path: root/imap/src/mailutil/mailutil.1

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 * ========================================================================
 * Copyright 1988-2008 University of Washington
 *
 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
 * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
 * You may obtain a copy of the License at
 *
 *     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
 *
 * 
 * ========================================================================
..
.TH mailutil 1 "March 3, 2008" 
.SH NAME
mailutil - mail utility program
.nh
.SH SYNTAX
.B mailutil command [switches] [arguments]
.PP
All commands accept the -d, -v, and -u switches in addition to any
command-specific switches.
.PP
.B mailutil check [MAILBOX]
.PP
.B mailutil create MAILBOX
.PP
.B mailutil delete MAILBOX
.PP
.B mailutil rename SOURCE DESTINATION
.PP
.B mailutil copy [-rw] [-kw] [-ig] SOURCE DESTINATION
.PP
.B mailutil move [-rw] [-kw] [-ig] SOURCE DESTINATION
.PP
.B mailutil append [-rw] [-kw] [-ig] SOURCE DESTINATION
.PP
.B mailutil appenddelete [-rw] [-kw] [-ig] SOURCE DESTINATION
.PP
.B mailutil prune MAILBOX CRITERIA
.PP
.B mailutil transfer [-m mode] [-rw] [-kw] [-ig] SOURCE DESTINATION
.SH DESCRIPTION
.B mailutil
replaces the old chkmail, imapcopy, imapmove, imapxfer, mbxcopy,
mbxcreat, and mbxcvt programs.
.PP
.B mailutil check
determines whether new mail exists in the given mailbox (the default
is INBOX).  The number of new messages is defined as the number of
messages that have "Recent" status set.  If the mailbox contains no
new messages, 
.B mailutil check
will indicate that no new mail is present;
otherwise, it will report the number of new messages.  In either case,
it will also indicate the canonical form of the name of the mailbox.
.PP
.B mailutil create
creates a new
.I mailbox
with the given name.  The mailbox name must not already exist.  A mailbox
can be created in a particular format by prefixing the name with 
.I #driver.
followed by the format name and a
.I /
character.  For example, the command
.br
   mailutil create #driver.mbx/junkmail
.br
will create a new mailbox named "junkmail" in mbx format.
.PP
.B mailutil delete
deletes an existing
.I mailbox
with the given name.
.PP
.B mailutil rename
renames an existing mailbox to a new name (which must not already exist).
This only works if the old and new names are in the same mail store.  A
more general means to rename a mailbox is to do a
.B mailutil copy
of the old name to the new name, followed by a
.B mailutil delete
of the old name.
.PP
.B mailutil copy
creates a new mailbox and copies messages from the old mailbox to the
new mailbox.  As in
.B mailutil create
a mailbox format can be specified with the new mailbox.  For example, the
command
.br
   mailutil copy INBOX #driver.mbx/INBOX
.br
will copy messages from your existing INBOX to an mbx-format INBOX.
.PP
.B mailutil move
is similar to
.B mailutil copy
but in addition will also remove (delete and expunge) the messages from the
old mailbox after copying them to the new mailbox.
.PP
.B mailutil append
and
.B mailutil appenddelete
are similar to
.B mailutil copy
and
.B mailutil move
respectively except that they do not create the destination mailbox.
.PP
.B mailutil prune
prunes the mailbox of messages which match certain criteria, which are
in the form of IMAP2 (RFC 1176) SEARCH arguments.  For example, the
command.
.br
  mailutil prune INBOX "before 1-jan-2004"
.br
will delete and expunge all messages written before January 1, 2004.
.PP
Note that mailutil implements pruning by deleting the matching messages,
and then expunging the mailbox.  Consequently, mailutil will also expunge
any messages which were deleted at the time of the pruning.
.PP
.B mailutil transfer
copies an entire hierarchy of mailboxes from the named source to the
named destination.  Mailboxes are created on the destination as
needed.  Any error in copying messages will cause the transfer to stop.
.PP
Normally, any error in creation will cause the transfer to stop.
