1 <!doctype linuxdoc system>
5 <title>The Mutt E-Mail Client
6 <author>by Michael Elkins <htmlurl url="mailto:me@cs.hmc.edu" name="<me@cs.hmc.edu>">
7 <date>version @VERSION@
9 ``All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less.'' -me, circa 1995
16 <bf/Mutt-ng/ is a small but very powerful text-based MIME mail client. Mutt-ng is
17 highly configurable, and is well suited to the mail power user with advanced
18 features like key bindings, keyboard macros, mail threading, regular
19 expression searches and a powerful pattern matching language for selecting
22 <p>This documentation additionaly contains documentation to <bf/Mutt-NG/, a
23 fork from Mutt with the goal to fix all the little annoyances of Mutt, to
24 integrate all the Mutt patches that are floating around in the web, and to
25 add other new features. Features specific to Mutt-ng will be discussed in
26 an extra section. Don't be confused when most of the documentation talk about
27 Mutt and not Mutt-ng, Mutt-ng contains all Mutt-ng features, plus many more.
30 <sect1>Mutt-ng Home Page
32 <htmlurl url="http://www.muttng.org/"
33 name="http://www.muttng.org">
39 <item><htmlurl url="https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/mutt-ng-users"
40 name="mutt-ng-users@lists.berlios.de"> -- This is where the mutt-ng user support happens.
41 <item><htmlurl url="https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/mutt-ng-devel" name="mutt-ng-devel@lists.berlios.de"> -- The development mailing list for mutt-ng
44 <sect1>Software Distribution Sites
46 So far, there are no official releases of Mutt-ng, but you can download
47 daily snapshots from <htmlurl url="http://mutt-ng.berlios.de/snapshots/" name="http://mutt-ng.berlios.de/snapshots/">
50 <item><htmlurl url="ftp://ftp.mutt.org/mutt/"
51 name="ftp://ftp.mutt.org/mutt/">
54 For a list of mirror sites, please refer to <htmlurl
55 url="http://www.mutt.org/download.html"
56 name="http://www.mutt.org/download.html">.
62 Visit channel <em/#muttng/ on <htmlurl
63 url="http://www.freenode.net/" name="irc.freenode.net
64 (www.freenode.net)"> to chat with other people interested in Mutt-ng.
69 If you want to read fresh news about the latest development in Mutt-ng, and get informed
70 about stuff like interesting, Mutt-ng-related articles and packages for your favorite
71 distribution, you can read and/or subscribe to our
72 <htmlurl url="http://mutt-ng.supersized.org/" name="Mutt-ng development weblog">.
76 Mutt is Copyright (C) 1996-2000 Michael R. Elkins
77 <me@cs.hmc.edu> and others
79 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
80 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
81 the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
82 (at your option) any later version.
84 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
85 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
86 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
87 GNU General Public License for more details.
89 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
90 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
91 Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111, USA.
96 This section is intended as a brief overview of how to use Mutt. There are
97 many other features which are described elsewhere in the manual. There
98 is even more information available in the Mutt FAQ and various web
99 pages. See the <htmlurl url="http://www.mutt.org/mutt/"
100 name="Mutt Page"> for more details.
102 The keybindings described in this section are the defaults as distributed.
103 Your local system administrator may have altered the defaults for your site.
104 You can always type ``?'' in any menu to display the current bindings.
106 The first thing you need to do is invoke mutt, simply by typing mutt
107 at the command line. There are various command-line options, see
108 either the mutt man page or the <ref id="commandline" name="reference">.
110 <sect1>Moving Around in Menus
113 Information is presented in menus, very similar to ELM. Here is a table
114 showing the common keys used to navigate menus in Mutt.
117 j or Down next-entry move to the next entry
118 k or Up previous-entry move to the previous entry
119 z or PageDn page-down go to the next page
120 Z or PageUp page-up go to the previous page
121 = or Home first-entry jump to the first entry
122 * or End last-entry jump to the last entry
123 q quit exit the current menu
124 ? help list all keybindings for the current menu
127 <sect1>Editing Input Fields<label id="editing">
129 Mutt has a builtin line editor which is used as the primary way to input
130 textual data such as email addresses or filenames. The keys used to move
131 around while editing are very similar to those of Emacs.
134 ^A or <Home> bol move to the start of the line
135 ^B or <Left> backward-char move back one char
136 Esc B backward-word move back one word
137 ^D or <Delete> delete-char delete the char under the cursor
138 ^E or <End> eol move to the end of the line
139 ^F or <Right> forward-char move forward one char
140 Esc F forward-word move forward one word
141 <Tab> complete complete filename or alias
142 ^T complete-query complete address with query
143 ^K kill-eol delete to the end of the line
144 ESC d kill-eow delete to the end ot the word
145 ^W kill-word kill the word in front of the cursor
146 ^U kill-line delete entire line
147 ^V quote-char quote the next typed key
148 <Up> history-up recall previous string from history
149 <Down> history-down recall next string from history
150 <BackSpace> backspace kill the char in front of the cursor
151 Esc u upcase-word convert word to upper case
152 Esc l downcase-word convert word to lower case
153 Esc c capitalize-word capitalize the word
155 <Return> n/a finish editing
158 You can remap the <em/editor/ functions using the <ref id="bind" name="bind">
159 command. For example, to make the <em/Delete/ key delete the character in
160 front of the cursor rather than under, you could use
162 <tt/bind editor <delete> backspace/
164 <sect1>Reading Mail - The Index and Pager
167 Similar to many other mail clients, there are two modes in which mail is
168 read in Mutt. The first is the index of messages in the mailbox, which is
169 called the ``index'' in Mutt. The second mode is the display of the
170 message contents. This is called the ``pager.''
172 The next few sections describe the functions provided in each of these
175 <sect2>The Message Index
179 c change to a different mailbox
180 ESC c change to a folder in read-only mode
181 C copy the current message to another mailbox
182 ESC C decode a message and copy it to a folder
183 ESC s decode a message and save it to a folder
184 D delete messages matching a pattern
185 d delete the current message
187 l show messages matching a pattern
188 N mark message as new
189 o change the current sort method
190 O reverse sort the mailbox
191 q save changes and exit
193 T tag messages matching a pattern
194 t toggle the tag on a message
195 ESC t toggle tag on entire message thread
196 U undelete messages matching a pattern
199 x abort changes and exit
200 <Return> display-message
201 <Tab> jump to the next new message
202 @ show the author's full e-mail address
203 $ save changes to mailbox
206 ^L clear and redraw the screen
207 ^T untag messages matching a pattern
213 In addition to who sent the message and the subject, a short summary of
214 the disposition of each message is printed beside the message number.
215 Zero or more of the following ``flags'' may appear, which mean:
219 <tag/D/ message is deleted (is marked for deletion)
220 <tag/d/ message have attachments marked for deletion
221 <tag/K/ contains a PGP public key
222 <tag/N/ message is new
223 <tag/O/ message is old
224 <tag/P/ message is PGP encrypted
225 <tag/r/ message has been replied to
226 <tag/S/ message is signed, and the signature is succesfully verified
227 <tag/s/ message is signed
228 <tag/!/ message is flagged
229 <tag/*/ message is tagged
232 Some of the status flags can be turned on or off using
234 <item><bf/set-flag/ (default: w)
235 <item><bf/clear-flag/ (default: W)
239 Furthermore, the following flags reflect who the message is addressed
240 to. They can be customized with the
241 <ref id="to_chars" name="$to_chars"> variable.
245 <tag/+/ message is to you and you only
246 <tag/T/ message is to you, but also to or cc'ed to others
247 <tag/C/ message is cc'ed to you
248 <tag/F/ message is from you
249 <tag/L/ message is sent to a subscribed mailing list
255 By default, Mutt uses its builtin pager to display the body of messages.
256 The pager is very similar to the Unix program <em/less/ though not nearly as
260 <Return> go down one line
261 <Space> display the next page (or next message if at the end of a message)
262 - go back to the previous page
263 n search for next match
264 S skip beyond quoted text
265 T toggle display of quoted text
267 / search for a regular expression (pattern)
268 ESC / search backwards for a regular expression
269 \ toggle search pattern coloring
270 ^ jump to the top of the message
273 In addition, many of the functions from the <em/index/ are available in
274 the pager, such as <em/delete-message/ or <em/copy-message/ (this is one
275 advantage over using an external pager to view messages).
277 Also, the internal pager supports a couple other advanced features. For
278 one, it will accept and translate the ``standard'' nroff sequences for
279 bold and underline. These sequences are a series of either the letter,
280 backspace (^H), the letter again for bold or the letter, backspace,
281 ``_'' for denoting underline. Mutt will attempt to display these
282 in bold and underline respectively if your terminal supports them. If
283 not, you can use the bold and underline <ref id="color" name="color">
284 objects to specify a color or mono attribute for them.
286 Additionally, the internal pager supports the ANSI escape sequences for
287 character attributes. Mutt translates them into the correct color and
288 character settings. The sequences Mutt supports are:
292 ESC [ Ps;Ps;Ps;...;Ps m
299 3x Foreground color is x
300 4x Background color is x
313 Mutt uses these attributes for handling text/enriched messages, and they
314 can also be used by an external <ref id="auto_view" name="autoview">
315 script for highlighting purposes. <bf/Note:/ If you change the colors for your
316 display, for example by changing the color associated with color2 for
317 your xterm, then that color will be used instead of green.
319 <sect2>Threaded Mode<label id="threads">
321 When the mailbox is <ref id="sort" name="sorted"> by <em/threads/, there are
322 a few additional functions available in the <em/index/ and <em/pager/ modes.
325 ^D delete-thread delete all messages in the current thread
326 ^U undelete-thread undelete all messages in the current thread
327 ^N next-thread jump to the start of the next thread
328 ^P previous-thread jump to the start of the previous thread
329 ^R read-thread mark the current thread as read
330 ESC d delete-subthread delete all messages in the current subthread
331 ESC u undelete-subthread undelete all messages in the current subthread
332 ESC n next-subthread jump to the start of the next subthread
333 ESC p previous-subthread jump to the start of the previous subthread
334 ESC r read-subthread mark the current subthread as read
335 ESC t tag-thread toggle the tag on the current thread
336 ESC v collapse-thread toggle collapse for the current thread
337 ESC V collapse-all toggle collapse for all threads
338 P parent-message jump to parent message in thread
341 <bf/Note:/ Collapsing a thread displays only the first message
342 in the thread and hides the others. This is useful when threads
343 contain so many messages that you can only see a handful of threads on
344 the screen. See %M in <ref id="index_format"name="$index_format">.
345 For example, you could use "%?M?(#%03M)&(%4l)?" in <ref
346 id="index_format"name="$index_format"> to optionally
347 display the number of hidden messages if the thread is collapsed.
349 See also: <ref id="strict_threads" name="$strict_threads">.
351 <sect2>Miscellaneous Functions
352 <p><bf/create-alias/<label id="create-alias"> (default: a)<newline>
354 Creates a new alias based upon the current message (or prompts for a
355 new one). Once editing is complete, an <ref id="alias" name="alias">
356 command is added to the file specified by the <ref id="alias_file"
357 name="$alias_file"> variable for future use. <bf/Note:/
358 Specifying an <ref id="alias_file" name="$alias_file">
359 does not add the aliases specified there-in, you must also <ref
360 id="source" name="source"> the file.
362 <p><bf/check-traditional-pgp/<label id="check-traditional-pgp"> (default: ESC P)<newline>
364 This function will search the current message for content signed or
365 encrypted with PGP the "traditional" way, that is, without proper
366 MIME tagging. Technically, this function will temporarily change
367 the MIME content types of the body parts containing PGP data; this
368 is similar to the <ref id="edit-type" name="edit-type"> function's
372 <p><bf/display-toggle-weed/<label id="display-toggle-weed"> (default: h)<newline>
374 Toggles the weeding of message header fields specified by <ref id="ignore"
375 name="ignore"> commands.
377 <p><bf/edit/<label id="edit"> (default: e)<newline>
379 This command (available in the ``index'' and ``pager'') allows you to
380 edit the raw current message as it's present in the mail folder.
381 After you have finished editing, the changed message will be
382 appended to the current folder, and the original message will be
385 <p><bf/edit-type/<label id="edit-type"><newline>
386 (default: ^E on the attachment menu, and in the pager and index menus; ^T on the
389 This command is used to temporarily edit an attachment's content
390 type to fix, for instance, bogus character set parameters. When
391 invoked from the index or from the pager, you'll have the
392 opportunity to edit the top-level attachment's content type. On the
393 <ref id="attach_menu" name="attachment menu">, you can change any
394 attachment's content type. These changes are not persistent, and get
395 lost upon changing folders.
397 Note that this command is also available on the <ref
398 id="compose_menu" name="compose menu">. There, it's used to
399 fine-tune the properties of attachments you are going to send.
401 <p><bf/enter-command/<label id="enter-command"> (default: ``:'')<newline>
403 This command is used to execute any command you would normally put in a
404 configuration file. A common use is to check the settings of variables, or
405 in conjunction with <ref id="macro" name="macros"> to change settings on the
408 <p><bf/extract-keys/<label id="extract-keys"> (default: ^K)<newline>
410 This command extracts PGP public keys from the current or tagged
411 message(s) and adds them to your PGP public key ring.
413 <p><bf/forget-passphrase/<label id="forget-passphrase"> (default:
416 This command wipes the passphrase(s) from memory. It is useful, if
417 you misspelled the passphrase.
419 <p><bf/list-reply/<label id="list-reply"> (default: L)<newline>
421 Reply to the current or tagged message(s) by extracting any addresses which
422 match the regular expressions given by the <ref id="lists" name="lists or subscribe">
423 commands, but also honor any <tt/Mail-Followup-To/ header(s) if the
424 <ref id="honor_followup_to" name="$honor_followup_to">
425 configuration variable is set. Using this when replying to messages posted
426 to mailing lists helps avoid duplicate copies being sent to the author of
427 the message you are replying to.
429 <bf/pipe-message/<label id="pipe-message"> (default: |)<newline>
431 Asks for an external Unix command and pipes the current or
432 tagged message(s) to it. The variables <ref id="pipe_decode"
433 name="$pipe_decode">, <ref id="pipe_split"
434 name="$pipe_split">, <ref id="pipe_sep"
435 name="$pipe_sep"> and <ref id="wait_key"
436 name="$wait_key"> control the exact behaviour of this
439 <bf/resend-message/<label id="resend-message"> (default: ESC e)<newline>
441 With resend-message, mutt takes the current message as a template for a
442 new message. This function is best described as "recall from arbitrary
443 folders". It can conveniently be used to forward MIME messages while
444 preserving the original mail structure. Note that the amount of headers
445 included here depends on the value of the <ref id="weed" name="$weed">
448 This function is also available from the attachment menu. You can use this
449 to easily resend a message which was included with a bounce message
450 as a message/rfc822 body part.
452 <bf/shell-escape/<label id="shell-escape"> (default: !)<newline>
454 Asks for an external Unix command and executes it. The <ref
455 id="wait_key" name="$wait_key"> can be used to control
456 whether Mutt will wait for a key to be pressed when the command returns
457 (presumably to let the user read the output of the command), based on
458 the return status of the named command.
460 <bf/toggle-quoted/<label id="toggle-quoted"> (default: T)<newline>
462 The <em/pager/ uses the <ref id="quote_regexp"
463 name="$quote_regexp"> variable to detect quoted text when
464 displaying the body of the message. This function toggles the display
465 of the quoted material in the message. It is particularly useful when
466 are interested in just the response and there is a large amount of
467 quoted text in the way.
469 <bf/skip-quoted/<label id="skip-quoted"> (default: S)<newline>
471 This function will go to the next line of non-quoted text which come
472 after a line of quoted text in the internal pager.
477 The following bindings are available in the <em/index/ for sending
481 m compose compose a new message
482 r reply reply to sender
483 g group-reply reply to all recipients
484 L list-reply reply to mailing list address
485 f forward forward message
486 b bounce bounce (remail) message
487 ESC k mail-key mail a PGP public key to someone
490 Bouncing a message sends the message as is to the recipient you
491 specify. Forwarding a message allows you to add comments or
492 modify the message you are forwarding. These items are discussed
493 in greater detail in the next chapter <ref id="forwarding_mail"
494 name="``Forwarding and Bouncing Mail''">.
496 Mutt will then enter the <em/compose/ menu and prompt you for the
497 recipients to place on the ``To:'' header field. Next, it will ask
498 you for the ``Subject:'' field for the message, providing a default if
499 you are replying to or forwarding a message. See also <ref id="askcc"
500 name="$askcc">, <ref id="askbcc" name="$askbcc">, <ref
501 id="autoedit" name="$autoedit">, <ref id="bounce"
502 name="$bounce">, and <ref id="fast_reply"
503 name="$fast_reply"> for changing how Mutt asks these
506 Mutt will then automatically start your <ref id="editor"
507 name="$editor"> on the message body. If the <ref id="edit_headers"
508 name="$edit_headers"> variable is set, the headers will be at
509 the top of the message in your editor. Any messages you are replying
510 to will be added in sort order to the message, with appropriate <ref
511 id="attribution" name="$attribution">, <ref id="indent_string"
512 name="$indent_string"> and <ref id="post_indent_string"
513 name="$post_indent_string">. When forwarding a
514 message, if the <ref id="mime_forward" name="$mime_forward">
515 variable is unset, a copy of the forwarded message will be included. If
516 you have specified a <ref id="signature" name="$signature">, it
517 will be appended to the message.
