1 .\"@ nail.1 - S-nail(1) reference manual.
3 .\" Copyright (c) 2012 - 2020 Steffen (Daode) Nurpmeso <steffen@sdaoden.eu>.
4 .\" SPDX-License-Identifier: ISC
6 .\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any
7 .\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
8 .\" copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
10 .\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES
11 .\" WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
12 .\" MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR
13 .\" ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES
14 .\" WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN
15 .\" ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF
16 .\" OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
19 .\"@ S-nail v14.9.22 / 2021-02-24
29 .ds VD \\%~/dead.letter
33 .ds vS /etc/mime.types
40 .ds ID [v15 behaviour may differ]
42 .ds NQ [Only new quoting rules]
45 .ds OU [no v15-compat]
49 .if !d str-Lb-libterminfo \
50 .ds str-Lb-libterminfo Terminal Information Library (libterminfo, \-lterminfo)
59 .Nd send and receive Internet mail
65 .\" Keep in SYNC: ./nail.1:"SYNOPSIS, main()
71 .Op : Ns Fl a Ar attachment Ns \&:
72 .Op : Ns Fl b Ar bcc-addr Ns \&:
73 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """field:\0body""" Ns \&:
74 .Op : Ns Fl c Ar cc-addr Ns \&:
75 .Op Fl M Ar type | Fl m Ar file | Fl q Ar file | Fl t
77 .Oo : Ns Fl S\0 Ns Ar var Ns Oo Ns = Ns Ar value Ns Oc Ns : Ns Oc
79 .Op : Ns Fl T Ar """field:\0addr""" Ns \&:
80 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
81 .Op : Ns Fl Y Ar cmd Ns \&:
83 .Pf : Ar to-addr Ns \&:
84 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
92 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """field:\0body""" Ns \&:
95 .Oo : Ns Fl S\0 Ns Ar var Ns Oo Ns = Ns Ar value Ns Oc Ns : Ns Oc
97 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
98 .Op : Ns Fl Y Ar cmd Ns \&:
99 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
106 .Op : Ns Fl C Ar """field:\0body""" Ns \&:
109 .Op Fl r Ar from-addr
110 .Oo : Ns Fl S\0 Ns Ar var Ns Oo Ns = Ns Ar value Ns Oc Ns : Ns Oc
111 .Op : Ns Fl X Ar cmd Ns \&:
112 .Op : Ns Fl Y Ar cmd Ns \&:
114 .Op Fl Fl \~ Ns : Ns Ar mta-option Ns \&:
120 .Fl V | Fl Fl version
125 .Mx -toc -tree html pdf ps xhtml
128 .\" .Sh DESCRIPTION {{{
131 .Bd -filled -compact -offset indent
133 S-nail (\*(UA) will see major changes in v15.0 (circa 2022).
134 Some backward incompatibilities cannot be avoided.
137 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ,
138 and shell metacharacters will become (more) meaningful.
139 Some commands accept new syntax today via
141 .Pf ( Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
142 Behaviour is flagged \*(IN and \*(OU,
146 .Pf ( Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
147 will choose new behaviour when applicable;
148 giving it a value makes
151 \*(OB flags what will vanish.
155 (with value) will be a default in v14.10.0!
159 \*(UA provides a simple and friendly environment for sending and
161 It is intended to provide the functionality of the POSIX
163 command, but is MIME capable and optionally offers extensions for
164 line editing, S/MIME, SMTP and POP3, among others.
165 \*(UA divides incoming mail into its constituent messages and allows
166 the user to deal with them in any order.
170 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
171 for manipulating messages and sending mail.
172 It provides the user simple editing capabilities to ease the composition
173 of outgoing messages, and increasingly powerful and reliable
174 non-interactive scripting capabilities.
176 .\" .Ss "Options" {{{
179 .Bl -tag -width ".It Fl BaNg"
181 .It Fl \&: Ar spec , Fl Fl resource-files Ns =..
182 Controls loading of (as via
184 .Sx "Resource files" :
186 is parsed case-insensitively, the letter
188 corresponds to the system wide
191 the user's personal file
193 The (original) system wide resource is also compiled-in, accessible via
199 disable usage of resource files.
200 Order matters, default is
202 This option overrides
206 .It Fl A Ar name , Fl Fl account Ns =..
210 after program startup is complete (resource files loaded, only
212 commands are to be executed), and switch to its
214 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
217 If activation fails the program
219 s if used non-interactively, or if any of
226 .It Fl a Ar file Ns Oo Ar =input-charset Ns Oo Ar #output-charset Oc Oc , \
230 For \*(CM opportunities refer to
235 is subject to tilde expansion (see
236 .Sx "Filename transformations"
239 if it is not accessible but contains a
241 character, anything before the last
243 will be used as the filename, anything thereafter as a character set
244 specification, as shown.
246 If only an input character set
247 .Mx -ix "character set specification"
248 is specified, the input side is fixed, and no character set conversion
249 will be applied; an empty or the special string hyphen-minus
254 If an output character set has also been specified the desired
255 conversion is performed immediately, not considering file type and
256 content, except for an empty string or hyphen-minus
258 which select the default conversion algorithm (see
259 .Sx "Character sets" ) :
260 no immediate conversion is performed,
262 and its contents will be MIME-classified
263 .Pf ( Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" , "The mime.types files")
264 first \(em only the latter mode is available unless
270 (\*(OB: \*(UA will always use line-buffered output, to gain
271 line-buffered input even in batch mode enable batch mode via
275 .It Fl b Ar addr , Fl Fl bcc Ns =..
276 \*(SM Send a blind carbon copy to recipient
278 The option may be used multiple times.
280 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
283 .It Fl C Ar """field: body""" , Fl Fl custom-header Ns =..
284 Create a custom header which persists for an entire session.
285 A custom header consists of the field name followed by a colon
287 and the field content body, for example
288 .Ql -C """Blah: Neminem laede; imo omnes, quantum potes, juva""" .
289 Standard header field names cannot be overwritten by custom headers.
290 Runtime adjustable custom headers are available via the variable
295 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
298 are the most flexible and powerful options to manage message headers.
299 This option may be used multiple times.
302 .It Fl c Ar addr , Fl Fl cc Ns =..
305 except it places the argument in the list of carbon copies.
308 .It Fl D , Fl Fl disconnected
314 .It Fl d , Fl Fl debug
315 Enter a debug-only sandbox mode by setting the internal variable
317 the same can be achieved via
318 .Ql Fl S Va \&\&debug
320 .Ql Ic set Va \&\&debug .
325 .It Fl E , Fl Fl discard-empty-messages
329 and thus discard messages with an empty message part body, successfully.
332 .It Fl e , Fl Fl check-and-exit
333 Just check if mail is present (in the system
335 or the one specified via
337 if yes, return an exit status of zero, a non-zero value otherwise.
338 To restrict the set of mails to consider in this evaluation a message
339 specification can be added with the option
341 Quickrun: does not open an interactive session.
345 \*(SM Save the message to send in a file named after the local part of
346 the first recipient's address (instead of in
350 .It Fl f , Fl Fl file
351 Read in the contents of the user's
353 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
355 (or the specified file) for processing;
356 when \*(UA is quit, it writes undeleted messages back to this file
362 argument will undergo some special
363 .Sx "Filename transformations"
368 is not an argument to the flag
370 but is instead taken from the command line after option processing has
374 that starts with a hyphen-minus, prefix with a relative path, as in
375 .Ql ./-hyphenbox.mbox .
378 .It Fl H , Fl Fl header-summary
391 A configurable summary view is available via the option
393 This mode does not honour
395 Quickrun: does not open an interactive session.
398 .It Fl h , Fl Fl help
399 Show a brief usage summary; use
401 for a list long options.
407 to ignore tty interrupt signals.
410 .It Fl L Ar spec , Fl Fl search Ns =..
413 of all messages that match the given
417 found by the same algorithm used by
421 .Sx "Specifying messages"
424 This mode does not honour
429 option has been given in addition no header summary is produced,
430 but \*(UA will instead indicate via its exit status whether
436 note that any verbose output is suppressed in this mode and must instead
437 be enabled explicitly (see
439 Quickrun: does not open an interactive session.
443 \*(SM Will flag standard input with the MIME
445 set to the given known
447 .Pf ( Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" , "The mime.types files" )
448 and use it as the main message body.
449 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
450 .Va message-inject-head
452 .Va message-inject-tail .
458 \*(SM MIME classify the specified
460 and use it as the main message body.
461 \*(ID Using this option will bypass processing of
462 .Va message-inject-head
464 .Va message-inject-tail .
469 .It Fl N , Fl Fl no-header-summary
470 inhibit the initial display of message headers when reading mail or
475 for the internal variable
480 Standard flag that inhibits reading the system wide
485 allows more control over the startup sequence; also see
486 .Sx "Resource files" .
489 .It Fl q Ar file , Fl Fl quote-file Ns =..
490 \*(SM Initialize the message body with the contents of
492 which may be standard input
494 only in non-interactive context.
499 .It Fl R , Fl Fl read-only
504 opened will be in read-only mode.
508 .It Fl r Ar from-addr , Fl Fl from-address Ns =..
509 The RFC 5321 reverse-path used for relaying and delegating messages to
510 its destination(s), for example to report delivery errors, is normally
511 derived from the address which appears in the
513 header (or, if that contains multiple addresses, in
515 A file-based aka local executable
517 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), however, instead uses the local identity of the
521 When this command line option is used the given single addressee
523 will be assigned to the internal variable
525 but in addition the command line option
526 .Fl \&\&f Ar from-addr
527 will be passed to a file-based
529 whenever a message is sent.
532 include a user name the address components will be separated and
533 the name part will be passed to a file-based
537 Even though not a recipient the
543 If an empty string is passed as
545 then the content of the variable
547 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
549 will be evaluated and used for this purpose whenever the file-based
558 command line options are used when contacting a file-based MTA, unless
559 this automatic deduction is enforced by
561 ting the internal variable
562 .Va r-option-implicit .
565 Remarks: many default installations and sites disallow overriding the
566 local user identity like this unless either the MTA has been configured
567 accordingly or the user is member of a group with special privileges.
568 Passing an invalid address will cause an error.
572 .It Fl S Ar var Ns Oo = Ns value Oc , Fl Fl set Ns =..
574 (or, with a prefix string
577 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
580 iable and optionally assign
582 if supported; \*(ID the entire expression is evaluated as if specified
583 within dollar-single-quotes (see
584 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
585 if the internal variable
588 If the operation fails the program will exit if any of
593 Settings established via
595 cannot be changed from within
597 or an account switch initiated by
599 They will become mutable again before commands registered via
604 .It Fl s Ar subject , Fl Fl subject Ns =..
605 \*(SM Specify the subject of the message to be sent.
606 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
607 normalized to space (SP) characters.
610 .It Fl T Ar """field: addr""" , Fl Fl target Ns =..
613 to the list of receivers targeted by
615 for now supported are only
621 Field and body (address) are separated by a colon
623 and optionally blank (space, tabulator) characters.
629 is parsed like a message header address line, as if it would be part of
630 a template message fed in via
632 and the same modifier suffix is supported.
633 This option may be used multiple times.
636 .It Fl t , Fl Fl template
637 \*(SM The text message given (on standard input) is expected to contain,
638 separated from the message body by an empty line, one or multiple
639 plain text message headers.
640 \*(ID Readily prepared MIME mail messages cannot be passed.
641 Headers can span multiple consecutive lines if follow lines start with
642 any amount of whitespace.
643 A line starting with the number sign
645 in the first column is ignored.
646 Message recipients can be given via the message headers
652 modifier enforces treatment as a single addressee, for example
653 .Ql To?single: exa, <m@ple> )
656 they will be added to any recipients specified on the command line,
657 and are likewise subject to
660 If a message subject is specified via
662 then it will be used in favour of one given on the command line.
664 More optional headers are
678 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: ,
679 by default created automatically dependent on message context, will
680 be used if specified (a special address massage will however still occur
682 Any other custom header field (also see
687 is passed through entirely
688 unchanged, and in conjunction with the options
692 it is possible to embed
693 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
698 .It Fl u Ar user , Fl Fl inbox-of Ns =..
701 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
704 appropriate privileges presumed; effectively identical to
705 .Ql Fl \&\&f Ns \0%user .
708 .It Fl V , Fl Fl version
714 will also show the list of
716 .Ql $ \*(uA -:/ -Xversion -Xx .
719 .It Fl v , Fl Fl verbose
721 s the internal variable
723 to enable logging of informational context messages.
724 (Increases level of verbosity when used multiple times.)
729 .It Fl X Ar cmd , Fl Fl startup-cmd Ns =..
730 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
732 to a list of commands to be executed before normal operation starts.
733 The commands will be evaluated as a unit, just as via
741 .It Fl Y Ar cmd , Fl Fl cmd Ns =..
742 Add the given (or multiple for a multiline argument)
744 to a list of commands to be executed after normal operation has started.
745 The commands will be evaluated successively in the given order, and as
746 if given on the program's standard input \(em before interactive
747 prompting begins in interactive mode, after standard input has been
751 .It Fl ~ , Fl Fl enable-cmd-escapes
753 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
754 in \*(CM even in non-interactive use cases.
755 This can for example be used to automatically format the composed
756 message text before sending the message:
757 .Bd -literal -offset indent
758 $ ( echo 'line one. Word. Word2.';\e
759 echo '~| /usr/bin/fmt -tuw66' ) |\e
760 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d~:/ -Sttycharset=utf-8 bob@exam.ple
764 .It Fl # , Fl Fl batch-mode
765 Enables batch mode: standard input is made line buffered, the complete
766 set of (interactive) commands is available, processing of
767 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
771 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
772 are adjusted for batch necessities, exactly as if done via
792 are looked up, and acted upon.
793 The following prepares an email message in a batched dry run:
794 .Bd -literal -offset indent
795 $ for name in bob alice@exam.ple lisa@exam.ple; do
796 printf 'mail %s\en~s ubject\enText\en~.\en' "${name}"
798 LC_ALL=C \*(uA -#:x -Smta=test \e
799 -X'alias bob bob@exam.ple'
803 .It Fl \&. , Fl Fl end-options
804 This flag forces termination of option processing in order to prevent
807 It also forcefully puts \*(UA into send mode, see
808 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
814 allows their recognition all
816 arguments given at the end of the command line after a
818 separator will be passed through to a file-based
820 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) and persist for the entire session.
822 constraints do not apply to the content of
824 Command line receiver address handling supports the
829 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
831 .Bd -literal -offset indent
832 $ \*(uA -#:/ -X 'addrcodec enc Hey, ho <silver@go>' -Xx
836 .\" .Ss "A starter" {{{ review
839 \*(UA is a direct descendant of
841 Mail, itself a successor to the Research
844 .Dq was there from the start
847 It thus represents the user side of the
849 mail system, whereas the system side (Mail-Transfer-Agent, MTA) was
850 traditionally taken by
852 (and most MTAs provide a binary of this name for compatibility reasons).
857 of \*(UA then the system side is not a mandatory precondition for mail
861 \*(UA strives for compliance with the POSIX
866 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
870 .Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT ,
871 needs to be set to adjust behaviour to be almost on par.
872 Almost, because there is one important difference: POSIX
873 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
874 is (\*(ID increasingly) used instead of the
875 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting"
876 that the standard documents, which is believed to be a feature.
877 The builtin as well as the (default) global
880 already bend the standard imposed settings a bit.
889 in order to suppress the automatic moving of messages to the
891 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
893 that would otherwise occur (see
894 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
897 to not remove empty system MBOX mailbox files (or all empty such files in
899 mode) to avoid mangling of file permissions when files eventually get
903 To enter interactive mode even if the initial mailbox is empty
907 to allow editing of headers as well as
909 to not strip down addresses in
913 to include the message that is being responded to when
915 ing, which is indented by an
917 that also deviates from standard imposed settings.
918 .Va mime-counter-evidence
919 is fully enabled, too.
921 .Va followup-to-honour
924 to comply with reply address desires.
927 Credentials and other settings are easily addressable by grouping them via
929 The file mode creation mask can be managed with
931 Files and shell pipe output can be
935 uation, also during startup from within the
936 .Sx "Resource files" .
937 Informational context can be available by
947 .\" .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" {{{
948 .Ss "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode"
950 To send a message to one or more people, using a local or built-in
952 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) transport to actually deliver the generated mail
953 message, \*(UA can be invoked with arguments which are the names of
954 people to whom the mail will be sent, and the command line options
958 can be used to add (blind) carbon copy receivers:
960 .Bd -literal -offset indent
962 $ echo Hello, world | \*(uA -:/ -Smta=test -s test $LOGNAME
964 # Via sendmail(1) MTA
965 $ </dev/null \*(uA -:x -s test $LOGNAME
967 # Debug dry-run mode:
968 $ </dev/null LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ \e
969 -Sttycharset=utf8 -Sfullnames \e
970 -b bcc@exam.ple -c cc@exam.ple -. \e
971 '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' eric@exam.ple
973 # With SMTP (no real sending due to -d debug dry-run)
974 $ LC_ALL=C \*(uA -d -:/ -Sv15-compat -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
975 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=none \e
976 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
977 -a /etc/mail.rc --end-options \e
978 eric@exam.ple < /tmp/letter.txt
982 Email addresses and plain user names are subject to
984 filtering, names only are first expanded through
988 An address in angle brackets consisting only of a valid local user
990 will be converted to a fully qualified address if either
992 is not set, or set to a non-empty value; if set to the empty value the
993 conversion is left up to the
995 .\" When changing any of the following adjust any RECIPIENTADDRSPEC;
996 .\" grep the latter for the complete picture
999 fine-grained control of recipient address types other than user names
1000 and network addresses is possible.
1001 Recipients are classified as follows:
1002 any name that starts with a vertical bar
1004 character specifies a command pipe \(en the command string following the
1006 is executed and the message is sent to its standard input;
1007 likewise, any name that consists only of hyphen-minus
1009 or starts with the character solidus
1011 or the character sequence dot solidus
1013 is treated as a file, regardless of the remaining content.
1014 Any other name which contains a commercial at
1016 character is a network address;
1017 Any other name which starts with a plus sign
1019 character is a mailbox name;
1020 Any other name which contains a solidus
1022 character but no exclamation mark
1026 character before is also a mailbox name;
1027 What remains is treated as a network address.
1028 This classification can be avoided by using a
1031 .Sx "Compose mode" .
1033 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1034 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test ./mbox.mbox
1035 $ echo bla | \*(uA -Sexpandaddr -s test '|cat >> ./mbox.mbox'
1036 $ echo safe | LC_ALL=C \e
1037 \*(uA -:/ -Smta=test -Sv15-compat -Sttycharset=utf8 \e
1038 --set mime-force-sendout --set fullnames \e
1039 -S expandaddr=fail,-all,+addr,failinvaddr -s test \e
1040 --end-options 'Imagine John <cold@turk.ey>'
1044 Before messages are sent they undergo editing in
1045 .Sx "Compose mode" .
1046 But many settings are static and can be set more generally.
1047 The envelope sender address for example is defined by
1049 explicitly defining an originating
1051 may be desirable, especially with the built-in SMTP Mail-Transfer-Agent
1053 .Sx "Character sets"
1054 for outgoing message and MIME part content are configurable via
1056 whereas input data is assumed to be in
1058 Message data will be passed over the wire in a
1060 and MIME parts aka attachments need a
1062 usually taken out of
1063 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
1064 Saving copies of sent messages in a
1066 mailbox may be desirable \(en as for most mailbox
1069 .Sx "Filename transformations"
1073 For the purpose of arranging a complete environment of settings that can
1074 be switched to with a single command or command line option there are
1076 Alternatively a flat configuration could be possible, making use
1077 of so-called variable chains which automatically pick
1081 context-dependent variants some variables support: for example addressing
1082 .Ql Ic Folder Ns \& pop3://yaa@exam.ple
1084 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-yaa@exam.ple ,
1085 .Va \&\&pop3-no-apop-exam.ple
1090 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1092 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" .
1095 To avoid environmental noise scripts should create a script-local
1096 environment, ideally with the command line options
1098 to disable configuration files in conjunction with repetitions of
1100 to specify variables:
1102 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1103 $ env LC_ALL=C \*(uA -:/ \e
1105 -Sttycharset=utf-8 -Smime-force-sendout \e
1106 -Sexpandaddr=fail,-all,failinvaddr \e
1107 -S mta=smtps://mylogin@exam.ple:465 -Ssmtp-auth=login \e
1108 -S from=scriptreply@exam.ple \e
1109 -s 'Subject to go' -a attachment_file \e
1111 'Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>' rec2@exam.ple \e
1116 As shown, scripts can
1118 a locale environment, the above specifies the all-compatible 7-bit clean
1121 but will nonetheless take and send UTF-8 in the message text by using
1123 If character set conversion is compiled in
1127 invalid (according to
1129 character input data would normally cause errors; setting
1130 .Va mime-force-sendout
1131 will instead, as a last resort, classify the input as binary data, and
1132 therefore allow message creation to be successful.
1133 (Such content can then be inspected either by installing a
1134 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1136 .Ql application/octet-stream ,
1137 or possibly automatically through
1138 .Va mime-counter-evidence ) .
1141 In interactive mode, introduced soon, messages can be sent by calling the
1143 command with a list of recipient addresses:
1145 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1146 $ \*(uA -:/ -Squiet -Semptystart -Sfullnames -Smta=test
1147 "/var/spool/mail/user": 0 messages
1148 ? mail "Recipient 1 <rec1@exam.ple>", rec2@exam.ple
1150 ? # Will do the right thing (tm)
1151 ? m rec1@exam.ple rec2@exam.ple
1155 .\" .Ss "Compose mode" {{{
1158 If standard input is a terminal rather than the message to be sent,
1159 the user is expected to type in the message contents.
1160 In compose mode lines beginning with the character
1162 (in fact the value of
1164 are special \(en these are so-called
1165 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
1166 which can be used to read in files, process shell commands, add and edit
1167 attachments and more.
1176 respectively, to revise the message in its current state,
1178 allows editing of the most important message headers, with the potent
1180 custom headers can be created, for example (more specifically than with
1186 gives an overview of most other available command escapes.
1189 To create file-carbon-copies the special recipient header
1191 may be used as often as desired, for example via
1193 Its entire value (or body in standard terms) is interpreted as a
1195 target, after having been subject to
1196 .Sx "Filename transformations" :
1197 this is the only way to create a file-carbon-copy without introducing an
1198 ambiguity regarding the interpretation of the address, file names with
1199 leading vertical bars or commercial ats can be used.
1200 Like all other recipients
1202 is subject to the checks of
1204 Any local file and pipe command addressee honours the setting of
1205 .Va mbox-fcc-and-pcc .
1208 Once finished with editing the command escape
1210 (see there) will call hooks, insert automatic injections and receivers,
1211 leave compose mode and send the message once it is completed.
1212 Aborting letter composition is possible with either of
1216 the latter of which will save the message in the file denoted by
1223 is set the effect of
1225 can also be achieved by typing end-of-transmission (EOT) via
1228 at the beginning of an empty line, and
1230 is always reachable by typing end-of-text (ETX) twice via
1235 The compose mode hooks
1236 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-splice , on-compose-leave
1238 .Va on-compose-cleanup
1241 d macros and provide reliable and increasingly powerful mechanisms to
1242 perform automated message adjustments dependent on message context,
1243 for example addition of message signatures
1244 .Pf ( Va message-inject-head , message-inject-tail )
1245 or creation of additional receiver lists (also by setting
1246 .Va autocc , autobcc ) .
1247 To achieve that the command
1249 may be used in order to query and adjust status of message(s).
1250 The splice hook can also make use of
1251 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
1252 (\*(ID The compose mode hooks work for
1253 .Ic forward , mail , reply
1258 only provide the hooks
1261 .Va on-resend-cleanup ,
1262 which are pretty restricted due to the nature of the operation.)
1265 .\" .Ss "On reading mail, and more on interactive mode" {{{
1266 .Ss "On reading mail, and more on interactive mode"
1268 When invoked without addressees \*(UA enters interactive mode in which
1270 When used like that the user's system
1272 (for more on mailbox types please see the command
1274 is read in and a one line header of each message therein is displayed if
1278 The visual style of this summary of
1280 can be adjusted through the variable
1282 and the possible sorting criterion via
1288 can be performed with the command
1290 If the initially opened mailbox is empty \*(UA will instead exit
1291 immediately (after displaying a message) unless the variable
1300 will give a listing of all available commands and
1302 will \*(OPally give a summary of some common ones.
1303 If the \*(OPal documentation strings are available (see
1307 .Pf "(or " Ql \&?X )
1308 and see the actual expansion of
1310 and what its purpose is, i.e., commands can be abbreviated
1311 (note that POSIX defines some abbreviations, so that the alphabetical
1312 order of commands does not necessarily relate to the abbreviations; it is
1313 however possible to define overwrites with
1314 .Ic commandalias ) .
1315 These commands can also produce a more
1320 Messages are given numbers (starting at 1) which uniquely identify
1321 messages; the current message \(en the
1323 \(en will either be the first new message, or the first unread message,
1324 or the first message of the mailbox; the internal variable
1326 will instead cause usage of the last message for this purpose.
1331 ful of header summaries containing the
1335 will display only the summaries of the given messages, defaulting to the
1339 Message content can be displayed with the command
1346 controls whether and when \*(UA will use the configured
1348 for display instead of directly writing to the user terminal
1350 the sole difference to the command
1352 which will always use the
1356 will instead only show the first
1358 of a message (maybe even compressed if
1361 Message display experience may improve by setting and adjusting
1362 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
1364 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" .
1367 By default the current message
1369 is displayed, but like with many other commands it is possible to give
1370 a fancy message specification (see
1371 .Sx "Specifying messages" ) ,
1374 will display all unread messages,
1379 will type the messages 1 and 5,
1381 will type the messages 1 through 5, and
1385 will display the previous and the next message, respectively.
1388 (a more substantial alias for
1390 will display a header summary of the given message specification list
1391 instead of their content; the following will search for subjects:
1394 .Dl ? from "'@Some subject to search for'"
1397 In the default setup all header fields of a message will be
1399 d, but fields can be white- or blacklisted for a variety of
1400 applications by using the command
1402 e.g., to restrict their display to a very restricted set for
1404 .Ql Ic \:headerpick Cd \:type retain Ar \:from to cc subject .
1405 In order to display all header fields of a message regardless of
1406 currently active ignore or retain lists, use the commands
1411 will show the raw message content.
1412 Note that historically the global
1414 not only adjusts the list of displayed headers, but also sets
1416 (\*(ID A yet somewhat restricted) Reliable scriptable message
1417 inspection is available via
1421 Dependent upon the configuration a line editor (see the section
1422 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
1423 aims at making the user experience with the many
1426 When reading the system
1432 specified a mailbox explicitly prefixed with the special
1434 modifier (to propagate it to a
1436 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ) ,
1437 then messages which have been read
1438 .Pf (see\0 Sx "Message states" )
1439 will be automatically moved to a
1441 .Sx "secondary mailbox" ,
1444 file, when the mailbox is left, either by changing the active mailbox or
1445 by quitting \*(UA \(en this automatic moving from a system- or primary-
1446 to the secondary mailbox is not performed when the variable
1449 Messages can also be explicitly
1451 d to other mailboxes, whereas
1453 keeps the original message.
1455 can be used to write out data content of specific parts of messages.
1458 After examining a message the user can
1460 to the sender and all recipients (which will also be placed in
1463 .Va recipients-in-cc
1466 exclusively to the sender(s).
1467 To comply with with the receivers desired reply address the
1471 .Va followup-to-honour
1474 should usually be set.
1479 know how to apply a special addressee massage, see
1480 .Sx "Mailing lists" .
1481 Dependent on the presence and value of
1483 the message being replied to will be included in a quoted form.
1485 ing a message will allow editing the new message: the original message
1486 will be contained in the message body, adjusted according to
1492 messages: the former will add a series of
1494 headers, whereas the latter will not; different to newly created
1495 messages editing is not possible and no copy will be saved even with
1497 unless the additional variable
1500 When sending, replying or forwarding messages comments and full names
1501 will be stripped from recipient addresses unless the internal variable
1506 Of course messages can be
1508 and they can spring into existence again via
1510 or when the \*(UA session is ended via the
1514 commands to perform a quick program termation.
1515 To end a mail processing session regularly and perform a full program
1516 exit one may issue the command
1518 It will, among others, move read messages to the
1520 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
1522 as necessary, discard deleted messages in the current mailbox,
1523 and update the \*(OPal (see
1527 By the way, whenever the main event loop is about to look out for the
1528 next input line it will trigger the hook
1529 .Va on-main-loop-tick .
1532 .\" .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments" {{{ review
1533 .Ss "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
1535 HTML-only messages become more and more common, and many messages come
1536 bundled with a bouquet of MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
1537 parts and attachments.
1538 To get a notion of MIME types \*(UA has a default set of types built-in,
1539 onto which the content of
1540 .Sx "The mime.types files"
1541 will be added (as configured and allowed by
1542 .Va mimetypes-load-control ) .
1543 Types can also become registered with the command
1545 To improve interaction with the faulty MIME part declarations of real life
1546 .Va mime-counter-evidence
1547 will allow verification of the given assertion, and the possible
1548 provision of an alternative, better MIME type.
1551 Whereas a simple HTML-to-text filter for displaying HTML messages is
1552 \*(OPally supported (indicated by
1553 .Ql ,+filter-html-tagsoup,
1556 MIME types other than plain text cannot be handled directly.
1557 Instead programs need to become registered to deal with specific MIME
1558 types or file extensions, either to prepare (re-)integrable plain text
1559 versions of their input (a mode which is called
1560 .Cd copiousoutput ) ,
1561 or to display the content externally, for example in a graphical window:
1562 the latter type is only considered by and for the command
1566 To install a handler program for a MIME type an according
1567 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
1568 variable needs to be set; to define a handler for a file extension
1570 can be used \(en these handlers take precedence.
1571 \*(OPally mail user agent configuration is supported (see
1572 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ) ,
1573 and will be queried for display or quote handlers after the former ones.
1574 Type-markers registered via
1576 are the last possible source for information how to handle a MIME type.
1579 For example, to display HTML messages integrated via the text browsers
1583 register a MathML MIME type and enable its plain text display, and to
1584 open PDF attachments in an external PDF viewer, asynchronously and with
1585 some other magic attached:
1587 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1588 ? if "$features" !% ,+filter-html-tagsoup,
1589 ? #set pipe-text/html='?* elinks -force-html -dump 1'
1590 ? set pipe-text/html='?* lynx -stdin -dump -force_html'
1591 ? # Display HTML as plain text instead
1592 ? #set pipe-text/html=?t
1594 ? mimetype ?t application/mathml+xml mathml
1595 ? wysh set pipe-application/pdf='?&=? \e
1596 trap "rm -f \e"${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}\e"" EXIT;\e
1597 trap "trap \e"\e" INT QUIT TERM; exit 1" INT QUIT TERM;\e
1598 mupdf "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}"'
1602 .\" .Ss "Mailing lists" {{{
1605 Known or subscribed-to mailing lists may be flagged in the summary of
1610 and will gain special treatment when sending mails: the variable
1611 .Va followup-to-honour
1613 .Ql Mail-\:Followup-\:To:
1614 header is honoured when a message is being replied to
1621 controls creation of this header when creating
1623 s, if the necessary user setup
1624 .Pf ( from , sender ) ;
1625 is available; then, it may also be created automatically, for example
1626 when list-replying via
1634 is used and the messages
1635 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1643 manage \*(UAs notion of which addresses are mailing lists.
1644 With the \*(OPal regular expression support any address
1645 .Mx -ix "magic regular expression characters"
1646 which contains any of the magic regular expression characters
1652 dependent on the host system)
1653 will be compiled and used as one, possibly matching many addresses.
1654 It is not possible to escape the
1656 in order to match special characters as-is, bracket expressions must be
1658 .Ql Ic search Li @subject@'[[]open bracket' .
1660 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1661 ? set followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes \e
1662 reply-to-honour=ask-yes
1663 ? mlist a1@b1.c1 a2@b2.c2 '.*@lists\e.c3$'
1664 ? mlsubscribe a4@b4.c4 exact@lists.c3
1668 Known and subscribed lists differ in that for the latter the
1670 s address is not part of a generated
1671 .Ql Mail-Followup-To: .
1672 There are exceptions, for example if multiple lists are addressed and
1673 not all have the subscription attribute.
1674 When replying to a message its list address
1676 header) is automatically and temporarily treated like a known
1678 dependent on the variable
1682 is used instead (if it is a single address on the same domain as
1684 in order to accept a list administrator's wish that is supposed to have
1685 been manifested like that.
1688 For convenience and compatibility with mail programs that do not honour
1689 the non-standard M-F-T, an automatic user entry in the carbon-copy
1691 address list of generated message can be created by setting
1692 .Va followup-to-add-cc .
1693 This entry will be added whenever the user will be placed in the
1694 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
1695 list, and is not a regular addressee already.
1696 .Va reply-to-swap-in
1697 tries to deal with the address rewriting that many mailing-lists nowadays
1698 perform to work around DKIM / DMARC etc. standard imposed problems.
1701 .\" .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" {{{
1702 .Ss "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
1704 \*(OP S/MIME provides two central mechanisms:
1705 message signing and message encryption.
1706 A signed message contains some data in addition to the regular text.
1707 The data can be used to verify that the message has been sent using
1708 a valid certificate, that the sender address matches that in the
1709 certificate, and that the message text has not been altered.
1710 Signing a message does not change its regular text;
1711 it can be read regardless of whether the recipients software is able to
1713 It is thus usually possible to sign all outgoing messages if so desired.
1716 Encryption, in contrast, makes the message text invisible for all people
1717 except those who have access to the secret decryption key.
1718 To encrypt a message, the specific recipients public encryption key
1720 It is therefore not possible to send encrypted mail to people unless their
1721 key has been retrieved from either previous communication or public key
1723 Because signing is performed with private keys, and encryption with
1724 public keys, messages should always be signed before being encrypted.
1727 A central concept to S/MIME is that of the certification authority (CA).
1728 A CA is a trusted institution that issues certificates.
1729 For each of these certificates it can be verified that it really
1730 originates from the CA, provided that the CA's own certificate is
1732 A set of CA certificates is usually delivered and installed together
1733 with the cryptographical library that is used on the local system.
1734 Therefore reasonable security for S/MIME on the Internet is provided if
1735 the source that provides that library installation is trusted.
1736 It is also possible to use a specific pool of trusted certificates.
1738 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults
1739 should be set to avoid using the default certificate pool, and
1743 should be pointed to a trusted pool of certificates.
1744 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
1745 has been retrieved with.
1748 This trusted pool of certificates is used by the command
1750 to ensure that the given S/MIME messages can be trusted.
1751 If so, verified sender certificates that were embedded in signed
1752 messages can be saved locally with the command
1754 and used by \*(UA to encrypt further communication with these senders:
1756 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1758 ? set smime-encrypt-USER@HOST=FILENAME \e
1759 smime-cipher-USER@HOST=AES256
1763 To sign outgoing messages, in order to allow receivers to verify the
1764 origin of these messages, a personal S/MIME certificate is required.
1765 \*(UA supports password-protected personal certificates (and keys), see
1766 .Va smime-sign-cert .
1768 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1769 gives an overview of the possible sources of user credentials, and
1770 .Sx "S/MIME step by step"
1771 shows examplarily how a private S/MIME certificate can be obtained.
1772 In general, if such a private key plus certificate
1774 is available, all that needs to be done is to set some variables:
1776 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1777 ? set smime-sign-cert=ME@exam.ple.paired \e
1778 smime-sign-digest=SHA512 \e
1779 smime-sign from=myname@my.host
1783 Variables of interest for S/MIME in general are
1786 .Va smime-ca-flags ,
1787 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
1789 .Va smime-crl-file .
1790 For S/MIME signing of interest are
1792 .Va smime-sign-cert ,
1793 .Va smime-sign-include-certs
1795 .Va smime-sign-digest .
1796 Additional variables of interest for S/MIME en- and decryption:
1799 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST .
1800 Variables of secondary interest may be
1801 .Va content-description-smime-message
1803 .Va content-description-smime-signature .
1804 S/MIME is available if
1810 \*(ID Note that neither S/MIME signing nor encryption applies to
1811 message subjects or other header fields yet.
1812 Thus they may not contain sensitive information for encrypted messages,
1813 and cannot be trusted even if the message content has been verified.
1814 When sending signed messages,
1815 it is recommended to repeat any important header information in the
1819 .\" .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup" {{{ review
1820 .Ss "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
1822 For accessing protocol-specific resources Uniform Resource Locators
1823 (URL, RFC 3986) have become omnipresent.
1824 Here they are expected in a
1826 variant, not used in data exchange, but only meant as a compact,
1827 easy-to-use way of defining and representing information in a well-known
1828 notation; as such they do not conform to any real standard.
1829 Optional parts are placed in brackets
1831 optional either because there also exist other ways to define the
1832 information, or because the part is protocol specific.
1834 for example is used by the \*(OPal Maildir
1836 type and the IMAP protocol, but not by POP3.
1841 are included in an URL server specification, URL percent encoded
1842 (RFC 3986) forms are needed, generable with
1846 .Dl PROTOCOL://[USER[:PASSWORD]@]server[:port][/path]
1850 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
1851 exist in multiple versions, called
1853 in this document: the plain
1858 .Ql variable-USER@HOST .
1859 If a port was specified
1867 is never in URL percent encoded form.
1868 For example, whether the hypothetical
1869 .Ql smtp://\:wings\:%3A\:of\:@a.dove
1870 including user and password was used, or whether it was
1872 and it came from a different source, to lookup the chain
1873 .Va tls-config-pairs
1875 .Ql tls-\:config-\:pairs-\:wings:of@a.dove
1877 .Ql tls-\:config-pairs\-\:a.dove ,
1878 before finally looking up the plain variable.
1881 The logic to collect (an
1883 s) credential information is as follows:
1887 A user is always required.
1890 has been given in the URL the variables
1895 Afterwards, when enforced by the \*(OPal variables
1896 .Va netrc-lookup-HOST
1899 .Sx "The .netrc file"
1900 of the user will be searched for a
1902 specific entry which provides a
1904 name: only unambiguous entries are used (one possible matching entry for
1907 If there is still no
1911 known to be a valid user on the current host, is used.
1914 Authentication: unless otherwise noted the chain
1915 .Va PROTOCOL-auth-USER@HOST , PROTOCOL-auth-HOST , PROTOCOL-auth
1916 is checked, falling back to a protocol-specific default as necessary.
1921 has been given in the URL, then if the
1923 has been found through the \*(OPal
1925 that may have also provided the password.
1927 .Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
1930 Thereafter the (now complete) \*(OPal chain
1931 .Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
1932 is checked, if set the
1934 cache is searched for a password only (multiple user accounts for
1935 a single machine may exist as well as a fallback entry without user
1936 but with a password).
1938 If at that point there is still no password available, but the
1939 (protocols') chosen authentication type requires a password, then in
1940 interactive mode the user will be prompted on the terminal.
1945 S/MIME verification works relative to the values found in the
1949 header field(s), which means the values of
1950 .Va smime-sign , smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
1952 .Va smime-sign-digest
1953 will not be looked up using the
1957 chains from above, but instead use the corresponding values from the
1958 message that is being worked on.
1959 If no address matches we assume and use the setting of
1961 In unusual cases multiple and different
1965 combinations may therefore be involved \(en on the other hand those
1966 unusual cases become possible.
1967 The usual case is as short as:
1969 .Bd -literal -offset indent
1970 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@HOST smtp-use-starttls \e
1971 smime-sign smime-sign-cert=+smime.pair \e
1978 contains complete example configurations.
1981 .\" .Ss "Encrypted network communication" {{{ review
1982 .Ss "Encrypted network communication"
1984 \*(OP SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) aka its successor TLS (Transport Layer
1985 Security) are protocols which aid in securing communication by providing
1986 a safely initiated and encrypted network connection.
1987 A central concept of TLS are certificates: as part of each network
1988 connection setup a (set of) certificates will be exchanged through which
1989 the identity of the network peer can be cryptographically verified;
1990 if possible the TLS/SNI (ServerNameIndication) extension will be enabled
1991 to allow servers fine-grained control over the certificates being used.
1992 A locally installed pool of trusted certificates will then be inspected,
1993 and verification will succeed if it contains a(n in)direct signer of the
1994 presented certificate(s).
1997 The local pool of trusted so-called CA (Certification Authority)
1998 certificates is usually delivered with and used along the TLS library.
1999 A custom pool of trusted certificates can be selected by pointing
2001 and/or (with special preparation)
2003 to the desired location; setting
2004 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults
2005 in addition will avoid additional inspection of the default pool.
2006 A certificate cannot be more secure than the method its CA certificate
2007 has been retrieved with.
2008 For inspection or other purposes, the certificate of a server (as seen
2009 when connecting to it) can be fetched with the command
2011 (port can usually be the protocol name, too, and
2013 is taken into account here):
2015 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2016 $ \*(uA -vX 'tls certchain SERVER-URL[:PORT]; x'
2020 A local pool of CA certificates is not strictly necessary, however,
2021 server certificates can also be verified via their fingerprint.
2022 For this a message digest will be calculated and compared against the
2024 .Va tls-fingerprint ,
2025 and verification will succeed if the fingerprint matches.
2026 The message digest (algorithm) can be configured via the variable chain
2027 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest ;
2031 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2032 $ \*(uA -X 'wysh set verbose; tls fingerprint SERVER-URL[:PORT]; x'
2036 It depends on the used protocol whether encrypted communication is
2037 possible, and which configuration steps have to be taken to enable it.
