X-Git-Url: https://git.cworth.org/git?a=blobdiff_plain;f=howto.mdwn;h=d0219949c6f7a2f2149dcd8f2e1ad2bd450fa5ec;hb=2a10fc7c9d949c836a1134c5b2a3ad1a22376503;hp=d6ce893acc2ca4f63590f046373bd40ff72437f9;hpb=24a2a33de9ec901e55ca455448f59a2d76e178c0;p=notmuch-wiki
diff --git a/howto.mdwn b/howto.mdwn
index d6ce893..d021994 100644
--- a/howto.mdwn
+++ b/howto.mdwn
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+[[!img notmuch-logo.png alt="Notmuch logo" class="left"]]
# How to...
Some tips about how to do some useful things with notmuch, and the
@@ -5,6 +6,12 @@ various "third party" notmuch utilities.
[[!toc levels=2]]
+## **Debian squeeze packages outdated**
+
+The notmuch package(s) in Debian squeeze are very old (version 0.3).
+It's better to start off with an up to date version from
+[backports](http://backports-master.debian.org/).
+
## **Receive mail**
Notmuch does not fetch mail for you. For that, you need to use an
@@ -19,7 +26,7 @@ mbox mail store formats is not supported, but fortunately it is very
easy to [[convert mbox to maildir|howto/#mbox]] . The following
utilities support these formats:
-* [offlineimap](https://github.com/nicolas33/offlineimap/) -
+* [offlineimap](http://offlineimap.org/) -
quite useful and widely tested, it also offers a handy hook that
will come in useful a bit later in our setup. Also supports
"presynchook" and "postsynchook" command that will get run
@@ -38,16 +45,16 @@ messages.
## **Sync notmuch tags and maildir flags**
-notmuch has (since version 0.5) the ability to sync IMAP maildir flags
-and respective tags in both directions. This feature is not enabled
-by default, but it is simple to enable it with the 'notmuch config'
-command:
-
- $ notmuch config set maildir.synchronize_flags true
+notmuch has the ability to synchronize maildir flags and respective tags in both
+directions. For more information on maildir flags see the [maildir
+page](http://cr.yp.to/proto/maildir.html), and for the respective tags see your
+notmuch configuration file. This feature is enabled by default, but if you don't
+need it, it is simple to disable it with the 'notmuch config' command:
+ $ notmuch config set maildir.synchronize_flags false
-For more information on maildir flags see the
-[maildir page](http://cr.yp.to/proto/maildir.html).
+The maildir flags may, in turn, be synchronized with IMAP flags by another tool,
+such as offlineimap.
For safety reasons, and because
[[notmuch does not support delete operations|deleting]], notmuch does
@@ -74,53 +81,7 @@ expression:
## **Using notmuch with Mutt**
-Notmuch is a great mail indexing tool that can also be used *in conjunction*
-with existing Mail User Agents (MUA) instead of replacing them. The advantage
-of such mixed solutions is that users can benefit from notmuch features (such
-as full-text search and thread reconstruction) without *having to* change
-MUA.
-
-A popular geek MUA is [the Mutt e-mail client](http://www.mutt.org);
-integrating notmuch with Mutt is not seamless, but fairly straightforward.
-There are two principal possibilities, each with its own ups and downs:
-
-* Using mutt-notmuch, which will create a "virtual" maildir folder with
- search results whenever a search is made. The upside is that you can
- search all your folders simultanously; the downside is that your
- modifications in the results listing do not carry over, also having
- to switch folders comes with some more annoyances.
-
- An
- [**how to use Notmuch with Mutt**](http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2011/01/how_to_use_Notmuch_with_Mutt/)
- has been written by Stefano Zacchiroli. Check out the
- [howto](http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2011/01/how_to_use_Notmuch_with_Mutt/)
- for more information.
-
- (Note by the howto author: I've linked the howto from this wiki rather
- than splicing it in, in order to avoid duplication of information. If you
- think it would be better to have it here, feel free to copy the text
- here. The howto is
- [available](http://git.upsilon.cc/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?p=zack-homepage.git;a=history;f=blog/posts/2011/01/how_to_use_Notmuch_with_Mutt.mdwn)
- in markdown syntax from the Git repository of my homepage.)
-
-* Using a simple macro that will emulate the "limit" mutt functionality
- using notmuch.
-
- See the [**alternative notmuch integration**](http://log.or.cz/?p=228)
- blog post for instructions and details,
- or simply put these two macros to your muttrc:
-
- # 'L' performs a notmuch query, showing only the results
- macro index L "unset wait_keyread -p 'notmuch query: ' x; echo \$x >~/.cache/mutt_terms~i \"\`notmuch search --output=messages \$(cat ~/.cache/mutt_terms) | head -n 600 | perl -le '@a=<>;chomp@a;s/\^id:// for@a;$,=\"|\";print@a'\`\"" "show only messages matching a notmuch pattern"
- # 'a' shows all messages again (supersedes default binding)
- macro index a "all\n" "show all messages (undo limit)"
-
- The upside (if you are used to working in the context of a single folder)
- is that this really does use the limit functionality of mutt
- and you are still in your original folder.
- The downside is that this approach has scaling problems
- and works well only for reasonably specific queries.
-
+See [[notmuch-mutt]].
## **Automatically retagging the database (e.g., when upgrading versions)**
@@ -130,11 +91,11 @@ However, for users running with databases created in older versions of
notmuch, these tags are missing in pre-existing messages and need to be
added. One way to do this is as follows:
- $ notmuch dump ~/out.nm
+ $ notmuch dump --output=~/out.nm
$ mv ~/Mail/.notmuch ~/.notmuch.bak
$ notmuch new
$ notmuch tag -inbox -unread '*'
- $ notmuch restore --accumulate ~/out.nm
+ $ notmuch restore --accumulate --input=~/out.nm
At this point, one should run a sanity check on the tags, and if everything
has merged correctly, the ~/.notmuch.bak directory is expendable, as is
@@ -165,6 +126,11 @@ output. Using the instructions from [Gmane's
site](http://gmane.org/export.php), we can download an mbox file, which we
can then convert to maildir using mb2md or other utility.
+Please note that mail delivered by Postfix will have envelope headers
+that may cause notmuch to complain about "single-message mbox files".
+Removing the first line from the message or passing it through
+reformail will solve the problem.
+
## **Take advantage of tags that are special to notmuch**
See [[tags special to notmuch|special-tags]].