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693ca8d8a8
We want to be able to query the properties directly, like: notmuch count property:foo=bar which should return a count of messages where the property with key "foo" has value equal to "bar".
406 lines
12 KiB
ReStructuredText
406 lines
12 KiB
ReStructuredText
====================
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notmuch-search-terms
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====================
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SYNOPSIS
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========
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**notmuch** **count** [option ...] <*search-term*> ...
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**notmuch** **dump** [--format=(batch-tag|sup)] [--] [--output=<*file*>] [--] [<*search-term*> ...]
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**notmuch** **search** [option ...] <*search-term*> ...
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**notmuch** **show** [option ...] <*search-term*> ...
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**notmuch** **tag** +<*tag*> ... -<*tag*> [--] <*search-term*> ...
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DESCRIPTION
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===========
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Several notmuch commands accept a common syntax for search terms.
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The search terms can consist of free-form text (and quoted phrases)
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which will match all messages that contain all of the given
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terms/phrases in the body, the subject, or any of the sender or
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recipient headers.
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As a special case, a search string consisting of exactly a single
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asterisk ("\*") will match all messages.
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In addition to free text, the following prefixes can be used to force
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terms to match against specific portions of an email, (where <brackets>
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indicate user-supplied values):
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- from:<name-or-address>
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- to:<name-or-address>
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- subject:<word-or-quoted-phrase>
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- attachment:<word>
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- mimetype:<word>
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- tag:<tag> (or is:<tag>)
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- id:<message-id>
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- thread:<thread-id>
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- folder:<maildir-folder>
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- path:<directory-path> or path:<directory-path>/**
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- date:<since>..<until>
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- lastmod:<initial-revision>..<final-revision>
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- query:<name>
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- property:<key>=<value>
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The **from:** prefix is used to match the name or address of the sender
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of an email message.
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The **to:** prefix is used to match the names or addresses of any
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recipient of an email message, (whether To, Cc, or Bcc).
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Any term prefixed with **subject:** will match only text from the
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subject of an email. Searching for a phrase in the subject is supported
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by including quotation marks around the phrase, immediately following
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**subject:**.
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The **attachment:** prefix can be used to search for specific filenames
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(or extensions) of attachments to email messages.
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The **mimetype:** prefix will be used to match text from the
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content-types of MIME parts within email messages (as specified by the
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sender).
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For **tag:** and **is:** valid tag values include **inbox** and
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**unread** by default for new messages added by **notmuch new** as well
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as any other tag values added manually with **notmuch tag**.
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For **id:**, message ID values are the literal contents of the
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Message-ID: header of email messages, but without the '<', '>'
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delimiters.
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The **thread:** prefix can be used with the thread ID values that are
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generated internally by notmuch (and do not appear in email messages).
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These thread ID values can be seen in the first column of output from
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**notmuch search**
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The **path:** prefix searches for email messages that are in
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particular directories within the mail store. The directory must be
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specified relative to the top-level maildir (and without the leading
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slash). By default, **path:** matches messages in the specified
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directory only. The "/\*\*" suffix can be used to match messages in
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the specified directory and all its subdirectories recursively.
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**path:""** matches messages in the root of the mail store and,
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likewise, **path:\*\*** matches all messages.
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The **folder:** prefix searches for email messages by maildir or MH
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folder. For MH-style folders, this is equivalent to **path:**. For
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maildir, this includes messages in the "new" and "cur"
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subdirectories. The exact syntax for maildir folders depends on your
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mail configuration. For maildir++, **folder:""** matches the inbox
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folder (which is the root in maildir++), other folder names always
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start with ".", and nested folders are separated by "."s, such as
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**folder:.classes.topology**. For "file system" maildir, the inbox is
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typically **folder:INBOX** and nested folders are separated by
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slashes, such as **folder:classes/topology**.
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Both **path:** and **folder:** will find a message if *any* copy of
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that message is in the specific directory/folder.
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The **date:** prefix can be used to restrict the results to only
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messages within a particular time range (based on the Date: header) with
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a range syntax of:
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date:<since>..<until>
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See **DATE AND TIME SEARCH** below for details on the range expression,
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and supported syntax for <since> and <until> date and time expressions.
