MAN page from Other fetchmail-4.3.9-1.i386.rpm

fetchmail

Section: User Commands (1)
Index

NAME

fetchmail - fetch mail from a POP, IMAP, or ETRN-capable server

SYNOPSIS

fetchmail [options] [mailserver...]

DESCRIPTION

fetchmailis a mail-retrieval and forwarding utility; it fetchesmail from remote mailservers and forwards it to your local (client)machine's delivery system. You can then handle the retrieved mailusing normal mail user agents such as elm(1) or Mail(1).The fetchmail utility can be run in a daemon mode to repeatedlypoll one or more systems at a specified interval.

Thefetchmailprogram can gather mail from servers supporting any of the commonmail-retrieval protocols: POP2, POP3, IMAP2bis, and IMAP4. It canalso use the ESMTP ETRN extension. (The RFCs describing all theseprotocols are listed at the end of this document.)

Whilefetchmailis primarily intended to be used over on-demand TCP/IP links (such asSLIP or PPP connections), it may also be useful as a message transferagent for sites which refuse for security reasons to permit(sender-initiated) SMTP transactions with sendmail.

As each message is retrieved fetchmail normally delivers it via SMTP toport 25 on the machine it is running on (localhost), just as though itwere being passed in over a normal TCP/IP link. The mail will then bedelivered locally via your system's MDA (Mail Delivery Agent, usuallysendmail(8) but your system may use a different one suchas smail, mmdf, or qmail). All the delivery-controlmechanisms (such as .forward files) normally available throughyour system MDA and local delivery agents will therefore work.

The behavior offetchmailis controlled by command-line options and a run control file,~/.fetchmailrc, the syntax of which we describe below. Command-lineoptions override~/.fetchmailrcdeclarations.

Each server name that you specify following the options on thecommand line will be queried. If you don't specify any serverson the command line, each server in your ~/.fetchmailrcfile will be queried.

To facilitate the use offetchmailIn scripts, pipelines, etc., it returns an appropriate exit code upon termination -- see EXIT CODES below.

OPTIONS

The following options modify the behavior of fetchmail. It isseldom necessary to specify any of these once you have aworking .fetchmailrc file set up.

Almost all options have a corresponding keyword which can be used todeclare them in a fetchmailrcfile.

Some special options are not covered here, but are documented instteadin sections on AUTHENTICATION and DAEMON MODE which follows.

General Options

-V, --version: Displays the version information for your copy of fetchmail.No mail fetch is performed.Instead, for each server specified, all option informationthat would be computed iffetchmail.were connecting to that server is displayed. Any non-printables inpasswords or other string names are shown as backslashed C-likeescape sequences. This option is useful for verifying that youroptions are set the way you want them.
-c, --check: Return a status code to indicate whether there is mail waiting,without actually fetching or deleting mail (see EXIT CODES below).This option turns off daemon mode (in which it would be useless). Itdoesn't play well with queries to multiple sites, and doesn't workwith ETRN. It will return a false positive if you leave read butundeleted mail in your server mailbox and your fetch protocol can'ttell kept messages from new ones. This means it will work with IMAP,not work with POP2, and may occasionally flake out under POP3.
-s, --silent: Silent mode. Suppresses all progress/status messages that are normallyechoed to standard error during a fetch. The --verbose optionoverrides this.
-v, --verbose: Verbose mode. All control messages passed between fetchmailand the mailserver are echoed to stderr. Overrides --silent.

Disposal Options

-a, --all: (Keyword: fetchall)Retrieve both old (seen) and new messages from the mailserver. Thedefault is to fetch only messages the server has not marked seen.Note that POP2 retrieval behaves as though --all is always on (seeRETRIEVAL FAILURE MODES below) and this option does not work with ETRN.
-k, --keep: (Keyword: keep)Keep retrieved messages on the remote mailserver. Normally, messages are deleted from the folder on the mailserver after they have been retrieved.Specifying the keep option causes retrieved messages to remain in your folder on themailserver. This option does not work with ETRN.
-K, --nokeep: (Keyword: nokeep)Delete retrieved messages from the remote mailserver. Thisoption forces retrieved mail to be deleted. It may be useful ifyou have specified a default of keep in your.fetchmailrc. This option is forced on with ETRN.
-F, --flush: POP3/IMAP only. Delete old (previously retrieved) messages from the mailserverbefore retrieving new messages. This option does not work with ETRN.Warning: if your local MTA hangs and fetchmail is aborted, the nexttime you run fetchmail, it will delete mail that was never delivered to you.What you probably want is the default setting: if you don't specify `-k', thenfetchmail will automatically delete messages after successful delivery.

Protocol and Query Options

-p, --protocol proto

(Keyword: proto[col])Specify the protocol to used when communicating with the remote mailserver. If no protocol is specified,fetchmailwill try each of the supported protocols in turn, terminating afterany successful attempt.proto may be one of the following:

POP2: Post Office Protocol 2
POP3: Post Office Protocol 3
APOP: Use POP3 with MD5 authentication.
RPOP: Use POP3 with RPOP authentication.
KPOP: Use POP3 with Kerberos V4 authentication on port 1109.
IMAP: IMAP2bis, IMAP4, or IMAP4rev1 (fetchmail autodetects their capabilities).
IMAP-K4: IMAP4, or IMAP4rev1 (fetchmail autodetects their capabilities)with RFC 1731 Kerberos v4 authentication.
IMAP-GSS: IMAP4, or IMAP4rev1 (fetchmail autodetects their capabilities)with RFC 1731 GSSAPI authentication.
ETRN: Use the ESMTP ETRN option.

All these alternatives work in basically the same way (communicatingwith standard server daemons to fetch mail already delivered to amailbox on the server) except ETRN. The ETRN mode allows you to ask acompliant ESMTP server (such as BSD sendmail at release 8.8.0 orhigher) to immediately open a sender-SMTP connection to yourclient machine and begin forwarding any items addressed to your clientmachine in the server's queue of undelivered mail.

-U, --uidl

(Keyword: uidl)Force UIDL use (effective only with POP3). Force client-side trackingof `newness' of messages (UIDL stands for ``unique ID listing'' and isdescribed in RFC1725). Use with `keep' to use a mailbox as a babynews drop for a group of users.

-P, --port

(Keyword: port)The option permits you to specify a TCP/IP port to connect on. This option will seldom be necessary as all the supported protocols havewell-established default port numbers.

