Mutt or Alpine

Linux for blind general discussion blinux-list at redhat.com
Fri Feb 18 22:58:33 UTC 2022


Tim here.  I've used both mutt/neomutt and alpine (and pine back in
the day).

The big advantage of mutt/neomutt is power/flexibility.  I've found
that it's less of a mail-reader and more a toolkit for creating your
custom mail-reader experience from the parts that it brings to the
table.  And everything is configured using the ~/.muttrc file alone
(no nice user-interface for tweaking settings) which can be daunting
if you don't have a solid grasp of what's going on under the hood.
It plays well with external tools like notmuch for indexing and your
mailcap definitions for using external programs to open attachments,
or using urlview/urlscan to search a message-body for URLs to open.
It's still not great at multi-account, requiring a lot of manual care
in setting it up (this is my biggest frustration in using it, and the
main reason I don't use it more frequently).

As far as *easier*, alpine wins pretty hands-down.  It has a
settings-editing interface for configuring pretty much everything.
Like Pico/Nano, it also keeps the list of commands along the bottom
of the screen, making it more new-user friendly.  It has a concept of
"roles" which I haven't explored recently, but it sounds like a way
to manage multiple accounts better than mutt/neomutt does.

-tim



On February 18, 2022, Linux for blind general discussion wrote:
> If you want to use an email client with Orca, stick to Thunderbird.
> 
> I find Orca unwieldy in the terminal anyway.
> 
> If, however, you wish to do so with Speakup or Fenrir, I personally
> prefer Alpine.
> 
> Why? Simple. I don't know Mutt at all.
> 
> Warm regards,
> 
> Brandt Steenkamp
> 
> Sent from the Slint console using Alpine
> 
> On Fri, 18 Feb 2022, Linux for blind general discussion wrote:
> 
> > Date: Fri, 18 Feb 2022 16:00:22 +0000
> > From: Linux for blind general discussion <blinux-list at redhat.com>
> > To: Linux for blind general discussion <blinux-list at redhat.com>
> > Subject: Mutt or Alpine
> > 
> > So I'm using Mutt, but...
> >
> > What does Mutt have over Alpine and vice versa, why would I use
> > one over the other?
> >
> > Mutt seems faster to me, but Alpine seems more user friendly
> > without making temporary files while composing a message (unles I
> > can tell Mutt/Neomutt to delete those automatically
> >
> > So is there a consensus of which is the easier choice to use with
> > Orca?
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > Blinux-list at redhat.com
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> >
> >  
> 
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