Vmail

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

VMAIL is a utility program which functions as both a user interface to the standard UNIX mail system and as a manager for manipulating received electronic mail messages.

VMAIL is a standalone utility. However, using VMAIL with Boston Business Computing's VCL, EDT+, and Vbackup products provides a homogeneous environment across a variety of computer systems.

VMAIL operates with standard UNIX mail mechanisms:

  o

Incoming mail messages are read from a UNIX-style 'spool' file. The messages are then written into a user-specific Managed Mail File. The control information needed for Vmail to emulate the functions of the VMS MAIL utility are included in this managed file.

  o

Outgoing messages are sent using the native Mail Transport Agent ('sendmail' on most systems). This allows Vmail to use the same routing mechanisms and alias lists as the native mail interface.

To invoke the VMAIL program, type vmail from your UNIX prompt. By default, a 'vmail' directory will be created in your HOME directory. Any mail messages that are retrieved are stored in a file called MAIL.user in the vmail directory, where user is your username. To override this default or to review the list of supported commands and their functionality please refer to the VMAIL Reference Guide.

You can activate VMAIL using the following command line switches:

  -e[frs]

Instructs VMAIL to invoke the user selected text editor to enter outgoing messages. Specify just '-e' to invoke the editor for all messages. Specify 'f', 'r', and 's' to invoke the editor from the FORWARD, REPLY, and SEND commands respectively.

  -p<name-string>

Uses the supplied string as the personal name string for this message only. Specifying this qualifier overrides any existing personal name specification. If 'name-string' contains blanks, enclose it in quotes.

  -P

Do not use a personal name string for this message only. Specifying this qualifier overrides any existing personal name specification.

  -a | A

Enables/disables the generation of a carbon copy of any mail messages sent to be mailed back to the sender.

  -s <subject-line>

Specifies the text to appear in the subject line for the subsequent SEND command. If 'subject-line' contains blanks, it must be enclosed in quotes(").

  -c | C

Enables/disables automatic retrieval of new messages from the native mail system.

  filename

Specifies the name of a file to send as the mail message body.

  recipients

Specifies the user (or a list of users) to receive the mail message. Specify an external file containing a distribution list by preceding the file name with an at-sign character (@).

SEE ALSO

Index

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