Message Manual

All message composition from Gnus (both mail and news) takes place in Message mode buffers.

Message is distributed with Gnus. The Gnus distribution corresponding to this manual is No Gnus v0.11.

1. Interface

When a program (or a person) wants to respond to a message--reply, follow up, forward, cancel--the program (or person) should just put point in the buffer where the message is and call the required command. Message will then pop up a new message mode buffer with appropriate headers filled out, and the user can edit the message before sending it.

You can customize the Message Mode tool bar, see M-x customize-apropos RET message-tool-bar. This feature is only available in Emacs.

1.1 New Mail Message

The message-mail command pops up a new message buffer.

Two optional parameters are accepted: The first will be used as the To header and the second as the Subject header. If these are nil, those two headers will be empty.

1.2 New News Message

The message-news command pops up a new message buffer.

This function accepts two optional parameters. The first will be used as the Newsgroups header and the second as the Subject header. If these are nil, those two headers will be empty.

1.3 Reply

The message-reply function pops up a message buffer that's a reply to the message in the current buffer.

Message uses the normal methods to determine where replies are to go (see section 5.1 Responses), but you can change the behavior to suit your needs by fiddling with the message-reply-to-function variable.

If you want the replies to go to the Sender instead of the From, you could do something like this:

(setq message-reply-to-function
      (lambda ()
       (cond ((equal (mail-fetch-field "from") "somebody")
               (list (cons 'To (mail-fetch-field "sender"))))
             (t
              nil))))

This function will be called narrowed to the head of the article that is being replied to.

As you can see, this function should return a list. In this case, it returns ((To . "Whom")) if it has an opinion as to what the To header should be. If it does not, it should just return nil, and the normal methods for determining the To header will be used.

Each list element should be a cons, where the CAR should be the name of a header (e.g. Cc) and the CDR should be the header value (e.g. `larsi@ifi.uio.no'). All these headers will be inserted into the head of the outgoing mail.

1.4 Wide Reply

The message-wide-reply pops up a message buffer that's a wide reply to the message in the current buffer. A wide reply is a reply that goes out to all people listed in the To, From (or Reply-to) and Cc headers.

Message uses the normal methods to determine where wide replies are to go, but you can change the behavior to suit your needs by fiddling with the message-wide-reply-to-function. It is used in the same way as message-reply-to-function (see section 1.3 Reply).

Addresses that match the message-dont-reply-to-names regular expression (or list of regular expressions) will be removed from the Cc header. A value of nil means exclude your name only.

If message-wide-reply-confirm-recipients is non-nil you will be asked to confirm that you want to reply to multiple recipients. The default is nil.

1.5 Followup

The message-followup command pops up a message buffer that's a followup to the message in the current buffer.

Message uses the normal methods to determine where followups are to go, but you can change the behavior to suit your needs by fiddling with the message-followup-to-function. It is used in the same way as message-reply-to-function (see section 1.3 Reply).

The message-use-followup-to variable says what to do about Followup-To headers. If it is use, always use the value. If it is ask (which is the default), ask whether to use the value. If it is t, use the value unless it is `poster'. If it is nil, don't use the value.

1.6 Canceling News

The message-cancel-news command cancels the article in the current buffer.

The value of message-cancel-message is inserted in the body of the cancel message. The default is `I am canceling my own article.'.

When Message posts news messages, it inserts Cancel-Lock headers by default. This is a cryptographic header that ensures that only you can cancel your own messages, which is nice. The downside is that if you lose your `.emacs' file (which is where Gnus stores the secret cancel lock password (which is generated automatically the first time you use this feature)), you won't be able to cancel your message. If you want to manage a password yourself, you can put something like the following in your `~/.gnus.el' file:

(setq canlock-password "geheimnis"
      canlock-password-for-verify canlock-password)

Whether to insert the header or not is controlled by the message-insert-canlock variable.

Not many news servers respect the Cancel-Lock header yet, but this is expected to change in the future.

1.7 Superseding

The message-supersede command pops up a message buffer that will supersede the message in the current buffer.

Headers matching the message-ignored-supersedes-headers are removed before popping up the new message buffer. The default is
`^Path:\\|^Date\\|^NNTP-Posting-Host:\\|^Xref:\\|^Lines:\\|
^Received:\\|^X-From-Line:\\|^X-Trace:\\|^X-Complaints-To:\\|
Return-Path:\\|^Supersedes:\\|^NNTP-Posting-Date:\\|^X-Trace:\\|
^X-Complaints-To:\\|^Cancel-Lock:\\|^Cancel-Key:\\|^X-Hashcash:\\|
^X-Payment:\\|^Approved:'.

1.8 Forwarding

The message-forward command pops up a message buffer to forward the message in the current buffer. If given a prefix, forward using news.

message-forward-ignored-headers

All headers that match this regexp will be deleted when forwarding a message.

message-make-forward-subject-function

A list of functions that are called to generate a subject header for forwarded messages. The subject generated by the previous function is passed into each successive function.

The provided functions are:

message-forward-subject-author-subject

Source of article (author or newsgroup), in brackets followed by the subject.

message-forward-subject-fwd

Subject of article with `Fwd:' prepended to it.

message-wash-forwarded-subjects

If this variable is t, the subjects of forwarded messages have the evidence of previous forwards (such as `Fwd:', `Re:', `(fwd)') removed before the new subject is constructed. The default value is nil.

message-forward-as-mime

If this variable is t (the default), forwarded messages are included as inline MIME RFC822 parts. If it's nil, forwarded messages will just be copied inline to the new message, like previous, non MIME-savvy versions of Gnus would do.

message-forward-before-signature

If non-nil, put forwarded message before signature, else after.

1.9 Resending

The message-resend command will prompt the user for an address and resend the message in the current buffer to that address.

Headers that match the message-ignored-resent-headers regexp will be removed before sending the message.

1.10 Bouncing

The message-bounce command will, if the current buffer contains a bounced mail message, pop up a message buffer stripped of the bounce information. A bounced message is typically a mail you've sent out that has been returned by some mailer-daemon as undeliverable.