2038 Some protocols, like POP3S, are implicitly encrypted, others, like
2039 POP3, can upgrade a plain text connection if so requested.
2040 For example, to use the
2042 that POP3 offers (a member of) the variable (chain)
2043 .Va pop3-use-starttls
2044 needs to be set, with convenience via
2047 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2048 shortcut encpop1 pop3s://pop1.exam.ple
2050 shortcut encpop2 pop3://pop2.exam.ple
2051 set pop3-use-starttls-pop2.exam.ple
2053 set mta=smtps://smtp.exam.ple:465
2054 set mta=smtp://smtp.exam.ple smtp-use-starttls
2058 Normally that is all there is to do, given that TLS libraries try to
2059 provide safe defaults, plenty of knobs however exist to adjust settings.
2060 For example certificate verification settings can be fine-tuned via
2062 and the TLS configuration basics are accessible via
2063 .Va tls-config-pairs ,
2064 for example to control protocol versions or cipher lists.
2065 In the past hints on how to restrict the set of protocols to highly
2066 secure ones were indicated, but as of the time of this writing the list
2067 of protocols or ciphers may need to become relaxed in order to be able
2068 to connect to some servers; the following example allows connecting to a
2070 that uses OpenSSL 0.9.8za from June 2014 (refer to
2071 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2072 for more on variable chains):
2074 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2075 wysh set tls-config-pairs-lion@exam.ple='MinProtocol=TLSv1.1,\e
2076 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:\e
2077 ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA:\e
2078 DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:@STRENGTH'
2084 should be referred to when creating a custom cipher list.
2085 Variables of interest for TLS in general are
2089 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ,
2090 .Va tls-config-file ,
2091 .Va tls-config-module ,
2092 .Va tls-config-pairs ,
2106 .\" .Ss "Character sets" review {{{
2107 .Ss "Character sets"
2109 \*(OP The user's locale environment is detected by looking at the
2111 environment variable.
2112 The internal variable
2114 will be set to the detected terminal character set accordingly,
2115 and will thus show up in the output of commands like
2119 This character set will be targeted when trying to display data,
2120 and user input data is expected to be in this character set, too.
2123 When creating messages their character input data is classified.
2124 7-bit clean text data and attachments will be classified as
2126 8-bit data will \*(OPally be converted into members of
2128 until a character set conversion succeeds.
2130 is the implied default last member of this list.
2131 If no 8-bit character set is capable to represent input data,
2132 no message will be sent, and its text will optionally be
2136 If that is not acceptable, for example in script environments,
2137 .Va mime-force-sendout
2138 can be set to force sending of non-convertible data as
2139 .Ql application/octet-stream
2140 classified binary content instead: like this receivers still have the
2141 option to inspect message content (for example via
2142 .Va mime-counter-evidence ) .
2143 If the \*(OPal character set conversion is not available
2148 is the only supported character set for non 7-bit clean data, and
2149 it is simply assumed it can be used to exchange 8-bit messages.
2153 may also be given an explicit value to send mail in a completely
2155 locale environment, which can be used to generate and send for
2156 example 8-bit UTF-8 input data in a pure 7-bit US-ASCII
2158 environment (an example of this can be found in the section
2159 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
2160 Doing so does not mean much beside that since several aspects of the
2161 real character set are implied by the locale environment of the system,
2162 which stays unaffected by
2166 Classifying 7-bit clean data as
2168 is a problem if the input character set
2169 .Pf ( Va ttycharset )
2170 is a multibyte character set that is itself 7-bit clean.
2171 For example, the Japanese character set ISO-2022-JP is, but is capable
2172 to encode the rich set of Japanese Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana
2173 characters: in order to notify receivers of this character set the mail
2174 message must be MIME encoded so that the character set ISO-2022-JP can
2175 be advertised, otherwise an invalid email message would result!
2176 To achieve this, the variable
2178 can be set to ISO-2022-JP.
2179 (Today a better approach regarding email is the usage of UTF-8, which
2180 uses 8-bit bytes for non-US-ASCII data.)
2183 When replying to a message and the variable
2184 .Va reply-in-same-charset
2185 is set, the character set of the message being replied to is tried first
2186 as a target character set (still being a subject of
2188 filtering, however).
2189 Another opportunity is
2190 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
2191 to reflect the user's locale environment automatically, it will treat
2193 as an implied member of (an unset)
2197 \*(OP When reading messages, their text data is converted into
2199 as necessary in order to display them on the user's terminal.
2200 Unprintable characters and invalid byte sequences are detected
2201 and replaced by substitution characters.
2202 Character set mappings for source character sets can be established with
2204 which may be handy to work around faulty or incomplete character set
2205 catalogues (one could for example add a missing LATIN1 to ISO-8859-1
2206 mapping), or to enforce treatment of one character set as another one
2207 .Pf ( Dq interpret LATIN1 as CP1252 ) .
2209 .Va charset-unknown-8bit
2210 to deal with another hairy aspect of message interpretation.
2213 In general, if a message saying
2214 .Dq cannot convert from a to b
2215 appears, either some characters are not appropriate for the currently
2216 selected (terminal) character set,
2217 or the needed conversion is not supported by the system.
2218 In the first case, it is necessary to set an appropriate
2220 locale and/or the variable
2222 The best results are usually achieved when running in a UTF-8
2223 locale on a UTF-8 capable terminal, in which case the full Unicode
2224 spectrum of characters is available.
2225 In this setup characters from various countries can be displayed,
2226 while it is still possible to use more simple character sets for sending
2227 to retain maximum compatibility with older mail clients.
2230 On the other hand the POSIX standard defines a locale-independent 7-bit
2231 .Dq portable character set
2232 that should be used when overall portability is an issue, the even more
2233 restricted subset named
2234 .Dq portable filename character set
2235 consists of A-Z, a-z, 0-9, period
2243 .\" .Ss "Message states" {{{
2244 .Ss "Message states"
2246 \*(UA differentiates in between several message states; the current
2247 state will be reflected in the summary of
2254 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2255 dependent on their state is possible.
2256 When operating on the system
2260 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
2261 special actions, like the automatic moving of messages to the
2263 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2265 may be applied when the mailbox is left (also implicitly by program
2266 termination, unless the command
2268 was used) \(en however, because this may be irritating to users which
2271 mail-user-agents, the provided global
2273 template sets the internal
2277 variables in order to suppress this behaviour.
2279 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ql new"
2281 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state.
2282 Such messages are retained even in the
2284 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2287 Message has neither been viewed nor moved to any other state, but the
2288 message was present already when the mailbox has been opened last:
2289 Such messages are retained even in the
2291 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
2294 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2313 will always try to automatically
2319 logical message, and may thus mark multiple messages as read, the
2321 command will do so if the internal variable
2327 command is used, messages that are in a
2329 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2332 state when the mailbox is left will be saved in the
2334 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2336 unless the internal variable
2341 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2347 can be used to access such messages.
2350 The message has been processed by a
2352 command and it will be retained in its current location.
2355 The message has been processed by one of the following commands:
2361 command is used, messages that are in a
2363 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
2366 state when the mailbox is left will be deleted; they will be saved in the
2368 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
2370 when the internal variable
2376 In addition to these message states, flags which otherwise have no
2377 technical meaning in the mail system except allowing special ways of
2378 addressing them when
2379 .Sx "Specifying messages"
2380 can be set on messages.
2381 These flags are saved with messages and are thus persistent, and are
2382 portable between a set of widely used MUAs.
2384 .Bl -hang -width ".It Ic answered"
2386 Mark messages as having been answered.
2388 Mark messages as being a draft.
2390 Mark messages which need special attention.
2394 .\" .Ss "Specifying messages" {{{
2395 .Ss "Specifying messages"
2400 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
2407 can perform actions on a number of messages at once.
2408 Specifying invalid messages, or using illegal syntax, will cause errors
2409 to be reported through the
2410 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
2413 and companions, as well as the command exit status
2419 deletes the messages 1 and 2,
2422 will delete the messages 1 through 5.
2423 In sorted or threaded mode (see the
2427 will delete the messages that are located between (and including)
2428 messages 1 through 5 in the sorted/threaded order, as shown in the
2433 Errors can for example be
2435 when requesting an invalid message,
2437 if no applicable message can be found,
2438 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
2439 for missing informational data (mostly thread-related).
2441 for invalid syntax as well as
2443 for input/output errors can happen.
2444 The following special message names exist:
2447 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ar BaNg"
2449 The current message, the so-called
2453 The message that was previously the current message; needs to be quoted.
2456 The parent message of the current message,
2457 that is the message with the Message-ID given in the
2459 field or the last entry of the
2461 field of the current message.
2464 The previous undeleted message, or the previous deleted message for the
2470 ed mode, the previous such message in the according order.
2473 The next undeleted message, or the next deleted message for the
2479 ed mode, the next such message in the according order.
2482 The first undeleted message,
2483 or the first deleted message for the
2489 ed mode, the first such message in the according order.
2492 The last message; In
2496 ed mode, the last such message in the according order.
2504 mode, selects the message addressed with
2508 is any other message specification,
2509 and all messages from the thread that begins at it.
2510 Otherwise it is identical to
2515 the thread beginning with the current message is selected.
2521 All messages that were included in the
2522 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2523 of the previous command; needs to be quoted.
2524 (A convenient way to read all new messages is to select them via
2526 as below, and then to read them in order with the default command \(em
2528 \(em simply by successively typing
2535 An inclusive range of message numbers.
2536 Selectors that may also be used as endpoints include any of
2541 .Dq any substring matches
2544 header, which will match addresses (too) even if
2546 is set (and POSIX says
2547 .Dq any address as shown in a header summary shall be matchable in this form ) ;
2550 variable is set, only the local part of the address is evaluated
2551 for the comparison, not ignoring case, and the setting of
2553 is completely ignored.
2554 For finer control and match boundaries use the
2558 .It Ar / Ns Ar string
2559 All messages that contain
2561 in the subject field (case ignored according to locale).
2568 the string from the previous specification of that type is used again.
2571 .It Xo Op Ar @ Ns Ar name-list Ns
2574 All messages that contain the given case-insensitive search
2576 ession; If the \*(OPal regular expression support is available
2578 will be interpreted as (an extended) one if any of the
2580 .Sx "magic regular expression characters"
2583 .Ar @ Ns Ar name-list
2584 part is missing the search is restricted to the subject field body,
2587 specifies a comma-separated list of header fields to search, for example
2590 .Dl '@to,from,cc@Someone i ought to know'
2593 In order to search for a string that includes a
2595 (commercial at) character the
2597 is effectively non-optional, but may be given as the empty string.
2598 Also, specifying an empty search
2600 ession will effectively test for existence of the given header fields.
2601 Some special header fields may be abbreviated:
2615 respectively and case-insensitively.
2616 \*(OPally, and just like
2619 will be interpreted as (an extended) regular expression if any of the
2621 .Sx "magic regular expression characters"
2629 can be used to search in (all of) the header(s) of the message, and the
2638 will perform full text searches \(en whereas the former searches only
2639 the body, the latter also searches the message header (\*(ID this mode
2640 yet brute force searches over the entire decoded content of messages,
2641 including administrativa strings).
2644 This specification performs full text comparison, but even with
2645 regular expression support it is almost impossible to write a search
2646 expression that safely matches only a specific address domain.
2647 To request that the body content of the header is treated as a list of
2648 addresses, and to strip those down to the plain email address which the
2649 search expression is to be matched against, prefix the effective
2655 .Dl '@~f,c@@a\e.safe\e.domain\e.match$'
2659 All messages of state or with matching condition
2663 is one or multiple of the following colon modifiers:
2665 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar :M"
2668 messages (cf. the variable
2669 .Va markanswered ) .
2681 Messages with receivers that match
2685 Messages with receivers that match
2692 Old messages (any not in state
2700 \*(OP Messages with unsure spam classification (see
2701 .Sx "Handling spam" ) .
2703 \*(OP Messages classified as spam.
2715 \*(OP IMAP-style SEARCH expressions may also be used.
2716 These consist of keywords and criterions, and because
2717 .Sx "Message list arguments"
2718 are split into tokens according to
2719 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2720 it is necessary to quote the entire IMAP search expression in order to
2721 ensure that it remains a single token.
2722 This addressing mode is available with all types of mailbox
2724 s; \*(UA will perform the search locally as necessary.
2725 Strings must be enclosed by double quotation marks
2727 in their entirety if they contain whitespace or parentheses;
2728 within the quotes, only reverse solidus
2730 is recognized as an escape character.
2731 All string searches are case-insensitive.
2732 When the description indicates that the
2734 representation of an address field is used,
2735 this means that the search string is checked against both a list
2738 .Bd -literal -offset indent
2739 \&'(\*qname\*q \*qsource\*q \*qlocal-part\*q \*qdomain-part\*q)'
2744 and the addresses without real names from the respective header field.
2745 These search expressions can be nested using parentheses, see below for
2749 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
2750 .It Ar ( criterion )
2751 All messages that satisfy the given
2753 .It Ar ( criterion1 criterion2 ... criterionN )
2754 All messages that satisfy all of the given criteria.
2756 .It Ar ( or criterion1 criterion2 )
2757 All messages that satisfy either
2762 To connect more than two criteria using
2764 specifications have to be nested using additional parentheses,
2766 .Ql (or a (or b c)) ,
2770 .Ql ((a or b) and c) .
2773 operation of independent criteria on the lowest nesting level,
2774 it is possible to achieve similar effects by using three separate
2778 .It Ar ( not criterion )
2779 All messages that do not satisfy
2781 .It Ar ( bcc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2782 All messages that contain
2784 in the envelope representation of the
2787 .It Ar ( cc \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2788 All messages that contain
2790 in the envelope representation of the
2793 .It Ar ( from \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2794 All messages that contain
2796 in the envelope representation of the
2799 .It Ar ( subject \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2800 All messages that contain
2805 .It Ar ( to \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2806 All messages that contain
2808 in the envelope representation of the
2811 .It Ar ( header name \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2812 All messages that contain
2817 .It Ar ( body \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2818 All messages that contain
2821 .It Ar ( text \*q Ns Ar string Ns Ar \*q )
2822 All messages that contain
2824 in their header or body.
2825 .It Ar ( larger size )
2826 All messages that are larger than
2829 .It Ar ( smaller size )
2830 All messages that are smaller than
2834 .It Ar ( before date )
2835 All messages that were received before
2837 which must be in the form
2841 denotes the day of the month as one or two digits,
2843 is the name of the month \(en one of
2844 .Ql Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec ,
2847 is the year as four digits, for example
2851 All messages that were received on the specified date.
2852 .It Ar ( since date )
2853 All messages that were received since the specified date.
2854 .It Ar ( sentbefore date )
2855 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2856 .It Ar ( senton date )
2857 All messages that were sent on the specified date.
2858 .It Ar ( sentsince date )
2859 All messages that were sent since the specified date.
2861 The same criterion as for the previous search.
2862 This specification cannot be used as part of another criterion.
2863 If the previous command line contained more than one independent
2864 criterion then the last of those criteria is used.
2868 .\" .Ss "On terminal control and line editor" {{{ review
2869 .Ss "On terminal control and line editor"
2871 \*(OP Terminal control through one of the standard
2880 inal defined in the environment interactive usage aspects, for example
2881 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
2882 and insight of cursor and function keys for the Mailx-Line-Editor
2883 (MLE), will be enhanced or enabled.
2884 Library interaction can be disabled on a per-invocation basis via
2885 .Va termcap-disable ,
2886 whereas the internal variable
2888 is always used as a preferred source of terminal capabilities.
2889 (For a usage example see the
2892 .Sx "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" . )
2895 \*(OP The built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE) should work in all
2896 environments which comply to the ISO C standard
2898 and will support wide glyphs if possible (the necessary functionality
2899 had been removed from ISO C, but was included in
2901 Usage of a line editor in interactive mode can be prevented by setting
2902 .Va line-editor-disable .
2903 Especially if the \*(OPal terminal control support is missing setting
2906 will help shall the MLE misbehave, see there for more.
2907 The MLE can support a little bit of
2913 feature is available then input from line editor prompts will be saved
2914 in a history list that can be searched in and be expanded from.
2915 Such saving can be prevented by prefixing input with any amount of
2917 Aspects of history, like allowed content and maximum size, as well as
2918 whether history shall be saved persistently, can be configured with the
2922 .Va history-gabby-persist
2925 There also exists the macro hook
2926 .Va on-history-addition
2927 which can be used to apply finer control on what enters history.
2930 The MLE supports a set of editing and control commands.
2931 By default (as) many (as possible) of these will be assigned to a set of
2932 single-letter control codes, which should work on any terminal (and can
2933 be generated by holding the
2935 key while pressing the key of desire, for example
2939 command is available then the MLE commands can also be accessed freely
2940 by assigning the command name, which is shown in parenthesis in the list
2941 below, to any desired key-sequence, and the MLE will instead and also use
2943 to establish its built-in key bindings
2944 (more of them if the \*(OPal terminal control is available),
2945 an action which can then be suppressed completely by setting
2946 .Va line-editor-no-defaults .
2947 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
2948 notation is used in the following:
2952 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql \eBa"
2954 Go to the start of the line
2956 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-home ) .
2959 Move the cursor backward one character
2961 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-bwd ) .
2967 .Pf ( Cd mle-raise-int ) .
2970 Forward delete the character under the cursor;
2971 quits \*(UA if used on the empty line unless the internal variable
2975 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-fwd ) .
2978 Go to the end of the line
2980 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-end ) .
2983 Move the cursor forward one character
2985 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-fwd ) .
2988 Cancel current operation, full reset.
2989 If there is an active history search or tabulator expansion then this
2990 command will first reset that, reverting to the former line content;
2991 thus a second reset is needed for a full reset in this case
2993 .Pf ( Cd mle-reset ) .
2996 Backspace: backward delete one character
2998 .Pf ( Cd mle-del-bwd ) .
3002 Horizontal tabulator:
3003 try to expand the word before the cursor, supporting the usual
3004 .Sx "Filename transformations"
3006 .Pf ( Cd mle-complete ;
3008 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip
3010 .Va line-editor-cpl-word-breaks ) .
3014 commit the current line
3016 .Pf ( Cd mle-commit ) .
3019 Cut all characters from the cursor to the end of the line
3021 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-end ) .
3026 .Pf ( Cd mle-repaint ) .
3029 \*(OP Go to the next history entry
3031 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-fwd ) .
3034 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3038 \*(OP Go to the previous history entry
3040 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-bwd ) .
3043 Toggle roundtrip mode shell quotes, where produced,
3046 .Pf ( Cd mle-quote-rndtrip ) .
3047 This setting is temporary, and will be forgotten once the command line
3048 is committed; also see
3052 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) older history entries
3054 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-bwd ) .
3057 \*(OP Complete the current line from (the remaining) newer history entries
3059 .Pf ( Cd mle-hist-srch-fwd ) .
3062 Paste the snarf buffer
3064 .Pf ( Cd mle-paste ) .
3072 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-line ) .
3075 Prompts for a Unicode character (hexadecimal number without prefix, see
3079 .Pf ( Cd mle-prompt-char ) .
3080 Note this command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code
3081 in order to become recognized and executed during input of
3082 a key-sequence (only three single-letter control codes can be used for
3083 that shortcut purpose); this control code is then special-treated and
3084 thus cannot be part of any other sequence (because it will trigger the
3085 .Cd \&\&mle-prompt-char
3086 function immediately).
3089 Cut the characters from the one preceding the cursor to the preceding
3092 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-bwd ) .
3095 Move the cursor forward one word boundary
3097 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-fwd ) .
3100 Move the cursor backward one word boundary
3102 .Pf ( Cd mle-go-word-bwd ) .
3108 .Pf ( Cd mle-raise-tstp ) .
3111 Escape: reset a possibly used multibyte character input state machine
3112 and \*(OPally a lingering, incomplete key binding
3114 .Pf ( Cd mle-cancel ) .
3115 This command needs to be assigned to a single-letter control code in
3116 order to become recognized and executed during input of a key-sequence
3117 (only three single-letter control codes can be used for that shortcut
3119 This control code may also be part of a multi-byte sequence, but if
3120 a sequence is active and the very control code is currently also an
3121 expected input, then the active sequence takes precedence and will
3122 consume the control code.
3125 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3129 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3133 (\*(OPally context-dependent) Invokes the command
3137 Cut the characters from the one after the cursor to the succeeding word
3140 .Pf ( Cd mle-snarf-word-fwd ) .
3149 ring the audible bell.
3154 .Cd mle-clear-screen :
3155 move the cursor home and clear the screen.
3162 this will immediately reset a possibly active search etc.
3166 .Cd mle-go-screen-bwd :
3167 move the cursor backward one screen width.
3171 .Cd mle-go-screen-fwd :
3172 move the cursor forward one screen width.
3182 .\" .Ss "Coloured display" {{{ review
3183 .Ss "Coloured display"
3185 \*(OP Colours and font attributes through ANSI a.k.a. ISO 6429 SGR
3186 (select graphic rendition) escape sequences are optionally supported.
3187 Usage of colours and font attributes solely depends upon the
3188 capability of the detected terminal type
3190 and as fine-tuned through
3192 Colours and font attributes can be managed with the multiplexer command
3196 removes the given mappings.
3199 suppresses usage of colour and font attribute sequences, while leaving
3200 established mappings unchanged.
3203 Whether actually applicable colour and font attribute sequences should
3204 also be generated when output is going to be paged through the external
3208 ) depends upon the setting of
3210 because pagers usually need to be configured in order to support ISO
3212 Knowledge of some widely used pagers is however built-in, and in a clean
3213 environment it is often enough to simply set
3215 please refer to that variable for more on this topic.
3218 It might make sense to conditionalize colour setup on interactive mode via
3224 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3225 if terminal && "$features" =% ,+colour,
3226 colour iso view-msginfo ft=bold,fg=green
3227 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=red (from|subject) # regex
3228 colour iso view-header fg=red
3230 uncolour iso view-header from,subject
3231 colour iso view-header ft=bold,fg=magenta,bg=cyan
3232 colour 256 view-header ft=bold,fg=208,bg=230 "subject,from"
3233 colour mono view-header ft=bold
3234 colour mono view-header ft=bold,ft=reverse subject,from
3239 .\" .Ss "Handling spam" {{{
3242 \*(OP \*(UA can make use of several spam interfaces for the purpose of
3243 identification of, and, in general, dealing with spam messages.
3244 A precondition of most commands in order to function is that the
3246 variable is set to one of the supported interfaces.
3247 .Sx "Specifying messages"
3248 that have been identified as spam is possible via their (volatile)
3254 specifications, and their
3256 entries will be used when displaying the
3264 rates the given messages and sets their
3267 If the spam interface offers spam scores these can be shown in
3276 will interact with the Bayesian filter of the chosen interface and learn
3277 the given messages as
3281 respectively; the last command can be used to cause
3283 of messages; it adheres to their current
3285 state and thus reverts previous teachings.
3290 will simply set and clear, respectively, the mentioned volatile
3292 message flag, without any interface interaction.
3301 requires a running instance of the
3303 server in order to function, started with the option
3305 shall Bayesian filter learning be possible.
3307 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3308 $ spamd -i localhost:2142 -i /tmp/.spamsock -d [-L] [-l]
3309 $ spamd --listen=localhost:2142 --listen=/tmp/.spamsock \e
3310 --daemonize [--local] [--allow-tell]
3314 Thereafter \*(UA can make use of these interfaces:
3316 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3317 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3318 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3319 -Sspamc-arguments="-U /tmp/.spamsock" -Sspamc-user=
3321 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=spamc -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3322 -Sspamc-command=/usr/local/bin/spamc \e
3323 -Sspamc-arguments="-d localhost -p 2142" -Sspamc-user=
3327 Using the generic filter approach allows usage of programs like
3329 Here is an example, requiring it to be accessible via
3332 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3333 $ \*(uA -Sspam-interface=filter -Sspam-maxsize=500000 \e
3334 -Sspamfilter-ham="bogofilter -n" \e
3335 -Sspamfilter-noham="bogofilter -N" \e
3336 -Sspamfilter-nospam="bogofilter -S" \e
3337 -Sspamfilter-rate="bogofilter -TTu 2>/dev/null" \e
3338 -Sspamfilter-spam="bogofilter -s" \e
3339 -Sspamfilter-rate-scanscore="1;^(.+)$"
3343 Because messages must exist on local storage in order to be scored (or
3344 used for Bayesian filter training), it is possibly a good idea to
3345 perform the local spam check last.
3346 Spam can be checked automatically when opening specific folders by
3347 setting a specialized form of the internal variable
3350 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3351 define spamdelhook {
3353 spamset (header x-dcc-brand-metrics "bulk")
3354 # Server-side spamassassin(1)
3355 spamset (header x-spam-flag "YES")
3356 del :s # TODO we HAVE to be able to do `spamrate :u ! :sS'
3362 set folder-hook-SOMEFOLDER=spamdelhook
3366 See also the documentation for the variables
3367 .Va spam-interface , spam-maxsize ,
3368 .Va spamc-command , spamc-arguments , spamc-user ,
3369 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
3372 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore .
3375 .\" }}} (DESCRIPTION)
3378 .\" .Sh COMMANDS {{{
3381 \*(UA reads input in lines.
3382 An unquoted reverse solidus
3384 at the end of a command line
3386 the newline character: it is discarded and the next line of input is
3387 used as a follow-up line, with all leading whitespace removed;
3388 once an entire line is completed, the whitespace characters
3389 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3390 as well as those defined by the variable
3392 are removed from the beginning and end.
3393 Placing any whitespace characters at the beginning of a line will
3394 prevent a possible addition of the command line to the \*(OPal
3398 The beginning of such input lines is then scanned for the name of
3399 a known command: command names may be abbreviated, in which case the
3400 first command that matches the given prefix will be used.
3401 .Sx "Command modifiers"
3402 may prefix a command in order to modify its behaviour.
3403 A name may also be a
3405 which will become expanded until no more expansion is possible.
3406 Once the command that shall be executed is known, the remains of the
3407 input line will be interpreted according to command-specific rules,
3408 documented in the following.
3411 This behaviour is different to the
3413 ell, which is a programming language with syntactic elements of clearly
3414 defined semantics, and therefore capable to sequentially expand and
3415 evaluate individual elements of a line.
3416 .Ql \&? set one=value two=$one
3417 for example will never possibly assign value to one, because the
3418 variable assignment is performed no sooner but by the command
3420 long after the expansion happened.
3423 A list of all commands in lookup order is dumped by the command
3425 \*(OPally the command
3429 when given an argument, will show a documentation string for the
3430 command matching the expanded argument, as in
3432 which should be a shorthand of
3434 with these documentation strings both commands support a more
3436 listing mode which includes the argument type of the command and other
3437 information which applies; a handy suggestion might thus be:
3439 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3441 # Before v15: need to enable sh(1)ell-style on _entire_ line!
3442 localopts yes;wysh set verbose;ignerr eval "${@}";return ${?}
3444 ? commandalias xv '\ecall __xv'
3448 .\" .Ss "Command modifiers" {{{
3449 .Ss "Command modifiers"
3451 Commands may be prefixed by none to multiple command modifiers.
3452 Some command modifiers can be used with a restricted set of commands
3457 will (\*(OPally) show which modifiers apply.
3461 The modifier reverse solidus
3464 to be placed first, prevents
3466 expansions on the remains of the line, for example
3468 will always evaluate the command
3470 even if an (command)alias of the same name exists.
3472 content may itself contain further command modifiers, including
3473 an initial reverse solidus to prevent further expansions.
3479 indicates that any error generated by the following command should be
3480 ignored by the state machine and not cause a program exit with enabled
3482 or for the standardized exit cases in
3487 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3488 will be set to the real exit status of the command regardless.
3493 will alter the called command to apply changes only temporarily,
3494 local to block-scope, and can thus only be used inside of a
3499 Specifying it implies the modifier
3501 Local variables will not be inherited by macros deeper in the
3503 chain, and all local settings will be garbage collected once the local
3505 To record and unroll changes in the global scope use the command
3511 does yet not implement any functionality.
3516 does yet not implement any functionality.
3519 Some commands support the
3522 modifier: if used, they expect the name of a variable, which can itself
3523 be a variable, i.e., shell expansion is applied, as their first
3524 argument, and will place their computation result in it instead of the
3525 default location (it is usually written to standard output).
3527 The given name will be tested for being a valid
3529 variable name, and may therefore only consist of upper- and lowercase
3530 characters, digits, and the underscore; the hyphen-minus may be used as
3531 a non-portable extension; digits may not be used as first, hyphen-minus
3532 may not be used as last characters.
3533 In addition the name may either not be one of the known
3534 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
3535 or must otherwise refer to a writable (non-boolean) value variable.
3536 The actual put operation may fail nonetheless, for example if the
3537 variable expects a number argument only a number will be accepted.
3538 Any error during these operations causes the command as such to fail,
3539 and the error number
3542 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTSUP ,
3547 but some commands deviate from the latter, which is documented.
3550 Last, but not least, the modifier
3553 can be used for some old and established commands to choose the new
3554 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3555 rules over the traditional
3556 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting" .
3557 This modifier is implied if
3559 is set to a non-empty value.
3563 .\" .Ss "Old-style argument quoting" v15-compat: rename Obsolete.. {{{
3564 .Ss "Old-style argument quoting"
3566 \*(ID This section documents the traditional and POSIX standardized
3567 style of quoting non-message list arguments to commands which expect
3568 this type of arguments: whereas still used by the majority of such
3570 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
3571 may be available even for those via
3574 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
3575 Nonetheless care must be taken, because only new commands have been
3576 designed with all the capabilities of the new quoting rules in mind,
3577 which can, for example generate control characters.
3580 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3582 An argument can be enclosed between paired double-quotes
3587 any whitespace, shell word expansion, or reverse solidus characters
3588 (except as described next) within the quotes are treated literally as
3589 part of the argument.
3590 A double-quote will be treated literally within single-quotes and vice
3592 Inside such a quoted string the actually used quote character can be
3593 used nonetheless by escaping it with a reverse solidus
3599 An argument that is not enclosed in quotes, as above, can usually still
3600 contain space characters if those spaces are reverse solidus escaped, as in
3604 A reverse solidus outside of the enclosing quotes is discarded
3605 and the following character is treated literally as part of the argument.
3609 .\" .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting" {{{
3610 .Ss "Shell-style argument quoting"
3613 ell-style, and therefore POSIX standardized, argument parsing and
3614 quoting rules are used by most commands.
3615 \*(ID Most new commands only support these new rules and are flagged
3616 \*(NQ, some elder ones can use them with the command modifier
3618 in the future only this type of argument quoting will remain.
3621 A command line is parsed from left to right and an input token is
3622 completed whenever an unquoted, otherwise ignored, metacharacter is seen.
3623 Metacharacters are vertical bar
3629 as well as all characters from the variable
3632 .Cm space , tabulator , newline .
3633 The additional metacharacters left and right parenthesis
3635 and less-than and greater-than signs
3639 supports are not used, and are treated as ordinary characters: for one
3640 these characters are a vivid part of email addresses, and it seems
3641 highly unlikely that their function will become meaningful to \*(UA.
3643 .Bd -filled -offset indent
3644 .Sy Compatibility note:
3645 \*(ID Please note that even many new-style commands do not yet honour
3647 to parse their arguments: whereas the
3649 ell is a language with syntactic elements of clearly defined semantics,
3650 \*(UA parses entire input lines and decides on a per-command base what
3651 to do with the rest of the line.
3652 This also means that whenever an unknown command is seen all that \*(UA
3653 can do is cancellation of the processing of the remains of the line.
3655 It also often depends on an actual subcommand of a multiplexer command
3656 how the rest of the line should be treated, and until v15 we are not
3657 capable to perform this deep inspection of arguments.
3658 Nonetheless, at least the following commands which work with positional
3659 parameters fully support
3661 for an almost shell-compatible field splitting:
3662 .Ic call , call_if , read , vpospar , xcall .
3666 Any unquoted number sign
3668 at the beginning of a new token starts a comment that extends to the end
3669 of the line, and therefore ends argument processing.
3670 An unquoted dollar sign
3672 will cause variable expansion of the given name, which must be a valid
3674 ell-style variable name (see
3676 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
3679 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism, brace
3680 enclosing the name is supported (i.e., to subdivide a token).
3683 Whereas the metacharacters
3684 .Cm space , tabulator , newline
3685 only complete an input token, vertical bar
3691 also act as control operators and perform control functions.
3692 For now supported is semicolon
3694 which terminates a single command, therefore sequencing the command line
3695 and making the remainder of the line a subject to reevaluation.
3696 With sequencing, multiple command argument types and quoting rules may
3697 therefore apply to a single line, which can become problematic before
3698 v15: e.g., the first of the following will cause surprising results.
3701 .Dl ? echo one; set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3702 .Dl ? echo one; wysh set verbose; echo verbose=$verbose.
3705 Quoting is a mechanism that will remove the special meaning of
3706 metacharacters and reserved words, and will prevent expansion.
3707 There are four quoting mechanisms: the escape character, single-quotes,
3708 double-quotes and dollar-single-quotes:
3711 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3713 The literal value of any character can be preserved by preceding it
3714 with the escape character reverse solidus
3718 Arguments which are enclosed in
3719 .Ql 'single-\:quotes'
3720 retain their literal value.
3721 A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.
3724 The literal value of all characters enclosed in
3725 .Ql \(dqdouble-\:quotes\(dq
3726 is retained, with the exception of dollar sign
3728 which will cause variable expansion, as above, backquote (grave accent)
3730 (which not yet means anything special), reverse solidus
3732 which will escape any of the characters dollar sign
3734 (to prevent variable expansion), backquote (grave accent)
3738 (to prevent ending the quote) and reverse solidus
3740 (to prevent escaping, i.e., to embed a reverse solidus character as-is),
3741 but has no special meaning otherwise.
3744 Arguments enclosed in
3745 .Ql $'dollar-\:single-\:quotes'
3746 extend normal single quotes in that reverse solidus escape sequences are
3747 expanded as follows:
3749 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".Ql \eNNN"
3751 bell control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BEL).
3753 backspace control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 BS).
3755 escape control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 ESC).
3759 form feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 FF).
3761 line feed control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 LF).
3763 carriage return control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 CR).
3765 horizontal tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 HT).
3767 vertical tabulator control character (ASCII and ISO-10646 VT).
3769 emits a reverse solidus character.
3773 double quote (escaping is optional).
3775 eight-bit byte with the octal value
3777 (one to three octal digits), optionally prefixed by an additional
3779 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3781 eight-bit byte with the hexadecimal value
3783 (one or two hexadecimal characters, no prefix, see
3785 A 0 byte will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3787 the Unicode / ISO-10646 character with the hexadecimal codepoint value
3789 (one to eight hexadecimal characters) \(em note that Unicode defines the
3790 maximum codepoint ever to be supported as
3795 This escape is only supported in locales that support Unicode (see
3796 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
3797 in other cases the sequence will remain unexpanded unless the given code
3798 point is ASCII compatible or (if the \*(OPal character set conversion is
3799 available) can be represented in the current locale.
3800 The character NUL will suppress further output for the quoted argument.
3804 except it takes only one to four hexadecimal characters.
3806 Emits the non-printable (ASCII and compatible) C0 control codes
3807 0 (NUL) to 31 (US), and 127 (DEL).
3808 Printable representations of ASCII control codes can be created by
3809 mapping them to a different, visible part of the ASCII character set.
3810 Adding the number 64 achieves this for the codes 0 to 31, here 7 (BEL):
3811 .Ql 7 + 64 = 71 = G .
3812 The real operation is a bitwise logical XOR with 64 (bit 7 set, see
3814 thus also covering code 127 (DEL), which is mapped to 63 (question mark):
3815 .Ql \&?\0vexpr\0^\0127\064 .
3817 Whereas historically circumflex notation has often been used for
3818 visualization purposes of control codes, as in
3820 the reverse solidus notation has been standardized:
3822 Some control codes also have standardized (ISO-10646, ISO C) aliases,
3828 whenever such an alias exists it will be used for display purposes.
3829 The control code NUL
3831 a non-standard extension) will suppress further output for the remains
3832 of the token (which may extend beyond the current quote), or, depending
3833 on the context, the remains of all arguments for the current command.
3835 Non-standard extension: expand the given variable name, as above.
3836 Brace enclosing the name is supported.
3838 Not yet supported, just to raise awareness: Non-standard extension.
3845 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3846 ? echo 'Quotes '${HOME}' and 'tokens" differ!"# no comment
3847 ? echo Quotes ${HOME} and tokens differ! # comment
3848 ? echo Don"'"t you worry$'\ex21' The sun shines on us. $'\eu263A'
3852 .\" .Ss "Message list arguments" {{{
3853 .Ss "Message list arguments"
3855 Many commands operate on message list specifications, as documented in
3856 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
3857 The argument input is first split into individual tokens via
3858 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ,
3859 which are then interpreted as the mentioned specifications.
3860 If no explicit message list has been specified, many commands will
3861 search for and use the next message forward that satisfies the commands'
3862 requirements, and if there are no messages forward of the current
3863 message, the search proceeds backwards;
3864 if there are no good messages at all to be found, an error message is
3865 shown and the command is aborted.
3868 output of the command
3870 will indicate whether a command searches for a default message, or not.
3873 .\" .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands" {{{
3874 .Ss "Raw data arguments for codec commands"
3876 A special set of commands, which all have the string
3882 take raw string data as input, which means that the content of the
3883 command input line is passed completely unexpanded and otherwise
3884 unchanged: like this the effect of the actual codec is visible without
3885 any noise of possible shell quoting rules etc., i.e., the user can input
3886 one-to-one the desired or questionable data.
3887 To gain a level of expansion, the entire command line can be
3889 uated first, for example
3891 .Bd -literal -offset indent
3892 ? vput shcodec res encode /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3894 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3896 $'/usr/Sch\eu00F6nes Wetter/heute.txt'
3897 ? eval shcodec d $res
3898 /usr/Sch\[:o]nes Wetter/heute.txt
3902 .\" .Ss "Filename transformations" {{{
3903 .Ss "Filename transformations"
3905 Filenames, where expected, and unless documented otherwise, are
3906 subsequently subject to the following filename transformations, in
3909 .Bl -bullet -offset indent
3911 If the given name is a registered
3913 it will be replaced with the expanded shortcut.
3914 This step is mostly taken for
3919 The filename is matched against the following patterns or strings.
3923 expansion this step is mostly taken for
3929 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".Ar %user"
3931 (Number sign) is expanded to the previous file.
3934 (Percent sign) is replaced by the invoking
3935 .Mx -ix "primary system mailbox"
3936 user's primary system mailbox, which either is the (itself expandable)
3938 if that is set, the standardized absolute pathname indicated by
3940 if that is set, or a built-in compile-time default otherwise.
3943 the used name is actively checked for being a primary mailbox, first
3950 Expands to the primary system mailbox of
3952 (and never the value of
3954 regardless of its actual setting).
3957 (Ampersand) is replaced with the invoking user's
3958 .Mx -ix "secondary mailbox"
3959 secondary mailbox, the
3967 directory (if that variable is set).
3970 Expands to the same value as
3972 but has special meaning when used with, for example, the command
3974 the file will be treated as a primary system mailbox by, among others, the
3978 commands, meaning that messages that have been read in the current
3979 session will be moved to the
3981 mailbox instead of simply being flagged as read.
3986 Meta expansions may be applied to the resulting filename, as allowed by
3987 the operation and applicable to the resulting access protocol (also see
3988 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
3989 For the file-protocol, a leading tilde
3991 character will be replaced by the expansion of
3993 except when followed by a valid user name, in which case the home
3994 directory of the given user is used instead.
3996 A shell expansion as if specified in double-quotes (see
3997 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
3998 may be applied, so that any occurrence of
4002 will be replaced by the expansion of the variable, if possible;
4003 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
4006 (shell) variables can be accessed through this mechanism.
4008 Shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
4010 may be applied as documented.
4011 If the fully expanded filename results in multiple pathnames and the
4012 command is expecting only one file, an error results.
4014 In interactive context, in order to allow simple value acceptance (via
4016 arguments will usually be displayed in a properly quoted form, so a file
4017 .Ql diet\e is \ecurd.txt
4019 .Ql 'diet\e is \ecurd.txt' .
4023 .\" .Ss "Commands" {{{
4026 The following commands are available:
4028 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
4035 command which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the
4036 previously executed command if the internal variable
4039 This command supports
4042 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
4043 and manages the error number
4045 A 0 or positive exit status
4047 reflects the exit status of the command, negative ones that
4048 an error happened before the command was executed, or that the program
4049 did not exit cleanly, but maybe due to a signal: the error number is
4050 .Va ^ERR Ns -CHILD ,
4054 In conjunction with the
4056 modifier the following special cases exist:
4057 a negative exit status occurs if the collected data could not be stored
4058 in the given variable, which is a
4060 error that should otherwise not occur.
4061 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED
4062 indicates that no temporary file could be created to collect the command
4063 output at first glance.
4064 In case of catchable out-of-memory situations
4066 will occur and \*(UA will try to store the empty string, just like with
4067 all other detected error conditions.
4072 The comment-command causes the entire line to be ignored.
4074 this really is a normal command which' purpose is to discard its
4077 indicating special character, which means that for example trailing
4078 comments on a line are not possible (except for commands which use
4079 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
4083 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it
4089 Display the preceding message, or the n'th previous message if given
4090 a numeric argument n.
4094 Shows the message number of the current message (the
4096 when used without arguments, that of the given list otherwise.
