Using mutt to send mail from a Gmail account...

[stim]

...or other IMAP server...

Note: I removed the original text because the code tags were messing-up the formatting, and some configuration text wouldn't display properly. Hence it wouldn't work.

Here's link to a post with the same details:

http://bigchemdatabase.wordpress.com/sunday-linux/ 

 

[MannDude]

Nice and simple to follow guide.

When would sending emails via the console be practical?

 

[vanarp]

@stim, Nice tutorial. Even I am curious to know some good use cases.

 

[drmike]

When would sending emails via the console be practical?

 

Ahh all the time - if this send messages directly out when configured and had some easy means to output a structured email... (as opposed to a one liner pipe).

I have a person I help with technical job aspects who lives in browser with 50 tabs open and bunches of other job-necessary crap (spreadsheets mainly).  It is a computer cruncher and especially the email part (Thunderbird + Gmail).  Being able to send like this from commandline many of the quick inner day things would save a bunch of time potentially.

 

[Aldryic C'boas]

When would sending emails via the console be practical?

For those of us that don't use X very often :3

Another example that doesn't involve Mutt - say you're logged in to a server, and want to move... oh, I dunno, /var/log/lighttpd/access.log back to your machine.  You don't want to open another terminal, you don't want to exit out of where you are?  cat /var/log/lighttpd/access.log | mail -s "It's a logfile <_<" [email protected], and away it goes to your inbox.

I also use this all the time for note-to-self stuff when I'm in the middle of other work.. echo "Dammit.. Fran broke the API again, fix X and Y before you do Z" | mail [email protected]. 

 

[stim]

Nice and simple to follow guide.

When would sending emails via the console be practical?

I don't send mail from the command line, but I write scripts that do

For example, you could have a cron job mail you daily server stats, or notify you of changes in the authlog file, or a ruby script that scrapes websites and mails you the results, or automatically sends mail to your Mum on her birthday...

Lot's of uses, your imagination is da limit

For me, mutt is preferable to setting-up a mailserver. I just pipe everything from all my VPS through a separate gmail account. It's a nice way to store info and keep organised. Just so simple.

BTW - I am pretty new to all this, but I've been documenting as I explore and keeping all the good bits here for my own perusal. You are welcome to dip-in. 

 

[eva2000]

...or other IMAP server...

Note: I removed the original text because the code tags were messing-up the formatting, and some configuration text wouldn't display properly. Hence it wouldn't work.

Here's link to a post with the same details:

http://bigchemdatabase.wordpress.com/sunday-linux/ 

Interesting idea, but that would mean if server is compromised, so would the password and details to your gmail a/c ? Guess you could setup a separate gmail a/c just for this though.

 

[D. Strout]

echo "Dammit.. Fran broke the API again, fix X and Y before you do Z" | mail [email protected].

Seriously, this does seem like a good way to send yourself notes or even log files without installing a whole mail stack. I like a lot of the other stuff that's in the linked article, especially the Dropbox thing. Need a file on the server for later? Dump it in a "to servers" folder.

 

[stim]

Interesting idea, but that would mean if server is compromised, so would the password and details to your gmail a/c ? Guess you could setup a separate gmail a/c just for this though.

Yeah, I just set-up a 'junk' gmail account to use for stuff like this, signing-up for boards etc. Anybody who compromised it would be sorely disappointed!  

Seriously, this does seem like a good way to send yourself notes or even log files without installing a whole mail stack. I like a lot of the other stuff that's in the linked article, especially the Dropbox thing. Need a file on the server for later? Dump it in a "to servers" folder.

Dropbox is easy to set-up but I've moved-over to BTSync which is also very easy, not on cloud, and no data limits.

 

[D. Strout]

Yeah, I just set-up a 'junk' gmail account to use for stuff like this, signing-up for boards etc. Anybody who compromised it would be sorely disappointed!

...Then have it send the e-mail to a shell "forwarder" that goes through to your real e-mail.

 

[vanarp]

Then have it send the e-mail to a shell "forwarder" that goes through to your real e-mail

 
Can you explain what this "shell forwarder" thing is like?