Your message dated Tue, 21 Jul 2026 06:34:30 +0000
with message-id <[email protected]>
and subject line Bug#1113796: fixed in mutt 2.4.1-1
has caused the Debian Bug report #1113796,
regarding mutt: key bindings involving meta (esc) do not work on foot
to be marked as done.
This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.
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1113796: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1113796
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact [email protected] with problems
--- Begin Message ---
Package: mutt
Version: 2.2.13-1
Control: affects -1 + foot
X-Debbugs-Cc: [email protected]
Hi,
I am observing an annoying oddity when using mutt inside foot. By
default, foot causes meta ("alt" key) to send a ESC (0x1b) as a prefix.
This is what xterm calls metaSendsEscape (see manual page of foot for
details) and as far as I can see, this is also what mutt expects. The
behavior of the meta key can be changed at runtime using the escape
sequences named "smm" and "rmm" in the terminfo database. Consider the
following interaction in both an xterm and a foot terminal:
* Start the terminal (expecting a bash shell).
* Press meta-1.
+ Both: This invokes a readline behavior and looks like "(arg: 1)".
* Press ctrl-c to abort.
* Start mutt.
* Use a key binding that involves meta. Example meta-l to show the
current limit.
+ xterm: "No limit pattern is in effect."
+ foot: "Key is not bound. Press '?' for help."
* Exit mutt.
* Press meta-1.
+ xterm: "(arg: 1)"
+ foot: "±"
* On foot, we may restore the meta behavior using printf "\e[?1036h"
(first half of rmm) or by resetting the terminal.
What we can see here is that mutt somehow invokes smm and thus disables
the sending of meta keys for sending escape, but it does not expect that
behavior. It also does not restore the behavior on exit.
We can further verify this by running mutt in strace and observing what
it writes to stdout. Right after parsing /etc/Muttrc it goes:
write(1, "\33[?1036l\33[?1034h\33[39;49m\33[37m\33[40m\33[H\33[2J", 41) = 41
That \33[?1036l is what disables the sending of esc. However, I could
not locate any relevant "smm", "rmm" or "1036l" in the mutt source code
that would be causing this. Ultimately, I may be looking at the wrong
layer.
I appreciate if someone knows a workaround for the issue. What works is
pressing the actual escape key (e.g. esc then l instead of meta-l). In
any case, this is not working as intended.
Helmut
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Source: mutt
Source-Version: 2.4.1-1
Done: Antonio Radici <[email protected]>
We believe that the bug you reported is fixed in the latest version of
mutt, which is due to be installed in the Debian FTP archive.
A summary of the changes between this version and the previous one is
attached.
Thank you for reporting the bug, which will now be closed. If you
have further comments please address them to [email protected],
and the maintainer will reopen the bug report if appropriate.
Debian distribution maintenance software
pp.
Antonio Radici <[email protected]> (supplier of updated mutt package)
(This message was generated automatically at their request; if you
believe that there is a problem with it please contact the archive
administrators by mailing [email protected])
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA512
Format: 1.8
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2026 07:46:27 +0200
Source: mutt
Architecture: source
Version: 2.4.1-1
Distribution: unstable
Urgency: medium
Maintainer: Mutt maintainers <[email protected]>
Changed-By: Antonio Radici <[email protected]>
Closes: 1072814 1113796 1140576 1141601
Changes:
mutt (2.4.1-1) unstable; urgency=medium
.
* New upstream release (Closes: 1072814, 1113796, 1141601).
* debian-specific/Muttrc.patch: removed sort=threads as default behavior to
reflect upstream default (Closes: 1140576).
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