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The time range can also be specified using timestamps with a syntax of:
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<initial-timestamp>..<final-timestamp>
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Each timestamp is a number representing the number of seconds since
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1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC.
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The **lastmod:** prefix can be used to restrict the result by the
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database revision number of when messages were last modified (tags
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were added/removed or filenames changed). This is usually used in
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conjunction with the **--uuid** argument to **notmuch search**
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to find messages that have changed since an earlier query.
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The **query:** prefix allows queries to refer to previously saved
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queries added with **notmuch-config(1)**. Named queries are only
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available if notmuch is built with **Xapian Field Processors** (see
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below).
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The **property:** prefix searches for messages with a particular
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<key>=<value> property pair. Properties are used internally by notmuch
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(and extensions) to add metadata to messages. A given key can be
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present on a given message with several different values.
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Operators
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---------
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In addition to individual terms, multiple terms can be combined with
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Boolean operators (**and**, **or**, **not**, and **xor**). Each term
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in the query will be implicitly connected by a logical AND if no
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explicit operator is provided (except that terms with a common prefix
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will be implicitly combined with OR). The shorthand '-<term>' can be
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used for 'not <term>' but unfortunately this does not work at the
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start of an expression. Parentheses can also be used to control the
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combination of the Boolean operators, but will have to be protected
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from interpretation by the shell, (such as by putting quotation marks
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around any parenthesized expression).
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In addition to the standard boolean operators, Xapian provides several
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operators specific to text searching.
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::
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notmuch search term1 NEAR term2
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will return results where term1 is within 10 words of term2. The
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threshold can be set like this:
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::
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notmuch search term1 NEAR/2 term2
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The search
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::
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notmuch search term1 ADJ term2
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will return results where term1 is within 10 words of term2, but in the
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same order as in the query. The threshold can be set the same as with
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NEAR:
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::
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notmuch search term1 ADJ/7 term2
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Stemming
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--------
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**Stemming** in notmuch means that these searches
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::
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notmuch search detailed
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notmuch search details
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notmuch search detail
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will all return identical results, because Xapian first "reduces" the
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term to the common stem (here 'detail') and then performs the search.
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There are two ways to turn this off: a search for a capitalized word
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will be performed unstemmed, so that one can search for "John" and not
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get results for "Johnson"; phrase searches are also unstemmed (see
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below for details). Stemming is currently only supported for
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English. Searches for words in other languages will be performed unstemmed.
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Wildcards
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---------
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It is possible to use a trailing '\*' as a wildcard. A search for
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'wildc\*' will match 'wildcard', 'wildcat', etc.
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Boolean and Probabilistic Prefixes
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----------------------------------
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Xapian (and hence notmuch) prefixes are either **boolean**, supporting
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exact matches like "tag:inbox" or **probabilistic**, supporting a more flexible **term** based searching. The prefixes currently supported by notmuch are as follows.
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Boolean
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**tag:**, **id:**, **thread:**, **folder:**, **path:**, **property:**
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Probabilistic
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**from:**, **to:**, **subject:**, **attachment:**, **mimetype:**
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Terms and phrases
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-----------------
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In general Xapian distinguishes between lists of terms and
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**phrases**. Phrases are indicated by double quotes (but beware you
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probably need to protect those from your shell) and insist that those
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unstemmed words occur in that order. One useful, but initially
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surprising feature is that the following are equivalant ways to write
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the same phrase.
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- "a list of words"
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- a-list-of-words
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- a/list/of/words
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- a.list.of.words
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Both parenthesised lists of terms and quoted phrases are ok with
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probabilisitic prefixes such as **to:**, **from:**, and **subject:**. In particular
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::
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subject:(pizza free)
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is equivalent to
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::
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subject:pizza and subject:free
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Both of these will match a subject "Free Delicious Pizza" while
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::
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subject:"pizza free"
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will not.
