Imap Smtp Mail Cli

The problem

Managing email from the terminal is usually clunky, requiring manual IMAP/SMTP configurations or clunky web interfaces that break your flow. Developers need a way to programmatically search, read, and send mail without leaving the shell or leaking plaintext credentials.

What it does

• Lists and reads messages directly through the terminal using the Himalaya CLI.
• Searches mailboxes using advanced queries like sender, subject, or date filters.
• Composes and sends emails via SMTP using a markdown-friendly message format.
• Manages folder aliases to handle non-standard IMAP structures like Gmail's system folders.
• Secures credentials by integrating with password managers instead of storing secrets in config files.

Frameworks & tools

Himalaya CLI, IMAP, SMTP, and TOML configuration. Works with standard password managers like pass or system keyrings.

Why this beats prompting it yourself

Prompting an agent to "send an email" often results in hallucinated Python scripts or API calls that lack local auth. This skill provides a specific, hardened procedure for the Himalaya CLI, ensuring correct folder mapping and secure credential handling through external commands rather than fragile environment variables.

Use cases

• Search your inbox for specific technical alerts or logs while debugging.
• Draft and send replies to specific senders using CLI templates.
• Automate mailbox cleanup or batch-archiving via terminal commands.
• Fetch message bodies to be used as context for other development tasks.

Known limitations

Not suitable for heavy attachments or large-scale account migrations. Does not support OAuth-only providers that require browser-based authentication flows not supported by the CLI.