# Email settings

The Kallithea configuration file has several email related settings. When these contain correct values, Kallithea will send email in the situations described below. If the email configuration is not correct so that emails cannot be sent, all mails will show up in the log output.

Before any email can be sent, an SMTP server has to be configured using the configuration file setting `smtp_server`. If required for that server, specify a username (`smtp_username`) and password (`smtp_password`), a non-standard port (`smtp_port`), encryption settings (`smtp_use_tls` or `smtp_use_ssl`) and/or specific authentication parameters (`smtp_auth`).

## Application emails

Kallithea sends an email to users on several occasions:

- when comments are given on one of their changesets
- when comments are given on changesets they are reviewer on or on which they commented regardless
- when they are invited as reviewer in pull requests
- when they request a password reset

Kallithea sends an email to all administrators upon new account registration. Administrators are users with the `Admin` flag set on the Admin > Users page.

When Kallithea wants to send an email but due to an error cannot correctly determine the intended recipients, the administrators and the addresses specified in `email_to` in the configuration file are used as fallback.

Recipients will see these emails originating from the sender specified in the `app_email_from` setting in the configuration file. This setting can either contain only an email address, like kallithea-noreply@example.com, or both a name and an address in the following format: Kallithea <kallithea-noreply@example.com>. However, if the email is sent due to an action of a particular user, for example when a comment is given or a pull request created, the name of that user will be combined with the email address specified in `app_email_from` to form the sender (and any name part in that configuration setting disregarded).

The subject of these emails can optionally be prefixed with the value of `email_prefix` in the configuration file.

## Error emails

When an exception occurs in Kallithea – and unless interactive debugging is enabled using `set debug = true` in the `[app:main]` section of the configuration file – an email with exception details is sent by WebError‘s `ErrorMiddleware` to the addresses specified in `email_to` in the configuration file.

Recipients will see these emails originating from the sender specified in the `error_email_from` setting in the configuration file. This setting can either contain only an email address, like kallithea-noreply@example.com, or both a name and an address in the following format: Kallithea Errors <kallithea-noreply@example.com>.

Note: The WebError package does not respect `smtp_port` and assumes the standard SMTP port (25). If you have a remote SMTP server with a different port, you could set up a local forwarding SMTP server on port 25.

## References

- Error Middleware (Pylons documentation)
- ErrorHandler (Pylons modules documentation)