519 Once you have finished editing the body of your mail message, you are
520 returned to the <em/compose/ menu. The following options are available:
523 a attach-file attach a file
524 A attach-message attach message(s) to the message
525 ESC k attach-key attach a PGP public key
526 d edit-description edit description on attachment
527 D detach-file detach a file
528 t edit-to edit the To field
529 ESC f edit-from edit the From field
530 r edit-reply-to edit the Reply-To field
531 c edit-cc edit the Cc field
532 b edit-bcc edit the Bcc field
533 y send-message send the message
534 s edit-subject edit the Subject
535 S smime-menu select S/MIME options
536 f edit-fcc specify an ``Fcc'' mailbox
537 p pgp-menu select PGP options
538 P postpone-message postpone this message until later
539 q quit quit (abort) sending the message
540 w write-fcc write the message to a folder
541 i ispell check spelling (if available on your system)
542 ^F forget-passphrase wipe passphrase(s) from memory
545 <bf/Note:/ The attach-message function will prompt you for a folder to
546 attach messages from. You can now tag messages in that folder and they
547 will be attached to the message you are sending. Note that certain
548 operations like composing a new mail, replying, forwarding, etc. are
549 not permitted when you are in that folder. The %r in <ref
550 id="status_format" name="$status_format"> will change to
551 a 'A' to indicate that you are in attach-message mode.
553 <sect2>Editing the message header
555 When editing the header of your outgoing message, there are a couple of
556 special features available.
558 If you specify<newline>
559 <tt/Fcc:/ <em/filename/<newline>
560 Mutt will pick up <em/filename/
561 just as if you had used the <em/edit-fcc/ function in the <em/compose/ menu.
563 You can also attach files to your message by specifying<newline>
564 <tt/Attach:/ <em/filename/ [ <em/description/ ]<newline>
565 where <em/filename/ is the file to attach and <em/description/ is an
566 optional string to use as the description of the attached file.
568 When replying to messages, if you remove the <em/In-Reply-To:/ field from
569 the header field, Mutt will not generate a <em/References:/ field, which
570 allows you to create a new message thread.
572 Also see <ref id="edit_headers" name="edit_headers">.
574 <sect2>Using Mutt with PGP
577 If you want to use PGP, you can specify
579 <tt/Pgp:/ [ <tt/E/ | <tt/S/ | <tt/S/<em/<id>/ ] <newline>
581 ``E'' encrypts, ``S'' signs and
582 ``S<id>'' signs with the given key, setting <ref
583 id="pgp_sign_as" name="$pgp_sign_as"> permanently.
585 If you have told mutt to PGP encrypt a message, it will guide you
586 through a key selection process when you try to send the message.
587 Mutt will not ask you any questions about keys which have a
588 certified user ID matching one of the message recipients' mail
589 addresses. However, there may be situations in which there are
590 several keys, weakly certified user ID fields, or where no matching
593 In these cases, you are dropped into a menu with a list of keys from
594 which you can select one. When you quit this menu, or mutt can't
595 find any matching keys, you are prompted for a user ID. You can, as
596 usually, abort this prompt using <tt/^G/. When you do so, mutt will
597 return to the compose screen.
599 Once you have successfully finished the key selection, the message
600 will be encrypted using the selected public keys, and sent out.
602 Most fields of the entries in the key selection menu (see also <ref
603 id="pgp_entry_format" name="$pgp_entry_format">)
604 have obvious meanings. But some explanations on the capabilities, flags,
605 and validity fields are in order.
607 The flags sequence (%f) will expand to one of the following flags:
609 R The key has been revoked and can't be used.
610 X The key is expired and can't be used.
611 d You have marked the key as disabled.
612 c There are unknown critical self-signature
616 The capabilities field (%c) expands to a two-character sequence
617 representing a key's capabilities. The first character gives
618 the key's encryption capabilities: A minus sign (<bf/-/) means
619 that the key cannot be used for encryption. A dot (<bf/./) means that
620 it's marked as a signature key in one of the user IDs, but may
621 also be used for encryption. The letter <bf/e/ indicates that
622 this key can be used for encryption.
624 The second character indicates the key's signing capabilities. Once
625 again, a ``<bf/-/'' implies ``not for signing'', ``<bf/./'' implies
626 that the key is marked as an encryption key in one of the user-ids, and
627 ``<bf/s/'' denotes a key which can be used for signing.
629 Finally, the validity field (%t) indicates how well-certified a user-id
630 is. A question mark (<bf/?/) indicates undefined validity, a minus
631 character (<bf/-/) marks an untrusted association, a space character
632 means a partially trusted association, and a plus character (<bf/+/)
633 indicates complete validity.
635 <sect2>Sending anonymous messages via mixmaster.
638 You may also have configured mutt to co-operate with Mixmaster, an
639 anonymous remailer. Mixmaster permits you to send your messages
640 anonymously using a chain of remailers. Mixmaster support in mutt is for
641 mixmaster version 2.04 (beta 45 appears to be the latest) and 2.03.
642 It does not support earlier versions or the later so-called version 3 betas,
643 of which the latest appears to be called 2.9b23.
645 To use it, you'll have to obey certain restrictions. Most
646 important, you cannot use the <tt/Cc/ and <tt/Bcc/ headers. To tell
647 Mutt to use mixmaster, you have to select a remailer chain, using
648 the mix function on the compose menu.
650 The chain selection screen is divided into two parts. In the
651 (larger) upper part, you get a list of remailers you may use. In
652 the lower part, you see the currently selected chain of remailers.
654 You can navigate in the chain using the <tt/chain-prev/ and
655 <tt/chain-next/ functions, which are by default bound to the left
656 and right arrows and to the <tt/h/ and <tt/l/ keys (think vi
657 keyboard bindings). To insert a remailer at the current chain
658 position, use the <tt/insert/ function. To append a remailer behind
659 the current chain position, use <tt/select-entry/ or <tt/append/.
660 You can also delete entries from the chain, using the corresponding
661 function. Finally, to abandon your changes, leave the menu, or
662 <tt/accept/ them pressing (by default) the <tt/Return/ key.
664 Note that different remailers do have different capabilities,
665 indicated in the %c entry of the remailer menu lines (see
666 <ref id="mix_entry_format"
667 name="$mix_entry_format">). Most important is
668 the ``middleman'' capability, indicated by a capital ``M'': This
669 means that the remailer in question cannot be used as the final
670 element of a chain, but will only forward messages to other
671 mixmaster remailers. For details on the other capabilities, please
672 have a look at the mixmaster documentation.
674 <sect1>Forwarding and Bouncing Mail<label id="forwarding_mail">
677 Bouncing and forwarding let you send an existing message to recipients
678 that you specify. Bouncing a message uses the <ref id="sendmail"
679 name="sendmail"> command to send a copy to alternative addresses as if
680 they were the message's original recipients. Forwarding a message, on
681 the other hand, allows you to modify the message before it is resent
682 (for example, by adding your own comments).
684 The following keys are bound by default:
687 f forward forward message
688 b bounce bounce (remail) message
691 Forwarding can be done by including the original message in the new
692 message's body (surrounded by indicating lines) or including it as a MIME
693 attachment, depending on the value of the <ref id="mime_forward"
694 name="$mime_forward"> variable. Decoding of attachments,
695 like in the pager, can be controlled by the <ref id="forward_decode"
696 name="$forward_decode"> and <ref id="mime_forward_decode"
697 name="$mime_forward_decode"> variables,
698 respectively. The desired forwarding format may depend on the content,
699 therefore <em/$mime_forward/ is a quadoption which, for
700 example, can be set to ``ask-no''.
702 The inclusion of headers is controlled by the current setting of the
703 <ref id="weed" name="$weed"> variable, unless <ref
704 id="mime_forward" name="mime_forward"> is set.
706 Editing the message to forward follows the same procedure as sending or
707 replying to a message does.
709 <sect1>Postponing Mail<label id="postponing_mail">
712 At times it is desirable to delay sending a message that you have
713 already begun to compose. When the <em/postpone-message/ function is
714 used in the <em/compose/ menu, the body of your message and attachments
715 are stored in the mailbox specified by the <ref id="postponed"
716 name="$postponed"> variable. This means that you can recall the
717 message even if you exit Mutt and then restart it at a later time.
719 Once a message is postponed, there are several ways to resume it. From the
720 command line you can use the ``-p'' option, or if you <em/compose/ a new
721 message from the <em/index/ or <em/pager/ you will be prompted if postponed
722 messages exist. If multiple messages are currently postponed, the
723 <em/postponed/ menu will pop up and you can select which message you would
726 <bf/Note:/ If you postpone a reply to a message, the reply setting of
727 the message is only updated when you actually finish the message and
728 send it. Also, you must be in the same folder with the message you
729 replied to for the status of the message to be updated.
731 See also the <ref id="postpone" name="$postpone"> quad-option.
733 <sect1>Reading news via NNTP<label id="reading_news">
736 If compiled with ``--enable-nntp'' option, Mutt can read news from newsserver
737 via NNTP. You can open a newsgroup with function ``change-newsgroup''
738 (default: i). Default newsserver can be obtained from <em/NNTPSERVER/
739 environment variable. Like other news readers, info about subscribed
740 newsgroups is saved in file by <ref id="newsrc" name="$newsrc">
741 variable. Article headers are cached and can be loaded from file when
742 newsgroup entered instead loading from newsserver.
747 While the default configuration (or ``preferences'') make Mutt-ng usable right out
748 of the box, it is often desirable to tailor Mutt to suit your own tastes. When
749 Mutt-ng is first invoked, it will attempt to read the ``system'' configuration
750 file (defaults set by your local system administrator), unless the ``-n'' <ref
751 id="commandline" name="command line"> option is specified. This file is
752 typically <tt>/usr/local/share/muttng/Muttngrc</tt> or <tt>/etc/Muttngrc</tt>,
753 Mutt-ng users will find this file in <tt>/usr/local/share/muttng/Muttrc</tt> or
754 <tt>/etc/Muttngrc</tt>. Mutt will next look for a file named <tt>.muttrc</tt>
755 in your home directory, Mutt-ng will look for <tt>.muttngrc</tt>. If this file
756 does not exist and your home directory has a subdirectory named <tt/.mutt/,
757 mutt try to load a file named <tt>.muttng/muttngrc</tt>.
759 <tt>.muttrc</tt> (or <tt>.muttngrc</tt> for Mutt-ng) is the file where you will
760 usually place your <ref id="commands" name="commands"> to configure Mutt.
762 In addition, mutt supports version specific configuration files that are
763 parsed instead of the default files as explained above. For instance, if
764 your system has a <tt/Muttrc-0.88/ file in the system configuration
765 directory, and you are running version 0.88 of mutt, this file will be
766 sourced instead of the <tt/Muttrc/ file. The same is true of the user
767 configuration file, if you have a file <tt/.muttrc-0.88.6/ in your home
768 directory, when you run mutt version 0.88.6, it will source this file
769 instead of the default <tt/.muttrc/ file. The version number is the
770 same which is visible using the ``-v'' <ref id="commandline"
771 name="command line"> switch or using the <tt/show-version/ key (default:
772 V) from the index menu.
774 <sect1>Syntax of Initialization Files<label id="muttrc-syntax">
777 An initialization file consists of a series of <ref id="commands"
778 name="commands">. Each line of the file may contain one or more commands.
779 When multiple commands are used, they must be separated by a semicolon (;).
781 set realname='Mutt user' ; ignore x-
783 The hash mark, or pound sign
784 (``#''), is used as a ``comment'' character. You can use it to
785 annotate your initialization file. All text after the comment character
786 to the end of the line is ignored. For example,
789 my_hdr X-Disclaimer: Why are you listening to me? # This is a comment
792 Single quotes (') and double quotes (&dquot;) can be used to quote strings
793 which contain spaces or other special characters. The difference between
794 the two types of quotes is similar to that of many popular shell programs,
795 namely that a single quote is used to specify a literal string (one that is
796 not interpreted for shell variables or quoting with a backslash [see
797 next paragraph]), while double quotes indicate a string for which
798 should be evaluated. For example, backtics are evaluated inside of double
799 quotes, but <bf/not/ for single quotes.
801 \ quotes the next character, just as in shells such as bash and zsh.
802 For example, if want to put quotes ``&dquot;'' inside of a string, you can use
803 ``\'' to force the next character to be a literal instead of interpreted
806 set realname="Michael \"MuttDude\" Elkins"
809 ``\\'' means to insert a literal ``\'' into the line.
810 ``\n'' and ``\r'' have their usual C meanings of linefeed and
811 carriage-return, respectively.
813 A \ at the end of a line can be used to split commands over
814 multiple lines, provided that the split points don't appear in the
815 middle of command names.
817 Please note that, unlike the various shells, mutt-ng interpretes a ``\''
818 at the end of a line also in comments. This allows you to disable a command
819 split over multiple lines with only one ``#''.
823 set realname="Michael \"MuttDude\" Elkins"
826 When testing your config files, beware the following caveat. The backslash
827 at the end of the commented line extends the current line with the next line
828 - then referred to as a ``continuation line''. As the first line is
829 commented with a hash (#) all following continuation lines are also
830 part of a comment and therefore are ignored, too. So take care of comments
831 when continuation lines are involved within your setup files!
843 line1 ``continues'' until line4. however, the part after the # is a
844 comment which includes line3 and line4. line5 is a new line of its own and
845 thus is interpreted again.
847 It is also possible to substitute the output of a Unix command in an
848 initialization file. This is accomplished by enclosing the command in
849 backquotes (``). For example,
851 my_hdr X-Operating-System: `uname -a`
853 The output of the Unix command ``uname -a'' will be substituted before the
854 line is parsed. Note that since initialization files are line oriented, only
855 the first line of output from the Unix command will be substituted.
857 UNIX environments can be accessed like the way it is done in shells like
858 sh and bash: Prepend the name of the environment by a ``$''. For
861 set record=+sent_on_$HOSTNAME
864 The commands understood by mutt are explained in the next paragraphs.
865 For a complete list, see the <ref id="commands" name="command reference">.
867 <sect1>Defining/Using aliases<label id="alias">
870 Usage: <tt/alias/ <em/key/ <em/address/ [ , <em/address/, ... ]
872 It's usually very cumbersome to remember or type out the address of someone
873 you are communicating with. Mutt allows you to create ``aliases'' which map
874 a short string to a full address.
876 <bf/Note:/ if you want to create an alias for a group (by specifying more than
877 one address), you <bf/must/ separate the addresses with a comma (``,'').
879 To remove an alias or aliases (``*'' means all aliases):
881 <tt/unalias/ [ * | <em/key/ <em/.../ ]
884 alias muttdude me@cs.hmc.edu (Michael Elkins)
885 alias theguys manny, moe, jack
888 Unlike other mailers, Mutt doesn't require aliases to be defined
889 in a special file. The <tt/alias/ command can appear anywhere in
890 a configuration file, as long as this file is <ref id="source"
891 name="sourced">. Consequently, you can have multiple alias files, or
892 you can have all aliases defined in your muttrc.
894 On the other hand, the <ref id="create-alias" name="create-alias">
895 function can use only one file, the one pointed to by the <ref
896 id="alias_file" name="$alias_file"> variable (which is
897 <tt>˜/.muttrc</tt> by default). This file is not special either,
898 in the sense that Mutt will happily append aliases to any file, but in
899 order for the new aliases to take effect you need to explicitly <ref
900 id="source" name="source"> this file too.
905 source /usr/local/share/Mutt.aliases
906 source ~/.mail_aliases
907 set alias_file=~/.mail_aliases
910 To use aliases, you merely use the alias at any place in mutt where mutt
911 prompts for addresses, such as the <em/To:/ or <em/Cc:/ prompt. You can
912 also enter aliases in your editor at the appropriate headers if you have the
913 <ref id="edit_headers" name="$edit_headers"> variable set.
915 In addition, at the various address prompts, you can use the tab character
916 to expand a partial alias to the full alias. If there are multiple matches,
917 mutt will bring up a menu with the matching aliases. In order to be
918 presented with the full list of aliases, you must hit tab with out a partial
919 alias, such as at the beginning of the prompt or after a comma denoting
922 In the alias menu, you can select as many aliases as you want with the
923 <em/select-entry/ key (default: RET), and use the <em/exit/ key
924 (default: q) to return to the address prompt.
926 <sect1>Changing the default key bindings<label id="bind">
928 Usage: <tt/bind/ <em/map/ <em/key/ <em/function/
930 This command allows you to change the default key bindings (operation
931 invoked when pressing a key).
933 <em/map/ specifies in which menu the binding belongs. Multiple maps may
934 be specified by separating them with commas (no additional whitespace is
935 allowed). The currently defined maps are:
940 This is not a real menu, but is used as a fallback for all of the other
941 menus except for the pager and editor modes. If a key is not defined in
942 another menu, Mutt will look for a binding to use in this menu. This allows
943 you to bind a key to a certain function in multiple menus instead of having
944 multiple bind statements to accomplish the same task.
946 The alias menu is the list of your personal aliases as defined in your
947 muttrc. It is the mapping from a short alias name to the full email
948 address(es) of the recipient(s).
950 The attachment menu is used to access the attachments on received messages.
952 The browser is used for both browsing the local directory structure, and for
953 listing all of your incoming mailboxes.
