tickle-me-email

Toolbox for implementing GTD-like behaviours in your IMAP inbox.

Examples

• Print the current "TODO" list::

  $ tickle-me-email todo

• Send a "TODO" email to yourself, injecting it via IMAP::

  $ tickle-me-email todo Empty recycle bin

  or::

  $ echo Empty recycle bin | tickle-me-email todo -

• "Tickler" file email rotation from DELAYED.07 to DELAYED.06 etc. Mail from DELAYED.01 is moved to your main inbox. Use this to "put off" emails until a day they are important. To be run daily from cron(8)::

  $ tickle-me-email rotate Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.%02d 1 7 INBOX

• Single-folder version of the above to move email for "after" work into your main inbox. Use this when you receive a non-work email during the day. To be run at, say, 6:15pm from cron(8)::

  $ tickle-me-email move Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.18h15 INBOX

• Create count folders based on the specified Python string template starting at start. For example::

  $ tickle-me-email create-folders "Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.%02d" 1 14

  ... will create:

  • Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.01
  • Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.02
  • [...]
  • Inbox.Mail.DELAYED.14

• Send draft emails queued in the LATER.Evening, moving them to a Sent Items if successful. Use this to avoid getting replies "too" quickly. To be run at, say, 6:15pm from cron(8)::

  $ tickle-me-email send-later INBOX.Mail.LATER.Evening

• List all email mailboxes. Use this to find out the "internal" names of your IMAP folders::

  $ tickle-me-email list

• Insert an email into your drafts folder::

  $ DRAFT_ATTACHMENT="/path/to/attachment.txt" tickle-me-email drafts - < /path/to/body.txt

• Print the all the current subject lines (eg. for scripting)::

  $ tickle-me-email subjects

• Print the current configuration::

  $ tickle-me-email config

Configuration

You configure tickle-me-email via the optional configuration files:

• ~/.config/tickle-me-email/tickle-me-email.cfg
• /etc/tickle-me-email/tickle-me-email.cfg

For example::

[imap]
server=imap.example.org
username=lamby
password=secret
secure=true

[smtp]
server=smtp.example.org
username=lamby
password=secret
secure=true

[todo]
mailbox=INBOX
recipient=TODO <[email protected]>

[draft]
mailbox=INBOX.Drafts
subject=Default draft subject

Alternatively, you can define the following environment variables:

• IMAP_SERVER (eg. imap.example.org)

• IMAP_SECURE (eg. true/false)

• IMAP_USERNAME (eg. lamby)

• IMAP_PASSWORD (eg. secret)

• SMTP_SERVER (eg. smtp.example.org)

• SMTP_SECURE (eg. true/false)

• SMTP_USERNAME (eg. lamby)

• SMTP_PASSWORD (eg. secret)

• TODO_EMAIL (eg. TODO <[email protected]>)

• TODO_PREFIX (eg. TODO: )

• TODO_MAILBOX (eg. INBOX)

• DRAFT_TO (eg. [email protected])

• DRAFT_CC (eg. [email protected])

• DRAFT_BCC (eg. [email protected])

• DRAFT_SUBJECT (eg. Draft subject)

• DRAFT_MAILBOX (eg. INBOX.Drafts)

• DRAFT_ATTACHMENT (eg. /path/to/filename.txt)

• DRAFT_EXTRA_HEADERS (eg. X-Me-Personality: 20851409)

• SUBJECTS_MAILBOX (eg. INBOX)