Headers that match the message-ignored-bounced-headers regexp will be removed before popping up the buffer. The default is `^\\(Received\\|Return-Path\\|Delivered-To\\):'.

1.11 Mailing Lists

Sometimes while posting to mailing lists, the poster needs to direct followups to the post to specific places. The Mail-Followup-To (MFT) was created to enable just this. Three example scenarios where this is useful:

• A mailing list poster can use MFT to express that responses should be sent to just the list, and not the poster as well. This will happen if the poster is already subscribed to the list.

• A mailing list poster can use MFT to express that responses should be sent to the list and the poster as well. This will happen if the poster is not subscribed to the list.

• If a message is posted to several mailing lists, MFT may also be used to direct the following discussion to one list only, because discussions that are spread over several lists tend to be fragmented and very difficult to follow.

Gnus honors the MFT header in other's messages (i.e. while following up to someone else's post) and also provides support for generating sensible MFT headers for outgoing messages as well.

1.11.1 Composing a correct MFT header automagically

The first step in getting Gnus to automagically generate a MFT header in posts you make is to give Gnus a list of the mailing lists addresses you are subscribed to. You can do this in more than one way. The following variables would come in handy.

message-subscribed-addresses

This should be a list of addresses the user is subscribed to. Its default value is nil. Example:

(setq message-subscribed-addresses '("ding@gnus.org" "bing@noose.org"))

message-subscribed-regexps

This should be a list of regexps denoting the addresses of mailing lists subscribed to. Default value is nil. Example: If you want to achieve the same result as above:

(setq message-subscribed-regexps '("\\(ding@gnus\\)\\|\\(bing@noose\\)\\.org")

message-subscribed-address-functions

This can be a list of functions to be called (one at a time!!) to determine the value of MFT headers. It is advisable that these functions not take any arguments. Default value is nil.

There is a pre-defined function in Gnus that is a good candidate for this variable. gnus-find-subscribed-addresses is a function that returns a list of addresses corresponding to the groups that have the subscribed (see section `Group Parameters' in The Gnus Manual) group parameter set to a non-nil value. This is how you would do it.

(setq message-subscribed-address-functions '(gnus-find-subscribed-addresses))

message-subscribed-address-file

You might be one organized human freak and have a list of addresses of all subscribed mailing lists in a separate file! Then you can just set this variable to the name of the file and life would be good.

You can use one or more of the above variables. All their values are "added" in some way that works :-)

Now you are all set. Just start composing a message as you normally do. And just send it; as always. Just before the message is sent out, Gnus' MFT generation thingy kicks in and checks if the message already has a MFT field. If there is one, it is left alone. (Except if it's empty - in that case, the field is removed and is not replaced with an automatically generated one. This lets you disable MFT generation on a per-message basis.) If there is none, then the list of recipient addresses (in the To: and Cc: headers) is checked to see if one of them is a list address you are subscribed to. If none of them is a list address, then no MFT is generated; otherwise, a MFT is added to the other headers and set to the value of all addresses in To: and Cc:

Hm. "So", you ask, "what if I send an email to a list I am not subscribed to? I want my MFT to say that I want an extra copy." (This is supposed to be interpreted by others the same way as if there were no MFT, but you can use an explicit MFT to override someone else's to-address group parameter.) The function message-generate-unsubscribed-mail-followup-to might come in handy. It is bound to C-c C-f C-a by default. In any case, you can insert a MFT of your own choice; C-c C-f C-m (message-goto-mail-followup-to) will help you get started.

1.11.2 Honoring an MFT post

When you followup to a post on a mailing list, and the post has a MFT header, Gnus' action will depend on the value of the variable message-use-mail-followup-to. This variable can be one of:

use

Always honor MFTs. The To: and Cc: headers in your followup will be derived from the MFT header of the original post. This is the default.

nil

Always dishonor MFTs (just ignore the darned thing)

ask

Gnus will prompt you for an action.

It is considered good netiquette to honor MFT, as it is assumed the fellow who posted a message knows where the followups need to go better than you do.

2. Commands

2.1 Buffer Entry

You most often end up in a Message buffer when responding to some other message of some sort. Message does lots of handling of quoted text, and may remove signatures, reformat the text, or the like--depending on which used settings you're using. Message usually gets things right, but sometimes it stumbles. To help the user unwind these stumblings, Message sets the undo boundary before each major automatic action it takes. If you press the undo key (usually located at C-_) a few times, you will get back the un-edited message you're responding to.

2.2 Header Commands

2.2.1 Commands for moving to headers

These following commands move to the header in question. If it doesn't exist, it will be inserted.

C-c ?

Describe the message mode.

C-c C-f C-t

Go to the To header (message-goto-to).

C-c C-f C-o

Go to the From header (message-goto-from). (The "o" in the key binding is for Originator.)

C-c C-f C-b

Go to the Bcc header (message-goto-bcc).

C-c C-f C-f

Go to the Fcc header (message-goto-fcc).

C-c C-f C-c

Go to the Cc header (message-goto-cc).

C-c C-f C-s

Go to the Subject header (message-goto-subject).

C-c C-f C-r

Go to the Reply-To header (message-goto-reply-to).

C-c C-f C-n

Go to the Newsgroups header (message-goto-newsgroups).

C-c C-f C-d

Go to the Distribution header (message-goto-distribution).

C-c C-f C-o

Go to the Followup-To header (message-goto-followup-to).

C-c C-f C-k

Go to the Keywords header (message-goto-keywords).

C-c C-f C-u

Go to the Summary header (message-goto-summary).

C-c C-f C-i

This inserts the `Importance:' header with a value of `high'. This header is used to signal the importance of the message to the receiver. If the header is already present in the buffer, it cycles between the three valid values according to RFC 1376: `low', `normal' and `high'.

