Provided by: bsd-mailx_8.1.2-0.20220412cvs-1build1_amd64 
NAME
mail, mailx, Mail — send and receive mail
SYNOPSIS
mail [-dEIinv] [-a header] [-b bcc-addr] [-c cc-addr] [-r from-addr] [-s subject] [--] to-addr ...
mail [-dEIiNnv] -f [file]
mail [-dEIiNnv] [-u user]
DESCRIPTION
mail is an intelligent mail processing system which has a command syntax reminiscent of ed(1) with lines
replaced by messages.
The options are as follows:
-a Specify additional header fields on the command line such as "X-Loop: foo@bar" etc. It can be
also used to override MIME headers mail adds by default to each outgoing mail, see “Character
sets and MIME” below. You have to use quotes if the string contains spaces. This argument may
be specified more than once, the headers will then be concatenated.
-b bcc-addr
Send blind carbon copies to bcc-addr.
-c cc-addr
Send carbon copies to list of users. cc-addr should be a comma separated list of names.
-d Causes mail to output all sorts of information useful for debugging mail.
-E Don't send messages with an empty body.
-f Use an alternate mailbox. Defaults to the user's mbox if no file is specified. When quit, mail
writes undeleted messages back to this file.
-I Forces mail to run in interactive mode, even when input is not a terminal. In particular, the
special ~ command character, used when sending mail, is only available interactively.
-i Ignore tty interrupt signals. This is particularly useful when using mail on noisy phone lines.
-N Inhibits initial display of message headers when reading mail or editing a mail folder.
-n Inhibits reading /etc/mail.rc upon startup.
-r from-addr
Use from-addr as the from address in the message and envelope. Overrides any from options in the
startup files.
-s subject
Specify subject on command line (only the first argument after the -s flag is used as a subject;
be careful to quote subjects containing spaces).
-u user
Equivalent to:
$ mail -f /var/mail/user
except that locking is done.
-v Verbose mode. The details of delivery are displayed on the user's terminal.
-- End of options. Any further argument is treated as a direct receipient address.
Note: For security reasons the -- separator is strongly recommended for scripts that need to send
mails to addresses obtained from untrusted sources (such as web forms).
Startup actions
At startup time, mail will execute commands in the system command file, /etc/mail.rc, unless explicitly
told not to by using the -n option. Next, the commands in the user's personal command file ~/.mailrc are
executed. mail then examines its command line options to determine whether the user requested a new
message to be sent or existing messages in a mailbox to be examined.
Sending mail
To send a message to one or more people, mail can be invoked with arguments which are the names of people
to whom the mail will be sent. You are then expected to type in your message, followed by a control-D
(‘^D’) at the beginning of a line. The section below, “Replying to or originating mail”, describes some
features of mail available to help you compose your letter.
Reading mail
In normal usage, mail is given no arguments and checks your mail out of the post office, then prints out
a one line header of each message found. The current message is initially set to the first message
(numbered 1) and can be printed using the print command (which can be abbreviated p). Moving among the
messages is much like moving between lines in ed(1); you may use + and - to shift forwards and backwards,
or simply enter a message number to move directly.
Disposing of mail
After examining a message, you can delete (d) or reply (r) to it. Deletion causes the mail program to
forget about the message. This is not irreversible; the message can be undeleted (u) by giving its
number, or the mail session can be aborted by giving the exit (x) command. Deleted messages, however,
will usually disappear, never to be seen again.
Specifying messages
Commands such as print and delete can be given a list of message numbers as arguments to apply to a
number of messages at once. Thus delete 1 2 deletes messages 1 and 2, while delete 1-5 deletes messages
1 through 5.
Messages may also be selected using one of the following categories:
* all messages
$ last message
:d deleted messages
:n new messages
:o old messages
:r read messages
:u unread messages
Thus the command top, which prints the first few lines of a message, could be used in top * to print the
first few lines of all messages.
Replying to or originating mail
You can use the reply command to set up a response to a message, sending it back to the person who it was
from. Text you then type in, up to an end-of-file, defines the contents of the message. While you are
composing a message, mail treats lines beginning with the tilde (‘~’) character specially. For instance,
typing ~m (alone on a line) will place a copy of the current message into the response, right shifting it
by a single tab-stop (see the indentprefix variable, below). Other escapes will set up subject fields,
add and delete recipients to the message, and allow you to escape to an editor to revise the message or
to a shell to run some commands. (These options are given in the summary below.)
Ending a mail processing session
You can end a mail session with the quit (q) command. Messages which have been examined go to your mbox
file unless they have been deleted, in which case they are discarded. Unexamined messages go back to the
post office (see the -f option above).
Personal and system wide distribution lists
It is also possible to create personal distribution lists so that, for instance, you can send mail to
“cohorts” and have it go to a group of people. Such lists can be defined by placing a line like
alias cohorts bill ozalp jkf mark kridle@ucbcory
in the file .mailrc in your home directory. The current list of such aliases can be displayed with the
alias command in mail. System wide distribution lists can be created by editing /etc/aliases, (see
aliases(5)); these are kept in a different syntax. In mail you send, personal aliases will be expanded
in mail sent to others so that they will be able to reply to the recipients. System wide aliases are not
expanded when the mail is sent, but any reply returned to the machine will have the system wide alias
expanded as all mail goes through an MTA.
Recipient address specifications
Recipient addresses (any of the “To”, “Cc” or “Bcc” header fields) are subject to expansion when the
expandaddr option is set.
An address may be expanded as follows:
• An address that starts with a pipe (‘|’) character is treated as a command to run. The command
immediately following the ‘|’ is executed with the message as its standard input.
• An address that starts with a ‘+’ character is treated as a folder.
• An address that contains a ‘/’ character but no ‘!’, ‘%’, or ‘@’ characters is also treated as a
folder.
• If none of the above apply, the recipient is treated as a local or network mail address.
If the expandaddr option is not set (the default), no expansion is performed and the recipient is treated
as a local or network mail address.
Character sets and MIME
Generally mail does not handle neither different character sets nor any other MIME feature. Especially
it does not perform any any conversions between character sets while displaying or sending mails.
Starting from April 2017, however, as a Debian extension this version of mail adds a few MIME headers to
every outgoing mail in order to indicate that the mail is sent as 8-bit plain text data that uses
character set encoding detected from the current locale(7) settings. The -a command-line option can be
used to override those headers, for example:
$ mail -a 'Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"'
sets header indicating legacy character encoding.
SUMMARY
(Adapted from the “Mail Reference Manual”.)
Each command is typed on a line by itself, and may take arguments following the command word. The
command need not be typed in its entirety — the first command which matches the typed prefix is used.
For commands which take message lists as arguments, if no message list is given, then the next message
forward which satisfies the command's requirements is used. If there are no messages forward of the
current message, the search proceeds backwards, and if there are no good messages at all, mail types “No
applicable messages” and aborts the command.
- Print out the preceding message. If given a numeric argument n, goes to the nth previous message
and prints it.
= Prints the currently selected message number.
? Prints a brief summary of commands.
! Executes the shell (see sh(1) and csh(1)) command which follows.
alias (a) With no arguments, prints out all currently defined aliases. With one argument, prints out
that alias. With more than one argument, creates a new alias or changes an old one.
alternates
(alt) The alternates command is useful if you have accounts on several machines. It can be used
to inform mail that the listed addresses are really you. When you reply to messages, mail will
not send a copy of the message to any of the addresses listed on the alternates list. If the
alternates command is given with no argument, the current set of alternate names is displayed.
chdir (cd or ch) Changes the user's working directory to that specified, if given. If no directory is
given, then changes to the user's login directory.
copy (c) The copy command does the same thing that save does, except that it does not mark the
messages it is used on for deletion when you quit.
delete (d) Takes a list of messages as argument and marks them all as deleted. Deleted messages will
not be saved in mbox, nor will they be available for most other commands.
dp (also dt) Deletes the current message and prints the next message. If there is no next message,
mail says “No more messages.”
edit (e) Takes a list of messages and points the text editor at each one in turn. On return from the
editor, the message is read back in.
exit (ex or x) Effects an immediate return to the shell without modifying the user's system mailbox,
mbox file, or edit file in -f.
file (fi) The same as folder.
folder (fo) The folder command switches to a new mail file or folder. With no arguments, it tells you
which file you are currently reading. If you give it an argument, it will write out changes
(such as deletions) you have made in the current file and read in the new file. Some special
conventions are recognized for the name. # means the previous file, % means your system mailbox,
%user means user's system mailbox, & means your mbox file, and +folder means a file in your
folder directory.
folders
List the names of the folders in your folder directory.
from (f) Takes a list of messages and prints their message headers.
headers
(h) Lists the current windowful of headers. To view the next or previous group of headers, see
the z command.
help A synonym for ?.
hold (ho, also preserve) Takes a message list and marks each message therein to be saved in the user's
system mailbox instead of in mbox. Does not override the delete command.
ignore Add the list of header fields named to the ignored list. Header fields in the ignore list are
not printed on your terminal when you print a message. This command is very handy for
suppression of certain machine-generated header fields. The Type and Print commands can be used
to print a message in its entirety, including ignored fields. If ignore is executed with no
arguments, it lists the current set of ignored fields.
inc Incorporate any new messages that have arrived while mail is being read. The new messages are
added to the end of the message list, and the current message is reset to be the first new mail
message. This does not renumber the existing message list, nor does it cause any changes made so
far to be saved.
list (l) List the valid mail commands.
mail (m) Takes as argument login names and distribution group names and sends mail to those people.
mbox Indicate that a list of messages be sent to mbox in your home directory when you quit. This is
the default action for messages if you do not have the hold option set.
more (mo) Takes a message list and invokes the pager on that list.
next (n) (like + or CR) Goes to the next message in sequence and types it. With an argument list,
types the next matching message.
preserve
(pre) A synonym for hold.
Print (P) Like print but also prints out ignored header fields. See also print, ignore, and retain.
print (p) Takes a message list and types out each message on the user's terminal.
quit (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted, unsaved messages in the mbox file in the user's
login directory, preserving all messages marked with hold or preserve or never referenced in the
user's system mailbox, and removing all other messages from the user's system mailbox. If new
mail has arrived during the session, the message “You have new mail” is given. If given while
editing a mailbox file with the -f flag, then the edit file is rewritten. A return to the shell
is effected, unless the rewrite of edit file fails, in which case the user can escape with the
exit command.
Reply (R) Reply to originator. Does not reply to other recipients of the original message.
reply (r) Takes a message list and sends mail to the sender and all recipients of the specified
message. The default message must not be deleted.
respond
A synonym for reply.
retain Add the list of header fields named to the retained list. Only the header fields in the retain
list are shown on your terminal when you print a message. All other header fields are
suppressed. The Type and Print commands can be used to print a message in its entirety. If
retain is executed with no arguments, it lists the current set of retained fields.
save (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each message in turn to the end of the file.
The filename in quotes, followed by the line count and character count is echoed on the user's
terminal.
saveignore
saveignore is to save what ignore is to print and type. Header fields thus marked are filtered
out when saving a message by save or when automatically saving to mbox.
saveretain
saveretain is to save what retain is to print and type. Header fields thus marked are the only
ones saved with a message when saving by save or when automatically saving to mbox. saveretain
overrides saveignore.
set (se) With no arguments, prints all variable values. Otherwise, sets option. Arguments are of
the form option=value (no space before or after =) or option. Quotation marks may be placed
around any part of the assignment statement to quote blanks or tabs, i.e., set indentprefix="->".
shell (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell.
size Takes a message list and prints out the size in characters of each message.
source The source command reads commands from a file.
top Takes a message list and prints the top few lines of each. The number of lines printed is
controlled by the variable toplines and defaults to five.
Type (T) Identical to the Print command.
type (t) A synonym for print.
unalias
Takes a list of names defined by alias commands and discards the remembered groups of users. The
group names no longer have any significance.
undelete
(u) Takes a message list and marks each message as not being deleted.
unread (U) Takes a message list and marks each message as not having been read.
unset Takes a list of option names and discards their remembered values; the inverse of set.
visual (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor on each message.
write (w) Similar to save, except that only the message body (without the header) is saved. Extremely
useful for such tasks as sending and receiving source program text over the message system.
xit (x) A synonym for exit.
z mail presents message headers in windowfuls as described under the headers command. You can move
mail's attention forward to the next window with the z command. Also, you can move to the
previous window by using z-.
Tilde/escapes
Here is a summary of the tilde escapes, which are used when composing messages to perform special
functions. Tilde escapes are only recognized at the beginning of lines. The name “tilde escape” is
somewhat of a misnomer since the actual escape character can be set by the option escape.
~bname ...
Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients but do not make the names visible in
the Cc: line ("blind" carbon copy).
~cname ...
Add the given names to the list of carbon copy recipients.
~d Read the file dead.letter from your home directory into the message.
~e Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far. After the editing session is finished,
you may continue appending text to the message.
~Fmessages
Identical to ~f, except all message headers are included.
~fmessages
Read the named messages into the message being sent. If no messages are specified, read in the
current message. Message headers currently being ignored (by the ignore or retain command) are
not included.
~h Edit the message header fields by typing each one in turn and allowing the user to append text to
the end or modify the field by using the current terminal erase and kill characters.
~Mmessages
Identical to ~m, except all message headers are included.
~mmessages
Read the named messages into the message being sent, indented by a tab or by the value of
indentprefix. If no messages are specified, read the current message. Message headers currently
being ignored (by the ignore or retain command) are not included.
~p Print out the message collected so far, prefaced by the message header fields.
~q Abort the message being sent, copying the message to dead.letter in your home directory if save
is set.
~Rstring
Use string as the Reply-To field.
~rfilename
~<filename
Read the named file into the message.
~sstring
Cause the named string to become the current subject field.
~tname ...
Add the given names to the direct recipient list.
~v Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the VISUAL option) on the message collected so far.
Usually, the alternate editor will be a screen editor. After you quit the editor, you may resume
appending text to the end of your message.
~wfilename
Write the message onto the named file.
~x Abort the message being sent. No message is copied to ~/dead.letter, even if save is set.
~? Prints a brief summary of tilde escapes.
~!command
Execute the indicated shell command, then return to the message.
~|command
Pipe the message through the command as a filter. If the command gives no output or terminates
abnormally, retain the original text of the message. The command fmt(1) is often used as command
to rejustify the message.
~:mail-command
~_mail-command
Execute the given mail command. Not all commands, however, are allowed.
~~string
Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a single ~. If you have changed the escape
character, then you should double that character in order to send it.
~. Simulate end of file on input.
Mail options
A number of options can be set in the .mailrc file to alter the behavior of mail, controlled via the set
and unset commands. Options may be either binary, in which case it is only significant to see whether
they are set or not; or string, in which case the actual value is of interest. The binary options
include the following:
append Causes messages saved in mbox to be appended to the end rather than prepended. This should
always be set (perhaps in /etc/mail.rc).
ask, asksub
Causes mail to prompt you for the subject of each message you send. If you respond with simply a
newline, no subject field will be sent.
askbcc Causes you to be prompted for additional blind carbon copy recipients at the end of each message.
Responding with a newline indicates your satisfaction with the current list.
askcc Causes you to be prompted for additional carbon copy recipients at the end of each message.
Responding with a newline indicates your satisfaction with the current list.
autoinc
Causes new mail to be automatically incorporated when it arrives. Setting this is similar to
issuing the inc command at each prompt, except that the current message is not reset when new
mail arrives.
autoprint
Causes the delete command to behave like dp; thus, after deleting a message, the next one will be
typed automatically.
debug Setting the binary option debug is the same as specifying -d on the command line and causes mail
to output all sorts of information useful for debugging mail.
dot The binary option dot causes mail to interpret a period alone on a line as the terminator of a
message you are sending.
expandaddr
Causes mail to expand message recipient addresses, as explained in the section “Recipient address
specifications”.
from Causes mail to use the specified sender address in the “From:” field of the message header. A
stripped down version of the address is also used in the message envelope. If unset, the message
will not include an explicit sender address and a default value will be added by the MTA,
typically “user@host”. This value can be overridden by specifying the -r flag on the command
line.
hold This option is used to hold messages in the system mailbox by default.
ignore Causes interrupt signals from your terminal to be ignored and echoed as @'s.
ignoreeof
An option related to dot is ignoreeof which makes mail refuse to accept a control-D as the end of
a message. ignoreeof also applies to mail command mode.
keep Setting this option causes mail to truncate your system mailbox instead of deleting it when it's
empty.
keepsave
Messages saved with the save command are not normally saved in mbox at quit time. Use this
option to retain those messages.
metoo Usually, when a group is expanded that contains the sender, the sender is removed from the
expansion. Setting this option causes the sender to be included in the group.
noheader
Setting the option noheader is the same as giving the -N flag on the command line.
nosave Normally, when you abort a message with two interrupt characters (usually control-C), mail copies
the partial letter to the file dead.letter in your home directory. Setting the binary option
nosave prevents this.
quiet Suppresses the printing of the version when first invoked.
Replyall
Reverses the sense of reply and Reply commands.
searchheaders
If this option is set, then a message-list specifier in the form “/x:y” will expand to all
messages containing the substring ‘y’ in the header field ‘x’. The string search is case
insensitive. If ‘x’ is omitted, it will default to the “Subject” header field. The form “/to:y”
is a special case, and will expand to all messages containing the substring ‘y’ in the “To”, “Cc”
or “Bcc” header fields. The check for “to” is case sensitive, so that “/To:y” can be used to
limit the search for ‘y’ to just the “To:” field.
skipempty
Don't send messages with an empty body.
verbose
Setting the option verbose is the same as using the -v flag on the command line. When mail runs
in verbose mode, the actual delivery of messages is displayed on the user's terminal.
Option string values
EDITOR Pathname of the text editor to use in the edit command and ~e escape. If not defined,
/usr/bin/ex is used.
LISTER Pathname of the directory lister to use in the folders command. Default is /bin/ls.
MBOX The name of the mbox file. It can be the name of a folder. The default is “mbox” in the
user's home directory.
PAGER Pathname of the program to use in the more command or when the crt variable is set. The
default paginator more(1) is used if this option is not defined.
REPLYTO If set, will be used to initialize the Reply-To field for outgoing messages.
SHELL Pathname of the shell to use in the ! command and the ~! escape. A default shell is used
if this option is not defined.
VISUAL Pathname of the text editor to use in the visual command and ~v escape. If not defined,
/usr/bin/vi is used.
crt The valued option crt is used as a threshold to determine how long a message must be before
PAGER is used to read it. If crt is set without a value, then the height of the terminal
screen stored in the system is used to compute the threshold (see stty(1)).
escape If defined, the first character of this option gives the character to use in the place of ~
to denote escapes.
folder The name of the directory to use for storing folders of messages. If this name begins with
a ‘/’, mail considers it to be an absolute pathname; otherwise, the folder directory is
found relative to your home directory.
indentprefix String used by the ~m tilde escape for indenting messages, in place of the normal tab
character (‘^I’). Be sure to quote the value if it contains spaces or tabs.
record If defined, gives the pathname of the file used to record all outgoing mail. If not
defined, then outgoing mail is not so saved.
screen Size of window of message headers for z.
sendmail Pathname to an alternative mail delivery system.
toplines If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to be printed out with the top command;
normally, the first five lines are printed.
ENVIRONMENT
mail utilizes the HOME, LOGNAME, USER, SHELL, DEAD, PAGER, LISTER, EDITOR, VISUAL, REPLYTO, MAIL, MAILRC,
and MBOX environment variables.
If the MAIL environment variable is set, its value is used as the path to the user's mail spool.
FILES
/var/mail/* post office (unless overridden by the MAIL environment variable)
~/mbox user's old mail
~/.mailrc file giving initial mail commands; can be overridden by setting the
MAILRC environment variable
/tmp/R* temporary files
/usr/share/bsd-mailx/mail.*help help files
/etc/mail.rc system initialization file
EXIT STATUS
The mail utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.
SEE ALSO
fmt(1), newaliases(1), vacation(1), aliases(5), mail.local(8), newaliases(8), sendmail(8), smtpd(8)
Kurt Shoens, “Mail Reference Manual”, 4.4BSD User's Supplementary Documents (USD).
STANDARDS
The mailx utility is compliant with the IEEE Std 1003.1-2008 (“POSIX.1”) specification.
The flags [-iNnu] are marked by IEEE Std 1003.1-2008 (“POSIX.1”) as being optional.
The flags [-eFH] are marked by IEEE Std 1003.1-2008 (“POSIX.1”) as being optional, and are not supported
by this implementation of mailx.
The flags [-abcdEIrv] are extensions to the specification.
HISTORY
A mail command appeared in Version 1 AT&T UNIX. This man page is derived from the Mail Reference Manual
originally written by Kurt Shoens.
BUGS
Usually, Mail and mailx are just links to mail, which can be confusing.
Debian March 31, 2022 MAIL(1)