-r folder, --folder folder

(Keyword: folder[s])Causes a specified non-default mail folder on the mailserver (orcomma-separated list of folders) to be retrieved. The syntax of thefolder name is server-dependent. This option is not available underPOP3 or ETRN.

Delivery Control Options

-S host, --smtphost host: (Keyword: smtp[host])Specify a hunt list of hosts to forward mail to (one or morehostnames, comma-separated). In ETRN mode, set the host that themailserver is asked to ship mail to. Hosts are tried in list order;the first one that is up becomes the forwarding or ETRN target for thecurrent run. Each hostname may have a '/'-delimited suffix specifyinga port or service to forward to; the default is 25 (or "smtp" underIPv6).
-D domain, --smtpaddress domain: (Keyword: smtpaddress) Specify the domain to be put in RCPT TO lines shipped to SMTP. Thename of the SMTP server (as specified by --smtphost, or defaulted to"localhost") is used when this is not specified.
-Z nnn, --antispam nnn: (Keyword: antispam) Specifies the numeric SMTP error that is to be interpreted as aspam-block response from the listener. A value of -1 disablesthis option.
-m, --mda: (Keyword: mda)You can force mail to be passed to an MDA directly (rather thanforwarded to port 25) with the -mda or -m option. If fetchmailis running as root, it sets its userid to that of the target userwhile delivering mail through an MDA. Some possible MDAs are"/usr/sbin/sendmail -oem", "/usr/lib/sendmail -oem","/usr/bin/formail", and "/usr/bin/deliver". Local delivery addresseswill be inserted into the MDA command wherever you place a %T; themail message's From address will be inserted where you place an %F. Donot use an MDA invocation like"sendmail -oem -t" that dispatches on the contents of To/Cc/Bcc, itwill create mail loops and bring the just wrath of many postmastersdown upon your head.

Resource Limit Control Options

-l, --limit: (Keyword: limit)Takes a maximum octet size argument. Messages larger than this sizewill not be fetched, not be marked seen, and will be left on theserver (in foreground sessions, the progress messages will note thatthey are "oversized"). An explicit --limit of 0 overrides any limits setin your run control file. This option is intended for those needing tostrictly control fetch time in interactive mode. It may not be usedwith daemon mode, as users would never receive a notification thatmessages were waiting. This option does not work with ETRN.
-b, --batchlimit: (Keyword: batchlimit)Specify the maximum number of messages that will be shipped to an SMTPlistener before the connection is deliberately torn down and rebuilt(defaults to 0, meaning no limit). An explicit --batchlimit of 0overrides any limits set in your run control file. Whilesendmail(8) normally initiates delivery of a message immediatelyafter receiving the message terminator, some SMTP listeners are not soprompt. MTAs like qmail(8) and smail(8) may wait till thedelivery socket is shut down to deliver. This may produce annoyingdelays whenfetchmail(8)is processing very large batches. Setting the batch limit to somenonzero size will prevent these delays.This option does not work with ETRN.
-B, --fetchlimit: (Keyword: fetchlimit)Limit the number of messages accepted from a given server in a singlepoll. By default there is no limit. An explicit --fetchlimit of 0overrides any limits set in your run control file.This option does not work with ETRN.
-e, --expunge: (keyword: expunge)When talking to an IMAP server, fetchmailnormally issues an EXPUNGE command after each deletion in order toforce the deletion to be done immediately. This is safest when yourconnection to the server is flaky and expensive, as it avoidsresending duplicate mail after a line hit. However, on largemailboxes the overhead of re-indexing after every message can slam theserver pretty hard, so if your connection is reliable it is good to doexpunges less frequently. If you specify this option to an integer N,it tellsfetchmailto only issue expunges on every Nth delete. An argumentof zero suppresses expunges entirely (so no expunges at all will bedone until the end of run). This option does not work with ETRN, POP2, or POP3.

Authentication Options

-u name, --username name

(Keyword: user[name])Specifies the user identification to be used when logging in to the mailserver.The appropriate user identification is both server and user-dependent. The default is your login name on the client machine that is running fetchmail.See USER AUTHENTICATION below for a complete description.

-I specification, --interface specification

(Keyword: interface)Require that a specific interface device be up and have a specific localIP address (or range) before polling. Frequentlyfetchmailis used over a transient point-to-point TCP/IP link established directlyto a mailserver via SLIP or PPP. That is a relatively secure channel.But when other TCP/IP routes to the mailserver exist (e.g. when the linkis connected to an alternate ISP), your username and password may bevulnerable to snooping (especially when daemon mode automatically pollsfor mail, shipping a clear password over the net at predictableintervals). The --interface option may be used to prevent this. Whenthe specified link is not up or is not connected to a matching IPaddress, polling will be skipped. The format is:

interface/iii.iii.iii.iii/mmm.mmm.mmm.mmm

The field before the first slash is the interface name (i.e. sl0, ppp0etc.). The field before the second slash is the acceptable IP address.The field after the second slash is a mask which specifies a range ofIP addresses to accept. If no mask is present 255.255.255.255 isassumed (i.e. an exact match). This option is currently only supportedunder Linux.

-M interface, --monitor interface

(Keyword: monitor)Daemon mode can cause transient links which are automatically taken downafter a period of inactivity (e.g. PPP links) to remain upindefinitely. This option identifies a system TCP/IP interface to bemonitored for activity. After each poll interval, if the link is up butno other activity has occurred on the link, then the poll will beskipped. This option is currently only supported under Linux.

-A, --auth

(Keyword: auth[enticate]) This option permits you to specify a preauthentication type (see USERAUTHENTICATION below for details). The possible values are`password', `kerberos_v5' and `kerberos' (or, forexcruciating exactness, `kerberos_v4'). This option is providedprimarily for developers; choosing KPOP protocol automatically selectsKerberos preauthentication, and all other alternatives use passwordauthentication (though APOP uses a generated one-time key as thepassword and IMAP-K4 uses RFC1731 Kerberos v4 authentication). Thisoption does not work with ETRN.

Miscellaneous Options

-f pathname, --fetchmailrc pathname

Specify a non-default name for the .fetchmailrcrun control file. Unless the --version option is also on, the file must havepermissions no more open than 0600 (u=rw,g=,o=) or else be /dev/null.

-i pathname, --idfile pathname

Specify an alternate name for the .fetchids file used to save POP3UIDs.

