Using GnuPG on Linux desktops with GUI

[Stuart Longland]

On Thu, 14 Oct 2021 22:06:03 +0800
Turritopsis Dohrnii Teo En Ming via Gnupg-users <gnupg-users at gnupg.org> wrote:

> I am using Linux desktops with GUI and GUI mail clients as well.
> 
> I understand GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG) is a free and open source
> command line tool.
> 
> How do I use it with a GUI mail client to sign and encrypt email
> messages and files?

I'd have a look for a GnuPG plug-in for your email client.  It's not
clear which one you are using.

I'm using Claws Mail right now, PGP/MIME can be enabled by enabling it
in the plug-ins dialogue.  Others like Trojitá, there are similar
options for enabling and configuring GnuPG support.

For Mozilla Thunderbird, it has its own OpenPGP implementation
built-in, but if you wish, you can (at the moment) tell it to use
GnuPG.  An example use case where you might want to do this is if your
OpenPGP keys are stored on a hardware token (Thunderbird's built-in
OpenPGP support doesn't support these tokens yet).

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird:OpenPGP:Smartcards says "Use the
Thunderbird config editor (found at the bottom of preferences/options),
and search for mail.openpgp.allow_external_gnupg. Switch the value to
true."

Web-based clients: you'll need to look at some sort of browser
extension to enable this feature.

For just file and message encryption outside of emails, there are
various front-ends for GnuPG if you must use a GUI tool, for example
KDE ships Kleopatra.
-- 
Stuart Longland (aka Redhatter, VK4MSL)

I haven't lost my mind...
  ...it's backed up on a tape somewhere.