955 The editor is the line-based editor the user enters text data.
957 The index is the list of messages contained in a mailbox.
959 The compose menu is the screen used when sending a new message.
961 The pager is the mode used to display message/attachment data, and help
964 The pgp menu is used to select the OpenPGP keys used for encrypting outgoing
967 The postpone menu is similar to the index menu, except is used when
968 recalling a message the user was composing, but saved until later.
971 <em/key/ is the key (or key sequence) you wish to bind. To specify a
972 control character, use the sequence <em/\Cx/, where <em/x/ is the
973 letter of the control character (for example, to specify control-A use
974 ``\Ca''). Note that the case of <em/x/ as well as <em/\C/ is
975 ignored, so that <em/\CA/, <em/\Ca/, <em/\cA/ and <em/\ca/ are all
976 equivalent. An alternative form is to specify the key as a three digit
977 octal number prefixed with a ``\'' (for example <em/\177/ is
978 equivalent to <em/\c?/).
980 In addition, <em/key/ may consist of:
995 <backspace> Backspace
1004 <f10> function key 10
1007 <em/key/ does not need to be enclosed in quotes unless it contains a
1010 <em/function/ specifies which action to take when <em/key/ is pressed.
1011 For a complete list of functions, see the <ref id="functions"
1012 name="reference">. The special function <tt/noop/ unbinds the specified key
1015 <sect1>Defining aliases for character sets <label id="charset-hook">
1017 Usage: <tt/charset-hook/ <em/alias/ <em/charset/<newline>
1018 Usage: <tt/iconv-hook/ <em/charset/ <em/local-charset/
1020 The <tt/charset-hook/ command defines an alias for a character set.
1021 This is useful to properly display messages which are tagged with a
1022 character set name not known to mutt.
1024 The <tt/iconv-hook/ command defines a system-specific name for a
1025 character set. This is helpful when your systems character
1026 conversion library insists on using strange, system-specific names
1030 <sect1>Setting variables based upon mailbox<label id="folder-hook">
1032 Usage: <tt/folder-hook/ [!]<em/regexp/ <em/command/
1034 It is often desirable to change settings based on which mailbox you are
1035 reading. The folder-hook command provides a method by which you can execute
1036 any configuration command. <em/regexp/ is a regular expression specifying
1037 in which mailboxes to execute <em/command/ before loading. If a mailbox
1038 matches multiple folder-hook's, they are executed in the order given in the
1041 <bf/Note:/ if you use the ``!'' shortcut for <ref id="spoolfile"
1042 name="$spoolfile"> at the beginning of the pattern, you must place it
1043 inside of double or single quotes in order to distinguish it from the
1044 logical <em/not/ operator for the expression.
1046 Note that the settings are <em/not/ restored when you leave the mailbox.
1047 For example, a command action to perform is to change the sorting method
1048 based upon the mailbox being read:
1051 folder-hook mutt set sort=threads
1054 However, the sorting method is not restored to its previous value when
1055 reading a different mailbox. To specify a <em/default/ command, use the
1060 folder-hook . set sort=date-sent
1063 <sect1>Keyboard macros<label id="macro">
1065 Usage: <tt/macro/ <em/menu/ <em/key/ <em/sequence/ [ <em/description/ ]
1067 Macros are useful when you would like a single key to perform a series of
1068 actions. When you press <em/key/ in menu <em/menu/, Mutt will behave as if
1069 you had typed <em/sequence/. So if you have a common sequence of commands
1070 you type, you can create a macro to execute those commands with a single
1073 <em/menu/ is the <ref id="maps" name="map"> which the macro will be bound.
1074 Multiple maps may be specified by separating multiple menu arguments by
1075 commas. Whitespace may not be used in between the menu arguments and the
1076 commas separating them.
1078 <em/key/ and <em/sequence/ are expanded by the same rules as the <ref
1079 id="bind" name="key bindings">. There are some additions however. The
1080 first is that control characters in <em/sequence/ can also be specified
1081 as <em/ˆx/. In order to get a caret (`ˆ'') you need to use
1082 <em/ˆˆ/. Secondly, to specify a certain key such as <em/up/
1083 or to invoke a function directly, you can use the format
1084 <em/<key name>/ and <em/<function name>/. For a listing of key
1085 names see the section on <ref id="bind" name="key bindings">. Functions
1086 are listed in the <ref id="functions" name="function reference">.
1088 The advantage with using function names directly is that the macros will
1089 work regardless of the current key bindings, so they are not dependent on
1090 the user having particular key definitions. This makes them more robust
1091 and portable, and also facilitates defining of macros in files used by more
1092 than one user (eg. the system Muttrc).
1094 Optionally you can specify a descriptive text after <em/sequence/,
1095 which is shown in the help screens.
1097 <bf/Note:/ Macro definitions (if any) listed in the help screen(s), are
1098 silently truncated at the screen width, and are not wrapped.
1100 <sect1>Using color and mono video attributes<label id="color">
1102 Usage: <tt/color/ <em/object/ <em/foreground/ <em/background/ [ <em/regexp/ ]<newline>
1103 Usage: <tt/color/ index <em/foreground/ <em/background/ <em/pattern/<newline>
1104 Usage: <tt/uncolor/ index <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]<newline>
1106 If your terminal supports color, you can spice up Mutt by creating your own
1107 color scheme. To define the color of an object (type of information), you
1108 must specify both a foreground color <bf/and/ a background color (it is not
1109 possible to only specify one or the other).
1111 <em/object/ can be one of:
1115 <item>body (match <em/regexp/ in the body of messages)
1116 <item>bold (hiliting bold patterns in the body of messages)
1117 <item>error (error messages printed by Mutt)
1118 <item>header (match <em/regexp/ in the message header)
1119 <item>hdrdefault (default color of the message header in the pager)
1120 <item>index (match <em/pattern/ in the message index)
1121 <item>indicator (arrow or bar used to indicate the current item in a menu)
1122 <item>markers (the ``+'' markers at the beginning of wrapped lines in the pager)
1123 <item>message (informational messages)
1125 <item>quoted (text matching <ref id="quote_regexp"
1126 name="$quote_regexp"> in the body of a message)
1127 <item>quoted1, quoted2, ..., quoted<bf/N/ (higher levels of quoting)
1128 <item>search (hiliting of words in the pager)
1130 <item>status (mode lines used to display info about the mailbox or message)
1131 <item>tilde (the ``˜'' used to pad blank lines in the pager)
1132 <item>tree (thread tree drawn in the message index and attachment menu)
1133 <item>underline (hiliting underlined patterns in the body of messages)
1136 <em/foreground/ and <em/background/ can be one of the following:
1151 <em/foreground/ can optionally be prefixed with the keyword <tt/bright/ to make
1152 the foreground color boldfaced (e.g., <tt/brightred/).
1154 If your terminal supports it, the special keyword <em/default/ can be
1155 used as a transparent color. The value <em/brightdefault/ is also valid.
1156 If Mutt is linked against the <em/S-Lang/ library, you also need to set
1157 the <em/COLORFGBG/ environment variable to the default colors of your
1158 terminal for this to work; for example (for Bourne-like shells):
1161 set COLORFGBG="green;black"
1165 <bf/Note:/ The <em/S-Lang/ library requires you to use the <em/lightgray/
1166 and <em/brown/ keywords instead of <em/white/ and <em/yellow/ when
1167 setting this variable.
1169 <bf/Note:/ The uncolor command can be applied to the index object only. It
1170 removes entries from the list. You <bf/must/ specify the same pattern
1171 specified in the color command for it to be removed. The pattern ``*'' is
1172 a special token which means to clear the color index list of all entries.
1174 Mutt also recognizes the keywords <em/color0/, <em/color1/, …,
1175 <em/color/<bf/N-1/ (<bf/N/ being the number of colors supported
1176 by your terminal). This is useful when you remap the colors for your
1177 display (for example by changing the color associated with <em/color2/
1178 for your xterm), since color names may then lose their normal meaning.
1180 If your terminal does not support color, it is still possible change the video
1181 attributes through the use of the ``mono'' command:
1183 Usage: <tt/mono/ <em/<object> <attribute>/ [ <em/regexp/ ]<newline>
1184 Usage: <tt/mono/ index <em/attribute/ <em/pattern/<newline>
1185 Usage: <tt/unmono/ index <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]<newline>
1187 where <em/attribute/ is one of the following:
1197 <sect1>Ignoring (weeding) unwanted message headers<label id="ignore">
1199 Usage: <tt/[un]ignore/ <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
1201 Messages often have many header fields added by automatic processing systems,
1202 or which may not seem useful to display on the screen. This command allows
1203 you to specify header fields which you don't normally want to see.
1205 You do not need to specify the full header field name. For example,
1206 ``ignore content-'' will ignore all header fields that begin with the pattern
1207 ``content-''. ``ignore *'' will ignore all headers.
1209 To remove a previously added token from the list, use the ``unignore'' command.
1210 The ``unignore'' command will make Mutt display headers with the given pattern.
1211 For example, if you do ``ignore x-'' it is possible to ``unignore x-mailer''.
1213 ``unignore *'' will remove all tokens from the ignore list.
1217 # Sven's draconian header weeding
1219 unignore from date subject to cc
1220 unignore organization organisation x-mailer: x-newsreader: x-mailing-list:
1224 <sect1>Alternative addresses<label id="alternates">
1226 Usage: <tt/[un]alternates/ <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]<newline>
1228 With various functions, mutt will treat messages differently,
1229 depending on whether you sent them or whether you received them from
1230 someone else. For instance, when replying to a message that you
1231 sent to a different party, mutt will automatically suggest to send
1232 the response to the original message's recipients -- responding to
1233 yourself won't make much sense in many cases. (See <ref
1234 id="reply_to" name="$reply_to">.)
1236 Many users receive e-mail under a number of different addresses. To
1237 fully use mutt's features here, the program must be able to
1238 recognize what e-mail addresses you receive mail under. That's the
1239 purpose of the <tt/alternates/ command: It takes a list of regular
1240 expressions, each of which can identify an address under which you
1243 The <tt/unalternates/ command can be used to write exceptions to
1244 <tt/alternates/ patterns. If an address matches something in an
1245 <tt/alternates/ command, but you nonetheless do not think it is
1246 from you, you can list a more precise pattern under an <tt/unalternates/
1249 To remove a regular expression from the <tt/alternates/ list, use the
1250 <tt/unalternates/ command with exactly the same <em/regexp/.
1251 Likewise, if the <em/regexp/ for a <tt/alternates/ command matches
1252 an entry on the <tt/unalternates/ list, that <tt/unalternates/
1253 entry will be removed. If the <em/regexp/ for <tt/unalternates/
1254 is ``*'', <em/all entries/ on <tt/alternates/ will be removed.
1256 <sect1>Mailing lists<label id="lists">
1258 Usage: <tt/[un]lists/ <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]<newline>
1259 Usage: <tt/[un]subscribe/ <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
1261 Mutt has a few nice features for <ref id="using_lists" name="handling
1262 mailing lists">. In order to take advantage of them, you must
1263 specify which addresses belong to mailing lists, and which mailing
1264 lists you are subscribed to. Once you have done this, the <ref
1265 id="list-reply" name="list-reply"> function will work for all known lists.
1266 Additionally, when you send a message to a subscribed list, mutt will
1267 add a Mail-Followup-To header to tell other users' mail user agents
1268 not to send copies of replies to your personal address. Note that
1269 the Mail-Followup-To header is a non-standard extension which is not
1270 supported by all mail user agents. Adding it is not bullet-proof against
1271 receiving personal CCs of list messages. Also note that the generation
1272 of the Mail-Followup-To header is controlled by the <ref id="followup_to"
1273 name="$followup_to"> configuration variable.
1275 More precisely, Mutt maintains lists of patterns for the addresses
1276 of known and subscribed mailing lists. Every subscribed mailing
1277 list is known. To mark a mailing list as known, use the ``lists''
1278 command. To mark it as subscribed, use ``subscribe''.
1280 You can use regular expressions with both commands. To mark all
1281 messages sent to a specific bug report's address on mutt's bug
1282 tracking system as list mail, for instance, you could say
1283 ``subscribe [0-9]*@bugs.guug.de''. Often, it's sufficient to just
1284 give a portion of the list's e-mail address.
1286 Specify as much of the address as you need to to remove ambiguity. For
1287 example, if you've subscribed to the Mutt mailing list, you will receive mail
1288 addresssed to <em/mutt-users@mutt.org/. So, to tell Mutt that this is a
1289 mailing list, you could add ``lists mutt-users'' to your
1290 initialization file. To tell mutt that you are subscribed to it,
1291 add ``subscribe mutt-users'' to your initialization file instead.
1292 If you also happen to get mail from someone whose address is
1293 <em/mutt-users@example.com/, you could use ``lists mutt-users@mutt\\.org''
1294 or ``subscribe mutt-users@mutt\\.org'' to
1295 match only mail from the actual list.
1297 The ``unlists'' command is used to remove a token from the list of
1298 known and subscribed mailing-lists. Use ``unlists *'' to remove all
1301 To remove a mailing list from the list of subscribed mailing lists,
1302 but keep it on the list of known mailing lists, use ``unsubscribe''.
1304 <sect1>Using Multiple spool mailboxes<label id="mbox-hook">
1306 Usage: <tt/mbox-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
1308 This command is used to move read messages from a specified mailbox to a
1309 different mailbox automatically when you quit or change folders.
1310 <em/pattern/ is a regular expression specifying the mailbox to treat as a
1311 ``spool'' mailbox and <em/mailbox/ specifies where mail should be saved when
1314 Unlike some of the other <em/hook/ commands, only the <em/first/ matching
1315 pattern is used (it is not possible to save read mail in more than a single
1318 <sect1>Defining mailboxes which receive mail<label id="mailboxes">
1320 Usage: <tt/[un]mailboxes/ [!]<em/filename/ [ <em/filename/ ... ]
1322 This command specifies folders which can receive mail and
1323 which will be checked for new messages. By default, the
1324 main menu status bar displays how many of these folders have
1327 When changing folders, pressing <em/space/ will cycle
1328 through folders with new mail.
1330 Pressing TAB in the directory browser will bring up a menu showing the files
1331 specified by the <tt/mailboxes/ command, and indicate which contain new
1332 messages. Mutt will automatically enter this mode when invoked from the
1333 command line with the <tt/-y/ option.
1335 The ``unmailboxes'' command is used to remove a token from the list
1336 of folders which receive mail. Use ``unmailboxes *'' to remove all
1340 <bf/Note:/ new mail is detected by comparing the last modification time to
1341 the last access time. Utilities like <tt/biff/ or <tt/frm/ or any other
1342 program which accesses the mailbox might cause Mutt to never detect new mail
1343 for that mailbox if they do not properly reset the access time. Backup
1344 tools are another common reason for updated access times.
1347 <bf/Note:/ the filenames in the <tt/mailboxes/ command are resolved when
1348 the command is executed, so if these names contain <ref id="shortcuts"
1349 name="shortcut characters"> (such as ``='' and ``!''), any variable
1350 definition that affect these characters (like <ref id="folder"
1351 name="$folder"> and <ref id="spoolfile" name="$spoolfile">)
1352 should be executed before the <tt/mailboxes/ command.
1354 <sect1>User defined headers<label id="my_hdr">
1357 <tt/my_hdr/ <em/string/<newline>
1358 <tt/unmy_hdr/ <em/field/ [ <em/field/ ... ]
1360 The ``my_hdr'' command allows you to create your own header
1361 fields which will be added to every message you send.
1363 For example, if you would like to add an ``Organization:'' header field to
1364 all of your outgoing messages, you can put the command
1367 my_hdr Organization: A Really Big Company, Anytown, USA
1370 in your <tt/.muttrc/.
1372 <bf/Note:/ space characters are <em/not/ allowed between the keyword and
1373 the colon (``:''). The standard for electronic mail (RFC822) says that
1374 space is illegal there, so Mutt enforces the rule.
1376 If you would like to add a header field to a single message, you should
1377 either set the <ref id="edit_headers" name="edit_headers"> variable,
1378 or use the <em/edit-headers/ function (default: ``E'') in the send-menu so
1379 that you can edit the header of your message along with the body.
1381 To remove user defined header fields, use the ``unmy_hdr''
1382 command. You may specify an asterisk (``*'') to remove all header
1383 fields, or the fields to remove. For example, to remove all ``To'' and
1384 ``Cc'' header fields, you could use:
1390 <sect1>Defining the order of headers when viewing messages<label id="hdr_order">
1392 Usage: <tt/hdr_order/ <em/header1/ <em/header2/ <em/header3/
1394 With this command, you can specify an order in which mutt will attempt
1395 to present headers to you when viewing messages.
1397 ``unhdr_order *'' will clear all previous headers from the order list,
1398 thus removing the header order effects set by the system-wide startup
1402 hdr_order From Date: From: To: Cc: Subject:
1405 <sect1>Specify default save filename<label id="save-hook">
1407 Usage: <tt/save-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/filename/
1409 This command is used to override the default filename used when saving
1410 messages. <em/filename/ will be used as the default filename if the message is
1411 <em/From:/ an address matching <em/regexp/ or if you are the author and the
1412 message is addressed <em/to:/ something matching <em/regexp/.
