.TH "DOVEADM-FETCH" "1" "May 2026" "e5ac02a" "Dovecot" .SH "NAME" \fBdoveadm-fetch\fR - Fetch partial/full messages or message information .SH "SYNOPSIS" .P \fBdoveadm\fR \[lB]\fIGLOBAL OPTIONS\fR\[rB] \[lB]\fB-f\fR \fIformatter\fR\[rB] \fBfetch\fR \[lB]\fB-S\fR \fIsocket_path\fR\[rB] \fB-A\fR \fIfields\fR \fIsearch_query\fR .P \fBdoveadm\fR \[lB]\fIGLOBAL OPTIONS\fR\[rB] \[lB]\fB-f\fR \fIformatter\fR\[rB] \fBfetch\fR \[lB]\fB-S\fR \fIsocket_path\fR\[rB] \fB-F\fR \fIfile\fR \fIfields\fR \fIsearch_query\fR .P \fBdoveadm\fR \[lB]\fIGLOBAL OPTIONS\fR\[rB] \[lB]\fB-f\fR \fIformatter\fR\[rB] \fBfetch\fR \[lB]\fB-S\fR \fIsocket_path\fR\[rB] \fB--no-userdb-lookup\fR \fIfields\fR \fIsearch_query\fR .P \fBdoveadm\fR \[lB]\fIGLOBAL OPTIONS\fR\[rB] \[lB]\fB-f\fR \fIformatter\fR\[rB] \fBfetch\fR \[lB]\fB-S\fR \fIsocket_path\fR\[rB] \fB-u\fR \fIuser\fR \fIfields\fR \fIsearch_query\fR .SH "DESCRIPTION" .P \fBdoveadm fetch\fR can be used to fetch messages' contents and metadata. This can be useful for scripts and for debugging. If you want to fetch messages one at a time, see doveadm-search(1). .RS 0 .IP \(bu 4 Please respect your users' privacy. .RE 0 .SH "GLOBAL OPTIONS" .P Global doveadm(1) \fIoptions\fR: .P \fB-D\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Enables \fIverbosity\fR and debug messages. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-O\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Do not read any config file, just use defaults. The \fBdovecot_storage_version\fR setting defaults to the latest version, but can be overridden with \fB-o\fR. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-k\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Preserve entire environment for doveadm, not just \fBimport_environment\fR setting. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-v\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Enables verbosity, including progress counter. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-i\fR \fIinstance-name\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P If using multiple Dovecot instances, choose the config file based on this instance name. .P See \fBinstance_name\fR setting for more information. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-c\fR \fIconfig-file\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Read configuration from the given \fIconfig-file\fR. By default it first reads config socket, and then falls back to \fI/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf\fR. You can also point this to config socket of some instance running compatible version. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-o\fR \fIsetting\fR\fB=\fR\fIvalue\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Overrides the configuration \fIsetting\fR from \fI/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf\fR and from the userdb with the given \fIvalue\fR. In order to override multiple settings, the \fB-o\fR option may be specified multiple times. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-f\fR \fIformatter\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Specifies the \fIformatter\fR for formatting the output. Supported formatters are: .P \fBflow\fR .RS 4 .P prints each line with \fIkey\fR\fB=\fR\fIvalue\fR pairs. .RE 0 .P \fBjson\fR .RS 4 .P prints a JSON array of JSON objects. .RE 0 .P \fBpager\fR .RS 4 .P prints each \fIkey\fR: \fIvalue\fR pair on its own line and separates records with form feed character (\fB^L\fR). .RE 0 .P \fBtab\fR .RS 4 .P prints a table header followed by tab separated value lines. .RE 0 .P \fBtable\fR .RS 4 .P prints a table header followed by adjusted value lines. .RE 0 .RE 0 .RE 0 .P This command uses by default the output formatter \fBpager\fR. .SH "OPTIONS" .P \fB-A\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P If the \fB-A\fR option is present, the \fIcommand\fR will be performed for all users. Using this option in combination with system users from \fBuserdb { driver = passwd }\fR is not recommended, because it contains also users with a lower UID than the one configured with the \fBfirst_valid_uid\fR setting. .P When the SQL userdb module is used, make sure that the \fBuserdb_sql_iterate_query\fR setting setting matches your database layout. .P When using the LDAP userdb module, make sure that the \fBuserdb_fields\fR setting and \fBuserdb_ldap_iterate_fields\fR setting settings match your LDAP schema. Otherwise doveadm(1) will be unable to iterate over all users. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-F\fR \fIfile\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Execute the \fIcommand\fR for all the users in the \fIfile\fR. This is similar to the \fB-A\fR option, but instead of getting the list of users from the userdb, they are read from the given \fIfile\fR. The \fIfile\fR contains one username per line. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB--no-userdb-lookup\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Do not perform userdb lookup. Use the \fBUSER\fR environment variable to specify the username. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-S\fR \fIsocket_path\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P The option's argument is either an absolute path to a local UNIX domain socket, or a hostname and port (\fIhostname\fR:\fIport\fR), in order to connect a remote host via a TCP socket. .P This allows an administrator to execute doveadm(1) mail commands through the given socket. .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fB-u\fR \fIuser/mask\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Run the \fIcommand\fR only for the given \fIuser\fR. It's also possible to use '\fB*\fR' and '\fB?\fR' wildcards (e.g. -u *@example.org). .RE 0 .RE 0 .SH "ARGUMENTS" .P \fIfields\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P One or more result field names to display, if the \fIsearch_query\fR matches any messages. In order to specify multiple fields, enclose them in single or double quotes. .P Supported \fIfields\fR are: .RS 4 .P \fBbinary\fR : Message body in decoded format. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBbinary.