4097 Output numbers will be separated from each other with the first
4100 and followed by the first character of
4102 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
4103 If that results in no separation at all a
4106 This command supports
4109 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
4110 and manages the error number
4115 \*(OP Show a brief summary of commands.
4116 \*(OP Given an argument a synopsis for the command in question is
4117 shown instead; commands can be abbreviated in general and this command
4118 can be used to see the full expansion of an abbreviation including the
4119 synopsis, try, for example
4124 and see how the output changes.
4125 To avoid that aliases are resolved the modifier
4127 can be prepended to the argument, but note it must be quoted.
4128 This mode also supports a more
4130 output, which will provide the information documented for
4141 .It Ic account , unaccount
4142 (ac, una) Creates, selects or lists (an) account(s).
4143 Accounts are special incarnations of
4145 macros and group commands and variable settings which together usually
4146 arrange the environment for the purpose of creating an email account.
4147 Different to normal macros settings which are covered by
4149 \(en here by default enabled! \(en will not be reverted before the
4154 (case-insensitive) always exists, and all but it can be deleted by the
4155 latter command, and in one operation with the special name
4157 Also for all but it a possibly set
4158 .Va on-account-cleanup
4159 hook is called once they are left, also for program exit.
4161 Without arguments a listing of all defined accounts is shown.
4162 With one argument the given account is activated: the system
4164 of that account will be activated (as via
4166 a possibly installed
4168 will be run, and the internal variable
4171 The two argument form behaves identical to defining a macro as via
4173 Important settings for accounts include
4174 .Va folder , from , hostname , inbox , mta , password
4177 .Pf ( Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) ,
4178 as well as things like
4179 .Va tls-config-pairs
4180 .Pf ( Sx "Encrypted network communication" ) ,
4181 and protocol specifics like
4182 .Va imap-auth , pop3-auth , smtp-auth .
4183 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4185 set folder=~/mail inbox=+syste.mbox record=+sent.mbox
4186 set from='(My Name) myname@myisp.example'
4187 set mta=smtp://mylogin@smtp.myisp.example
4194 Perform email address codec transformations on raw-data argument, rather
4195 according to email standards (RFC 5322; \*(ID will furtherly improve).
4199 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
4200 and manages the error number
4202 The first argument must be either
4203 .Ar [+[+[+]]]e[ncode] ,
4208 and specifies the operation to perform on the rest of the line.
4211 Decoding will show how a standard-compliant MUA will display the given
4212 argument, which should be an email address.
4213 Please be aware that most MUAs have difficulties with the address
4214 standards, and vary wildly when (comments) in parenthesis,
4216 strings, or quoted-pairs, as below, become involved.
4217 \*(ID \*(UA currently does not perform decoding when displaying addresses.
4220 Skinning is identical to decoding but only outputs the plain address,
4221 without any string, comment etc. components.
4222 Another difference is that it may fail with the error number
4226 if decoding fails to find a(n) (valid) email address, in which case the
4227 unmodified input will be output again.
4231 first performs a skin operation, and thereafter checks a valid
4232 address for whether it is a registered mailing list (see
4236 eventually reporting that state in the error number
4239 .Va ^ERR Ns -EXIST .
4240 (This state could later become overwritten by an I/O error, though.)
4243 Encoding supports four different modes, lesser automated versions can be
4244 chosen by prefixing one, two or three plus signs: the standard imposes
4245 a special meaning on some characters, which thus have to be transformed
4246 to so-called quoted-pairs by pairing them with a reverse solidus
4248 in order to remove the special meaning; this might change interpretation
4249 of the entire argument from what has been desired, however!
4250 Specify one plus sign to remark that parenthesis shall be left alone,
4251 two for not turning double quotation marks into quoted-pairs, and three
4252 for also leaving any user-specified reverse solidus alone.
4253 The result will always be valid, if a successful exit status is reported
4254 (\*(ID the current parser fails this assertion for some constructs).
4255 \*(ID Addresses need to be specified in between angle brackets
4258 if the construct becomes more difficult, otherwise the current parser
4259 will fail; it is not smart enough to guess right.
4261 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4262 ? addrc enc "Hey, you",<diet@exam.ple>\e out\e there
4263 "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4264 ? addrc d "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4265 "Hey, you", \e out\e there <diet@exam.ple>
4266 ? addrc s "\e"Hey, you\e", \e\e out\e\e there" <diet@exam.ple>
4273 .It Ic alias , unalias
4274 \*(NQ(a, una) Define or list, and remove, respectively, address aliases,
4275 which are a method of creating personal distribution lists that map
4276 a single name to none to multiple receivers, to be expanded after
4278 is left; the expansion correlates with
4280 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name asterisk
4282 will remove all existing aliases.
4283 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4284 known aliases, with one argument only the target(s) of the given one.
4285 When given two arguments, hyphen-minus
4287 being the first, the target(s) of the second is/are expanded recursively.
4290 In all other cases the given alias is newly defined, or will be appended
4291 to: arguments must either be themselves valid alias names, or any
4292 other address type (see
4293 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ) .
4294 Recursive expansion of aliases can be prevented by prefixing the desired
4295 argument with the modifier reverse solidus
4297 A valid alias name conforms to
4299 syntax, but follow-up characters can also be the number sign
4310 .Dq any character that has the high bit set .
4313 may be the last character.
4317 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
4320 .\" ALIASCOLON next sentence
4321 \*(ID Unfortunately the colon is currently not supported, as it
4322 interferes with normal address parsing rules.
4323 .\" ALIASCOLON next sentence
4324 \*(ID Such high bit characters will likely cause warnings at the moment
4325 for the same reasons why colon is unsupported; also, in the future
4326 locale dependent character set validity checks will be performed.
4328 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4329 ? alias cohorts bill jkf mark kridle@ucbcory ~/cohorts.mbox
4330 ? alias mark mark@exam.ple
4331 ? set mta-aliases=/etc/aliases
4337 .It Ic alternates , unalternates
4338 \*(NQ (alt) Manage a list of alternate addresses or names of the active
4339 user, members of which will be removed from recipient lists (except one).
4340 There is a set of implicit alternates which is formed of the values of
4350 The latter command removes the given list of alternates, the special name
4352 will discard all existing alternate names.
4354 The former command manages the error number
4356 It shows the current set of alternates when used without arguments; in
4357 this mode only it also supports
4360 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
4361 Otherwise the given arguments (after being checked for validity) are
4362 appended to the list of alternate names; in
4364 mode they replace that list instead.
4368 .It Ic answered , unanswered
4369 Take a message lists and mark each message as (not) having been answered.
4370 Messages will be marked answered when being
4372 to automatically if the
4376 .Sx "Message states" .
4381 .It Ic bind , unbind
4382 \*(OP\*(NQ The bind command extends the MLE (see
4383 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4384 with freely configurable key bindings.
4385 The latter command removes from the given context the given key binding,
4386 both of which may be specified as a wildcard
4390 will remove all bindings of all contexts.
4391 Due to initialization order unbinding will not work for built-in key
4392 bindings upon program startup, however: please use
4393 .Va line-editor-no-defaults
4394 for this purpose instead.
4397 With zero arguments, or with a context name the former command shows
4398 all key bindings (of the given context; an asterisk
4400 will iterate over all contexts); a more verbose listing will be
4401 produced if either of
4406 With two or more arguments a specific binding is shown, or
4407 (re)established: the first argument is the context to which the binding
4408 shall apply, the second argument is a comma-separated list of the
4410 which form the binding.
4411 Further arguments will be joined to form the expansion, and cause the
4412 binding to be created or updated.
4413 To indicate that a binding shall not be auto-committed, but that the
4414 expansion shall instead be furtherly editable by the user, a commercial at
4416 (that will be removed) can be placed last in the expansion, from which
4417 leading and trailing whitespace will finally be removed.
4418 Reverse solidus cannot be used as the last character of expansion.
4419 An empty expansion will be rejected.
4422 Contexts define when a binding applies, i.e., a binding will not be seen
4423 unless the context for which it is defined for is currently active.
4424 This is not true for the shared binding
4426 which is the foundation for all other bindings and as such always
4427 applies, its bindings, however, only apply secondarily.
4428 The available contexts are the shared
4432 context which is used in all not otherwise documented situations, and
4434 which applies only to
4435 .Sx "Compose mode" .
4438 Bindings are specified as a comma-separated list of byte-sequences,
4439 where each list entry corresponds to one
4442 Byte sequence boundaries will be forcefully terminated after
4443 .Va bind-inter-byte-timeout
4444 milliseconds, whereas key sequences can be timed out via
4445 .Va bind-inter-key-timeout .
4446 A list entry may, indicated by a leading colon character
4448 also refer to the name of a terminal capability; several dozen names
4449 are compiled in and may be specified either by their
4451 or, if existing, by their
4453 name, regardless of the actually used \*(OPal terminal control library.
4454 But any capability may be used, as long as the name is resolvable by the
4455 \*(OPal control library, or was defined via the internal variable
4457 Input sequences are not case-normalized, an exact match is required to
4458 update or remove a binding.
4459 It is advisable to use an initial escape or other control character (like
4461 for user (as opposed to purely terminal capability based) bindings in
4462 order to avoid ambiguities; it also reduces search time.
4465 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4466 ? bind base a,b echo one
4467 ? bind base $'\eE',d mle-snarf-word-fwd # Esc(ape)
4468 ? bind base $'\eE',$'\ec?' mle-snarf-word-bwd # Esc,Delete
4469 ? bind default $'\ecA',:khome,w 'echo Editable binding@'
4470 ? bind default a,b,c rm -irf / @ # Also editable
4471 ? bind default :kf1 File %
4472 ? bind compose :kf1 ~v
4476 Note that the entire comma-separated list is first parsed (over) as a
4477 shell-token with whitespace as the field separator, then parsed and
4478 expanded for real with comma as the field separator, therefore
4479 whitespace needs to be properly quoted, see
4480 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
4481 Using Unicode reverse solidus escape sequences renders a binding
4482 defunctional if the locale does not support Unicode (see
4483 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
4484 and using terminal capabilities does so if no (corresponding) terminal
4485 control support is (currently) available.
4486 Adding, deleting or modifying a key binding invalidates the internal
4487 prebuilt lookup tree, it will be recreated as necessary: this process
4488 will be visualized in most
4495 The following terminal capability names are built-in and can be used in
4497 or (if available) the two-letter
4500 See the respective manual for a list of capabilities.
4503 can be used to show all the capabilities of
4505 or the given terminal type;
4508 flag will also show supported (non-standard) extensions.
4511 .Bl -tag -compact -width kcuuf_or_kcuuf
4512 .It Cd kbs Ns \0or Cd kb
4514 .It Cd kdch1 Ns \0or Cd kD
4516 .It Cd kDC Ns \0or Cd *4
4517 \(em shifted variant.
4518 .It Cd kel Ns \0or Cd kE
4519 Clear to end of line.
4520 .It Cd kext Ns \0or Cd @9
4522 .It Cd kich1 Ns \0or Cd kI
4524 .It Cd kIC Ns \0or Cd #3
4525 \(em shifted variant.
4526 .It Cd khome Ns \0or Cd kh
4528 .It Cd kHOM Ns \0or Cd #2
4529 \(em shifted variant.
4530 .It Cd kend Ns \0or Cd @7
4532 .It Cd knp Ns \0or Cd kN
4534 .It Cd kpp Ns \0or Cd kP
4536 .It Cd kcub1 Ns \0or Cd kl
4537 Left cursor (with more modifiers: see below).
4538 .It Cd kLFT Ns \0or Cd #4
4539 \(em shifted variant.
4540 .It Cd kcuf1 Ns \0or Cd kr
4541 Right cursor (ditto).
4542 .It Cd kRIT Ns \0or Cd %i
4543 \(em shifted variant.
4544 .It Cd kcud1 Ns \0or Cd kd
4545 Down cursor (ditto).
4547 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4548 .It Cd kcuu1 Ns \0or Cd ku
4551 \(em shifted variant (only terminfo).
4552 .It Cd kf0 Ns \0or Cd k0
4554 Add one for each function key up to
4559 .It Cd kf10 Ns \0or Cd k;
4561 .It Cd kf11 Ns \0or Cd F1
4563 Add one for each function key up to
4571 Some terminals support key-modifier combination extensions, e.g.,
4573 For example, the delete key,
4575 in its shifted variant, the name is mutated to
4577 then a number is appended for the states
4589 .Ql Shift+Alt+Control
4591 The same for the left cursor key,
4593 .Cd KLFT , KLFT3 , KLFT4 , KLFT5 , KLFT6 , KLFT7 , KLFT8 .
4598 \*(NQ Calls the given macro, which must have been created via
4600 (see there for more), otherwise an
4603 Calling macros recursively will at some time excess the stack size
4604 limit, causing a hard program abortion; if recursively calling a macro
4605 is the last command of the current macro, consider to use the command
4607 which will first release all resources of the current macro before
4608 replacing the current macro with the called one.
4615 if the given macro has been created via
4617 but does not fail nor warn if the macro does not exist.
4626 \*(OP Only applicable to S/MIME signed messages.
4627 Takes an optional message list and a filename and saves the certificates
4628 contained within the message signatures to the named file in both
4629 human-readable and PEM format.
4630 The certificates can later be used to send encrypted messages to the
4631 respective message senders by setting
4632 .Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
4637 .It Ic charsetalias , uncharsetalias
4638 \*(NQ Manage alias mappings for (conversion of)
4639 .Sx "Character sets" .
4640 Alias processing is not performed for
4641 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
4644 and mappings are ineffective if character set conversion is not available
4648 Expansion happens recursively for cases where aliases point to other
4649 aliases (built-in loop limit: 8).
4651 The latter command deletes all aliases given as arguments,
4652 or all at once when given the asterisk
4654 The former shows the list of all currently defined aliases if used
4655 without arguments, or the target of the given single argument;
4656 when given two arguments, hyphen-minus
4658 being the first, the second is instead expanded recursively.
4659 In all other cases the given arguments are treated as pairs of character
4660 sets and their desired target alias name, creating new or updating
4661 already existing aliases.
4665 \*(NQ(ch) Change the working directory to
4667 or the given argument.
4673 .It Ic collapse , uncollapse
4679 Takes a message list and makes all replies to these messages invisible
4680 in header summaries, except for
4684 Also when a message with collapsed replies is displayed,
4685 all of these are automatically uncollapsed.
4686 The latter command undoes collapsing.
4689 .\" FIXME review until this point
4692 .It Ic colour , uncolour
4693 \*(OP\*(NQ Manage colour mappings of and for a
4694 .Sx "Coloured display" .
4695 Without arguments the former shows all currently defined mappings.
4696 Otherwise a colour type is expected (case-insensitively),
4699 for 256-colour terminals,
4704 for the standard 8-colour ANSI / ISO 6429 colour palette, and
4708 for monochrome terminals, which only support (some) font attributes.
4709 Without further arguments the list of all currently defined mappings
4710 of the given type is shown (here the special
4714 also show all currently defined mappings).
4717 Otherwise the second argument defines the mappable slot, the third
4718 argument a (comma-separated list of) colour and font attribute
4719 specification(s), and the optionally supported fourth argument can be
4720 used to specify a precondition: if conditioned mappings exist they are
4721 tested in (creation) order unless a (case-insensitive) match has been
4722 found, and the default mapping (if any has been established) will only
4723 be chosen as a last resort.
4724 The types of available preconditions depend on the mappable slot,
4725 the following of which exist:
4728 Mappings prefixed with
4730 are used for the \*(OPal built-in Mailx-Line-Editor (MLE, see
4731 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
4732 and do not support preconditions.
4734 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4736 This mapping is used for the position indicator that is visible when
4737 a line cannot be fully displayed on the screen.
4742 Used for the occasionally appearing error indicator that is joined onto
4744 \*(ID Also used for error messages written on standard error .
4748 Mappings prefixed with
4750 are used in header summaries, and they all understand the preconditions
4752 (the current message) and
4754 for elder messages (only honoured in conjunction with
4755 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
4757 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4759 This mapping is used for the
4761 that can be created with the
4765 formats of the variable
4768 For the complete header summary line except the
4770 and the thread structure.
4772 For the thread structure which can be created with the
4774 format of the variable
4779 Mappings prefixed with
4781 are used when displaying messages.
4783 .Bl -tag -compact -width view-partinfo
4785 This mapping is used for so-called
4787 lines, which are MBOX file format specific header lines (also see
4788 .Va mbox-rfc4155 ) .
4791 A comma-separated list of headers to which the mapping applies may be
4792 given as a precondition; if the \*(OPal regular expression support is
4793 available then if any of the
4795 .Sx "magic regular expression characters"
4796 is seen the precondition will be evaluated as (an extended) one.
4798 For the introductional message info line.
4799 .It Ar view-partinfo
4800 For MIME part info lines.
4804 The following (case-insensitive) colour definitions and font attributes
4805 are understood, multiple of which can be specified in a comma-separated
4815 It is possible (and often applicable) to specify multiple font
4816 attributes for a single mapping.
4819 foreground colour attribute, in order (numbers 0 - 7)
4829 To specify a 256-colour mode a decimal number colour specification in
4830 the range 0 to 255, inclusive, is supported, and interpreted as follows:
4832 .Bl -tag -compact -width "999 - 999"
4834 the standard ISO 6429 colours, as above.
4836 high intensity variants of the standard colours.
4838 216 colours in tuples of 6.
4840 grayscale from black to white in 24 steps.
4842 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4844 fg() { printf "\e033[38;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4845 bg() { printf "\e033[48;5;${1}m($1)"; }
4847 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do fg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4848 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4850 while [ $i -lt 256 ]; do bg $i; i=$(($i + 1)); done
4851 printf "\e033[0m\en"
4855 background colour attribute (see
4857 for possible values).
4863 will remove for the given colour type (the special type
4865 selects all) the given mapping; if the optional precondition argument is
4866 given only the exact tuple of mapping and precondition is removed.
4869 will remove all mappings (no precondition allowed), thus
4871 will remove all established mappings.
4876 .It Ic commandalias , uncommandalias
4877 \*(NQ Define or list, and remove, respectively, command aliases.
4878 An (command)alias can be used everywhere a normal command can be used,
4879 but always takes precedence: any arguments that are given to the command
4880 alias are joined onto the alias expansion, and the resulting string
4881 forms the command line that is, in effect, executed.
4882 The latter command removes all given aliases, the special name asterisk
4884 will remove all existing aliases.
4885 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
4886 known aliases, with one argument only the expansion of the given one.
4888 With two or more arguments a command alias is defined or updated: the
4889 first argument is the name under which the remaining command line should
4890 be accessible, the content of which can be just about anything.
4891 An alias may itself expand to another alias, but to avoid expansion loops
4892 further expansion will be prevented if an alias refers to itself or if
4893 an expansion depth limit is reached.
4894 Explicit expansion prevention is available via reverse solidus
4897 .Sx "Command modifiers" .
4898 .Bd -literal -offset indent
4900 \*(uA: `commandalias': no such alias: xx
4901 ? commandalias xx echo hello,
4903 commandalias xx 'echo hello,'
4914 but copy the messages to a file named after the local part of the
4915 sender of the first message instead of taking a filename argument;
4917 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
4921 (c) Copy messages to the named file and do not mark them as being saved;
4922 otherwise identical to
4928 \*(NQ A multiplexer command which provides C-style string operations on
4929 8-bit bytes without a notion of locale settings and character sets,
4930 effectively assuming ASCII data.
4931 For numeric and other operations refer to
4935 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
4939 for usage errors and numeric results, the empty string otherwise;
4940 missing data errors, as for unsuccessful searches, result in the
4942 error number being set to
4943 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
4944 Where the question mark
4946 modifier suffix is supported, a case-insensitive (ASCII mapping)
4947 operation mode is supported; the keyword
4955 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm length"
4957 Queries the length of the given argument.
4959 .It Cm hash , Cm hash32
4960 Calculates a hash value of the given argument.
4961 The latter will return a 32-bit result regardless of host environment.
4963 modifier suffix is supported.
4964 These use Chris Torek's hash algorithm, the resulting hash value is
4965 bit mixed as shown by Bret Mulvey.
4968 Search for the second in the first argument.
4969 Shows the resulting 0-based offset shall it have been found.
4971 modifier suffix is supported.
4974 Creates a substring of its first argument.
4975 The optional second argument is the 0-based starting offset,
4976 a negative one counts from the end;
4977 the optional third argument specifies the length of the desired result,
4978 a negative length leaves off the given number of bytes at the end of the
4979 original string; by default the entire string is used.
4980 This operation tries to work around faulty arguments (set
4982 for error logs), but reports them via the error number
4985 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
4988 Trim away whitespace characters from both ends of the argument.
4991 Trim away whitespace characters from the begin of the argument.
4994 Trim away whitespace characters from the end of the argument.
5000 Show the name of the current working directory, as reported by
5005 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
5006 The return status is tracked via
5011 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
5013 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
5017 \*(OP For unencrypted messages this command is identical to
5019 Encrypted messages are first decrypted, if possible, and then copied.
5024 .It Ic define , undefine
5025 The latter command deletes the given macro, the special name
5027 will discard all existing macros.
5028 Deletion of (a) macro(s) can be performed from within running (a)
5029 macro(s), including self-deletion.
5030 Without arguments the former command prints the current list of macros,
5031 including their content, otherwise it defines a macro, replacing an
5032 existing one of the same name as applicable.
5035 A defined macro can be invoked explicitly by using the
5040 commands, or implicitly if a macro hook is triggered, for example a
5042 Execution of a macro body can be stopped from within by calling
5046 Temporary macro block-scope variables can be created or deleted with the
5048 command modifier in conjunction with the commands
5053 To enforce unrolling of changes made to (global)
5054 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5057 can be used instead; its covered scope depends on how (i.e.,
5059 normal macro, folder hook, hook,
5061 switch) the macro is invoked.
5066 ed macro, the given positional parameters are implicitly local
5067 to the macro's scope, and may be accessed via the variables
5073 and any other positive unsigned decimal number less than or equal to
5075 Positional parameters can be
5077 ed, or become completely replaced, removed etc. via
5079 A helpful command for numeric computation and string evaluations is
5082 offers C-style byte string operations.
5084 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5093 echo Parameter 1 of ${#} is ${1}, all: ${*} / ${@}
5096 call exmac Hello macro exmac!
5097 echo ${?}/${!}/${^ERRNAME}
5103 .It Ic delete , undelete
5104 (d, u) Marks the given message list as being or not being
5106 respectively; if no argument has been specified then the usual search
5107 for a visible message is performed, as documented for
5108 .Sx "Message list arguments" ,
5109 showing only the next input prompt if the search fails.
5110 Deleted messages will neither be saved in the
5112 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5114 nor will they be available for most other commands.
5117 variable is set, the new
5119 or the last message restored, respectively, is automatically
5128 \*(NQ Digging (information out of) messages is possible through
5130 objects, which can be
5132 d for the given message number; in
5136 will instead open the message that is being composed.
5137 If a hyphen-minus is given as the optional third argument then output
5138 will be generated on the standard output channel instead of being
5139 subject to consumption by the
5149 d again by giving the same identifier used for creation;
5150 this step could be omitted: objects will be automatically closed
5153 (mailbox) or the compose mode is left, respectively.
5154 In all other use cases the second argument is an object identifier,
5155 and the third and all following arguments are interpreted as via
5158 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) :
5159 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5160 ? vput = msgno; digmsg create $msgno
5161 ? digmsg $msgno header list; readall x; echon $x
5162 210 Subject From To Message-ID References In-Reply-To
5163 ? digmsg $msgno header show Subject;readall x;echon $x
5167 ? digmsg remove $msgno
5175 Superseded by the multiplexer
5181 Delete the given messages and automatically
5185 if one exists, regardless of the setting of
5192 up or down by one message when given
5196 argument, respectively.
5200 .It Ic draft , undraft
5201 Take message lists and mark each given message as being draft, or not
5202 being draft, respectively, as documented in the section
5203 .Sx "Message states" .
5207 \*(NQ(ec) Print the given strings, equivalent to the shell utility
5210 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5211 expansion is performed and, different to the otherwise identical
5213 a trailing newline is echoed.
5216 .Sx "Command modifiers"
5217 is supported, and the error number
5219 is managed: if data is stored in a variable then the return value
5220 reflects the length of the result string in case of success and is
5225 this command traditionally (in BSD Mail) also performed
5226 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
5227 which is standard incompatible and hard to handle because quoting
5228 transformation patterns is not possible; the subcommand
5232 can be used to expand filenames.
5238 but the message is written to standard error, and prefixed by
5242 In interactive sessions the \*(OPal message ring queue for
5244 will be used instead, if available and
5252 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
5258 but does not write or store a trailing newline.
5264 at each message from the given list in turn.
5265 Modified contents are discarded unless the
5267 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
5268 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
5270 can be used instead for a more display oriented editor.
5276 (see there for more),
5277 .Ic elif , else , endif
5278 conditional \(em if the condition of a preceding
5280 was false, check the following condition and execute the following block
5281 if it evaluates true.
5287 (see there for more),
5288 .Ic elif , else , endif
5289 conditional \(em if none of the conditions of the preceding
5293 commands was true, the
5299 (en) Marks the end of an
5301 (see there for more),
5302 .Ic elif , else , endif
5303 conditional execution block.
5308 \*(NQ There is a strict separation in between
5309 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5312 which is inherited by child processes.
5313 Some variables of the latter are however vivid for program operation,
5314 their purpose is known, therefore they have been integrated
5315 transparently into handling of the former, as accessible via
5319 To integrate any other environment variable, and/or to export internal
5320 variables into the process environment where they normally are not, a
5322 needs to become established with this command, for example
5325 .Dl environ link PERL5LIB TZ
5328 Afterwards changing such variables with
5330 will cause automatic updates of the environment, too.
5331 Sufficient system support provided (it was in BSD as early as 1987, and
5332 is standardized since Y2K) removing such variables with
5334 will remove them also from the environment, but in any way the knowledge
5340 may cause loss of such links.
5345 removes an existing link without otherwise touching variables, the
5349 subcommands are identical to
5353 but additionally update the program environment accordingly; removing
5354 a variable breaks any freely established
5360 \*(OP As console user interfaces at times scroll error messages by too
5361 fast and/or out of scope, data can additionally be sent to an error queue
5362 manageable by this command:
5364 or no argument will display and clear the queue,
5367 As the queue becomes filled with
5369 entries the eldest entries are being dropped.
5370 There are also the variables
5373 .Va ^ERRQUEUE-EXISTS .
5377 \*(NQ Construct a command by concatenating the arguments, separated with
5378 a single space character, and then evaluate the result.
5379 This command passes through the exit status
5383 of the evaluated command; also see
5385 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5396 call yyy '\ecall xxx' "b\e$'\et'u ' "
5404 (ex or x) Exit from \*(UA without changing the active mailbox and skip
5405 any saving of messages in the
5407 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5409 as well as a possibly tracked line editor
5412 .Va on-account-cleanup
5413 will be invoked, however.
5414 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
5416 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
5417 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
5418 otherwise success indicating status.
5424 but open the mailbox read-only.
5433 .It Ic filetype , unfiletype
5434 \*(NQ Define, list, and remove, respectively, file handler hooks,
5435 which provide (shell) commands that enable \*(UA to load and save MBOX
5436 files from and to files with the registered file extensions, as shown
5439 The extensions are used case-insensitively, yet the auto-completion
5440 feature of for example
5442 will only work case-sensitively.
5443 An intermediate temporary file will be used to store the expanded data.
5444 The latter command will remove hooks for all given extensions, asterisk
5446 will remove all existing handlers.
5448 When used without arguments the former shows a list of all currently
5449 defined file hooks, with one argument the expansion of the given alias.
5450 Otherwise three arguments are expected, the first specifying the file
5451 extension for which the hook is meant, and the second and third defining
5452 the load- and save commands to deal with the file type, respectively,
5453 both of which must read from standard input and write to standard
5455 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes (\*(ID except below).
5456 \*(ID For now too much work is done, and files are oftened read in twice
5457 where once would be sufficient: this can cause problems if a filetype is
5458 changed while such a file is opened; this was already so with the
5459 built-in support of .gz etc. in Heirloom, and will vanish in v15.
5460 \*(ID For now all handler strings are passed to the
5461 .Ev SHELL for evaluation purposes; in the future a
5463 prefix to load and save commands may mean to bypass this shell instance:
5464 placing a leading space will avoid any possible misinterpretations.
5465 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5466 ? filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
5467 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
5468 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
5469 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5470 ? set record=+sent.zst.pgp
5475 .It Ic flag , unflag
5476 Take message lists and mark the messages as being flagged, or not being
5477 flagged, respectively, for urgent/special attention.
5479 .Sx "Message states" .
5485 but open the mailbox read-only.
5490 (fold) Open a new, or show status information of the current mailbox.
5491 If an argument is given, changes (such as deletions) will be written
5492 out, a new mailbox will be opened, the internal variables
5493 .Va mailbox-resolved
5496 will be updated, a set according
5498 is executed, and optionally a summary of
5500 is displayed if the variable
5505 .Sx "Filename transformations"
5506 will be applied to the
5510 prefixes are, i.e., URL (see
5511 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" )
5512 syntax is understood, as in
5513 .Ql mbox:///tmp/somefolder .
5514 If a protocol prefix is used the mailbox type is fixated, otherwise
5515 opening none-existing
5517 uses the protocol defined in
5525 (MBOX database), as well as
5527 (electronic mail message \*(ID read-only) the list of all registered
5529 s is traversed to check whether hooks shall be used to load (and save)
5530 data from (and to) the given
5532 Changing hooks will not affect already opened mailboxes.
5533 For example, the following creates hooks for the
5535 compression tool and a combined compressed and encrypted format:
5537 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5539 gzip 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' \e
5540 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
5544 For historic reasons
5546 s provide limited (case-sensitive) auto-completion capabilities.
5551 provided that corresponding handlers are installed.
5552 It will neither find
5556 however, but an explicit
5557 .Ql \&? file mbox.GZ
5558 will find and use the handler for
5560 \*(ID The latter mode can only be used for MBOX files.
5563 EML files consist of only one mail message,
5564 \*(ID and can only be opened read-only.
5565 When reading MBOX files tolerant POSIX rules are used by default.
5566 Invalid message boundaries that can be found quite often in historic
5567 MBOX files will be complained about (even more with
5569 in this case the method described for
5571 can be used to create a valid MBOX database from the invalid input.
5574 MBOX databases and EML files will always be protected via file-region locks
5576 during file operations to protect against concurrent modifications.
5577 .Mx -ix "dotlock files"
5583 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
5584 will also be protected by so-called dotlock files,
5585 the traditional way of mail spool file locking: for any file
5589 will be created during the synchronization, in the same directory and
5590 with the same user and group identities as the file of interest \(em
5591 as necessary created by an external privileged dotlock helper.
5593 disables dotlock files.
5596 .Sx "Howto handle stale dotlock files" .
5599 \*(OP If no protocol has been fixated, and
5601 refers to a directory with the subdirectories
5606 then it is treated as a folder in
5609 The maildir format stores each message in its own file, and has been
5610 designed so that file locking is not necessary when reading or writing
5614 \*(OPally URLs can be used to access network resources, securely via
5615 .Sx "Encrypted network communication" ,
5617 Network communication socket timeouts are configurable via
5618 .Va socket-connect-timeout .
5619 All network traffic may be proxied over a SOCKS server via
5623 .Dl \*(IN protocol://[user[:password]@]host[:port][/path]
5624 .Dl \*(OU protocol://[user@]host[:port][/path]
5627 \*(OPally supported network protocols are
5631 (POP3 with TLS encrypted transport),
5637 part is valid only for IMAP; there it defaults to
5639 Network URLs require a special encoding as documented in the section
5640 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
5645 Lists the names of all folders below the given argument or
5647 For file-based protocols
5649 will be used for display purposes.
5653 .It Ic Followup , followup
5654 \*(CM(F,fo) Similar to
5658 respectively, but save the message in a file named after the local part
5659 of the (first) recipient's address, possibly overwriting
5672 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the
5673 recipient's address (instead of in
5678 \*(CM Take a message list and the address of a recipient, subject to
5680 to whom the messages are sent.
5681 The text of the original message is included in the new one,
5682 enclosed by the values of
5683 .Va forward-inject-head
5685 .Va forward-inject-tail .
5686 .Va content-description-forwarded-message
5688 The list of included headers can be filtered with the
5690 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
5692 Only the first part of a multipart message is included but for
5693 .Va forward-as-attachment .
5695 This may generate the errors
5696 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
5697 if no receiver has been specified, or was rejected by
5701 if an I/O error occurs,
5703 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
5706 It can also fail with errors of
5707 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
5708 Any error stops processing of further messages.
5712 (f) Takes a list of message specifications and displays a summary of
5713 their message headers, exactly as via
5715 making the first message of the result the new
5717 (the last message if
5720 An alias of this command is
5723 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
5734 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5738 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
5741 .It Ic ghost , unghost
5744 .Ic uncommandalias .
5748 .It Ic headerpick , unheaderpick
5749 \*(NQ Multiplexer command to manage white- and blacklisting
5750 selections of header fields for a variety of applications.
5751 Without arguments the set of contexts that have settings is displayed.
5752 When given arguments, the first argument is the context to which the
5753 command applies, one of (case-insensitive)
5755 for display purposes (for example
5758 for selecting which headers shall be stored persistently when
5764 ing messages (note that MIME related etc. header fields should not be
5765 ignored in order to not destroy usability of the message in this case),
5767 for stripping down messages when
5769 ing message (has no effect if
5770 .Va forward-as-attachment
5773 for defining user-defined set of fields for the command
5776 The current settings of the given context are displayed if it is the
5778 A second argument denotes the type of restriction that is to be chosen,
5779 it may be (a case-insensitive prefix of)
5783 for white- and blacklisting purposes, respectively.
5784 Establishing a whitelist suppresses inspection of the corresponding
5787 If no further argument is given the current settings of the given type
5788 will be displayed, otherwise the remaining arguments specify header
5789 fields, which \*(OPally may be given as regular expressions, to be added
5791 The special wildcard field (asterisk,
5793 will establish a (fast) shorthand setting which covers all fields.
5795 The latter command always takes three or more arguments and can be used
5796 to remove selections, i.e., from the given context, the given type of
5797 list, all the given headers will be removed, the special argument
5799 will remove all headers.
5803 (h) Show the current group of headers, the size of which depends on
5806 in interactive mode, and the format of which can be defined with
5808 If a message-specification is given the group of headers containing the
5809 first message therein is shown and the message at the top of the screen
5812 the last message is targeted if
5823 \*(OP Without arguments or when given
5825 all history entries are shown (this mode also supports a more
5829 will replace the list of entries with the content of
5833 will dump all entries to said file, replacing former content, and
5835 will delete all entries.
5836 The argument can also be a signed decimal
5838 which will select and evaluate the respective history entry, and move it
5839 to the top of the history; a negative number is used as an offset to the
5840 current command so that
5842 will select the last command, the history top, whereas
5844 will delete all given entries
5845 .Pf ( Ar :NUMBER: ) .
5847 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
5853 Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the
5858 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
5860 Does not override the
5863 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command, because a
5865 command issued after
5867 will display the following message, not the current one.
5873 .Ic \&\&if , Ic elif , else , endif
5874 conditional execution construct \(em if the given condition is true then
5875 the encapsulated block is executed.
5876 The POSIX standard only supports the (case-insensitive) conditions
5881 end, the remaining are non-portable extensions.
5882 \*(ID In conjunction with the
5885 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
5886 and more test operators are available.
5888 .Bd -literal -offset indent
5897 Further (case-insensitive) one-argument conditions are
5899 erminal which evaluates to true in interactive terminal sessions
5900 (running with standard input or standard output attached to a terminal,
5903 command line options
5908 have been used), as well as any boolean value (see
5909 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5910 for textual boolean representations) to mark an enwrapped block as
5913 .Dq always execute .
5914 (Remarks: condition syntax errors skip all branches until
5920 It is possible to check
5921 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
5924 variables for existence or compare their expansion against a user given
5925 value or another variable by using the
5927 .Pf ( Dq variable next )
5928 conditional trigger character;
5929 a variable on the right hand side may be signalled using the same
5931 Variable names may be enclosed in a pair of matching braces.
5932 When this mode has been triggered, several operators are available
5935 they are always available, and there is no trigger: variables will have
5936 been expanded by the shell-compatible parser before the
5938 etc. command sees them).
5941 \*(IN Two argument conditions.
5942 Variables can be tested for existence and expansion:
5944 will test whether the given variable exists, so that
5946 will evaluate to true when
5951 .Ql -n """$editalong"""
5952 will be true if the variable is set and expands to a non-empty string,
5953 .Ql -z $'\e$editalong'
5954 only if the expansion is empty, whether the variable exists or not.
5955 The remaining conditions take three arguments.
5958 Integer operators treat the arguments on the left and right hand side of
5959 the operator as integral numbers and compare them arithmetically.
5960 It is an error if any of the operands is not a valid integer, an empty
5961 argument (which implies it had been quoted) is treated as if it were 0.
5962 Via the question mark
5964 modifier suffix a saturated operation mode is available where numbers
5965 will linger at the minimum or maximum possible value, instead of
5966 overflowing (or trapping), the keyword
5973 are therefore identical.
5974 Available operators are
5978 (less than or equal to),
5984 (greater than or equal to), and
5989 String and regular expression data operators compare the left and right
5990 hand side according to their textual content.
5991 Unset variables are treated as the empty string.
5992 Via the question mark
5994 modifier suffix a case-insensitive operation mode is available, the keyword
6003 Available string operators are
6007 (less than or equal to),
6013 (greater than or equal to),
6017 (is substring of) and
6019 (is not substring of).
6020 By default these operators work on bytes and (therefore) do not take
6021 into account character set specifics.
6022 If the case-insensitivity modifier has been used, case is ignored
6023 according to the rules of the US-ASCII encoding, i.e., bytes are
6027 When the \*(OPal regular expression support is available, the additional
6033 They treat the right hand side as an extended regular expression that is
6034 matched according to the active locale (see
6035 .Sx "Character sets" ) ,
6036 i.e., character sets should be honoured correctly.
6039 Conditions can be joined via AND-OR lists (where the AND operator is
6041 and the OR operator is
6043 which have equal precedence and will be evaluated with left
6044 associativity, thus using the same syntax that is known for the
6046 It is also possible to form groups of conditions and lists by enclosing
6047 them in pairs of brackets
6048 .Ql [\ \&.\&.\&.\ ] ,
6049 which may be interlocked within each other, and also be joined via
6053 The results of individual conditions and entire groups may be modified
6054 via unary operators: the unary operator
6056 will reverse the result.
6058 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6059 wysh set v15-compat=yes # with value: automatic "wysh"!
6060 if -N debug;echo *debug* set;else;echo not;endif
6061 if "$ttycharset" == UTF-8 || "$ttycharset" ==?cas UTF8
6062 echo ttycharset is UTF-8, the former case-sensitive!
6065 if [ "${t1}" == "${t2}" ]
6066 echo These two variables are equal
6068 if "$features" =% ,+regex, && "$TERM" =~?case ^xterm\&.*
6069 echo ..in an X terminal
6071 if [ [ true ] && [ [ "${debug}" != '' ] || \e
6072 [ "$verbose" != '' ] ] ]
6075 if true && [ -n "$debug" || -n "${verbose}" ]
6076 echo Left associativity, as is known from the shell
6085 Superseded by the multiplexer
6090 Shows the names of all available commands, in command lookup order.
6091 \*(OP In conjunction with a set variable
6093 additional information will be provided for each command: the argument
6094 type will be indicated, the documentation string will be shown,
6095 and the set of command flags will show up:
6097 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql NEEDS_BOX"
6099 command supports the command modifier
6102 command supports the command modifier
6105 the error number is tracked in
6108 whether the command needs an active mailbox, a
6111 indicators whether command is \&.\h'.3m'.\h'.3m'.
6112 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql SUBPROCESS"
6113 .It Ql batch/interactive
6114 usable in interactive or batch mode
6117 usable in send mode.
6119 allowed to be used when running in a subprocess instance,
6120 for example from within a macro that is called via
6121 .Va on-compose-splice .
6124 indicators whether command is not \&.\h'.3m'.\h'.3m'.
6125 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql COMPOSE_MODE"
6130 available during program startup, like in
6131 .Sx "Resource files" .
6134 The command produces
6143 Enforce change localization of
6148 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
6149 meaning that their state will be reverted to the former one once the
6152 Just like the command modifier
6154 which provides block-scope localization for some commands (instead),
6155 it can only be used inside of macro definition blocks introduced by
6159 The covered scope of an
6161 is left once a different account is activated, and some macros, notably
6162 .Va folder-hook Ns s ,
6163 use their own specific notion of covered scope, here it will be extended
6164 until the folder is left again.
6167 This setting stacks up: i.e., if
6169 enables change localization and calls
6171 which explicitly resets localization, then any value changes within
6173 will still be reverted when the scope of
6176 (Caveats: if in this example
6178 changes to a different
6180 which sets some variables that are already covered by localizations,
6181 their scope will be extended, and in fact leaving the
6183 will (thus) restore settings in (likely) global scope which actually
6184 were defined in a local, macro private context!)
6187 This command takes one or two arguments, the optional first one
6188 specifies an attribute that may be one of
6190 which refers to the current scope and is thus the default,
6192 which causes any macro that is being
6194 ed to be started with localization enabled by default, as well as
6196 which (if enabled) disallows any called macro to turn off localization:
6197 like this it can be ensured that once the current scope regains control,
6198 any changes made in deeper levels have been reverted.
