mutt treats email address as file name when using attachments

[Vasya Pupkin]

$ date |mutt -a services.txt <email address hidden>
Can't stat <email address hidden>: No such file or directory
<email address hidden>: unable to attach file.

It can be worked around by inserting -- before email address, but this should not be required.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: mutt 1.5.20-7ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-32.62-server 2.6.32.38+drm33.16
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-32-server x86_64
Architecture: amd64
Date: Mon Jul 4 21:59:07 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Server 10.04.2 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20110211.1)
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: mutt

[Alex Ng (alex-ng)]

The man page for mutt has for the -a option:

       -a file [...]
              Attach a file to your message using MIME. When attaching single or multiple files, separating filenames and recipient addresses with "--" is mandatory, e.g.
              mutt -a image.jpg -- addr1 or mutt -a img.jpg *.png -- addr1 addr2. The -a option must be placed at the end of command line options.

so it would appear the double dash '--' is mandatory, and is working as designed.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[e633 (e633)]

Definitely not a bug.