-n, --norewrite

(Keyword: no rewrite)Normally,fetchmailedits RFC-822 address headers (To, From, Cc, Bcc, and Reply-To) infetched mail so that any mail IDs local to the server are expanded tofull addresses (@ and the mailserver hostname are appended). This enables replies on the client to get addressed correctly (otherwise yourmailer might think they should be addressed to local users on theclient machine!). This option disables the rewrite. (This option isprovided to pacify people who are paranoid about having an MTA editmail headers and want to know they can prevent it, but it is generallynot a good idea to actually turn off rewrite.)When using ETRN, the rewrite option is ineffective.

-E, --envelope

(Keyword: envelope)This option changes the header fetchmailassumes will carry a copy of the mail's envelope address. Normallythis is `X-Envelope-To' but as this header is not standard, practicevaries. See the discussion of multidrop address handling below. As aspecial case, `envelope "Received"' enables parsing of sendmail-styleReceived lines. This is the default, and it should not be necessaryunless you have globally disabled Received parsing with `no envelope'in the .fetchmailrc file.

-Q, --qvirtual

(Keyword: qvirtual)The string assigned to this option will be removed from the username found in the header specified with the envelope option.This option is useful if you are using fetchmailto collect the mail for an entire domain and your ISP (or your mailredirection provider) is using qmail.One of the basic features of qmail is the

`Delivered-To:'

message header. Whenever qmail delivers a message to a local mailboxit puts the username and hostname of the envelope recipient on thisline. The major reason for this is to prevent mail loops. To set upqmail to batch mail for a disconnected site the ISP-mailhost will havenormally put that site in its `Virtualhosts' control file so it willadd a prefix to all mail addresses for this site. This results in mailsent to 'usernameAATTuserhost.userdom.dom.com' having a`Delivered-To:' line of the form:

Delivered-To: mbox-userstr-usernameAATTuserhost.userdom.dom.com

The ISP can make the 'mbox-userstr-' prefix anything they choosebut a string matching the user host name is likely.By using the option `envelope Delivered-To:' you can make fetchmail reliablyidentify the original envelope recipient, but you have to strip the`mbox-userstr-' prefix to deliver to the correct user.This is what this option is for.

USER AUTHENTICATION AND ENCRYPTION

Every mode except ETRN requires authentication of the client.Normal user authentication in fetchmailis very much like the authentication mechanism of ftp(1).The correct user-id and password depend upon the underlying securitysystem at the mailserver.

If the mailserver is a Unix machine on which you have an ordinary user account, your regular login name and password are used with fetchmail.If you use the same login name on both the server and the client machines,you needn't worry about specifying a user-id with the -uoption -- the default behavior is to use your login name on the client machine as the user-id on the server machine. If you use a different login nameon the server machine, specify that login name with the-uoption. e.g. if your login name is 'jsmith' on a machine named 'mailgrunt',you would start fetchmail as follows:

: fetchmail -u jsmith mailgrunt

The default behavior of fetchmailis to prompt you for your mailserver password before the connection isestablished. This is the safest way to use fetchmailand ensures that your password will not be compromised. You may also specifyyour password in your~/.fetchmailrcfile. This is convenient when using fetchmailin daemon mode or with scripts.

If you do not specify a password, andfetchmailcannot extract one from your.fetchmailrcfile, it will look for a .netrcfile in your home directory before requesting one interactively; if anentry matching the mailserver is found in that file, the password willbe used. See theftp(1)man page for details of the syntax of the.netrcfile. (This feature may allow you to avoid duplicating passwordinformation in more than one file.)

On mailservers that do not provide ordinary user accounts, your user-id and password are usually assigned by the server administrator when you apply for a mailbox on the server. Contact your server administrator if you don't know the correct user-id and password for your mailbox account.

Early versions of POP3 (RFC1081, RFC1225) supported a crude form ofindependent authentication using therhostsfile on the mailserver side. Under this RPOP variant, a fixedper-user ID equivalent to a password was sent in clear over a link toa reserved port, with the command RPOP rather than PASS to alert theserver that it should do special checking. RPOP is supportedbyfetchmail(you can specify `protocol RPOP' to have the program send `RPOP'rather than `PASS') but its use is strongly discouraged. Thisfacility was vulnerable to spoofing and was withdrawn in RFC1460.

RFC1460 introduced APOP authentication. In this variant of POP3,you register an APOP password on your server host (the programto do this with on the server is probably called popauth(8)). Youput the same password in your .fetchmailrcfile. Each time fetchmaillogs in, it sends a cryptographically secure hash of your password andthe server greeting time to the server, which can verify it bychecking its authorization database.

If your fetchmail was built with Kerberos support and you specify Kerberos preauthentication (either with --auth or the .fetchmailrcoption authenticate kerberos_v4) it will try to get a Kerberosticket from the mailserver at the start of each query.

If you use IMAP-K4, fetchmail will expect the IMAP server to haveRFC1731-conformant AUTHENTICATE KERBEROS_V4 capability, and will use it.

If you use IMAP-GSS, fetchmail will expect the IMAP server to haveRFC1731-conformant AUTHENTICATE GSSAPI capability, and will use it. Currently this has only been tested over Kerberos V, so you're expectedto already have a ticket-granting ticket. You may pass a username differentfrom your principal name using the standard --user command or bythe .fetchmailrc option user.

If you are using POP3, and the server issues a one-time-passwordchallenge conforming to RFC1938, fetchmail will use yourpassword as a pass phrase to generate the required response. Thisavoids sending secrets over the net unencrypted.

Compuserve's RPA authentication (similar to APOP) is supported. Ifyou are using POP3, and the RPA code has been compiled into yourbinary, and you query a server in the Compuserve csi.com domain,fetchmail will try to perform an RPA pass-phrase authenticationinstead of sending over the password en clair.

If you are using IPsec, the -T (--netsec) option can be used to passan IP security request to be used when outgoing IP connections areinitialized. You can also do this using the `netsec' server optionin the .fetchmailrc file. In either case, the option value is astring in the format accepted by the net_security_strtorequest() function of the inet6_apps library.

DAEMON MODE

The --daemonor-d option runs fetchmailin daemon mode. You must specify a numeric argument which is apolling interval in seconds.

In daemon mode, fetchmailputs itself in background and runs forever, querying each specifiedhost and then sleeping for the given polling interval.

Simply invoking

: fetchmail -d 900

will, therefore, poll all the hosts described in your ~/.fetchmailrcfile (except those explicitly excluded with the `skip' verb) onceevery fifteen minutes.

