[[http://www.procmail.org|Procmail]] is a versatile e-mail processor that can be used to sort your incoming mail.  You configure it by creating a `~/.procmailrc` file.  It's described by some rather complicated manpages, so people have put together:

 * a [[http://www.ii.com/internet/robots/procmail/qs/|quick start guide]]
 * a [[http://lipas.uwasa.fi/~ts/info/proctips.html|cookbook]]
 * a [[https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bugs/HowToFilter|How to filter guide]]

== Sample ==

Here is a sample `~/.procmailrc` file that you can use to weed out duplicate mail and throw away extra mail from [[http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs|ubuntu-bugs]].

{{{
# Set to yes when debugging
VERBOSE=yes

# Default INBOX
INBOX=$MAIL

# Directory for storing procmail-related files
PMDIR=$HOME/procmail

# Uncomment the following line to get logging
#LOGFILE=$PMDIR/log

# Eliminate duplicates
:0 Wh: .msgid.lock
| formail -D 8192 $PMDIR/.msgid.cache

# Only keep ubuntu-bugs mail that announces newly reported bugs.
:0
* ^TO_ubuntu-bugs@lists\.ubuntu\.com
* ^X-Launchpad-Bug:
{
  :0 B
  * ^Public bug reported:
  $INBOX
  :0
  /dev/null
}

# Add all the rest to my inbox
:0
$INBOX
}}}