Shallow Thoughts : tags : attachments

Mutt mailer: Show Messages With Attachments

A discussion on the Mutt-Users list a while back involved someone trying to configure mutt to show on the index screen which messages had attachments.

I had no idea that was possible! But it's something I've wanted for ages. Normally, mutt shows a list of attachments after the end of the email message. That was useful back in the day when people trimmed their email messages; but now, when most people append the contents of an entire message thread going back several weeks, scrolling down to the end of an email message is barely even possible.

What I'd really like is to see in the message view whether the message has attachments -- up at the top of the message, along with the headers. But showing it in the folder index would be a great start.

What Constitutes an Attachment?

First you have to define what attachments you care about. Most normal email messages have attachments just for the text.

Read more ...

Tags: mutt, email, attachments, mime
[ 10:46 May 22, 2021    More linux | permalink to this entry | ]

Forwarding a message with attachments in Mutt

I've wanted to know forever how to forward a message with all or some of its attachments from mutt.

You can set the variable mime_forward so that when you forward a message, it includes the entire message, headers, attachments and all, as a single attachment. You can't edit this or change it in any way. If you want to trim the original message, or omit one of the attachments, you're out of luck.

I've found two ways to do it.

First: type v to get to the attachments screen. Type t repeatedly to tag all the attachments, including the initial small text/plain attachment (that's the original message body). When they're all tagged, type ;f (forward all tagged attachments). After you fill in the To: prompt, you'll be able to edit the message body, and when you leave the editor, you'll have the attachment list there to edit as you see fit.

If that doesn't work (I haven't tried it on HTML messages), there's a slightly more elaborate procedure: use
Esc-e   resend-message   use the current message as a template for a new one.
This calls up an editor on the current message, including headers. Change the From to your name, the To to your intended recipient, and edit the message body to your heart's content. When you're done, you're sent to the Compose screen, where you can adjust the attachment list and send the message.

Forwarding is pretty clearly not what Esc-E was intended for ... but it does the job and might be a handy trick to know.

Tags: mutt, forward, attachments, mime
[ 23:14 Aug 23, 2008    More linux | permalink to this entry | ]