However, if
.B -m MODE
or
.B -merge MODE
is specified, a merging transfer is performed.  The
.B MODE
argument indicats the type of merge:
.PP
.B -m[erge] prompt
indicates that the user should be asked for an alternative name to create.
If creating the new name fails, the user will be asked again.
.PP
.B -m[erge] append
indicates that it's alright to copy the messages into an existing mailbox
with that name.  If the mailbox does not exist, the user will be prompted
for an alternative name.
.PP
.B -m[erge] suffix=XXXX
where XXXX is any string, indicates that an alternative name should be
built by appending the given suffix to the name.  It that alternative name
can't be created, then the user will be prompted for an alternative name.
.PP
The source hierarchy consists of all mailboxes which start
with the given source name.  With the exception of a remote system
specification (within "{}" braces), the source name is used as the
name of the destination.  The destination hierarchy is a prefix
applied to any new names being created.  For example,
.br
   mailutil transfer foo bar
.br
will copy all mailboxes with names beginning with "foo" to names
beginning with "bar" (hence "foobar" will be copied to "barfoobar").
Similarly,
.br
   mailutil transfer "{imap.foo.com}" "{imap.bar.com}old/"
.br
will copy all mailboxes from the imap.foo.com IMAP server to
equivalent names starting with "old/" on the imap.bar.com IMAP server.
.SH FLAGS
The
.B -d
or
.B -debug
flag prints full debugging telemetry including protocol operations.
.PP
The
.B -v
or
.B -verbose
flag prints verbose (non-error) telemetry.
.PP
The
.B -u USERID
or
.B -user USERID
switch attempts to become the indicated user.  This is for the benefit of
system administrators who want to do mailutil operations on a userid that
does not normally have shell access.
.PP
The
.B -rw
or
.B -rwcopy
flag causes the source mailbox to be open in readwrite mode rather than
readonly mode.  Normally, mailutil tries to use readonly mode to avoid
altering any flags in the source mailbox, but some mailbox types, e.g.
POP3, can't be open in readonly mode.
.PP
The
.B -kw
or
.B -kwcopy
flag causes the keywords of the source mailbox to be created in the
destination mailbox.  Normally, mailutil does not create keywords in
the destination mailbox so only those keywords that are already defined
in the destination mailbox will be preserved.  Note that some IMAP servers
may automatically create keywords, so this flag may not be necessary.
.PP
The
.B -ig
or
.B -ignore
flag causes the keywords of the source mailbox to be ignored completely
and no attempt is made to copy them to the destination mailbox.
.PP
The
.B -ig[nore]
and
.B -kw[copy]
flags are mutually exclusive.
.SH ARGUMENTS
The arguments are standard c-client mailbox names.  A
variety of mailbox name formats and types of mailboxes are supported
by c-client; examples of the most common forms of names are:
.PP
.I
.IP Name 15
.I Meaning
.IP INBOX
primary incoming mail folder on the local system
.IP archive/tx-project
mail folder named "tx-project" in "archive" subdirectory of local
filesystem home directory
.IP {imapserver.foo.com}INBOX
primary incoming mail folder on IMAP server system
"imapserver.foo.com"
.IP {imapserver.foo.com}archive/tx-project
mail folder named "tx-project" in "archive" subdirectory on IMAP
server system "imapserver.foo.com"
.IP #news.comp.mail.misc
newsgroup "comp.mail.misc" on local filesystem
.IP {newserver.foo.com/nntp}comp.mail.misc
newsgroup "comp.mail.misc" on NNTP server system "newserver.foo.com"
.IP {popserver.foo.com/pop3}
mail folder on POP3 server system "popserver.foo.com"
.LP
See your system manager for more information about the types of
mailboxes which are available on your system.
.SH RESTRICTIONS
You must surround a
.I {host}mailbox
argument with quotation marks if you run
.B mailutil
from
.IR csh (1)
or another shell for which braces have special meaning.
.PP
You must surround a
.I #driver.format/mailbox
argument with quotation marks if you run
.B mailutil
from a shell in which "#" is the comment character.
.SH AUTHOR
Mark Crispin, MRC@Washington.EDU