mail Command Examples

The command operates on the user's mailbox if no argument is given. To send an email the message body is built from stdin. More information: https://manned.org/mail.

• Open an interactive prompt to check personal mail:

mail

• Send a typed email message with optional CC. The command-line below continues after pressing <Enter>. Input message text (can be multiline). Press <Ctrl d> to complete the message text:

mail --subject "{{subject line}}" {{to_user@example.com}} --cc "{{cc_email_address}}"

• Send an email that contains file content:

mail --subject "{{$HOSTNAME filename.txt}}" {{to_user@example.com}} < {{path/to/filename.txt}}

• Send a tar.gz file as an attachment:

tar cvzf - {{path/to/directory1 path/to/directory2}} | uuencode {{data.tar.gz}} | mail --subject "{{subject_line}}" {{to_user@example.com}}

• Display help:

mail {{[-h|--help]}}