Building NeoMutt

How to build NeoMutt from the source code

Install dependencies

See Downloads.

Obtain the source

The NeoMutt project is hosted on GitHub, so there are two main options to get the sources – either as Git repository or GitHub archive file. A repository, not only for GitHub users, provides some benefits over a single release or snapshot archive, e.g. will empower you to work with the source code and contribute to the project more easily.

Git

Cloning the main branch but also see our list of branches.

git clone https://github.com/neomutt/neomutt

Same as above but pointing to an other branch, e.g. sample/summary, for checkout.

git clone -b sample/summary https://github.com/neomutt/neomutt

GitHub

Latest release

: neomutt/neomutt

Select a source package (Tar or ZIP archive) and the checksum file for download. Important, verify the tarball/ZIP archive file to ensure its integrity, see Signing Code / Releases for an example.

Specific branch

: neomutt/neomutt

Note, archive file verification isn’t possible here because this is not a NeoMutt release archive and thus no checksum file is available. Consider to use Git instead (as mentioned above) to clone the repository and checkout the specific branch afterwards.

Configure

List supported options to adapt or fine tune NeoMutt’s build.

./configure --help

Configure options

This is not a comprehensive list of configure options. Check ./configure --help for full help. The options marked “Path” have either take a path, or have an extra option for specifying the library path.

e.g. ./configure --notmuch --with-notmuch=/usr/local/lib/notmuch

Configure option	Path	Notes
--everything		Enable all options
--with-ncurses=path		Location of ncurses
--gpgme	Path	GPG Made Easy
--gnutls	Path	Gnu TLS (SSL)
--gss	Path	Generic Security Services
--sasl	Path	Simple Authentication and Security Layer
--ssl	Path	OpenSSL
--fmemopen		Optional Feature (Dangerous)
--lua	Path	Optional Feature
--notmuch	Path	Optional Feature
--bdb	Path	Header cache backend
--gdbm	Path	Header cache backend
--kyotocabinet	Path	Header cache backend
--lmdb	Path	Header cache backend
--qdbm	Path	Header cache backend
--tokyocabinet	Path	Header cache backend
--disable-fcntl		fcntl(2) file locking
--flock		flock(2) file locking
--locales-fix		Workaround for broken locales
--disable-nls	Path	National Language Support (translations)
--disable-pgp	Path	Pretty Good Privacy
--disable-smime	Path	Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions
--disable-idn	Path	Internationalised domain names
--with-domain=DOMAIN		Default email domain
--with-mailpath	Path	Location of spooled mail
--homespool	Path	Spooled mail is in user’s home dir
--prefix	Path	Target directory for build (default: /usr)
--disable-doc		Don’t build the docs
--full-doc		Document disabled features
--quiet		Only show the summary

Build

Targets: neomutt, test, …

The build can be adjusted by setting any of six environment variables:

• CC - set the compiler

• CFLAGS - replace all the compiler flags

• EXTRA_CFLAGS - append flags to the default compiler flags

• LD - set the linker

• LDFLAGS - replace all the linker flags

• EXTRA_LDFLAGS - append flags to the default linker flags

e.g. make EXTRA_CFLAGS=-g

make

Install

make install

Uninstall

make uninstall

*[GCC]: GNU Compiler Collection *GDBM: GNU Data Base Manager *GPGME: GnuPG Made Easy *[GSSAPI]: Generic Security Services Application Program Interface *[IMAP]: Internet Message Access Protocol *LMDB: Lightning Memory-Mapped Database Manager *OBDB: Oracle Berkeley Database *QDBM: Quick Data Base Manager *SASL: Simple Authentication and Security Layer *[SSL]: Secure Sockets Layer *[Tar]: Tape archiver *[TLS]: Transport Layer Security *[tarball]: Tar generated archive file *[ZIP]: archive file format (meaning “move at high speed”)