.. _notmuch-show(1):

============
notmuch-show
============

SYNOPSIS
========

**notmuch** **show** [*option* ...] <*search-term*> ...

DESCRIPTION
===========

Shows all messages matching the search terms.

See :any:`notmuch-search-terms(7)` for details of the supported syntax for
<search-terms>.

The messages will be grouped and sorted based on the threading (all
replies to a particular message will appear immediately after that
message in date order). The output is not indented by default, but depth
tags are printed so that proper indentation can be performed by a
post-processor (such as the emacs interface to notmuch).

Supported options for **show** include

.. program:: show

.. option:: --entire-thread=(true|false)

   If true, **notmuch show** outputs all messages in the thread of
   any message matching the search terms; if false, it outputs only
   the matching messages. For ``--format=json`` and ``--format=sexp``
   this defaults to true. For other formats, this defaults to false.

.. option:: --format=(text|json|sexp|mbox|raw)

   text (default for messages)
     The default plain-text format has all text-content MIME parts
     decoded. Various components in the output, (**message**,
     **header**, **body**, **attachment**, and MIME **part**), will
     be delimited by easily-parsed markers. Each marker consists of
     a Control-L character (ASCII decimal 12), the name of the
     marker, and then either an opening or closing brace, ('{' or
     '}'), to either open or close the component. For a multipart
     MIME message, these parts will be nested.

   json
     The output is formatted with Javascript Object Notation
     (JSON). This format is more robust than the text format for
     automated processing. The nested structure of multipart MIME
     messages is reflected in nested JSON output. By default JSON
     output includes all messages in a matching thread; that is, by
     default, ``--format=json`` sets ``--entire-thread``. The
     caller can disable this behaviour by setting
     ``--entire-thread=false``.  The JSON output is always encoded
     as UTF-8 and any message content included in the output will
     be charset-converted to UTF-8.

   sexp
     The output is formatted as the Lisp s-expression (sexp)
     equivalent of the JSON format above. Objects are formatted as
     property lists whose keys are keywords (symbols preceded by a
     colon). True is formatted as ``t`` and both false and null are
     formatted as ``nil``. As for JSON, the s-expression output is
     always encoded as UTF-8.

   mbox
     All matching messages are output in the traditional, Unix mbox
     format with each message being prefixed by a line beginning
     with "From " and a blank line separating each message. Lines
     in the message content beginning with "From " (preceded by
     zero or more '>' characters) have an additional '>' character
     added. This reversible escaping is termed "mboxrd" format and
     described in detail here:

       http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/mail-mbox-formats.html

   raw (default if ``--part`` is given)
     Write the raw bytes of the given MIME part of a message to
     standard out. For this format, it is an error to specify a
     query that matches more than one message.

     If the specified part is a leaf part, this outputs the body of
     the part after performing content transfer decoding (but no
     charset conversion). This is suitable for saving attachments,
     for example.

     For a multipart or message part, the output includes the part
     headers as well as the body (including all child parts). No
     decoding is performed because multipart and message parts
     cannot have non-trivial content transfer encoding. Consumers
     of this may need to implement MIME decoding and similar
     functions.

.. option:: --format-version=N

   Use the specified structured output format version. This is
   intended for programs that invoke :any:`notmuch(1)` internally. If
   omitted, the latest supported version will be used.

.. option:: --part=N

   Output the single decoded MIME part N of a single message. The
   search terms must match only a single message. Message parts are
   numbered in a depth-first walk of the message MIME structure, and
   are identified in the 'json', 'sexp' or 'text' output formats.

   Note that even a message with no MIME structure or a single body
   part still has two MIME parts: part 0 is the whole message
   (headers and body) and part 1 is just the body.

.. option:: --sort=(newest-first|oldest-first)

   This option can be used to present results in either chronological
   order (**oldest-first**) or reverse chronological order
   (**newest-first**).

   Only threads as a whole are reordered.  Ordering of messages within
   each thread will not be affected by this flag, since that order is
   always determined by the thread's replies.

