Trouble shooters .Com^® and Linux Library
Present:

Alpine, the Simple Email Client

Viewing IMAP With Alpine details how to set up Alpine to be a window onto your IMAP server. It does not cover sending or replying..
Sending with Alpine maps the tricky path to sending email with Alpine.

Intro duction

Alpine is a Command Line Interface (CLI) application using nCurses. It's IMAP aware, but it lacks the facility to automatically detect and reveal IMAP folders. And because of its lack of caching and general efficiency, once configured to see an IMAP folder, it sees the folder instantly.

Like Mutt, Alpine has no built in SMTP on-ramp, relying on your local SMPT server or a separate SMTP on-ramp like nullmailer or msmtp.

Alpine is so raw and crude that few folks will find it sufficient for their daily email activities. However, as a comparison tool for troubleshooting, or as a temporary shelter when your chosen email client goes bad, as all email clients must, Alpine shines.