RCVALERT

Section: User Commands (1)
Updated: 21 May 1986
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NAME

rcvalert - mail-receipt notification

SYNOPSIS

rcvalert [size]

DESCRIPTION

Rcvalert is run by the mail delivery system, on the user's behalf, rather than by the user directly. A line entered in the user's .maildelivery file causes rcvalert to run when mail is delivered. The size argument tells the program the size of the message. Rcvalert checks whether the user is logged in and the user's terminal may be written to. If so, rcvalert prints a scan listing of the message on the user's terminal.

The scan line rings the terminal's bell and then prints the number of characters in the message and the contents of the "From:" and "Subject:" components, if present. If the "Subject:" component is not present or is very short, some of the initial text from the body of the message is included.

EXAMPLE

A typical entry in the user's .maildelivery file is:

* - pipe R ``rcvalert $(size)''

You will need to give the full path to the rcvalert program. if it is not in a directory normally searched by a vanilla /bin/sh.

FILES

${RCVDIR}/rcvalert: typical location of rcvalert program
/etc/utmp: to see who is logged in
<login directory>/.maildelivery: user's delivery specification file

AUTHOR

David H. Crocker

This document was created by man2html, using the manual pages.
Time: 06:40:39 GMT, May 19, 2025