6199 The latter two are mutually exclusive, and neither affects
6201 The (second) argument is interpreted as a boolean (string, see
6202 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" )
6203 and states whether the given attribute shall be turned on or off.
6205 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6206 define temporary_settings {
6207 set possibly_global_option1
6209 set localized_option1
6210 set localized_option2
6212 set possibly_global_option2
6219 .It Ic Lfollowup , Lreply
6220 \*(CM Reply to messages that come in via known
6223 .Pf ( Ic mlsubscribe )
6224 mailing lists, or pretend to do so (see
6225 .Sx "Mailing lists" ) :
6230 respectively, functionality this will actively resort and even remove
6231 message recipients in order to generate a message that is supposed to be
6232 sent to a mailing list.
6233 For example it will also implicitly generate a
6234 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
6235 header if that seems useful, regardless of the setting of the variable
6237 For more documentation please refer to
6238 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6240 This may generate the errors
6241 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6242 if no receiver has been specified,
6244 if some addressees where rejected by
6247 if an I/O error occurs,
6249 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6252 It can also fail with errors of
6253 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6254 Occurrence of some of the errors depend on the value of
6256 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6262 but saves the message in a file named after the local part of the first
6263 recipient's address (instead of in
6268 \*(CM(m) Takes a (list of) recipient address(es) as (an) argument(s),
6269 or asks on standard input if none were given;
6270 then collects the remaining mail content and sends it out.
6271 Unless the internal variable
6273 is set recipient addresses will be stripped from comments, names etc.
6274 For more documentation please refer to
6275 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6277 This may generate the errors
6278 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6279 if no receiver has been specified,
6281 if some addressees where rejected by
6284 if multiple messages have been specified,
6286 if an I/O error occurs,
6288 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6291 It can also fail with errors of
6292 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6293 Occurrence of some of the errors depend on the value of
6298 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
6300 has been given the content of
6301 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
6302 cache is shown, (re-)initializing it first (as necessary.
6305 then the cache will only be (re-)initialized, and
6307 will remove its contents.
6308 Note that \*(UA will try to load the files only once, use
6309 .Ql Ic \&\&mailcap Ns \:\0\:clear
6310 to unlock further attempts.
6311 Loading and parsing can be made more
6316 (mb) The given message list is to be sent to the
6318 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6320 when \*(UA is quit; this is the default action unless the variable
6323 \*(ID This command can only be used in a
6325 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
6329 .It Ic mimetype , unmimetype
6330 \*(NQ Without arguments the content of the MIME type cache will displayed;
6331 a more verbose listing will be produced if either of
6336 When given arguments they will be joined, interpreted as shown in
6337 .Sx "The mime.types files"
6339 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) ,
6340 and the resulting entry will be added (prepended) to the cache.
6341 In any event MIME type sources are loaded first as necessary \(en
6342 .Va mimetypes-load-control
6343 can be used to fine-tune which sources are actually loaded.
6345 The latter command deletes all specifications of the given MIME type, thus
6346 .Ql \&? unmimetype text/plain
6347 will remove all registered specifications for the MIME type
6351 will discard all existing MIME types, just as will
6353 but which also reenables cache initialization via
6354 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
6358 \*(ID Only available in interactive mode, this command allows execution
6359 of external MIME type handlers which do not integrate into the normal
6362 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ) .
6363 (\*(ID No syntax to directly address parts, this restriction may vanish.)
6364 The user will be asked for each non-text part of the given message in
6365 turn whether the registered handler shall be used to display the part.
6369 .It Ic mlist , unmlist
6370 \*(NQ Manage the list of known
6371 .Sx "Mailing lists" ;
6372 subscriptions are controlled via
6374 The latter command deletes all given arguments,
6375 or all at once when given the asterisk
6377 The former shows the list of all currently known lists if used
6378 without arguments, otherwise the given arguments will become known.
6379 \*(OP In the latter case, arguments which contain any of the
6381 .Sx "magic regular expression characters"
6382 will be interpreted as one, possibly matching many addresses;
6383 these will be sequentially matched via linked lists instead of being
6384 looked up in a dictionary.
6388 .It Ic mlsubscribe , unmlsubscribe
6389 Building upon the command pair
6390 .Ic mlist , unmlist ,
6391 but only managing the subscription attribute of mailing lists.
6392 (The former will also create not yet existing mailing lists.)
6398 but move the messages to a file named after the local part of the
6399 sender of the first message instead of taking a filename argument;
6401 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
6407 but marks the messages for deletion if they were transferred
6414 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6416 selection, and all MIME parts.
6424 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
6425 standard output is a terminal.
6431 \*(OP When used without arguments or if
6433 has been given the content of the
6435 cache is shown, (re-)initializing it first (as necessary).
6438 then the cache will only be (re-)initialized, and
6440 will remove its contents.
6444 \*(OP When used without arguments, or when the argument was
6448 cache is shown, initializing it as necessary.
6451 then the cache will be (re)loaded, whereas
6454 Loading and parsing can be made more
6457 will query the cache for the URL given as the second argument
6458 .Pf ( Ql [USER@]HOST ) .
6463 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ;
6465 .Sx "The .netrc file"
6466 documents the file format in detail.
6470 Checks for new mail in the current folder without committing any changes
6472 If new mail is present, a message is shown.
6476 the headers of each new message are also shown.
6477 This command is not available for all mailbox types.
6485 Goes to the next message in sequence and types it.
6486 With an argument list, types the next matching message.
6500 If the current folder is accessed via a network connection, a
6502 command is sent, otherwise no operation is performed.
6508 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
6510 selection, and all MIME parts.
6518 on the given messages, even in non-interactive mode and as long as the
6519 standard output is a terminal.
6527 but also pipes header fields which would not pass the
6529 selection, and all parts of MIME
6530 .Ql multipart/alternative
6535 (pi) Takes an optional message list and shell command (that defaults to
6537 and pipes the messages through the command.
6541 every message is followed by a formfeed character.
6562 (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in
6565 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6567 preserving all messages marked with
6571 or never referenced in the system
6573 and removing all other messages from the
6575 .Sx "primary system mailbox" .
6576 If new mail has arrived during the session,
6578 .Dq You have new mail
6580 If given while editing a mailbox file with the command line option
6582 then the edit file is rewritten.
6583 A return to the shell is effected,
6584 unless the rewrite of edit file fails,
6585 in which case the user can escape with the exit command.
6586 The optional status number argument will be passed through to
6588 \*(ID For now it can happen that the given status will be overwritten,
6589 later this will only occur if a later error needs to be reported onto an
6590 otherwise success indicating status.
6594 \*(NQ Read a line from standard input, or the channel set active via
6596 and assign the data, which will be split as indicated by
6598 to the given variables.
6599 The variable names are checked by the same rules as documented for
6601 and the same error codes will be seen in
6605 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6607 with the error number
6611 in case of I/O errors, or
6614 If there are more fields than variables, assigns successive fields to the
6615 last given variable.
6616 If there are less fields than variables, assigns the empty string to the
6618 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6621 ? echo "<$a> <$b> <$c>"
6623 ? wysh set ifs=:; read a b c;unset ifs
6624 hey2.0,:"'you ",:world!:mars.:
6625 ? echo $?/$^ERRNAME / <$a><$b><$c>
6626 0/NONE / <hey2.0,><"'you ",><world!:mars.:><><>
6633 but splits on shell token boundaries (see
6634 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
6637 \*(ID Could become a
6640 .Ql read --tokenize -- .
6644 \*(NQ Read anything from standard input, or the channel set active via
6646 and assign the data to the given variable.
6647 The variable name is checked by the same rules as documented for
6649 and the same error codes will be seen in
6653 indicates the number of bytes read, it will be
6655 with the error number
6659 in case of I/O errors, or
6662 \*(ID The input data length is restricted to 31-bits.
6666 \*(NQ Manages input channels for
6671 to be used to avoid complicated or impracticable code, like calling
6673 from within a macro in non-interactive mode.
6674 Without arguments, or when the first argument is
6676 a listing of all known channels is printed.
6677 Channels can otherwise be
6679 d, and existing channels can be
6683 d by giving the string used for creation.
6685 The channel name is expected to be a file descriptor number, or,
6686 if parsing the numeric fails, an input file name that undergoes
6687 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
6688 For example (this example requires a modern shell):
6689 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6690 $ printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enyou\enecho $a' |\e
6693 $ LC_ALL=C printf 'echon "hey, "\enread a\enecho $a' |\e
6694 LC_ALL=C 6<<< 'you' \*(uA -R#X'readctl create 6'
6700 \*(NQ Removes the named files or directories.
6701 If a name refers to a mailbox, say a Maildir mailbox, then a mailbox
6702 type specific removal will be performed, deleting the complete mailbox.
6703 In interactive mode the user is asked for confirmation.
6707 \*(NQ Takes the name of an existing folder
6708 and the name for the new folder
6709 and renames the first to the second one.
6710 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6711 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6713 are performed on both arguments.
6714 Both folders must be of the same type.
6718 .It Ic Reply , Respond
6719 \*(CM(R) Identical to
6721 except that it replies to only the sender of each message of the given
6722 list, by using the first message as the template to quote, for the
6726 will exchange this command with
6731 .It Ic reply , respond
6732 \*(CM(r) Take a message (list) and group-respond (to each in turn)
6733 by addressing the sender and all recipients, subject to
6739 .Va followup-to-honour ,
6742 .Va recipients-in-cc
6743 influence response behaviour.
6746 .Va quote-as-attachment
6747 configure whether responded-to message shall be quoted etc.,
6748 .Va content-description-quote-attachment
6752 will exchange this command with
6756 offers special support for replying to mailing lists.
6757 For more documentation please refer to
6758 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
6760 This may generate the errors
6761 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6762 if no receiver has been specified, or was rejected by
6766 if an I/O error occurs,
6768 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6771 It can also fail with errors of
6772 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6773 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6779 but does not add any header lines.
6780 This is not a way to hide the sender's identity,
6781 but useful for sending a message again to the same recipients.
6785 Takes a list of messages and a name,
6786 and sends each message to the given addressee, which is subject to
6789 and related header fields are prepended to the new copy of the message.
6792 is only performed if
6795 \*(ID\*(CM is not entered, the only supported hooks are
6798 .Va on-resend-cleanup .
6800 This may generate the errors
6801 .Va ^ERR Ns -DESTADDRREQ
6802 if no receiver has been specified, or was rejected by
6806 if an I/O error occurs,
6808 if a necessary character set conversion fails, and
6811 It can also fail with errors of
6812 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6813 Any error stops processing of further messages.
6817 (ret) Superseded by the multiplexer
6822 Only available inside of a
6826 this command returns control of execution to the outer scope.
6827 The two optional parameters are positive decimal numbers and default to 0:
6828 the first specifies the 32-bit return value (stored in
6830 \*(ID and later extended to 64-bit),
6831 the second the 32-bit error number (stored in
6835 a non-0 exit status may cause the program to exit.
6841 but saves the messages in a file named after the local part of the
6842 sender of the first message instead of taking a filename argument;
6844 is inspected to decide on the actual storage location.
6848 (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn
6849 to the end of the file.
6850 .Sx "Filename transformations"
6851 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
6853 is performed on the filename.
6854 If no filename is given, the
6856 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
6859 The filename in quotes, followed by the generated character count
6860 is echoed on the user's terminal.
6863 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
6864 the messages are marked for deletion.
6865 To filter the saved header fields to the desired subset use the
6867 slot of the white- and blacklisting command
6873 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6877 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6881 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
6886 Takes a message specification (list) and displays a header summary of
6887 all matching messages, as via
6889 This command is an alias of
6892 .Sx "Specifying messages" .
6896 Takes a message list and marks all messages as having been read.
6902 (se, \*(NQ uns) The latter command will delete all given global
6903 variables, or only block-scope local ones if the
6905 command modifier has been used.
6906 The former, when used without arguments, will show all
6907 currently known variables, being more verbose if either of
6912 Remarks: this list mode will not automatically link-in (known)
6914 variables, this only happens for explicit addressing, examples are
6916 using a variable in an
6918 condition or a string passed to
6922 ting, as well as some program-internal use cases (look-ups).
6925 Otherwise the given variables (and arguments) are set or adjusted.
6926 Arguments are of the form
6928 (no space before or after
6932 if there is no value, i.e., a boolean variable.
6933 If a name begins with
6937 the effect is the same as invoking the
6939 command with the remaining part of the variable
6940 .Pf ( Ql unset save ) .
6941 \*(ID In conjunction with the
6943 .Pf (or\0 Cm local )
6945 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
6946 can be used to quote arguments as necessary.
6947 \*(ID Otherwise quotation marks may be placed around any part of the
6948 assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs.
6951 When operating in global scope any
6953 that is known to map to an environment variable will automatically cause
6954 updates in the program environment (unsetting a variable in the
6955 environment requires corresponding system support) \(em use the command
6957 for further environmental control.
6958 If the command modifier
6960 has been used to enforce local scoping then the given user variables
6961 will be garbage collected when the local scope is left;
6963 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES" ,
6966 behaves the same as if
6968 would have been set (temporarily), which means that changes are
6969 inherited by deeper scopes.
6973 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
6977 .Bd -literal -offset indent
6978 ? wysh set indentprefix=' -> '
6979 ? wysh set atab=$'\t' aspace=' ' zero=0
6985 Apply shell quoting rules to the given raw-data arguments.
6989 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
6990 The first argument specifies the operation:
6994 cause shell quoting to be applied to the remains of the line, and
6995 expanded away thereof, respectively.
6996 If the former is prefixed with a plus-sign, the quoted result will not
6997 be roundtrip enabled, and thus can be decoded only in the very same
6998 environment that was used to perform the encode; also see
6999 .Cd mle-quote-rndtrip .
7000 If the coding operation fails the error number
7003 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
7004 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
7005 change again due to output or result storage errors.
7009 \*(NQ (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell,
7010 and returns its exit status.
7014 .It Ic shortcut , unshortcut
7015 \*(NQ Manage the file- or pathname shortcuts as documented for
7017 The latter command deletes all shortcuts given as arguments,
7018 or all at once when given the asterisk
7020 The former shows the list of all currently defined shortcuts if used
7021 without arguments, the target of the given with a single argument.
7022 Otherwise arguments are treated as pairs of shortcuts and their desired
7023 expansion, creating new or updating already existing ones.
7027 \*(NQ Shift the positional parameter stack (starting at
7029 by the given number (which must be a positive decimal),
7030 or 1 if no argument has been given.
7031 It is an error if the value exceeds the number of positional parameters.
7032 If the given number is 0, no action is performed, successfully.
7033 The stack as such can be managed via
7035 Note this command will fail in
7037 and hook macros unless the positional parameter stack has been
7038 explicitly created in the current context via
7045 but performs neither MIME decoding nor decryption, so that the raw
7046 message text is shown.
7050 (si) Shows the size in characters of each message of the given
7055 \*(NQ Sleep for the specified number of seconds (and optionally
7056 milliseconds), by default interruptible.
7057 If a third argument is given the sleep will be uninterruptible,
7058 otherwise the error number
7062 if the sleep has been interrupted.
7063 The command will fail and the error number will be
7064 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
7065 if the given duration(s) overflow the time datatype, and
7067 if the given durations are no valid integers.
7072 .It Ic sort , unsort
7073 The latter command disables sorted or threaded mode, returns to normal
7074 message order and, if the
7077 displays a header summary.
7078 The former command shows the current sorting criterion when used without
7079 an argument, but creates a sorted representation of the current folder
7080 otherwise, and changes the
7082 command and the addressing modes such that they refer to messages in
7084 Message numbers are the same as in regular mode.
7088 a header summary in the new order is also displayed.
7089 Automatic folder sorting can be enabled by setting the
7092 .Ql set autosort=thread .
7093 Possible sorting criterions are:
7096 .Bl -tag -compact -width "subject"
7098 Sort the messages by their
7100 field, that is by the time they were sent.
7102 Sort messages by the value of their
7104 field, that is by the address of the sender.
7107 variable is set, the sender's real name (if any) is used.
7109 Sort the messages by their size.
7111 \*(OP Sort the message by their spam score, as has been classified by
7114 Sort the messages by their message status.
7116 Sort the messages by their subject.
7118 Create a threaded display.
7120 Sort messages by the value of their
7122 field, that is by the address of the recipient.
7125 variable is set, the recipient's real name (if any) is used.
7131 \*(NQ (so) The source command reads commands from the given file.
7132 .Sx "Filename transformations"
7134 If the given expanded argument ends with a vertical bar
7136 then the argument will instead be interpreted as a shell command and
7137 \*(UA will read the output generated by it.
7138 Dependent on the settings of
7142 and also dependent on whether the command modifier
7144 had been used, encountering errors will stop sourcing of the given input.
7147 cannot be used from within macros that execute as
7148 .Va folder-hook Ns s
7151 i.e., it can only be called from macros that were
7156 \*(NQ The difference to
7158 (beside not supporting pipe syntax aka shell command input) is that
7159 this command will not generate an error nor warn if the given file
7160 argument cannot be opened successfully.
7164 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and clears their
7170 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and causes the
7172 to forget it has ever used them to train its Bayesian filter.
7173 Unless otherwise noted the
7175 flag of the message is inspected to chose whether a message shall be
7183 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
7187 This also clears the
7189 flag of the messages in question.
7193 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and rates them using the configured
7194 .Va spam-interface ,
7195 without modifying the messages, but setting their
7197 flag as appropriate; because the spam rating headers are lost the rate
7198 will be forgotten once the mailbox is left.
7199 Refer to the manual section
7201 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
7205 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and sets their
7211 \*(OP Takes a list of messages and informs the Bayesian filter of the
7217 flag of the messages in question.
7229 \*(NQ TLS information and management command multiplexer to aid in
7230 .Sx "Encrypted network communication" ,
7231 mostly available only if the term
7237 if so documented (see
7238 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7239 The result that is shown in case of errors is always the empty string,
7240 errors can be identified via the error number
7242 For example, string length overflows are caught and set
7245 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7246 The TLS configuration is honoured, especially
7249 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7250 ? vput tls result fingerprint pop3s://ex.am.ple
7251 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME: $result
7254 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
7256 Show the complete verified peer certificate chain.
7257 Includes informational fields in conjunction with
7260 Show only the peer certificate, without any signers.
7261 Includes informational fields in conjunction with
7265 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest Ns
7266 ed fingerprint of the certificate of the given HOST
7267 .Pf ( Ql server:port ,
7268 where the port defaults to the HTTPS port, 443).
7270 is actively ignored for the runtime of this command.
7281 slot for white- and blacklisting header fields.
7285 (to) Takes a message list and types out the first
7287 lines of each message on the user's terminal.
7288 Unless a special selection has been established for the
7292 command, the only header fields that are displayed are
7303 It is possible to apply compression to what is displayed by setting
7305 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
7310 (tou) Takes a message list and marks the messages for saving in the
7312 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
7314 \*(UA deviates from the POSIX standard with this command,
7317 command will display the following message instead of the current one.
7323 but also displays header fields which would not pass the
7325 selection, and all visualizable parts of MIME
7326 .Ql multipart/alternative
7331 (t) Takes a message list and types out each message on the user's terminal.
7332 The display of message headers is selectable via
7334 For MIME multipart messages, all parts with a content type of
7336 all parts which have a registered MIME type handler (see
7337 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
7338 which produces plain text output, and all
7340 parts are shown, others are hidden except for their headers.
7341 Messages are decrypted and converted to the terminal character set
7345 can be used to display parts which are not displayable as plain text.
7388 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7392 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7397 Superseded by the multiplexer
7408 .It Ic unmlsubscribe
7419 Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
7423 Superseded by the multiplexer
7427 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7431 \*(OB Superseded by the multiplexer
7453 Perform URL percent codec operations on the raw-data argument, rather
7454 according to RFC 3986.
7455 The first argument specifies the operation:
7459 perform plain URL percent en- and decoding, respectively.
7463 perform a slightly modified operation which should be better for
7464 pathnames: it does not allow a tilde
7466 and will neither accept hyphen-minus
7470 as an initial character.
7471 The remains of the line form the URL data which is to be converted.
7472 This is a character set agnostic operation,
7473 and it may thus decode bytes which are invalid in the current
7479 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
7480 and manages the error number
7482 If the coding operation fails the error number
7485 .Va ^ERR Ns -CANCELED ,
7486 and the unmodified input is used as the result; the error number may
7487 change again due to output or result storage errors.
7488 \*(ID This command does not know about URLs beside what is documented.
7492 subcommand, shall the URL be displayed.)
7496 \*(NQ This command produces the same output as the listing mode of
7500 ity adjustments, but only for the given variables.
7504 \*(OP Takes a message list and verifies each message.
7505 If a message is not a S/MIME signed message,
7506 verification will fail for it.
7507 The verification process checks if the message was signed using a valid
7509 if the message sender's email address matches one of those contained
7510 within the certificate,
7511 and if the message content has been altered.
7519 of \*(UA, optionally in a more
7521 form which also includes the build and running system environment.
7522 This command supports
7525 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7530 \*(NQ A multiplexer command which offers signed 64-bit numeric
7531 calculations, as well as other, mostly string-based operations.
7532 C-style byte string operations are available via
7534 The first argument defines the number, type, and meaning of the
7535 remaining arguments.
7536 An empty number argument is treated as 0.
7540 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7541 The result shown in case of errors is
7543 for usage errors and numeric operations, the empty string otherwise;
7545 errors, like when a search operation failed, will also set the
7548 .Va ^ERR Ns -NODATA .
7549 Except when otherwise noted numeric arguments are parsed as signed 64-bit
7550 numbers, and errors will be reported in the error number
7552 as the numeric error
7553 .Va ^ERR Ns -RANGE .
7556 Numeric operations work on one or two signed 64-bit integers.
7557 Numbers prefixed with
7561 are interpreted as hexadecimal (base 16) numbers, whereas
7563 indicates octal (base 8), and
7567 denote binary (base 2) numbers.
7568 It is possible to use any base in between 2 and 36, inclusive, with the
7570 notation, where the base is given as an unsigned decimal number, so
7572 is a different way of specifying a hexadecimal number.
7573 Unsigned interpretation of a number can be enforced by prefixing an
7575 (case-insensitively), as in
7577 this is not necessary for power-of-two bases (2, 4, 8, 16 and 32),
7578 which will be interpreted as unsigned by default, but it still makes
7579 a difference regarding overflow detection and overflow constant.
7580 It is possible to enforce signed interpretation by (instead) prefixing a
7582 (case-insensitively).
7583 The number sign notation uses a permissive parse mode and as such
7584 supports complicated conditions out of the box:
7585 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7586 ? wysh set ifs=:;read i;unset ifs;echo $i;vexpr pb 2 10#$i
7593 One integer is expected by assignment (equals sign
7595 which does nothing but parsing the argument, thus detecting validity and
7596 possible overflow conditions, unary not (tilde
7598 which creates the bitwise complement, and unary plus and minus.
7599 Two integers are used by addition (plus sign
7601 subtraction (hyphen-minus
7603 multiplication (asterisk
7607 and modulo (percent sign
7609 as well as for the bitwise operators logical or (vertical bar
7612 bitwise and (ampersand
7615 bitwise xor (circumflex
7617 the bitwise signed left- and right shifts
7620 as well as for the unsigned right shift
7624 Another numeric operation is
7626 which takes a number base in between 2 and 36, inclusive, and will act
7627 on the second number given just the same as what equals sign
7629 does, but the number result will be formatted in the base given, as
7630 a signed 64-bit number unless unsigned interpretation of the input
7631 number had been forced (with an u prefix).
7634 Numeric operations support a saturated mode via the question mark
7636 modifier suffix; the keyword
7643 are therefore identical.
7644 In saturated mode overflow errors and division and modulo by zero are no
7645 longer reported via the exit status, but the result will linger at the
7646 minimum or maximum possible value, instead of overflowing (or trapping).
7647 This is true also for the argument parse step.
7648 For the bitwise shifts, the saturated maximum is 63.
7649 Any caught overflow will be reported via the error number
7652 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW .
7654 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7655 ? vput vexpr res -? +1 -9223372036854775808
7656 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME:$res
7657 0/75/OVERFLOW:-9223372036854775808
7661 Character set agnostic string functions have no notion of locale
7662 settings and character sets.
7664 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm random"
7666 Outputs the current date and time in UTC (Coordinated Universal Time)
7667 with values named such that
7668 .Ql vput vexpr x date-utc; eval wysh set $x
7669 creates accessible variables.
7670 .It Cm date-stamp-utc
7671 Outputs a RFC 3339 internet date/time format of UTC.
7673 The seconds and nanoseconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01T00:00:00)
7679 .Ql vput vexpr x epoch; eval wysh set $x
7680 creates accessible variables.
7683 .Sx "Filename transformations"
7685 .It Cm file-stat , file-lstat
7687 .Sx "Filename transformations"
7688 on the argument, then call
7692 respectively, and output values such that
7693 .Ql vput vexpr x file-stat FILE; eval wysh set $x
7694 creates accessible variables.
7699 to denote directories, commercial at
7701 for links, number sign
7703 for block devices, percent sign
7705 for for character devices, vertical bar
7707 for FIFOs, equal sign
7709 for sockets, and the period
7713 Generates a random string of the given length, or of
7715 bytes (a constant from
7717 if the value 0 is given; the random string will be base64url encoded
7718 according to RFC 4648, and thus be usable as a (portable) filename.
7722 String operations work, sufficient support provided, according to the
7723 active user's locale encoding and character set (see
7724 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
7725 Where the question mark
7727 modifier suffix is supported, a case-insensitive operation mode is
7728 available; the keyword
7734 are therefore identical.
7736 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm regex"
7738 (One-way) Converts the argument to something safely printable on the
7742 \*(OP A string operation that will try to match the first argument with
7743 the regular expression given as the second argument.
7745 modifier suffix is supported.
7746 If the optional third argument has been given then instead of showing
7747 the match offset a replacement operation is performed: the third
7748 argument is treated as if specified within dollar-single-quote (see
7749 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) ,
7750 and any occurrence of a positional parameter, for example
7752 etc. is replaced with the according match group of the regular expression:
7753 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7754 ? vput vexpr res regex bananarama \e
7755 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}au\e$2'
7756 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME:$res:
7758 ? vput vexpr res regex?case bananarama \e
7759 (.*)NanA(.*) '\e${1}uauf\e$2'
7760 ? echo $?/$!/$^ERRNAME:$res:
7761 0/0/NONE:bauauframa:
7768 \*(NQ Manage the positional parameter stack (see
7772 If the first argument is
7774 then the positional parameter stack of the current context, or the
7775 global one, if there is none, is cleared.
7778 then the remaining arguments will be used to (re)create the stack,
7779 if the parameter stack size limit is excessed an
7780 .Va ^ERR Ns -OVERFLOW
7784 If the first argument is
7786 a round-trip capable representation of the stack contents is created,
7787 with each quoted parameter separated from each other with the first
7790 and followed by the first character of
7792 if that is not empty and not identical to the first.
7793 If that results in no separation at all a
7799 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
7800 I.e., the subcommands
7804 can be used (in conjunction with
7806 to (re)create an argument stack from and to a single variable losslessly.
7808 .Bd -literal -offset indent
7809 ? vpospar set hey, "'you ", world!
7810 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7811 ? vput vpospar x quote
7813 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7814 ? eval vpospar set ${x}
7815 ? echo $#: <${1}><${2}><${3}>
7821 (v) Takes a message list and invokes the
7823 display editor on each message.
7824 Modified contents are discarded unless the
7826 variable is set, and are not used unless the mailbox can be written to
7827 and the editor returns a successful exit status.
7829 can be used instead for a less display oriented editor.
7833 (w) For conventional messages the body without all headers is written.
7834 The original message is never marked for deletion in the originating
7836 The output is decrypted and converted to its native format as necessary.
7837 If the output file exists, the text is appended.
7838 If a message is in MIME multipart format its first part is written to
7839 the specified file as for conventional messages, handling of the remains
7840 depends on the execution mode.
7841 No special handling of compressed files is performed.
7843 In interactive mode the user is consecutively asked for the filenames of
7844 the processed parts.
7845 For convenience saving of each part may be skipped by giving an empty
7846 value, the same result as writing it to
7848 Shell piping the part content by specifying a leading vertical bar
7850 character for the filename is supported.
7851 Other user input undergoes the usual
7852 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
7853 including shell pathname wildcard pattern expansions
7855 and shell variable expansion for the message as such, not the individual
7856 parts, and contents of the destination file are overwritten if the file
7858 Character set conversion to
7860 is performed when saving text data.
7862 \*(ID In non-interactive mode any part which does not specify a filename
7863 is ignored, and suspicious parts of filenames of the remaining parts are
7864 URL percent encoded (as via
7866 to prevent injection of malicious character sequences, resulting in
7867 a filename that will be written into the current directory.
7868 Existing files will not be overwritten, instead the part number or
7869 a dot are appended after a number sign
7871 to the name until file creation succeeds (or fails due to other
7876 \*(NQ The sole difference to
7878 is that the new macro is executed in place of the current one, which
7879 will not regain control: all resources of the current macro will be
7881 This implies that any setting covered by
7883 will be forgotten and covered variables will become cleaned up.
7884 If this command is not used from within a
7886 ed macro it will silently be (a more expensive variant of)
7896 \*(NQ \*(UA presents message headers in
7898 fuls as described under the
7901 Without arguments this command scrolls to the next window of messages,
7902 likewise if the argument is
7906 scrolls to the last,
7908 scrolls to the first, and
7913 A number argument prefixed by
7917 indicates that the window is calculated in relation to the current
7918 position, and a number without a prefix specifies an absolute position.
7924 but scrolls to the next or previous window that contains at least one
7935 .\" .Sh COMMAND ESCAPES {{{
7936 .Sh "COMMAND ESCAPES"
7938 Command escapes are available in
7940 during interactive usage, when explicitly requested via
7944 They perform special functions, like editing headers of the message
7945 being composed, calling normal
7947 yielding a shell, etc.
7948 Command escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines, and
7949 consist of an escape followed by a command character.
7952 character is the tilde
7956 Unless otherwise documented command escapes ensure proper updates of
7963 controls whether a failed operation errors out message compose mode and
7964 causes program exit.
7965 Escapes may be prefixed by none to multiple single character command
7966 modifiers, interspersed whitespace is ignored:
7970 An effect equivalent to the command modifier
7972 can be achieved with hyphen-minus
7980 uates the remains of the line; also see
7981 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
7982 \*(ID For now the entire input line is evaluated as a whole; to avoid
7983 that control operators like semicolon
7985 are interpreted unintentionally, they must be quoted.
7989 Addition of the command line to the \*(OPal history can be prevented by
7990 placing whitespace directly after
7994 ings support a compose mode specific context.
7995 The following command escapes are supported:
7998 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
8001 Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single
8003 (If the escape character has been changed,
8004 that character must be doubled instead.)
8007 .It Ic ~! Ar command
8008 Execute the indicated shell
8010 which follows, replacing unescaped exclamation marks with the previously
8011 executed command if the internal variable
8013 is set, then return to the message.
8017 End compose mode and send the message.
8019 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
8021 .Va on-compose-splice ,
8022 in order, will be called when set, after which, in interactive mode
8025 .Va askcc , askbcc )
8028 will be checked as well as
8031 .Va on-compose-leave
8032 hook will be called,
8036 will be joined in if set,
8038 .Va message-inject-tail
8039 will be incorporated, after which the compose mode is left.
8042 .It Ic ~: Ar \*(UA-command Ns \0or Ic ~_ Ar \*(UA-command
8043 Can be used to execute
8045 (which are allowed in compose mode).
8048 .It Ic ~< Ar filename
8053 .It Ic ~<! Ar command
8055 is executed using the shell.
8056 Its standard output is inserted into the message.
8060 \*(OP Write a summary of command escapes.
8063 .It Ic ~@ Op Ar filename...
8064 Append or edit the list of attachments.
8065 Does not manage the error number
8071 if error handling is necessary).
8072 The append mode expects a list of
8074 arguments as shell tokens (see
8075 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ;
8076 token-separating commas are ignored, too), to be
8077 interpreted as documented for the command line option
8079 with the message number exception as below.
8083 arguments the attachment list is edited, entry by entry;
8084 if a filename is left empty, that attachment is deleted from the list;
8085 once the end of the list is reached either new attachments may be
8086 entered or the session can be quit by committing an empty
8089 In non-interactive mode or in batch mode
8091 the list of attachments is effectively not edited but instead recreated;
8092 again, an empty input ends list creation.
8094 For all modes, if a given filename solely consists of the number sign
8096 followed by either a valid message number of the currently active
8097 mailbox, or by a period
8099 referring to the current message of the active mailbox, the so-called
8101 then the given message is attached as a
8104 The number sign must be quoted to avoid misinterpretation as a shell
8108 .It Ic ~| Ar command
8109 Pipe the message text through the specified filter command.
8110 If the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
8111 retain the original text of the message.
8114 is often used as a rejustifying filter.
8116 If the first character of the command is a vertical bar, then the entire
8117 message including header fields is subject to the filter command, so
8118 .Ql ~|| echo Fcc: /tmp/test; cat
8119 will prepend a file-carbon-copy message header.
8125 .It Ic ~^ Ar cmd Op Ar subcmd Op Ar arg3 Op Ar arg4
8126 Low-level compose mode command which shares semantics with
8128 and therefore evaluates its command line as documented in
8129 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" .
8130 Does not manage the error number
8134 errors are handled via the protocol, and hard errors like I/O failures
8138 The protocol consists of command lines followed by (a) response line(s).
8139 The first field of the response line represents a status code
8140 which specifies whether a command was successful or not, whether result
8141 data is to be expected, and if, the format of the result data.
8142 Response data will be shell quoted as necessary for consumption by
8149 Error status code lines may optionally contain additional context:
8153 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql 210"
8155 Status ok; the remains of the line are the result.
8158 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
8159 What follows are lines of result addresses, terminated by an empty line.
8160 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
8161 commands can be issued.
8162 Address lines consist of two token, first the plain network address, e.g.,
8164 followed by the (quoted) full address as known:
8165 .Ql '(Lovely) Bob <bob@exam.ple>' .
8166 Non-network addresses use the first field to indicate the type (hyphen-minus
8168 for files, vertical bar
8170 for pipes, and number sign
8172 for names which will undergo
8174 processing) instead, the actual value will be in the second field.
8177 Status ok; the rest of the line is optionally used for more status.
8178 What follows are lines of furtherly unspecified (quoted) string content,
8179 terminated by an empty line.
8180 All the input, including the empty line, must be consumed before further
8181 commands can be issued.
8184 Syntax error; invalid command.
8187 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
8190 Error: an argument fails verification.
8191 For example an invalid address has been specified (also see
8193 or an attempt was made to modify anything in \*(UA's own namespace,
8194 or a modifying subcommand has been used on a read-only message.
8197 Error: an otherwise valid argument is rendered invalid due to context.
8198 For example, a second address is added to a header which may consist of
8199 a single address only.
8204 If a command indicates failure then the message will have remained
8206 Most commands can fail with
8208 if required arguments are missing, or excessive arguments have been
8209 given (false command usage).
8210 (\*(ID The latter does not yet occur regularly, because as stated in
8211 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
8212 our argument parser is not yet smart enough to work on subcommand base;
8213 for example one might get excess argument error for a three argument
8214 subcommand that receives four arguments, but not for a four argument
8215 subcommand which receives six arguments: here excess will be joined.)
8216 The following (case-insensitive) commands are supported:
8219 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm version"
8221 This command allows listing, removal and addition of message attachments.
8222 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
8224 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
8226 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8228 and prints any known attributes of the first found attachment via
8232 if no such attachment can be found.
8233 The attributes are written as lines with a keyword and a value token.
8236 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8238 and is otherwise identical to
8241 .It Cm attribute-set
8242 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8244 and will set the attribute given as the fourth to the value given as
8245 the fifth token argument.
8246 If the value is an empty token, then the given attribute is removed,
8247 or reset to a default value if existence of the attribute is crucial.
8251 upon success, with the index of the found attachment following,
8253 for message attachments or if the given keyword is invalid, and
8255 if no such attachment can be found.
8256 The following keywords may be used (case-insensitively):
8258 .Bl -hang -compact -width ".It Ql filename"
8260 Sets the filename of the MIME part, i.e., the name that is used for
8261 display and when (suggesting a name for) saving (purposes).
8262 .It Ql content-description
8263 Associate some descriptive information to the attachment's content, used
8264 in favour of the plain filename by some MUAs.
8266 May be used for uniquely identifying MIME entities in several contexts;
8267 this expects a special reference address format as defined in RFC 2045
8270 upon address content verification failure.
8272 Defines the media type/subtype of the part, which is managed
8273 automatically, but can be overwritten.
8274 .It Ql content-disposition
8275 Automatically set to the string
8279 .It Cm attribute-set-at
8280 This uses the same search mechanism as described for
8282 and is otherwise identical to
8286 Adds the attachment given as the third argument, specified exactly as
8287 documented for the command line option
8289 and supporting the message number extension as documented for
8293 upon success, with the index of the new attachment following,
8295 if the given file cannot be opened,
8297 if an on-the-fly performed character set conversion fails, otherwise
8299 is reported; this is also reported if character set conversion is
8300 requested but not available.
8303 List all attachments via
8307 if no attachments exist.
8308 This command is the default command of
8310 if no second argument has been given.
8313 This will remove the attachment given as the third argument, and report
8317 if no such attachment can be found.
8318 If there exists any path component in the given argument, then an exact
8319 match of the path which has been used to create the attachment is used
8320 directly, but if only the basename of that path matches then all
8321 attachments are traversed to find an exact match first, and the removal
8322 occurs afterwards; if multiple basenames match, a
8325 Message attachments are treated as absolute pathnames.
8327 If no path component exists in the given argument, then all attachments
8328 will be searched for
8330 parameter matches as well as for matches of the basename of the path
8331 which has been used when the attachment has been created; multiple
8336 This will interpret the third argument as a number and remove the
8337 attachment at that list position (counting from one!), reporting
8341 if the argument is not a number or
8343 if no such attachment exists.
8348 This command allows listing, inspection, and editing of message headers.
8349 Header name case is not normalized, so that case-insensitive comparison
8350 should be used when matching names.
8351 The second argument specifies the subcommand to apply, one of:
8354 .Bl -hang -width ".It Cm remove"
8356 Create a new or an additional instance of the header given in the third
8357 argument, with the header body content as given in the fourth token.
8360 if the third argument specifies a free-form header field name that is
8361 invalid, or if body content extraction fails to succeed,
8363 if any extracted address does not pass syntax and/or security checks or
8364 on \*(UA namespace violations, and
8366 to indicate prevention of excessing a single-instance header \(em note that
8368 can be appended to (a space separator will be added automatically first).
8375 modifier to enforce treatment as a single addressee, for example
8376 .Ql header insert To?single: 'exa, <m@ple>' ;
8382 is returned upon success, followed by the name of the header and the list
8383 position of the newly inserted instance.
8384 The list position is always 1 for single-instance header fields.
8385 All free-form header fields are managed in a single list; also see
8389 Without a third argument a list of all yet existing headers is given via
8391 this command is the default command of
8393 if no second argument has been given.
8394 A third argument restricts output to the given header only, which may
8397 if no such field is defined.
8400 This will remove all instances of the header given as the third
8405 if no such header can be found, and
8407 on \*(UA namespace violations.
8410 This will remove from the header given as the third argument the
8411 instance at the list position (counting from one!) given with the fourth
8416 if the list position argument is not a number or on \*(UA namespace
8419 if no such header instance exists.
8422 Shows the content of the header given as the third argument.
8423 Dependent on the header type this may respond with
8427 any failure results in
8433 In compose-mode read-only access to optional pseudo headers in the \*(UA
8434 private namespace is available:
8438 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Va BaNg"
8439 .It Ql Mailx-Command:
8440 The name of the command that generates the message, one of
8447 This pseudo header always exists (in compose-mode).
8449 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-To:
8450 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Cc:
8451 .It Ql Mailx-Raw-Bcc:
8452 Represent the frozen initial state of these headers before any
8456 .Va recipients-in-cc
8459 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Sender:
8460 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-From:
8461 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-To:
8462 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Cc:
8463 .It Ql Mailx-Orig-Bcc:
8464 The values of said headers of the original message which has been
8466 .Ic reply , forward , resend .
8467 The sender field is special as it is filled in with the sole sender
8468 according to RFC 5322 rules, it may thus be equal to the from field.
8473 Show an abstract of the above commands via
8477 This command will print the protocol version via
8485 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va Sign .
8490 .Ql Ic ~i Ns \| Va sign .
8493 .It Ic ~b Ar name ...
8494 Add the given names to the list of blind carbon copy recipients.
8497 .It Ic ~c Ar name ...
8498 Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
8502 Read the file specified by the
8504 variable into the message.
8510 on the message collected so far, then return to compose mode.
8512 can be used for a more display oriented editor, and
8514 offers a pipe-based editing approach.
8517 .It Ic ~F Ar messages
8518 Read the named messages into the message being sent, including all
8519 message headers and MIME parts, and honouring
8522 .Va forward-inject-head
8524 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8525 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
8529 .It Ic ~f Ar messages
8530 Read the named messages into the message being sent.
8531 If no messages are specified, read in the current message, the
8533 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
8538 white- and blacklist selection of
8543 .Va forward-inject-head
8545 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8546 For MIME multipart messages,
8547 only the first displayable part is included.
8551 In interactive mode, edit the message header fields
8556 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
8557 The default values for these fields originate from the
8562 In non-interactive mode this sets
8563 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTTY .
8567 In interactive mode, edit the message header fields
8573 by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to edit the field.
8574 In non-interactive mode this sets
8575 .Va ^ERR Ns -NOTTY .
8578 .It Ic ~I Ar variable
8579 Insert the value of the specified variable into the message.
8580 The message remains unaltered if the variable is unset or empty.
8581 Any embedded character sequences
8583 horizontal tabulator and
8585 line feed are expanded in
8587 mode; otherwise the expansion should occur at
8589 time (\*(ID by using the command modifier
8593 .It Ic ~i Ar variable
8596 but appends a newline character.
8599 .It Ic ~M Ar messages
8600 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
8603 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
8608 .Va forward-inject-head
8610 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8613 .It Ic ~m Ar messages
8614 Read the named messages into the message being sent,
8617 If no messages are specified, read the current message, the
8619 Strips down the list of header fields according to the
8621 white- and blacklist selection of
8626 .Va forward-inject-head
8628 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8629 For MIME multipart messages,
8630 only the first displayable part is included.
8634 Display the message collected so far,
8635 prefaced by the message header fields
8636 and followed by the attachment list, if any.
8640 Read in the given / current message(s) using the algorithm of
8642 (except that is implicitly assumed, even if not set), honouring
8647 Abort the message being sent,
8648 copying it to the file specified by the
8655 .It Ic ~R Ar filename
8658 but indent each line that has been read by
8662 .It Ic ~r Ar filename Op Ar HERE-delimiter
8663 Read the named file, object to
8664 .Sx "Filename transformations"
8665 excluding shell globs and variable expansions, into the message; if
8669 then standard input is used (for pasting, for example).
8670 Only in this latter mode
8672 may be given: if it is data will be read in until the given
8674 is seen on a line by itself, and encountering EOF is an error; the
8676 is a required argument in non-interactive mode; if it is single-quote
8677 quoted then the pasted content will not be expanded, \*(ID otherwise
8678 a future version of \*(UA may perform shell-style expansion on the content.
8682 Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
8683 Newline (NL) and carriage-return (CR) bytes are invalid and will be
8684 normalized to space (SP) characters.
8687 .It Ic ~t Ar name ...
8688 Add the given name(s) to the direct recipient list.
8691 .It Ic ~U Ar messages
8692 Read in the given / current message(s) excluding all headers, indented by
8697 .Va forward-inject-head
8699 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8702 .It Ic ~u Ar messages
8703 Read in the given / current message(s), excluding all headers.
8707 .Va forward-inject-head
8709 .Va forward-inject-tail .
8715 editor on the message collected so far, then return to compose mode.
8717 can be used for a less display oriented editor, and
8719 offers a pipe-based editing approach.
8722 .It Ic ~w Ar filename
8723 Write the message onto the named file, which is object to the usual
8724 .Sx "Filename transformations" .
8726 the message is appended to it.
8732 except that the message is not saved at all.
8738 .\" .Sh INTERNAL VARIABLES {{{
8739 .Sh "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
8741 Internal \*(UA variables are controlled via the
8745 commands; prefixing a variable name with the string
8749 has the same effect as using
8756 will give more insight on the given variable(s), and
8758 when called without arguments, will show a listing of all variables.
8759 Both commands support a more
8762 Some well-known variables will also become inherited from the
8765 implicitly, others can be imported explicitly with the command
8767 and henceforth share said properties.
8770 Two different kinds of internal variables exist, and both of which can
8772 There are boolean variables, which can only be in one of the two states
8776 and value variables with a(n optional) string value.
8777 For the latter proper quoting is necessary upon assignment time, the
8778 introduction of the section
8780 documents the supported quoting rules.
8782 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8783 ? wysh set one=val\e 1 two="val 2" \e
8784 three='val "3"' four=$'val \e'4\e''; \e
8785 varshow one two three four; \e
8786 unset one two three four
8790 Dependent upon the actual option string values may become interpreted as
8791 colour names, command specifications, normal text, etc.
8792 They may be treated as numbers, in which case decimal values are
8793 expected if so documented, but otherwise any numeric format and
8794 base that is valid and understood by the
8796 command may be used, too.
8799 There also exists a special kind of string value, the
8800 .Dq boolean string ,
8801 which must either be a decimal integer (in which case
8805 and any other value is true) or any of the (case-insensitive) strings
8811 for a false boolean and
8819 a special kind of boolean string is the
8821 it can optionally be prefixed with the (case-insensitive) term
8825 in interactive mode the user will be prompted, otherwise the actual
8829 Variable chains extend a plain
8834 .Ql variable-USER@HOST
8838 will be converted to all lowercase when looked up (but not when the
8839 variable is set or unset!), \*(OPally IDNA converted, and indeed means
8843 had been specified in the contextual Uniform Resource Locator URL, see
8844 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
8845 Even though this mechanism is based on URLs no URL percent encoding may
8846 be applied to neither of
8850 variable chains need to be specified using raw data;
8851 the mentioned section contains examples.
8852 Variables which support chains are explicitly documented as such, and
8853 \*(UA treats the base name of any such variable special, meaning that
8854 users should not create custom names like
8856 in order to avoid false classifications and treatment of such variables.
8858 .\" .Ss "Initial settings" {{{
8859 .\" (Keep in SYNC: mx/nail.h:okeys, ./nail.rc, ./nail.1:"Initial settings")
8860 .Ss "Initial settings"
8862 The standard POSIX 2008/Cor 2-2016 mandates the following initial
8868 .Pf no Va autoprint ,
8882 .Pf no Va ignoreeof ,
8884 .Pf no Va keepsave ,
8886 .Pf no Va outfolder ,
8894 .Pf no Va sendwait ,
8903 However, \*(UA has built-in some initial (and some default) settings
8904 which (may) diverge, others may become adjusted by one of the
8905 .Sx "Resource files" .
8906 Displaying the former is accomplished via
8908 .Ql $ \*(uA -:/ -v -Xset -Xx .
8909 In general this implementation sets (and has extended the meaning of)
8911 and does not support the
8913 variable \(en use command line options or
8915 to pass options through to a
8917 The default global resource file sets, among others, the variables
8922 establishes a default
8924 selection etc., and should thus be taken into account.
8927 .\" .Ss "Variables" {{{
8930 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
8934 \*(RO The exit status of the last command, or the
8939 This status has a meaning in the state machine: in conjunction with
8941 any non-0 exit status will cause a program exit, and in
8943 mode any error while loading (any of the) resource files will have the
8947 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
8948 can be used to instruct the state machine to ignore errors.
8952 \*(RO The current error number
8953 .Pf ( Xr errno 3 ) ,
8954 which is set after an error occurred; it is also available via
8956 and the error name and documentation string can be queried via
8960 \*(ID This machinery is new and the error number is only really usable
8961 if a command explicitly states that it manages the variable
8963 for others errno will be used in case of errors, or
8965 if that is 0: it thus may or may not reflect the real error.
8966 The error number may be set with the command
8972 \*(RO This is a multiplexer variable which performs dynamic expansion of
8973 the requested state or condition, of which there are:
8975 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
8979 .It Va ^ERR , ^ERRDOC , ^ERRNAME
8980 The number, documentation, and name of the current
8982 respectively, which is usually set after an error occurred.
8983 The documentation is an \*(OP, the name is used if not available.
8984 \*(ID This machinery is new and is usually reliable only if a command
8985 explicitly states that it manages the variable
8987 which is effectively identical to
8989 Each of those variables can be suffixed with a hyphen minus followed by
8990 a name or number, in which case the expansion refers to the given error.
8991 Note this is a direct mapping of (a subset of) the system error values:
8992 .Bd -literal -offset indent
8994 eval echo \e$1: \e$^ERR-$1:\e
8995 \e$^ERRNAME-$1: \e$^ERRDOC-$1
8996 vput vexpr i + "$1" 1
9006 .It Va ^ERRQUEUE-COUNT , ^ERRQUEUE-EXISTS
9007 The number of messages present in the \*(OPal log queue of
9009 and a boolean which indicates whether the queue is not empty,
9010 respectively; both are always 0 unless
9019 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
9021 separated by the first character of the value of
9023 \*(ID The special semantics of the equally named special parameter of the
9025 are not yet supported.
9029 \*(RO Expands all positional parameters (see
9031 separated by a space character.
9032 If placed in double quotation marks, each positional parameter is
9033 properly quoted to expand to a single parameter again.
9037 \*(RO Expands to the number of positional parameters, i.e., the size of
9038 the positional parameter stack in decimal.
9042 \*(RO Inside the scope of a
9046 ed macro this expands to the name of the calling macro, or to the empty
9047 string if the macro is running from top-level.
9048 For the \*(OPal regular expression search and replace operator of
9050 this expands to the entire matching expression.
9051 It represents the program name in global context.
9055 \*(RO Access of the positional parameter stack.
9056 All further parameters can be accessed with this syntax, too,
9059 etc.; positional parameters can be shifted off the stack by calling
9061 The parameter stack contains, for example, the arguments of a
9065 d macro, the matching groups of the \*(OPal regular expression search
9066 and replace expression of
9068 and can be explicitly created or overwritten with the command
9073 \*(RO Is set to the active
9077 .It Va add-file-recipients
9078 \*(BO When file or pipe recipients have been specified,
9079 mention them in the corresponding address fields of the message instead
9080 of silently stripping them from their recipient list.
9081 By default such addressees are not mentioned.
9085 \*(BO Causes only the local part to be evaluated
9086 when comparing addresses.
9090 \*(BO Causes messages saved in the
9092 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
9094 to be appended to the end rather than prepended.
9095 This should always be set.
9099 \*(BO Causes the prompts for
9103 lists to appear after the message has been edited.
9107 \*(BO If set, \*(UA asks an interactive user for files to attach at the
9108 end of each message; An empty line finalizes the list.
9112 \*(BO Causes the interactive user to be prompted for carbon copy
9113 recipients (at the end of each message if
9121 \*(BO Causes the interactive user to be prompted for blind carbon copy
9122 recipients (at the end of each message if
9130 \*(BO Causes the interactive user to be prompted for confirmation to
9131 send the message or reenter compose mode after having been shown
9132 a preliminary envelope summary.
9136 \*(BO\*(OP Causes the interactive user to be prompted if the message is
9137 to be signed at the end of each message.
9140 variable is ignored when this variable is set.
9144 .\" The alternative *ask* is not documented on purpose
9145 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to prompt the interactive user for the subject upon
9146 entering compose mode unless a subject already exists.
9150 A sequence of characters to display in the
9154 as shown in the display of
9156 each for one type of messages (see
9157 .Sx "Message states" ) ,
9158 with the default being
9161 .Ql NU\ \ *HMFAT+\-$~
9164 variable is set, in the following order:
9166 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _"
9188 \*(ID start of a (collapsed) thread in threaded mode (see
9192 \*(ID an uncollapsed thread in threaded mode; only used in conjunction with
9197 classified as possible spam.
9203 Specifies a list of recipients to which a blind carbon copy of each
9204 outgoing message will be sent automatically.
9208 Specifies a list of recipients to which a carbon copy of each outgoing
9209 message will be sent automatically.
9213 \*(BO Causes threads to be collapsed automatically when .Ql thread Ns
9216 mode is entered (see the
9222 \*(BO Enable automatic
9224 ing of a(n existing)
9230 commands: the message that becomes the new
9232 is shown automatically, as via
9239 Causes sorted mode (see the
9241 command) to be entered automatically with the value of this variable as
9242 sorting method when a folder is opened, for example
9243 .Ql set autosort=thread .
9247 \*(BO Enables the substitution of all not (reverse-solidus) escaped
9250 characters by the contents of the last executed command for the
9252 shell escape command and
9254 one of the compose mode
9255 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
9256 If this variable is not set no reverse solidus stripping is performed.
9260 \*(OB Predecessor of
9261 .Va bind-inter-byte-timeout .
9262 \*(ID Setting this automatically sets the successor.
9265 .It Va bind-inter-byte-timeout
9266 \*(OP Terminals may generate multi-byte sequences for special function
9267 keys, for example, but these sequences may not become read as a unit.
9268 And multi-byte sequences can be defined freely via
9270 This variable specifies the timeout in milliseconds that the MLE (see
9271 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
9272 waits for more bytes to arrive unless it considers a sequence
9274 The default is 200, the maximum is about 10 seconds.
9275 In the following example the comments state which sequences are
9276 affected by this timeout:
9277 .Bd -literal -offset indent
9278 ? bind base abc echo 0 # abc
9279 ? bind base ab,c echo 1 # ab
9280 ? bind base abc,d echo 2 # abc
9281 ? bind base ac,d echo 3 # ac
9282 ? bind base a,b,c echo 4
9283 ? bind base a,b,c,d echo 5
9284 ? bind base a,b,cc,dd echo 6 # cc and dd
9288 .It Va bind-inter-key-timeout
9291 sequences do not time out by default.
9292 If this variable is set, then the current key sequence is forcefully
9293 terminated once the timeout (in milliseconds) triggers.
9294 The value should be (maybe significantly) larger than
9295 .Va bind-inter-byte-timeout ,
9296 but may not excess the maximum, too.
9300 \*(BO Sets some cosmetical features to traditional BSD style;
9301 has the same affect as setting
9303 and all other variables prefixed with
9305 it also changes the behaviour of
9307 (which does not exist in BSD).
9311 \*(BO Changes the letters shown in the first column of a header
9312 summary to traditional BSD style.
9316 \*(BO Changes the display of columns in a header summary to traditional
9321 \*(BO Changes some informational messages to traditional BSD style.
9327 field to appear immediately after the
9329 field in message headers and with the
9331 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
9337 .It Va build-cc , build-ld , build-os , build-rest
9338 \*(RO The build environment, including the compiler, the linker, the
9339 operating system \*(UA has been build for, usually taken from
9343 and then lowercased, as well as all the possibly interesting rest of the
9344 configuration and build environment.
9345 This information is also available in the
9347 output of the command
9352 The value that should appear in the
9356 MIME header fields when no character set conversion of the message data
9358 This defaults to US-ASCII, and the chosen character set should be
9359 US-ASCII compatible.
9363 \*(OP The default 8-bit character set that is used as an implicit last
9364 member of the variable
9366 This defaults to UTF-8 if character set conversion capabilities are
9367 available, and to ISO-8859-1 otherwise (unless the operating system
9368 environment is known to always and exclusively support UTF-8 locales),
9369 in which case the only supported character set is
9371 and this variable is effectively ignored.
9374 .It Va charset-unknown-8bit
9375 \*(OP RFC 1428 specifies conditions when internet mail gateways shall
9377 the content of a mail message by using a character set with the name
9379 Because of the unclassified nature of this character set \*(UA will not
9380 be capable to convert this character set to any other character set.
9381 If this variable is set any message part which uses the character set
9383 is assumed to really be in the character set given in the value,
9384 otherwise the (final) value of
9386 is used for this purpose.
9388 This variable will also be taken into account if a MIME type (see
9389 .Sx "The mime.types files" )
9390 of a MIME message part that uses the
9392 character set is forcefully treated as text.
9396 The default value for the
9401 .It Va colour-disable
9402 \*(BO\*(OP Forcefully disable usage of colours.
9403 Also see the section
9404 .Sx "Coloured display" .
9408 \*(BO\*(OP Whether colour shall be used for output that is paged through
9410 Note that pagers may need special command line options, for example
9418 in order to support colours.
9419 Often doing manual adjustments is unnecessary since \*(UA may perform
9420 adjustments dependent on the value of the environment variable
9422 (see there for more).
9426 .It Va contact-mail , contact-web
9427 \*(RO Addresses for contact per email and web, respectively, for
9428 bug reports, suggestions, or anything else regarding \*(UA.
9429 The former can be used directly:
9430 .Ql \&? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
9436 .It Va content-description-forwarded-message , \
9437 content-description-quote-attachment , \
9438 content-description-smime-message , \
9439 content-description-smime-signature
9440 \*(OP(partially) Strings which will be placed in according
9441 .Ql Content-Description:
9442 headers if non-empty.
9443 They all have default values, for example
9444 .Ql Forwarded message .
9448 In a(n interactive) terminal session, then if this valued variable is
9449 set it will be used as a threshold to determine how many lines the given
9450 output has to span before it will be displayed via the configured
9454 can be forced by setting this to the value
9456 setting it without a value will deduce the current height of the
9457 terminal screen to compute the threshold (see
9462 \*(ID At the moment this uses the count of lines of the message in wire
9463 format, which, dependent on the
9465 of the message, is unrelated to the number of display lines.
9466 (The software is old and historically the relation was a given thing.)
9470 Define a set of custom headers to be injected into newly composed or
9472 A custom header consists of the field name followed by a colon
9474 and the field content body.
9475 Standard header field names cannot be overwritten by a custom header,
9476 with the exception of
9480 Different to the command line option
9482 the variable value is interpreted as a comma-separated list of custom
9483 headers: to include commas in header bodies they need to become escaped
9484 with reverse solidus
9486 Headers can be managed more freely in
9491 .Dl ? set customhdr='Hdr1: Body1-1\e, Body1-2, Hdr2: Body2'
9495 Controls the appearance of the
9497 date and time format specification of the
9499 variable, that is used, for example, when viewing the summary of
9501 If unset, then the local receiving date is used and displayed
9502 unformatted, otherwise the message sending
9504 It is possible to assign a
9506 format string and control formatting, but embedding newlines via the
9508 format is not supported, and will result in display errors.
9510 .Ql %Y-%m-%d %H:%M ,
9512 .Va datefield-markout-older .
9515 .It Va datefield-markout-older
9516 Only used in conjunction with
9518 Can be used to create a visible distinction of messages dated more than
9519 a day in the future, or older than six months, a concept comparable to the
9521 option of the POSIX utility
9523 If set to the empty string, then the plain month, day and year of the
9525 will be displayed, but a
9527 format string to control formatting can be assigned.
9533 \*(BO (Almost) Enter a debug-only sandbox mode which generates many
9534 log messages, disables the actual delivery of messages, and also implies
9542 .It Va disposition-notification-send
9544 .Ql Disposition-Notification-To:
9545 header (RFC 3798) with the message.
9549 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-HOST
9551 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
9552 .\" for SMTP accounts on a specific host.
9553 .\" TODO .It Va disposition-notification-send-USER@HOST
9555 .\".Va disposition-notification-send
9556 .\"for a specific account.
9560 \*(BO When dot is set, a period
9562 on a line by itself during message input in (interactive or batch
9565 will be treated as end-of-message (in addition to the
9566 normal end-of-file condition).
9567 This behaviour is implied in
9573 .It Va dotlock-disable
9574 \*(BO\*(OP Disable creation of
9579 .It Va dotlock-ignore-error
9580 \*(OB\*(BO\*(OP Ignore failures when creating
9582 .Sx "dotlock files" .
9589 If this variable is set then the editor is started automatically when
9590 a message is composed in interactive mode.
9591 If the value starts with the letter
9593 then this acts as if
9597 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" )
9601 variable is implied for this automatically spawned editor session.
9605 \*(BO When a message is edited while being composed,
9606 its header is included in the editable text.
9610 \*(BO When entering interactive mode \*(UA normally writes
9611 .Dq \&No mail for user
9612 and exits immediately if a mailbox is empty or does not exist.
9613 If this variable is set \*(UA starts even with an empty or non-existent
9614 mailbox (the latter behaviour furtherly depends upon
9620 \*(BO Let each command with a non-0 exit status, including every
9624 s a non-0 status, cause a program exit unless prefixed by
9627 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) .
9629 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ,
9630 but which use a different modifier for ignoring the error.
9631 Please refer to the variable
9633 for more on this topic.
9637 \*(OP Maximum number of entries in the
9643 The first character of this value defines the escape character for
9644 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9646 .Sx "Compose mode" .
9647 The default value is the character tilde
9649 If set to the empty string, command escapes are disabled.
9654 If unset only user name and email address recipients are allowed
9655 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" .
9656 If set without value all possible recipient types will be accepted.
9657 A value is parsed as a comma-separated list of case-insensitive strings,
9658 and if that contains
9660 behaviour equals the former except when in interactive mode or if
9661 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9666 in which case it equals the latter, allowing all address types.
9669 .Ql restrict,\:-all,\:+name,\:+addr ,
9670 so care for ordering issues must be taken.
9673 Recipient types can be added and removed with a plus sign
9677 prefix, respectively.
9678 By default invalid or disallowed types are filtered out and
9679 cause a warning, hard send errors need to be enforced by including
9687 header targets regardless of other settings,
9689 file targets (it includes
9692 command pipeline targets,
9694 user names still unexpanded after
9698 processing and thus left for expansion by the
9700 (invalid for the built-in SMTP one), and
9703 Targets are interpreted in the given order, so that
9704 .Ql restrict,\:fail,\:+file,\:-all,\:+addr
9705 will cause hard errors for any non-network address recipient address
9706 unless running interactively or having been started with the option
9710 in the latter case(s) any type may be used.
9713 User name receivers addressing valid local users can be expanded to
9714 fully qualified network addresses (also see
9719 Historically invalid recipients were stripped off without causing
9720 errors, this can be changed by making
9722 an entry of the list (it really acts like
9723 .Ql failinvaddr,\:+addr ) .
9726 .Pf (really\0\: Ql domaincheck,\:+addr )
9727 compares address domain names against a whitelist and strips off
9729 for hard errors) addressees which fail this test; the domain name
9731 and the non-empty value of
9733 (the real hostname otherwise) are always whitelisted,
9734 .Va expandaddr-domaincheck
9735 can be set to extend this list.
9736 Finally some address providers (for example
9738 and all other command line recipients) will be evaluated as
9739 if specified within dollar-single-quotes (see
9740 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" )
9741 if the value list contains the string
9746 .It Va expandaddr-domaincheck
9747 Can be set to a comma-separated list of domain names which should be
9748 whitelisted for the evaluation of the
9752 IDNA encoding is not automatically performed,
9754 can be used to prepare the domain (of an address).
9758 Unless this variable is set additional
9760 (Mail-Transfer-Agent)
9761 arguments from the command line, as can be given after a
9763 separator, results in a program termination with failure status.
9764 The same can be accomplished by using the special (case-insensitive) value
9766 A lesser strict variant is the otherwise identical
9768 which does accept such arguments in interactive mode, or if tilde
9769 commands were enabled explicitly by using one of the command line options
9773 The empty value will allow unconditional usage.
9777 \*(RO String giving a list of optional features.
9778 Features are preceded with a plus sign
9780 if they are available, with a hyphen-minus
9783 To ease substring matching the string starts and ends with a comma.
9784 The output of the command
9786 includes this information in a more pleasant output.
9790 \*(BO This setting reverses the meanings of a set of reply commands,
9791 turning the lowercase variants, which by default address all recipients
9792 included in the header of a message
9793 .Pf ( Ic reply , respond , followup )
9794 into the uppercase variants, which by default address the sender only
9795 .Pf ( Ic Reply , Respond , Followup )
9800 The default path under which mailboxes are to be saved:
9801 filenames that begin with the plus sign
9803 will have the plus sign replaced with the value of this variable if set,
9804 otherwise the plus sign will remain unchanged when doing
9805 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
9808 for more on this topic, and know about standard imposed implications of
9810 The value supports a subset of transformations itself, and if the
9811 non-empty value does not start with a solidus
9815 will be prefixed automatically.
9816 Once the actual value is evaluated first, the internal variable
9818 will be updated for caching purposes.
9821 .It Va folder-hook-FOLDER , Va folder-hook
9824 macro which will be called whenever a
9827 The macro will also be invoked when new mail arrives,
9828 but message lists for commands executed from the macro
9829 only include newly arrived messages then.
9831 are activated by default in a folder hook, causing the covered settings
9832 to be reverted once the folder is left again.
9834 The specialized form will override the generic one if
9836 matches the file that is opened.
9837 Unlike other folder specifications, the fully expanded name of a folder,
9838 without metacharacters, is used to avoid ambiguities.
9839 However, if the mailbox resides under
9843 specification is tried in addition, so that if
9847 (and thus relative to the user's home directory) then
9848 .Pa /home/usr1/mail/sent
9850 .Ql folder-hook-/home/usr1/mail/sent
9851 first, but then followed by
9852 .Ql folder-hook-+sent .
9855 .It Va folder-resolved
9856 \*(RO Set to the fully resolved path of
9858 once that evaluation has occurred; rather internal.
9862 \*(BO Controls whether a
9863 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
9864 header is generated when sending messages to known mailing lists.
9865 The user as determined via
9867 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
9869 will be placed in there if any list addressee is not a subscribed list.
9871 .Va followup-to-honour
9873 .Ic mlist , mlsubscribe , reply
9878 .It Va followup-to-add-cc
9879 \*(BO Controls whether the user will be added to the messages'
9881 list in addition to placing an entry in
9882 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
9887 .It Va followup-to-honour
9889 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
9890 header is honoured when group-replying to a message via
9897 if set without a value it defaults to
9903 .It Va forward-add-cc
9904 \*(BO Whether senders of messages forwarded via
9905 .Ic ~F , ~f , ~m , ~U
9908 shall be made members of the carbon copies
9913 .It Va forward-as-attachment
9914 \*(BO Original messages are normally sent as inline text with the
9917 and only the first part of a multipart message is included.
9918 With this setting enabled messages are sent as unmodified MIME
9920 attachments with all of their parts included.
9924 .It Va forward-inject-head , forward-inject-tail
9925 The strings to put before and after the text of a message with the
9927 command, respectively.
9928 The former defaults to
9929 .Ql -------- Original Message --------\en .
9930 Special format directives in these strings will be expanded if possible,
9931 and if so configured the output will be folded according to
9933 for more please refer to
9934 .Va quote-inject-head .
9935 Injections will not be performed by
9938 .Va forward-as-attachment
9940 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
9941 .Ic ~F , ~f , ~M , ~m , ~U , ~u
9947 The address (or a list of addresses) to put into the
9949 field of the message header, quoting RFC 5322:
9950 the author(s) of the message, that is, the mailbox(es) of the person(s)
9951 or system(s) responsible for the writing of the message.
9952 According to that RFC setting the
9954 variable is required if
9956 contains more than one address.
9957 \*(ID Please expect automatic management of the
9962 Dependent on the context these addresses are handled as if they were in
9967 If a file-based MTA is used, then
9969 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
9971 can nonetheless be used as the envelope sender address at the MTA
9972 protocol level (the RFC 5321 reverse-path), either via the
9974 command line option (without argument; see there for more), or by setting
9975 .Va r-option-implicit .
9978 If the machine's hostname is not valid at the Internet (for example at
9979 a dialup machine), then either this variable or
9983 adds even more fine-tuning capabilities with
9985 have to be set: if so the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
9989 will be created (except when disallowed by
9990 .Va message-id-disable
9997 \*(BO Due to historical reasons comments and name parts of email
9998 addresses are removed by default when sending mail, replying to or
9999 forwarding a message.
10000 If this variable is set such stripping is not performed.
10003 \*(OB Predecessor of
10004 .Va forward-inject-head .
10008 \*(BO Causes the header summary to be written at startup and after
10009 commands that affect the number of messages or the order of messages in
10014 mode a header summary will also be displayed on folder changes.
10015 The command line option
10023 A format string to use for the summary of
10025 Format specifiers in the given string start with a percent sign
10027 and may be followed by an optional decimal number indicating the field
10028 width \(em if that is negative, the field is to be left-aligned.
10029 Names and addresses are subject to modifications according to
10033 Valid format specifiers are:
10036 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
10038 A plain percent sign.
10041 a space character but for the current message
10043 for which it expands to
10046 .Va headline-plain ) .
10049 a space character but for the current message
10051 for which it expands to
10054 .Va headline-plain ) .
10056 \*(OP The spam score of the message, as has been classified via the
10059 Shows only a replacement character if there is no spam support.
10061 Message attribute character (status flag); the actual content can be
10062 adjusted by setting
10065 The date found in the
10067 header of the message when
10069 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
10070 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
10075 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
10077 The indenting level in
10083 The address of the message sender.
10085 The message thread tree structure.
10086 (Note that this format does not support a field width, and honours
10087 .Va headline-plain . )
10089 Mailing list status: is the addressee of the message a known
10098 announces the presence of a RFC 2369
10100 header, which makes a message a valuable target of
10103 The number of lines of the message, if available.
10107 The number of octets (bytes) in the message, if available.
10109 Message subject (if any) in double quotes.
10111 Message subject (if any).
10113 The position in threaded/sorted order.
10115 The value 0 except in an IMAP mailbox,
10116 where it expands to the UID of the message.
10120 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %-18f\ %16d\ %4l/%\-5o\ %i%-s ,
10122 .Ql %>\&%a\&%m\ %20-f\ \ %16d\ %3l/%\-5o\ %i%-S
10130 .Va headline-bidi .
10134 .It Va headline-bidi
10135 Bidirectional text requires special treatment when displaying headers,
10136 because numbers (in dates or for file sizes etc.) will not affect the
10137 current text direction, in effect resulting in ugly line layouts when
10138 arabic or other right-to-left text is to be displayed.
10139 On the other hand only a minority of terminals is capable to correctly
10140 handle direction changes, so that user interaction is necessary for
10141 acceptable results.
10142 Note that extended host system support is required nonetheless, e.g.,
10143 detection of the terminal character set is one precondition;
10144 and this feature only works in an Unicode (i.e., UTF-8) locale.
10146 In general setting this variable will cause \*(UA to encapsulate text
10147 fields that may occur when displaying
10149 (and some other fields, like dynamic expansions in
10151 with special Unicode control sequences;
10152 it is possible to fine-tune the terminal support level by assigning
10154 no value (or any value other than
10159 will make \*(UA assume that the terminal is capable to properly deal
10160 with Unicode version 6.3, in which case text is embedded in a pair of
10161 U+2068 (FIRST STRONG ISOLATE) and U+2069 (POP DIRECTIONAL ISOLATE)
10163 In addition no space on the line is reserved for these characters.
10165 Weaker support is chosen by using the value
10167 (Unicode 6.3, but reserve the room of two spaces for writing the control
10168 sequences onto the line).
10173 select Unicode 1.1 support (U+200E, LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK); the latter
10174 again reserves room for two spaces in addition.
10177 .It Va headline-plain
10178 \*(BO On Unicode (UTF-8) aware terminals enhanced graphical symbols are
10179 used by default for certain entries of
10181 If this variable is set only basic US-ASCII symbols will be used.
10184 .It Va history-file
10185 \*(OP The (expandable) location of a permanent
10187 file for the MLE line editor
10188 .Pf ( Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ) .
10193 .It Va history-gabby
10194 \*(OP Add more entries to the MLE
10196 as is normally done.
10197 A comma-separated list of case-insensitive strings can be used to
10198 fine-tune which gabby entries shall be allowed.
10201 erroneous commands will also be added.
10203 adds all optional entries, and is the fallback chattiness identifier of
10204 .Va on-history-addition .
10207 .It Va history-gabby-persist
10210 entries will not be saved in persistent storage unless this variable is set.
10211 The knowledge of whether a persistent entry was gabby is not lost.
10216 .It Va history-size
10217 \*(OP Setting this variable imposes a limit on the number of concurrent
10220 If set to the value 0 then no further history entries will be added,
10221 and loading and incorporation of the
10223 upon program startup can also be suppressed by doing this.
10224 Runtime changes will not be reflected before the
10226 is saved or loaded (again).
10230 \*(BO This setting controls whether messages are held in the system
10232 and it is set by default.
10236 Used instead of the value obtained from
10240 as the hostname when expanding local addresses, for example in
10243 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" ,
10244 for expansion of addresses that have a valid user-, but no domain
10245 name in angle brackets).
10248 or this variable is set the message and MIME part related unique ID fields
10252 will be created (except when disallowed by
10253 .Va message-id-disable
10256 If the \*(OPal IDNA support is available (see
10258 variable assignment is aborted when a necessary conversion fails.
10260 Setting it to the empty string will cause the normal hostname to be
10261 used, but nonetheless enables creation of said ID fields.
10262 \*(IN in conjunction with the built-in SMTP
10265 also influences the results:
10266 one should produce some test messages with the desired combination of
10274 .It Va idna-disable
10275 \*(BO\*(OP Can be used to turn off the automatic conversion of domain
10276 names according to the rules of IDNA (internationalized domain names
10278 Since the IDNA code assumes that domain names are specified with the
10280 character set, an UTF-8 locale charset is required to represent all
10281 possible international domain names (before conversion, that is).
10285 The input field separator that is used (\*(ID by some functions) to
10286 determine where to split input data.
10288 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
10290 Unsetting is treated as assigning the default value,
10293 If set to the empty value, no field splitting will be performed.
10295 If set to a non-empty value, all whitespace characters are extracted
10296 and assigned to the variable
10300 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It MMM"
10303 will be ignored at the beginning and end of input.
10304 Diverging from POSIX shells default whitespace is removed in addition,
10305 which is owed to the entirely different line content extraction rules.
10307 Each occurrence of a character of
10309 will cause field-splitting, any adjacent
10311 characters will be skipped.
10316 \*(RO Automatically deduced from the whitespace characters in
10321 \*(BO Ignore interrupt signals from the terminal while entering
10322 messages; instead echo them as
10324 characters and discard the current line.
10328 \*(BO Ignore end-of-file conditions
10329 .Pf ( Ql control-D )
10332 on message input and in interactive command input.
10333 If set an interactive command input session can only be left by
10334 explicitly using one of the commands
10338 and message input in compose mode can only be terminated by entering
10341 on a line by itself or by using the
10343 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ;
10344 Setting this implies the behaviour that
10352 If this is set to a non-empty string it will specify the user's
10354 .Sx "primary system mailbox" ,
10357 and the system-dependent default, and (thus) be used to replace
10360 .Sx "Filename transformations" ;
10363 for more on this topic.
10364 The value supports a subset of transformations itself.
10366 .It Va indentprefix
10371 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
10374 option for indenting messages,
10375 in place of the POSIX mandated default tabulator character
10382 \*(BO If set, an empty
10384 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
10385 file is not removed.
10386 Note that, in conjunction with
10388 mode any empty file will be removed unless this variable is set.
10389 This may improve the interoperability with other mail user agents
10390 when using a common folder directory, and prevents malicious users
10391 from creating fake mailboxes in a world-writable spool directory.
10392 \*(ID Only local regular (MBOX) files are covered, Maildir and other
10393 mailbox types will never be removed, even if empty.
10396 .It Va keep-content-length
10397 \*(BO When (editing messages and) writing MBOX mailbox files \*(UA can
10398 be told to keep the
10399 .Ql Content-Length:
10402 header fields that some MUAs generate by setting this variable.
10403 Since \*(UA does neither use nor update these non-standardized header
10404 fields (which in itself shows one of their conceptual problems),
10405 stripping them should increase interoperability in between MUAs that
10406 work with with same mailbox files.
10407 Note that, if this is not set but
10408 .Va writebackedited ,
10409 as below, is, a possibly performed automatic stripping of these header
10410 fields already marks the message as being modified.
10411 \*(ID At some future time \*(UA will be capable to rewrite and apply an
10413 to modified messages, and then those fields will be stripped silently.
10417 \*(BO When a message is saved it is usually discarded from the
10418 originating folder when \*(UA is quit.
10419 This setting causes all saved message to be retained.
10422 .It Va line-editor-cpl-word-breaks
10423 \*(OP List of bytes which are used by the
10425 tabulator completion to decide where word boundaries exist, by default
10427 \*(ID This mechanism is yet restricted.
10430 .It Va line-editor-disable
10431 \*(BO Turn off any line editing capabilities (from \*(UAs POW, see
10432 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor"
10436 .It Va line-editor-no-defaults
10437 \*(BO\*(OP Do not establish any default key binding.
10441 Error log message prefix string
10442 .Pf ( Ql "\*(uA: " ) .
10445 .It Va mailbox-display
10446 \*(RO The name of the current mailbox
10447 .Pf ( Ic folder ) ,
10448 possibly abbreviated for display purposes.
10451 .It Va mailbox-resolved
10452 \*(RO The fully resolved path of the current mailbox.
10455 .It Va mailcap-disable
10456 \*(BO\*(OP Turn off consideration of MIME type handlers from,
10457 and implicit loading of
10458 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
10461 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
10462 An additional startup file that is loaded as the last of the
10463 .Sx "Resource files" .
10464 Use this file for commands that are not understood by other POSIX
10466 implementations, i.e., mostly anything which is not covered by
10467 .Sx "Initial settings" .
10470 .It Va markanswered
10471 \*(BO When a message is replied to and this variable is set,
10472 it is marked as having been
10475 .Sx "Message states" .
10478 .It Va mbox-fcc-and-pcc
10479 \*(BO By default all file and pipe message receivers (see
10481 will be fed valid MBOX database entry message data (see
10483 .Va mbox-rfc4155 ) ,
10484 and existing file targets will become extended in compliance to RFC 4155.
10485 If this variable is unset then a plain standalone RFC 5322 message will
10486 be written, and existing file targets will be overwritten.
10489 .It Va mbox-rfc4155
10490 \*(BO When opening MBOX mailbox databases, and in order to achieve
10491 compatibility with old software, the very tolerant POSIX standard rules
10492 for detecting message boundaries (so-called
10494 lines) are used instead of the stricter rules from the standard RFC 4155.
10495 This behaviour can be switched by setting this variable.
10497 This may temporarily be handy when \*(UA complains about invalid
10499 lines when opening a MBOX: in this case setting this variable and
10500 re-opening the mailbox in question may correct the result.
10501 If so, copying the entire mailbox to some other file, as in
10502 .Ql copy * SOME-FILE ,
10503 will perform proper, all-compatible
10505 quoting for all detected messages, resulting in a valid MBOX mailbox.
10506 (\*(ID The better and non-destructive approach is to re-encode invalid
10507 messages, as if it would be created anew, instead of mangling the
10509 lines; this requires the structural code changes of the v15 rewrite.)
10510 Finally the variable can be unset again:
10511 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10513 localopts yes; wysh set mbox-rfc4155;\e
10514 wysh File "${1}"; copy * "${2}"
10516 call mboxfix /tmp/bad.mbox /tmp/good.mbox
10521 \*(BO Internal development variable.
10522 (Keeps memory debug enabled even if
10527 .It Va message-id-disable
10528 \*(BO By setting this variable the generation of
10532 message and MIME part headers can be completely suppressed, effectively
10533 leaving this task up to the
10535 (Mail-Transfer-Agent) or the SMTP server.
10536 Note that according to RFC 5321 a SMTP server is not required to add this
10537 field by itself, so it should be ensured that it accepts messages without
10541 .It Va message-inject-head
10542 A string to put at the beginning of each new message, followed by a newline.
10543 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
10547 are understood (use the
10551 ting the variable(s) instead).
10554 .It Va message-inject-tail
10555 A string to put at the end of each new message, followed by a newline.
10556 \*(OB The escape sequences tabulator
10560 are understood (use the
10564 ting the variable(s) instead).
10566 .Va on-compose-leave .
10570 \*(BO Usually, when an
10572 expansion contains the sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
10573 Setting this option suppresses these removals.
10578 option to be passed through to the
10580 (Mail-Transfer-Agent); though most of the modern MTAs no longer document
10581 this flag, no MTA is known which does not support it (for historical
10585 .It Va mime-allow-text-controls
10586 \*(BO When sending messages, each part of the message is MIME-inspected
10587 in order to classify the
10590 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding:
10592 .Va mime-encoding )
10593 that is required to send this part over mail transport, i.e.,
10594 a computation rather similar to what the
10596 command produces when used with the
10600 This classification however treats text files which are encoded in
10601 UTF-16 (seen for HTML files) and similar character sets as binary
10602 octet-streams, forcefully changing any
10607 .Ql application/octet-stream :
10608 If that actually happens a yet unset charset MIME parameter is set to
10610 effectively making it impossible for the receiving MUA to automatically
10611 interpret the contents of the part.
10613 If this variable is set, and the data was unambiguously identified as
10614 text data at first glance (by a
10618 file extension), then the original
10620 will not be overwritten.
10623 .It Va mime-alternative-favour-rich
10624 \*(BO If this variable is set then rich MIME alternative parts (e.g.,
10625 HTML) will be preferred in favour of included plain text versions when
10626 displaying messages, provided that a handler exists which produces
10627 output that can be (re)integrated into \*(UA's normal visual display.
10630 .It Va mime-counter-evidence
10633 field is used to decide how to handle MIME parts.
10634 Some MUAs, however, do not use
10635 .Sx "The mime.types files"
10637 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
10638 or a similar mechanism to correctly classify content, but specify an
10639 unspecific MIME type
10640 .Pf ( Ql application/octet-stream )
10641 even for plain text attachments.
10642 If this variable is set then \*(UA will try to re-classify such MIME
10643 message parts, if possible, for example via a possibly existing
10644 attachment filename.
10645 A non-empty value may also be given, in which case a number is expected,
10646 actually a carrier of bits, best specified as a binary value, like
10649 .Bl -bullet -compact
10651 If bit two is set (counting from 1, decimal 2) then the detected
10653 will be carried along with the message and be used for deciding which
10654 MIME handler is to be used, for example;
10655 when displaying such a MIME part the part-info will indicate the
10656 overridden content-type by showing a plus sign
10659 If bit three is set (decimal 4) then the counter-evidence is always
10660 produced and a positive result will be used as the MIME type, even
10661 forcefully overriding the parts given MIME type.
10663 If bit four is set (decimal 8) as a last resort the actual content of
10664 .Ql application/octet-stream
10665 parts will be inspected, so that data which looks like plain text can be
10667 This mode is even more relaxed when data is to be displayed to the user
10668 or used as a message quote (data consumers which mangle data for display
10669 purposes, which includes masking of control characters, for example).
