11 **notmuch** [option ...] **command** [arg ...]
16 Notmuch is a command-line based program for indexing, searching,
17 reading, and tagging large collections of email messages.
19 This page describes how to get started using notmuch from the command
20 line, and gives a brief overview of the commands available. For more
21 information on e.g. **notmuch show** consult the
22 :any:`notmuch-show(1)` man page, also accessible via **notmuch help
25 The quickest way to get started with Notmuch is to simply invoke the
26 ``notmuch`` command with no arguments, which will interactively guide
27 you through the process of indexing your mail.
32 While the command-line program ``notmuch`` provides powerful
33 functionality, it does not provide the most convenient interface for
34 that functionality. More sophisticated interfaces are expected to be
35 built on top of either the command-line interface, or more likely, on
36 top of the notmuch library interface. See https://notmuchmail.org for
37 more about alternate interfaces to notmuch. The emacs-based interface to
38 notmuch (available under **emacs/** in the Notmuch source distribution)
39 is probably the most widely used at this time.
44 Supported global options for ``notmuch`` include
48 .. option:: --help [command-name]
50 Print a synopsis of available commands and exit. With an optional
51 command name, show the man page for that subcommand.
55 Print the installed version of notmuch, and exit.
57 .. option:: --config=FILE
59 Specify the configuration file to use. This overrides any
60 configuration file specified by :envvar:`NOTMUCH_CONFIG`. The empty
61 string is a permitted and sometimes useful value of *FILE*, which
62 tells ``notmuch`` to use only configuration metadata from the database.
64 .. option:: --uuid=HEX
66 Enforce that the database UUID (a unique identifier which persists
67 until e.g. the database is compacted) is HEX; exit with an error
68 if it is not. This is useful to detect rollover in modification
69 counts on messages. You can find this UUID using e.g. ``notmuch
72 All global options except ``--config`` can also be specified after the
73 command. For example, ``notmuch subcommand --uuid=HEX`` is equivalent
74 to ``notmuch --uuid=HEX subcommand``.
82 The **notmuch setup** command is used to configure Notmuch for first
83 use, (or to reconfigure it later).
85 The setup command will prompt for your full name, your primary email
86 address, any alternate email addresses you use, and the directory
87 containing your email archives. Your answers will be written to a
88 configuration file in :envvar:`NOTMUCH_CONFIG` (if set) or
89 ${HOME}/.notmuch-config . This configuration file will be created with
90 descriptive comments, making it easy to edit by hand later to change the
91 configuration. Or you can run **notmuch setup** again to change the
94 The mail directory you specify can contain any number of sub-directories
95 and should primarily contain only files with individual email messages
96 (eg. maildir or mh archives are perfect). If there are other, non-email
97 files (such as indexes maintained by other email programs) then notmuch
98 will do its best to detect those and ignore them.
100 Mail storage that uses mbox format, (where one mbox file contains many
101 messages), will not work with notmuch. If that's how your mail is
102 currently stored, it is recommended you first convert it to maildir
103 format with a utility such as :manpage:`mb2md(1)` before running
106 Invoking ``notmuch`` with no command argument will run **setup** if the
107 setup command has not previously been completed.
112 Several of the notmuch commands accept search terms with a common
113 syntax. See :any:`notmuch-search-terms(7)` for more details on the
116 The :any:`notmuch-search(1)`, :any:`notmuch-show(1)`,
117 :any:`notmuch-address(1)` and :any:`notmuch-count(1)` commands are
118 used to query the email database.
120 The :any:`notmuch-reply(1)` command is useful for preparing a template
123 The :any:`notmuch-tag(1)` command is the only command available for
124 manipulating database contents.
126 The :any:`notmuch-dump(1)` and :any:`notmuch-restore(1)` commands can
127 be used to create a textual dump of email tags for backup purposes,
128 and to restore from that dump.
130 The :any:`notmuch-config(1)` command can be used to get or set
131 settings in the notmuch configuration file.
136 If the given command is not known to notmuch, notmuch tries to execute
137 the external **notmuch-<subcommand>** in :envvar:`PATH` instead. This
138 allows users to have their own notmuch related tools to be run via the
139 notmuch command. By design, this does not allow notmuch's own commands
140 to be overridden using external commands. The environment variable
141 :envvar:`NOTMUCH_CONFIG` will be set according to :option:`--config`,
142 if the latter is present.
147 All options accepting an argument can be used with '=' or ':' as a
148 separator. Except for boolean options (which would be ambiguous), a
149 space can also be used as a separator. The following are all
154 notmuch --config=alt-config config get user.name
155 notmuch --config:alt-config config get user.name
156 notmuch --config alt-config config get user.name
160 DUPLICATE MESSAGE FILES
161 =======================
163 Notmuch considers the :mailheader:`Message-ID` to be the primary
164 identifier of message. Per :rfc:`5322` the :mailheader:`Message-ID` is
165 supposed to be globally unique, but this fails in two distinct
166 ways. When you receive copies of a message via a mechanism like
167 :mailheader:`Cc` or via a mailing list, the copies are typically
168 interchangeable. In the case of some broken mail sending software, the
169 same :mailheader:`Message-ID` is used for completely unrelated
170 messages. The options :option:`search --duplicate` and :option:`show
171 --duplicate` options provide the user with control over which message
172 file is displayed. Front ends will need to provide their own
173 interface, see e.g. the Emacs front-end :any:`emacs-show-duplicates`.
178 The following environment variables can be used to control the behavior
181 .. envvar:: NOTMUCH_CONFIG
183 Specifies the location of the notmuch configuration file. See
184 :any:`notmuch-config(1)` for details.
186 .. envvar:: NOTMUCH_DATABASE
188 Specifies the location of the notmuch database. See
189 :any:`notmuch-config(1)` for details.
191 .. envvar:: NOTMUCH_PROFILE
193 Selects among notmuch configurations. See :any:`notmuch-config(1)`
196 .. envvar:: NOTMUCH_TALLOC_REPORT
198 Location to write a talloc memory usage report. See
199 **talloc\_enable\_leak\_report\_full** in :manpage:`talloc(3)` for more
202 .. envvar:: NOTMUCH_DEBUG_QUERY
204 If set to a non-empty value, the notmuch library will print (to
205 stderr) Xapian queries it constructs.
210 :any:`notmuch-address(1)`,
211 :any:`notmuch-compact(1)`,
212 :any:`notmuch-config(1)`,
213 :any:`notmuch-count(1)`,
214 :any:`notmuch-dump(1)`,
215 :any:`notmuch-hooks(5)`,
216 :any:`notmuch-insert(1)`,
217 :any:`notmuch-new(1)`,
218 :any:`notmuch-properties(7)`,
219 :any:`notmuch-reindex(1)`,
220 :any:`notmuch-reply(1)`,
221 :any:`notmuch-restore(1)`,
222 :any:`notmuch-search(1)`,
223 :any:`notmuch-search-terms(7)`,
224 :any:`notmuch-show(1)`,
225 :any:`notmuch-tag(1)`
227 The notmuch website: **https://notmuchmail.org**
232 Feel free to send questions, comments, or kudos to the notmuch mailing
233 list <notmuch@notmuchmail.org> . Subscription is not required before
234 posting, but is available from the notmuchmail.org website.
236 Real-time interaction with the Notmuch community is available via IRC
237 (server: irc.libera.chat, channel: #notmuch).