Microsoft; Outlook, &kmail; and many other email clients all use this
same layout.  </para>

<para>Other layouts are available, however.  Under the <guimenu>View</guimenu> menu, simply
select <menuchoice><guimenu>Layout</guimenu> <guimenuitem>Wide</guimenuitem></menuchoice>
to choose instead a three pane layout suitable for
larger, wider screens, where your folders are shown in the left column,
the messages of the selected folder in the center column, and the
contents of the selected message in the right column.</para>

<para>When you select a message, it will be displayed below.  Right click
on the selected message in the top pane if you'd like to delete the
message, save it to disk as a text file, or view all the headers.</para>

<para>To respond to, or forward a message, use the buttons on the
toolbar, as no keystroke shortcuts are currently defined.  Choose
<guibutton>Private Reply</guibutton> to respond only to the sender.  Choose <guibutton>Reply to All</guibutton> if
you'd like to reply to the sender and everyone else on the To: or CC:
lines.  If the message arrived through a properly-configured mailing
list, the <guibutton>Reply to Mailing List</guibutton> option will also be made available.</para>

<note><para>At present, the "Forward message" function has not yet been
included.</para></note>

</sect1>

<sect1 id="composing-mail">
<title>Writing/Composing Mail</title>

<para>To compose a new message, click the icon at the far left of the
toolbar.  A new message window will appear, where you can choose your
recipients, compose your text, and send.  If you get interrupted and need
to save a draft, you can do so by clicking on the little expander menu
next to the send button.  A draft will then be saved in your drafts
folder.</para>
</sect1>

<sect1 id="address-book">
<title>Address Book</title>

<para>At present, &trojita; does not have a graphical addressbook,
though one is actively being developed.  However, in the
meantime, there's a very effective work-around.  Upon start up,
&trojita; reads the address book located in <filename role="directory">~/.abook/</filename>,
which you can create using the console-only program called <application>abook</application>.
 Running <application>abook</application> in a terminal window like &konsole;, you can add,
delete, and edit address book entries.  &trojita; doesn't
manipulate that address book in any way, so for example, it won't
add new entries as you write messages.  But if you've got an
<filename role="extension">.abook</filename> address book, &trojita;
will auto-complete entries using it.</para></sect1>

</chapter>

<chapter id="commands">
<title>Command Reference</title>


<sect1 id="kapp-mainwindow">
<title>The main &trojita; window</title>

<sect2>
<title>The IMAP Menu</title>
<para>
<variablelist>

<varlistentry  id="compose-new">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>IMAP</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Compose Mail...</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Opens a new message for
editing</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>


<varlistentry  id="expunge">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
   <shortcut>
      <keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>E</keycap></keycombo>
    </shortcut>
    <guimenu>IMAP</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Expunge Mailbox</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Removes from the server any message already
marked for deletion in the currently selected
mailbox (folder).</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry  id="network-offline">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>Network Access</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Offline</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>If selected, &trojita;
will not fetch any new data (messages) from your
server and will rather limit itself to the messages
you have previously downloaded.  (It will still let
you compose new messages, however, even though you
won't be able to send them).</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry  id="network-expensive">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>Network Access</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Expensive Connection</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Use this if you're using
&trojita; on a cell-phone or other device
where it's important to reduce network traffic and be
efficient.</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>


<varlistentry  id="network-free">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>Network Access</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Free Access</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Use this if you are on a
desktop computer with unlimited broadband internet
access.  This permits &trojita; to more
aggressively preload data.  That is, instead of just
downloading headers, for example, it will go right
ahead and download a local copy of the messages, too.
 </action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>




</variablelist>
</para>
</sect2>

<sect2>
<title>The View Menu</title>
<para>
<variablelist>

<varlistentry  id="layout">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>View</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Layout</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Choose <guimenuitem>Wide</guimenuitem> for a modern,
three-panel view with the message list in the center
and the message itself on the right.  Choose
<guimenuitem>Compact</guimenuitem> for the traditional three panel view with
the message list on top and the message itself on the
bottom.</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry  id="threads">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>View</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Show Messages in Threads</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Select this option to show
messages grouped into threads (conversations).  This
is useful for mailing lists, for example.  This
depends on your IMAP server supporting one or more
voluntary extensions, as &trojita; would
otherwise have to do more work to properly thread
messages.</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry  id="hide">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>View</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Hide Read Messages</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Choose this option if you
like only new messages to appear in the message list.</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry  id="subscribed">
<term>
  <menuchoice>
    <guimenu>View</guimenu>
    <guimenuitem>Show Only Subscribed Folders</guimenuitem>
  </menuchoice>
</term>
<listitem><para><action>Your mailbox may have more
folders than you actually need to monitor.  Select
this option to limit the folders shown to only those
you've subscribed to.  (This doesn't delete the other
folders, it just prevents them from being shown in
the list of folders).</action></para></listitem>
</varlistentry>





</variablelist>
</para>
</sect2>

</sect1>
</chapter>

<chapter id="credits">

<title>Credits and License</title>

<para>
&trojita;
</para>
<para>
Program copyright 2006-2013 Jan Kundrát <email>jkt@flaska.net</email>
</para>
<para>
Contributors:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Thomas Lübking <email>thomas.luebking@gmail.com</email></para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para>

<para>
Documentation Copyright &copy; 2013 Randall Wood
<email>randall+kde@woodbriceno.net</email>
</para>

<!-- TRANS:CREDIT_FOR_TRANSLATORS -->

&underFDL;
&underGPL;
<para>Under the GPLv2/GPLv3 license and CC-BY-SA</para>

</chapter>

&documentation.index;
</book>

<!--
Local Variables:
mode: xml
sgml-minimize-attributes:nil
sgml-general-insert-case:lower
sgml-indent-step:0
sgml-indent-data:nil
End:

vim:tabstop=2:shiftwidth=2:expandtab
kate: space-indent on; indent-width 2; tab-width 2; indent-mode none;
-->