$Id: PGP-Notes.txt,v 1.10 1999/11/23 19:17:38 roessler Exp $
USING PGP FROM WITHIN MUTT
WARNING: The configuration interface has completely changed as of
0.96.3!
USERS' GUIDE
How do I use mutt with PGP, PGP5, or GnuPG?
-------------------------------------------
Go to the contrib subdirectory of the source tree. You'll find
three files there, pgp2.rc, pgp5.rc, and gpg.rc. These files
contain ready-to-use configurations for using mutt with pgp2, pgp5,
and gpg.
Include one of these files with your ~/.muttrc, and things should
work out fine.
You may wish to verify that all paths and the language parameters
given to the PGP binaries match your needs.
Frequently Asked Questions and Tips
-----------------------------------
Q: "People are sending PGP messages which mutt doesn't
recognize. What can I do?"
Add the following lines to your ~/.procmailrc (you are
using procmail, aren't you?):
------------------------------
##
## PGP
##
:0
* !^Content-Type: message/
* !^Content-Type: multipart/
* !^Content-Type: application/pgp
{
:0 fBw
* ^-----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE-----
* ^-----END PGP MESSAGE-----
| formail \
-i "Content-Type: application/pgp; format=text; x-action=encrypt"
:0 fBw
* ^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
* ^-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
* ^-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
| formail \
-i "Content-Type: application/pgp; format=text; x-action=sign"
}
------------------------------
For users of maildrop, "Mark Weinem"
suggests the following recipe:
------------------------------
BPGPM="-----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE-----"
EPGPM="-----END PGP MESSAGE-----"
BPGPS="-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----"
EPGPS="-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----"
if (!/^Content-Type: message/ && !/^Content-Type: multipart/ \
&& !/^Content-Type: application\/pgp/)
{
if (/^$BPGPM/:b && /^$EPGPM/:b)
xfilter "reformail -A 'Content-Type: application/pgp; format=text; \
x-action=encrypt'"
if (/^$BPGPS/:b && /^$EPGPS/:b)
xfilter "reformail -A 'Content-Type: application/pgp; format=text; \
x-action=sign'"
}
------------------------------
Q: "I don't like that PGP/MIME stuff, but want to use the
old way of PGP-signing my mails. Can't you include
that with mutt?"
No. Application/pgp is not really suited to a world with
MIME, non-textual body parts and similar things. Anyway,
if you really want to generate these old-style
attachments, include the following macro in your ~/.muttrc
(line breaks for readability, this is actually one line):
macro compose S "Fpgp +verbose=0 -fast
+clearsig=on\ny^T^Uapplication/pgp; format=text;
x-action=sign\n"
Q: "I don't like all the ^Gs and various other verbosity
PGP is presenting me with."
Roland Rosenfeld has found a
quite elegant solution to this problem: PGP has some
pretty good foreign language support. So we just
introduce a language called "mutt" which contains empty
strings for the messages we don't want to see. To use
this, copy either language.txt or language50.txt
(depending on what PGP version you are using) to your
$PGPPATH. Make sure the PGP command formats pass "+language=pgp" to
all the PGP binaries (but not to pgpring!).
For PGP 2.6, a German version called "muttde" is available
as well.
BACKGROUND
Auxiliary Programs
------------------
Mutt needs two auxiliary programs for its PGP support: pgpewrap and
pgpring.
1. pgpring
pgpring is a key ring dumper. It extracts information from PGP's
binary key ring and emits it in an (almost) readable output format
understood by mutt's key selection routines. This output format
mimics the one used by the GNU Privacy Guard (GPG).
You'll need this program with PGP 2 and PGP 5.
Command line options:
-k Dump the contents of the key ring specified
as an argument to -k.
-2, -5 Use the default key ring for PGP 2 or 5,
respectively.
-s Dump the secret key ring.
2. pgpewrap
This is a little shell script which does some command line munging:
The first argument is a command to be executed. When pgpewrap
encounters a "--" (dash-dash) argument, it will interpret the next
argument as a prefix which is put in front of all following
arguments.
Example:
pgpewrap pgpe file -- -r a b c
will execute:
pgpe file -r a -r b -r c
This script is needed with PGP 5 and with GPG, since their command
line interfaces can't be properly served by mutt's format mechanism.
The Configuration Interface
---------------------------
As usual within mutt, the configuration interface for the PGP
commands relies on printf-like formats. For all PGP commands, the
following %-sequences are defined.
%p The empty string when no passphrase is needed,
the string "PGPPASSFD=0" if one is needed.
This is mostly used in conditional % sequences.
%f Most PGP commands operate on a single file or a file
containing a message. %f expands to this file's name.
%s When verifying signatures, there is another temporary file
containing the detached signature. %s expands to this
file's name.
%a In "signing" contexts, this expands to the value of the
configuration variable $pgp_sign_as. You probably need to
use this within a conditional % sequence.
%r In many contexts, mutt passes key IDs to pgp. %r expands to
a list of key IDs.
The following command formats are defined:
$pgp_decode_command Decode application/pgp messages. This
command operates with and without pass phrases.
$pgp_verify_command Verify a PGP/MIME signature.
$pgp_decrypt_command Decrypt a PGP/MIME encrypted MIME body.
This command always gets a pass phrase.
$pgp_sign_command Sign a PGP/MIME body. This command always
gets a pass phrase.
$pgp_encrypt_sign_command Encrypt and sign a MIME body. This
command always gets a pass phrase.
$pgp_encrypt_only_command Encrypt a MIME body, but don't sign it.
$pgp_import_command Import PGP keys from a file.
$pgp_export_command Export PGP keys to a file. The output must
be ASCII armored.
$pgp_verify_key_command Check a public key. This is used from the
key selection menu.
$pgp_list_secring_command List the secret keys matching some hints
given in %r.
$pgp_list_pubring_command List the public keys matching some hints
given in %r.
The passphrase is always passed on stdin; all commands must send
their output to stdout and stderr.