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- Date: 26 Nov 2001 06:00:02 GMT
- Supersedes: <mailfaq.3_1004853601@ferret.ocunix.on.ca>
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- References: <mailfaq.1_1006754401@ferret.ocunix.on.ca>
- Subject: UNIX Email Software Survey FAQ [Part 3 of 3]
- From: clewis@ferret.ocunix.on.ca (Chris Lewis)
- Newsgroups: news.admin.misc,comp.mail.misc,news.answers,comp.answers
- Followup-To: poster
- Reply-To: mailfaq@ferret.ocunix.on.ca (Mail FAQ commentary reception)
- Summary: How to set up Email on UNIX systems.
- Approved: news-answers-request@mit.edu
- Keywords: mail software survey UNIX FAQ
- Organization: eh?
- Lines: 657
- Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu news.admin.misc:78188 comp.mail.misc:62682 news.answers:219737 comp.answers:47911
-
- Archive-name: mail/setup/unix/part3
- Last-modified: Mon Feb 21 09:57:37 EST 2000
-
- UNIX EMail Software - a Survey
- Chris Lewis
- clewis@ferret.ocunix.on.ca
- [and a host of others - thanks]
-
- Copyright 1991, 1992, 1993, Chris Lewis
-
- Redistribution for profit, or in altered content/format
- prohibited without permission of the author.
- Redistribution via printed book or CDROM expressly
- prohibited without consent of the author. Any other
- redistribution must include this copyright notice and
- attribution.
-
- Mailshield Author: Lyris Technologies http://www.lyristechnologies.com
-
- [Watch this space, see http://www.mailshield.com]
-
- Exim* Author: Philip Hazel (ph10@cus.cam.ac.uk)
-
- [Author note: Exim is very highly regarded in the industry, and it,
- along with qmail, are the most frequently recommended replacements
- for sendmail on UNIX.]
-
- Exim is a mail transport agent (MTA) developed at the University
- of Cambridge for use on Unix systems connected to the Internet.
- It is freely available under the terms of the GNU General Public
- Licence. In style it is similar to Smail 3, but its facilities
- are more extensive, and in particular it has options for
- verifying incoming sender and recipient addresses, for refusing
- mail from specified hosts, networks, or senders, and for
- controlling mail relaying.
-
- Exim is intended for use as an Internet mailer, and therefore
- handles addresses in RFC 822 domain format only. It cannot handle
- 'bang paths', though simple two-component bang paths can be
- converted by a straightforward rewriting configuration. However,
- there is no problem in interfacing Exim to UUCP systems, provided
- they use domain-style addressing.
-
- Exim is in production use at quite a few sites, some of which
- move hundreds of thousands of messages per day.
-
- The following operating systems are currently supported: AIX, BSDI, DGUX,
- FreeBSD, HI-OSF (Hitachi), HP-UX, IRIX, Linux, MIPS RISCOS, NetBSD,
- OpenBSD, DEC OSF1 (aka Digital UNIX), SCO, SCO SVR4.2 (aka UNIX-SV),
- SunOS4, SunOS5 (Solaris 2), Ultrix, and Unixware.
-
- Further information can be obtained from the Exim web sites:
-
- http://www.exim.org (main site, in the UK)
- http://www.us.exim.org (a mirror in the USA)
-
- |qmail: Author Daniel Bernstein <djb@pobox.com>
- |
- | [Ed note: Qmail, along with Exim, is the most often recommended
- | sendmail replacement. Qmail is capable of handling very high mail
- | volumes. Qmail is one of the few mailers capable of integrating
- | spam filters directly, however, given how this is done, qmail probably
- | could not match the volumes of, say, Mailshield - which was designed
- | for the purpose of filtering spam from the beginning.]
- |
- | Web page: http://www.qmail.org
- | also: ftp://koobera.math.uic.edu/www/qmail.html
- |
- | Download:
- | ftp://koobera.math.uic.edu/pub/software/qmail-1.03.tar.gz
- | ftp://koobera.math.uic.edu/www/software/dot-forward-0.71.tar.gz
- | ftp://koobera.math.uic.edu/www/software/fastforward-0.51.tar.gz
- | ftp://koobera.math.uic.edu/www/software/ucspi-tcp-0.84.tar.gz
- |
- | RPMs: ftp://moni.msci.memphis.edu/pub/qmail
- |
- | Lists: mailto:qmail-help@list.cr.yp.to
- | mailto:qmailannounce-help@list.cr.yp.to
- |
- | qmail is an MTA for UNIX and UNIX-like systems (including FreeBSD,
- | Linux, SunOS, Solaris, HP/UX, AIX, amongst others). It was written by
- | Dan Bernstein to overcome the limitations of and flaws in sendmail, and
- | to demonstrate by example that there are better ways of doing some
- | things (see Maildirs below).
- |
- | * qmail is Modular
- |
- | qmail follows the UNIX philosophy of combining small single-purpose
- | tools together. Instead of being one enormous setuid-root binary,
- | qmail comprises a suite of small programs, each of which does one
- | particular job. This makes qmail flexible, allowing substitutions
- | to be made for individual parts of the system according to one's
- | requirements.