C-c C-f C-a

Insert a reasonable `Mail-Followup-To:' header (see section 1.11 Mailing Lists) in a post to an unsubscribed list. When making original posts to a mailing list you are not subscribed to, you have to type in a `Mail-Followup-To:' header by hand. The contents, usually, are the addresses of the list and your own address. This function inserts such a header automatically. It fetches the contents of the `To:' header in the current mail buffer, and appends the current user-mail-address.

If the optional argument include-cc is non-nil, the addresses in the `Cc:' header are also put into the `Mail-Followup-To:' header.

2.2.2 Commands to change headers

C-c C-o

Sort headers according to message-header-format-alist (message-sort-headers).

C-c C-t

Insert a To header that contains the Reply-To or From header of the message you're following up (message-insert-to).

C-c C-n

Insert a Newsgroups header that reflects the Followup-To or Newsgroups header of the article you're replying to (message-insert-newsgroups).

C-c C-l

Send a message to the list only. Remove all addresses but the list address from To: and Cc: headers.

C-c M-n

Insert a request for a disposition notification. (message-insert-disposition-notification-to). This means that if the recipient support RFC 2298 she might send you a notification that she received the message.

M-x message-insert-importance-high

Insert an `Importance' header with a value of `high', deleting headers if necessary.

M-x message-insert-importance-low

Insert an `Importance' header with a value of `low', deleting headers if necessary.

C-c C-f s

Change the current `Subject' header. Ask for new `Subject' header and append `(was: <Old Subject>)'. The old subject can be stripped on replying, see message-subject-trailing-was-query (see section 3.1 Message Headers).

C-c C-f x

Set up the `FollowUp-To' header with a target newsgroup for a cross-post, add that target newsgroup to the `Newsgroups' header if it is not a member of `Newsgroups', and insert a note in the body. If message-cross-post-default is nil or if this command is called with a prefix-argument, only the `FollowUp-To' header will be set but the target newsgroup will not be added to the `Newsgroups' header. The function to insert a note is controlled by the message-cross-post-note-function variable.

C-c C-f t

Replace contents of `To' header with contents of `Cc' or `Bcc' header. (Iff `Cc' header is not present, `Bcc' header will be used instead.)

C-c C-f w

Insert `To' and `Cc' headers as if you were doing a wide reply even if the message was not made for a wide reply first.

C-c C-f a

Insert `X-No-Archive: Yes' in the header and a note in the body. The header and the note can be customized using message-archive-header and message-archive-note. When called with a prefix argument, ask for a text to insert. If you don't want the note in the body, set message-archive-note to nil.

2.3 Movement

C-c C-b

Move to the beginning of the body of the message (message-goto-body).

C-c C-i

Move to the signature of the message (message-goto-signature).

C-a

If at beginning of header value, go to beginning of line, else go to beginning of header value. (The header value comes after the header name and the colon.) This behavior can be disabled by toggling the variable message-beginning-of-line.

2.4 Insertion

C-c C-y

Yank the message that's being replied to into the message buffer (message-yank-original).

C-c C-M-y

Prompt for a buffer name and yank the contents of that buffer into the message buffer (message-yank-buffer).

C-c C-q

Fill the yanked message (message-fill-yanked-message). Warning: Can severely mess up the yanked text if its quoting conventions are strange. You'll quickly get a feel for when it's safe, though. Anyway, just remember that C-x u (undo) is available and you'll be all right.

C-c C-w

Insert a signature at the end of the buffer (message-insert-signature).

C-c M-h

Insert the message headers (message-insert-headers).

C-c M-m

Mark some region in the current article with enclosing tags. See message-mark-insert-begin and message-mark-insert-end. When called with a prefix argument, use slrn style verbatim marks (`#v+' and `#v-').

C-c M-f

Insert a file in the current article with enclosing tags. See message-mark-insert-begin and message-mark-insert-end. When called with a prefix argument, use slrn style verbatim marks (`#v+' and `#v-').

2.5 MIME

Message is a MIME-compliant posting agent. The user generally doesn't have to do anything to make the MIME happen--Message will automatically add the Content-Type and Content-Transfer-Encoding headers.

The most typical thing users want to use the multipart things in MIME for is to add "attachments" to mail they send out. This can be done with the C-c C-a command (M-x mml-attach-file), which will prompt for a file name and a MIME type.

If your Emacs supports drag and drop, you can also drop the file in the Message buffer. The variable mml-dnd-protocol-alist specifies what kind of action is done when you drop a file into the Message buffer. The variable mml-dnd-attach-options controls which MIME options you want to specify when dropping a file. If it is a list, valid members are type, description and disposition. disposition implies type. If it is nil, don't ask for options. If it is t, ask the user whether or not to specify options.

You can also create arbitrarily complex multiparts using the MML language (see section `Composing' in The Emacs MIME Manual).

2.6 IDNA

Message is a IDNA-compliant posting agent. The user generally doesn't have to do anything to make the IDNA happen--Message will encode non-ASCII domain names in From, To, and Cc headers automatically.

Until IDNA becomes more well known, Message queries you whether IDNA encoding of the domain name really should occur. Some users might not be aware that domain names can contain non-ASCII now, so this gives them a safety net if they accidently typed a non-ASCII domain name.

The message-use-idna variable control whether IDNA is used. If the variable is nil no IDNA encoding will ever happen, if it is set to the symbol ask the user will be queried, and if set to t (which is the default if IDNA is fully available) IDNA encoding happens automatically.

If you want to experiment with the IDNA encoding, you can invoke M-x message-idna-to-ascii-rhs RET in the message buffer to have the non-ASCII domain names encoded while you edit the message.

Note that you must have GNU Libidn installed in order to use this functionality.

2.7 Security

Using the MML language, Message is able to create digitally signed and digitally encrypted messages. Message (or rather MML) currently support PGP (RFC 1991), PGP/MIME (RFC 2015/3156) and S/MIME.

2.7.1 Signing and encrypting commands

Instructing MML to perform security operations on a MIME part is done using the C-c C-m s key map for signing and the C-c C-m c key map for encryption, as follows.

C-c C-m s s

Digitally sign current message using S/MIME.

