EDIT: Thanks y’all! I got this working by installing mutt and configuring it with my Gmail info. Please note the warning from u/jherazob below–if this were something mission critical I would not want to rely on this solution.

================

Noob question incoming, thanks in advance for any help with this!

I have a specific use case in which I want to send an automated email or text to myself once a day (the message is different each time–otherwise I would just set an alarm, lol!). I’m running Pop_OS on an old desktop computer. Where I’m stuck is getting an email to successfully send from the command line. I’m looking for easy-to-follow instructions that would help me do that, and none of the articles or videos I’ve come across thus far have helped.

I’m aware of Twilio and other services that send SMS messages, but I’m looking for something free. Especially since I only need to text one person (myself), and infrequently at that.

Below is my attempt to send an email with the telnet command. Nothing ever came through…

XXXXXXXX@pop-os:~$ telnet localhost smtp
Trying ::1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
220 pop-os ESMTP Exim 4.95 Ubuntu Sun, 07 Jan 2024 15:12:28 -0500
HELO gmail.com
250 pop-os Hello localhost [::1]
mail from: XXXXXXXX@gmail.com
250 OK
rcpt to: XXXXXXXX@gmail.com
250 Accepted
data
354 Enter message, ending with "." on a line by itself
Subject: Test
Body: Is this working?
.
250 OK id=1rMZW4-0002dj-Uy
quit
  • Radiant_sir_radiant@beehaw.org
    16·
    10 months ago

    I see several issues with your SMTP session.

    First, gmail.com will be protected by SPF and DKIM and your message will likely be flagged as spam (or outright rejected) because it’s clear that you’re not sending on behalf of the real gmail.com.

    Second, commands should be in all-caps. A server may accept or reject lowercase keywords.

    Third, you need to leave a blank line between the mail headers and the body, so that part of your session would look like so: …

    DATA
354 Go ahead
From: ...
To: ...
Subject: ...

This is the first line of text.
This is the second line.
.
250 Queued

    Having said that, many servers will require an encrypted connection (SMTPS), many ISPs will block port 25 for residential customers as an anti-spam measure (so your local mail server may accept the message from your script but be unable to forward it), ESMTP should be preferred over SMTP etc.
    If at all possible, you should use a full-featured mail library for this and use your ISP’s own mail server.

    Doesn’t Pop_OS come with a sendmail command?