git-imap-send(1) — Linux manual page
GIT-IMAP-SEND(1) Git Manual GIT-IMAP-SEND(1)
NAME
git-imap-send - Send a collection of patches from stdin to an
IMAP folder
SYNOPSIS
git imap-send [-v] [-q] [--[no-]curl]
DESCRIPTION
This command uploads a mailbox generated with git format-patch
into an IMAP drafts folder. This allows patches to be sent as
other email is when using mail clients that cannot read mailbox
files directly. The command also works with any general mailbox
in which emails have the fields "From", "Date", and "Subject" in
that order.
Typical usage is something like:
git format-patch --signoff --stdout --attach origin | git
imap-send
OPTIONS
-v, --verbose
Be verbose.
-q, --quiet
Be quiet.
--curl
Use libcurl to communicate with the IMAP server, unless
tunneling into it. Ignored if Git was built without the
USE_CURL_FOR_IMAP_SEND option set.
--no-curl
Talk to the IMAP server using git’s own IMAP routines instead
of using libcurl. Ignored if Git was built with the
NO_OPENSSL option set.
CONFIGURATION
To use the tool, imap.folder and either imap.tunnel or imap.host
must be set to appropriate values.
Everything above this line in this section isn’t included from
the git-config(1) documentation. The content that follows is the
same as what’s found there:
imap.folder
The folder to drop the mails into, which is typically the
Drafts folder. For example: "INBOX.Drafts", "INBOX/Drafts" or
"[Gmail]/Drafts". Required.
imap.tunnel
Command used to set up a tunnel to the IMAP server through
which commands will be piped instead of using a direct
network connection to the server. Required when imap.host is
not set.
imap.host
A URL identifying the server. Use an imap:// prefix for
non-secure connections and an imaps:// prefix for secure
connections. Ignored when imap.tunnel is set, but required
otherwise.
imap.user
The username to use when logging in to the server.
imap.pass
The password to use when logging in to the server.
imap.port
An integer port number to connect to on the server. Defaults
to 143 for imap:// hosts and 993 for imaps:// hosts. Ignored
when imap.tunnel is set.
imap.sslverify
A boolean to enable/disable verification of the server
certificate used by the SSL/TLS connection. Default is true.
Ignored when imap.tunnel is set.
imap.preformattedHTML
A boolean to enable/disable the use of html encoding when
sending a patch. An html encoded patch will be bracketed with
<pre> and have a content type of text/html. Ironically,
enabling this option causes Thunderbird to send the patch as
a plain/text, format=fixed email. Default is false.
imap.authMethod
Specify the authentication method for authenticating with the
IMAP server. If Git was built with the NO_CURL option, or if
your curl version is older than 7.34.0, or if you’re running
git-imap-send with the --no-curl option, the only supported
method is CRAM-MD5. If this is not set then git imap-send
uses the basic IMAP plaintext LOGIN command.
EXAMPLES
Using tunnel mode:
[imap]
folder = "INBOX.Drafts"
tunnel = "ssh -q -C user@example.com /usr/bin/imapd ./Maildir 2> /dev/null"
Using direct mode:
[imap]
folder = "INBOX.Drafts"
host = imap://imap.example.com
user = bob
pass = p4ssw0rd
Using direct mode with SSL:
[imap]
folder = "INBOX.Drafts"
host = imaps://imap.example.com
user = bob
pass = p4ssw0rd
port = 123
; sslVerify = false
Note
You may want to use sslVerify=false while troubleshooting, if
you suspect that the reason you are having trouble connecting
is because the certificate you use at the private server
example.com you are trying to set up (or have set up) may not
be verified correctly.
Using Gmail’s IMAP interface:
[imap]
folder = "[Gmail]/Drafts"
host = imaps://imap.gmail.com
user = user@gmail.com
port = 993
Note
You might need to instead use: folder = "[Google
Mail]/Drafts" if you get an error that the "Folder doesn’t
exist".
Note
If your Gmail account is set to another language than
English, the name of the "Drafts" folder will be localized.
Once the commits are ready to be sent, run the following command:
$ git format-patch --cover-letter -M --stdout origin/master | git imap-send
Just make sure to disable line wrapping in the email client
(Gmail’s web interface will wrap lines no matter what, so you
need to use a real IMAP client).
CAUTION
It is still your responsibility to make sure that the email
message sent by your email program meets the standards of your
project. Many projects do not like patches to be attached. Some
mail agents will transform patches (e.g. wrap lines, send them as
format=flowed) in ways that make them fail. You will get angry
flames ridiculing you if you don’t check this.
Thunderbird in particular is known to be problematic. Thunderbird
users may wish to visit this web page for more information:
https://kb.mozillazine.org/Plain_text_e-mail_-_Thunderbird#Completely_plain_email
SEE ALSO
git-format-patch(1), git-send-email(1), mbox(5)
GIT
Part of the git(1) suite
COLOPHON
This page is part of the git (Git distributed version control
system) project. Information about the project can be found at
⟨http://git-scm.com/⟩. If you have a bug report for this manual
page, see ⟨http://git-scm.com/community⟩. This page was obtained
from the project's upstream Git repository
⟨https://github.com/git/git.git⟩ on 2024-06-14. (At that time,
the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
repository was 2024-06-12.) If you discover any rendering
problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there
is a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
(which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
man-pages@man7.org
Git 2.45.2.492.gd63586 2024-06-12 GIT-IMAP-SEND(1)
Pages that refer to this page: git(1), git-format-patch(1), git-send-email(1)