How to pipe text for a Mutt email body, then edit the email interactively?

Question

I've been trying to figure out how to start Mutt in such a way that it's just like starting up an interactive Mutt and creating a new email, then copying the output of git request-pull into the body (to be able to edit it manually). git request-pull HEAD https://... | mutt -i- invalid@example.org doesn't work - It just exits with exit code 0 and no message at all, and I'm not even sure if anything was sent, because there's no copy of the email in the standard sent folder.

Answer 1

I assume you want to edit the mail before it is sent? In that case piping is not going to work because mutt receives an EOF when the pipe closes. Either use an actual file or use process substitution, a ksh93 feature also available in bash and zsh, e.g.:

mutt -i<(git request-pull HEAD https://...) -s SUBJECT invalid@example.org