It is possible to set a polling interval in your~/.fetchmailrcfile by saying `set daemon <interval>', where <interval> is aninteger number of seconds. If you do this, fetchmail will alwaysstart in daemon mode unless you override it with the command-lineoption --daemon 0 or -d0.

Only one daemon process is permitted per user; in daemon mode,fetchmailmakes a per-user lockfile to guarantee this.

Normally, calling fetchmail with a daemon in the background sends awakeup signal to the daemon, forcing it to poll mailserversimmediately. (The wakeup signal is SIGHUP if fetchmail is running asroot, SIGUSR1 otherwise.)

The option--quitwill kill a running daemon process instead of waking it up (if thereis no such option, fetchmailnotifies you). If the --quit option is the only command-line option,that's all there is to it.

The quit option may also be mixed with other command-line options; itseffect is to kill any running daemon before doing what the otheroptions specify in combination with the rc file.

The -tor--timeoutoption (keyword: timeout) allows you to set a server-nonresponsetimeout in seconds. If a mailserver does not send a greeting messageor respond to commands for the given number of seconds,fetchmail will hang up on it. Without such a timeoutfetchmail might hang up indefinitely trying to fetch mail from adown host. This would be particularly annoying for a fetchmailrunning in background. There is a default timeout which fetchmail -Vwill report.

The-Lor--logfileoption (keyword: set logfile) allows you to redirect status messagesemitted while detached into a specified logfile (follow theoption with the logfile name). The logfile is opened for append, soprevious messages aren't deleted. This is primarily useful fordebugging configurations.

The--syslogoption (keyword: syslog) allows you to redirect status and errormessages emitted to thesyslog(3)system daemon if available.Messages are logged with an id of fetchmail, the facility LOG_MAIL,and priorities LOG_ERR, LOG_ALERT or LOG_INFO.This option is intended for logging status and error messages whichindicate the status of the daemon and the results while fetching mailfrom the server(s).Error messages for command line options and parsing the .fetchmailrcfile are still written to stderr, or the specified log file if the-Lor--logfileoption was used.

The --invisibleoption tries to make fetchmail invisible. Normally, fetchmail behaveslike any other MTA would -- it generates a Received header into eachmessage describing its place in the chain of transmission, and tellsthe MTA it forwards to that the mail came from the machine fetchmailitself is running on. If the invisible option is on, the Receivedheader is suppressed and fetchmail tries to spoof the MTA it forwardsto into thinking it came directly from the mailserver host.

The -Nor --nodetach option suppresses backgrounding and detachment of thedaemon process from its control terminal. This is primarily usefulfor debugging. Note that this also causes the logfile option to beignored (though perhaps it shouldn't).

Note that while running in daemon mode polling a POP2 or POP3 server,transient errors (such as DNS failures or sendmail delivery refusals)may force the fetchall option on for the duration of the next pollingcycle. This is a robustness feature. It means that if a message isfetched (and thus marked seen by the mailserver) but not deliveredlocally due to some transient error, it will be re-fetched during thenext poll cycle. (The IMAP logic doesn't delete messages untilthey're delivered, so this problem does not arise.)

RETRIEVAL FAILURE MODES

The protocols fetchmail uses to talk to mailservers are next tobulletproof. In normal operation forwarding to port 25, no message isever deleted (or even marked for deletion) on the host until the SMTPlistener on the client has acknowledged to fetchmail that themessage has been accepted for delivery. When forwarding to an MDA,however, there is more possibility of error (because there's no wayfor fetchmail to get a reliable positive acknowledgement from the MDA).

The normal mode of fetchmail is to try to download only `new'messages, leaving untouched (and undeleted) messages you have alreadyread directly on the server (or fetched with a previous fetchmail--keep). But you may find that messages you've already read on theserver are being fetched (and deleted) even when you don't specify--all. There are several reasons this can happen.

One could be that you're using POP2. The POP2 protocol includes norepresentation of `new' or `old' state in messages, so fetchmailmust treat all messages as new all the time. But POP2 is obsolete, sothis is unlikely.

Under POP3, blame RFC1725. That version of the POP3 protocolspecification removed the LAST command, and some POP servers follow it(you can verify this by invoking fetchmail -v to the mailserverand watching the response to LAST early in the query). Thefetchmail code tries to compensate by using POP3's UID feature,storing the identifiers of messages seen in each session until thenext session, in the .fetchids file. But this doesn't trackmessages seen with other clients, or read directly with a mailer onthe host but not deleted afterward. A better solution would be toswitch to IMAP.

Another potential POP3 problem might be servers that insert messagesin the middle of mailboxes (some VMS implementations of mail arerumored to do this). The fetchmail code assumes that newmessages are appended to the end of the mailbox; when this is not trueit may treat some old messages as new and vice versa. The only real fix for this problem is to switch to IMAP.

The IMAP code uses the presence or absence of the server flag \Seento decide whether or not a message is new. Under Unix, it counts onyour IMAP server to notice the BSD-style Status flags set by mail useragents and set the \Seen flag from them when appropriate. All UnixIMAP servers we know of do this, though it's not specified by the IMAPRFCs. If you ever trip over a server that doesn't, the symptom willbe that messages you have already read on your host will look new tothe server. In this (unlikely) case, only messages you fetched withfetchmail --keep will be both undeleted and marked old.

In ETRN mode, fetchmail does not actually retrieve messages;instead, it asks the server's SMTP listener to start a queue flushto the client via SMTP. Therefore it sends only undelivered messages.

SPAM FILTERING

Many SMTP listeners allow administrators to set up `spam filters' thatblock unsolicited email from specified domains. A MAIL FROM line thattriggers this feature will elicit an SMTP response which(unfortunately) varies according to the listener.

Newer versions of sendmailreturn an error code of 571. This return valueis blessed by RFC1893 as "Delivery not authorized, message refused".

According to current drafts of the replacement for RFC821, the correctthing to return in this situation is 550 "Requested action not taken:mailbox unavailable" (the draft adds "[E.g., mailbox not found, noaccess, or command rejected for policy reasons].").

TheeximMTA returns 501 "Syntax error in parameters or arguments" , but willmove to 550 soon.

Thefetchmailcode recognizes and discards the message on a code that defaults tosendmail's 571 but can be set with the `antispam' option. This is theonlycircumstance under which fetchmail ever discards mail.

Iffetchmailis fetching from an IMAP server, the antispam response will be detected andthe message rejected immediately after the headers have been fetched,without reading the message body. Thus, you won't pay for downloading spam message bodies.

