Linux mail command to bcc multiple addresses?

Question

I am using linux mail command to send an automated email to a bunch of people once per week. I want each one of the recipients to be BCC'ed.

I am trying this command:

mail -v -s "Email Subject" -b [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] -- -f [email protected] < /pathTo/dir/emailText.txt

But get this error:

You must specify direct recipients with -s, -c, or -b.

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 26 '16 at 21:37

2

you need to put them all in a single argument by quoting it.

mail -v -s "Email Subject" -b '[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]' -- -f [email protected] < /pathTo/dir/emailText.txt

answered Aug 26 '16 at 21:37

Barmar

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I can't reproduce the error. However, I get a bounce message when it tries to send to `-f`. Why do you have that in the regular recipient list? – Barmar Aug 26 '16 at 21:50
I use -f to specify the "from" parameter in the email – quelquecosa Aug 26 '16 at 21:51
Everything after `--` is the recipients. – Barmar Aug 26 '16 at 21:51
Like I said, it works but I get a bounce message saying that delivery to `-f@mydomain` failed. All the other recipients get the message. – Barmar Aug 26 '16 at 21:54
There's no `-f` option for setting the `From` header in http://linux.die.net/man/1/mail – Barmar Aug 26 '16 at 21:55

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 18 '22 at 16:16

1

It seems there are multiple versions of the mail command.

mail (GNU Mailutils) 3.7 has an append option to add headers and values directly without piping them in. Just add the headers you need there, e.g. bcc:

echo "Just testing my sendmail" | mail -s "Sendmail test" [email protected] --append=Bcc:[email protected],[email protected]

How to send mail through BCC in UNIX

answered Mar 18 '22 at 16:16

poleguy

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This works with the standard "mail" command in Ubuntu. – Raúl Salinas-Monteagudo Mar 13 '23 at 14:42

Linux mail command to bcc multiple addresses?

2 Answers2