Power User Reference

Every feature and setting documented for scanning. If you're new to LastPost, start with the Getting Started guide first.

Layout overview

LastPost uses a fixed three-pane layout:

• Sidebar (left) — folder tree, compose button, settings access, and account info at the bottom.
• Message list (center) — the messages in the currently selected folder, sorted newest first. The list paginates; scroll to the bottom to load more.
• Message detail (right) — the full content of the selected message, with action toolbar above.

When you open Compose, a compose panel slides in on the right and the message detail pane shifts or collapses. The drafts list opens alongside it automatically.

Folder tree

The sidebar shows every IMAP folder your server exposes. Standard folders (INBOX, Sent, Drafts, Junk, Trash) are listed at the top. Custom folders and nested folder hierarchies appear below them.

Folders with unread messages show a count badge. Click any folder to load its messages in the center pane.

Message list

Each row in the message list shows the sender name, subject line, preview text, and timestamp. Unread messages are visually distinct from read ones.

Actions available from the message list:

• Click — open the message in the detail pane.
• Flag icon — toggle a flag on the message for follow-up.
• Delete — moves the message to Trash. Messages in Trash can be deleted permanently.

Message detail

The detail pane renders the message in full. HTML emails are displayed in an isolated frame. If the email contains external images, they're blocked by default — a banner appears letting you load them for that message.

The toolbar above the message body offers:

• Reply — opens compose pre-filled with the sender in To, the original subject prefixed with Re:, and your quoted original below.
• Reply All — same as Reply but includes all recipients in CC.
• Forward — opens compose with the original body quoted and attachments included, To field blank.
• Mark unread — returns the message to unread state.
• Move to folder — opens a folder picker to move the message.
• Delete — moves to Trash.

Attachments are listed at the bottom of the message with individual download links.

Composing

The compose panel has these fields:

When replying, the From field pre-selects the persona whose address matches the To address of the original message. If you were emailed as [email protected] and have a billing persona, it's selected automatically.

Drafts

LastPost auto-saves drafts as you type. There's no save button — it happens continuously in the background. When you open Compose (or Reply, or Forward), the drafts panel slides open alongside it showing all in-progress messages.

A few behaviors worth knowing:

• Blank draft deduplication — if you open Compose and immediately close it without typing anything, no draft is created (or if one already exists with nothing in it, the timestamp is updated instead). This prevents a pile of empty drafts from accumulating.
• Resuming a draft — click any draft in the drafts panel to resume it. The compose panel fills in with everything you had.
• Discarding a draft — close the compose panel with content in it to save to drafts, or use the discard button to delete it.

Search

The search bar at the top of the message list searches the current folder by default. Search is handled server-side via IMAP — it searches subject, sender, and body text.

To search a different folder, switch to it first, then search. To search all mail, select the All Mail or Archive folder if your server provides one, then search from there.

Personas

A persona is a complete sending identity. Each one stores:

• Name — a label for your own reference (e.g. "Work", "Personal", "Billing").
• From address — the email address that appears in the From header. Must be an address your mail server is authorized to send as.
• Reply-To — optional. If set, replies from recipients go to this address instead of the From address.
• Signature — HTML and plain text variants. Injected automatically when you open compose with this persona selected.

Personas live in Settings → Personas. You can add, edit, and delete them there.

Auto-selection on reply

When you reply to a message, LastPost checks whether any of your personas has a From address matching the To address of the message you received. If you were emailed at [email protected] and you have a persona with that From address, it's selected automatically. If there's no match, the first persona in your list is used.

Privacy note

Personas are stored in your browser's localStorage. They exist on this device and this browser only. They are never sent to the LastPost server or stored anywhere server-side. If you switch devices, you'll configure your personas again there.

Themes

Themes control every color in the interface. LastPost ships with a set of dark and light themes — find them in Settings → Themes.

Importing a theme

Themes are plain JSON files. To import one, go to Settings → Themes → Import, and select the file. The theme applies immediately. Community-made themes can be shared as JSON files and imported the same way.

The theme format

If you want to build a custom theme, the format is straightforward:

{
  "name": "My Theme",
  "slug": "my-theme",
  "author": "Your Name",
  "colors": {
    "bg":          "#0f1014",
    "bg-surface":  "#17191e",
    "accent":      "#2a9de0",
    "text":        "#e4e6ed"
  }
}

Each key in colors maps to a CSS custom property (bg → --lapo-bg, etc.). You only need to include the values you want to override — anything omitted falls back to the default dark theme.

The full list of token names is in the self-hosting guide.

Light and dark mode

The light/dark toggle in Settings switches between the colors block (dark) and the colors_light block of the active theme. All bundled themes include both. Custom themes that only define colors will fall back to the default light palette when light mode is active.

Exporting the current theme

Settings → Themes → Export downloads a JSON snapshot of every token value currently applied. Useful for saving a theme you've tweaked or sharing one you've built.

Settings reference

Personas

Add, edit, and delete sending identities. Each persona has a name, From address, optional Reply-To, and HTML/plain text signature blocks.

Themes

Browse bundled themes, import a theme JSON file, export the current theme, reset to the default dark theme, and toggle light/dark mode.

Display

• Email dark mode inversion — when enabled, HTML emails that use a light background are inverted to match the dark interface. Disable this if you prefer to see emails exactly as the sender designed them.

Maintenance

• Regenerate cache — clears the local message cache and re-fetches from the server. Use this if message counts or folder lists seem out of sync.

Keyboard shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are coming in an upcoming release. The planned set: