NAME
newmail - biff like tool for the terminal
SYNOPSIS
newmail [-b] [-h] [-i interval] [-r] [-w] [ mbox [...]]
DESCRIPTION
The newmail program monitors a given set of mailboxes and looks for new
mail. If new mail is received the sender and subject will be written
on the terminal it was started from. By default newmail puts itself in
the background so the console is still usable.
newmail is able to monitor arbitrary numbers of mailbox files. If no
mailbox was specified on the commandline it will monitor the default
mailbox, which may be overwritten by the MAIL environment variable.
If more than one mailbox is being monitored, a prefix is printed for
each mail line so the user can distinguish between the different
mailbox files. By default the prefix is the name of the mailbox
without its path.
If a mailbox is specified as path=string then string will be used as
prefix for mails received in the mailbox denoted by path.
newmail is able to decode header lines when non-ascii characters are
transported. They will be displayed properly if the locale (LC_CTYPE)
is set accordingly.
OPTIONS
-b Ring a bell after one or more incoming mails have been detected
for at least one mailbox.
-h Print a help message.
-i interval
Set the interval between two mailbox checks to interval seconds.
The default is 60 seconds which is suffient for the terminal.
For the use inside of a window or dock application a lower value
may be prudent.
-r Emit raw data from the mail. This will bypass routines to
decode character encodings used for mail headers as described in
RFC 2047. This may be useful for window applications that want
to decode the strings on their own.
-w Run as window application. This will prevent newmail from
moving itself into the background so its output can be used as
input for a window application. This will also change the
output format slightly and prevent a bell to be rung after new
mail has been received.
OUTPUT FORMAT
The output format differs from being read by humans and programs (-w).
newmail:
>> Mail from <from> - <subject>
>> Priority mail from <from> - <subject>
>> <folder>: Mail from <from> - <subject>
>> <folder>: Priority mail from <from> - <subject>
newmail -w:
<from> - <subject>
Priority: <from> - <subject>
<folder>: <from> - <subject>
<folder>: Priority: <from> - <subject>
It should be easy for third party programs which are interested in such
information to parse the output when newmail is running with the -w
option.
ENVIRONMENT
newmail supports the following environment variables:
LANG Locale setting for the output character set.
LC_CTYPE
Locale setting only for the output character set.
MAIL Full path of the user’s spool mailbox.
NOTES
This program is inspired by the newmail program from the Elm
interactive mail program. It is a rewrite from scratch though.
Many thanks go to Dave Taylor and the Elm Development Group who have
provided me with a great mail program for several years. Many
additional thanks go to the former lead developer Dave Taylor who
started the program back in 1986.
SEE ALSO
locale(7).
AUTHOR
Joey Schulze <joey@infodrom.org>