Simtel MSDOS - Coast to Coast/simteldosarchivecoasttocoast2.iso/uucp/mush71.zip/README.DOS

Text File | 1990-09-24 | 10KB | 291 lines

/* @(#)README.DOS 1.4   Mike O'Carroll 05 Jan 90 */

INTRO
=====

The DOS (tm) patches for the Mail User's Shell were intended to allow Mush
to be used as a font-end to UUPC, a PD implementation of UUCP for IBM PCs
and compatibles.  Mush also runs under OS/2(tm), though it uses the DOS box
(or a dedicated DOS mail-server on a network) to handle the actual data
transfer.

The above notwithstanding, Mush should be usable with any MTA, given minor
modifications, so long as the latter can be run with a command of the
form:

    <mta> [flags] addressee

This may exclude some PC products with an integrated menu system on the
front-end.

Needless to say, there are problems moving any significant body of
software from Unix(tm) to DOS.  There now follows a brief discussion of
some of these and their solutions (if any).



PROBLEMS
========

1) Size!  These days, mini (and many micro) users tend to assume infinite
memory.  DOS restricts one to 640K, barring a whole range of extensions,
sidesteps and general kludges.  In its "straight" form, Mush 6.5 occupies
about 240K, plus dynamically assigned memory.  While this in itself is no
problem, remember that, to be useful, Mush needs to execute other programs
such as an editor, pager, the MTA and so on.  Add to this all your
favourite TSR programs, a decent shell (I prefer sh to command.com) and
life soon becomes claustrophobic.

    As an example, the full Dos version allows use of the MKS port of vi,
but not my port of e2 (the Rand editor - I like to use the same editor
under Dos & Unix too :-)

   The first thing was to cut the number of messages from 1000 to 500.
Sorry all you people with bulging folders [but can you really handle 1000
in one packet?].

   This still left only 3 or 4 bytes [he exaggerates] for other things, so
I have made Mush 6.5 run by the use of overlays (refer to your local
science museum, folks).  This in itself leads to a number of problems:

     i) It runs rather slowly, especially when the overlays are being
        pulled off an already overloaded file-server on a network.

    ii) Control-C's and other things causing longjump()s are tricky and if
        they happen into a non-resident overlay, often fatal. [OK, always
        fatal.] The supplied code appears to work, and does handle
        interrupt signals OK as long as the user is patient and allows
        things to settle down between each one.  I tried to put all the
        "dangerous" code in the root area, but it didn't save enough room.
    Any experts out there? ...

I have retained a working version 5.7 which is mush [sic] smaller, if anyone
wants.  Of course, you lose some nice features.  There is no problem with
OS/2.  I'll rephrase that.  There is plenty of room to run Mush 6.5 under
OS/2.

OK, I exaggerate.

2) Filenames are more restricted.  Things like '&' are acceptable to DOS,
but when they appear in a system() call to OS/2, they are interpreted as
separators.  I settled for things like "m_xxxxx.tmp" which are at least
identifiable as temporaries by the suffix.

3) DOS and OS/2 lack "standards" in the sense of PATHs, HOMEs and library
directories.  Of course you can still use "/usr/lib/...", but is it on
drive A:, or C:, or ...?  These systems do have environments, but they
can rapidly become clogged and unmanageable when you have to specify HOME,
MAILDIR, MAILBOX, HELPDIR, LIBDIR, SPOOLDIR, TEMPDIR, LOGNAME, REALNAME,
..., enuff said?

The procedure used by UUPC is to make the environment point to 2
configuration files, a "system" config and a "user" config.  These have
been adopted and adapted for Mush.

4) Again, on the subject of paths.  Most DOS calls allow the use of '/' in
place of the usual '\'.  However, some operations invoke a system() which
calls up COMMAND.COM; unless you have discovered the secret operation which
makes DOS flip its '/' and '\' and recognise '-' for flags, you are stuck
with path\names\like\this.  Some experimentation with your mush.rc setup
may be necessary here.

Don't be alarmed by messages like

        ... saving msg 1 in c:\usr\foo/junkmail

i.e. with mixed slashes.  However, if you get *error* messages saying
things like "can't open \mixed/slashes", this *might* be the problem if it
comes from an externally exec()ed program such as a pager.  A typical
example is given in the next section.

5) Pipes.  COMMAND.COM users may be fooled by their ability to do things
like:

        C> verbose_prog | pg

However, this is just a cover-up for

       C> verbose_prog >temp
      pg <temp
      del temp

I have written a simple DOS piper which works so long as you don't expect
the two ends really to play concurrently. [What?  It cheats just like
COMMAND.COM, of course.]

The "pipes" are created in a temporary directory.  This may be defined as

    set tmpdir=c:\tmp

in your environment, or in the mush.rc file.  If it is not defined, mush
will use the Home parameter in your usr.rc file (see below).  Since
the "pipe" files are picked up by another command, this is one case
where the slashes must\go\this\way.