C-c C-m s o

Digitally sign current message using PGP.

C-c C-m s p

Digitally sign current message using PGP/MIME.

C-c C-m c s

Digitally encrypt current message using S/MIME.

C-c C-m c o

Digitally encrypt current message using PGP.

C-c C-m c p

Digitally encrypt current message using PGP/MIME.

C-c C-m C-n

Remove security related MML tags from message.

These commands do not immediately sign or encrypt the message, they merely insert the proper MML secure tag to instruct the MML engine to perform that operation when the message is actually sent. They may perform other operations too, such as locating and retrieving a S/MIME certificate of the person you wish to send encrypted mail to. When the mml parsing engine converts your MML into a properly encoded MIME message, the secure tag will be replaced with either a part or a multipart tag. If your message contains other mml parts, a multipart tag will be used; if no other parts are present in your message a single part tag will be used. This way, message mode will do the Right Thing (TM) with signed/encrypted multipart messages.

Since signing and especially encryption often is used when sensitive information is sent, you may want to have some way to ensure that your mail is actually signed or encrypted. After invoking the above sign/encrypt commands, it is possible to preview the raw article by using C-u C-c RET P (mml-preview). Then you can verify that your long rant about what your ex-significant other or whomever actually did with that funny looking person at that strange party the other night, actually will be sent encrypted.

Note! Neither PGP/MIME nor S/MIME encrypt/signs RFC822 headers. They only operate on the MIME object. Keep this in mind before sending mail with a sensitive Subject line.

By default, when encrypting a message, Gnus will use the "signencrypt" mode, which means the message is both signed and encrypted. If you would like to disable this for a particular message, give the mml-secure-message-encrypt-* command a prefix argument, e.g., C-u C-c C-m c p.

Actually using the security commands above is not very difficult. At least not compared with making sure all involved programs talk with each other properly. Thus, we now describe what external libraries or programs are required to make things work, and some small general hints.

2.7.2 Using S/MIME

Note! This section assume you have a basic familiarity with modern cryptography, S/MIME, various PKCS standards, OpenSSL and so on.

The S/MIME support in Message (and MML) require OpenSSL. OpenSSL performs the actual S/MIME sign/encrypt operations. OpenSSL can be found at http://www.openssl.org/. OpenSSL 0.9.6 and later should work. Version 0.9.5a cannot extract mail addresses from certificates, and it insert a spurious CR character into MIME separators so you may wish to avoid it if you would like to avoid being regarded as someone who send strange mail. (Although by sending S/MIME messages you've probably already lost that contest.)

To be able to send encrypted mail, a personal certificate is not required. Message (MML) need a certificate for the person to whom you wish to communicate with though. You're asked for this when you type C-c C-m c s. Currently there are two ways to retrieve this certificate, from a local file or from DNS. If you chose a local file, it need to contain a X.509 certificate in PEM format. If you chose DNS, you're asked for the domain name where the certificate is stored, the default is a good guess. To my belief, Message (MML) is the first mail agent in the world to support retrieving S/MIME certificates from DNS, so you're not likely to find very many certificates out there. At least there should be one, stored at the domain simon.josefsson.org. LDAP is a more popular method of distributing certificates, support for it is planned. (Meanwhile, you can use ldapsearch from the command line to retrieve a certificate into a file and use it.)

As for signing messages, OpenSSL can't perform signing operations without some kind of configuration. Especially, you need to tell it where your private key and your certificate is stored. MML uses an Emacs interface to OpenSSL, aptly named smime.el, and it contain a custom group used for this configuration. So, try M-x customize-group RET smime RET and look around.

Currently there is no support for talking to a CA (or RA) to create your own certificate. None is planned either. You need to do this manually with OpenSSL or using some other program. I used Netscape and got a free S/MIME certificate from one of the big CA's on the net. Netscape is able to export your private key and certificate in PKCS #12 format. Use OpenSSL to convert this into a plain X.509 certificate in PEM format as follows.

$ openssl pkcs12 -in ns.p12 -clcerts -nodes > key+cert.pem

The `key+cert.pem' file should be pointed to from the smime-keys variable. You should now be able to send signed mail.

Note! Your private key is now stored unencrypted in the file, so take care in handling it. Storing encrypted keys on the disk are supported, and Gnus will ask you for a passphrase before invoking OpenSSL. Read the OpenSSL documentation for how to achieve this. If you use unencrypted keys (e.g., if they are on a secure storage, or if you are on a secure single user machine) simply press RET at the passphrase prompt.

2.7.3 Using PGP/MIME

PGP/MIME requires an external OpenPGP implementation, such as GNU Privacy Guard. Pre-OpenPGP implementations such as PGP 2.x and PGP 5.x are also supported. One Emacs interface to the PGP implementations, PGG (see section `PGG' in PGG Manual), is included, but Mailcrypt and Florian Weimer's gpg.el are also supported. See section 2.7.4 Compatibility with older implementations.

Message internally calls GnuPG (the gpg command) to perform data encryption, and in certain cases (decrypting or signing for example), gpg requires user's passphrase. Currently the recommended way to supply your passphrase to gpg is to use the gpg-agent program.

To use gpg-agent in Emacs, you need to run the following command from the shell before starting Emacs.

eval `gpg-agent --daemon`

This will invoke gpg-agent and set the environment variable GPG_AGENT_INFO to allow gpg to communicate with it. It might be good idea to put this command in your `.xsession' or `.bash_profile'. See section `Invoking GPG-AGENT' in Using the GNU Privacy Guard.

Once your gpg-agent is set up, it will ask you for a passphrase as needed for gpg. Under the X Window System, you will see a new passphrase input dialog appear. The dialog is provided by PIN Entry (the pinentry command), and as of version 0.7.2, pinentry cannot cooperate with Emacs on a single tty. So, if you are using a text console, you may need to put a passphrase into gpg-agent's cache beforehand. The following command does the trick.

gpg --use-agent --sign < /dev/null > /dev/null

The Lisp variable pgg-gpg-use-agent controls whether to use gpg-agent. See also See section `Caching passphrase' in The PGG Manual.