10674 .It Va mime-encoding
10676 .Ql Content-Transfer-Encoding
10677 to use in outgoing text messages and message parts, where applicable
10678 (7-bit clean text messages are without an encoding if possible):
10681 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
10683 .Pf (Or\0 Ql 8b . )
10684 8-bit transport effectively causes the raw data be passed through
10685 unchanged, but may cause problems when transferring mail messages over
10686 channels that are not ESMTP (RFC 1869) compliant.
10687 Also, several input data constructs are not allowed by the
10688 specifications and may cause a different transfer-encoding to be used.
10689 By established rules and popular demand occurrences of
10693 will be MBOXO quoted (prefixed with greater-than sign
10695 instead of causing a non-destructive encoding like
10696 .Ql quoted-printable
10697 to be chosen, unless context (like message signing) requires otherwise.
10699 .It Ql quoted-printable
10700 .Pf (Or\0 Ql qp . )
10701 Quoted-printable encoding is 7-bit clean and has the property that ASCII
10702 characters are passed through unchanged, so that an english message can
10703 be read as-is; it is also acceptable for other single-byte locales that
10704 share many characters with ASCII, for example ISO-8859-1.
10705 The encoding will cause a large overhead for messages in other character
10706 sets: for example it will require up to twelve (12) bytes to encode
10707 a single UTF-8 character of four (4) bytes.
10708 It is the default encoding.
10711 .Pf (Or\0 Ql b64 . )
10712 This encoding is 7-bit clean and will always be used for binary data.
10713 This encoding has a constant input:output ratio of 3:4, regardless of
10714 the character set of the input data it will encode three bytes of input
10715 to four bytes of output.
10716 This transfer-encoding is not human readable without performing
10722 .It Va mime-force-sendout
10723 \*(BO\*(OP Whenever it is not acceptable to fail sending out messages
10724 because of non-convertible character content this variable may be set.
10725 It will, as a last resort, classify the part content as
10726 .Ql application/octet-stream .
10727 Please refer to the section
10728 .Sx "Character sets"
10729 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
10732 .It Va mimetypes-load-control
10733 Can be used to control which of
10734 .Sx "The mime.types files"
10735 are loaded: if the letter
10737 is part of the option value, then the user's personal
10739 file will be loaded (if it exists); likewise the letter
10741 controls loading of the system wide
10743 directives found in the user file take precedence, letter matching is
10745 If this variable is not set \*(UA will try to load both files.
10746 Incorporation of the \*(UA-built-in MIME types cannot be suppressed,
10747 but they will be matched last (the order can be listed via
10750 More sources can be specified by using a different syntax: if the
10751 value string contains an equals sign
10753 then it is instead parsed as a comma-separated list of the described
10756 pairs; the given filenames will be expanded and loaded, and their
10757 content may use the extended syntax that is described in the section
10758 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
10759 Directives found in such files always take precedence (are prepended to
10760 the MIME type cache).
10765 Select an alternate Mail-Transfer-Agent by either specifying the full
10766 pathname of an executable (a
10768 prefix may be given), or \*(OPally a SMTP aka SUBMISSION protocol URL \*(IN:
10770 .Dl submissions://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10773 .Ql [smtp://]server[:port] . )
10774 The default has been chosen at compile time.
10775 MTA data transfers are always performed in asynchronous child processes,
10776 and without supervision unless either the
10783 \*(OPally expansion of
10785 can be performed by setting
10789 For testing purposes there is the
10791 pseudo-MTA, which dumps to standard output or optionally to a file,
10793 .Va mbox-fcc-and-pcc :
10795 .Bd -literal -offset indent
10796 $ echo text | \*(uA -:/ -Smta=test -s ubject ex@am.ple
10797 $ </dev/null \*(uA -:/ -Smta=test://./xy ex@am.ple
10801 For a file-based MTA it may be necessary to set
10803 in in order to choose the right target of a modern
10806 It will be passed command line arguments from several possible sources:
10809 if set, from the command line if given and the variable
10812 Argument processing of the MTA will be terminated with a
10817 The otherwise occurring implicit usage of the following MTA command
10818 line arguments can be disabled by setting the boolean variable
10819 .Va mta-no-default-arguments
10820 (which will also disable passing
10824 (for not treating a line with only a dot
10826 character as the end of input),
10828 (shall the variable
10834 variable is set); in conjunction with the
10836 command line option or
10837 .Va r-option-implicit
10839 as well as possibly
10841 will (not) be passed.
10844 \*(OPally \*(UA can send mail over SMTP aka SUBMISSION network
10845 connections to a single defined smart host by setting this variable to
10846 a SMTP or SUBMISSION URL (see
10847 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
10848 An authentication scheme can be specified via the variable chain
10850 Encrypted network connections are \*(OPally available, the section
10851 .Sx "Encrypted network communication"
10852 should give an overview and provide links to more information on this.
10853 Note that with some mail providers it may be necessary to set the
10855 variable in order to use a specific combination of
10860 Network communication socket timeouts are configurable via
10861 .Va socket-connect-timeout .
10862 All generated network traffic may be proxied over a SOCKS
10864 it can be logged by setting
10867 The following SMTP variants may be used:
10871 The plain SMTP protocol (RFC 5321) that normally lives on the
10872 server port 25 and requires setting the
10873 .Va smtp-use-starttls
10874 variable to enter a TLS encrypted session state.
10875 Assign a value like \*(IN
10876 .Ql smtp://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10878 .Ql smtp://server[:port] )
10879 to choose this protocol.
10881 The so-called SMTPS which is supposed to live on server port 465
10882 and is automatically TLS secured.
10883 Unfortunately it never became a standardized protocol and may thus not
10884 be supported by your hosts network service database
10885 \(en in fact the port number has already been reassigned to other
10888 SMTPS is nonetheless a commonly offered protocol and thus can be
10889 chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
10890 .Ql smtps://[user[:password]@]server[:port]
10892 .Ql smtps://server[:port] ) ;
10893 due to the mentioned problems it is usually necessary to explicitly
10894 specify the port as
10898 The SUBMISSION protocol (RFC 6409) lives on server port 587 and
10899 is identically to the SMTP protocol from \*(UA's point of view;
10900 it requires setting
10901 .Va smtp-use-starttls
10902 to enter a TLS secured session state; e.g., \*(IN
10903 .Ql submission://[user[:password]@]server[:port] .
10905 The SUBMISSIONS protocol (RFC 8314) that lives on server port 465 and is
10906 TLS secured by default.
10907 It can be chosen by assigning a value like \*(IN
10908 .Ql submissions://[user[:password]@]server[:port] .
10909 Due to the problems mentioned for SMTPS above and the fact that
10910 SUBMISSIONS is new and a successor that lives on the same port as the
10911 historical engineering mismanagement named SMTPS, it is usually
10912 necessary to explicitly specify the port as
10919 \*(OP If set to a path pointing to a text file in valid MTA (Postfix)
10921 format, the file is loaded and cached (manageable with
10923 and henceforth plain
10927 message receiver names are recursively expanded as a last expansion
10928 step, after the distribution lists which can be created with
10932 content support: only local addresses (names) which are valid usernames
10933 .Pf ( Ql [a-z_][a-z0-9_-]*[$]? )
10934 are treated as expandable aliases, and \*(ID
10935 .Ql :include:/file/name
10936 directives are not supported.
10941 it can be asserted that only expanded names (mail addresses) are passed
10942 through to the MTA.
10945 .It Va mta-arguments
10946 Arguments to pass through to a file-based
10948 (Mail-Transfer-Agent), parsed according to
10949 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
10950 into an array of arguments which will be joined onto MTA options
10951 from other sources, for example
10952 .Ql \&? wysh set mta-arguments='-t -X \&"/tmp/my log\&"' .
10955 .It Va mta-no-default-arguments
10956 \*(BO Avoids passing standard command line options to a file-based
10958 (please see there).
10961 .It Va mta-no-receiver-arguments
10962 \*(BO By default all receiver addresses will be passed as command line
10963 options to a file-based
10965 Setting this variable disables this behaviour to aid those MTAs which
10966 employ special treatment of such arguments.
10967 Doing so can make it necessary to pass a
10970 .Va mta-arguments ,
10971 to testify the MTA that it should use the passed message as a template.
10975 Many systems use a so-called
10977 environment to ensure compatibility with
10979 This works by inspecting the name that was used to invoke the mail
10981 If this variable is set then the mailwrapper (the program that is
10982 actually executed when calling the file-based
10984 will treat its contents as that name.
10988 \*(BO In violation of RFC 5322 some MTAs do not remove
10990 header lines from transported messages after having noted the respective
10991 receivers for addressing purposes.
10992 (The MTAs Exim and Courier for example require the command line option
10994 to enforce removal.)
10995 Unless this is set corresponding receivers are addressed by
10996 protocol-specific means or MTA command line options only, the header
10997 itself is stripped before being sent over the wire.
10999 .Mx Va netrc-lookup
11000 .It Va netrc-lookup-USER@HOST , netrc-lookup-HOST , netrc-lookup
11001 \*(BO\*(IN\*(OP Used to control usage of the user's
11003 file for lookup of account credentials, as documented in the section
11004 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup"
11005 and for the command
11008 .Sx "The .netrc file"
11009 documents the file format.
11021 then \*(UA will read the output of a shell pipe instead of the user's
11023 file if this variable is set (to the desired shell command).
11024 This can be used to, for example, store
11027 .Ql \&? set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp' .
11031 \*(OP If this variable has the value
11033 newly created local folders will be in Maildir instead of MBOX format.
11037 Checks for new mail in the current folder each time the prompt is shown.
11038 A Maildir folder must be re-scanned to determine if new mail has arrived.
11039 If this variable is set to the special value
11041 then a Maildir folder will not be rescanned completely, but only
11042 timestamp changes are detected.
11043 Maildir folders are \*(OPal.
11047 \*(BO Causes a non-absolute filename specified in
11049 as well as the sender-based filenames of the
11055 commands to be interpreted relative to the
11057 directory rather than relative to the current directory.
11059 .Mx Va on-account-cleanup
11060 .It Va on-account-cleanup-ACCOUNT , Va on-account-cleanup
11061 Macro hook which will be called once an
11063 is left, as the very last step before unrolling per-account
11065 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, including those generated
11066 by switching to the account as such, and it is advisable to perform only
11067 absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
11070 The specialized form is used in favour of the generic one if found.
11073 .It Va on-compose-cleanup
11074 Macro hook which will be called after the message has been sent (or not,
11075 in case of failures), as the very last step before unrolling compose mode
11077 This hook is run even in case of fatal errors, and it is advisable to
11078 perform only absolutely necessary actions, like cleaning up
11082 For compose mode hooks that may affect the message content please see
11083 .Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave , on-compose-splice .
11084 \*(ID This hook exists because
11085 .Ic alias , alternates , commandalias , shortcut ,
11086 to name a few, are neither covered by
11090 changes applied in compose mode will continue to be in effect thereafter.
11095 .It Va on-compose-enter , on-compose-leave
11096 Macro hooks which will be called once compose mode is entered,
11097 and after composing has been finished, respectively;
11098 the exact order of the steps taken is documented for
11101 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11102 Context about the message being worked on can be queried via
11105 are enabled for these hooks, and changes on variables will be forgotten
11106 after the message has been sent.
11107 .Va on-compose-cleanup
11108 can be used to perform other necessary cleanup steps.
11111 Here is an example that injects a signature via
11112 .Va message-inject-tail ;
11114 .Va on-compose-splice
11115 to simply inject the file of desire via
11119 may be a better approach.
11121 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11123 vput ! i cat ~/.mysig
11125 vput csop message-inject-tail trim-end $i
11129 readctl create ~/.mysig
11133 vput csop message-inject-tail trim-end $i
11135 readctl remove ~/.mysig
11138 set on-compose-leave=t_ocl
11144 .It Va on-compose-splice , on-compose-splice-shell
11145 These hooks run once the normal compose mode is finished, but before the
11146 .Va on-compose-leave
11147 macro hook is called etc.
11148 Both hooks will be executed in a subprocess, with their input and output
11149 connected to \*(UA such that they can act as if they would be an
11151 The difference in between them is that the latter is a
11153 command, whereas the former is a normal
11155 d macro, but which is restricted to a small set of commands (the
11157 output of for example
11159 will indicate said capability).
11161 are enabled for these hooks (in the parent process), causing any setting
11162 to be forgotten after the message has been sent;
11163 .Va on-compose-cleanup
11164 can be used to perform other cleanup as necessary.
11167 During execution of these hooks \*(UA will temporarily forget whether it
11168 has been started in interactive mode, (a restricted set of)
11169 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
11170 will always be available, and for guaranteed reproducibilities sake
11174 will be set to their defaults.
11175 The compose mode command
11177 has been especially designed for scriptability (via these hooks).
11178 The first line the hook will read on its standard input is the protocol
11179 version of said command escape, currently
11181 backward incompatible protocol changes have to be expected.
11184 Care must be taken to avoid deadlocks and other false control flow:
11185 if both involved processes wait for more input to happen at the
11186 same time, or one does not expect more input but the other is stuck
11187 waiting for consumption of its output, etc.
11188 There is no automatic synchronization of the hook: it will not be
11189 stopped automatically just because it, e.g., emits
11191 The hooks will however receive a termination signal if the parent enters
11192 an error condition.
11193 \*(ID Protection against and interaction with signals is not yet given;
11194 it is likely that in the future these scripts will be placed in an
11195 isolated session, which is signalled in its entirety as necessary.
11197 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11198 define ocs_signature {
11200 echo '~< ~/.mysig' # '~<! fortune pathtofortunefile'
11202 set on-compose-splice=ocs_signature
11204 wysh set on-compose-splice-shell=$'\e
11206 printf "hello $version! Headers: ";\e
11207 echo \e'~^header list\e';\e
11208 read status result;\e
11209 echo "status=$status result=$result";\e
11214 echo Splice protocol version is $version
11215 echo '~^h l'; read hl; vput csop es subs "${hl}" 0 1
11217 echoerr 'Cannot read header list'; echo '~x'; xit
11219 if "$hl" !%?case ' cc'
11220 echo '~^h i cc "Diet is your <mirr.or>"'; read es;\e
11221 vput csop es substring "${es}" 0 1
11223 echoerr 'Cannot insert Cc: header'; echo '~x'
11224 # (no xit, macro finishes anyway)
11228 set on-compose-splice=ocsm
11233 .It Va on-history-addition
11234 This hook will be called if an entry is about to be added to the
11236 of the MLE, as documented in
11237 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
11238 It will be called with three arguments: the first is the name of the
11241 the second is either an empty string or the matching
11243 type, and the third being the complete command line to be added.
11244 The entry will not be added to history if the hook uses a non-0
11246 \*(ID A future version will give the expanded command name as the third
11247 argument, followed by the tokenized command line as parsed in the
11248 remaining arguments, the first of which is the original unexpanded
11249 command name; i.e., one may do
11250 .Ql Ic shift Ns \| 4
11251 and will then be able to access the positional parameters as usual via
11256 .It Va on-main-loop-tick
11257 This hook will be called whenever the program's main event loop is
11258 about to read the next input line.
11259 Note variable and other changes it performs are not scoped as via
11263 .It Va on-program-exit
11264 This hook will be called when the program exits, whether via
11268 or because the send mode is done.
11270 this runs late and so terminal settings etc. are already teared down.
11273 .It Va on-resend-cleanup
11275 .Va on-compose-cleanup ,
11276 but is only triggered by
11280 .It Va on-resend-enter
11282 .Va on-compose-enter ,
11283 but is only triggered by
11285 currently there is no
11287 support, for example.
11291 \*(BO If set, each message feed through the command given for
11293 is followed by a formfeed character
11297 .It Va password-USER@HOST , password-HOST , password
11298 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a password, which is used in case none has
11299 been given in the protocol and account-specific URL;
11300 as a last resort \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal if
11301 the authentication method requires a password.
11302 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
11303 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
11305 .It Va password-USER@HOST
11306 \*(OU (see the chain above for \*(IN)
11307 Set the password for
11311 If no such variable is defined for a host,
11312 the user will be asked for a password on standard input.
11313 Specifying passwords in a startup file is generally a security risk;
11314 the file should be readable by the invoking user only.
11318 \*(BO Send messages to the
11320 command without performing MIME and character set conversions.
11324 .It Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
11325 When a MIME message part of type
11327 (case-insensitive) is displayed or quoted,
11328 its text is filtered through the value of this variable interpreted as
11330 Note that only parts which can be displayed inline as plain text (see
11331 .Cd copiousoutput )
11332 are displayed unless otherwise noted, other MIME parts will only be
11333 considered by and for the command
11337 The special value question mark
11339 forces interpretation of the message part as plain text, for example
11340 .Ql set pipe-application/xml=?
11341 will henceforth display XML
11343 (The same could also be achieved by adding a MIME type marker with the
11346 And \*(OPally MIME type handlers may be defined via
11347 .Sx "The Mailcap files"
11348 \(em these directives,
11350 has already been used, should be referred to for further documentation.
11355 can in fact be used as a trigger character to adjust usage and behaviour
11356 of a following shell command specification more thoroughly by appending
11357 more special characters which refer to further mailcap directives, for
11358 example the following hypothetical command specification could be used:
11360 .Bd -literal -offset indent
11361 ? set pipe-X/Y='?!++=? vim ${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}'
11365 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql __"
11367 The command produces plain text to be integrated in \*(UAs output:
11368 .Cd copiousoutput .
11371 If set the handler will not be invoked when a message is to be quoted,
11372 but only when it will be displayed:
11373 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
11376 Run the command asynchronously, i.e., without blocking \*(UA:
11377 .Cd x-mailx-async .
11378 The standard output of the command will go to
11382 The command must be run on an interactive terminal, \*(UA will
11383 temporarily release the terminal to it:
11384 .Cd needsterminal .
11387 Request creation of a zero-sized temporary file, the absolute pathname
11388 of which will be made accessible via the environment variable
11389 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY :
11390 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
11391 If given twice then the file will be unlinked automatically by \*(UA
11392 when the command loop is entered again at latest:
11393 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink ;
11394 it is an error to use automatic deletion in conjunction with
11395 .Cd x-mailx-async .
11398 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
11399 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
11400 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
11401 .Pf ( Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill ) ,
11402 the creation of which is implied; in order to cause automatic deletion
11403 of the temporary file two plus signs
11405 still have to be used.
11408 To avoid ambiguities with normal shell command content another
11409 question mark can be used to forcefully terminate interpretation of
11410 remaining characters.
11411 (Any character not in this list will have the same effect.)
11415 Some information about the MIME part to be displayed is embedded into
11416 the environment of the shell command:
11419 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ev _AIL__ILENAME__ENERATED"
11421 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT
11422 The MIME content-type of the part, if known, the empty string otherwise.
11425 .It Ev MAILX_CONTENT_EVIDENCE
11427 .Va mime-counter-evidence
11428 includes the carry-around-bit (2), then this will be set to the detected
11429 MIME content-type; not only then identical to
11430 .Ev \&\&MAILX_CONTENT
11434 .It Ev MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL
11436 .Ql message/external-body access-type=url
11437 will store the access URL in this variable, it is empty otherwise.
11438 URL targets should not be activated automatically, without supervision.
11441 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME
11442 The filename, if any is set, the empty string otherwise.
11445 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
11449 .It Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY
11450 If temporary file creation has been requested through the command prefix
11451 this variable will be set and contain the absolute pathname of the
11457 .It Va pipe-EXTENSION
11458 This is identical to
11459 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE
11462 (normalized to lowercase using character mappings of the ASCII charset)
11463 names a file extension, for example
11465 Handlers registered using this method take precedence.
11468 .It Va pop3-auth-USER@HOST , pop3-auth-HOST , pop3-auth
11469 \*(OP\*(IN Variable chain that sets the POP3 authentication method.
11470 Supported are the default
11477 .Sx "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?" ) ,
11482 for TLS secured connections which pass a client certificate via
11483 .Va tls-config-pairs .
11484 There may be the \*(OPal method \*(IN
11487 does not need any user credentials,
11493 the remains also require a
11496 solely builds upon the credentials passed via a client certificate,
11497 and is usually the way to go since tested servers do not actually follow
11498 RFC 4422, and fail if additional credentials are actually passed.
11503 method will \*(OPally be replaced with APOP if possible (see there).
11505 .Mx Va pop3-bulk-load
11506 .It Va pop3-bulk-load-USER@HOST , pop3-bulk-load-HOST , pop3-bulk-load
11507 \*(BO\*(OP When accessing a POP3 server \*(UA loads the headers of
11508 the messages, and only requests the message bodies on user request.
11509 For the POP3 protocol this means that the message headers will be
11511 If this variable is set then \*(UA will download only complete messages
11512 from the given POP3 server(s) instead.
11514 .Mx Va pop3-keepalive
11515 .It Va pop3-keepalive-USER@HOST , pop3-keepalive-HOST , pop3-keepalive
11516 \*(OP POP3 servers close the connection after a period of inactivity;
11517 the standard requires this to be at least 10 minutes,
11518 but practical experience may vary.
11519 Setting this variable to a numeric value greater than
11523 command to be sent each value seconds if no other operation is performed.
11525 .Mx Va pop3-no-apop
11526 .It Va pop3-no-apop-USER@HOST , pop3-no-apop-HOST , pop3-no-apop
11527 \*(BO\*(OP Unless this variable is set the MD5 based
11529 authentication method will be used instead of a chosen
11532 when connecting to a POP3 server that advertises support.
11535 is that only a single packet is sent for the user/password tuple.
11536 (Originally also that the password is not sent in clear text over the
11537 wire, but for one MD5 does not any longer offer sufficient security,
11538 and then today transport is almost ever TLS secured.)
11540 .Va pop3-no-apop-HOST
11543 .Mx Va pop3-use-starttls
11544 .It Va pop3-use-starttls-USER@HOST , pop3-use-starttls-HOST , pop3-use-starttls
11545 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
11547 command to make an unencrypted POP3 session TLS encrypted.
11548 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
11549 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the POP3S method.
11551 .Va pop3-use-starttls-HOST
11557 \*(BO This flag enables POSIX mode, which changes behaviour of \*(UA
11558 where that deviates from standardized behaviour.
11559 It is automatically squared with the environment variable
11560 .Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT ,
11561 changing the one will adjust the other.
11562 The following behaviour is covered and enforced by this mechanism:
11565 .Bl -bullet -compact
11567 In non-interactive mode, any error encountered while loading resource
11568 files during program startup will cause a program exit, whereas in
11569 interactive mode such errors will stop loading of the currently loaded
11570 (stack of) file(s, i.e., recursively).
11571 These exits can be circumvented on a per-command base by using
11574 .Sx "Command modifiers" ,
11575 for each command which shall be allowed to fail.
11579 will replace the list of alternate addresses instead of appending to it.
11580 In addition alternates will only be honoured for any sort of message
11585 The variable inserting
11586 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
11592 will expand embedded character sequences
11594 horizontal tabulator and
11597 \*(ID For compatibility reasons this step will always be performed.
11600 Reading in messages via
11602 .Pf ( Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" )
11611 Upon changing the active
11615 will be displayed even if
11622 implies the behaviour described by
11628 is extended to cover any empty mailbox, not only empty
11630 .Sx "primary system mailbox" Ns
11631 es: they will be removed when they are left in empty state otherwise.
11636 .It Va print-alternatives
11637 \*(BO When a MIME message part of type
11638 .Ql multipart/alternative
11639 is displayed and it contains a subpart of type
11641 other parts are normally discarded.
11642 Setting this variable causes all subparts to be displayed,
11643 just as if the surrounding part was of type
11644 .Ql multipart/mixed .
11648 The string used as a prompt in interactive mode.
11649 Whenever the variable is evaluated the value is treated as if specified
11650 within dollar-single-quotes (see
11651 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting" ) .
11652 This (post-assignment, i.e., second) expansion can be used to embed
11653 status information, for example
11658 .Va mailbox-display .
11660 In order to embed characters which should not be counted when
11661 calculating the visual width of the resulting string, enclose the
11662 characters of interest in a pair of reverse solidus escaped brackets:
11664 a slot for coloured prompts is also available with the \*(OPal command
11666 Prompting may be prevented by setting this to the null string
11668 .Ql set noprompt ) .
11672 This string is used for secondary prompts, but is otherwise identical to
11679 \*(BO Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
11683 If set messages processed by variants of
11687 will start with the original message, lines of which prefixed by
11689 taking into account
11693 No headers will be quoted when set without value or for
11700 selection will be included in the quote,
11702 embeds the (body) contents of all MIME parts, and
11704 also includes all headers.
11705 The quoted message will be enclosed by the expansions of
11706 .Va quote-inject-head
11708 .Va quote-inject-tail .
11711 .Va quote-as-attachment
11715 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
11718 .It Va quote-add-cc
11719 \*(BO Whether senders of messages quoted via
11721 shall be made members of the carbon copies
11726 .It Va quote-as-attachment
11727 \*(BO Add the original message in its entirety as a
11729 MIME attachment when replying to a message.
11730 Note this works regardless of the setting of
11735 Can be set to a string consisting of non-whitespace ASCII characters
11736 which shall be treated as quotation leaders, the default being
11741 \*(OP Can be set in addition to
11743 and creates a more fancy quotation in that leading quotation characters
11744 .Pf ( Va quote-chars )
11745 are compressed and overlong lines are folded.
11747 can be set to either one, two or three (space separated) numeric values,
11748 which are interpreted as the maximum (goal) and the minimum line length,
11749 respectively, in a spirit rather equal to the
11751 program, but line- instead of paragraph-based.
11752 The third value is used as the maximum line length instead of the first
11753 if no better break point can be found; it is ignored unless it is larger
11754 than the minimum and smaller than the maximum.
11755 If not set explicitly the minimum will reflect the goal algorithmically.
11756 The goal cannot be smaller than the length of
11758 plus some additional pad; necessary adjustments take place silently.
11763 .It Va quote-inject-head , quote-inject-tail
11764 The strings to put before and after the text of a
11766 d message, if non-empty, and respectively.
11767 The former defaults to
11768 .Ql %f wrote:\en\en .
11769 Special format directives will be expanded if possible, and if so
11770 configured the output will be folded according to
11772 Format specifiers in the given strings start with a percent sign
11774 and expand values of the original message, unless noted otherwise.
11775 Note that names and addresses are not subject to the setting of
11777 Valid format specifiers are:
11780 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ql _%%_"
11782 A plain percent sign.
11784 The address(es) of the sender(s).
11786 The date found in the
11788 header of the message when
11790 is set (the default), otherwise the date when the message was received.
11791 Formatting can be controlled by assigning a
11796 .Va datefield-markout-older ) .
11798 The full name(s) (name and address, as given) of the sender(s).
11803 The real name(s) of the sender(s) if there is one and
11805 allows usage, the address(es) otherwise.
11807 The senders real name(s) if there is one, the address(es) otherwise.
11812 .It Va r-option-implicit
11813 \*(BO Setting this option evaluates the contents of
11815 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
11817 and passes the results onto the used (file-based) MTA as described for the
11819 option (empty argument case).
11822 .It Va recipients-in-cc
11829 as well as addressees which possibly came in via
11832 .Ql Mail-Followup-To:
11833 are by default merged into the new
11835 If this variable is set a sensitive algorithm tries to place in
11837 only the sender of the message being replied to, others are placed in
11842 Unless this variable is defined, no copies of outgoing mail will be saved.
11843 If defined it gives the pathname, subject to the usual
11844 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
11845 of a folder where all new, replied-to or forwarded messages are saved:
11846 when saving to this folder fails the message is not sent, but instead
11850 The standard defines that relative (fully expanded) paths are to be
11851 interpreted relative to the current directory
11853 to force interpretation relative to
11856 needs to be set in addition.
11859 .It Va record-files
11860 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
11862 will be extended to cover messages which target only file and pipe
11865 These address types will not appear in recipient lists unless
11866 .Va add-file-recipients
11870 .It Va record-resent
11871 \*(BO If this variable is set the meaning of
11873 will be extended to also cover the
11880 .It Va reply-in-same-charset
11881 \*(BO If this variable is set \*(UA first tries to use the same
11882 character set of the original message for replies.
11883 If this fails, the mechanism described in
11884 .Sx "Character sets"
11885 is evaluated as usual.
11888 .It Va reply-strings
11889 Can be set to a comma-separated list of (case-insensitive according to
11890 ASCII rules) strings which shall be recognized in addition to the
11891 built-in strings as
11893 reply message indicators \(en built-in are
11895 which is mandated by RFC 5322, as well as the german
11900 which often has been seen in the wild;
11901 I.e., the separating colon has to be specified explicitly.
11905 A list of addresses to put into the
11907 field of the message header.
11908 Members of this list are handled as if they were in the
11917 .It Va reply-to-honour
11920 header is honoured when replying to a message via
11927 if set without a value it defaults to
11931 .It Va reply-to-swap-in
11932 Standards like DKIM and (in conjunction with) DMARC caused many
11933 .Sx "Mailing lists"
11934 to use sender address rewriting in the style of
11935 .Ql Name via List <list@address> ,
11936 where the original sender address often being placed in
11938 If this is set and a
11940 exists, and consists of only one addressee (!), then that is used in
11941 place of the pretended sender.
11942 This works independently from
11943 .Va reply-to-honour .
11944 The optional value, a comma-separated list of strings, offers more
11945 fine-grained control on when swapping shall be used; for now supported is
11947 here swapping occurs if the sender is a mailing-list as defined by
11951 .It Va rfc822-body-from_
11952 \*(BO This variable can be used to force displaying a so-called
11954 line for messages that are embedded into an envelope mail via the
11956 MIME mechanism, for more visual convenience, also see
11961 \*(BO Enable saving of (partial) messages in
11963 upon interrupt or delivery error.
11967 The number of lines that represents a
11976 line display and scrolling via
11978 If this variable is not set \*(UA falls back to a calculation based upon
11979 the detected terminal window size and the baud rate: the faster the
11980 terminal, the more will be shown.
11981 Overall screen dimensions and pager usage is influenced by the
11982 environment variables
11990 .It Va searchheaders
11991 \*(BO Expand message list specifiers in the form
11993 to all messages containing the substring
11995 in the header field
11997 The string search is case insensitive.
12000 .It Va sendcharsets
12001 \*(OP A comma-separated list of character set names that can be used in
12002 outgoing internet mail.
12003 The value of the variable
12005 is automatically appended to this list of character sets.
12006 If no character set conversion capabilities are compiled into \*(UA then
12007 the only supported charset is
12010 .Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
12011 and refer to the section
12012 .Sx "Character sets"
12013 for the complete picture of character set conversion in \*(UA.
12016 .It Va sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
12017 \*(BO\*(OP If this variable is set, but
12019 is not, then \*(UA acts as if
12021 had been set to the value of the variable
12023 In effect this combination passes through the message data in the
12024 character set of the current locale encoding:
12025 therefore mail message text will be (assumed to be) in ISO-8859-1
12026 encoding when send from within a ISO-8859-1 locale, and in UTF-8
12027 encoding when send from within an UTF-8 locale.
12031 never comes into play as
12033 is implicitly assumed to be 8-bit and capable to represent all files the
12034 user may specify (as is the case when no character set conversion
12035 support is available in \*(UA and the only supported character set is
12038 .Sx "Character sets" ) .
12039 This might be a problem for scripts which use the suggested
12041 setting, since in this case the character set is US-ASCII by definition,
12042 so that it is better to also override
12044 then; and/or do something like the following in the resource file:
12045 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12046 # Avoid ASCII "propagates to 8-bit" when scripting
12047 \eif ! t && "$LC_ALL" != C && "$LC_CTYPE" != C
12048 \eset sendcharsets-else-ttycharset
12054 An address that is put into the
12056 field of outgoing messages, quoting RFC 5322: the mailbox of the agent
12057 responsible for the actual transmission of the message.
12058 This field should normally not be used unless the
12060 field contains more than one address, on which case it is required.
12061 \*(ID Please expect automatic management of the
12066 Dependent on the context this address is handled as if it were in
12071 .Va r-option-implicit .
12074 \*(OB Predecessor of
12077 .It Va sendmail-arguments
12078 \*(OB Predecessor of
12079 .Va mta-arguments .
12081 .It Va sendmail-no-default-arguments
12082 \*(OB\*(BO Predecessor of
12083 .Va mta-no-default-arguments .
12085 .It Va sendmail-progname
12086 \*(OB Predecessor of
12091 Sending messages to the chosen
12093 or to command-pipe receivers (see
12094 .Sx "On sending mail, and non-interactive mode" )
12095 will be performed asynchronously.
12096 This means that only startup errors of the respective program will be
12097 recognizable, but no delivery errors.
12098 Also, no guarantees can be made as to when the respective program will
12099 actually run, as well as to when they will have produced output.
12101 If this variable is set then child program exit is waited for, and its
12102 exit status code is used to decide about success.
12103 Remarks: in conflict with the POSIX standard this variable is built-in
12104 to be initially set.
12105 Another difference is that it can have a value, which is interpreted as
12106 a comma-separated list of case-insensitive strings naming specific
12107 subsystems for which synchronousness shall be ensured (only).
12108 Possible values are
12114 for command-pipe receivers.
12118 \*(BO This setting causes \*(UA to start at the last message
12119 instead of the first one when opening a mail folder, as well as with
12126 \*(BO Causes \*(UA to use the sender's real name instead of the plain
12127 address in the header field summary and in message specifications.
12131 \*(BO Causes the recipient of the message to be shown in the header
12132 summary if the message was sent by the user.
12139 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12141 .Va message-inject-tail ,
12142 .Va on-compose-leave
12144 .Va on-compose-splice .
12151 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" .
12153 .Va message-inject-tail ,
12154 .Va on-compose-leave
12156 .Va on-compose-splice .
12161 .Va on-compose-splice
12163 .Va on-compose-splice-shell
12165 .Va on-compose-leave
12167 .Va message-inject-tail
12171 .It Va skipemptybody
12172 \*(BO If an outgoing message has an empty first or only message part, do
12173 not send, but discard it, successfully (also see the command line option
12178 .It Va smime-ca-dir , smime-ca-file
12179 \*(OP Specify the location of trusted CA certificates in PEM (Privacy
12180 Enhanced Mail) for the purpose of verification of S/MIME signed messages.
12182 documents the necessary preparation steps to use the former.
12183 The set of CA certificates which are built into the TLS library can
12184 be explicitly turned off by setting
12185 .Va smime-ca-no-defaults ,
12186 and further fine-tuning is possible via
12187 .Va smime-ca-flags .
12190 .It Va smime-ca-flags
12191 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
12192 storage, and the certificate verification that is used.
12193 The actual values and their meanings are documented for
12197 .It Va smime-ca-no-defaults
12198 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
12199 used to TLS library to verify S/MIME signed messages.
12201 .Mx Va smime-cipher
12202 .It Va smime-cipher-USER@HOST , smime-cipher
12203 \*(OP Specifies the cipher to use when generating S/MIME encrypted
12204 messages (for the specified account).
12205 RFC 5751 mandates a default of
12208 Possible values are (case-insensitive and) in decreasing cipher strength:
12216 (DES EDE3 CBC, 168 bits; default if
12218 is not available) and
12220 (DES CBC, 56 bits).
12222 The actually available cipher algorithms depend on the cryptographic
12223 library that \*(UA uses.
12224 \*(OP Support for more cipher algorithms may be available through
12225 dynamic loading via
12226 .Xr EVP_get_cipherbyname 3
12227 (OpenSSL) if \*(UA has been compiled to support this.
12230 .It Va smime-crl-dir
12231 \*(OP Specifies a directory that contains files with CRLs in PEM format
12232 to use when verifying S/MIME messages.
12235 .It Va smime-crl-file
12236 \*(OP Specifies a file that contains a CRL in PEM format to use when
12237 verifying S/MIME messages.
12240 .It Va smime-encrypt-USER@HOST
12241 \*(OP If this variable is set, messages send to the given receiver are
12242 encrypted before sending.
12243 The value of the variable must be set to the name of a file that
12244 contains a certificate in PEM format.
12246 If a message is sent to multiple recipients,
12247 each of them for whom a corresponding variable is set will receive an
12248 individually encrypted message;
12249 other recipients will continue to receive the message in plain text
12251 .Va smime-force-encryption
12253 It is recommended to sign encrypted messages, i.e., to also set the
12256 .Va content-description-smime-message
12257 will be inspected for messages which become encrypted.
12260 .It Va smime-force-encryption
12261 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to refuse sending unencrypted messages.
12265 \*(BO\*(OP S/MIME sign outgoing messages with the user's
12267 private key and include the users certificate as a MIME attachment.
12268 Signing a message enables a recipient to verify that the sender used
12269 a valid certificate,
12270 that the email addresses in the certificate match those in the message
12271 header and that the message content has not been altered.
12272 It does not change the message text,
12273 and people will be able to read the message as usual.
12274 .Va content-description-smime-signature
12277 .Va smime-sign-cert , smime-sign-include-certs
12279 .Va smime-sign-digest .
12281 .Mx Va smime-sign-cert
12282 .It Va smime-sign-cert-USER@HOST , smime-sign-cert
12283 \*(OP Points to a file in PEM format.
12284 For the purpose of signing and decryption this file needs to contain the
12285 user's private key, followed by his certificate.
12287 For message signing
12289 is always derived from the value of
12291 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
12293 For the purpose of encryption the recipients public encryption key
12294 (certificate) is expected; the command
12296 can be used to save certificates of signed messages (the section
12297 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
12298 gives some details).
12299 This mode of operation is usually driven by the specialized form.
12301 When decrypting messages the account is derived from the recipient
12306 of the message, which are searched for addresses for which such
12308 \*(UA always uses the first address that matches,
12309 so if the same message is sent to more than one of the user addresses
12310 using different encryption keys, decryption might fail.
12312 Password-encrypted keys may be used for signing and decryption.
12313 Automated password lookup is possible via the
12315 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-key
12316 for the private key, and
12317 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-cert-cert
12318 for the certificate stored in the same file.
12319 For example, the hypothetical address
12321 could be driven with a private key / certificate pair path defined in
12322 .Va \&\&smime-sign-cert-bob@exam.ple ,
12323 and the needed passwords would then be looked up as
12324 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-key
12326 .Ql bob@exam.ple.smime-cert-cert .
12327 When decrypting the value of
12329 will be tried as a fallback to provide the necessary
12331 To include intermediate certificates, use
12332 .Va smime-sign-include-certs .
12333 The possible password sources are documented in
12334 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
12336 .Mx Va smime-sign-digest
12337 .It Va smime-sign-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-digest
12338 \*(OP Specifies the message digest to use when signing S/MIME messages.
12339 Please remember that for this use case
12341 refers to the variable
12343 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
12345 The available algorithms depend on the used cryptographic library, but
12346 at least one usable built-in algorithm is ensured as a default.
12347 If possible the standard RFC 5751 will be violated by using
12349 instead of the mandated
12351 due to security concerns.
12352 This variable is ignored for very old (released before 2010)
12353 cryptographic libraries which do not offer the necessary interface:
12354 it will be logged if that happened.
12356 \*(UA will try to add built-in support for the following message
12357 digests, names are case-insensitive:
12364 as well as the widely available
12369 and the proposed insecure
12373 More digests may \*(OPally be available through dynamic loading via the
12375 .Xr EVP_get_digestbyname 3 .
12377 .Mx Va smime-sign-include-certs
12378 .It Va smime-sign-include-certs-USER@HOST , smime-sign-include-certs
12379 \*(OP If used, this is supposed to a consist of a comma-separated list
12380 of files, each of which containing a single certificate in PEM format to
12381 be included in the S/MIME message in addition to the
12382 .Va smime-sign-cert
12384 This can be used to include intermediate certificates of the certificate
12385 authority, in order to allow the receiver's S/MIME implementation to
12386 perform a verification of the entire certificate chain, starting from
12387 a local root certificate, over the intermediate certificates, down to the
12388 .Va smime-sign-cert .
12389 Even though top level certificates may also be included in the chain,
12390 they will not be used for the verification on the receiver's side.
12392 For the purpose of the mechanisms involved here,
12394 refers to the content of the internal variable
12396 (or, if that contains multiple addresses,
12399 .Ql USER@HOST.smime-include-certs
12400 will be used for performing password lookups for these certificates,
12401 shall they have been given one, therefore the lookup can be automated
12402 via the mechanisms described in
12403 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" .
12405 .It Va smime-sign-message-digest-USER@HOST , smime-sign-message-digest
12406 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor(s) of
12407 .Va smime-sign-digest .
12410 \*(OB\*(OP To use the built-in SMTP transport, specify a SMTP URL in
12412 \*(ID For compatibility reasons a set
12414 is used in preference of
12418 .It Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST , smtp-auth-HOST , smtp-auth
12419 \*(OP Variable chain that controls the SMTP
12421 authentication method, possible values are
12432 .Sx "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?" )
12437 for TLS secured connections which pass a client certificate via
12438 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12439 There may be the \*(OPal methods
12446 do not need any user credentials,
12450 require a user name, and all other methods require a
12455 solely builds upon the credentials passed via a client certificate,
12456 and is usually the way to go since tested servers do not actually follow
12457 RFC 4422 aka RFC 4954, and fail if additional credentials are passed.
12464 .Va smtp-auth-password
12466 .Va smtp-auth-user .
12468 .Va smtp-auth-USER@HOST :
12469 may override dependent on sender address in the variable
12472 .It Va smtp-auth-password
12473 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback password for SMTP authentication.
12474 If the authentication method requires a password, but neither
12475 .Va smtp-auth-password
12477 .Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
12479 \*(UA will ask for a password on the user's terminal.