6) Unix users tend to be blase' about things like

    fopen("zork", "w");
    ...
    unlink("zork"); /* i.e. no fclose */

This can upset DOS and/or OS/2 in strange ways.  [And I now know yet another
way to bring your network down, but I ain't telling ;-) ]

7) The standard distribution of the uupc front-end is (i) Dos only and
(ii) inserts its own headers as well as mush's.  A slightly modified
"mailer.exe" is availabled which runs in either mode.  For completeness,
"uuio.exe" (the MTA) is also available, but is Dos only at present.

CONFIGS
=======

1) The following are something like the author's UUPC config files.
They are defined to the environment by

    set UUPCSYSRC=[<drive>:]<path>\sys.rc
    set UUPCUSRRC=[<drive>:]<path>\usr.rc

   sys.rc

    Domain=lena.uucp
    NodeName=mocpc
    Mailserv=lena
    MailDir=e:/usr/mail
    MushDir=c:/usr/lib/mush
    NewsDir=c:/u/usr1/moc/news
    ConfDir=c:/usr/lib/uucp
    SpoolDir=e:/usr/spool/uucp
    PubDir=e:/usr/spool/uupublic
    TempDir=e:/tmp
    TZOffset=0000
    TZName=GMT

   usr.rc
    Mailbox=moc
    Name=Mike O'Carroll
    Home=c:\u\usr1\moc
    Folders=folders
    Editor=e2 %s
    Pager=pg %s
    Signature=Signatur.e

Only MushDir, MailDir, Mailbox and Home are required by Mush itself.  The
slashes are not guarranteed to be right for all uses.

The NodeName and Domain may be the same.  On our system, they are different
as there are various nodes hanging off a central host.  The latter
is defined as the Domain, and is the only name to appear to the outside
world (except that the NodeName is used in generating message IDs, to
facilitate tracing).

The NewsDir is currently unused.  PubDir is usable if you allow direct
uucp [sic] commands from your host;  our uupc has no uucp command at present.

2) A sample "mush.rc" file is included in this distribution. As with
the Unix version, the local version (in Home) overrides the default in
MushDir.


INSTALLATION
============

1) Put the .EXEs in a suitable directory in your PATH.  Mush6 is an
overlayed Dos version, mushn is not overlayed.  Mushp is the OS/2
protected mode version, and mushpg is a simple pager.  Mailer is
the uupc front-end, suitably modified for mush (and dual-mode), while
uuio is the Dos MTA.

2) Put the .rc files in a suitable library directory.  Set UUPCSYSRC
and UUPCUSRRC to point to the correct locations of sys.rc and usr.rc.
This might be done in your autoexec.bat.

3) Create the directories defined in your sys.rc and usr.rc files.

4) Put "cmd_help" and "mush.rc" in the directory defined as MushDir.

5) Put the "systems" and "commands" file (if any) in the directory defined
as ConfDir.

6) Put your own "mush.rc" (if required) in your Home directory.


RUNNING
=======

To read mail, type

    mush

To send mail, type

    mush user@address
or
    mush address!user

if your mail host is pure uucp!

There is a "-S" flag which leaves you in mush, even if there is no mail.
The curses mode "-C" is not implemented.

Periodically, connect to your host using

    uuio

There is a debug flag, "-xN" which may help debug your "systems" file.
Try an N between 3 and 10 - it gets very verbose very quickly.



DOCUMENTATION
=============

Apart from these READMEs, there is a Unix style "man" and a built-in
online "help".  If you've used another mailer, you should pick things
up quickly enough.


THAT'S IT
=========

All trademarks recognised.  Unless I failed to recognise any.

I am not the author of mush, nor uupc, nor the editor e2.  However, I
am prepared to collate bug reports and provide fixes from time to time.
I am in touch with the authors of mush, and will upgrade the Dos/OS-2
versions some time after I receive fixes to the Unix one.

One day, there may be a PM front-end, and an OS/2 version of the MTA.
One day.





VERSION 7.1 UPDATE
==================

Most of the above remarks apply equally to 7.1.  It is slightly larger,
and the Dos overlay scheme needs reorganising as some changes from 6.5
have caused an incredible amount of disk activity during initialisation.
I'll get round to it one day (but now there's 7.1.2! - woe :-)

Once running, it isn't too bad.

I have checked this version for compatibility with **ix by uploading to
our SCO system.  The same code compiles and runs, with only the appropriate
-D defines to the compiler.  Just 1 source to maintain - bliss :-)))

There are some small deviations from the "standard" **ix mush (sorry
Dan & Bart), mainly to make maintenance under the 2 (3?) operating
systems easier, but these mainly have to do with locating things like
the help file.  I have added a UK date format for those of our users
who get confused by 6/5/90 ( == 6th of May to me).  The cmd_help file
should be amended accordingly for %pick%. [ Many, many years ago, I
was nearly refused admission to a bar in SF.  My ID gave my birthday
as 12/6, and this was August.  Think about it. As it happens, I wish I
had been refused entry, but that's another story :-) ]

I am still prepared to collect bug reports and provide occasional fixes.
This version is fairly well hammered locally, but of course people tend
to use only a small subset of all the features.