---
title: email
author:
  - benharri
  - xwindows
category: tutorial
---

Your shiny, new tilde.club account comes with an email account. `alpine`  is a command-line email application to use it, as is `mutt`. Good old-fashioned `mail` works too, although it's a little cryptic.

`alpine` is menu driven, and the menus are self-explanatory; it's surprisingly easy to learn, and surprisingly powerful when you want to customize it.

From the command line (after logged in via SSH), type: `pine` and `[return]`
Follow instructions and use the menus at the bottom and top. (Note: When you see the ^ in front of the letter it means you need to use CTRL, otherwise just use the letter.)

## non-cli options

alternatively, you can use the [webmail](https://webmail.tilde.club/) or standard imap/smtp.

some clients will automatically detect the right settings (tested with thunderbird).

connection settings:

- imap.tilde.club port 993 with ssl
- pop3.tilde.club port 995 with ssl
- smtp.tilde.club port 587 with starttls

please remember to use only your tilde username as the login name, excluding the `@tilde.club`; for example `invalid` instead of `invalid@tilde.club`

if you'd like your @tilde.club mail forwarded elsewhere, you can put an email 
address in a file called `~/.forward`

## sieve filtering

our dovecot configuration supports [sieve](http://sieve.info/) and 
[managesieve](https://wiki1.dovecot.org/ManageSieve).

this means that you should put your scripts in a `~/sieve/` directory,
symlink the active script to `~/.dovecot.sieve`, and make sure to compile it
with `sievec ~/.dovecot.sieve`.

you can find some example sieve scripts [here](
https://doc.dovecot.org/configuration_manual/sieve/examples/).

alternately, you can use webmail's [filter settings](
https://webmail.tilde.club/#/settings/filters) to configure your filters.

## mailing list

we now have an official mailing list!

if your account is old (pre sept 2019), you should be subscribed with the email
you originally signed up with. if your account is newer (post sept 2019), then 
you should be subscribed with your @tilde.club address. if you don't fit either
of those categories, you can subscribe by visiting the [web portal](
https://lists.tildeverse.org/postorius/lists/tildeclub.lists.tildeverse.org/)
or by sending a mail to tildeclub-subscribe@lists.tildeverse.org with "subscribe"
in the subject line. in either case, you can change the email you're subscribed
with on the web portal or by unsubscribing and re-subscribing from the other
address.

list archives are available [on the web here](
https://lists.tildeverse.org/hyperkitty/list/tildeclub@lists.tildeverse.org/).

as of september 17, 2019, we're still seeing quite a few pending mails to
gmail, yahoo, and fastmail. help get our list delivered by making sure to
mark list messages as not spam and adding the list address to your contacts.
if you're feeling especially motivated, please reach out to the support on
your mail provider and ask them to look into why you're not receiving the
messages.

## Mailbox Format

Tilde.club uses [Dovecot](https://www.dovecot.org/) as a local mail delivery agent
as well as an IMAP server.
It is configured to deliver your emails
into a `.mail/` subdirectory
within your home directory on the server,
structured in [Courier MTA's Maildir++ format](https://www.courier-mta.org/imap/README.maildirquota.html).

Maildir++ format is essentially the same as Maildir mailbox format,
but with a concept of subfolders added in:
apart from the usual `cur/`,
`new/`,
and `tmp/` subdirectories for normal Maildir operations;
there would now also be dot-subdirectories
which are email subfolders.
Each dot-subdirectory
would contain usual Maildir subdirectories,
but not any more dot-subdirectory inside it.

In Tilde.club,
the default layout of your Maildir++ folder hierarchy
would be as the following:

| Email Folder | Filesystem Directory  |
|:-------------|:----------------------|
| _(Inbox)_    | `~/.mail/`            |
| _(Sent)_     | `~/.mail/.sent-mail/` |
| Junk         | `~/.mail/.Junk/`      |
| Drafts       | `~/.mail/.Drafts/`    |
| Trash        | `~/.mail/.Trash/`     |

So,
if you would like to use command line tools
to tinker with your mailbox,
then more power to you.
Also,
note that email access via IMAP and webmail
actually read/write emails directly onto these directories;
so now you know where to grab a copy of all your emails data
if you ever need a backup as well.