Himalaya

Himalaya Email CLI

Himalaya is a CLI email client that lets you manage emails from the terminal using IMAP, SMTP, Notmuch, or Sendmail backends.

This skill is separate from the Hermes Email gateway adapter. The gateway adapter lets people email the agent and uses Hermes' built-in IMAP/SMTP adapter; this skill lets the agent operate a mailbox from terminal tools and requires the external himalaya CLI.

References

• references/configuration.md (config file setup + IMAP/SMTP authentication)
• references/message-composition.md (MML syntax for composing emails)

Prerequisites

1. Himalaya CLI installed (himalaya --version to verify)
2. A configuration file at ~/.config/himalaya/config.toml
3. IMAP/SMTP credentials configured (password stored securely)

Installation

# Pre-built binary (Linux/macOS — recommended)
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/pimalaya/himalaya/master/install.sh | PREFIX=~/.local sh

# macOS via Homebrew
brew install himalaya

# Or via cargo (any platform with Rust)
cargo install himalaya --locked

Configuration Setup

Run the interactive wizard to set up an account:

himalaya account configure

Or create ~/.config/himalaya/config.toml manually:

[accounts.personal]
email = "you@example.com"
display-name = "Your Name"
default = true

backend.type = "imap"
backend.host = "imap.example.com"
backend.port = 993
backend.encryption.type = "tls"
backend.login = "you@example.com"
backend.auth.type = "password"
backend.auth.cmd = "pass show email/imap"  # or use keyring

message.send.backend.type = "smtp"
message.send.backend.host = "smtp.example.com"
message.send.backend.port = 587
message.send.backend.encryption.type = "start-tls"
message.send.backend.login = "you@example.com"
message.send.backend.auth.type = "password"
message.send.backend.auth.cmd = "pass show email/smtp"

# Folder aliases (himalaya v1.2.0+ syntax). Required whenever the
# server's folder names don't match himalaya's canonical names
# (inbox/sent/drafts/trash). Gmail is the common case — see
# `references/configuration.md` for the `[Gmail]/Sent Mail` mapping.
folder.aliases.inbox = "INBOX"
folder.aliases.sent = "Sent"
folder.aliases.drafts = "Drafts"
folder.aliases.trash = "Trash"

> Heads up on the alias syntax. Pre-v1.2.0 docs used a > [accounts.NAME.folder.alias] sub-section (singular alias). > v1.2.0 silently ignores that form — TOML parses fine, but the > alias resolver never reads it, so every lookup falls through to > the canonical name. On Gmail this means save-to-Sent fails after > SMTP delivery succeeds, and himalaya message send exits non-zero. > Any caller (agent, script, user) that retries on that exit code > will re-run the entire send — including SMTP — producing duplicate > emails to recipients. Always use folder.aliases.X (plural, dotted > keys, directly under [accounts.NAME]).

Hermes Integration Notes

• Reading, listing, searching, moving, deleting all work directly through the terminal tool
• Composing/replying/forwarding — piped input (`cat

Your reply here. EOF

Reply-all (interactive — needs $EDITOR, use template approach above instead):

```bash
himalaya message reply 42 --all

Forward an Email

# Get forward template and pipe with modifications
himalaya template forward 42 | sed 's/^To:.*/To: newrecipient@example.com/' | himalaya template send

Write a New Email

Non-interactive (use this from Hermes) — pipe the message via stdin:

cat  --help` for detailed usage.
- Message IDs are relative to the current folder; re-list after folder changes.
- For composing rich emails with attachments, use MML syntax (see `references/message-composition.md`).
- Store passwords securely using `pass`, system keyring, or a command that outputs the password.

## Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

- **Author:** [john-data-chen](https://github.com/john-data-chen)
- **Source:** [john-data-chen/hermes-agent-backup](https://github.com/john-data-chen/hermes-agent-backup)
- **License:** MIT

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.