2.7.4 Compatibility with older implementations

Note, if you are using the gpg.el you must make sure that the directory specified by gpg-temp-directory have permissions 0700.

Creating your own key is described in detail in the documentation of your PGP implementation, so we refer to it.

If you have imported your old PGP 2.x key into GnuPG, and want to send signed and encrypted messages to your fellow PGP 2.x users, you'll discover that the receiver cannot understand what you send. One solution is to use PGP 2.x instead (i.e., if you use pgg, set pgg-default-scheme to pgp). If you do want to use GnuPG, you can use a compatibility script called gpg-2comp available from http://muppet.faveve.uni-stuttgart.de/~gero/gpg-2comp/. You could also convince your fellow PGP 2.x users to convert to GnuPG. As a final workaround, you can make the sign and encryption work in two steps; separately sign, then encrypt a message. If you would like to change this behavior you can customize the mml-signencrypt-style-alist variable. For example:

(setq mml-signencrypt-style-alist '(("smime" separate)
                                    ("pgp" separate)
                                    ("pgpauto" separate)
                                    ("pgpmime" separate)))

This causes to sign and encrypt in two passes, thus generating a message that can be understood by PGP version 2.

(Refer to http://www.gnupg.org/gph/en/pgp2x.html for more information about the problem.)

2.8 Various Commands

C-c C-r

Caesar rotate (aka. rot13) the current message (message-caesar-buffer-body). If narrowing is in effect, just rotate the visible portion of the buffer. A numerical prefix says how many places to rotate the text. The default is 13.

C-c C-e

Elide the text between point and mark (message-elide-region). The text is killed and replaced with the contents of the variable message-elide-ellipsis. The default value is to use an ellipsis (`[...]').

C-c M-k

Kill the address under point.

C-c C-z

Kill all the text up to the signature, or if that's missing, up to the end of the message (message-kill-to-signature).

C-c C-v

Delete all text in the body of the message that is outside the region (message-delete-not-region).

M-RET

Insert four newlines, and then reformat if inside quoted text.

Here's an example:

> This is some quoted text. And here's more quoted text.

If point is before `And' and you press M-RET, you'll get:

> This is some quoted text. * > And here's more quoted text.

`*' says where point will be placed.

C-c M-r

Rename the buffer (message-rename-buffer). If given a prefix, prompt for a new buffer name.

TAB

If message-tab-body-function is non-nil, execute the function it specifies. Otherwise use the function bound to TAB in text-mode-map or global-map.

2.9 Sending

C-c C-c

Send the message and bury the current buffer (message-send-and-exit).

C-c C-s

Send the message (message-send).

C-c C-d

Bury the message buffer and exit (message-dont-send).

C-c C-k

Kill the message buffer and exit (message-kill-buffer).

2.10 Mail Aliases

The message-mail-alias-type variable controls what type of mail alias expansion to use. Currently two forms are supported: mailabbrev and ecomplete. If this variable is nil, no mail alias expansion will be performed.

mailabbrev works by parsing the `/etc/mailrc' and `~/.mailrc' files. These files look like:

alias lmi "Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@ifi.uio.no>"
alias ding "ding@ifi.uio.no (ding mailing list)"

After adding lines like this to your `~/.mailrc' file, you should be able to just write `lmi' in the To or Cc (and so on) headers and press SPC to expand the alias.

No expansion will be performed upon sending of the message--all expansions have to be done explicitly.

If you're using ecomplete, all addresses from To and Cc headers will automatically be put into the `~/.ecompleterc' file. When you enter text in the To and Cc headers, ecomplete will check out the values stored there and "electrically" say what completions are possible. To choose one of these completions, use the M-n command to move down to the list. Use M-n and M-p to move down and up the list, and RET to choose a completion.

2.11 Spelling

There are two popular ways to have Emacs spell-check your messages: ispell and flyspell. ispell is the older and probably more popular package. You typically first write the message, and then run the entire thing through ispell and fix all the typos. To have this happen automatically when you send a message, put something like the following in your `.emacs' file:

(add-hook 'message-send-hook 'ispell-message)

If you're in the habit of writing in different languages, this can be controlled by the ispell-message-dictionary-alist variable:

(setq ispell-message-dictionary-alist
      '(("^Newsgroups:.*\\bde\\." . "deutsch8")
        (".*" . "default")))

ispell depends on having the external `ispell' command installed.

The other popular method is using flyspell. This package checks your spelling while you're writing, and marks any mis-spelled words in various ways.

To use flyspell, put something like the following in your `.emacs' file:

(defun my-message-setup-routine ()
  (flyspell-mode 1))
(add-hook 'message-setup-hook 'my-message-setup-routine)

flyspell depends on having the external `ispell' command installed.

3. Variables

3.1 Message Headers

Message is quite aggressive on the message generation front. It has to be--it's a combined news and mail agent. To be able to send combined messages, it has to generate all headers itself (instead of letting the mail/news system do it) to ensure that mail and news copies of messages look sufficiently similar.

message-generate-headers-first

If t, generate all required headers before starting to compose the message. This can also be a list of headers to generate:

(setq message-generate-headers-first '(References))

The variables message-required-headers, message-required-mail-headers and message-required-news-headers specify which headers are required.