12481 .It Va smtp-auth-password-USER@HOST
12483 .Va smtp-auth-password
12484 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
12487 .It Va smtp-auth-user
12488 \*(OP\*(OU Sets the global fallback user name for SMTP authentication.
12489 If the authentication method requires a user name, but neither
12492 .Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
12494 \*(UA will ask for a user name on the user's terminal.
12496 .It Va smtp-auth-user-USER@HOST
12499 for specific values of sender addresses, dependent upon the variable
12503 .It Va smtp-hostname
12504 \*(OP\*(IN Normally \*(UA uses the variable
12506 to derive the necessary
12508 information in order to issue a
12515 can be used to use the
12517 from the SMTP account
12525 if the empty string is given, or the local hostname as a last resort).
12526 This often allows using an address that is itself valid but hosted by
12527 a provider other than from which (in
12529 the message is sent.
12530 Setting this variable also influences generated
12535 If the \*(OPal IDNA support is available (see
12537 variable assignment is aborted when a necessary conversion fails.
12539 .Mx Va smtp-use-starttls
12540 .It Va smtp-use-starttls-USER@HOST , smtp-use-starttls-HOST , smtp-use-starttls
12541 \*(BO\*(OP Causes \*(UA to issue a
12543 command to make an SMTP
12545 session TLS encrypted, i.e., to enable transport layer security.
12548 .It Va socket-connect-timeout
12549 \*(OP A positive number that defines the timeout to wait for
12550 establishing a socket connection before forcing
12551 .Va ^ERR Ns -TIMEDOUT .
12554 .It Va socks-proxy-USER@HOST , socks-proxy-HOST , socks-proxy
12555 \*(OP If set to the URL of a SOCKS5 server then all network activities
12556 are proxied through it, except for the single DNS name lookup necessary
12557 to resolve the proxy URL (unnecessary when given an already resolved IP
12559 It is automatically squared with the environment variable
12561 changing the one will adjust the other.
12562 This example creates a local SOCKS5 proxy on port 10000 that forwards to
12567 and from which actual network traffic happens:
12568 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12569 $ ssh -D 10000 USER@HOST
12570 $ \*(uA -Ssocks-proxy=[socks5://]localhost:10000
12571 # or =localhost:10000; no local DNS: =127.0.0.1:10000
12575 .It Va spam-interface
12576 \*(OP In order to use any of the spam-related commands (like
12578 the desired spam interface must be defined by setting this variable.
12579 Please refer to the manual section
12580 .Sx "Handling spam"
12581 for the complete picture of spam handling in \*(UA.
12582 All or none of the following interfaces may be available:
12584 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ql _ilte_"
12590 .Pf ( Lk http://spamassassin.apache.org SpamAssassin )
12592 Different to the generic filter interface \*(UA will automatically add
12593 the correct arguments for a given command and has the necessary
12594 knowledge to parse the program's output.
12595 A default value for
12597 will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if
12601 during compilation.
12602 Shall it be necessary to define a specific connection type (rather than
12603 using a configuration file for that), the variable
12604 .Va spamc-arguments
12605 can be used as in for example
12606 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
12607 It is also possible to specify a per-user configuration via
12609 Note that this interface does not inspect the
12611 flag of a message for the command
12615 generic spam filter support via freely configurable hooks.
12616 This interface is meant for programs like
12618 and requires according behaviour in respect to the hooks' exit
12619 status for at least the command
12622 meaning a message is spam,
12626 for unsure and any other return value indicating a hard error);
12627 since the hooks can include shell code snippets diverting behaviour
12628 can be intercepted as necessary.
12630 .Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , spamfilter-nospam , \
12633 .Va spamfilter-spam ;
12635 .Sx "Handling spam"
12636 contains examples for some programs.
12637 The process environment of the hooks will have the variable
12638 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_GENERATED
12640 Note that spam score support for
12642 is not supported unless the \*(OPtional regular expression support is
12644 .Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
12650 .It Va spam-maxsize
12651 \*(OP Messages that exceed this size will not be passed through to the
12653 .Va spam-interface .
12654 If unset or 0, the default of 420000 bytes is used.
12657 .It Va spamc-command
12658 \*(OP The path to the
12662 .Va spam-interface .
12663 Note that the path is not expanded, but used
12665 A fallback path will have been compiled into the \*(UA binary if the
12666 executable had been found during compilation.
12669 .It Va spamc-arguments
12670 \*(OP Even though \*(UA deals with most arguments for the
12673 automatically, it may at least sometimes be desirable to specify
12674 connection-related ones via this variable, for example
12675 .Ql -d server.example.com -p 783 .
12679 \*(OP Specify a username for per-user configuration files for the
12681 .Va spam-interface .
12682 If this is set to the empty string then \*(UA will use the name of the
12691 .It Va spamfilter-ham , spamfilter-noham , \
12692 spamfilter-nospam , spamfilter-rate , spamfilter-spam
12693 \*(OP Command and argument hooks for the
12695 .Va spam-interface .
12697 .Sx "Handling spam"
12698 contains examples for some programs.
12701 .It Va spamfilter-rate-scanscore
12702 \*(OP Because of the generic nature of the
12705 spam scores are not supported for it by default, but if the \*(OPnal
12706 regular expression support is available then setting this variable can
12707 be used to overcome this restriction.
12708 It is interpreted as follows: first a number (digits) is parsed that
12709 must be followed by a semicolon
12711 and an extended regular expression.
12712 Then the latter is used to parse the first output line of the
12713 .Va spamfilter-rate
12714 hook, and, in case the evaluation is successful, the group that has been
12715 specified via the number is interpreted as a floating point scan score.
12717 .It Va ssl-ca-dir-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-dir-HOST , ssl-ca-dir ,\
12718 ssl-ca-file-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-file-HOST , ssl-ca-file
12719 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessors of
12723 .It Va ssl-ca-flags-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-flags-HOST , ssl-ca-flags
12724 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12727 .It Va ssl-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , ssl-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
12729 \*(OB\*(BO\*(OP Predecessor of
12730 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults .
12732 .It Va ssl-cert-USER@HOST , ssl-cert-HOST , ssl-cert
12733 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12736 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12738 .It Va ssl-cipher-list-USER@HOST , ssl-cipher-list-HOST , ssl-cipher-list
12739 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12742 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12744 .It Va ssl-config-file
12745 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12746 .Va tls-config-file .
12748 .It Va ssl-config-module-USER@HOST , ssl-config-module-HOST ,\
12750 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12751 .Va tls-config-module .
12753 .It Va ssl-config-pairs-USER@HOST , ssl-config-pairs-HOST , ssl-config-pairs
12754 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12755 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12757 .It Va ssl-crl-dir , ssl-crl-file
12758 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessors of
12762 .It Va ssl-curves-USER@HOST , ssl-curves-HOST , ssl-curves
12763 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12766 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12768 .It Va ssl-features
12769 \*(OB\*(OP\*(RO Predecessor of
12772 .It Va ssl-key-USER@HOST , ssl-key-HOST , ssl-key
12773 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12776 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12778 .It Va ssl-method-USER@HOST , ssl-method-HOST , ssl-method
12779 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12782 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12784 .It Va ssl-protocol-USER@HOST , ssl-protocol-HOST , ssl-protocol
12785 \*(OB\*(OP Please use the
12788 .Va tls-config-pairs .
12790 .It Va ssl-rand-file
12791 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12792 .Va tls-rand-file .
12794 .It Va ssl-verify-USER@HOST , ssl-verify-HOST , ssl-verify
12795 \*(OB\*(OP Predecessor of
12800 If only set without an assigned value, then this setting inhibits the
12806 header fields that include obvious references to \*(UA.
12807 There are two pitfalls associated with this:
12808 First, the message id of outgoing messages is not known anymore.
12809 Second, an expert may still use the remaining information in the header
12810 to track down the originating mail user agent.
12811 If set to the value
12817 suppression does not occur.
12820 .It Va system-mailrc
12821 \*(RO The compiled in path of the system wide initialization file
12823 .Sx "Resource files" :
12829 (\*(OP) This specifies a comma-separated list of
12834 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" ,
12835 escape commas with reverse solidus
12837 to be used to overwrite or define entries.
12839 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
12840 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
12841 It will always be inspected, regardless of whether
12843 denotes termcap/terminfo library support via
12847 String capabilities form
12849 pairs and are expected unless noted otherwise.
12850 Numerics have to be notated as
12852 where the number is expected in normal decimal notation.
12853 Finally, booleans do not have any value but indicate a true or false
12854 state simply by being defined or not; this indeed means that \*(UA
12855 does not support undefining an existing boolean.
12856 String capability values will undergo some expansions before use:
12857 for one notations like
12860 .Ql control-LETTER ,
12861 and for clarification purposes
12863 can be used to specify
12865 (the control notation
12867 could lead to misreadings when a left bracket follows, which it does for
12868 the standard CSI sequence);
12869 finally three letter octal sequences, as in
12872 To specify that a terminal supports 256-colours, and to define sequences
12873 that home the cursor and produce an audible bell, one might write:
12875 .Bd -literal -offset indent
12876 ? set termcap='Co#256,home=\eE[H,bel=^G'
12880 The following terminal capabilities are or may be meaningful for the
12881 operation of the built-in line editor or \*(UA in general:
12884 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd yay"
12886 .Cd auto_right_margin :
12887 boolean which indicates if the right margin needs special treatment; the
12889 capability is related, for more see
12891 This capability is only used when backed by library support.
12893 .It Cd clear Ns \0or Cd cl
12895 clear the screen and home cursor.
12896 (Will be simulated via
12902 .It Cd colors Ns \0or Cd Co
12904 numeric capability specifying the maximum number of colours.
12905 Note that \*(UA does not actually care about the terminal beside that,
12906 but always emits ANSI / ISO 6429 escape sequences; also see
12910 .Cd carriage_return :
12911 move to the first column in the current row.
12912 The default built-in fallback is
12915 .It Cd cub1 Ns \0or Cd le
12917 move the cursor left one space (non-destructively).
12918 The default built-in fallback is
12921 .It Cd cuf1 Ns \0or Cd nd
12923 move the cursor right one space (non-destructively).
12924 The default built-in fallback is
12926 which is used by most terminals.
12932 .It Cd ed Ns \0or Cd cd
12937 .It Cd el Ns \0or Cd ce
12939 clear to the end of line.
12940 (Will be simulated via
12942 plus repetitions of space characters.)
12944 .It Cd home Ns \0or Cd ho
12948 .It Cd hpa Ns \0or Cd ch
12949 .Cd column_address :
12950 move the cursor (to the given column parameter) in the current row.
12951 (Will be simulated via
12956 .\" mx_HAVE_TERMCAP
12957 .It Cd rmcup Ns \0or Cd te Ns \0/ Cd smcup Ns \0or Cd ti
12960 .Cd enter_ca_mode ,
12961 respectively: exit and enter the alternative screen ca-mode,
12962 effectively turning \*(UA into a fullscreen application.
12963 This must be enabled explicitly by setting
12964 .Va termcap-ca-mode .
12966 .It Cd smkx Ns \0or Cd ks Ns \0/ Cd rmkx Ns \0or Cd ke
12970 respectively: enable and disable the keypad.
12971 This is always enabled if available, because it seems even keyboards
12972 without keypads generate other key codes for, e.g., cursor keys in that
12973 case, and only if enabled we see the codes that we are interested in.
12975 .It Cd xenl Ns \0or Cd xn
12976 .Cd eat_newline_glitch :
12977 boolean which indicates whether a newline written in the last column of an
12978 .Cd auto_right_margin
12979 indicating terminal is ignored.
12980 With it the full terminal width is available even on autowrap terminals.
12981 This will be inspected even without
12987 Many more capabilities which describe key-sequences are documented for
12992 .It Va termcap-ca-mode
12993 \*(OP Allow usage of the
12998 abilities in order to enter an alternative exclusive screen, the
12999 so-called ca-mode; this usually requires special configuration of the
13001 also dependent on the value of
13004 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
13005 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
13008 .It Va termcap-disable
13009 \*(OP Disable any interaction with a terminal control library.
13010 If set only some generic fallback built-ins and possibly the content of
13012 describe the terminal to \*(UA.
13014 this variable will only be queried once at program startup and can
13015 thus only be specified in resource files or on the command line.
13019 .It Va tls-ca-dir-USER@HOST , tls-ca-dir-HOST , tls-ca-dir ,\
13020 tls-ca-file-USER@HOST , tls-ca-file-HOST , tls-ca-file
13021 \*(OP Directory and file, respectively, for pools of trusted CA
13022 certificates in PEM (Privacy Enhanced Mail) format, for the purpose of
13023 verification of TLS server certificates.
13024 Concurrent use is possible, the file is loaded once needed first, the
13025 directory lookup is performed anew as a last resort whenever necessary.
13026 The CA certificate pool built into the TLS library can be disabled via
13027 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ,
13028 further fine-tuning is possible via
13030 The directory search requires special filename conventions, please see
13031 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
13038 .Mx Va tls-ca-flags
13039 .It Va tls-ca-flags-USER@HOST , tls-ca-flags-HOST , tls-ca-flags
13040 \*(OP Can be used to fine-tune behaviour of the X509 CA certificate
13041 storage, and the certificate verification that is used (also see
13043 The value is expected to consist of a comma-separated list of
13044 configuration directives, with any intervening whitespace being ignored.
13045 The directives directly map to flags that can be passed to
13046 .Xr X509_STORE_set_flags 3 ,
13047 which are usually defined in a file
13048 .Pa openssl/x509_vfy.h ,
13049 and the availability of which depends on the used TLS library
13050 version: a directive without mapping is ignored (error log subject to
13052 Directives currently understood (case-insensitively) include:
13055 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd BaNg"
13056 .It Cd no-alt-chains
13057 If the initial chain is not trusted, do not attempt to build an
13059 Setting this flag will make OpenSSL certificate verification match that
13060 of older OpenSSL versions, before automatic building and checking of
13061 alternative chains has been implemented; also see
13062 .Cd trusted-first .
13063 .It Cd no-check-time
13064 Do not check certificate/CRL validity against current time.
13065 .It Cd partial-chain
13066 By default partial, incomplete chains which cannot be verified up to the
13067 chain top, a self-signed root certificate, will not verify.
13068 With this flag set, a chain succeeds to verify if at least one signing
13069 certificate of the chain is in any of the configured trusted stores of
13071 The OpenSSL manual page
13072 .Xr SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations 3
13073 gives some advise how to manage your own trusted store of CA certificates.
13075 Disable workarounds for broken certificates.
13076 .It Cd trusted-first
13077 Try building a chain using issuers in the trusted store first to avoid
13078 problems with server-sent legacy intermediate certificates.
13079 Newer versions of OpenSSL support alternative chain checking and enable
13080 it by default, resulting in the same behaviour; also see
13081 .Cd no-alt-chains .
13085 .Mx Va tls-ca-no-defaults
13086 .It Va tls-ca-no-defaults-USER@HOST , tls-ca-no-defaults-HOST ,\
13088 \*(BO\*(OP Do not load the default CA locations that are built into the
13089 used to TLS library to verify TLS server certificates.
13092 .It Va tls-config-file
13093 \*(OP If this variable is set
13094 .Xr CONF_modules_load_file 3
13096 .Ql ,+modules-load-file,
13099 is used to allow resource file based configuration of the TLS library.
13100 This happens once the library is used first, which may also be early
13101 during startup (logged with
13103 If a non-empty value is given then the given file, after performing
13104 .Sx "Filename transformations" ,
13105 will be used instead of the TLS libraries global default, and it is an
13106 error if the file cannot be loaded.
13107 The application name will always be passed as
13109 Some TLS libraries support application-specific configuration via
13110 resource files loaded like this, please see
13111 .Va tls-config-module .
13113 .Mx Va tls-config-module
13114 .It Va tls-config-module-USER@HOST , tls-config-module-HOST ,\
13116 \*(OP If file based application-specific configuration via
13117 .Va tls-config-file
13118 is available, announced as
13122 indicating availability of
13123 .Xr SSL_CTX_config 3 ,
13124 then, it becomes possible to use a central TLS configuration file
13125 for all programs, including \*(uA, for example
13126 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13127 # Register a configuration section for \*(uA
13128 \*(uA = mailx_master
13129 # The top configuration section creates a relation
13130 # in between dynamic SSL configuration and an actual
13131 # program specific configuration section
13133 ssl_conf = mailx_tls_config
13134 # And that program specific configuration section now
13135 # can map diverse tls-config-module names to sections,
13136 # as in: tls-config-module=account_xy
13138 account_xy = mailx_account_xy
13139 account_yz = mailx_account_yz
13141 MinProtocol = TLSv1.2
13144 CipherString = TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:
13145 MinProtocol = TLSv1.1
13150 .Mx Va tls-config-pairs
13151 .It Va tls-config-pairs-USER@HOST , tls-config-pairs-HOST , tls-config-pairs
13152 \*(OP The value of this variable chain will be interpreted as
13153 a comma-separated list of directive/value pairs.
13154 Directives and values need to be separated by equals signs
13156 any whitespace surrounding pair members is removed.
13157 Keys are (usually) case-insensitive.
13158 Different to when placing these pairs in a
13159 .Va tls-config-module
13161 .Va tls-config-file ,
13164 need to be escaped with a reverse solidus
13166 when included in pairs; also different: if the equals sign
13168 is preceded with an asterisk
13170 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13171 will be performed on the value; it is an error if these fail.
13172 Unless proper support is announced by
13174 .Pf ( Ql ,+conf-ctx, )
13175 only the keys below are supported, otherwise the pairs will be used
13176 directly as arguments to the function
13177 .Xr SSL_CONF_cmd 3 .
13180 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Cd C_rtificate_"
13182 Filename of a TLS client certificate (chain) required by some servers.
13183 Fallback support via
13184 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_certificate_chain_file 3 .
13185 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13188 will be set to the same value if not initialized explicitly.
13189 Some services support so-called
13191 authentication if a TLS client certificate was successfully presented
13192 during connection establishment
13193 .Pf ( Dq connecting is authenticating ) .
13195 .It Cd CipherString
13196 A list of ciphers for TLS connections, see
13198 By default no list of ciphers is set, resulting in a
13199 .Cd Protocol Ns - Ns
13200 specific list of ciphers (the protocol standards define lists of
13201 acceptable ciphers; possibly cramped by the used TLS library).
13202 Fallback support via
13203 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_cipher_list 3 .
13205 .It Cd Ciphersuites
13206 A list of ciphers used for TLSv1.3 connections, see
13208 These will be joined onto the list of ciphers from
13213 .Ql ,+ctx-set-ciphersuites, ,
13215 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_ciphersuites 3 .
13218 A list of supported elliptic curves, if applicable.
13219 By default no curves are set.
13220 Fallback support via
13221 .Xr SSL_CTX_set1_curves_list 3 ,
13224 .It Cd MaxProtocol , MinProtocol
13225 The maximum and minimum supported TLS versions, respectively.
13229 .Ql ,+ctx-set-maxmin-proto, ,
13231 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_max_proto_version 3
13233 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_min_proto_version 3 ;
13234 these fallbacks use an internal parser which understands the strings
13240 and the special value
13242 which disables the given limit.
13245 Various flags to set.
13247 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
13248 in which case any other value but (exactly)
13250 results in an error.
13253 Filename of the private key in PEM format of a TLS client certificate.
13254 If unset, the value of
13257 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13260 .Xr SSL_CTX_use_PrivateKey_file 3 .
13263 The used TLS protocol.
13269 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
13276 .Xr SSL_CTX_set_options 3 ,
13277 driven via an internal parser which understands the strings
13283 and the special value
13285 Multiple protocols may be given as a comma-separated list, any
13286 whitespace is ignored, an optional plus sign
13288 prefix enables, a hyphen-minus
13290 prefix disables a protocol, so that
13292 enables only the TLSv1.2 protocol.
13298 .It Va tls-crl-dir , tls-crl-file
13299 \*(OP Specify a directory / a file, respectively, that contains a CRL in
13300 PEM format to use when verifying TLS server certificates.
13303 .It Va tls-features
13304 \*(OP\*(RO This expands to a comma-separated list of the TLS library
13305 identity and optional features.
13306 To ease substring matching the string starts and ends with a comma.
13307 Currently supported identities are
13311 (OpenSSL v3.0.0 series),
13313 (OpenSSL v1.1.x series)
13316 (elder OpenSSL series, other clones).
13317 Optional features are preceded with a plus sign
13319 when available, and with a hyphen-minus
13323 Currently known features are
13325 .Pf ( Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
13327 .Pf ( Va tls-config-module ) ,
13328 .Ql ctx-set-ciphersuites
13329 .Pf ( Cd Ciphersuites
13331 .Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
13332 .Ql ctx-set-maxmin-proto
13333 .Pf ( Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
13334 .Ql modules-load-file
13335 .Pf ( Va tls-config-file ) ,
13338 .Pf ( Va tls-rand-file ) .
13340 .Mx Va tls-fingerprint
13341 .It Va tls-fingerprint-USER@HOST , tls-fingerprint-HOST , tls-fingerprint
13342 \*(OP It is possible to replace the verification of the connection
13343 peer certificate against the entire local pool of CAs (for more see
13344 .Sx "Encrypted network communication" )
13345 with the comparison against a precalculated certificate message digest,
13346 the so-called fingerprint, to be specified as the used
13347 .Va tls-fingerprint-digest .
13348 This fingerprint can for example be calculated with
13349 .Ql Ic tls Ns \:\0\:fingerprint HOST .
13351 .Mx Va tls-fingerprint-digest
13352 .It Va tls-fingerprint-digest-USER@HOST , tls-fingerprint-digest-HOST , \
13353 tls-fingerprint-digest
13354 \*(OP The message digest to be used when creating TLS certificate
13355 fingerprints, the defaults, if available, in test order, being
13358 For the complete list of digest algorithms refer to
13359 .Va smime-sign-digest .
13362 .It Va tls-rand-file
13366 .Ql ,+tls-rand-file,
13367 then this will be queried to find a file with random entropy data which
13368 can be used to seed the P(seudo)R(andom)N(umber)G(enerator), see
13369 .Xr RAND_load_file 3 .
13370 The default filename
13371 .Pf ( Xr RAND_file_name 3 ,
13374 will be used if this variable is not set or empty, or if the
13375 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13377 Shall seeding the PRNG have been successful,
13378 .Xr RAND_write_file 3
13379 will be called to update the entropy.
13380 Remarks: libraries which do not announce this feature seed the PRNG by
13384 .It Va tls-verify-USER@HOST , tls-verify-HOST , tls-verify
13385 \*(OP Variable chain that sets the action to be performed if an error
13386 occurs during TLS server certificate validation against the
13387 specified or default trust stores
13390 or the TLS library built-in defaults (unless usage disallowed via
13391 .Va tls-ca-no-defaults ) ,
13392 and as fine-tuned via
13394 Valid (case-insensitive) values are
13396 (fail and close connection immediately),
13398 (ask whether to continue on standard input),
13400 (show a warning and continue),
13402 (do not perform validation).
13407 If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be displayed
13410 if unset, the first five lines are printed, if set to 0 the variable
13413 If the value is negative then its absolute value will be used for
13414 unsigned right shifting (see
13422 \*(BO If set then the
13424 command series will strip adjacent empty lines and quotations.
13428 The character set of the terminal \*(UA operates on,
13429 and the one and only supported character set that \*(UA can use if no
13430 character set conversion capabilities have been compiled into it,
13431 in which case it defaults to ISO-8859-1.
13432 Otherwise it defaults to UTF-8.
13433 Sufficient locale support provided the default will be preferably
13434 deduced from the locale environment if that is set (for example
13436 see there for more); runtime locale changes will be reflected by
13438 except during the program startup phase and if
13440 had been used to freeze the given value.
13441 Refer to the section
13442 .Sx "Character sets"
13443 for the complete picture about character sets.
13446 .It Va typescript-mode
13447 \*(BO A special multiplex variable that disables all variables and
13448 settings which result in behaviour that interferes with running \*(UA in
13451 .Va colour-disable ,
13452 .Va line-editor-disable
13453 and (before startup completed only)
13454 .Va termcap-disable .
13455 Unsetting it does not restore the former state of the covered settings.
13459 For a safe-by-default policy the process file mode creation mask
13463 on program startup after the resource files have been loaded,
13464 and unless this variable is set.
13465 By assigning this an empty value the active setting will not be changed,
13466 otherwise the given value will be made the new file mode creation mask.
13467 Child processes inherit the file mode creation mask of their parent.
13470 .It Va user-HOST , user
13471 \*(IN Variable chain that sets a global fallback user name, used in case
13472 none has been given in the protocol and account-specific URL.
13473 This variable defaults to the name of the user who runs \*(UA.
13477 Enable upward compatibility with \*(UA version 15.0 in respect to which
13478 configuration options are available and how they are handled.
13479 If set to a non-empty value the command modifier
13481 is implied and thus enforces
13482 .Sx "Shell-style argument quoting"
13484 .Sx "Old-style argument quoting"
13485 for all commands which support both.
13486 This manual uses \*(IN and \*(OU to refer to the new and the old way of
13487 doing things, respectively.
13491 Verbose mode enables logging of informational context messages.
13492 Historically a \*(BO variable, this can either be set multiple times
13493 (what the command line option
13495 uses), or be assigned a numeric value in order to increase verbosity.
13496 Assigning the value 0 disables verbosity and thus (almost) equals
13498 The maximum number is 3.
13508 .It Va version , version-date , \
13509 version-hexnum , version-major , version-minor , version-update
13510 \*(RO \*(UA version information: the first variable is a string with
13511 the complete version identification, the second the release date in ISO
13512 8601 notation without time.
13513 The third is a 32-bit hexadecimal number with the upper 8 bits storing
13514 the major, followed by the minor and update version numbers which occupy
13516 The latter three variables contain only decimal digits: the major, minor
13517 and update version numbers.
13518 The output of the command
13520 will include this information.
13523 .It Va writebackedited
13524 If this variable is set messages modified using the
13528 commands are written back to the current folder when it is quit;
13529 it is only honoured for writable folders in MBOX format, though.
13530 Note that the editor will be pointed to the raw message content in that
13531 case, i.e., neither MIME decoding nor decryption will have been
13532 performed, and proper
13535 quoting of newly added or edited content is also left as an exercise
13538 .\" }}} (Variables)
13540 .\" }}} (INTERNAL VARIABLES)
13543 .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT {{{
13547 .Dq environment variable
13548 should be considered an indication that these variables are either
13549 standardized as vivid parts of process environments, or that they are
13550 commonly found in there.
13551 The process environment is inherited from the
13553 once \*(UA is started, and unless otherwise explicitly noted handling of
13554 the following variables transparently integrates into that of the
13555 .Sx "INTERNAL VARIABLES"
13556 from \*(UA's point of view.
13557 This means they can be managed via
13561 causing automatic program environment updates (to be inherited by
13562 newly created child processes).
13565 In order to integrate other environment variables equally they need to
13566 be imported (linked) with the command
13568 This command can also be used to set and unset non-integrated
13569 environment variables from scratch, sufficient system support provided.
13570 The following example, applicable to a POSIX shell, sets the
13572 environment variable for \*(UA only, and beforehand exports the
13574 in order to affect any further processing in the running shell:
13576 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13577 $ EDITOR="vim -u ${HOME}/.vimrc"
13579 $ COLUMNS=80 \*(uA -R
13582 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ev BaNg"
13585 The user's preferred width in column positions for the terminal screen.
13586 Queried and used once on program startup in interactive or batch
13588 mode, actively managed for child processes and the MLE (see
13589 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" )
13590 in interactive mode thereafter.
13591 Non-interactive mode always uses, and the fallback default is
13592 a compile-time constant, by default 80 columns.
13597 are both set but not both are usable (empty, not a number, or 0) at
13598 program startup, then the real terminal screen size will be (tried to
13599 be) determined once.
13602 manages these variables, and unsets them for pipe specifications etc.)
13606 The name of the (mailbox)
13608 to use for saving aborted messages if
13610 is set; this defaults to
13614 is set no output will be generated, otherwise the contents of the file
13617 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13624 Pathname of the text editor to use for the
13628 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) ;
13630 is used for a more display oriented editor.
13634 The user's home directory.
13635 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
13636 The calling user's home directory will be used instead if this directory
13637 does not exist, is not accessible or cannot be read;
13638 it will always be used for the root user.
13639 (No test for being writable is performed to allow usage by
13640 non-privileged users within read-only jails, but dependent on settings
13641 this directory is a default write target for, for example,
13649 .It Ev LC_ALL , LC_CTYPE , LANG
13650 \*(OP The (names in lookup order of the)
13654 which indicates the used
13655 .Sx "Character sets" .
13656 Runtime changes trigger automatic updates of the entire locale system,
13657 which includes updating
13659 (except during startup if the variable has been frozen via
13664 The user's preferred number of lines for the terminal screen.
13665 The behaviour is as described for
13667 yet the compile-time constant used in non-interactive mode and as
13668 a fallback defaults to 24 (lines).
13672 Pathname of the directory lister to use in the
13674 command when operating on local mailboxes.
13677 (path search through
13682 Upon startup \*(UA will actively ensure that this variable refers to the
13683 name of the user who runs \*(UA, in order to be able to pass a verified
13684 name to any newly created child process.
13688 Is used as the user's
13690 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
13694 If the environmental fallback is also not set, a built-in compile-time
13696 This is assumed to be an absolute pathname.
13700 \*(OP Override the default path search of
13701 .Sx "The Mailcap files" :
13702 any existing file therein will be loaded in sequence, appending any
13703 content to the list of MIME type handler directives.
13704 The RFC 1524 standard imposed default value is assigned otherwise:
13705 .Ql ~/.mailcap:\:/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/etc/mailcap:\:/usr/local/etc/mailcap .
13706 (The default value is a compile-time \*(OP.)
13710 Is used as a startup file instead of
13713 In order to avoid side-effects from configuration files scripts should
13714 either set this variable to
13718 command line option should be used.
13721 .It Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC
13722 If this variable is set then reading of
13725 .Va system-mailrc )
13726 at startup is inhibited, i.e., the same effect is achieved as if \*(UA
13727 had been started up with the option
13729 (and according argument) or
13731 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment.
13735 The name of the user's
13737 .Sx "secondary mailbox"
13739 A logical subset of the special
13740 .Sx "Filename transformations"
13746 Traditionally this MBOX is used as the file to save messages from the
13748 .Sx "primary system mailbox"
13749 that have been read.
13751 .Sx "Message states" .
13755 \*(IN\*(OP This variable overrides the default location of the user's
13761 Pathname of the program to use for backing the command
13765 variable enforces usage of a pager for output.
13766 The default paginator is
13768 (path search through
13771 \*(UA inspects the contents of this variable: if its contains the string
13773 then a non-existing environment variable
13780 will optionally be set to
13787 A colon-separated list of directories that is searched by the shell when
13788 looking for commands, for example
13789 .Ql /bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin .
13792 .It Ev POSIXLY_CORRECT
13793 This environment entry is automatically squared with
13798 The shell to use for the commands
13803 .Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES"
13804 and when starting subprocesses.
13805 A default shell is used if this environment variable is not defined.
13808 .It Ev SOCKS5_PROXY
13809 This environment entry is automatically squared with
13813 .It Ev SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH
13814 Specifies a time in seconds since the Unix epoch (1970-01-01) to be
13815 used in place of the current time.
13816 This variable is looked up upon program startup, and its existence will
13817 switch \*(UA to a reproducible mode
13818 .Pf ( Lk https://reproducible-builds.org )
13819 which uses deterministic random numbers, a special fixated pseudo
13822 This operation mode is used for development and by software packagers.
13823 \*(ID Currently an invalid setting is only ignored, rather than causing
13824 a program abortion.
13826 .Dl $ SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=`date +%s` \*(uA
13830 \*(OP The terminal type for which output is to be prepared.
13831 For extended colour and font control please refer to
13832 .Sx "Coloured display" ,
13833 and for terminal management in general to
13834 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor" .
13838 Except for the root user this variable defines the directory for
13839 temporary files to be used instead of
13841 (or the given compile-time constant) if set, existent, accessible as
13842 well as read- and writable.
13843 This variable is only used when it resides in the process environment,
13844 but \*(UA will ensure at startup that this environment variable is
13845 updated to contain a usable temporary directory.
13851 (see there), but this variable is not standardized, should therefore not
13852 be used, and is only corrected if already set.
13856 Pathname of the text editor to use for the
13860 .Pf (see\0 Sx "COMMAND ESCAPES" ) ;
13862 is used for a less display oriented editor.
13872 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
13875 .It Pa ~/.mailcap , /etc/mailcap
13876 \*(OP Personal and system-wide MIME type handler definition files, see
13877 .Sx "The Mailcap files" .
13878 (The shown names are part of the RFC 1524 standard search path
13881 .It Pa \*(ur , \*(UR
13882 User-specific and system-wide files giving initial commands, the
13883 .Sx "Resource files" .
13884 (The used filenames come from
13887 .Va system-mailrc ,
13892 The default value for
13897 .It Pa \*(vU , \*(vS
13898 Personal and system-wide MIME types, see
13899 .Sx "The mime.types files" .
13903 \*(IN\*(OP The default location of the user's
13905 file \(en the section
13906 .Sx "The .netrc file"
13907 documents the file format.
13908 The used path can be set via
13918 \*(OP Possible location for persistent random entropy seed storage, see
13919 .Va tls-rand-file .
13923 .\" .Ss "Resource files" {{{
13924 .Ss "Resource files"
13926 Upon startup \*(UA reads in several resource files, in order:
13928 .Bl -tag -width ".It Pa BaNg"
13931 System wide initialization file
13932 .Pf ( Va system-mailrc ) .
13933 Reading of this file can be suppressed, either by using the
13935 (and according argument) or
13937 command line options, or by setting the
13940 .Ev MAILX_NO_SYSTEM_RC .
13944 File giving initial commands.
13945 A different file can be chosen by setting the
13949 Reading of this file can be suppressed with the
13951 command line option.
13953 .It Va mailx-extra-rc
13954 Defines a startup file to be read after all other resource files.
13955 It can be used to specify settings that are not understood by other
13957 implementations, for example.
13961 The content of these files is interpreted as follows:
13964 .Bl -bullet -compact
13966 The whitespace characters space, tabulator and newline,
13967 as well as those defined by the variable
13969 are removed from the beginning and end of input lines.
13971 Empty lines are ignored.
13973 Any other line is interpreted as a command.
13974 It may be spread over multiple input lines if the newline character is
13976 by placing a reverse solidus character
13978 as the last character of the line; whereas any leading whitespace of
13979 follow lines is ignored, trailing whitespace before a escaped newline
13980 remains in the input.
13982 If the line (content) starts with the number sign
13984 then it is a comment-command and also ignored.
13985 (The comment-command is a real command, which does nothing, and
13986 therefore the usual follow lines mechanism applies!)
13990 Errors while loading these files are subject to the settings of
13994 More files with syntactically equal content can be
13996 The following, saved in a file, would be an examplary content:
13998 .Bd -literal -offset indent
13999 # This line is a comment command. And y\e
14000 es, it is really continued here.
14007 .\" .Ss "The mime.types files" {{{
14008 .Ss "The mime.types files"
14011 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
14012 \*(UA needs to learn about MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
14013 media types in order to classify message and attachment content.
14014 One source for them are
14016 files, the loading of which can be controlled by setting the variable
14017 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
14018 Another is the command
14020 which also offers access to \*(UAs MIME type cache.
14022 files have the following syntax:
14024 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14025 type/subtype extension [extension ...]
14026 # For example text/html html htm
14032 define the MIME media type, as standardized in RFC 2046:
14034 is used to declare the general type of data, while the
14036 specifies a specific format for that type of data.
14037 One or multiple filename
14039 s, separated by whitespace, can be bound to the media type format.
14040 Comments may be introduced anywhere on a line with a number sign
14042 causing the remaining line to be discarded.
14044 \*(UA also supports an extended, non-portable syntax in especially
14045 crafted files, which can be loaded via the alternative value syntax of
14046 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
14047 and prepends an optional
14051 .Dl [type-marker ]type/subtype extension [extension ...]
14054 The following type markers are supported:
14057 .Bl -tag -compact -width ".It Ar _n_u"
14059 Treat message parts with this content as plain text.
14064 Treat message parts with this content as HTML tagsoup.
14065 If the \*(OPal HTML-tagsoup-to-text converter is not available treat
14066 the content as plain text instead.
14070 but instead of falling back to plain text require an explicit content
14071 handler to be defined.
14073 If no handler can be found a text message is displayed which says so.
14074 This can be annoying, for example signatures serve a contextual purpose,
14075 their content is of no use by itself.
14076 This marker will avoid displaying the text message.
14081 for sending messages:
14083 .Va mime-allow-text-controls ,
14084 .Va mimetypes-load-control .
14085 For reading etc. messages:
14086 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
14087 .Sx "The Mailcap files" ,
14089 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
14090 .Va mimetypes-load-control ,
14091 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
14092 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
14095 .\" .Ss "The Mailcap files" {{{ review
14096 .Ss "The Mailcap files"
14098 \*(OP RFC 1524 defines a
14099 .Dq User Agent Configuration Mechanism
14100 to be used to inform mail user agent programs about the locally
14101 installed facilities for handling various data formats, i.e., about
14102 commands and how they can be used to display, edit et cetera MIME part
14103 contents, as well as a default path search that includes multiple
14104 possible locations of resource files, and the
14106 environment variable to overwrite that.
14107 Handlers found from doing the path search will be cached, the command
14109 operates on that cache, and the variable
14110 .Va mailcap-disable
14111 will suppress automatic loading, and usage of any mailcap handlers.
14112 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments"
14113 gives a general overview of how MIME types are handled.
14117 files consist of a set of newline separated entries.
14118 Comment lines start with a number sign
14120 (in the first column!) and are ignored.
14121 Empty lines are ignored.
14122 All other lines are interpreted as mailcap entries.
14123 An entry definition may be split over multiple lines by placing the
14124 reverse solidus character
14126 last in all but the final line.
14127 The standard does not specify how leading whitespace of successive lines
14128 is to be treated, therefore they are retained.
14132 entries consist of a number of semicolon
14135 The first two fields are mandatory and must occur in the specified
14136 order, the remaining fields are optional and may appear in any order.
14137 Leading and trailing whitespace of field content is ignored (removed).
14138 The reverse solidus
14140 character can be used to escape any following character including
14141 semicolon and itself in the content of the second field, and in value
14142 parts of any optional key/value field.
14145 The first field defines the MIME
14147 the entry is about to handle (case-insensitively).
14148 If the subtype is specified as an asterisk
14150 the entry is meant to match all subtypes of the named type, e.g.,
14152 would match any audio type.
14153 The second field is the
14155 shell command used to display MIME parts of the given type.
14158 Data consuming shell commands will be fed message (MIME part) data on
14159 standard input unless one or more instances of the (unquoted) string
14161 are used: these formats will be replaced with a temporary file(name)
14162 that has been prefilled with the parts data.
14163 Data producing shell commands are expected to generata data on their
14164 standard output unless that format is used.
14165 In all cases any given
14167 format is replaced with a properly shell quoted filename.
14168 When a command requests a temporary file via
14170 then that will be removed again, as if the
14171 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
14173 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
14174 flags had been set; unless the command requests
14177 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
14178 flag is also implied; see below for more.
14181 Optional fields define single-word flags (case-insensitive), or key
14182 / value pairs consisting of a case-insensitive keyword, an equals sign
14184 and a shell command; whitespace surrounding the equals sign is removed.
14185 Optional fields include the following:
14188 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
14190 A program that can be used to compose a new body or body part in the
14192 (Currently unused.)
14194 .It Cd composetyped
14197 field, but is to be used when the composing program needs to specify the
14199 header field to be applied to the composed data.
14200 (Currently unused.)
14203 .It Cd copiousoutput
14204 A flag field which indicates that the output of the
14206 command is integrable into \*(UAs normal visual display.
14207 It is mutually exclusive with
14208 .Cd needsterminal .
14211 A textual description that describes this type of data.
14212 The text may optionally be enclosed within double quotation marks
14216 A program that can be used to edit a body or body part in the given
14218 (Currently unused.)
14220 .It Cd nametemplate
14221 This field specifies a filename format for the
14223 format used in the shell command fields, in which
14225 will be replaced by a random string.
14226 (The filename is also stored in and passed to subprocesses via
14227 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY . )
14228 The standard says this is
14229 .Dq only expected to be relevant in environments \
14230 where filename extensions are meaningful ,
14231 and so this field is ignored unless the
14233 is a prefix, optionally followed by (ASCII) alphabetic and numeric
14234 characters, the underscore and the period.
14235 For example, to specify that a JPG file is to be passed to an image
14236 viewer with a name ending in
14238 .Ql nametemplate=%s.jpg
14242 .It Cd needsterminal
14243 This flag field indicates that the given shell command must be run on
14244 an interactive terminal.
14245 \*(UA will temporarily release the terminal to the given command in
14246 interactive mode, in non-interactive mode this entry will be entirely
14247 ignored; this flag implies
14248 .Cd x-mailx-noquote .
14251 A program that can be used to print a message or body part in the given
14253 (Currently unused.)
14256 Specifies a program to be run to test some condition, for example, the
14257 machine architecture, or the window system in use, to determine whether
14258 or not this mailcap entry applies.
14259 If the test fails, a subsequent mailcap entry should be sought; also see
14260 .Cd x-mailx-test-once .
14261 Standard I/O of the test program is redirected from and to
14265 is not supported (the data does not yet exist).
