Pine

Syntax
pine [ options ] [ address , address ]
pinef [ options ] [ address , address ]

Description
Pine is a screen-oriented message-handling tool. In its default configuration, Pine offers an intentionally lim­ ited set of functions geared toward the novice user, but it also has a growing list of optional "power-user" and personal-preference features. pinef is a variant of Pine that uses function keys rather than mnemonic single-letter commands. Pine's basic feature set includes:

• View, Save, Export, Delete, Print, Reply and For­ ward messages.
• Compose messages in a simple editor (Pico) with word-wrap and a spelling checker. Messages may be postponed for later completion.
• Full-screen selection and management of message folders.
• Address book to keep a list of long or frequently-used addresses. Personal distribution lists may be defined. Addresses may be taken into the address book from incoming mail without retyping them.
• New mail checking and notification occurs automati­ cally every 2.5 minutes and after certain commands, e.g. refresh-screen (Ctrl-L).
• On-line, context-sensitive help screens.

Pine supports MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Exten­ sions), an Internet Standard for representing multipart and multimedia data in email. Pine allows you to save MIME objects to files, and in some cases, can also initi­ ate the correct program for viewing the object. It uses the system's mailcap configuration file to determine what program can process a particular MIME object type. Pine's message composer does not have integral multimedia capa­ bility, but any type of data file --including multimedia-- can be attached to a text message and sent using MIME's encoding rules. This allows any group of individuals with MIME-capable mail software (e.g. Pine, PC-Pine, or many other programs) to exchange formatted documents, spread-sheets, image files, etc, via Internet email.

Pine uses the c-client messaging API to access local and remote mail folders. This library provides a variety of low-level message-handling functions, including drivers for a variety of different mail file formats, as well as routines to access remote mail and news servers, using IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) and NNTP (Network News Transport Protocol). Outgoing mail is usually handed-off to the Unix sendmail, program but it can optionally be posted directly via SMTP (Simple Mail Trans­ fer Protocol).

Options
The command line options/arguments are:

address
Send mail to address. This will cause Pine to go directly into the message composer.

-attach file
Send mail with the listed file as an attachment.

-attachlist file-list
Send mail with the listed file-list as an attachments.

-attach_and_delete file
Send mail with the listed file as an attachment, and remove the file after the message is sent.

-aux local_directory
PC-Pine only. When using a remote con­ figuration (-p ) this tells PC-Pine the local directory to use for storing auxiliary files, like debug files, address books, and signa­ ture files.

-bail
Exit if the pinerc file does not exist. This might be useful if the config file is accessed using some remote filesystem protocol. If the remote mount is missing this will cause Pine to quit instead of creating a new pinerc.

-c context-number
context-number is the number corre­ sponding to the folder-collection to which the -f command line argument should be applied. By default the -f argument is applied to the first defined folder-collection.

-conf
Produce a sample/fresh copy of the system-wide configuration file, pine.conf, on the standard output. This is distinct from the per-user .pinerc file.

-convert_sigs -p pinerc
Convert signature files into literal signatures.

-copy_abook
Copy the local address book file to a remote address book folder.

-copy_pinerc
Copy the local pinerc file to a remote pinerc folder.

-create_lu addrbook sort-order
Creates auxiliarly index (look-up) file for addrbook and sorts addrbook in sort-order, which may be dont-sort, nickname, fullname, nickname-with-lists-last, or fullname-with-lists-last. Useful when creating global or shared address books. After creating the index file in this way, the file should be moved or copied in a way which preserves the mtime of the address book file. The mtime of the address book file at the time the index file was built is stored inside the index file and a comparison between that stored value and the cur­ rent mtime of the address book file is done when somebody runs pine. If the mtime has changed since the index file was made, then pine will want to rebuild the index file. In other words, don't build the index file with this option and then copy the address book to its final destination in a way which changes the file's mtime.

-d debug-level
Output diagnostic info at debug-level (0-9) to the current .pine-debug[1-4] file. A value of 0 turns debugging off and suppresses the .pine-debug file.

-d key[=val]
Fine tuned output of diagnostic mes­ sages where "flush" causes debug file writing without buffering, "timestamp" appends each message with a timestamp, "imap=n" where n is between 0 and 4 representing none to verbose IMAP telemetry reporting, "numfiles=n" where n is between 0 and 31 corre­ sponding to the number of debug files to maintain, and "verbose=n" where n is between 0 and 9 indicating an inverse threshold for message output.

-f folder
Open folder (in first defined folder collection, use -c n to specify another collection) instead of INBOX.

-F file
Open named text file and view with Pine's browser.

-h
Help: list valid command-line options.

-i
Start up in the FOLDER INDEX screen.

-I keystrokes
Initial (comma separated list of) keystrokes which Pine should execute on startup.

-k
Use function keys for commands. This is the same as running the command pinef.

-n number
Start up with current message-number set to number.

-o
Open first folder read-only.

-p config-file
Use config-file as the personal con­ figuration file instead of the default .pinerc.

-P config-file Use config-file as the configuration file instead of default system-wide configuration file pine.conf.

-pinerc file
Output fresh pinerc configuration to file, preserving the settings of vari­ ables that the user has made. Use file set to ``-'' to make output go to standard out. -registry cmd 20 For PC-Pine only, this option affects the values of Pine's registry entries. Possible values for cmd are set, clear, and dump. Set will always reset Pine's registry entries accord­ ing to its current settings. Clear will clear the registry values. Dump will display the values of current registry settings. Note that the dump command is currently disabled. With­ out the -registry option, PC-Pine will write values into the registry only if there currently aren't any values set.

-r
Use restricted/demo mode. Pine will only send mail to itself and functions like save and export are restricted.

-sort order
Sort the FOLDER INDEX display in one of the following orders: arrival, date, subject, orderedsubj, thread, from, size, score, to, cc, or reverse. Arrival order is the default. The OrderedSubj choice simulates a threaded sort. Any sort may be reversed by adding /reverse to it. Reverse by itself is the same as arrival/reverse.

-supported
Some options may or may not be sup­ ported depending on how Pine was com­ piled. This is a way to determine which options are supported in the particular copy of Pine you are using.

-url url
Open the given url. Cannot be used with -f, -F, or -attach options.

-v
Version: Print version information.

-version
Version: Print version information.

-x config
Use configuration exceptions in con­ fig. Exceptions are used to override your default pinerc settings for a particular platform, can be a local file or a remote folder.

-z
Enable ^Z and SIGTSTP so pine may be suspended.

-option=value
Assign value to the config option option e.g. -signature-file=sig1 or -feature-list=signature-at-bottom (Note: feature-list values are addi­ tive)

Configuration
There are several levels of Pine configuration. Configuration values at a given level over-ride corresponding values at lower levels. In order of increasing precedence:

• built-in defaults.
• system-wide pine.conf file.
• personal .pinerc file (may be set via built-in Setup/Config menu.)
• command-line options.
• system-wide pine.conf.fixed file.

There is one exception to the rule that configuration values are replaced by the value of the same option in a higher-precedence file: the feature-list variable has val­ ues that are additive, but can be negated by prepending "no-" in front of an individual feature name.

Unix Pine also uses the following environment variables:

Term Display
determines if Pine can display IMAGE attachments

Shell
if not set, default is /bin/sh

Mailcaps
semicolon delimited list of path names to mailcap files

Files