Note that some headers will be removed and re-generated before posting, because of the variable message-deletable-headers (see below).

message-draft-headers

When running Message from Gnus, the message buffers are associated with a draft group. message-draft-headers says which headers should be generated when a draft is written to the draft group.

message-from-style

Specifies how From headers should look. There are four valid values:

nil

Just the address---`king@grassland.com'.

parens

`king@grassland.com (Elvis Parsley)'.

angles

`Elvis Parsley <king@grassland.com>'.

default

Look like angles if that doesn't require quoting, and parens if it does. If even parens requires quoting, use angles anyway.

message-deletable-headers

Headers in this list that were previously generated by Message will be deleted before posting. Let's say you post an article. Then you decide to post it again to some other group, you naughty boy, so you jump back to the *post-buf* buffer, edit the Newsgroups line, and ship it off again. By default, this variable makes sure that the old generated Message-ID is deleted, and a new one generated. If this isn't done, the entire empire would probably crumble, anarchy would prevail, and cats would start walking on two legs and rule the world. Allegedly.

message-default-headers

This string is inserted at the end of the headers in all message buffers.

message-subject-re-regexp

Responses to messages have subjects that start with `Re: '. This is not an abbreviation of the English word "response", but is Latin, and means "in response to". Some illiterate nincompoops have failed to grasp this fact, and have "internationalized" their software to use abominations like `Aw: ' ("antwort") or `Sv: ' ("svar") instead, which is meaningless and evil. However, you may have to deal with users that use these evil tools, in which case you may set this variable to a regexp that matches these prefixes. Myself, I just throw away non-compliant mail.

Here's an example of a value to deal with these headers when responding to a message:

(setq message-subject-re-regexp (concat "^[ \t]*" "\\(" "\\(" "[Aa][Nn][Tt][Ww]\\.?\\|" ; antw "[Aa][Ww]\\|" ; aw "[Ff][Ww][Dd]?\\|" ; fwd "[Oo][Dd][Pp]\\|" ; odp "[Rr][Ee]\\|" ; re "[Rr][\311\351][Ff]\\.?\\|" ; ref "[Ss][Vv]" ; sv "\\)" "\\(\\[[0-9]*\\]\\)" "*:[ \t]*" "\\)" "*[ \t]*" ))

message-subject-trailing-was-query

Controls what to do with trailing `(was: <old subject>)' in subject lines. If nil, leave the subject unchanged. If it is the symbol ask, query the user what to do. In this case, the subject is matched against message-subject-trailing-was-ask-regexp. If message-subject-trailing-was-query is t, always strip the trailing old subject. In this case, message-subject-trailing-was-regexp is used.

message-alternative-emails

Regexp matching alternative email addresses. The first address in the To, Cc or From headers of the original article matching this variable is used as the From field of outgoing messages, replacing the default From value.

For example, if you have two secondary email addresses john@home.net and john.doe@work.com and want to use them in the From field when composing a reply to a message addressed to one of them, you could set this variable like this:

(setq message-alternative-emails (regexp-opt '("john@home.net" "john.doe@work.com")))

This variable has precedence over posting styles and anything that runs off message-setup-hook.

message-allow-no-recipients

Specifies what to do when there are no recipients other than Gcc or Fcc. If it is always, the posting is allowed. If it is never, the posting is not allowed. If it is ask (the default), you are prompted.

message-hidden-headers

A regexp, a list of regexps, or a list where the first element is not and the rest are regexps. It says which headers to keep hidden when composing a message.

(setq message-hidden-headers '(not "From" "Subject" "To" "Cc" "Newsgroups"))

Headers are hidden using narrowing, you can use M-x widen to expose them in the buffer.

message-header-synonyms

A list of lists of header synonyms. E.g., if this list contains a member list with elements Cc and To, then message-carefully-insert-headers will not insert a To header when the message is already Cced to the recipient.

3.2 Mail Headers

message-required-mail-headers

See section 3.4 News Headers, for the syntax of this variable. It is (From Subject Date (optional . In-Reply-To) Message-ID (optional . User-Agent)) by default.

message-ignored-mail-headers

Regexp of headers to be removed before mailing. The default is
`^[GF]cc:\\|^Resent-Fcc:\\|^Xref:\\|^X-Draft-From:\\|
^X-Gnus-Agent-Meta-Information:'.

message-default-mail-headers

This string is inserted at the end of the headers in all message buffers that are initialized as mail.

message-generate-hashcash

Variable that indicates whether `X-Hashcash' headers should be computed for the message. See section `Hashcash' in The Gnus Manual. If opportunistic, only generate the headers when it doesn't lead to the user having to wait.

3.3 Mail Variables

message-send-mail-function

Function used to send the current buffer as mail. The default is message-send-mail-with-sendmail, or smtpmail-send-it according to the system. Other valid values include message-send-mail-with-mailclient, message-send-mail-with-mh, message-send-mail-with-qmail, message-smtpmail-send-it and feedmail-send-it.

The function message-send-mail-with-sendmail pipes your article to the sendmail binary for further queuing and sending. When your local system is not configured for sending mail using sendmail, and you have access to a remote SMTP server, you can set message-send-mail-function to smtpmail-send-it and make sure to setup the smtpmail package correctly. An example:

(setq message-send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it smtpmail-default-smtp-server "YOUR SMTP HOST")

To the thing similar to this, there is message-smtpmail-send-it. It is useful if your ISP requires the POP-before-SMTP authentication. See section `POP before SMTP' in The Gnus Manual.

message-mh-deletable-headers

Most versions of MH doesn't like being fed messages that contain the headers in this variable. If this variable is non-nil (which is the default), these headers will be removed before mailing when sending messages via MH. Set it to nil if your MH can handle these headers.

message-qmail-inject-program

Location of the qmail-inject program.

message-qmail-inject-args

Arguments passed to qmail-inject programs. This should be a list of strings, one string for each argument. It may also be a function.

For e.g., if you wish to set the envelope sender address so that bounces go to the right place or to deal with listserv's usage of that address, you might set this variable to '("-f" "you@some.where").

message-sendmail-f-is-evil

Non-nil means don't add `-f username' to the sendmail command line. Doing so would be even more evil than leaving it out.

message-sendmail-envelope-from

When message-sendmail-f-is-evil is nil, this specifies the address to use in the SMTP envelope. If it is nil, use user-mail-address. If it is the symbol header, use the `From' header of the message.

message-mailer-swallows-blank-line

Set this to non-nil if the system's mailer runs the header and body together. (This problem exists on SunOS 4 when sendmail is run in remote mode.) The value should be an expression to test whether the problem will actually occur.

message-send-mail-partially-limit

The limitation of messages sent as message/partial. The lower bound of message size in characters, beyond which the message should be sent in several parts. If it is nil, the size is unlimited.