1414 See <ref id="pattern_hook" name="Message Matching in Hooks"> for information on the exact format of <em/pattern/.
1419 save-hook me@(turing\\.)?cs\\.hmc\\.edu$ +elkins
1420 save-hook aol\\.com$ +spam
1423 Also see the <ref id="fcc-save-hook" name="fcc-save-hook"> command.
1425 <sect1>Specify default Fcc: mailbox when composing<label id="fcc-hook">
1427 Usage: <tt/fcc-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
1429 This command is used to save outgoing mail in a mailbox other than
1430 <ref id="record" name="$record">. Mutt searches the initial list of
1431 message recipients for the first matching <em/regexp/ and uses <em/mailbox/
1432 as the default Fcc: mailbox. If no match is found the message will be saved
1433 to <ref id="record" name="$record"> mailbox.
1435 See <ref id="pattern_hook" name="Message Matching in Hooks"> for information on the exact format of <em/pattern/.
1437 Example: <tt/fcc-hook [@.]aol\\.com$ +spammers/
1439 The above will save a copy of all messages going to the aol.com domain to
1440 the `+spammers' mailbox by default. Also see the <ref id="fcc-save-hook"
1441 name="fcc-save-hook"> command.
1443 <sect1>Specify default save filename and default Fcc: mailbox at once<label
1446 Usage: <tt/fcc-save-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
1448 This command is a shortcut, equivalent to doing both a <ref id="fcc-hook" name="fcc-hook">
1449 and a <ref id="save-hook" name="save-hook"> with its arguments.
1451 <sect1>Change settings based upon message recipients<label id="send-hook"><label id="reply-hook"><label id="send2-hook">
1453 Usage: <tt/reply-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/command/<newline>
1454 Usage: <tt/send-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/command/<newline>
1455 Usage: <tt/send2-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/command/
1457 These commands can be used to execute arbitrary configuration commands based
1458 upon recipients of the message. <em/pattern/ is a regular expression
1459 matching the desired address. <em/command/ is executed when <em/regexp/
1460 matches recipients of the message.
1462 <tt/reply-hook/ is matched against the message you are <em/replying/
1463 <bf/to/, instead of the message you are <em/sending/. <tt/send-hook/ is
1464 matched against all messages, both <em/new/ and <em/replies/. <bf/Note:/
1465 <tt/reply-hook/s are matched <bf/before/ the <tt/send-hook/, <bf/regardless/
1466 of the order specified in the users's configuration file.
1468 <tt/send2-hook/ is matched every time a message is changed, either
1469 by editing it, or by using the compose menu to change its recipients
1470 or subject. <tt/send2-hook/ is executed after <tt/send-hook/, and
1471 can, e.g., be used to set parameters such as the <ref id="sendmail"
1472 name="$sendmail"> variable depending on the message's sender
1475 For each type of <tt/send-hook/ or <tt/reply-hook/, when multiple matches
1476 occur, commands are executed in the order they are specified in the muttrc
1477 (for that type of hook).
1479 See <ref id="pattern_hook" name="Message Matching in Hooks"> for information on the exact format of <em/pattern/.
1481 Example: <tt/send-hook mutt &dquot;set mime_forward signature=''&dquot;/
1483 Another typical use for this command is to change the values of the
1484 <ref id="attribution" name="$attribution">, <ref id="signature"
1485 name="$signature"> and <ref id="locale" name="$locale">
1486 variables in order to change the language of the attributions and
1487 signatures based upon the recipients.
1489 <bf/Note:/ the send-hook's are only executed ONCE after getting the initial
1490 list of recipients. Adding a recipient after replying or editing the
1491 message will NOT cause any send-hook to be executed. Also note that
1492 my_hdr commands which modify recipient headers, or the message's
1493 subject, don't have any effect on the current message when executed
1496 <sect1>Change settings before formatting a message<label id="message-hook">
1498 Usage: <tt/message-hook/ [!]<em/pattern/ <em/command/
1500 This command can be used to execute arbitrary configuration commands
1501 before viewing or formatting a message based upon information about the message.
1502 <em/command/ is executed if the <em/pattern/ matches the message to be
1503 displayed. When multiple matches occur, commands are executed in the order
1504 they are specified in the muttrc.
1506 See <ref id="pattern_hook" name="Message Matching in Hooks"> for
1507 information on the exact format of <em/pattern/.
1511 message-hook ~A 'set pager=builtin'
1512 message-hook '~f freshmeat-news' 'set pager="less \"+/^ subject: .*\""'
1515 <sect1>Choosing the cryptographic key of the recipient<label id="crypt-hook">
1517 Usage: <tt/crypt-hook/ <em/pattern/ <em/keyid/
1519 When encrypting messages with PGP or OpenSSL, you may want to associate a certain
1520 key with a given e-mail address automatically, either because the
1521 recipient's public key can't be deduced from the destination address,
1522 or because, for some reasons, you need to override the key Mutt would
1523 normally use. The crypt-hook command provides a method by which you can
1524 specify the ID of the public key to be used when encrypting messages to
1525 a certain recipient.
1527 The meaning of "key id" is to be taken broadly in this context: You
1528 can either put a numerical key ID here, an e-mail address, or even
1531 <sect1>Adding key sequences to the keyboard buffer<label id="push">
1533 Usage: <tt/push/ <em/string/
1535 This command adds the named string to the keyboard buffer. The string may
1536 contain control characters, key names and function names like the sequence
1537 string in the <ref id="macro" name="macro"> command. You may use it to
1538 automatically run a sequence of commands at startup, or when entering
1541 <sect1>Executing functions<label id="exec">
1543 Usage: <tt/exec/ <em/function/ [ <em/function/ ... ]
1545 This command can be used to execute any function. Functions are
1546 listed in the <ref id="functions" name="function reference">.
1547 ``exec function'' is equivalent to ``push <function>''.
1549 <sect1>Message Scoring<label id="score-command">
1551 Usage: <tt/score/ <em/pattern/ <em/value/<newline>
1552 Usage: <tt/unscore/ <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
1554 The <tt/score/ commands adds <em/value/ to a message's score if <em/pattern/
1555 matches it. <em/pattern/ is a string in the format described in the <ref
1556 id="patterns" name="patterns"> section (note: For efficiency reasons, patterns
1557 which scan information not available in the index, such as <tt>˜b</tt>,
1558 <tt>˜B</tt> or <tt>˜h</tt>, may not be used). <em/value/ is a
1559 positive or negative integer. A message's final score is the sum total of all
1560 matching <tt/score/ entries. However, you may optionally prefix <em/value/ with
1561 an equal sign (=) to cause evaluation to stop at a particular entry if there is
1562 a match. Negative final scores are rounded up to 0.
1564 The <tt/unscore/ command removes score entries from the list. You <bf/must/
1565 specify the same pattern specified in the <tt/score/ command for it to be
1566 removed. The pattern ``*'' is a special token which means to clear the list
1567 of all score entries.
1569 <sect1>Spam detection<label id="spam">
1571 Usage: <tt/spam/ <em/pattern/ <em/format/<newline>
1572 Usage: <tt/nospam/ <em/pattern/
1574 Mutt has generalized support for external spam-scoring filters.
1575 By defining your spam patterns with the <tt/spam/ and <tt/nospam/
1576 commands, you can <em/limit/, <em/search/, and <em/sort/ your
1577 mail based on its spam attributes, as determined by the external
1578 filter. You also can display the spam attributes in your index
1579 display using the <tt/%H/ selector in the <ref id="index_format"
1580 name="$index_format"> variable. (Tip: try <tt/%?H?[%H] ?/
1581 to display spam tags only when they are defined for a given message.)
1583 Your first step is to define your external filter's spam patterns using
1584 the <tt/spam/ command. <em/pattern/ should be a regular expression
1585 that matches a header in a mail message. If any message in the mailbox
1586 matches this regular expression, it will receive a ``spam tag'' or
1587 ``spam attribute'' (unless it also matches a <tt/nospam/ pattern -- see
1588 below.) The appearance of this attribute is entirely up to you, and is
1589 governed by the <em/format/ parameter. <em/format/ can be any static
1590 text, but it also can include back-references from the <em/pattern/
1591 expression. (A regular expression ``back-reference'' refers to a
1592 sub-expression contained within parentheses.) <tt/%1/ is replaced with
1593 the first back-reference in the regex, <tt/%2/ with the second, etc.
1595 If you're using multiple spam filters, a message can have more than
1596 one spam-related header. You can define <tt/spam/ patterns for each
1597 filter you use. If a message matches two or more of these patterns, and
1598 the $spam_separator variable is set to a string, then the
1599 message's spam tag will consist of all the <em/format/ strings joined
1600 together, with the value of $spam_separator separating
1603 For example, suppose I use DCC, SpamAssassin, and PureMessage. I might
1604 define these spam settings:
1606 spam "X-DCC-.*-Metrics:.*(....)=many" "90+/DCC-%1"
1607 spam "X-Spam-Status: Yes" "90+/SA"
1608 spam "X-PerlMX-Spam: .*Probability=([0-9]+)%" "%1/PM"
1609 set spam_separator=", "
1612 If I then received a message that DCC registered with ``many'' hits
1613 under the ``Fuz2'' checksum, and that PureMessage registered with a
1614 97% probability of being spam, that message's spam tag would read
1615 <tt>90+/DCC-Fuz2, 97/PM</tt>. (The four characters before ``=many'' in a
1616 DCC report indicate the checksum used -- in this case, ``Fuz2''.)
1618 If the $spam_separator variable is unset, then each
1619 spam pattern match supercedes the previous one. Instead of getting
1620 joined <em/format/ strings, you'll get only the last one to match.
1622 The spam tag is what will be displayed in the index when you use
1623 <tt/%H/ in the <tt/$index_format/ variable. It's also the
1624 string that the <tt/~H/ pattern-matching expression matches against for
1625 <em/search/ and <em/limit/ functions. And it's what sorting by spam
1626 attribute will use as a sort key.
1628 That's a pretty complicated example, and most people's actual
1629 environments will have only one spam filter. The simpler your
1630 configuration, the more effective mutt can be, especially when it comes
1633 Generally, when you sort by spam tag, mutt will sort <em/lexically/ --
1634 that is, by ordering strings alphnumerically. However, if a spam tag
1635 begins with a number, mutt will sort numerically first, and lexically
1636 only when two numbers are equal in value. (This is like UNIX's
1637 <tt/sort -n/.) A message with no spam attributes at all -- that is, one
1638 that didn't match <em/any/ of your <tt/spam/ patterns -- is sorted at
1639 lowest priority. Numbers are sorted next, beginning with 0 and ranging
1640 upward. Finally, non-numeric strings are sorted, with ``a'' taking lower
1641 priority than ``z''. Clearly, in general, sorting by spam tags is most
1642 effective when you can coerce your filter to give you a raw number. But
1643 in case you can't, mutt can still do something useful.
1645 The <tt/nospam/ command can be used to write exceptions to <tt/spam/
1646 patterns. If a header pattern matches something in a <tt/spam/ command,
1647 but you nonetheless do not want it to receive a spam tag, you can list a
1648 more precise pattern under a <tt/nospam/ command.
1650 If the <em/pattern/ given to <tt/nospam/ is exactly the same as the
1651 <em/pattern/ on an existing <tt/spam/ list entry, the effect will be to
1652 remove the entry from the spam list, instead of adding an exception.
1653 Likewise, if the <em/pattern/ for a <tt/spam/ command matches an entry
1654 on the <tt/nospam/ list, that <tt/nospam/ entry will be removed. If the
1655 <em/pattern/ for <tt/nospam/ is ``*'', <em/all entries on both lists/
1656 will be removed. This might be the default action if you use <tt/spam/
1657 and <tt/nospam/ in conjunction with a <tt/folder-hook/.
1659 You can have as many <tt/spam/ or <tt/nospam/ commands as you like.
1660 You can even do your own primitive spam detection within mutt -- for
1661 example, if you consider all mail from <tt/MAILER-DAEMON/ to be spam,
1662 you can use a <tt/spam/ command like this:
1665 spam "^From: .*MAILER-DAEMON" "999"
1669 <sect1>Setting variables<label id="set">
1671 Usage: <tt/set/ [no|inv]<em/variable/[=<em/value/] [ <em/variable/ ... ]<newline>
1672 Usage: <tt/toggle/ <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]<newline>
1673 Usage: <tt/unset/ <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]<newline>
1674 Usage: <tt/reset/ <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]
1676 This command is used to set (and unset) <ref id="variables"
1677 name="configuration variables">. There are four basic types of variables:
1678 boolean, number, string and quadoption. <em/boolean/ variables can be
1679 <em/set/ (true) or <em/unset/ (false). <em/number/ variables can be
1680 assigned a positive integer value.
1682 <em/string/ variables consist of any number of printable characters.
1683 <em/strings/ must be enclosed in quotes if they contain spaces or tabs. You
1684 may also use the ``C'' escape sequences <bf/\n/ and <bf/\t/ for
1685 newline and tab, respectively.
1687 <em/quadoption/ variables are used to control whether or not to be prompted
1688 for certain actions, or to specify a default action. A value of <em/yes/
1689 will cause the action to be carried out automatically as if you had answered
1690 yes to the question. Similarly, a value of <em/no/ will cause the the
1691 action to be carried out as if you had answered ``no.'' A value of
1692 <em/ask-yes/ will cause a prompt with a default answer of ``yes'' and
1693 <em/ask-no/ will provide a default answer of ``no.''
1695 Prefixing a variable with ``no'' will unset it. Example: <tt/set noaskbcc/.
1697 For <em/boolean/ variables, you may optionally prefix the variable name with
1698 <tt/inv/ to toggle the value (on or off). This is useful when writing
1699 macros. Example: <tt/set invsmart_wrap/.
1701 The <tt/toggle/ command automatically prepends the <tt/inv/ prefix to all
1702 specified variables.
1704 The <tt/unset/ command automatically prepends the <tt/no/ prefix to all
1705 specified variables.
1707 Using the enter-command function in the <em/index/ menu, you can query the
1708 value of a variable by prefixing the name of the variable with a question
1715 The question mark is actually only required for boolean and quadoption
1718 The <tt/reset/ command resets all given variables to the compile time
1719 defaults (hopefully mentioned in this manual). If you use the command
1720 <tt/set/ and prefix the variable with ``&'' this has the same
1721 behavior as the reset command.
1723 With the <tt/reset/ command there exists the special variable ``all'',
1724 which allows you to reset all variables to their system defaults.
1726 <sect1>Reading initialization commands from another file<label id="source">
1728 Usage: <tt/source/ <em/filename/ [ <em/filename/ ... ]
1730 This command allows the inclusion of initialization commands
1731 from other files. For example, I place all of my aliases in
1732 <tt>˜/.mail_aliases</tt> so that I can make my
1733 <tt>˜/.muttrc</tt> readable and keep my aliases private.
1735 If the filename begins with a tilde (``˜''), it will be expanded to the
1736 path of your home directory.
1738 If the filename ends with a vertical bar (|), then <em/filename/ is
1739 considered to be an executable program from which to read input (eg.
1740 <tt>source ~/bin/myscript|</tt>).
1742 <sect1>Configuring features conditionaly<label id="ifdef">
1744 Usage: <tt/ifdef/ <em/item/ <em/command/
1745 Usage: <tt/ifndef/ <em/item/ <em/command/
1747 These command allows to test if a variable, function or certain feature
1748 is available or not respectively, before actually executing the command.
1749 <tt/ifdef/ (short for ``if defined) handles commands if upon
1750 availability while <tt/ifndef/ (short for ``if not defined'') does if
1751 not. The <em/command/ may be any valid fraction of a configuration file.
1753 All names of variables and functions may be tested. Additionally, the
1754 following compile-features may be tested when prefixed with 'feature_':
1755 ncurses, slang, iconv, idn, dotlock, standalone, pop, nntp, imap, ssl,
1756 gnutls, sasl, sasl2, libesmtp, compressed, color, classic_pgp,
1757 classic_smime, gpgme, header_cache.
1761 To only source a file with IMAP related settings only if IMAP support is
1764 ifdef feature_imap 'source ~/.mutt-ng/imap_setup'
1766 # ifdef imap_user 'source ~/.mutt-ng/imap_setup'
1771 To exit mutt-ng directly if no NNTP support is compiled in:
1773 ifndef feature_nntp 'push q'
1775 # ifndef newsrc 'push q'
1780 To only set the <ref id="imap_mail_check"
1781 name="<$imap_mail_check"> when the system's SVN
1782 is recent enough to have it:
1784 ifdef imap_mail_check 'set imap_mail_check=300'
1787 <sect1>Removing hooks<label id="unhook">
1789 Usage: <tt/unhook/ [ * | <em/hook-type/ ]
1791 This command permits you to flush hooks you have previously defined.
1792 You can either remove all hooks by giving the ``*'' character as an
1793 argument, or you can remove all hooks of a specific type by saying
1794 something like <tt/unhook send-hook/.
1796 <sect>Advanced Usage
1798 <sect1>Regular Expressions<label id="regexp">
1800 All string patterns in Mutt including those in more complex
1801 <ref id="patterns" name="patterns"> must be specified
1802 using regular expressions (regexp) in the ``POSIX extended'' syntax (which
1803 is more or less the syntax used by egrep and GNU awk). For your
1804 convenience, we have included below a brief description of this syntax.
1806 The search is case sensitive if the pattern contains at least one upper
1807 case letter, and case insensitive otherwise. Note that ``\''
1808 must be quoted if used for a regular expression in an initialization
1809 command: ``\\''.
1811 A regular expression is a pattern that describes a set of strings.
1812 Regular expressions are constructed analogously to arithmetic
1813 expressions, by using various operators to combine smaller expressions.
1815 Note that the regular expression can be enclosed/delimited by either &dquot;
1816 or ' which is useful if the regular expression includes a white-space
1817 character. See <ref id="muttrc-syntax" name="Syntax of Initialization Files">
1818 for more information on &dquot; and ' delimiter processing. To match a
1819 literal &dquot; or ' you must preface it with \ (backslash).
1821 The fundamental building blocks are the regular expressions that match
1822 a single character. Most characters, including all letters and digits,
1823 are regular expressions that match themselves. Any metacharacter with
1824 special meaning may be quoted by preceding it with a backslash.
1826 The period ``.'' matches any single character. The caret ``ˆ'' and
1827 the dollar sign ``&dollar'' are metacharacters that respectively match
1828 the empty string at the beginning and end of a line.
1830 A list of characters enclosed by ``['' and ``]'' matches any
1831 single character in that list; if the first character of the list
1832 is a caret ``ˆ'' then it matches any character <bf/not/ in the
1833 list. For example, the regular expression <bf/[0123456789]/
1834 matches any single digit. A range of ASCII characters may be specified
1835 by giving the first and last characters, separated by a hyphen
1836 ``‐''. Most metacharacters lose their special meaning inside
1837 lists. To include a literal ``]'' place it first in the list.
1838 Similarly, to include a literal ``ˆ'' place it anywhere but first.
1839 Finally, to include a literal hyphen ``‐'' place it last.
1841 Certain named classes of characters are predefined. Character classes
1842 consist of ``[:'', a keyword denoting the class, and ``:]''.
1843 The following classes are defined by the POSIX standard:
1846 <tag/[:alnum:]/
1847 Alphanumeric characters.
1848 <tag/[:alpha:]/
1849 Alphabetic characters.
1850 <tag/[:blank:]/
1851 Space or tab characters.
1852 <tag/[:cntrl:]/
1854 <tag/[:digit:]/
1856 <tag/[:graph:]/
1857 Characters that are both printable and visible. (A space is printable,
1858 but not visible, while an ``a'' is both.)
1859 <tag/[:lower:]/
1860 Lower-case alphabetic characters.
1861 <tag/[:print:]/
1862 Printable characters (characters that are not control characters.)
1863 <tag/[:punct:]/
1864 Punctuation characters (characters that are not letter, digits, control
1865 characters, or space characters).
1866 <tag/[:space:]/
1867 Space characters (such as space, tab and formfeed, to name a few).
1868 <tag/[:upper:]/
1869 Upper-case alphabetic characters.
1870 <tag/[:xdigit:]/
1871 Characters that are hexadecimal digits.
1874 A character class is only valid in a regular expression inside the
1875 brackets of a character list. Note that the brackets in these
1876 class names are part of the symbolic names, and must be included
1877 in addition to the brackets delimiting the bracket list. For
1878 example, <bf/[[:digit:]]/ is equivalent to
1879 <bf/[0-9]/.
1881 Two additional special sequences can appear in character lists. These
1882 apply to non-ASCII character sets, which can have single symbols (called
1883 collating elements) that are represented with more than one character,
1884 as well as several characters that are equivalent for collating or
1888 <tag/Collating Symbols/
1889 A collating symbol is a multi-character collating element enclosed in
1890 ``[.'' and ``.]''. For example, if ``ch'' is a collating
1891 element, then <bf/[[.ch.]]/ is a regexp that matches
1892 this collating element, while <bf/[ch]/ is a regexp that
1893 matches either ``c'' or ``h''.
1894 <tag/Equivalence Classes/
1895 An equivalence class is a locale-specific name for a list of
1896 characters that are equivalent. The name is enclosed in ``[=''
1897 and ``=]''. For example, the name ``e'' might be used to
1898 represent all of ``è'' ``é'' and ``e''. In this case,
1899 <bf/[[=e=]]/ is a regexp that matches any of
1900 ``è'', ``é'' and ``e''.
1903 A regular expression matching a single character may be followed by one
1904 of several repetition operators:
1908 The preceding item is optional and matched at most once.
1910 The preceding item will be matched zero or more times.
1912 The preceding item will be matched one or more times.
1914 The preceding item is matched exactly <em/n/ times.
1915 <tag/{n,}/
1916 The preceding item is matched <em/n/ or more times.
1917 <tag/{,m}/
1918 The preceding item is matched at most <em/m/ times.
1919 <tag/{n,m}/
1920 The preceding item is matched at least <em/n/ times, but no more than
1924 Two regular expressions may be concatenated; the resulting regular
1925 expression matches any string formed by concatenating two substrings
1926 that respectively match the concatenated subexpressions.
1928 Two regular expressions may be joined by the infix operator ``|'';
1929 the resulting regular expression matches any string matching either
1932 Repetition takes precedence over concatenation, which in turn takes
1933 precedence over alternation. A whole subexpression may be enclosed in
1934 parentheses to override these precedence rules.
1936 <bf/Note:/ If you compile Mutt with the GNU <em/rx/ package, the
1937 following operators may also be used in regular expressions:
1941 Matches the empty string at either the beginning or the end of a word.
1943 Matches the empty string within a word.
1944 <tag/\\</
1945 Matches the empty string at the beginning of a word.
1946 <tag/\\>/
1947 Matches the empty string at the end of a word.
1949 Matches any word-constituent character (letter, digit, or underscore).
1951 Matches any character that is not word-constituent.
1953 Matches the empty string at the beginning of a buffer (string).
1955 Matches the empty string at the end of a buffer.
1958 Please note however that these operators are not defined by POSIX, so
1959 they may or may not be available in stock libraries on various systems.
1961 <sect1>Patterns<label id="patterns">
1963 Many of Mutt's commands allow you to specify a pattern to match
1964 (limit, tag-pattern, delete-pattern, etc.). There are several ways to select
1969 ~b EXPR messages which contain EXPR in the message body
1970 ~B EXPR messages which contain EXPR in the whole message
1971 ~c USER messages carbon-copied to USER
1972 ~C EXPR message is either to: or cc: EXPR
1974 ~d [MIN]-[MAX] messages with ``date-sent'' in a Date range
1976 ~e EXPR message which contains EXPR in the ``Sender'' field
1978 ~f USER messages originating from USER
1979 ~g cryptographically signed messages
1980 ~G cryptographically encrypted messages
1981 ~H EXPR messages with a spam attribute matching EXPR
1982 ~h EXPR messages which contain EXPR in the message header
1983 ~k message contains PGP key material
1984 ~i ID message which match ID in the ``Message-ID'' field
1985 ~L EXPR message is either originated or received by EXPR
1986 ~l message is addressed to a known mailing list
1987 ~m [MIN]-[MAX] message in the range MIN to MAX *)
1988 ~n [MIN]-[MAX] messages with a score in the range MIN to MAX *)
1991 ~p message is addressed to you (consults alternates)
1992 ~P message is from you (consults alternates)
1993 ~Q messages which have been replied to
1995 ~r [MIN]-[MAX] messages with ``date-received'' in a Date range
1996 ~S superseded messages
1997 ~s SUBJECT messages having SUBJECT in the ``Subject'' field.
1999 ~t USER messages addressed to USER
2001 ~v message is part of a collapsed thread.
2002 ~V cryptographically verified messages
2003 ~x EXPR messages which contain EXPR in the `References' field
2004 ~y EXPR messages which contain EXPR in the `X-Label' field
2005 ~z [MIN]-[MAX] messages with a size in the range MIN to MAX *)
2006 ~= duplicated messages (see $duplicate_threads)
2007 ~$ unreferenced messages (requires threaded view)
2008 ~* ``From'' contains realname and (syntactically) valid
2009 address (excluded are addresses matching against
2010 alternates or any alias)
2013 Where EXPR, USER, ID, and SUBJECT are
2014 <ref id="regexp" name="regular expressions">. Special attention has to be
2015 made when using regular expressions inside of patterns. Specifically,
2016 Mutt's parser for these patterns will strip one level of backslash (\),
2017 which is normally used for quoting. If it is your intention to use a
2018 backslash in the regular expression, you will need to use two backslashes
2021 *) The forms <tt/<[MAX]/, <tt/>[MIN]/,
2022 <tt/[MIN]-/ and <tt/-[MAX]/
2025 <sect2>Pattern Modifier
2028 Note that patterns matching 'lists' of addresses (notably c,C,p,P and t)
2029 match if there is at least one match in the whole list. If you want to
2030 make sure that all elements of that list match, you need to prefix your
2032 This example matches all mails which only has recipients from Germany.
2038 <sect2>Complex Patterns
2041 Logical AND is performed by specifying more than one criterion. For
2048 would select messages which contain the word ``mutt'' in the list of
2049 recipients <bf/and/ that have the word ``elkins'' in the ``From'' header
2052 Mutt also recognizes the following operators to create more complex search
2056 <item>! -- logical NOT operator
2057 <item>| -- logical OR operator
2058 <item>() -- logical grouping operator
2061 Here is an example illustrating a complex search pattern. This pattern will
2062 select all messages which do not contain ``mutt'' in the ``To'' or ``Cc''
2063 field and which are from ``elkins''.
2066 !(~t mutt|~c mutt) ~f elkins
2069 Here is an example using white space in the regular expression (note
2070 the ' and &dquot; delimiters). For this to match, the mail's subject must
2071 match the ``^Junk +From +Me$'' and it must be from either ``Jim +Somebody''
2072 or ``Ed +SomeoneElse'':
2075 '~s "^Junk +From +Me$" ~f ("Jim +Somebody"|"Ed +SomeoneElse")'
2078 Note that if a regular expression contains parenthesis, or a veritical bar
2079 ("|"), you <bf/must/ enclose the expression in double or single quotes since
2080 those characters are also used to separate different parts of Mutt's
2081 pattern language. For example,
2084 ~f "me@(mutt\.org|cs\.hmc\.edu)"
2087 Without the quotes, the parenthesis wouldn't end.
2088 This would be seperated to two OR'd patterns: <em/˜f me@(mutt\.org/
2089 and <em/cs\.hmc\.edu)/. They are never what you want.
2091 <sect2>Searching by Date
2093 Mutt supports two types of dates, <em/absolute/ and <em/relative/.
2095 <bf/Absolute/. Dates <bf/must/ be in DD/MM/YY format (month and year are
2096 optional, defaulting to the current month and year). An example of a valid
2100 Limit to messages matching: ~d 20/1/95-31/10
2103 If you omit the minimum (first) date, and just specify ``-DD/MM/YY'', all
2104 messages <em/before/ the given date will be selected. If you omit the maximum
2105 (second) date, and specify ``DD/MM/YY-'', all messages <em/after/ the given
2106 date will be selected. If you specify a single date with no dash (``-''),
2107 only messages sent on the given date will be selected.
2109 <bf/Error Margins/. You can add error margins to absolute dates.
2110 An error margin is a sign (+ or -), followed by a digit, followed by
2111 one of the following units:
2118 As a special case, you can replace the sign by a ``*'' character,
2119 which is equivalent to giving identical plus and minus error margins.
2121 Example: To select any messages two weeks around January 15, 2001,
2122 you'd use the following pattern:
2124 Limit to messages matching: ~d 15/1/2001*2w
2128 <bf/Relative/. This type of date is relative to the current date, and may
2131 <item>><em/offset/ (messages older than <em/offset/ units)
2132 <item><<em/offset/ (messages newer than <em/offset/ units)
2133 <item>=<em/offset/ (messages exactly <em/offset/ units old)
2136 <em/offset/ is specified as a positive number with one of the following
2145 Example: to select messages less than 1 month old, you would use
2147 Limit to messages matching: ~d <1m
2152 <bf/Note:/ all dates used when searching are relative to the
2153 <bf/local/ time zone, so unless you change the setting of your <ref
2154 id="index_format" name="$index_format"> to include a
2155 <tt/%[...]/ format, these are <bf/not/ the dates shown
2161 Sometimes it is desirable to perform an operation on a group of
2162 messages all at once rather than one at a time. An example might be
2163 to save messages to a mailing list to a separate folder, or to
2164 delete all messages with a given subject. To tag all messages
2165 matching a pattern, use the tag-pattern function, which is bound to
2166 ``shift-T'' by default. Or you can select individual messages by
2167 hand using the ``tag-message'' function, which is bound to ``t'' by
2168 default. See <ref id="patterns" name="patterns"> for Mutt's pattern
2171 Once you have tagged the desired messages, you can use the
2172 ``tag-prefix'' operator, which is the ``;'' (semicolon) key by default.
2173 When the ``tag-prefix'' operator is used, the <bf/next/ operation will
2174 be applied to all tagged messages if that operation can be used in that
2175 manner. If the <ref id="auto_tag" name="$auto_tag">
2176 variable is set, the next operation applies to the tagged messages
2177 automatically, without requiring the ``tag-prefix''.
2179 In <ref id="macro" name="macros"> or <ref id="push" name="push"> commands,
2180 you can use the ``tag-prefix-cond'' operator. If there are no tagged
2181 messages, mutt will "eat" the rest of the macro to abort it's execution.
2182 Mutt will stop "eating" the macro when it encounters the ``end-cond''
2183 operator; after this operator the rest of the macro will be executed as
2186 <sect1>Using Hooks<label id="hooks">
2188 A <em/hook/ is a concept borrowed from the EMACS editor which allows you to
2189 execute arbitrary commands before performing some operation. For example,
2190 you may wish to tailor your configuration based upon which mailbox you are
2191 reading, or to whom you are sending mail. In the Mutt world, a <em/hook/
2192 consists of a <ref id="regexp" name="regular expression"> or
2193 <ref id="patterns" name="pattern"> along with a
2194 configuration option/command. See
2196 <item><ref id="folder-hook" name="folder-hook">
2197 <item><ref id="send-hook" name="send-hook">
2198 <item><ref id="message-hook" name="message-hook">
2199 <item><ref id="save-hook" name="save-hook">
2200 <item><ref id="mbox-hook" name="mbox-hook">
2201 <item><ref id="fcc-hook" name="fcc-hook">
2202 <item><ref id="fcc-save-hook" name="fcc-save-hook">
2204 for specific details on each type of <em/hook/ available.
2206 <bf/Note:/ if a hook changes configuration settings, these changes remain
2207 effective until the end of the current mutt session. As this is generally
2208 not desired, a default hook needs to be added before all other hooks to
2209 restore configuration defaults. Here is an example with send-hook and the
2213 send-hook . 'unmy_hdr From:'
2214 send-hook ~C'^b@b\.b$' my_hdr from: c@c.c
2217 <sect2>Message Matching in Hooks<label id="pattern_hook">
2219 Hooks that act upon messages (<tt/send-hook, save-hook, fcc-hook,
2220 message-hook/) are evaluated in a slightly different manner. For the other
2221 types of hooks, a <ref id="regexp" name="regular expression"> is
2222 sufficient. But in dealing with messages a finer grain of control is
2223 needed for matching since for different purposes you want to match
2226 Mutt allows the use of the <ref id="patterns" name="search pattern">
2227 language for matching messages in hook commands. This works in
2228 exactly the same way as it would when <em/limiting/ or
2229 <em/searching/ the mailbox, except that you are restricted to those
2230 operators which match information mutt extracts from the header of
2231 the message (i.e. from, to, cc, date, subject, etc.).
2233 For example, if you wanted to set your return address based upon sending
2234 mail to a specific address, you could do something like:
2236 send-hook '~t ^me@cs\.hmc\.edu$' 'my_hdr From: Mutt User <user@host>'
2238 which would execute the given command when sending mail to
2241 However, it is not required that you write the pattern to match using the
2242 full searching language. You can still specify a simple <em/regular
2243 expression/ like the other hooks, in which case Mutt will translate your
2244 pattern into the full language, using the translation specified by the
2245 <ref id="default_hook" name="$default_hook"> variable. The
2246 pattern is translated at the time the hook is declared, so the value of
2247 <ref id="default_hook" name="$default_hook"> that is in effect
2248 at that time will be used.
2250 <sect1>Using the sidebar<label id="sidebar">
2252 The sidebar, a feature specific to Mutt-ng, allows you to use a mailbox listing
2253 which looks very similar to the ones you probably know from GUI mail clients.
2254 The sidebar lists all specified mailboxes, shows the number in each
2255 and highlights the ones with new email
2256 Use the following configuration commands:
2258 set sidebar_visible="yes"
2259 set sidebar_width=25
2262 If you want to specify the mailboxes you can do so with:
2271 You can also specify the colors for mailboxes with new mails by using:
2273 color sidebar_new red black
2274 color sidebar white black
2277 The available functions are:
2279 sidebar-scroll-up Scrolls the mailbox list up 1 page
2280 sidebar-scroll-down Scrolls the mailbox list down 1 page
2281 sidebar-next Hilights the next mailbox
2282 sidebar-next-new Hilights the next mailbox with new mail
2283 sidebar-previous Hilights the previous mailbox
2284 sidebar-open Opens the currently hilighted mailbox
2287 Reasonable key bindings look e.g. like this:
2289 bind index \Cp sidebar-prev
2290 bind index \Cn sidebar-next
2291 bind index \Cb sidebar-open
2292 bind pager \Cp sidebar-prev
2293 bind pager \Cn sidebar-next
2294 bind pager \Cb sidebar-open
2296 macro index B ':toggle sidebar_visible^M'
2297 macro pager B ':toggle sidebar_visible^M'
2300 You can then go up and down by pressing Ctrl-P and Ctrl-N, and
2301 switch on and off the sidebar simply by pressing 'B'.
