2.6.2 Summary of Movemail Usage

     movemail [option...] inbox destfile [remote-password]

The first argument, inbox, is the url (see URL) of the source mailbox. The second argument, destfile, traditionally means destination file, i.e. the UNIX mailbox to copy messages to. However, mailutils movemail extends the meaning of this parameter. You may actually specify any valid url as destfile parameter.¹. Finally, optional third argument is a traditional way of specifying user passwords for remote (POP or IMAP) mailboxes.

Following is the summary of available command line options:

--emacs

Output information used by Emacs rmail interface

-p

--preserve

--keep-messages

Preserve the source mailbox

-r

--reverse

Reverse the sorting order

--license

Print GPL license and exit

--external-locker=program

Use given program as the external locker program.

--lock-expire-timeout=seconds

Set number of seconds after which the lock expires

--lock-flags=flags

Set locker flags. flags is composed of the following letters: ‘E’ – use external locker program dotlock, ‘R’ – retry 10 times if acquiring of the lock failed (see also --lock-retry-count below), ‘T’ – remove stale locks after 10 minutes (see also --lock-expire-timeout, and ‘P’ – write process PID to the lock file.

--lock-retry-count=number

Set the maximum number of times to retry acquiring the lockfile

--lock-retry-timeout=seconds

Set timeout for acquiring the lockfile

-m url

--mail-spool URL

Use specified URL as a mailspool directory

--tls[=bool]

Enable (default) or disable TLS support