THE RUN CONTROL FILE

The preferred way to set up fetchmail is to write a.fetchmailrc file in your home directory. When there is aconflict between the command-line arguments and the arguments in thisfile, the command-line arguments take precedence.

To protect the security of your passwords, when --version is not onyour ~/.fetchmailrc may not have more than 0600 (u=rw,g=,o=) permissions;fetchmailwill complain and exit otherwise.

You may read the .fetchmailrc file as a list of commands to be executed when fetchmailis called with no arguments.

Run Control Syntax

Comments begin with a '#' and extend through the end of the line.Otherwise the file consists of a series of server entries or globaloption statements in a free-format, token-oriented syntax.

There are four kinds of tokens: grammar keywords, numbers(i.e. decimal digit sequences), unquoted strings, and quoted strings.A quoted string is bounded by double quotes and may containwhitespace (and quoted digits are treated as a string). An unquotedstring is any whitespace-delimited token that is neither numeric, stringquoted nor contains the special characters `,', `;', `:', or `='.

Any amount of whitespace separates tokens in server entries, but isotherwise ignored. You may use standard C-style escapes (\n, \t,\b, octal, and hex) to embed non-printable characters or stringdelimiters in strings.

Each server entry consists of one of the keywords `poll' or `skip',followed by a server name, followed by server options, followed by anynumber of user descriptions. Note: the most common cause of syntaxerrors is mixing up user and server options.

For backward compatibility, the word `server' is a synonym for `poll'.

You can use the noise keywords `and', `with',`has', `wants', and `options' anywhere in an entry to makeit resemble English. They're ignored, but but can make entries mucheasier to read at a glance. The punctuation characters ':', ';' and',' are also ignored.

Poll vs. Skip

The `poll' verb tells fetchmail to query this host when it is run withno arguments. The `skip' verb tellsfetchmail not to poll this host unless it is explicitly named on the commandline. (The `skip' verb allows you to experiment with test entriessafely, or easily disable entries for hosts that are temporarily down.)

Keyword/Option Summary

Here are the legal server options. Keyword suffixes enclosed insquare brackets are optional. Those corresponding to command-lineoptions are followed by `-' and the appropriate option letter.

Keyword Opt Function
via Specify DNS name of mailserver, overriding poll name
proto[col] -p Specify protocol (case insensitive):POP2, POP3, IMAP, IMAP-K4, IMAP-GSS, APOP, KPOP
port -P Specify TCP/IP service port
auth[enticate] -A Set preauthentication type (default `password')
timeout -t Server inactivity timout in seconds (default 300)
envelope -E Specify envelope-address header name
no envelope Disable looking for envelope address
qvirtual -Q Qmail virtual domain prefix to remove from user name
aka Specify alternate DNS names of mailserver
interface -I specify IP interface(s) that must be up for server poll to take place
monitor -M Specify IP address to monitor for activity
dns Enable DNS lookup for multidrop (default)
no dns Disable DNS lookup for multidrop
uidl -U Force POP3 to use client-side UIDLs
no uidl Turn off POP3 use of client-side UIDLs (default)

Here are the legal user options:

Keyword Opt Function
user[name] -u Set remote user name (local user name if name followed by `here')
is Connect local and remote user names
to Connect local and remote user names
pass[word] Specify remote account password
folder -r Specify remote folder to query
smtphost -S Specify smtp host(s) to forward to
smtpaddress -D Specify the domain to be put in RCPT TO lines
antispam -Z Specify what SMTP return is interpreted as a spam-policy block
mda -m Specify MDA for local delivery
preconnect Command to be executed before each connection
postconnect Command to be executed after each connection
keep -k Don't delete seen messages from server
flush -F Flush all seen messages before querying
fetchall -a Fetch all messages whether seen or not
rewrite Rewrite destination addresses for reply (default)
stripcr Strip carriage returns from ends of lines
forcecr Force carriage returns at ends of lines
pass8bits Force BODY=8BITMIME to ESMTP listener
dropstatus Strip Status and X-Mozilla-Status lines out of incoming mail
no keep -K Delete seen messages from server (default)
no flush Don't flush all seen messages before querying (default)
no fetchall Retrieve only new messages (default)
no rewrite Don't rewrite headers
no stripcr Don't strip carriage returns (default)
no forcecr Don't force carriage returns at EOL (default)
no pass8bits Don't force BODY=8BITMIME to ESMTP listener (default)
no dropstatus Don't drop Status headers (default)
limit -l Set message size limit
batchlimit -b Max # messages to fetch in single connect
fetchlimit -B Max # messages to forward in single connect
expunge -e Perform an expunge on every #th message (IMAP only)
syslog Do error logging through syslog(3).

Remember that all user options must follow all server options.

In the .fetchmailrc file, the `envelope' string argument may bepreceded by a whitespace-separated number. This number, if specified,is the number of such headers to skip (that is, an argument of 1selects the second header of the given type). This is sometime usefulfor ignoring bogus Received headers created by an ISP's local deliveryagent.

Keywords Not Corresponding To Option Switches

The `folder' and `smtphost' options (unlike their command-lineequivalents) can take a space- or comma-separated list of namesfollowing them.

All options correspond to the obvious command-line arguments, exceptthe following: `via', `interval', `aka', `is', `to', `dns'/`no dns',`password', `preconnect', `postconnect', `localdomains',`stripcr'/`no stripcr', `forcecr'/`no forcecr', `pass8bits'/`nopass8bits' `dropstatus/no dropstatus', and `no envelope'.

The `via' option is for use with ssh, or if you want to have morethan one configuration pointing at the same site. If it is present,the string argument will be taken as the actual DNS name of the mailserver host to query.This will override the argument of poll, which can then simply be adistinct label for the configuration (e.g. what you would give on thecommand line to explicitly query this host).If the `via' name is `localhost', the poll name will also still beused as a possible match in multidrop mode; otherwise the `via' namewill be used instead and the poll name will be purely a label.

The `interval' option (which takes a numeric argument) allows you to poll aserver less frequently than the basic poll interval. If you say`interval N' the server this option is attached to will only bequeried every N poll intervals.

The `is' or `to' keywords associate the following local (client)name(s) (or server-name to client-name mappings separated by =) withthe mailserver user name in the entry. If an is/to list has `*' asits last name, unrecognized names are simply passed through.