3.4 News Headers

message-required-news-headers a list of header symbols. These headers will either be automatically generated, or, if that's impossible, they will be prompted for. The following symbols are valid:

From

This required header will be filled out with the result of the message-make-from function, which depends on the message-from-style, user-full-name, user-mail-address variables.

Subject

This required header will be prompted for if not present already.

Newsgroups

This required header says which newsgroups the article is to be posted to. If it isn't present already, it will be prompted for.

Organization

This optional header will be filled out depending on the message-user-organization variable. message-user-organization-file will be used if this variable is t. This variable can also be a string (in which case this string will be used), or it can be a function (which will be called with no parameters and should return a string to be used).

Lines

This optional header will be computed by Message.

Message-ID

This required header will be generated by Message. A unique ID will be created based on the date, time, user name (for the local part) and the domain part. For the domain part, message will look (in this order) at message-user-fqdn, system-name, mail-host-address and message-user-mail-address (i.e. user-mail-address) until a probably valid fully qualified domain name (FQDN) was found.

User-Agent

This optional header will be filled out according to the message-newsreader local variable.

In-Reply-To

This optional header is filled out using the Date and From header of the article being replied to.

Expires

This extremely optional header will be inserted according to the message-expires variable. It is highly deprecated and shouldn't be used unless you know what you're doing.

Distribution

This optional header is filled out according to the message-distribution-function variable. It is a deprecated and much misunderstood header.

Path

This extremely optional header should probably never be used. However, some very old servers require that this header is present. message-user-path further controls how this Path header is to look. If it is nil, use the server name as the leaf node. If it is a string, use the string. If it is neither a string nor nil, use the user name only. However, it is highly unlikely that you should need to fiddle with this variable at all.

In addition, you can enter conses into this list. The CAR of this cons should be a symbol. This symbol's name is the name of the header, and the CDR can either be a string to be entered verbatim as the value of this header, or it can be a function to be called. This function should return a string to be inserted. For instance, if you want to insert Mime-Version: 1.0, you should enter (Mime-Version . "1.0") into the list. If you want to insert a funny quote, you could enter something like (X-Yow . yow) into the list. The function yow will then be called without any arguments.

If the list contains a cons where the CAR of the cons is optional, the CDR of this cons will only be inserted if it is non-nil.

If you want to delete an entry from this list, the following Lisp snippet might be useful. Adjust accordingly if you want to remove another element.

(setq message-required-news-headers
      (delq 'Message-ID message-required-news-headers))

Other variables for customizing outgoing news articles:

message-syntax-checks

Controls what syntax checks should not be performed on outgoing posts. To disable checking of long signatures, for instance, add

(signature . disabled)

to this list.

Valid checks are:

approved

Check whether the article has an Approved header, which is something only moderators should include.

continuation-headers

Check whether there are continuation header lines that don't begin with whitespace.

control-chars

Check for invalid characters.

empty

Check whether the article is empty.

existing-newsgroups

Check whether the newsgroups mentioned in the Newsgroups and Followup-To headers exist.

from

Check whether the From header seems nice.

illegible-text

Check whether there is any non-printable character in the body.

invisible-text

Check whether there is any invisible text in the buffer.

long-header-lines

Check for too long header lines.

long-lines

Check for too long lines in the body.

message-id

Check whether the Message-ID looks syntactically ok.

multiple-headers

Check for the existence of multiple equal headers.

new-text

Check whether there is any new text in the messages.

newsgroups

Check whether the Newsgroups header exists and is not empty.

quoting-style

Check whether text follows last quoted portion.

repeated-newsgroups

Check whether the Newsgroups and Followup-to headers contains repeated group names.

reply-to

Check whether the Reply-To header looks ok.

sender

Insert a new Sender header if the From header looks odd.

sendsys

Check for the existence of version and sendsys commands.

shoot

Check whether the domain part of the Message-ID header looks ok.

shorten-followup-to

Check whether to add a Followup-to header to shorten the number of groups to post to.

signature

Check the length of the signature.

size

Check for excessive size.

subject

Check whether the Subject header exists and is not empty.

subject-cmsg

Check the subject for commands.

valid-newsgroups

Check whether the Newsgroups and Followup-to headers are valid syntactically.

All these conditions are checked by default, except for sender for which the check is disabled by default if message-insert-canlock is non-nil (see section 1.6 Canceling News).

message-ignored-news-headers

Regexp of headers to be removed before posting. The default is
`^NNTP-Posting-Host:\\|^Xref:\\|^[BGF]cc:\\|^Resent-Fcc:\\|
^X-Draft-From:\\|^X-Gnus-Agent-Meta-Information:'.

message-default-news-headers

This string is inserted at the end of the headers in all message buffers that are initialized as news.

3.5 News Variables

message-send-news-function

Function used to send the current buffer as news. The default is message-send-news.

message-post-method

Gnusish select method (see the Gnus manual for details) used for posting a prepared news message.

3.6 Insertion Variables

message-ignored-cited-headers

All headers that match this regexp will be removed from yanked messages. The default is `.', which means that all headers will be removed.

message-cite-prefix-regexp

Regexp matching the longest possible citation prefix on a line.

message-citation-line-function

Function called to insert the citation line. The default is message-insert-citation-line, which will lead to citation lines that look like:

Hallvard B Furuseth <h.b.furuseth@usit.uio.no> writes:

Point will be at the beginning of the body of the message when this function is called.

