-.TH NOTMUCH-SEARCH 1 2013-01-07 "Notmuch 0.15"
+.TH NOTMUCH-SEARCH 1 2013-02-17 "Notmuch 0.15.2"
.SH NAME
notmuch-search \- search for messages matching the given search terms
.SH SYNOPSIS
.RS 4
.TP 4
-.BR \-\-exclude=(true|false|flag)
+.BR \-\-exclude=(true|false|all|flag)
+
+A message is called "excluded" if it matches at least one tag in
+search.tag_exclude that does not appear explicitly in the search terms.
+This option specifies whether to omit excluded messages in the search
+process.
+
+The default value,
+.BR true ,
+prevents excluded messages from matching the search terms.
+
+.B all
+additionally prevents excluded messages from appearing in displayed
+results, in effect behaving as though the excluded messages do not exist.
+
+.B false
+allows excluded messages to match search terms and appear in displayed
+results. Excluded messages are still marked in the relevant outputs.
-Specify whether to omit messages matching search.tag_exclude from the
-search results (the default) or not. The extra option
.B flag
only has an effect when
-.B --output=summary
-In this case all matching threads are returned but the "match count"
-is the number of matching non-excluded messages in the thread.
+.BR --output=summary .
+The output is almost identical to
+.BR false ,
+but the "match count" is the number of matching non-excluded messages in the
+thread, rather than the number of matching messages.
.RE
.SH EXIT STATUS