14267 .It Cd textualnewlines
14268 A flag field which indicates that this type of data is line-oriented and
14269 that, if encoded in
14271 all newlines should be converted to canonical form (CRLF) before
14272 encoding, and will be in that form after decoding.
14273 (Currently unused.)
14276 Names a file, in X11 bitmap (xbm) format, which points to an appropriate
14277 icon to be used to visually denote the presence of this kind of data.
14278 This field is not used by \*(UA.
14281 .It Cd x-mailx-async
14282 Extension flag field that denotes that the given
14284 command shall be executed asynchronously, without blocking \*(UA.
14285 Cannot be used in conjunction with
14286 .Cd needsterminal ;
14287 the standard output of the command will go to
14291 .It Cd x-mailx-noquote
14292 An extension flag field that indicates that even a
14295 command shall not be used when
14297 ing messages, as it would by default.
14300 .It Cd x-mailx-test-once
14301 Extension flag which denotes whether the given
14303 command shall be evaluated once only with its exit status being cached.
14304 This is handy if some global unchanging condition is to be queried, like
14305 .Dq running under the X Window System .
14308 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
14309 Extension flag field that requests creation of a zero-sized temporary
14310 file, the name of which is to be placed in the environment variable
14311 .Ev MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY .
14312 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
14314 format (because that is implemented by means of this temporary file).
14317 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-fill
14318 Normally the MIME part content is passed to the handler via standard
14319 input; if this flag is set then the data will instead be written into
14321 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile .
14322 In order to cause deletion of the temporary file you will have to set
14323 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
14325 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
14330 .It Cd x-mailx-tmpfile-unlink
14331 Extension flag field that requests that the temporary file shall be
14332 deleted automatically when the command loop is entered again at latest.
14333 It is an error to use this flag with commands that include a
14335 format, or in conjunction with
14336 .Cd x-mailx-async .
14337 .Cd x-mailx-tmpfile
14341 .It Cd x-mailx-last-resort
14342 An extension flag that indicates that this handler shall only be used
14343 as a last resort, when no other source (see
14344 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" )
14345 provides a MIME handler.
14348 .It Cd x-mailx-ignore
14349 An extension that enforces that this handler is not used at all.
14354 The standard includes the possibility to define any number of additional
14355 fields, prefixed by
14357 Flag fields apply to the entire
14359 entry \(em in some unusual cases, this may not be desirable, but
14360 differentiation can be accomplished via separate entries, taking
14361 advantage of the fact that subsequent entries are searched if an earlier
14362 one does not provide enough information.
14365 command needs to specify the
14369 command shall not, the following will help out the latter:
14371 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14372 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; needsterminal
14373 application/postscript; ps-to-terminal %s; compose=idraw %s
14377 In value parts of command fields any occurrence of the format string
14379 will be replaced by the
14382 Any named parameter from a messages'
14384 field may be embedded into the command line using the format
14386 followed by the parameter name and a closing brace
14389 The entire parameter should appear as a single command line argument,
14390 regardless of embedded spaces, shell quoting will be performed by the
14391 RFC 1524 processor, thus:
14393 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14395 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary=42
14398 multipart/*; /usr/local/bin/showmulti \e
14399 %t %{boundary} ; composetyped = /usr/local/bin/makemulti
14401 # Executed shell command
14402 /usr/local/bin/showmulti multipart/mixed 42
14406 Note that \*(UA does not support handlers for multipart MIME parts as
14407 shown in this example (as of today).
14408 It does not support the additional formats
14412 An example file, also showing how to properly deal with the expansion of
14414 which includes any quotes that are necessary to make it a valid shell
14415 argument by itself and thus will cause undesired behaviour when placed
14416 in additional user-provided quotes:
14418 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14420 text/richtext; richtext %s; copiousoutput
14422 text/x-perl; perl -cWT %s; nametemplate = %s.pl
14424 # Exit EX_TEMPFAIL=75 on signal
14425 application/pdf; \e
14427 trap "rm -f ${infile}" EXIT\e; \e
14428 trap "exit 75" INT QUIT TERM\e; \e
14429 mupdf "${infile}"; \e
14430 test = [ -n "${DISPLAY}" ]; \e
14431 nametemplate = %s.pdf; x-mailx-async
14432 application/pdf; pdftotext -layout - -; copiousoutput
14434 application/*; echo "This is \e\e"%t\e\e" but \e
14435 is 50 \e% Greek to me" \e; < %s head -c 512 | cat -vet; \e
14436 copiousoutput; x-mailx-noquote; x-mailx-last-resort
14441 .Sx "HTML mail and MIME attachments" ,
14442 .Sx "The mime.types files" ,
14445 .Va mime-counter-evidence ,
14446 .Va pipe-TYPE/SUBTYPE ,
14447 .Va pipe-EXTENSION .
14450 .\" .Ss "The .netrc file" {{{ review
14451 .Ss "The .netrc file"
14453 User credentials for machine accounts (see
14454 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" )
14455 can be placed in the
14457 file, which will be loaded and cached when requested by
14459 The default location
14461 may be overridden by the
14463 environment variable.
14464 As long as syntax constraints are honoured the file source may be
14465 replaced with the output of the shell command set in
14467 to load an encrypted file, for example.
14468 The cache can be managed with the command
14472 The file consists of space, tabulator or newline separated tokens.
14473 This parser implements a superset of the original BSD syntax, but users
14474 should nonetheless be aware of portability glitches, shall their
14476 be usable across multiple programs and platforms:
14479 .Bl -bullet -compact
14481 BSD only supports double quotation marks, for example
14482 .Ql password """pass with spaces""" .
14484 BSD (only?) supports escaping of single characters via a reverse solidus
14485 (a space could be escaped via
14487 in- as well as outside of a quoted string.
14488 This method is assumed to be present, and will actively be used to quote
14489 double quotation marks
14491 and reverse solidus
14493 characters inside the
14497 tokens, for example for display purposes.
14499 BSD does not require a final quotation mark of the last user input token.
14501 The original BSD (Berknet) parser also supported a format which allowed
14502 tokens to be separated with commas \(en whereas at least Hewlett-Packard
14503 still seems to support this syntax, this parser does not!
14505 As a non-portable extension some widely-used programs support
14506 shell-style comments: if an input line starts, after any amount of
14507 whitespace, with a number sign
14509 then the rest of the line is ignored.
14511 Whereas other programs may require that the
14513 file is accessible by only the user if it contains a
14515 token for any other
14519 this parser will always require these strict permissions.
14523 Of the following list of supported tokens this parser uses (and caches)
14530 entry will not be used.
14532 .Bl -tag -width ".It Cd BaNg"
14533 .It Cd machine Ar name
14534 The hostname of the entries' machine, lowercase-normalized before use.
14535 Any further file content, until either end-of-file or the occurrence
14540 first-class token is bound (only related) to the machine
14543 As an extension that should not be the cause of any worries this parser
14544 supports a single wildcard prefix for
14546 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14547 machine *.example.com login USER password PASS
14548 machine pop3.example.com login USER password PASS
14549 machine smtp.example.com login USER password PASS
14555 .Ql pop3.example.com ,
14559 .Ql local.smtp.example.com .
14560 In the example neither
14561 .Ql pop3.example.com
14563 .Ql smtp.example.com
14564 will be matched by the wildcard, since the exact matches take
14565 precedence (it is however faster to specify it the other way around).
14568 This is the same as
14570 except that it is a fallback entry that is used shall none of the
14571 specified machines match; only one default token may be specified,
14572 and it must be the last first-class token.
14574 .It Cd login Ar name
14575 The user name on the remote machine.
14577 .It Cd password Ar string
14578 The user's password on the remote machine.
14580 .It Cd account Ar string
14581 Supply an additional account password.
14582 This is merely for FTP purposes.
14584 .It Cd macdef Ar name
14586 A macro is defined with the specified
14588 it is formed from all lines beginning with the next line and continuing
14589 until a blank line is (consecutive newline characters are) encountered.
14592 entries cannot be utilized by multiple machines, too, but must be
14593 defined following the
14595 they are intended to be used with.)
14598 exists, it is automatically run as the last step of the login process.
14599 This is merely for FTP purposes.
14606 .\" .Sh EXAMPLES {{{
14609 .\" .Ss "An example configuration" {{{
14610 .Ss "An example configuration"
14612 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14613 # This example assumes v15.0 compatibility mode
14616 # Request strict TLL transport layer security checks
14617 set tls-verify=strict
14619 # Where are the up-to-date TLS certificates?
14620 # (Since we manage up-to-date ones explicitly, do not use any,
14621 # possibly outdated, default certificates shipped with OpenSSL)
14622 #set tls-ca-dir=/etc/ssl/certs
14623 set tls-ca-file=/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
14624 set tls-ca-no-defaults
14625 #set tls-ca-flags=partial-chain
14626 wysh set smime-ca-file="${tls-ca-file}" \e
14627 smime-ca-no-defaults #smime-ca-flags="${tls-ca-flags}"
14629 # This could be outsourced to a central configuration file via
14630 # tls-config-file plus tls-config-module if the used library allows.
14631 # CipherString: explicitly define the list of ciphers, which may
14632 # improve security, especially with protocols older than TLS v1.2.
14633 # See ciphers(1). Possibly best to only use tls-config-pairs-HOST
14634 # (or -USER@HOST), as necessary, again..
14635 # Note that TLSv1.3 uses Ciphersuites= instead, which will join
14636 # with CipherString (if protocols older than v1.3 are allowed)
14637 # Curves: especially with TLSv1.3 curves selection may be desired.
14638 # MinProtocol,MaxProtocol: do not use protocols older than TLS v1.2.
14639 # Change this only when the remote server does not support it:
14640 # maybe use chain support via tls-config-pairs-HOST / -USER@HOST
14641 # to define such explicit exceptions, then, e.g.,
14642 # MinProtocol=TLSv1.1
14643 if "$tls-features" =% ,+ctx-set-maxmin-proto,
14644 wysh set tls-config-pairs='\e
14645 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
14646 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
14647 MinProtocol=TLSv1.1'
14649 wysh set tls-config-pairs='\e
14650 CipherString=TLSv1.2:!aNULL:!eNULL:@STRENGTH,\e
14651 Curves=P-521:P-384:P-256,\e
14652 Protocol=-ALL\e,+TLSv1.1 \e, +TLSv1.2\e, +TLSv1.3'
14655 # Essential setting: select allowed character sets
14656 set sendcharsets=utf-8,iso-8859-1
14658 # A very kind option: when replying to a message, first try to
14659 # use the same encoding that the original poster used herself!
14660 set reply-in-same-charset
14662 # When replying, do not merge From: and To: of the original message
14663 # into To:. Instead old From: -> new To:, old To: -> merge Cc:.
14664 set recipients-in-cc
14666 # When sending messages, wait until the Mail-Transfer-Agent finishs.
14667 # Only like this you will be able to see errors reported through the
14668 # exit status of the MTA (including the built-in SMTP one)!
14671 # Only use built-in MIME types, no mime.types(5) files
14672 set mimetypes-load-control
14674 # Default directory where we act in (relative to $HOME)
14676 # A leading "+" (often) means: under *folder*
14677 # *record* is used to save copies of sent messages
14678 set MBOX=+mbox.mbox DEAD=+dead.txt \e
14679 record=+sent.mbox record-files record-resent
14681 # Make "file mymbox" and "file myrec" go to..
14682 shortcut mymbox %:+mbox.mbox myrec +sent.mbox
14684 # Not really optional, e.g., for S/MIME
14685 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
14687 # It may be necessary to set hostname and/or smtp-hostname
14688 # if the "SERVER" of mta and "domain" of from do not match.
14689 # The `urlencode' command can be used to encode USER and PASS
14690 set mta=(smtps?|submissions?)://[USER[:PASS]@]SERVER[:PORT] \e
14691 smtp-auth=login/plain... \e
14694 # Never refuse to start into interactive mode, and more
14696 colour-pager crt= \e
14697 followup-to followup-to-honour=ask-yes fullnames \e
14698 history-file=+.\*(uAhist history-size=-1 history-gabby \e
14699 mime-counter-evidence=0b1111 \e
14700 prompt='?\e$?!\e$!/\e$^ERRNAME[\e$account#\e$mailbox-display]? ' \e
14701 reply-to-honour=ask-yes \e
14704 # Only include the selected header fields when typing messages
14705 headerpick type retain from_ date from to cc subject \e
14706 message-id mail-followup-to reply-to
14707 # ...when forwarding messages
14708 headerpick forward retain subject date from to cc
14709 # ...when saving message, etc.
14710 #headerpick save ignore ^Original-.*$ ^X-.*$
14712 # Some mailing lists
14713 mlist '@xyz-editor\e.xyz$' '@xyzf\e.xyz$'
14714 mlsubscribe '^xfans@xfans\e.xyz$'
14716 # Handle a few file extensions (to store MBOX databases)
14717 filetype bz2 'bzip2 -dc' 'bzip2 -zc' \e
14718 gz 'gzip -dc' 'gzip -c' xz 'xz -dc' 'xz -zc' \e
14719 zst 'zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc' \e
14720 zst.pgp 'gpg -d | zstd -dc' 'zstd -19 -zc | gpg -e'
14722 # A real life example of a very huge free mail provider
14723 # Instead of directly placing content inside `account',
14724 # we `define' a macro: like that we can switch "accounts"
14725 # from within *on-compose-splice*, for example!
14727 set folder=~/spool/XooglX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
14728 set from='Your Name <address@examp.ple>'
14730 set pop3-no-apop-pop.gmXil.com
14731 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.gmXil.com
14732 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.gmXil.com
14733 # Or, entirely IMAP based setup
14734 #set folder=imaps://imap.gmail.com record="+[Gmail]/Sent Mail" \e
14735 # imap-cache=~/spool/cache
14737 set mta=smtp://USER:PASS@smtp.gmXil.com smtp-use-starttls
14739 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.gmail.com:465
14745 # Here is a pretty large one which does not allow sending mails
14746 # if there is a domain name mismatch on the SMTP protocol level,
14747 # which would bite us if the value of from does not match, e.g.,
14748 # for people who have a sXXXXeforge project and want to speak
14749 # with the mailing list under their project account (in from),
14750 # still sending the message through their normal mail provider
14752 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
14753 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
14755 shortcut pop %:pop3s://pop.yaXXex.com
14756 shortcut imap %:imaps://imap.yaXXex.com
14758 set mta=smtps://USER:PASS@smtp.yaXXex.com:465 \e
14759 hostname=yaXXex.com smtp-hostname=
14765 # Create some new commands so that, e.g., `ls /tmp' will..
14766 commandalias lls '!ls ${LS_COLOUR_FLAG} -aFlrS'
14767 commandalias llS '!ls ${LS_COLOUR_FLAG} -aFlS'
14769 set pipe-message/external-body='?* echo $MAILX_EXTERNAL_BODY_URL'
14771 # We do not support gpg(1) directly yet. But simple --clearsign'd
14772 # message parts can be dealt with as follows:
14775 wysh set pipe-text/plain=$'?*#++=?\e
14776 < "${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" awk \e
14777 -v TMPFILE="${MAILX_FILENAME_TEMPORARY}" \e'\e
14779 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----/,/^$/ {\e
14782 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
14783 system("gpg --verify " TMPFILE " 2>&1");\e
14784 print "--- GPG --verify ---";\e
14788 /^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----/,\e
14789 /^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----/{\e
14796 commandalias V '\e'call V
14800 When storing passwords in
14802 appropriate permissions should be set on this file with
14803 .Ql $ chmod 0600 \*(ur .
14806 is available user credentials can be stored in the central
14808 file instead; e.g., here is a different version of the example account
14809 that sets up SMTP and POP3:
14811 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14813 set folder=~/spool/XandeX inbox=+syste.mbox sent=+sent
14814 set from='Your Name <address@exam.ple>'
14816 # Load an encrypted ~/.netrc by uncommenting the next line
14817 #set netrc-pipe='gpg -qd ~/.netrc.pgp'
14819 set mta=smtps://smtp.yXXXXx.ru:465 \e
14820 smtp-hostname= hostname=yXXXXx.com
14821 set pop3-keepalive=240 pop3-no-apop-pop.yXXXXx.ru
14822 commandalias xp fi pop3s://pop.yXXXXx.ru
14834 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14835 machine *.yXXXXx.ru login USER password PASS
14839 This configuration should now work just fine:
14842 .Dl $ echo text | \*(uA -dvv -AXandeX -s Subject user@exam.ple
14845 .\" .Ss "S/MIME step by step" {{{
14846 .Ss "S/MIME step by step"
14848 \*(OP The first thing that is needed for
14849 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME"
14850 is a personal certificate, and a private key.
14851 The certificate contains public information, in particular a name and
14852 email address(es), and the public key that can be used by others to
14853 encrypt messages for the certificate holder (the owner of the private
14856 signed messages generated with that certificate('s private key).
14857 Whereas the certificate is included in each signed message, the private
14858 key must be kept secret.
14859 It is used to decrypt messages that were previously encrypted with the
14860 public key, and to sign messages.
14863 For personal use it is recommended to get a S/MIME certificate from
14864 one of the major CAs on the Internet.
14865 Many CAs offer such certificates for free.
14866 Usually offered is a combined certificate and private key in PKCS#12
14867 format which \*(UA does not accept directly.
14868 To convert it to PEM format, the following shell command can be used;
14869 please read on for how to use these PEM files.
14871 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14872 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out certpem.pem -clcerts -nodes
14874 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out cert.pem -clcerts -nokeys
14875 $ openssl pkcs12 -in cert.p12 -out key.pem -nocerts -nodes
14880 .Lk https://www.CAcert.org
14881 which issues client and server certificates to members of their
14882 community for free; their root certificate
14883 .Pf ( Lk https://\:www.cacert.org/\:certs/\:root.crt )
14884 is often not in the default set of trusted CA root certificates, though,
14885 which means their root certificate has to be downloaded separately,
14886 and needs to be part of the S/MIME certificate validation chain by
14889 or as a vivid member of the
14890 .Va smime-ca-file .
14891 But let us take a step-by-step tour on how to setup S/MIME with
14892 a certificate from CAcert.org despite this situation!
14895 First of all you will have to become a member of the CAcert.org
14896 community, simply by registrating yourself via the web interface.
14897 Once you are, create and verify all email addresses you want to be able
14898 to create signed and encrypted messages for/with using the corresponding
14899 entries of the web interface.
14900 Now ready to create S/MIME certificates, so let us create a new
14901 .Dq client certificate ,
14902 ensure to include all email addresses that should be covered by the
14903 certificate in the following web form, and also to use your name as the
14907 Create a private key and a certificate request on your local computer
14908 (please see the manual pages of the used commands for more in-depth
14909 knowledge on what the used arguments etc. do):
14912 .Dl $ openssl req -nodes -newkey rsa:4096 -keyout key.pem -out creq.pem
14915 Afterwards copy-and-paste the content of
14917 into the certificate-request (CSR) field of the web form on the
14918 CAcert.org website (you may need to unfold some
14919 .Dq advanced options
14920 to see the corresponding text field).
14921 This last step will ensure that your private key (which never left your
14922 box) and the certificate belong together (through the public key that
14923 will find its way into the certificate via the certificate-request).
14924 You are now ready and can create your CAcert certified certificate.
14925 Download and store or copy-and-paste it as
14930 In order to use your new S/MIME setup a combined private key/public key
14931 (certificate) file has to be created:
14934 .Dl $ cat key.pem pub.crt > ME@HERE.com.paired
14937 This is the file \*(UA will work with.
14938 If you have created your private key with a passphrase then \*(UA will
14939 ask you for it whenever a message is signed or decrypted, unless this
14940 operation has been automated as described in
14941 .Sx "Signed and encrypted messages with S/MIME" .
14942 Set the following variables to henceforth use S/MIME (setting
14944 is of interest for verification only):
14946 .Bd -literal -offset indent
14947 ? set smime-ca-file=ALL-TRUSTED-ROOT-CERTS-HERE \e
14948 smime-sign-cert=ME@HERE.com.paired \e
14949 smime-sign-digest=SHA512 \e
14950 smime-sign from=myname@my.host
14955 .\" .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or TLS" {{{
14956 .Ss "Using CRLs with S/MIME or TLS"
14958 \*(OP Certification authorities (CAs) issue certificate revocation
14959 lists (CRLs) on a regular basis.
14960 These lists contain the serial numbers of certificates that have been
14961 declared invalid after they have been issued.
14962 Such usually happens because the private key for the certificate has
14964 because the owner of the certificate has left the organization that is
14965 mentioned in the certificate, etc.
14966 To seriously use S/MIME or TLS verification,
14967 an up-to-date CRL is required for each trusted CA.
14968 There is otherwise no method to distinguish between valid and
14969 invalidated certificates.
14970 \*(UA currently offers no mechanism to fetch CRLs, nor to access them on
14971 the Internet, so they have to be retrieved by some external mechanism.
14974 \*(UA accepts CRLs in PEM format only;
14975 CRLs in DER format must be converted, like, e.\|g.:
14978 .Dl $ openssl crl \-inform DER \-in crl.der \-out crl.pem
14981 To tell \*(UA about the CRLs, a directory that contains all CRL files
14982 (and no other files) must be created.
14987 variables, respectively, must then be set to point to that directory.
14988 After that, \*(UA requires a CRL to be present for each CA that is used
14989 to verify a certificate.
14998 In general it is a good idea to turn on
15004 twice) if something does not work well.
15005 Very often a diagnostic message can be produced that leads to the
15006 problems' solution.
15008 .\" .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup" {{{
15009 .Ss "\*(UA shortly hangs on startup"
15011 This can have two reasons, one is the necessity to wait for a file lock
15012 and cannot be helped, the other being that \*(UA calls the function
15014 in order to query the nodename of the box (sometimes the real one is
15015 needed instead of the one represented by the internal variable
15017 One may have varying success by ensuring that the real hostname and
15021 or, more generally, that the name service is properly setup \(en
15024 return the expected value?
15025 Does this local hostname have a domain suffix?
15026 RFC 6762 standardized the link-local top-level domain
15028 try again after adding an (additional) entry with this extension.
15031 .\" .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail (via OAuth)" {{{
15032 .Ss "I cannot login to Google mail \&(via OAuth\&)"
15034 Since 2014 some free service providers classify programs as
15036 unless they use a special authentication method (OAuth 2.0) which
15037 was not standardized for non-HTTP protocol authentication token query
15038 until August 2015 (RFC 7628).
15041 Different to Kerberos / GSSAPI, which is developed since the mid of the
15042 1980s, where a user can easily create a local authentication ticket for
15043 her- and himself with the locally installed
15045 program, that protocol has no such local part but instead requires
15046 a world-wide-web query to create or fetch a token; since there is no
15047 local cache this query would have to be performed whenever \*(UA is
15048 invoked (in interactive sessions situation may differ).
15051 \*(UA does not directly support OAuth.
15052 It, however, supports XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER, see
15053 .Sx "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?"
15054 If that is not used it is necessary to declare \*(UA a
15055 .Dq less secure app
15056 (on the providers account web page) in order to read and send mail.
15057 However, it also seems possible to take the following steps instead:
15062 give the provider the number of a mobile phone,
15065 .Dq 2-Step Verification ,
15067 create an application specific password (16 characters), and
15069 use that special password instead of the real Google account password in
15070 \*(UA (for more on that see the section
15071 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) .
15075 .\" .Ss "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?" {{{
15076 .Ss "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?"
15079 .Sx "I cannot login to Google mail \&(via OAuth\&)"
15080 one OAuth-based authentication method is available:
15081 the OAuth 2.0 bearer token usage as standardized in RFC 6750 (according
15082 SASL mechanism in RFC 7628), also known as XOAUTH2 and OAUTHBEARER,
15083 allows fetching a temporary access token via the web that can locally be
15086 The protocol is simple and extendable, token updates or even password
15087 changes via a simple TLS secured server login would be possible in
15088 theory, but today a web browser and an external support tool are
15089 prerequisites for using this authentication method.
15090 The token times out and must be periodically refreshed via the web.
15093 Some hurdles must be taken before being able to use this method.
15094 Using GMail as an example, an application (that is a name) must be
15095 registered, for which credentials, a
15098 .Dq client secret ,
15099 need to be created and saved locally (in a secure way).
15100 These initial configuration steps can be performed at
15101 .Lk https://console.developers.google.com/apis/credentials .
15102 Thereafter a refresh token can be requested;
15103 a python program to do this for GMail accounts is
15104 .Lk https://github.com/google/\:gmail-oauth2-tools/\:raw/\:\
15105 master/\:python/\:oauth2.py :
15107 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15108 $ python oauth2.py --user=EMAIL \e
15109 --client-id=THE-ID --client-secret=THE-SECRET \e
15110 --generate_oauth2_token
15111 To authorize token, visit this url and follow the directions:
15112 https://accounts.google.com/o/oauth2/auth?client_id=...
15113 Enter verification code: ...
15116 Access Token Expiration Seconds: 3600
15117 $ # Of which the last three are actual token responses.
15118 $ # Thereafter access tokens can regularly be refreshed
15119 $ # via the created refresh token (read on)
15123 The generated refresh token must also be saved locally (securely).
15124 The procedure as a whole can be read at
15125 .Lk https://github.com/google/\:gmail-oauth2-tools/\:wiki/\:\
15126 OAuth2DotPyRunThrough .
15127 Since periodic timers are not yet supported, keeping an access token
15128 up-to-date (from within \*(UA) can only be performed via the hook
15129 .Va on-main-loop-tick ,
15130 or (for sending only)
15131 .Va on-compose-enter
15132 (for more on authentication please see the section
15133 .Sx "On URL syntax and credential lookup" ) :
15135 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15136 set on-main-loop-tick=o-m-l-t on-compose-enter=o-c-e
15138 xcall update_access_token
15141 xcall update_access_token
15144 set access_token_=0
15145 define update_access_token {
15146 local set i epoch_sec epoch_nsec
15148 eval set $i # set epoch_sec/_nsec of vexpr epoch
15149 vput vexpr i + $access_token_ 2100
15150 if $epoch_sec -ge $i
15151 vput ! password python oauth2.py --user=EMAIL \e
15152 --client-id=THE-ID --client-secret=THE-SECRET \e
15153 --refresh-token=THE-REFRESH-TOKEN |\e
15154 sed '1b PASS;d; :PASS s/^.\e{1,\e}:\e(.\e{1,\e}\e)$/\e1/'
15155 vput csop password trim "$password"
15157 echo password is <$password>
15159 set access_token_=$epoch_sec
15165 .\" .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work" {{{ review
15166 .Ss "Not \(dqdefunctional\(dq, but the editor key does not work"
15168 Two thinkable situations: the first is a shadowed sequence; setting
15170 or the most possible
15172 mode, causes a printout of the
15174 tree after that is built; being a cache, this happens only upon startup
15175 or after modifying bindings.
15178 Or second, terminal libraries (see
15179 .Sx "On terminal control and line editor",
15182 may report different codes than the terminal really sends, rendering
15183 bindings dysfunctional because expected and received data do not match; the
15187 ings will show the byte sequences that are expected.
15188 (One common source of problems is that the \(em possibly even
15189 non-existing \(em keypad is not turned on, and the resulting layout
15190 reports the keypad control codes for the normal keyboard keys.)
15193 To overcome the situation use for example the program
15197 if available, to see the byte sequences which are actually produced
15198 by keypresses, and use the variable
15200 to make \*(UA aware of them.
15201 The terminal this is typed on produces some unexpected sequences,
15202 here for an example the shifted home key:
15204 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15207 # 1B 5B=[ 31=1 3B=; 32=2 48=H
15212 $ \*(uA -v -Stermcap='kHOM=\eE[H'
15219 .\" .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?" {{{
15220 .Ss "Can \*(UA git-send-email?"
15223 Put (at least parts of) the following in your
15226 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15228 smtpserver = /usr/bin/\*(uA
15229 smtpserveroption = -t
15230 #smtpserveroption = -Sexpandaddr
15231 smtpserveroption = -Athe-account-you-need
15234 suppressfrom = false
15235 assume8bitEncoding = UTF-8
15238 chainreplyto = true
15246 Patches can also be send directly, for example:
15248 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15249 $ git format-patch -M --stdout HEAD^ |
15250 \*(uA -A the-account-you-need -t RECEIVER
15254 .\" .Ss "Howto handle stale dotlock files" {{{
15255 .Ss "Howto handle stale dotlock files"
15258 sometimes fails to open MBOX mail databases because creation of
15260 .Sx "dotlock files"
15261 is impossible due to existing but unowned lock files.
15262 \*(UA does not offer an option to deal with those files, because it is
15263 considered a site policy what counts as unowned, and what not.
15264 The site policy is usually defined by administrator(s), and expressed in
15265 the configuration of a locally installed MTA (for example Postfix
15266 .Ql stale_lock_time=500s ) .
15267 Therefore the suggestion:
15269 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15270 $ </dev/null \*(uA -s 'MTA: be no frog, handle lock' $LOGNAME
15274 By sending a mail to yourself the local MTA can use its normal queue
15275 mechanism to try the delivery multiple times, finally decide a lock file
15276 has become stale, and remove it.
15282 .\" .Sh "IMAP CLIENT" {{{
15285 \*(OPally there is IMAP client support available.
15286 This part of the program is obsolete and will vanish in v15 with the
15287 large MIME and I/O layer rewrite, because it uses old-style blocking I/O
15288 and makes excessive use of signal based long code jumps.
15289 Support can hopefully be readded later based on a new-style I/O, with
15290 SysV signal handling.
15291 In fact the IMAP support had already been removed from the codebase, but
15292 was reinstantiated on user demand: in effect the IMAP code is at the
15293 level of \*(UA v14.8.16 (with
15295 being the sole exception), and should be treated with some care.
15302 protocol prefixes, and an IMAP-based
15305 IMAP URLs (paths) undergo inspections and possible transformations
15306 before use (and the command
15308 can be used to manually apply them to any given argument).
15309 Hierarchy delimiters are normalized, a step which is configurable via the
15311 variable chain, but defaults to the first seen delimiter otherwise.
15312 \*(UA supports internationalised IMAP names, and en- and decodes the
15313 names from and to the
15315 as necessary and possible.
15316 If a mailbox name is expanded (see
15317 .Sx "Filename transformations" )
15318 to an IMAP mailbox, all names that begin with `+' then refer to IMAP
15319 mailboxes below the
15321 target box, while folder names prefixed by `@' refer to folders below
15322 the hierarchy base, so the following will list all folders below the
15323 current one when in an IMAP mailbox:
15327 Note: some IMAP servers do not accept the creation of mailboxes in
15328 the hierarchy base, but require that they are created as subfolders of
15329 `INBOX' \(en with such servers a folder name of the form
15331 .Dl imaps://mylogin@imap.myisp.example/INBOX.
15333 should be used (the last character is the server's hierarchy
15335 The following IMAP-specific commands exist:
15338 .Bl -tag -width ".It Ic BaNg"
15341 Only applicable to cached IMAP mailboxes;
15342 takes a message list and reads the specified messages into the IMAP
15347 If operating in disconnected mode on an IMAP mailbox,
15348 switch to online mode and connect to the mail server while retaining
15349 the mailbox status.
15350 See the description of the
15352 variable for more information.
15356 If operating in online mode on an IMAP mailbox,
15357 switch to disconnected mode while retaining the mailbox status.
15358 See the description of the
15361 A list of messages may optionally be given as argument;
15362 the respective messages are then read into the cache before the
15363 connection is closed, thus
15365 makes the entire mailbox available for disconnected use.
15369 Sends command strings directly to the current IMAP server.
15370 \*(UA operates always in IMAP `selected state' on the current mailbox;
15371 commands that change this will produce undesirable results and should be
15373 Useful IMAP commands are:
15374 .Bl -tag -offset indent -width ".Ic getquotearoot"
15376 Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument and creates it.
15378 (RFC 2087) Takes the name of an IMAP mailbox as an argument
15379 and prints the quotas that apply to the mailbox.
15380 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
15382 (RFC 2342) Takes no arguments and prints the Personal Namespaces,
15383 the Other User's Namespaces and the Shared Namespaces.
15384 Each namespace type is printed in parentheses;
15385 if there are multiple namespaces of the same type,
15386 inner parentheses separate them.
15387 For each namespace a prefix and a hierarchy separator is listed.
15388 Not all IMAP servers support this command.
15393 Perform IMAP path transformations.
15397 .Sx "Command modifiers" ) ,
15398 and manages the error number
15400 The first argument specifies the operation:
15402 normalizes hierarchy delimiters (see
15404 and converts the strings from the locale
15406 to the internationalized variant used by IMAP,
15408 performs the reverse operation.
15409 Encoding will honour the (global) value of
15415 The following IMAP-specific internal variables exist:
15418 .Bl -tag -width ".It Va BaNg"
15420 .It Va disconnected
15421 \*(BO When an IMAP mailbox is selected and this variable is set,
15422 no connection to the server is initiated.
15423 Instead, data is obtained from the local cache (see
15426 Mailboxes that are not present in the cache
15427 and messages that have not yet entirely been fetched from the server
15429 to fetch all messages in a mailbox at once,
15431 .No ` Ns Li copy * /dev/null Ns '
15432 can be used while still in connected mode.
15433 Changes that are made to IMAP mailboxes in disconnected mode are queued
15434 and committed later when a connection to that server is made.
15435 This procedure is not completely reliable since it cannot be guaranteed
15436 that the IMAP unique identifiers (UIDs) on the server still match the
15437 ones in the cache at that time.
15440 when this problem occurs.
15442 .It Va disconnected-USER@HOST
15443 The specified account is handled as described for the
15446 but other accounts are not affected.
15449 .It Va imap-auth-USER@HOST , imap-auth
15450 Sets the IMAP authentication method.
15451 Supported are the default
15458 .Sx "But, how about XOAUTH2 / OAUTHBEARER?" ) ,
15463 (for TLS secured connections which pass a client certificate via
15464 .Va tls-config-pairs ) ,
15465 as well as the \*(OPal
15477 which only need the former.
15479 solely builds upon the credentials passed via a client certificate,
15480 and is usually the way to go since tested servers do not actually follow
15481 RFC 4422, and fail if additional credentials are actually passed.
15485 Enables caching of IMAP mailboxes.
15486 The value of this variable must point to a directory that is either
15487 existent or can be created by \*(UA.
15488 All contents of the cache can be deleted by \*(UA at any time;
15489 it is not safe to make assumptions about them.
15492 .It Va imap-delim-USER@HOST , imap-delim-HOST , imap-delim
15493 The hierarchy separator used by the IMAP server.
15494 Whenever an IMAP path is specified it will undergo normalization.
15495 One of the normalization steps is the squeezing and adjustment of
15496 hierarchy separators.
15497 If this variable is set, any occurrence of any character of the given
15498 value that exists in the path will be replaced by the first member of
15499 the value; an empty value will cause the default to be used, it is
15501 If not set, we will reuse the first hierarchy separator character that
15502 is discovered in a user-given mailbox name.
15504 .Mx Va imap-keepalive
15505 .It Va imap-keepalive-USER@HOST , imap-keepalive-HOST , imap-keepalive
15506 IMAP servers may close the connection after a period of
15507 inactivity; the standard requires this to be at least 30 minutes,
15508 but practical experience may vary.
15509 Setting this variable to a numeric `value' greater than 0 causes
15510 a `NOOP' command to be sent each `value' seconds if no other operation
15514 .It Va imap-list-depth
15515 When retrieving the list of folders on an IMAP server, the
15517 command stops after it has reached a certain depth to avoid possible
15519 The value of this variable sets the maximum depth allowed.
15521 If the folder separator on the current IMAP server is a slash `/',
15522 this variable has no effect and the
15524 command does not descend to subfolders.
15526 .Mx Va imap-use-starttls
15527 .It Va imap-use-starttls-USER@HOST , imap-use-starttls-HOST , imap-use-starttls
15528 Causes \*(UA to issue a `STARTTLS' command to make an unencrypted
15529 IMAP session TLS encrypted.
15530 This functionality is not supported by all servers,
15531 and is not used if the session is already encrypted by the IMAPS method.
15537 .\" .Sh "SEE ALSO" {{{
15547 .Xr spamassassin 1 ,
15556 .Pf (or\0 Xr regex 7 ) ,
15557 .Xr mailwrapper 8 ,
15563 .\" .Sh HISTORY {{{
15566 M. Douglas McIlroy writes in his article
15567 .Dq A Research UNIX Reader: Annotated Excerpts \
15568 from the Programmer's Manual, 1971-1986
15571 command already appeared in First Edition
15575 .Bd -ragged -offset indent
15576 Electronic mail was there from the start.
15577 Never satisfied with its exact behavior, everybody touched it at one
15578 time or another: to assure the safety of simultaneous access, to improve
15579 privacy, to survive crashes, to exploit uucp, to screen out foreign
15580 freeloaders, or whatever.
15581 Not until v7 did the interface change (Thompson).
15582 Later, as mail became global in its reach, Dave Presotto took charge and
15583 brought order to communications with a grab-bag of external networks
15589 Mail, in large parts compatible with
15591 mail, was written in 1978 by Kurt Shoens and developed as part of the
15594 distribution until 1995.
15595 This manual page is derived from
15596 .Dq The Mail Reference Manual
15597 that Kurt Shoens wrote for Mail 1.3, included in 3BSD in 1980.
15602 denominator became standardized as
15604 in the X/Open Portability Guide Issue 2 (January 1987).
15605 After the rise of Open Source
15608 Mail saw continuous development in the individual code forks,
15609 noticeably by Christos Zoulas in
15611 Based upon this Nail, later Heirloom Mailx, was developed by Gunnar
15612 Ritter in the years 2000 until 2008.
15613 Since 2012 S-nail is maintained by Steffen Nurpmeso.
15616 Electronic mail exchange in general is a concept even older.
15617 The earliest well documented electronic mail system was part of the
15618 Compatible Time Sharing System (CTSS) at MIT, its MAIL command had been
15619 proposed in a staff planning memo at the end of 1964 and was implemented
15620 in mid-1965 when Tom Van Vleck and Noel Morris wrote the necessary code.
15621 Similar communication programs were built for other timesharing systems.
15622 One of the most ambitious and influential was Murray Turoff's EMISARI.
15623 Created in 1971 for the United States Office of Emergency Preparedness,
15624 EMISARI combined private electronic messages with a chat system, public
15625 postings, voting, and a user directory.
15628 During the 1960s it was common to connect a large number of terminals to
15629 a single, central computer.
15630 Connecting two computers together was relatively unusual.
15631 This began to change with the development of the ARPANET, the ancestor
15632 of today's Internet.
15633 In 1971 Ray Tomlinson adapted the SNDMSG program, originally developed
15634 for the University of California at Berkeley timesharing system, to give
15635 it the ability to transmit a message across the network into the mailbox
15636 of a user on a different computer.
15637 For the first time it was necessary to specify the recipient's computer
15638 as well as an account name.
15639 Tomlinson decided that the underused commercial at
15641 would work to separate the two.
15644 Sending a message across the network was originally treated as a special
15645 instance of transmitting a file, and so a MAIL command was included in
15646 RFC 385 on file transfer in 1972.
15647 Because it was not always clear when or where a message had come from,
15648 RFC 561 in 1973 aimed to formalize electronic mail headers, including
15653 In 1975 RFC 680 described fields to help with the transmission of
15654 messages to multiple users, including
15659 In 1977 these features and others went from best practices to a binding
15660 standard in RFC 733.
15661 Queen Elizabeth II of England became the first head of state to send
15662 electronic mail on March 26 1976 while ceremonially opening a building
15663 in the British Royal Signals and Radar Establishment (RSRE) in Malvern.
15670 .An "Kurt Shoens" ,
15671 .An "Edward Wang" ,
15672 .An "Keith Bostic" ,
15673 .An "Christos Zoulas" ,
15674 .An "Gunnar Ritter" .
15675 \*(UA is developed by
15676 .An "Steffen Nurpmeso" Aq s-mailx@lists.sdaoden.eu .
15679 .\" .Sh CAVEATS {{{
15682 \*(ID Interrupting an operation via
15686 from anywhere else but a command prompt is very problematic and likely
15687 to leave the program in an undefined state: many library functions
15688 cannot deal with the
15690 that this software (still) performs; even though efforts have been taken
15691 to address this, no sooner but in v15 it will have been worked out:
15692 interruptions have not been disabled in order to allow forceful breakage
15693 of hanging network connections, for example (all this is unrelated to
15697 The SMTP and POP3 protocol support of \*(UA is very basic.
15698 Also, if it fails to contact its upstream SMTP server, it will not make
15699 further attempts to transfer the message at a later time (setting
15704 If this is a concern, it might be better to set up a local SMTP server
15705 that is capable of message queuing.
15712 When a network-based mailbox is open, directly changing to another
15713 network-based mailbox of a different protocol (i.e., from POP3 to IMAP
15714 or vice versa) will cause a
15718 After deleting some message of a POP3 mailbox the header summary falsely
15719 claims that there are no messages to display, one needs to perform
15720 a scroll or dot movement to restore proper state.
15727 mode a power user may encounter crashes very occasionally (this is may
15731 Please report bugs to the
15733 address, for example from within \*(uA:
15734 .\" v15-compat: drop eval as `mail' will expand variable?
15735 .Ql \&? Ns \| Ic eval Ns \| Ic mail Ns \| $contact-mail .
15738 output of the command
15742 .Bd -literal -offset indent
15743 ? wysh set escape=! verbose; vput version xy; unset verbose;\e
15744 eval mail $contact-mail
15751 Information on the web at
15752 .Ql $ \*(uA -X 'echo Ns \| $ Ns Va contact-web Ns ; x' .