A single local name can be used to support redirecting your mail whenyour username on the client machine is different from your name on themailserver. When there is only a single local name, mail is forwardedto that local username regardless of the message's Received, To, Cc,and Bcc headers. In this case fetchmailnever does DNS lookups.

When there is more than one local name (or name mapping) thefetchmail code does look at the Received, To, Cc, and Bccheaders of retrieved mail (this is `multidrop mode'). It looks foraddresses with hostname parts that match your poll name or your `via',`aka' or `localdomains' options, and usually also for hostname partswhich DNS tells it are aliases of the mailserver. See the discussionof `dns', `localdomains', and `aka' for details on how matchingaddresses are handled. If fetchmail cannot match any mailserverusernames or localdomain addresses, the default recipient is thecalling user (as set by the USER or LOGNAME variable in theenvironment; you could use this to redirect to an alias like postmaster).

The `dns' option (normally on) controls the way addresses frommultidrop mailboxes are checked. On, it enables logic to check eachhost address that doesn't match an `aka' or `localdomains' declarationby looking it up with DNS. When a mailserver username is recognizedattached to a matching hostname part, its local mapping is added tothe list of local recipients.

The `aka' option is for use with multidrop mailboxes. It allows youto pre-declare a list of DNS aliases for a server. This is anoptimization hack that allows you to trade space for speed. Whenfetchmail,while processing a multidrop mailbox, grovels through message headerslooking for names of the mailserver, pre-declaring common ones cansave it from having to do DNS lookups.

The `localdomains' option allows you to declare a list of domainswhich fetchmail should consider local. When fetchmail is parsingaddress lines in multidrop modes, and a trailing segment of a hostname matches a declared local domain, that address is passed throughto the listener or MDA unaltered (local-name mappings are notapplied).

If you are using `localdomains', you may also need to specify `noenvelope', which disables fetchmail's normal attempt to deducean envelope address from the Received line or X-Envelope-To header orwhatever header has been previously set by `envelope'. If you set `noenvelope' in the defaults entry it is possible to undo that inindividual entries by using `envelope <string>'. As a special case,`envelope "Received"' restores the default parsing ofReceived lines.

The password option requires a string argument, which is the passwordto be used with the entry's server.

The `preconnect' keyword allows you to specify a shell command to beexecuted just before each timefetchmailestablishes a mailserver connection. This may be useful if you are attempting to set up secure POP connections with the aid ofssh(1).If the command returns a nonzero status, the poll of that mailserverwill be aborted.

Similarly, the `postconnect' keyword similarly allows you to specify ashell command to be executed just after each time a mailserverconnection is taken down.

The `forcecr' option controls whether lines terminated by LF only aregiven CRLF termination before forwarding. Strictly speaking RFC821requires this, but few MTAs enforce the requirement it so this optionis normally off (only one such MTA, qmail, is in significant use attime of writing).

The `stripcr' option controls whether carriage returns are strippedout of retrieved mail before it is forwarded. It is normally notnecessary to set this, because it defaults to `on' (CR strippingenabled) when there is an MDA declared but `off' (CR strippingdisabled) when forwarding is via SMTP. If `stripcr' and `forcecr' areboth on, `stripcr' will override.

The `pass8bits' option exists to cope with Microsoft mail programs thatstupidly slap a "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit" on everything. Withthis option off (the default) and such a header present, fetchmaildeclares BODY=7BIT to an ESMTP-capable listener; this causes problems formessages actually using 8-bit ISO or KOI-8 character sets, which willbe garbled by having the high bits of all characters stripped. If`pass8bits' is on, fetchmailis forced to declare BODY=8BITMIME to any ESMTP-capable listener. Ifthe listener is 8-bit-clean (as all the major ones now are) the rightthing will probably result.

The `dropstatus' option controls whether nonempty Status andX-Mozilla-Status lines are retained in fetched mail (the default) ordiscarded. Retaining them allows your MUA to see what messages (ifany) were marked seen on the server. On the other hand, it canconfuse some new-mail notifiers, which assume that anything with aStatus line in it has been seen. (Note: the empty Status linesinserted by some buggy POP servers are unconditionally discarded.)

Miscellaneous Run Control Options

The words `here' and `there' have useful English-likesignificance. Normally `user eric is esr' would mean that mail for the remote user `eric' is to be delivered to `esr',but you can make this clearer by saying `user eric there is esr here',or reverse it by saying `user esr here is eric there'

Legal protocol identifiers for use with the `protocol' keyword are:

    auto (or AUTO)
    pop2 (or POP2)
    pop3 (or POP3)
    imap (or IMAP)
    imap-k4 (or IMAP-K4)
    imap-gss (or IMAP-GSS)
    apop (or APOP)
    kpop (or KPOP)

Legal authentication types are `password' or `kerberos'. The formerspecifies authentication by normal transmission of a password (thepassword may be plaintext or subject to protocol-specific encryptionas in APOP); the second tells fetchmail to try to get a Kerberosticket at the start of each query instead, and send an arbitrarystring as the password.

Specifying `kpop' sets POP3 protocol over port 1109 with Kerberos V4preauthentication. These defaults may be overridden by later options.

There are currently three global option statements; `set logfile'followed by a string sets the same global specified by --logfile. Acommand-line --logfile option will override this. Also, `set daemon'sets the poll interval as --daemon does. This can be overridden bya command-line --daemon option; in particular --daemon 0 can be used to force foreground operation. Finally, `set syslog' sends logmessages to syslogd(8).

INTERACTION WITH RFC 822

When trying to detertmine the originating address of a message,fetchmail looks through headers in the following order:

        Return-Path:
        Resent-Sender:
        Sender:
        Resent-From:
        From:
        Reply-To:
        Apparently-From:

The originating address is used for logging, and to set the MAIL FROMaddress when forwarding to SMTP. This order is intended to copegracefully with receiving mailing list messages in multidrop mode. Theintent is that if a local address doesn't exist, the bounce messagewon't be returned blindly to the author or to the list itself, butrather to the list manager (which is less annoying).

In multidrop mode, destination headers are processed as follows:First, fetchmail looks for the Received: header (or whichever one isspecified by the `envelope' option) to determine the localrecipient adress. If the mail is addressed to more than one recipient,the Received line won't contain any information regarding recipient adresses.

Then fetchmail looks for the Resent-To:, Resent-Cc:, and Resent-Bcc:lines. If they exists, they should contain the final recipients andhave precedence over their To:/Cc:/Bcc: counterparts. If the Resent-*lines doesn't exist, the To:, Cc:, Bcc: and Apparently-To: lines arelooked for. (The presence of a Resent-To: is taken to impluy that theperson referred by the To: address has already received the originalcopy of the mail).