2303 <sect1>External Address Queries<label id="query">
2305 Mutt supports connecting to external directory databases such as LDAP,
2306 ph/qi, bbdb, or NIS through a wrapper script which connects to mutt
2307 using a simple interface. Using the <ref id="query_command"
2308 name="$query_command"> variable, you specify the wrapper
2309 command to use. For example:
2312 set query_command = "mutt_ldap_query.pl '%s'"
2315 The wrapper script should accept the query on the command-line. It
2316 should return a one line message, then each matching response on a
2317 single line, each line containing a tab separated address then name then
2318 some other optional information. On error, or if there are no matching
2319 addresses, return a non-zero exit code and a one line error message.
2321 An example multiple response output:
2323 Searching database ... 20 entries ... 3 matching:
2324 me@cs.hmc.edu Michael Elkins mutt dude
2325 blong@fiction.net Brandon Long mutt and more
2326 roessler@guug.de Thomas Roessler mutt pgp
2329 There are two mechanisms for accessing the query function of mutt. One
2330 is to do a query from the index menu using the query function (default: Q).
2331 This will prompt for a query, then bring up the query menu which will
2332 list the matching responses. From the query menu, you can select
2333 addresses to create aliases, or to mail. You can tag multiple addresses
2334 to mail, start a new query, or have a new query appended to the current
2337 The other mechanism for accessing the query function is for address
2338 completion, similar to the alias completion. In any prompt for address
2339 entry, you can use the complete-query function (default: ^T) to run a
2340 query based on the current address you have typed. Like aliases, mutt
2341 will look for what you have typed back to the last space or comma. If
2342 there is a single response for that query, mutt will expand the address
2343 in place. If there are multiple responses, mutt will activate the query
2344 menu. At the query menu, you can select one or more addresses to be
2345 added to the prompt.
2347 <sect1>Mailbox Formats
2349 Mutt supports reading and writing of four different mailbox formats:
2350 mbox, MMDF, MH and Maildir. The mailbox type is autodetected, so there
2351 is no need to use a flag for different mailbox types. When creating new
2352 mailboxes, Mutt uses the default specified with the <ref id="mbox_type"
2353 name="$mbox_type"> variable.
2355 <bf/mbox/. This is the most widely used mailbox format for UNIX. All
2356 messages are stored in a single file. Each message has a line of the form:
2359 From me@cs.hmc.edu Fri, 11 Apr 1997 11:44:56 PST
2362 to denote the start of a new message (this is often referred to as the
2363 ``From_'' line).
2365 <bf/MMDF/. This is a variant of the <em/mbox/ format. Each message is
2366 surrounded by lines containing ``^A^A^A^A'' (four control-A's).
2368 <bf/MH/. A radical departure from <em/mbox/ and <em/MMDF/, a mailbox
2369 consists of a directory and each message is stored in a separate file.
2370 The filename indicates the message number (however, this is may not
2371 correspond to the message number Mutt displays). Deleted messages are
2372 renamed with a comma (,) prepended to the filename. <bf/Note:/ Mutt
2373 detects this type of mailbox by looking for either <tt/.mh_sequences/
2374 or <tt/.xmhcache/ (needed to distinguish normal directories from MH
2377 <bf/Maildir/. The newest of the mailbox formats, used by the Qmail MTA (a
2378 replacement for sendmail). Similar to <em/MH/, except that it adds three
2379 subdirectories of the mailbox: <em/tmp/, <em/new/ and <em/cur/. Filenames
2380 for the messages are chosen in such a way they are unique, even when two
2381 programs are writing the mailbox over NFS, which means that no file locking
2384 <sect1>Mailbox Shortcuts<label id="shortcuts">
2386 There are a number of built in shortcuts which refer to specific mailboxes.
2387 These shortcuts can be used anywhere you are prompted for a file or mailbox
2391 <item>! -- refers to your <ref id="spoolfile" name="$spoolfile"> (incoming) mailbox
2392 <item>> -- refers to your <ref id="mbox" name="$mbox"> file
2393 <item>< -- refers to your <ref id="record" name="$record"> file
2394 <item>^ -- refers to the current mailbox
2395 <item>- or !! -- refers to the file you've last visited
2396 <item>˜ -- refers to your home directory
2397 <item>= or + -- refers to your <ref id="folder" name="$folder"> directory
2398 <item>@<em/alias/ -- refers to the <ref id="save-hook"
2399 name="default save folder"> as determined by the address of the alias
2402 <sect1>Handling Mailing Lists<label id="using_lists">
2405 Mutt has a few configuration options that make dealing with large
2406 amounts of mail easier. The first thing you must do is to let Mutt
2407 know what addresses you consider to be mailing lists (technically
2408 this does not have to be a mailing list, but that is what it is most
2409 often used for), and what lists you are subscribed to. This is
2410 accomplished through the use of the <ref id="lists"
2411 name="lists and subscribe"> commands in your muttrc.
2413 Now that Mutt knows what your mailing lists are, it can do several
2414 things, the first of which is the ability to show the name of a list
2415 through which you received a message (i.e., of a subscribed list) in
2416 the <em/index/ menu display. This is useful to distinguish between
2417 personal and list mail in the same mailbox. In the <ref id="index_format"
2418 name="$index_format"> variable, the escape ``%L''
2419 will return the string ``To <list>'' when ``list'' appears in the
2420 ``To'' field, and ``Cc <list>'' when it appears in the ``Cc''
2421 field (otherwise it returns the name of the author).
2423 Often times the ``To'' and ``Cc'' fields in mailing list messages
2424 tend to get quite large. Most people do not bother to remove the
2425 author of the message they are reply to from the list, resulting in
2426 two or more copies being sent to that person. The ``list-reply''
2427 function, which by default is bound to ``L'' in the <em/index/ menu
2428 and <em/pager/, helps reduce the clutter by only replying to the
2429 known mailing list addresses instead of all recipients (except as
2430 specified by <tt/Mail-Followup-To/, see below).
2432 Mutt also supports the <tt/Mail-Followup-To/ header. When you send
2433 a message to a list of recipients which includes one or several
2434 subscribed mailing lists, and if the <ref id="followup_to"
2435 name="$followup_to"> option is set, mutt will generate
2436 a Mail-Followup-To header which contains all the recipients to whom
2437 you send this message, but not your address. This indicates that
2438 group-replies or list-replies (also known as ``followups'') to this
2439 message should only be sent to the original recipients of the
2440 message, and not separately to you - you'll receive your copy through
2441 one of the mailing lists you are subscribed to.
2443 Conversely, when group-replying or list-replying to a message which
2444 has a <tt/Mail-Followup-To/ header, mutt will respect this header if
2445 the <ref id="honor_followup_to"
2446 name="$honor_followup_to"> configuration
2447 variable is set. Using list-reply will in this case also make sure
2448 that the reply goes to the mailing list, even if it's not specified
2449 in the list of recipients in the <tt/Mail-Followup-To/.
2451 Note that, when header editing is enabled, you can create a
2452 <tt/Mail-Followup-To/ header manually. Mutt will only auto-generate
2453 this header if it doesn't exist when you send the message.
2456 The other method some mailing list admins use is to generate a
2457 ``Reply-To'' field which points back to the mailing list address rather
2458 than the author of the message. This can create problems when trying
2459 to reply directly to the author in private, since most mail clients
2460 will automatically reply to the address given in the ``Reply-To''
2461 field. Mutt uses the <ref id="reply_to" name="$reply_to">
2462 variable to help decide which address to use. If set to <em/ask-yes/ or
2463 <em/ask-no/, you will be
2464 prompted as to whether or not you would like to use the address given in
2465 the ``Reply-To'' field, or reply directly to the address given in the
2466 ``From'' field. When set to <em/yes/, the ``Reply-To'' field will be used when
2469 The ``X-Label:'' header field can be used to further identify mailing
2470 lists or list subject matter (or just to annotate messages
2471 individually). The <ref id="index_format"
2472 name="$index_format"> variable's ``%y'' and
2473 ``%Y'' escapes can be used to expand ``X-Label:'' fields in the
2474 index, and Mutt's pattern-matcher can match regular expressions to
2475 ``X-Label:'' fields with the ``~y'' selector. ``X-Label:'' is not a
2476 standard message header field, but it can easily be inserted by procmail
2477 and other mail filtering agents.
2479 Lastly, Mutt has the ability to <ref id="sort" name="sort"> the mailbox into
2480 <ref id="threads" name="threads">. A thread is a group of messages which all relate to the same
2481 subject. This is usually organized into a tree-like structure where a
2482 message and all of its replies are represented graphically. If you've ever
2483 used a threaded news client, this is the same concept. It makes dealing
2484 with large volume mailing lists easier because you can easily delete
2485 uninteresting threads and quickly find topics of value.
2487 <sect1>Editing threads
2489 Mutt has the ability to dynamically restructure threads that are broken
2490 either by misconfigured software or bad behaviour from some
2491 correspondents. This allows to clean your mailboxes formats) from these
2492 annoyances which make it hard to follow a discussion.
2494 <sect2>Linking threads
2497 Some mailers tend to "forget" to correctly set the "In-Reply-To:" and
2498 "References:" headers when replying to a message. This results in broken
2499 discussions because Mutt has not enough information to guess the correct
2501 You can fix this by tagging the reply, then moving to the parent message
2502 and using the ``link-threads'' function (bound to & by default). The
2503 reply will then be connected to this "parent" message.
2505 You can also connect multiple childs at once, tagging them and using the
2506 tag-prefix command (';') or the auto_tag option.
2508 <sect2>Breaking threads
2511 On mailing lists, some people are in the bad habit of starting a new
2512 discussion by hitting "reply" to any message from the list and changing
2513 the subject to a totally unrelated one.
2514 You can fix such threads by using the ``break-thread'' function (bound
2515 by default to #), which will turn the subthread starting from the
2516 current message into a whole different thread.
2518 <sect1>Delivery Status Notification (DSN) Support
2521 RFC1894 defines a set of MIME content types for relaying information
2522 about the status of electronic mail messages. These can be thought of as
2523 ``return receipts.'' Berkeley sendmail 8.8.x currently has some command
2524 line options in which the mail client can make requests as to what type
2525 of status messages should be returned.
2527 To support this, there are two variables. <ref id="dsn_notify"
2528 name="$dsn_notify"> is used to request receipts for
2529 different results (such as failed message, message delivered, etc.).
2530 <ref id="dsn_return" name="$dsn_return"> requests how much
2531 of your message should be returned with the receipt (headers or full
2532 message). Refer to the man page on sendmail for more details on DSN.
2534 <sect1>POP3 Support (OPTIONAL)
2537 If Mutt was compiled with POP3 support (by running the <em/configure/
2538 script with the <em/--enable-pop/ flag), it has the ability to work
2539 with mailboxes located on a remote POP3 server and fetch mail for local
2542 You can access the remote POP3 mailbox by selecting the folder
2543 <tt>pop://popserver/</tt>.
2545 You can select an alternative port by specifying it with the server, ie:
2546 <tt>pop://popserver:port/</tt>.
2548 You can also specify different username for each folder, ie:
2549 <tt>pop://username@popserver[:port]/</tt>.
2551 Polling for new mail is more expensive over POP3 than locally. For this
2552 reason the frequency at which Mutt will check for mail remotely can be
2554 <ref id="pop_checkinterval" name="$pop_checkinterval">
2555 variable, which defaults to every 60 seconds.
2557 If Mutt was compiled with SSL support (by running the <em/configure/
2558 script with the <em/--with-ssl/ flag), connections to POP3 servers
2559 can be encrypted. This naturally requires that the server supports
2560 SSL encrypted connections. To access a folder with POP3/SSL, you should
2561 use pops: prefix, ie:
2562 <tt>pops://[username@]popserver[:port]/</tt>.
2564 Another way to access your POP3 mail is the <em/fetch-mail/ function
2565 (default: G). It allows to connect to <ref id="pop_host"
2566 name="pop_host">, fetch all your new mail and place it in the
2567 local <ref id="spoolfile" name="spoolfile">. After this
2568 point, Mutt runs exactly as if the mail had always been local.
2570 <bf/Note:/ If you only need to fetch all messages to local mailbox
2571 you should consider using a specialized program, such as <htmlurl
2572 url="http://www.ccil.org/~esr/fetchmail" name="fetchmail">
2574 <sect1>IMAP Support (OPTIONAL)
2577 If Mutt was compiled with IMAP support (by running the <em/configure/
2578 script with the <em/--enable-imap/ flag), it has the ability to work
2579 with folders located on a remote IMAP server.
2581 You can access the remote inbox by selecting the folder
2582 <tt>imap://imapserver/INBOX</tt>, where <tt/imapserver/ is the name of the
2583 IMAP server and <tt/INBOX/ is the special name for your spool mailbox on
2584 the IMAP server. If you want to access another mail folder at the IMAP
2585 server, you should use <tt>imap://imapserver/path/to/folder</tt> where
2586 <tt>path/to/folder</tt> is the path of the folder you want to access.
2588 You can select an alternative port by specifying it with the server, ie:
2589 <tt>imap://imapserver:port/INBOX</tt>.
2591 You can also specify different username for each folder, ie:
2592 <tt>imap://username@imapserver[:port]/INBOX</tt>.
2594 If Mutt was compiled with SSL support (by running the <em/configure/
2595 script with the <em/--with-ssl/ flag), connections to IMAP servers
2596 can be encrypted. This naturally requires that the server supports
2597 SSL encrypted connections. To access a folder with IMAP/SSL, you should
2598 use <tt>imaps://[username@]imapserver[:port]/path/to/folder</tt> as your
2601 Pine-compatible notation is also supported, ie
2602 <tt>{[username@]imapserver[:port][/ssl]}path/to/folder</tt>
2604 Note that not all servers use / as the hierarchy separator. Mutt should
2605 correctly notice which separator is being used by the server and convert
2608 When browsing folders on an IMAP server, you can toggle whether to look
2609 at only the folders you are subscribed to, or all folders with the
2610 <em/toggle-subscribed/ command. See also the
2611 <ref id="imap_list_subscribed"
2612 name="$imap_list_subscribed"> variable.
2614 Polling for new mail on an IMAP server can cause noticeable delays. So, you'll
2615 want to carefully tune the
2616 <ref id="imap_mail_check" name="$imap_mail_check">
2618 <ref id="timeout" name="$timeout">
2621 Note that if you are using mbox as the mail store on UW servers prior to
2622 v12.250, the server has been reported to disconnect a client if another client
2623 selects the same folder.
2625 <sect2>The Folder Browser
2628 As of version 1.2, mutt supports browsing mailboxes on an IMAP
2629 server. This is mostly the same as the local file browser, with the
2630 following differences:
2632 <item>Instead of file permissions, mutt displays the string "IMAP",
2633 possibly followed by the symbol "+", indicating
2634 that the entry contains both messages and subfolders. On
2635 Cyrus-like servers folders will often contain both messages and
2637 <item>For the case where an entry can contain both messages and
2638 subfolders, the selection key (bound to <tt>enter</tt> by default)
2639 will choose to descend into the subfolder view. If you wish to view
2640 the messages in that folder, you must use <tt>view-file</tt> instead
2641 (bound to <tt>space</tt> by default).
2642 <item>You can create, delete and rename mailboxes with the
2643 <tt>create-mailbox</tt>, <tt>delete-mailbox</tt>, and
2644 <tt>rename-mailbox</tt> commands (default bindings: <tt>C</tt>,
2645 <tt>d</tt> and <tt>r</tt>, respectively). You may also
2646 <tt>subscribe</tt> and <tt>unsubscribe</tt> to mailboxes (normally
2647 these are bound to <tt>s</tt> and <tt>u</tt>, respectively).
2650 <sect2>Authentication
2653 Mutt supports four authentication methods with IMAP servers: SASL,
2654 GSSAPI, CRAM-MD5, and LOGIN (there is a patch by Grant Edwards to add
2655 NTLM authentication for you poor exchange users out there, but it has
2656 yet to be integrated into the main tree). There is also support for
2657 the pseudo-protocol ANONYMOUS, which allows you to log in to a public
2658 IMAP server without having an account. To use ANONYMOUS, simply make
2659 your username blank or "anonymous".
2661 SASL is a special super-authenticator, which selects among several protocols
2662 (including GSSAPI, CRAM-MD5, ANONYMOUS, and DIGEST-MD5) the most secure
2663 method available on your host and the server. Using some of these methods
2664 (including DIGEST-MD5 and possibly GSSAPI), your entire session will be
2665 encrypted and invisible to those teeming network snoops. It is the best
2666 option if you have it. To use it, you must have the Cyrus SASL library
2667 installed on your system and compile mutt with the <em/--with-sasl/ flag.
2669 Mutt will try whichever methods are compiled in and available on the server,
2670 in the following order: SASL, ANONYMOUS, GSSAPI, CRAM-MD5, LOGIN.
2672 There are a few variables which control authentication:
2674 <item><ref id="imap_user" name="$imap_user"> - controls
2675 the username under which you request authentication on the IMAP server,
2676 for all authenticators. This is overridden by an explicit username in
2677 the mailbox path (ie by using a mailbox name of the form
2679 <item><ref id="imap_pass" name="$imap_pass"> - a
2680 password which you may preset, used by all authentication methods where
2681 a password is needed.