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DATE AND TIME SEARCH
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====================
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notmuch understands a variety of standard and natural ways of expressing
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dates and times, both in absolute terms ("2012-10-24") and in relative
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terms ("yesterday"). Any number of relative terms can be combined ("1
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hour 25 minutes") and an absolute date/time can be combined with
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relative terms to further adjust it. A non-exhaustive description of the
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syntax supported for absolute and relative terms is given below.
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The range expression
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--------------------
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date:<since>..<until>
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The above expression restricts the results to only messages from <since>
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to <until>, based on the Date: header.
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<since> and <until> can describe imprecise times, such as "yesterday".
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In this case, <since> is taken as the earliest time it could describe
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(the beginning of yesterday) and <until> is taken as the latest time it
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could describe (the end of yesterday). Similarly, date:january..february
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matches from the beginning of January to the end of February.
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date:<expr>..! can be used as a shorthand for date:<expr>..<expr>. The
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expansion takes place before interpretation, and thus, for example,
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date:monday..! matches from the beginning of Monday until the end of
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Monday.
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With **Xapian Field Processor** support (see below), non-range
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date queries such as date:yesterday will work, but otherwise
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will give unexpected results; if in doubt use date:yesterday..!
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Currently, we do not support spaces in range expressions. You can
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replace the spaces with '\_', or (in most cases) '-', or (in some cases)
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leave the spaces out altogether. Examples in this man page use spaces
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for clarity.
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Open-ended ranges are supported (since Xapian 1.2.1), i.e. it's possible
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to specify date:..<until> or date:<since>.. to not limit the start or
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end time, respectively. Pre-1.2.1 Xapian does not report an error on
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open ended ranges, but it does not work as expected either.
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Relative date and time
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----------------------
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[N\|number]
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(years\|months\|weeks\|days\|hours\|hrs\|minutes\|mins\|seconds\|secs)
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[...]
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All refer to past, can be repeated and will be accumulated.
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Units can be abbreviated to any length, with the otherwise ambiguous
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single m being m for minutes and M for months.
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Number can also be written out one, two, ..., ten, dozen, hundred.
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Additionally, the unit may be preceded by "last" or "this" (e.g., "last
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week" or "this month").
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When combined with absolute date and time, the relative date and time
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specification will be relative from the specified absolute date and
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time.
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Examples: 5M2d, two weeks
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Supported absolute time formats
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-------------------------------
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- H[H]:MM[:SS] [(am\|a.m.\|pm\|p.m.)]
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- H[H] (am\|a.m.\|pm\|p.m.)
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- HHMMSS
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- now
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- noon
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- midnight
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- Examples: 17:05, 5pm
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Supported absolute date formats
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-------------------------------
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- YYYY-MM[-DD]
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- DD-MM[-[YY]YY]
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- MM-YYYY
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- M[M]/D[D][/[YY]YY]
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- M[M]/YYYY
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- D[D].M[M][.[YY]YY]
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- D[D][(st\|nd\|rd\|th)] Mon[thname] [YYYY]
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- Mon[thname] D[D][(st\|nd\|rd\|th)] [YYYY]
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- Wee[kday]
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Month names can be abbreviated at three or more characters.
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Weekday names can be abbreviated at three or more characters.
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Examples: 2012-07-31, 31-07-2012, 7/31/2012, August 3
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Time zones
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----------
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- (+\|-)HH:MM
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- (+\|-)HH[MM]
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Some time zone codes, e.g. UTC, EET.
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XAPIAN FIELD PROCESSORS
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=======================
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Certain optional features of the notmuch query processor rely on the
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presence of the Xapian field processor API. You can determine if your
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notmuch was built against a sufficiently recent version of Xapian by running
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::
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% notmuch config get built_with.field_processor
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Currently the following features require field processor support:
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- non-range date queries, e.g. "date:today"
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- named queries e.g. "query:my_special_query"
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SEE ALSO
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========
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**notmuch(1)**, **notmuch-config(1)**, **notmuch-count(1)**,
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**notmuch-dump(1)**, **notmuch-hooks(5)**, **notmuch-insert(1)**,
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**notmuch-new(1)**, **notmuch-reply(1)**, **notmuch-restore(1)**,
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**notmuch-search(1)**, **notmuch-show(1)**, **notmuch-tag(1)**
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