\fR : Part of the body decoded, e.g. binary.1 .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBbody\fR : The body of a message. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBbody.
\fR : Part of the body, e.g. body.1 .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBbody.preview\fR : Short preview of the body. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBbody.snippet\fR : Old alias for preview. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.received\fR : Date and time of final delivery, when the message was delivered to a user's mailbox for the first time. .P The internal date and time of the source message, when the message was copied by the IMAP COPY command. .P The date-time attribute when present, otherwise the current time, when the message was saved by the IMAP APPEND command. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.received.unixtime\fR : date.received as unix timestamp. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.saved\fR : Date and time when the message was saved to mailbox. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.saved.unixtime\fR : date.saved as unix timestamp. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.sent\fR : Date and time of the message's Date: header. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBdate.sent.unixtime\fR : date.sent as unix timestamp. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBflags\fR : A message's IMAP flags, e.g. \[rs]Seen .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBguid\fR : A message's globally unique identifier. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBhdr\fR : The header of the message. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBhdr.\fR : Named header from the message. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBimap.body\fR : IMAP BODY output of the message (see RFC 3501). .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBimap.bodystructure\fR : IMAP BODYSTRUCTURE output of the message (see RFC 3501). .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBimap.envelope\fR : IMAP ENVELOPE output of the message (see RFC 3501). .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBmailbox\fR : Name of the mailbox, in which the message is stored. The name is in UTF-8. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBmailbox-guid\fR : The globally unique identifier of the mailbox, in which the message is located. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBmodseq\fR : Modification sequence number for the mail. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBpop3.order\fR : A message's order number within a mailbox. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBpop3.uidl\fR : A message's unique (POP3) identifier within a mailbox. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBrefcount\fR : Mail reference count, mdbox only. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBseq\fR : A message's sequence number in a mailbox. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBsize.physical\fR : A message's physical size. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBsize.virtual\fR : A message's virtual size, computed with CRLF line terminators. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBstorageid\fR : Mailbox driver specific ID for the mail. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBtext\fR : The entire message (header and body). .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBtext.utf8\fR : The entire message (header and body) \[em] UTF-8 encoded. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBuid\fR : A message's unique (IMAP) identifier in a mailbox. .RE 0 .RS 4 .P \fBuser\fR : A message owner's login name. .RE 0 .RE 0 .RE 0 .P \fIsearch_query\fR .RS 0 .RS 4 .P Fetch messages matching this search query. See doveadm-search-query(1) for details. .RE 0 .RE 0 .SH "EXAMPLE" .P This example based on the first example from doveadm-search(1). We are fetching the fields \fBmailbox\fR and \fBdate.sent\fR from user bob's mailbox with the guid "3a94c928d66ebe4bda04000015811c6a" for the messages with the UIDs \fB8\fR, \fB25\fR and \fB45\fR. .P .RS 2 .nf doveadm fetch -u bob "mailbox date.sent" mailbox-guid 3a94c928d66ebe4bda04000015811c6a uid 8,25,45 .fi .RE .P .RS 2 .nf mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0 date.sent: 2010-01-19 01:17:41 (+0100) ^L mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0 date.sent: 2010-01-28 09:38:49 (+0100) ^L mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0 date.sent: 2010-03-28 18:41:14 (+0200) .fi .RE .SH "REPORTING BUGS" .P Report bugs, including \fIdoveconf -n\fR output, to the Dovecot Mailing List \fI\(ladovecot@dovecot.org\(ra\fR. Information about reporting bugs is available at: \fI\(lahttps://dovecot.org/bugreport.html\(ra\fR .SH "SEE ALSO" .P doveadm(1)