Here are some hints on how to successfully submit patches inline
using various mailers.
GMail
GMail does not have any way to turn off line wrapping in the web
interface, so it will mangle any emails that you send. You can
however use "git send-email" and send your patches through the
GMail SMTP server, or use any IMAP email client to connect to the
google IMAP server and forward the emails through that.
For hints on using git send-email to send your patches through
the GMail SMTP server, see the EXAMPLE section of
git-send-email(1).
For hints on submission using the IMAP interface, see the EXAMPLE
section of git-imap-send(1).
Thunderbird
By default, Thunderbird will both wrap emails as well as flag
them as being format=flowed, both of which will make the
resulting email unusable by Git.
There are three different approaches: use an add-on to turn off
line wraps, configure Thunderbird to not mangle patches, or use
an external editor to keep Thunderbird from mangling the patches.
Approach #1 (add-on)
Install the Toggle Word Wrap add-on that is available from
https://addons.mozilla.org/thunderbird/addon/toggle-word-wrap/
It adds a menu entry "Enable Word Wrap" in the composer's
"Options" menu that you can tick off. Now you can compose the
message as you otherwise do (cut + paste, git format-patch |
git imap-send, etc), but you have to insert line breaks
manually in any text that you type.
Approach #2 (configuration)
Three steps:
1. Configure your mail server composition as plain text:
Edit...Account Settings...Composition & Addressing,
uncheck "Compose Messages in HTML".
2. Configure your general composition window to not wrap.
In Thunderbird 2: Edit..Preferences..Composition, wrap
plain text messages at 0
In Thunderbird 3: Edit..Preferences..Advanced..Config
Editor. Search for "mail.wrap_long_lines". Toggle it to
make sure it is set to false. Also, search for
"mailnews.wraplength" and set the value to 0.
3. Disable the use of format=flowed:
Edit..Preferences..Advanced..Config Editor. Search for
"mailnews.send_plaintext_flowed". Toggle it to make sure
it is set to false.
After that is done, you should be able to compose email as
you otherwise would (cut + paste, git format-patch | git
imap-send, etc), and the patches will not be mangled.
Approach #3 (external editor)
The following Thunderbird extensions are needed: AboutConfig
from http://aboutconfig.mozdev.org/ http://globs.org/articles.php?lng=en&pg=8
1. Prepare the patch as a text file using your method of
choice.
2. Before opening a compose window, use Edit→Account
Settings to uncheck the "Compose messages in HTML format"
setting in the "Composition & Addressing" panel of the
account to be used to send the patch.
3. In the main Thunderbird window, before you open the
compose window for the patch, use Tools→about:config to
set the following to the indicated values:
mailnews.send_plaintext_flowed => false
mailnews.wraplength => 0
4. Open a compose window and click the external editor icon.
5. In the external editor window, read in the patch file and
exit the editor normally.
Side note: it may be possible to do step 2 with about:config
and the following settings but no one's tried yet.
mail.html_compose => false
mail.identity.default.compose_html => false
mail.identity.id?.compose_html => false
There is a script in contrib/thunderbird-patch-inline which
can help you include patches with Thunderbird in an easy way.
To use it, do the steps above and then use the script as the
external editor.
KMail
This should help you to submit patches inline using KMail.
1. Prepare the patch as a text file.
2. Click on New Mail.
3. Go under "Options" in the Composer window and be sure that
"Word wrap" is not set.
4. Use Message → Insert file... and insert the patch.
5. Back in the compose window: add whatever other text you wish
to the message, complete the addressing and subject fields,
and press send.