2682 <item><ref id="imap_authenticators"
2683 name="$imap_authenticators"> - a colon-delimited list of IMAP
2684 authentication methods to try, in the order you wish to try them. If
2685 specified, this overrides mutt's default (attempt everything, in the order
2689 <sect1>Managing multiple IMAP/POP accounts (OPTIONAL)<label id="account-hook">
2692 If you happen to have accounts on multiple IMAP and/or POP servers,
2693 you may find managing all the authentication settings inconvenient and
2694 error-prone. The account-hook command may help. This hook works like
2695 folder-hook but is invoked whenever you access a remote mailbox
2696 (including inside the folder browser), not just when you open the
2702 account-hook . 'unset imap_user; unset imap_pass; unset tunnel'
2703 account-hook imap://host1/ 'set imap_user=me1 imap_pass=foo'
2704 account-hook imap://host2/ 'set tunnel="ssh host2 /usr/libexec/imapd"'
2707 <sect1>Start a WWW Browser on URLs (EXTERNAL)<label id="urlview">
2709 If a message contains URLs (<em/unified resource locator/ = address in the
2710 WWW space like <em>http://www.mutt.org/</em>), it is efficient to get
2711 a menu with all the URLs and start a WWW browser on one of them. This
2712 functionality is provided by the external urlview program which can be
2713 retrieved at <htmlurl url="ftp://ftp.mutt.org/mutt/contrib/"
2714 name="ftp://ftp.mutt.org/mutt/contrib/"> and the configuration commands:
2716 macro index \cb |urlview\n
2717 macro pager \cb |urlview\n
2720 <sect1>Compressed folders Support (OPTIONAL)
2723 If Mutt was compiled with compressed folders support (by running the
2724 <em/configure/ script with the <em/--enable-compressed/ flag), Mutt
2725 can open folders stored in an arbitrary format, provided that the user
2726 has a script to convert from/to this format to one of the accepted.
2728 The most common use is to open compressed archived folders e.g. with
2731 In addition, the user can provide a script that gets a folder in an
2732 accepted format and appends its context to the folder in the
2733 user-defined format, which may be faster than converting the entire
2734 folder to the accepted format, appending to it and converting back to
2735 the user-defined format.
2737 There are three hooks defined (<ref id="open-hook" name="open-hook">,
2738 <ref id="close-hook" name="close-hook"> and <ref id="append-hook"
2739 name="append-hook">) which define commands to uncompress and compress
2740 a folder and to append messages to an existing compressed folder
2746 open-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -cd %f > %t"
2747 close-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -c %t > %f"
2748 append-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -c %t >> %f"
2751 You do not have to specify all of the commands. If you omit <ref
2752 id="append-hook" name="append-hook">, the folder will be open and
2753 closed again each time you will add to it. If you omit <ref
2754 id="close-hook" name="close-hook"> (or give empty command) , the
2755 folder will be open in the mode. If you specify <ref
2756 id="append-hook" name="append-hook"> though you'll be able to append
2759 Note that Mutt will only try to use hooks if the file is not in one of
2760 the accepted formats. In particular, if the file is empty, mutt
2761 supposes it is not compressed. This is important because it allows the
2762 use of programs that do not have well defined extensions. Just use
2763 &dquot;.&dquot; as a regexp. But this may be surprising if your
2764 compressing script produces empty files. In this situation, unset <ref
2765 id="save_empty" name="$save_empty">, so that the compressed file
2766 will be removed if you delete all of the messages.
2768 <sect2>Open a compressed mailbox for reading<label id="open-hook">
2770 Usage: <tt/open-hook/ <em/regexp/ &dquot;<em/command/&dquot;
2772 The <em/command/ is the command that can be used for opening the
2773 folders whose names match <em/regexp/.
2775 The <em/command/ string is the printf-like format string, and it
2776 should accept two parameters: %f, which is replaced with the
2777 (compressed) folder name, and %t which is replaced with the
2778 name of the temporary folder to which to write.
2780 %f and %t can be repeated any number of times in the
2781 command string, and all of the entries are replaced with the
2782 appropriate folder name. In addition, %% is replaced by
2783 %, as in printf, and any other %anything is left as is.
2785 The <em/command/ should <bf/not/ remove the original compressed file.
2786 The <em/command/ should return non-zero exit status if it fails, so
2787 mutt knows something's wrong.
2792 open-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -cd %f > %t"
2795 If the <em/command/ is empty, this operation is disabled for this file
2798 <sect2>Write a compressed mailbox<label id="close-hook">
2800 Usage: <tt/close-hook/ <em/regexp/ &dquot;<em/command/&dquot;
2802 This is used to close the folder that was open with the <ref id="open-hook"
2803 name="open-hook"> command after some changes were made to it.
2805 The <em/command/ string is the command that can be used for closing the
2806 folders whose names match <em/regexp/. It has the same format as in
2807 the <ref id="open-hook" name="open-hook"> command. Temporary folder
2808 in this case is the folder previously produced by the <<ref id="open-hook"
2809 name="open-hook"> command.
2811 The <em/command/ should <bf/not/ remove the decompressed file. The
2812 <em/command/ should return non-zero exit status if it fails, so mutt
2813 knows something's wrong.
2818 close-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -c %t > %f"
2821 If the <em/command/ is empty, this operation is disabled for this file
2822 type, and the file can only be open in the readonly mode.
2824 <ref id="close-hook" name ="close-hook"> is not called when you exit
2825 from the folder if the folder was not changed.
2827 <sect2>Append a message to a compressed mailbox<label id="append-hook">
2829 Usage: <tt/append-hook/ <em/regexp/ &dquot;<em/command/&dquot;
2831 This command is used for saving to an existing compressed folder.
2832 The <em/command/ is the command that can be used for appending to the
2833 folders whose names match <em/regexp/. It has the same format as in
2834 the <ref id="open-hook" name="open-hook"> command.
2835 The temporary folder in this case contains the messages that are being
2838 The <em/command/ should <bf/not/ remove the decompressed file. The
2839 <em/command/ should return non-zero exit status if it fails, so mutt
2840 knows something's wrong.
2845 append-hook \\.gz$ "gzip -c %t >> %f"
2848 When <ref id="append-hook" name="append-hook"> is used, the folder is
2849 not opened, which saves time, but this means that we can not find out
2850 what the folder type is. Thus the default (<ref id="mbox_type"
2851 name="$mbox_type">) type is always supposed (i.e.
2852 this is the format used for the temporary folder).
2854 If the file does not exist when you save to it, <ref id="close-hook"
2855 name="close-hook"> is called, and not <ref id="append-hook"
2856 name="append-hook">. <ref id="append-hook" name="append-hook"> is only
2857 for appending to existing folders.
2859 If the <em/command/ is empty, this operation is disabled for this file
2860 type. In this case, the folder will be open and closed again (using
2861 <ref id="open-hook" name="open-hook"> and <ref id="close-hook"
2862 name="close-hook">respectively) each time you will add to it.
2864 <sect2>Encrypted folders
2866 The compressed folders support can also be used to handle encrypted
2867 folders. If you want to encrypt a folder with PGP, you may want to use
2868 the following hooks:
2871 open-hook \\.pgp$ "pgp -f < %f > %t"
2872 close-hook \\.pgp$ "pgp -fe YourPgpUserIdOrKeyId < %t > %f"
2875 Please note, that PGP does not support appending to an encrypted
2876 folder, so there is no append-hook defined.
2878 <bf/Note:/ the folder is temporary stored decrypted in the /tmp
2879 directory, where it can be read by your system administrator. So think
2880 about the security aspects of this.
2882 <sect>Mutt's MIME Support
2884 Quite a bit of effort has been made to make Mutt the premier text-mode
2885 MIME MUA. Every effort has been made to provide the functionality that
2886 the discerning MIME user requires, and the conformance to the standards
2887 wherever possible. When configuring Mutt for MIME, there are two extra
2888 types of configuration files which Mutt uses. One is the
2889 <tt/mime.types/ file, which contains the mapping of file extensions to
2890 IANA MIME types. The other is the <tt/mailcap/ file, which specifies
2891 the external commands to use for handling specific MIME types.
2893 <sect1>Using MIME in Mutt
2895 There are three areas/menus in Mutt which deal with MIME, they are the
2896 pager (while viewing a message), the attachment menu and the compose
2899 <sect2>Viewing MIME messages in the pager
2901 When you select a message from the index and view it in the pager, Mutt
2902 decodes the message to a text representation. Mutt internally supports
2903 a number of MIME types, including <tt>text/plain, text/enriched,
2904 message/rfc822, and message/news</tt>. In addition, the export
2905 controlled version of Mutt recognizes a variety of PGP MIME types,
2906 including PGP/MIME and application/pgp.
2908 Mutt will denote attachments with a couple lines describing them.
2909 These lines are of the form:
2911 [-- Attachment #1: Description --]
2912 [-- Type: text/plain, Encoding: 7bit, Size: 10000 --]
2914 Where the <tt/Description/ is the description or filename given for the
2915 attachment, and the <tt/Encoding/ is one of
2916 <tt>7bit/8bit/quoted-printable/base64/binary</tt>.
2918 If Mutt cannot deal with a MIME type, it will display a message like:
2920 [-- image/gif is unsupported (use 'v' to view this part) --]
2923 <sect2>The Attachment Menu<label id="attach_menu">
2925 The default binding for <tt/view-attachments/ is `v', which displays the
2926 attachment menu for a message. The attachment menu displays a list of
2927 the attachments in a message. From the attachment menu, you can save,
2928 print, pipe, delete, and view attachments. You can apply these
2929 operations to a group of attachments at once, by tagging the attachments
2930 and by using the ``tag-prefix'' operator. You can also reply to the
2931 current message from this menu, and only the current attachment (or the
2932 attachments tagged) will be quoted in your reply. You can view
2933 attachments as text, or view them using the mailcap viewer definition.
2935 Finally, you can apply the usual message-related functions (like
2936 <ref id="resend-message" name="resend-message">, and the reply
2937 and forward functions) to attachments of type <tt>message/rfc822</tt>.
2939 See the help on the attachment menu for more information.
2941 <sect2>The Compose Menu<label id="compose_menu">
2943 The compose menu is the menu you see before you send a message. It
2944 allows you to edit the recipient list, the subject, and other aspects
2945 of your message. It also contains a list of the attachments of your
2946 message, including the main body. From this menu, you can print, copy,
2947 filter, pipe, edit, compose, review, and rename an attachment or a
2948 list of tagged attachments. You can also modifying the attachment
2949 information, notably the type, encoding and description.
2951 Attachments appear as follows:
2953 - 1 [text/plain, 7bit, 1K] /tmp/mutt-euler-8082-0 <no description>
2954 2 [applica/x-gunzip, base64, 422K] ~/src/mutt-0.85.tar.gz <no description>
2957 The '-' denotes that Mutt will delete the file after sending (or
2958 postponing, or cancelling) the message. It can be toggled with the
2959 <tt/toggle-unlink/ command (default: u). The next field is the MIME
2960 content-type, and can be changed with the <tt/edit-type/ command
2961 (default: ^T). The next field is the encoding for the attachment,
2962 which allows a binary message to be encoded for transmission on 7bit
2963 links. It can be changed with the <tt/edit-encoding/ command
2964 (default: ^E). The next field is the size of the attachment,
2965 rounded to kilobytes or megabytes. The next field is the filename,
2966 which can be changed with the <tt/rename-file/ command (default: R).
2967 The final field is the description of the attachment, and can be
2968 changed with the <tt/edit-description/ command (default: d).
2970 <sect1>MIME Type configuration with <tt/mime.types/
2972 When you add an attachment to your mail message, Mutt searches your
2973 personal mime.types file at <tt>${HOME}/.mime.types</tt>, and then
2974 the system mime.types file at <tt>/usr/local/share/mutt/mime.types</tt> or
2975 <tt>/etc/mime.types</tt>
2977 The mime.types file consist of lines containing a MIME type and a space
2978 separated list of extensions. For example:
2980 application/postscript ps eps
2982 audio/x-aiff aif aifc aiff
2984 A sample <tt/mime.types/ file comes with the Mutt distribution, and
2985 should contain most of the MIME types you are likely to use.
2987 If Mutt can not determine the mime type by the extension of the file you
2988 attach, it will look at the file. If the file is free of binary
2989 information, Mutt will assume that the file is plain text, and mark it
2990 as <tt>text/plain</tt>. If the file contains binary information, then Mutt will
2991 mark it as <tt>application/octet-stream</tt>. You can change the MIME
2992 type that Mutt assigns to an attachment by using the <tt/edit-type/
2993 command from the compose menu (default: ^T). The MIME type is actually a
2994 major mime type followed by the sub-type, separated by a '/'. 6 major
2995 types: application, text, image, video, audio, and model have been approved
2996 after various internet discussions. Mutt recognises all of these if the
2997 appropriate entry is found in the mime.types file. It also recognises other
2998 major mime types, such as the chemical type that is widely used in the
2999 molecular modelling community to pass molecular data in various forms to
3000 various molecular viewers. Non-recognised mime types should only be used
3001 if the recipient of the message is likely to be expecting such attachments.
3003 <sect1>MIME Viewer configuration with <tt/mailcap/
3005 Mutt supports RFC 1524 MIME Configuration, in particular the Unix
3006 specific format specified in Appendix A of RFC 1524. This file format
3007 is commonly referred to as the mailcap format. Many MIME compliant
3008 programs utilize the mailcap format, allowing you to specify handling
3009 for all MIME types in one place for all programs. Programs known to
3010 use this format include Netscape, XMosaic, lynx and metamail.
3012 In order to handle various MIME types that Mutt can not handle
3013 internally, Mutt parses a series of external configuration files to
3014 find an external handler. The default search string for these files
3015 is a colon delimited list set to
3017 ${HOME}/.mailcap:/usr/local/share/mutt/mailcap:/etc/mailcap:/etc/mailcap:/usr/etc/mailcap:/usr/local/etc/mailcap
3019 where <tt/$HOME/ is your home directory.
3021 In particular, the metamail distribution will install a mailcap file,
3022 usually as <tt>/usr/local/etc/mailcap</tt>, which contains some baseline
3025 <sect2>The Basics of the mailcap file
3027 A mailcap file consists of a series of lines which are comments, blank,
3030 A comment line consists of a # character followed by anything you want.
3032 A blank line is blank.
3034 A definition line consists of a content type, a view command, and any
3035 number of optional fields. Each field of a definition line is divided
3036 by a semicolon ';' character.
3038 The content type is specified in the MIME standard type/subtype method.
3040 <tt>text/plain, text/html, image/gif, </tt>
3041 etc. In addition, the mailcap format includes two formats for
3042 wildcards, one using the special '*' subtype, the other is the implicit
3043 wild, where you only include the major type. For example, <tt>image/*</tt>, or
3044 <tt>video,</tt> will match all image types and video types,
3047 The view command is a Unix command for viewing the type specified. There
3048 are two different types of commands supported. The default is to send
3049 the body of the MIME message to the command on stdin. You can change
3050 this behaviour by using %s as a parameter to your view command.
3051 This will cause Mutt to save the body of the MIME message to a temporary
3052 file, and then call the view command with the %s replaced by
3053 the name of the temporary file. In both cases, Mutt will turn over the
3054 terminal to the view program until the program quits, at which time Mutt
3055 will remove the temporary file if it exists.
3057 So, in the simplest form, you can send a text/plain message to the
3058 external pager more on stdin:
3062 Or, you could send the message as a file:
3066 Perhaps you would like to use lynx to interactively view a text/html
3071 In this case, lynx does not support viewing a file from stdin, so you
3072 must use the %s syntax.
3073 <bf/Note:/ <em>Some older versions of lynx contain a bug where they
3074 will check the mailcap file for a viewer for text/html. They will find
3075 the line which calls lynx, and run it. This causes lynx to continuously
3076 spawn itself to view the object.</em>
3078 On the other hand, maybe you don't want to use lynx interactively, you
3079 just want to have it convert the text/html to text/plain, then you can
3082 text/html; lynx -dump %s | more
3085 Perhaps you wish to use lynx to view text/html files, and a pager on
3086 all other text formats, then you would use the following:
3091 This is the simplest form of a mailcap file.
3093 <sect2>Secure use of mailcap
3095 The interpretion of shell meta-characters embedded in MIME parameters
3096 can lead to security problems in general. Mutt tries to quote parameters
3097 in expansion of %s syntaxes properly, and avoids risky characters by
3098 substituting them, see the <ref id="mailcap_sanitize"
3099 name="mailcap_sanitize"> variable.
3101 Although mutt's procedures to invoke programs with mailcap seem to be
3102 safe, there are other applications parsing mailcap, maybe taking less care
3103 of it. Therefore you should pay attention to the following rules:
3105 <em/Keep the %-expandos away from shell quoting./
3106 Don't quote them with single or double quotes. Mutt does this for
3107 you, the right way, as should any other program which interprets
3108 mailcap. Don't put them into backtick expansions. Be highly careful
3109 with eval statements, and avoid them if possible at all. Trying to fix
3110 broken behaviour with quotes introduces new leaks - there is no
3111 alternative to correct quoting in the first place.
3113 If you have to use the %-expandos' values in context where you need
3114 quoting or backtick expansions, put that value into a shell variable
3115 and reference the shell variable where necessary, as in the following
3116 example (using <tt/$charset/ inside the backtick expansion is safe,
3117 since it is not itself subject to any further expansion):
3120 text/test-mailcap-bug; cat %s; copiousoutput; test=charset=%{charset} \
3121 && test "`echo $charset | tr '[A-Z]' '[a-z]'`" != iso-8859-1
3124 <sect2>Advanced mailcap Usage
3127 <sect3>Optional Fields
3129 In addition to the required content-type and view command fields, you
3130 can add semi-colon ';' separated fields to set flags and other options.
