perch mail send composes a MIME message and submits it through the SMTP submission listener.

# Simple text message.
perch mail send --from you@example.com --to alice@example.com \
  --subject 'Hello' --body 'Hi Alice'

# Read the body from stdin.
echo 'Hi Alice' | perch mail send --from you@example.com \
  --to alice@example.com --subject 'Hello'

# Attachments, Cc/Bcc, and both text and HTML bodies.
perch mail send \
  --from you@example.com \
  --to 'Alice <alice@example.com>' \
  --cc bob@example.net \
  --bcc audit@example.net \
  --subject 'Quarterly report' \
  --body-file message.txt \
  --html-file message.html \
  --attach report.pdf \
  --attach chart.png

# Compose and inspect the raw message without sending it.
perch mail send --from you@example.com --to alice@example.com \
  --subject 'Draft' --body 'Hello' --dry-run > message.eml

Bodies

The body is read from --body, --body-file, --html-body, --html-file, or stdin when stdin is not a terminal.

• Text only → text/plain
• HTML only → text/html
• Both text and HTML → multipart/alternative
• Attachments → multipart/mixed

Attachments are base64 encoded and content types are detected from the file extension or contents. Non-ASCII filenames use RFC 2231 encoding.

Headers

• --from defaults to --username or PERCH_IMAP_USER.
• --to, --cc, --bcc, and --reply-to accept an address or a comma-separated list and can be repeated.
• --bcc recipients receive the message but do not appear in headers.
• --header 'X-Name: value' adds an extra header. Core headers are reserved.
• --in-reply-to and --references set threading headers.

Credentials and transport

SMTP credentials and TLS options mirror the IMAP client with an smtp- prefix:

--smtp-server  --smtp-plaintext  --smtp-starttls  --smtp-implicit-tls
--smtp-insecure  --smtp-ca-file

When --smtp-server is omitted, the submission listener in --config is used (tls_addr first, then addr). For an explicit loopback address, pass --smtp-plaintext.

When a password is available, the SMTP username defaults to the From address. Use --username to authenticate as a different account.

Transfer encodings

Bodies are quoted-printable by default. --8bitmime sends raw UTF-8 with BODY=8BITMIME; attachments remain base64.

SMTPUTF8 is detected from non-ASCII envelope addresses and extra headers. Force it with --smtputf8, or disable it with --smtputf8=false.

--verbose prints the server’s EHLO capabilities and delivery details to stderr.