CONFIGURATION EXAMPLES

Basic format is:

  poll SERVERNAME protocol PROTOCOL username NAME password PASSWORD

Example:

  poll pop.provider.net protocol pop3 username jsmith password secret1

Or, using some abbreviations:

  poll pop.provider.net proto pop3 user jsmith password secret1

Multiple servers may be listed:

  poll pop.provider.net proto pop3 user jsmith pass secret1  poll other.provider.net proto pop2 user John.Smith pass My^Hat

Here's a version of those two with more whitespace and some noise words:

  poll pop.provider.net proto pop3      user jsmith, with password secret1, is jsmith here;  poll other.provider.net proto pop2:      user John.Smith, with password My^Hat, is John.Smith here;

This version is much easier to read and doesn't cost significantlymore (parsing is done only once, at startup time).

If you need to include whitespace in a parameter string, enclose thestring in double quotes. Thus:

  poll mail.provider.net with proto pop3:        user jsmith there has password "u can't krak this"                    is jws here and wants mda "/bin/mail"

You may have an initial server description headed by the keyword`defaults' instead of `poll' followed by a name. Such a recordis interpreted as defaults for all queries to use. It may be overwrittenby individual server descriptions. So, you could write:

  defaults proto pop3        user jsmith  poll pop.provider.net        pass secret1  poll mail.provider.net        user jjsmith there has password secret2

It's possible to specify more than one user per server (this is onlylikely to be useful when running fetchmail in daemon mode as root).The `user' keyword leads off a user description, and every user specificationin a multi-user entry must include it. Here's an example:

  poll pop.provider.net proto pop3 port 3111        user jsmith with pass secret1 is smith here        user jones with pass secret2 is jjones here

This associates the local username `smith' with the pop.provider.netusername `jsmith' and the local username `jjones' with thepop.provider.net username `jones'.

Here's what a simple retrieval configuration for a multi-drop mailboxlooks like:

  poll pop.provider.net:        user maildrop with pass secret1 to golux hurkle=happy snark here

This says that the mailbox of account `maildrop' on the server is amulti-drop box, and that messages in it should be parsed for theserver user names `golux', `hurkle', and `snark'. It furtherspecifies that `golux' and `snark' have the same name on theclient as on the server, but mail for server user `hurkle' should bedelivered to client user `happy'.

Here's an example of another kind of multidrop connection:

  poll pop.provider.net localdomains loonytoons.org:        user maildrop with pass secret1 to esr * here

This also says that the mailbox of account `maildrop' on the server isa multi-drop box. It tells fetchmail that any address in theloonytoons.org domain (including subdomain addresses like`joeAATTdaffy.loonytoons.org') should be passed through to the local SMTPlistener without modification. Be careful of mail loops if you do this!

Here's an example configuration using ssh. The queries go through anssh connecting local port 1234 to port 110 on mailhost.net; thepreconnect command sets up the ssh.

poll mailhost.net via localhost port 1234 with pop3:        preconnect "ssh -f -L 1234:mailhost.net:110                mailhost.net sleep 20 </dev/null >/dev/null";

THE USE AND ABUSE OF MULTIDROP MAILBOXES

Use the multiple-local-recipients feature with caution -- it can bite.Also note that all multidrop features are ineffective in ETRN mode.

Header vs. Envelope addresses

The fundamental problem is that by having your mailserver toss severalpeoples' mail in a single maildrop box, you may have thrown awaypotentially vital information about who each piece of mail wasactually addressed to (the `envelope address', as opposed to theheader addresses in the RFC822 To/Cc/Bcc headers). This `envelopeaddress' is the address you need in order to reroute mail properly.

Sometimes fetchmailcan deduce the envelope address. If the mailserver MTA issendmailand the item of mail had just one recipient, the MTA will have writtena `by/for' clause that gives the envelope addressee into its Receivedheader. But this doesn't work reliably for other MTAs, nor if there ismore than one recipient. By default, fetchmail looks forenvelope addresses in these lines; you can restore this default with-E "Received" or `envelope Received'.

Alternatively, some SMTP listeners and/or mail servers insert a headerin each message containing a copy of the envelope addresses. Thisheader (when it exists) is often `X-Envelope-To'. Fetchmail'sassumption about this can be changed with the -E or `envelope' option.Note that writing an envelope header of this kind exposes the names ofrecipients (including blind-copy recopients) to all receivers of themessages; it is therefore regarded by some administrators as asecurity/privacy problem.

A slight variation of the `X-Envelope-To' header is the `Delivered-To' putby qmail to avoid mail loops. It will probably prefix the user name with astring that normally matches the user's domain. To remove this prefix youcan use the -Q or `qvirtual' option.

Sometimes, unfortunately, neither of these methods works. When theyall fail, fetchmail must fall back on the contents of To/Cc/Bccheaders to try to determine recipient addressees -- and these are notreliable. In particular, mailing-list software often ships mail withonly the list broadcast address in the To header.

Whenfetchmailcannot deduce a recipient address that is local, and the intendedrecipient address was anyone other than fetchmail's invoking user,mail will get lost. This is what makes the multidrop feature risky.

A related problem is that when you blind-copy a mail message, the Bccinformation is carried only as envelope address (it's not putin the headers fetchmail can see unless there is an X-Envelopeheader). Thus, blind-copying to someone who gets mail over afetchmail link will fail unless the the mailserver host routinelywrites X-Envelope or an equivalent header into messages in your maildrop.

Good Ways To Use Multidrop Mailboxes

Multiple local names can be used to administer a mailing list from theclient side of a fetchmail collection. Suppose your name is`esr', and you want to both pick up your own mail and maintain a mailinglist called (say) "fetchmail-friends", and you want to keep the aliaslist on your client machine.

On your server, you can alias `fetchmail-friends' to `esr'; then, inyour .fetchmailrc, declare `to esr fetchmail-friends here'.Then, when mail including `fetchmail-friends' as a local addressgets fetched, the list name will be appended to the list ofrecipients your SMTP listener sees. Therefore it will undergo aliasexpansion locally. Be sure to include `esr' in the local aliasexpansion of fetchmail-friends, or you'll never see mail sent only tothe list. Also be sure that your listener has the "me-too" option set(sendmail's -oXm command-line option or OXm declaration) so your nameisn't removed from alias expansions in messages you send.

