1aerc-tutorial(7) Miscellaneous Information Manual aerc-tutorial(7)
2
6 aerc - the world's best email client
7
9 Welcome to aerc! This tutorial will guide you through your first steps
10 in using the client. This tutorial is a man page - you can read it
11 again later with :help tutorial from aerc, or man aerc-tutorial from
12 your terminal.
13 First, let's introduce some basic keybindings. For convention, we'll
15 use <C-p> to represent Ctrl+p, which matches the convention used for
16 writing keybindings for aerc.
17 <C-p>, <C-n>
19 Cycles to the previous or next tab
20 Try using these now to switch between your message list and the tuto‐
22 rial. In your message list, we use vim-style keys to get around.
23 k, j
25 Scrolls up and down between messages
26 <C-u>, <C-d>
28 Scrolls half a page up or down
29 g, G
31 Selects the first or last message, respectively
32 K, J
34 Switches between folders in the sidebar
35 <Enter>
37 Opens the selected message
38 You can also search the selected folder with /, or filter with \. When
40 searching you can use n and p to jump to the next and previous result.
41 Filtering hides any non-matching message.
42
44 Press <Enter> to open a message. By default, the message viewer will
45 display your message using less(1). This should also have familiar,
46 vim-like keybindings for scrolling around in your message.
47 Multipart messages (messages with attachments, or messages with several
49 alternative formats) show a part selector on the bottom of the message
50 viewer.
51 <C-k>, <C-j>
53 Cycle between parts of a multipart message
54 q
56 Close the message viewer
57 To show HTML messages, uncomment the text/html filter in your aerc.conf
59 file (which is probably in ~/.config/aerc/) and install its dependen‐
60 cies: w3m and dante-utils.
61 You can also do many tasks you could do in the message list from here,
63 like replying to emails, deleting the email, or view the next and pre‐
64 vious message (J and K).
65
67 Return to the message list by pressing q to dismiss the message viewer.
68 Once there, let's compose a message.
69 C
71 Compose a new message
72 rr
74 Reply-all to a message
75 rq
77 Reply-all to a message, and pre-fill the editor with a quoted ver‐
78 sion of the message being replied to
79 Rr
81 Reply to a message
82 Rq
84 Reply to a message, and pre-fill the editor with a quoted version
85 of the message being replied to
86 For now, let's use C to compose a new message. The message composer
88 will appear. You should see To, From, and Subject lines, as well as
89 your $EDITOR. You can use <Tab> or <C-j> and <C-k> to cycle between
90 these fields (tab won't cycle between fields once you enter the editor,
91 but <C-j> and <C-k> will).
92 Let's send an email to yourself. Note that the To and From headers ex‐
94 pect RFC 5322 addresses, e.g. John Doe <john@example.org>, or simply
95 <john@example.org>. Separate multiple recipients with commas. Go ahead
96 and fill out an email, then close the editor.
97 The message review screen is shown next. You have a chance now to re‐
99 vise the email before it's sent. Press y to send the email if it looks
100 good.
101 Note: when using the terminal in the message view, you can summon
103 aerc's ex command line by using <C-x>. ':' is sent to the editor.
104
106 aerc comes with an embedded terminal, which you've already used to view
107 and edit emails. We can also use this for other purposes, such as ref‐
108 erencing a git repository while reviewing a patch. From the message
109 list, we can use the following keybindings to open a terminal:
110 <C-t>
112 Opens a new terminal tab, running your shell
113 $, !
115 Prompts for a command to run, then opens a new terminal tab running
116 that command
117 |
119 Prompts for a command to run, then pipes the selected email into
120 that command and displays the result on a new terminal tab
121 Try pressing $ and entering "top". You can also use the :cd command to
123 change aerc's working directory, and the directory in which new termi‐
124 nals run. Use :pwd to see it again if you're not sure where you are.
125
127 COMMANDS
128 Every keybinding is ultimately bound to an aerc command. You can also
129 summon the command line by pressing ':', then entering one of these
130 commands. See aerc(1) or :help for a full list of commands.
131 MESSAGE FILTERS
133 When displaying messages in the message viewer, aerc will pipe them
134 through a message filter first. This allows you to decode messages in
135 non-plaintext formats, add syntax highlighting, etc. aerc ships with a
136 few default filters:
137 • Emails which begin with "[PATCH" will be piped into a filter for
139 rendering git-format-patch and hg export emails.
140 • text/html is rendered with w3m in a network sandbox
141 • text/* is rendered with a simple filter for coloring quoted text
142 CUSTOMIZING AERC
145 Aerc is highly customizable. Review aerc-config(5) (or use :help con‐
146 fig) to learn more about how to add custom keybindings, install new
147 message filters, change its appearance and behavior, and so on.
148
150 Originally created by Drew DeVault <sir@cmpwn.com> and maintained by
151 Robin Jarry <robin@jarry.cc> who is assisted by other open source con‐
152 tributors. For more information about aerc development, see
153 https://sr.ht/~rjarry/aerc/.
154 2022-11-02 aerc-tutorial(7)