Overview

Mutt is a mail user agent (MUA), and makes no effort to provide native ability to download, upload, or compose messages, relinquishing responsibility for those tasks to programs better suited to the job. Neither does it deal with HTML mail, attachments, or help you click on a URL in the text to be taken to the relevant web page. Rather, mutt interfaces with lots of other programs that already perform these tasks admirably. This means to use mutt you have to configure several different programs, including sendmail or equivalent for uploading (sending), fetchmail for downloading (assuming you have a POP3 account rather than IMAP), the lynx text browser for viewing HTML messages, and urlview for dealing with URLs in mail. In general, you will need the following configuration files on your system:

• .muttrc
• .mailcap
• .fetchmailrc
• a mail spool file, probably /var/mail/spool/$USERNAME
• an alias file of your choosing, such as .mutt-alias

The spool file is where mutt expects to find mail that's been downloaded from your ISP (i.e. your inbox). You'll also want to choose and configure your favorite text editor. Unix and Linux systems come with several text editors already installed, so it's just a matter of your choosing which one you like. Mutt also requires an address book called an alias file, and will help you develop one as you go through your mail, if you like. More on each of these things below.