   By default, results will be displayed in reverse chronological
   order, (that is, the newest results will be displayed first).

.. option:: --verify

   Compute and report the validity of any MIME cryptographic
   signatures found in the selected content (e.g., "multipart/signed"
   parts). Status of the signature will be reported (currently only
   supported with ``--format=json`` and ``--format=sexp``), and the
   multipart/signed part will be replaced by the signed data.

.. option:: --decrypt=(false|auto|true|stash)

   If ``true``, decrypt any MIME encrypted parts found in the
   selected content (e.g., "multipart/encrypted" parts). Status of
   the decryption will be reported (currently only supported
   with ``--format=json`` and ``--format=sexp``) and on successful
   decryption the multipart/encrypted part will be replaced by
   the decrypted content.

   ``stash`` behaves like ``true``, but upon successful decryption it
   will also stash the message's session key in the database, and
   index the cleartext of the message, enabling automatic decryption
   in the future.

   If ``auto``, and a session key is already known for the
   message, then it will be decrypted, but notmuch will not try
   to access the user's keys.

   Use ``false`` to avoid even automatic decryption.

   Non-automatic decryption (``stash`` or ``true``, in the absence of
   a stashed session key) expects a functioning :manpage:`gpg-agent(1)` to
   provide any needed credentials. Without one, the decryption will
   fail.

   Note: setting either ``true`` or ``stash`` here implies
   ``--verify``.

   Here is a table that summarizes each of these policies:

   +------------------------+-------+------+------+-------+
   |                        | false | auto | true | stash |
   +========================+=======+======+======+=======+
   | Show cleartext if      |       |  X   |  X   |   X   |
   | session key is         |       |      |      |       |
   | already known          |       |      |      |       |
   +------------------------+-------+------+------+-------+
   | Use secret keys to     |       |      |  X   |   X   |
   | show cleartext         |       |      |      |       |
   +------------------------+-------+------+------+-------+
   | Stash any newly        |       |      |      |   X   |
   | recovered session keys,|       |      |      |       |
   | reindexing message if  |       |      |      |       |
   | found                  |       |      |      |       |
   +------------------------+-------+------+------+-------+

   Note: ``--decrypt=stash`` requires write access to the database.
   Otherwise, ``notmuch show`` operates entirely in read-only mode.

   Default: ``auto``

.. option:: --exclude=(true|false)

   Specify whether to omit threads only matching search.exclude\_tags
   from the search results (the default) or not. In either case the
   excluded message will be marked with the exclude flag (except when
   output=mbox when there is nowhere to put the flag).

   If ``--entire-thread`` is specified then complete threads are returned
   regardless (with the excluded flag being set when appropriate) but
   threads that only match in an excluded message are not returned
   when ``--exclude=true.``

   The default is ``--exclude=true.``

.. option:: --body=(true|false)

   If true (the default) **notmuch show** includes the bodies of the
   messages in the output; if false, bodies are omitted.
   ``--body=false`` is only implemented for the text, json and sexp
   formats and it is incompatible with ``--part > 0.``

   This is useful if the caller only needs the headers as body-less
   output is much faster and substantially smaller.

.. option:: --include-html

   Include "text/html" parts as part of the output (currently
   only supported with ``--format=text``, ``--format=json`` and
   ``--format=sexp``). By default, unless ``--part=N`` is used to
   select a specific part or ``--include-html`` is used to include all
   "text/html" parts, no part with content type "text/html" is included
   in the output.

A common use of **notmuch show** is to display a single thread of
email messages. For this, use a search term of "thread:<thread-id>" as
can be seen in the first column of output from the
:any:`notmuch-search(1)` command.

EXIT STATUS
===========

This command supports the following special exit status codes

``20``
    The requested format version is too old.

``21``
    The requested format version is too new.

SEE ALSO
========

:any:`notmuch(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-config(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-count(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-dump(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-hooks(5)`,
:any:`notmuch-insert(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-new(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-reply(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-restore(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-search(1)`,
:any:`notmuch-search-terms(7)`,
:any:`notmuch-tag(1)`