3131 Mutt recognizes the following optional fields:
3134 This flag tells Mutt that the command passes possibly large amounts of
3135 text on stdout. This causes Mutt to invoke a pager (either the internal
3136 pager or the external pager defined by the pager variable) on the output
3137 of the view command. Without this flag, Mutt assumes that the command
3138 is interactive. One could use this to replace the pipe to <tt>more</tt>
3139 in the <tt>lynx -dump</tt> example in the Basic section:
3141 text/html; lynx -dump %s ; copiousoutput
3143 This will cause lynx to format the text/html output as text/plain
3144 and Mutt will use your standard pager to display the results.
3146 Mutt uses this flag when viewing attachments with <ref id="auto_view"
3147 name="autoview">, in order to decide whether it should honor the setting
3148 of the <ref id="wait_key" name="$wait_key"> variable or
3149 not. When an attachment is viewed using an interactive program, and the
3150 corresponding mailcap entry has a <em/needsterminal/ flag, Mutt will use
3151 <ref id="wait_key" name="$wait_key"> and the exit status
3152 of the program to decide if it will ask you to press a key after the
3153 external program has exited. In all other situations it will not prompt
3155 <tag>compose=<command></tag>
3156 This flag specifies the command to use to create a new attachment of a
3157 specific MIME type. Mutt supports this from the compose menu.
3158 <tag>composetyped=<command></tag>
3159 This flag specifies the command to use to create a new attachment of a
3160 specific MIME type. This command differs from the compose command in
3161 that mutt will expect standard MIME headers on the data. This can be
3162 used to specify parameters, filename, description, etc. for a new
3163 attachment. Mutt supports this from the compose menu.
3164 <tag>print=<command></tag>
3165 This flag specifies the command to use to print a specific MIME type.
3166 Mutt supports this from the attachment and compose menus.
3167 <tag>edit=<command></tag>
3168 This flag specifies the command to use to edit a specific MIME type.
3169 Mutt supports this from the compose menu, and also uses it to compose
3170 new attachments. Mutt will default to the defined editor for text
3172 <tag>nametemplate=<template></tag>
3173 This field specifies the format for the file denoted by %s in the
3174 command fields. Certain programs will require a certain file extension,
3175 for instance, to correctly view a file. For instance, lynx will only
3176 interpret a file as <tt>text/html</tt> if the file ends in <tt/.html/.
3177 So, you would specify lynx as a <tt>text/html</tt> viewer with a line in
3178 the mailcap file like:
3180 text/html; lynx %s; nametemplate=%s.html
3182 <tag>test=<command></tag>
3183 This field specifies a command to run to test whether this mailcap
3184 entry should be used. The command is defined with the command expansion
3185 rules defined in the next section. If the command returns 0, then the
3186 test passed, and Mutt uses this entry. If the command returns non-zero,
3187 then the test failed, and Mutt continues searching for the right entry.
3188 <bf/Note:/ <em>the content-type must match before Mutt performs the test.</em>
3191 text/html; netscape -remote 'openURL(%s)' ; test=RunningX
3194 In this example, Mutt will run the program RunningX which will return 0
3195 if the X Window manager is running, and non-zero if it isn't. If
3196 RunningX returns 0, then Mutt will call netscape to display the
3197 text/html object. If RunningX doesn't return 0, then Mutt will go on
3198 to the next entry and use lynx to display the text/html object.
3203 When searching for an entry in the mailcap file, Mutt will search for
3204 the most useful entry for its purpose. For instance, if you are
3205 attempting to print an <tt>image/gif</tt>, and you have the following
3206 entries in your mailcap file, Mutt will search for an entry with the
3210 image/gif; ; print= anytopnm %s | pnmtops | lpr; \
3213 Mutt will skip the <tt>image/*</tt> entry and use the <tt>image/gif</tt>
3214 entry with the print command.
3216 In addition, you can use this with <ref id="auto_view" name="Autoview">
3217 to denote two commands for viewing an attachment, one to be viewed
3218 automatically, the other to be viewed interactively from the attachment
3219 menu. In addition, you can then use the test feature to determine which
3220 viewer to use interactively depending on your environment.
3222 text/html; netscape -remote 'openURL(%s)' ; test=RunningX
3223 text/html; lynx %s; nametemplate=%s.html
3224 text/html; lynx -dump %s; nametemplate=%s.html; copiousoutput
3226 For <ref id="auto_view" name="Autoview">, Mutt will choose the third
3227 entry because of the copiousoutput tag. For interactive viewing, Mutt
3228 will run the program RunningX to determine if it should use the first
3229 entry. If the program returns non-zero, Mutt will use the second entry
3230 for interactive viewing.
3232 <sect3>Command Expansion
3234 The various commands defined in the mailcap files are passed to the
3235 <tt>/bin/sh</tt> shell using the system() function. Before the
3236 command is passed to <tt>/bin/sh -c</tt>, it is parsed to expand
3237 various special parameters with information from Mutt. The keywords
3241 As seen in the basic mailcap section, this variable is expanded
3242 to a filename specified by the calling program. This file contains
3243 the body of the message to view/print/edit or where the composing
3244 program should place the results of composition. In addition, the
3245 use of this keyword causes Mutt to not pass the body of the message
3246 to the view/print/edit program on stdin.
3248 Mutt will expand %t to the text representation of the content
3249 type of the message in the same form as the first parameter of the
3250 mailcap definition line, ie <tt>text/html</tt> or
3252 <tag>%{<parameter>}</tag>
3253 Mutt will expand this to the value of the specified parameter
3254 from the Content-Type: line of the mail message. For instance, if
3255 Your mail message contains:
3257 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
3259 then Mutt will expand %{charset} to iso-8859-1. The default metamail
3260 mailcap file uses this feature to test the charset to spawn an xterm
3261 using the right charset to view the message.
3262 <tag>\%</tag>
3263 This will be replaced by a %
3265 Mutt does not currently support the %F and %n keywords
3266 specified in RFC 1524. The main purpose of these parameters is for
3267 multipart messages, which is handled internally by Mutt.
3269 <sect2>Example mailcap files
3271 This mailcap file is fairly simple and standard:
3273 # I'm always running X :)
3274 video/*; xanim %s > /dev/null
3275 image/*; xv %s > /dev/null
3277 # I'm always running netscape (if my computer had more memory, maybe)
3278 text/html; netscape -remote 'openURL(%s)'
3281 This mailcap file shows quite a number of examples:
3284 # Use xanim to view all videos Xanim produces a header on startup,
3285 # send that to /dev/null so I don't see it
3286 video/*; xanim %s > /dev/null
3288 # Send html to a running netscape by remote
3289 text/html; netscape -remote 'openURL(%s)'; test=RunningNetscape
3291 # If I'm not running netscape but I am running X, start netscape on the
3293 text/html; netscape %s; test=RunningX
3295 # Else use lynx to view it as text
3298 # This version would convert the text/html to text/plain
3299 text/html; lynx -dump %s; copiousoutput
3301 # I use enscript to print text in two columns to a page
3302 text/*; more %s; print=enscript -2Gr %s
3304 # Netscape adds a flag to tell itself to view jpegs internally
3305 image/jpeg;xv %s; x-mozilla-flags=internal
3307 # Use xv to view images if I'm running X
3308 # In addition, this uses the \ to extend the line and set my editor
3310 image/*;xv %s; test=RunningX; \
3313 # Convert images to text using the netpbm tools
3314 image/*; (anytopnm %s | pnmscale -xysize 80 46 | ppmtopgm | pgmtopbm |
3315 pbmtoascii -1x2 ) 2>&1 ; copiousoutput
3317 # Send excel spreadsheets to my NT box
3318 application/ms-excel; open.pl %s
3321 <sect1>MIME Autoview<label id="auto_view">
3323 In addition to explicitly telling Mutt to view an attachment with the
3324 MIME viewer defined in the mailcap file, Mutt has support for
3325 automatically viewing MIME attachments while in the pager.
3327 To work, you must define a viewer in the mailcap file which uses the
3328 <tt/copiousoutput/ option to denote that it is non-interactive.
3329 Usually, you also use the entry to convert the attachment to a text
3330 representation which you can view in the pager.
3332 You then use the <tt/auto_view/ muttrc command to list the
3333 content-types that you wish to view automatically.
3335 For instance, if you set auto_view to:
3337 auto_view text/html application/x-gunzip application/postscript image/gif application/x-tar-gz
3340 Mutt could use the following mailcap entries to automatically view
3341 attachments of these types.
3343 text/html; lynx -dump %s; copiousoutput; nametemplate=%s.html
3344 image/*; anytopnm %s | pnmscale -xsize 80 -ysize 50 | ppmtopgm | pgmtopbm | pbmtoascii ; copiousoutput
3345 application/x-gunzip; gzcat; copiousoutput
3346 application/x-tar-gz; gunzip -c %s | tar -tf - ; copiousoutput
3347 application/postscript; ps2ascii %s; copiousoutput
3350 ``unauto_view'' can be used to remove previous entries from the autoview list.
3351 This can be used with message-hook to autoview messages based on size, etc.
3352 ``unauto_view *'' will remove all previous entries.
3354 <sect1>MIME Multipart/Alternative<label id="alternative_order">
3356 Mutt has some heuristics for determining which attachment of a
3357 multipart/alternative type to display. First, mutt will check the
3358 alternative_order list to determine if one of the available types
3359 is preferred. The alternative_order list consists of a number of
3360 mimetypes in order, including support for implicit and explicit
3361 wildcards, for example:
3363 alternative_order text/enriched text/plain text application/postscript image/*
3366 Next, mutt will check if any of the types have a defined
3367 <ref id="auto_view" name="auto_view">, and use that. Failing
3368 that, Mutt will look for any text type. As a last attempt, mutt will
3369 look for any type it knows how to handle.
3371 To remove a MIME type from the <tt/alternative_order/ list, use the
3372 <tt/unalternative_order/ command.
3374 <sect1>MIME Lookup<label id="mime_lookup">
3376 Mutt's mime_lookup list specifies a list of mime-types that should not
3377 be treated according to their mailcap entry. This option is designed to
3378 deal with binary types such as application/octet-stream. When an attachment's
3379 mime-type is listed in mime_lookup, then the extension of the filename will
3380 be compared to the list of extensions in the mime.types file. The mime-type
3381 associated with this extension will then be used to process the attachment
3382 according to the rules in the mailcap file and according to any other configuration
3383 options (such as auto_view) specified. Common usage would be:
3385 mime_lookup application/octet-stream application/X-Lotus-Manuscript
3388 In addition, the unmime_lookup command may be used to disable this feature
3389 for any particular mime-type if it had been set, for example, in a global
3393 <sect1>Command line options<label id="commandline">
3395 Running <tt/mutt/ with no arguments will make Mutt attempt to read your spool
3396 mailbox. However, it is possible to read other mailboxes and
3397 to send messages from the command line as well.
3401 -a attach a file to a message
3402 -b specify a blind carbon-copy (BCC) address
3403 -c specify a carbon-copy (Cc) address
3404 -e specify a config command to be run after initilization files are read
3405 -f specify a mailbox to load
3406 -F specify an alternate file to read initialization commands
3407 -h print help on command line options
3408 -H specify a draft file from which to read a header and body
3409 -i specify a file to include in a message composition
3410 -m specify a default mailbox type
3411 -n do not read the system Muttrc
3412 -p recall a postponed message
3413 -Q query a configuration variable
3414 -R open mailbox in read-only mode
3415 -s specify a subject (enclose in quotes if it contains spaces)
3416 -v show version number and compile-time definitions
3417 -x simulate the mailx(1) compose mode
3418 -y show a menu containing the files specified by the mailboxes command
3419 -z exit immediately if there are no messages in the mailbox
3420 -Z open the first folder with new message,exit immediately if none
3423 To read messages in a mailbox
3425 <tt/mutt/ [ -nz ] [ -F <em/muttrc/ ] [ -m <em/type/ ] [ -f <em/mailbox/ ]
3427 To compose a new message
3429 <tt/mutt/ [ -n ] [ -F <em/muttrc/ ] [ -a <em/file/ ] [ -c <em/address/ ] [ -i <em/filename/ ] [ -s <em/subject/ ] <em/address/ [ <em/address/ ... ]
3431 Mutt also supports a ``batch'' mode to send prepared messages. Simply redirect
3432 input from the file you wish to send. For example,
3434 <tt>mutt -s &dquot;data set for run #2&dquot; professor@bigschool.edu
3435 < ˜/run2.dat</tt>
3437 This command will send a message to ``professor@bigschool.edu'' with a subject
3438 of ``data set for run #2''. In the body of the message will be the contents
3439 of the file ``˜/run2.dat''.
3441 <sect1>Configuration Commands<label id="commands">
3443 The following are the commands understood by mutt.
3447 <tt><ref id="account-hook" name="account-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/command/
3449 <tt><ref id="alias" name="alias"></tt> <em/key/ <em/address/ [ , <em/address/, ... ]
3451 <tt><ref id="alias" name="unalias"></tt> [ * | <em/key/ ... ]
3453 <tt><ref id="alternates" name="alternates"></tt> <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
3455 <tt><ref id="alternates" name="unalternates"></tt> [ * | <em/regexp/ ... ]
3457 <tt><ref id="alternative_order" name="alternative_order"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3459 <tt><ref id="alternative_order" name="unalternative_order"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3461 <tt><ref id="append-hook" name="append-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/command/
3463 <tt><ref id="auto_view" name="auto_view"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3465 <tt><ref id="auto_view" name="unauto_view"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3467 <tt><ref id="bind" name="bind"></tt> <em/map/ <em/key/ <em/function/
3469 <tt><ref id="charset-hook" name="charset-hook"></tt> <em/alias/ <em/charset/
3471 <tt><ref id="close-hook" name="close-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/command/
3473 <tt><ref id="color" name="color"></tt> <em/object/ <em/foreground/ <em/background/ [ <em/regexp/ ]
3475 <tt><ref id="color" name="uncolor"></tt> <em/index/ <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
3477 <tt><ref id="exec" name="exec"></tt> <em/function/ [ <em/function/ ... ]
3479 <tt><ref id="fcc-hook" name="fcc-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
3481 <tt><ref id="fcc-save-hook" name="fcc-save-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
3483 <tt><ref id="folder-hook" name="folder-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/command/
3485 <tt><ref id="hdr_order" name="hdr_order"></tt> <em/header/ [ <em/header/ ... ]
3487 <tt><ref id="hdr_order" name="unhdr_order"></tt> <em/header/ [ <em/header/ ... ]
3489 <tt><ref id="charset-hook" name="iconv-hook"></tt> <em/charset/ <em/local-charset/
3491 <tt><ref id="ignore" name="ignore"></tt> <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
3493 <tt><ref id="ignore" name="unignore"></tt> <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
3495 <tt><ref id="lists" name="lists"></tt> <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
3497 <tt><ref id="lists" name="unlists"></tt> <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
3499 <tt><ref id="macro" name="macro"></tt> <em/menu/ <em/key/ <em/sequence/ [ <em/description/ ]
3501 <tt><ref id="mailboxes" name="mailboxes"></tt> <em/filename/ [ <em/filename/ ... ]
3503 <tt><ref id="mbox-hook" name="mbox-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/mailbox/
3505 <tt><ref id="message-hook" name="message-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/command/
3507 <tt><ref id="mime_lookup" name="mime_lookup"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3509 <tt><ref id="mime_lookup" name="unmime_lookup"></tt> <em/mimetype/ [ <em/mimetype/ ... ]
3511 <tt><ref id="color" name="mono"></tt> <em/object attribute/ [ <em/regexp/ ]
3513 <tt><ref id="color" name="unmono"></tt> <em/index/ <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
3515 <tt><ref id="my_hdr" name="my_hdr"></tt> <em/string/
3517 <tt><ref id="my_hdr" name="unmy_hdr"></tt> <em/field/ [ <em/field/ ... ]
3519 <tt><ref id="open-hook" name="open-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/command/
3521 <tt><ref id="crypt-hook" name="crypt-hook"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/key-id/
3523 <tt><ref id="push" name="push"></tt> <em/string/
3525 <tt><ref id="set" name="reset"></tt> <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]
3527 <tt><ref id="save-hook" name="save-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/filename/
3529 <tt><ref id="score-command" name="score"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/value/
3531 <tt><ref id="score-command" name="unscore"></tt> <em/pattern/ [ <em/pattern/ ... ]
3533 <tt><ref id="send-hook" name="send-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/command/
3535 <tt><ref id="reply-hook" name="reply-hook"></tt> <em/regexp/ <em/command/
3537 <tt><ref id="set" name="set"></tt> [no|inv]<em/variable/[=<em/value/] [ <em/variable/ ... ]
3539 <tt><ref id="set" name="unset"></tt> <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]
3541 <tt><ref id="source" name="source"></tt> <em/filename/
3543 <tt><ref id="spam" name="spam"></tt> <em/pattern/ <em/format/
3545 <tt><ref id="spam" name="nospam"></tt> <em/pattern/
3547 <tt><ref id="lists" name="subscribe"></tt> <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
3549 <tt><ref id="lists" name="unsubscribe"></tt> <em/regexp/ [ <em/regexp/ ... ]
3551 <tt><ref id="set" name="toggle"></tt> <em/variable/ [<em/variable/ ... ]
3553 <tt><ref id="unhook" name="unhook"></tt> <em/hook-type/
3556 <sect1>Configuration variables<label id="variables">