This trick is not without its problems, however. You'll begin to seethis when a message comes in that is addressed only to a mailing listyou do not have declared as a local name. Each such messagewill feature an `X-Fetchmail-Warning' header which is generatedbecause fetchmail cannot find a valid local name in the recipientaddresses. Such messages default (as was described above) to beingsent to the local user runningfetchmail,but the program has no way to know that that's actually the right thing.

Bad Ways To Abuse Multidrop Mailboxes

Multidrop mailboxes and fetchmailserving multiple users in daemon mode do not mix. The problem, again, ismail from mailing lists, which typically does not have an individualrecipient address on it. Unless fetchmailcan deduce an envelope address, such mail will only go to the accountrunning fetchmail (probably root). Also, blind-copied users are verylikely never to see their mail at all.

If you're tempted to use fetchmail to retrieve mail for multiple users from a single mail drop via POP orIMAP, think again (and reread the section on header and envelopeaddresses above). It would be smarter to just let the mail sit in themailserver's queue and use fetchmail's ETRN mode to trigger SMTP sendsperiodically (of course, this means you have to poll more frequentlythan the mailserver's expiry period). If you can't arrange this, trysetting up a UUCP feed.

If you absolutely must use multidrop for this purpose, make sureyour mailserver writes an envelope-address header that fetchmail cansee. Otherwise you will lose mail and it will come backto haunt you.

Speeding Up Multidrop Checking

Normally, when multiple user are declared fetchmailextracts recipient addresses as described above and checks each hostpart with DNS to see if it's an alias of the mailserver. If so, thename mappings described in the to ... here declaration are done andthe mail locally delivered.

This is the safest but also slowest method. To speed it up,pre-declare mailserver aliases with `aka'; these are checked beforeDNS lookups are done. If you're certain your aka list containsallDNS aliases of the mailserver (and all MX names pointing at it) you can declare `no dns' to suppress DNS lookups entirely andonly match against the aka list.

EXIT CODES

To facilitate the use of fetchmailin shell scripts, an exit code is returned to give an indicationof what occurred during a given connection.

The exit codes returned by fetchmailare as follows:

0: One or more messages were successfully retrieved.
1: There was no mail awaiting retrieval. (There may have been old mail stillon the server but not selected for retrieval.)
2: An error was encountered when attempting to open a socket for the POP connection. If you don't know what a socket is, don't worry about it --just treat this as an 'unrecoverable error'.
3: The user authentication step failed. This usually means that a bad user-id, password, or APOP id was specified.
4: Some sort of fatal protocol error was detected.
5: There was a syntax error in the arguments to fetchmail.
6: The run control file had bad permissions.
7: There was an error condition reported by the server. Can alsofire iffetchmailtimed out while waiting for the server.
8: Client-side exclusion error. This means fetchmaileither found another copy of itself already running, or failed in sucha way that it isn't sure whether another copy is running.
9: The user authentication step failed because the server responded "lockbusy". Try again after a brief pause! This error is not implementedfor all protocols, nor for all servers. If not implemented for yourserver, "3" will be returned instead, see above. May be returned whentalking to qpopper or other servers that can respond with "lock busy"or some similar text containing the word "lock".
10: The fetchmail.run failed while trying to do an SMTP port open or transaction.
11: Fatal DNS error. Fetchmail encountered an error while performinga DNS lookup at startup and could not proceed.
11: Internal error. You should see a message on standard error withdetails.

Whenfetchmailqueries more than one host, return status is 0 if any querysuccessfully retrieved mail. Otherwise the returned error status isthat of the last host queried.

AUTHOR

Eric S. Raymond <esrAATTsnark.thyrsus.com>. This program is descended from and replaces popclient,by Carl Harris <ceharrisAATTmal.com>; the internals are quite different, but some of its interface design is directly traceable to thatancestral program.

FILES

~/.fetchmailrc: default run control file
~/.fetchids: default location of file associating hosts with last message IDs seen(used only with newer RFC1725-compliant POP3 servers supporting theUIDL command).
~/.netrc: your FTP run control file, which (if present) will be searched forpasswords as a last resort before prompting for one interactively.
~/.fetchmail.pid: lock file to help prevent concurrent runs (non-root mode).
/var/run/fetchmail.pid: lock file to help prevent concurrent runs (root mode, Linux systems).
/etc/fetchmail.pid: lock file to help prevent concurrent runs (root mode, systems without /var/run).

ENVIRONMENT

For correct initialization, fetchmailrequires either that both the USER and HOME environment variables arecorrectly set, or that getpwuid(3) be able to retrieve a passwordentry from your user ID.

SIGNALS

If afetchmaildaemon is running as root, SIGHUP wakes it up from its sleep phase andforces a poll of all non-skipped servers (this is in accordance withthe usual conventions for system daemons).

Iffetchmailis running in daemon mode as non-root, use SIGUSR1 to wake it (this isso SIGHUP due to logout can retain the default action of killing it).

Runningfetchmailin foreground while a background fetchmail is running will dowhichever of these is appropriate to wake it up.

BUGS AND KNOWN PROBLEMS

The RFC822 parser used in multidrop mode chokes on some @-addresses thatare technically legal but bizarre. Strange uses of quoting andembedded comments are likely to confuse it.

Use of any of the supported protocols other than POP3 with OTP or RPA, APOP,KPOP, IMAP-K4, IMAP-GSS, or ETRN requires that the program send unencryptedpasswords over the TCP/IP connection to the mailserver. This createsa risk that name/password pairs might be snaffled with a packetsniffer or more sophisticated monitoring software. Under Linux, the--interface option can be used to restrict polling to availability ofa specific interface device with a specific local IP address, butsnooping is still possible if (a) either host has a network devicethat can be opened in promiscuous mode, or (b) the intervening networklink can be tapped.

Use of the %F or %T escapes in an mda option could open a securityhole, because they pass text manipulable by an attacker to a shellcommand. The hole is reduced by the fact that fetchmail temporarilydiscards any suid privileges it may have while running the MDA. Toavoid potential problems, (1) enclose the %F and %T escapes in singlequotes within the option, and (2) never use an mda command containing%F or %T when fetchmail is run from the root account itself.

Send comments, bug reports, gripes, and the like to Eric S. Raymond<esrAATTthyrsus.com>. An HTML FAQ is available at the fetchmail homepage; surf to http://www.ccil.org/~esr/fetchmail or do a WWW searchfor pages with `fetchmail' in their titles.