Note that Gnus provides a feature where clicking on `writes:' hides the cited text. If you change the citation line too much, readers of your messages will have to adjust their Gnus, too. See the variable gnus-cite-attribution-suffix. See section `Article Highlighting' in The Gnus Manual, for details.

message-yank-prefix

When you are replying to or following up an article, you normally want to quote the person you are answering. Inserting quoted text is done by yanking, and each line you yank will have message-yank-prefix prepended to it (except for quoted lines which use message-yank-cited-prefix and empty lines which use message-yank-empty-prefix). The default is `> '.

message-yank-cited-prefix

When yanking text from an article which contains already cited text, each line will be prefixed with the contents of this variable. The default is `>'. See also message-yank-prefix.

message-yank-empty-prefix

When yanking text from an article, each empty line will be prefixed with the contents of this variable. The default is `>'. You can set this variable to an empty string to split the cited text into paragraphs automatically. See also message-yank-prefix.

message-indentation-spaces

Number of spaces to indent yanked messages.

message-cite-function

Function for citing an original message. The default is message-cite-original, which simply inserts the original message and prepends `> ' to each line. message-cite-original-without-signature does the same, but elides the signature. You can also set it to sc-cite-original to use Supercite.

message-indent-citation-function

Function for modifying a citation just inserted in the mail buffer. This can also be a list of functions. Each function can find the citation between (point) and (mark t). And each function should leave point and mark around the citation text as modified.

message-mark-insert-begin

String to mark the beginning of some inserted text.

message-mark-insert-end

String to mark the end of some inserted text.

message-signature

String to be inserted at the end of the message buffer. If t (which is the default), the message-signature-file file will be inserted instead. If a function, the result from the function will be used instead. If a form, the result from the form will be used instead. If this variable is nil, no signature will be inserted at all.

message-signature-file

File containing the signature to be inserted at the end of the buffer. If a path is specified, the value of message-signature-directory is ignored, even if set. The default is `~/.signature'.

message-signature-directory

Name of directory containing signature files. Comes in handy if you have many such files, handled via Gnus posting styles for instance. If nil (the default), message-signature-file is expected to specify the directory if needed.

message-signature-insert-empty-line

If t (the default value) an empty line is inserted before the signature separator.

Note that RFC1036bis says that a signature should be preceded by the three characters `-- ' on a line by themselves. This is to make it easier for the recipient to automatically recognize and process the signature. So don't remove those characters, even though you might feel that they ruin your beautiful design, like, totally.

Also note that no signature should be more than four lines long. Including ASCII graphics is an efficient way to get everybody to believe that you are silly and have nothing important to say.

3.7 Various Message Variables

message-default-charset

Symbol naming a MIME charset. Non-ASCII characters in messages are assumed to be encoded using this charset. The default is iso-8859-1 on non-MULE Emacsen; otherwise nil, which means ask the user. (This variable is used only on non-MULE Emacsen.) See section `Charset Translation' in Emacs MIME Manual, for details on the MULE-to-MIME translation process.

message-fill-column

Local value for the column beyond which automatic line-wrapping should happen for message buffers. If non-nil (the default), also turn on auto-fill in message buffers.

message-signature-separator

Regexp matching the signature separator. It is `^-- *$' by default.

mail-header-separator

String used to separate the headers from the body. It is `--text follows this line--' by default.

message-directory

Directory used by many mailey things. The default is `~/Mail/'. All other mail file variables are derived from message-directory.

message-auto-save-directory

Directory where Message auto-saves buffers if Gnus isn't running. If nil, Message won't auto-save. The default is `~/Mail/drafts/'.

message-signature-setup-hook

Hook run when initializing the message buffer. It is run after the headers have been inserted but before the signature has been inserted.

message-setup-hook

Hook run as the last thing when the message buffer has been initialized, but before yanked text is inserted.

message-header-setup-hook

Hook called narrowed to the headers after initializing the headers.

For instance, if you're running Gnus and wish to insert a `Mail-Copies-To' header in all your news articles and all messages you send to mailing lists, you could do something like the following:

(defun my-message-header-setup-hook () (let ((group (or gnus-newsgroup-name ""))) (when (or (message-fetch-field "newsgroups") (gnus-group-find-parameter group 'to-address) (gnus-group-find-parameter group 'to-list)) (insert "Mail-Copies-To: never\n")))) (add-hook 'message-header-setup-hook 'my-message-header-setup-hook)

message-send-hook

Hook run before sending messages.

If you want to add certain headers before sending, you can use the message-add-header function in this hook. For instance:

(add-hook 'message-send-hook 'my-message-add-content) (defun my-message-add-content () (message-add-header "X-In-No-Sense: Nonsense") (message-add-header "X-Whatever: no"))

This function won't add the header if the header is already present.

message-send-mail-hook

Hook run before sending mail messages. This hook is run very late -- just before the message is actually sent as mail.

message-send-news-hook

Hook run before sending news messages. This hook is run very late -- just before the message is actually sent as news.

message-sent-hook

Hook run after sending messages.

message-cancel-hook

Hook run when canceling news articles.

message-mode-syntax-table

Syntax table used in message mode buffers.

message-cite-articles-with-x-no-archive

If non-nil, don't strip quoted text from articles that have `X-No-Archive' set. Even if this variable isn't set, you can undo the stripping by hitting the undo keystroke.

message-strip-special-text-properties

Emacs has a number of special text properties which can break message composing in various ways. If this option is set, message will strip these properties from the message composition buffer. However, some packages requires these properties to be present in order to work. If you use one of these packages, turn this option off, and hope the message composition doesn't break too bad.

message-send-method-alist

Alist of ways to send outgoing messages. Each element has the form:

(type predicate function)

type

A symbol that names the method.

predicate

A function called without any parameters to determine whether the message is a message of type type. The function will be called in the buffer where the message is.

function

A function to be called if predicate returns non-nil. function is called with one parameter--the prefix.

The default is:

((news message-news-p message-send-via-news) (mail message-mail-p message-send-via-mail))

The message-news-p function returns non-nil if the message looks like news, and the message-send-via-news function sends the message according to the message-send-news-function variable (see section 3.5 News Variables). The message-mail-p function returns non-nil if the message looks like mail, and the message-send-via-mail function sends the message according to the message-send-mail-function variable (see section 3.3 Mail Variables).

All the elements in this alist will be tried in order, so a message containing both a valid `Newsgroups' header and a valid `To' header, for example, will be sent as news, and then as mail.