- |
- | Substituting qmail-qmqpc for qmail-queue, for example, turns qmail
- | into "mini-qmail" (see below). For another example, all user
- | authentication in the POP3 server is done by calling a separate
- | external utility program, checkpassword, so changing the
- | authentication scheme merely involves replacing that program.
- |
- | Even qmail's configuration is modular. qmail doesn't have large
- | monolithic configuration files with complex structures, that have to
- | be read and parsed every time that a new mail process is created,
- | only to have 70% or more of that information remain unused because
- | it is irrelevant to the task at hand. qmail's configuration
- | comprises individual files in /var/qmail/control, each file having a
- | single job. The names of the local domains are listed, one per
- | line, in /var/qmail/control/locals, for example. Many configuration
- | tasks (and FAQ answers!) are, as a result of this philosophy,
- | one-liners involving `echo' and `cat'.
- |
- | * qmail is Secure
- |
- | qmail was designed to be secure. Not only does the mail system not
- | trust the outside world, but different modules in the mail system
- | don't even trust one another. Different parts of the mail system
- | run under different non-privileged UIDs ("qmaild", "qmailr",
- | "qmailq", &c.). So, for example, even if the SMTP server
- | (qmail-smtpd, which runs as user "qmailr") were compromised, the
- | rest of the system will not be.
- |
- | qmail has only one setuid binary, qmail-queue which is setuid to one
- | of the qmail user IDs, not root. qmail has only two programs that
- | run as root, qmail-start which spawns the other daemon processes
- | under the correct UIDs and qmail-lspawn which spawns the local
- | delivery program qmail-local under the UID and GID of the user being
- | delivered to. Neither program writes to any files or spawns any
- | program under the root user ID.
- |
- | And, of course, qmail doesn't treat root as a "real" user, and so
- | never delivers mail as root.
- |
- | * qmail provides a flexible aliasing/forwarding mechanism, qmail files
- | qmail supports /etc/aliases and .forward with its fastforward and
- | dot-forward packages. However, it is a testament to the power and
- | versatility of qmail's own "native" aliasing and forwarding
- | mechanism that both are merely plug-ins that run off it.
- |
- | With qmail, each user controls all local parts that begin with the
- | user's username, allowing each user to have an unlimited number of
- | different local parts. Delivery to each local part is (optionally)
- | controlled by a separate .qmail-* file in the user's home directory
-
-
- uumail:
-
- Uumail is a very old and obsolete precursor to smail 2.5. Included
- here only because I know that uumail sites still exist. You
- should not install uumail in new configurations, and existing
- uumail sites should convert to something more modern.
-
- smail 2.5: author The UUCP Mapping Project
-
- [Not recommended for general use now. UUCP is very little used.]
-
- Smail 2.5 is a small, simple and hard-coded rule MTA for use on
- UUCP networks. It understands RFC compliant headers, will
- generate RFC compliant Internet-style headers, can
- use domains, aliases, a pathalias UUCP routing database, and
- is very simple to install. For full functionality, you will
- also want pathalias and a map unpacker. The one thing
- it cannot do by itself is mail-to-pipe and mail-to-file aliasing.
- For that, you need Zeeff's lmail, deliver or procmail.
-
- Smail 2.5 has the capability of coalescing addresses into single
- UUCP transfers, and knows how to query UUCP for the names
- of UUCP neighbors, and autoroute if necessary.
-
- Smail 2.5 has a few bugs that are (usually) pretty rarely seen
- in operation. There have been a number of patches posted for it,
- but it is recommended that you do not apply them - some were
- ill-conceived, buggy in their own right, or conflicting with others.
- The only patches that I feel safe in recommending is Chip
- Salzenberg's patches for use with Xenix MICNET - which are
- unnecessary unless you are in the unfortunate position of having
- to actually *use* MICNET. Chip Salzenberg's "deliver" package
- (see below) combined with "smail-deliver.pch" from comp.sources.unix,
- volume 25 issue 107, makes the MICNET modifications to smail
- itself unnecessary.
-
- In particular, do not apply the "mail-to-pipe/file" patches that
- float around for smail 2.5. These are a major security hole.
-
- Smail 2.5 can also be used with sendmail as a UUCP router.
-
- Smail 2.5 was posted in comp.sources.unix in 1987, volume 11
- with archive name "smail3" (but it isn't the same thing as
- smail 3 below).
-
- lmail: Author Jon Zeeff <zeeff@b-tech.ann-arbor.mi.us, zeeff@ais.org>
-
- When you install smail 2.5, you link the original /bin/mail (binmail
- above) to /bin/lmail to perform the task of actually delivering the
- mail to the user's mailbox (LDA).
-
- Since smail 2.5 was not capable of doing mail-to-pipe and mail-to-file
- aliasing, Jon Zeeff wrote a replacement lmail that implemented
- these (along with user mailbox delivery).
-
- Jon's program is okay for casual use, but has some pretty serious
- bugs. Fixed versions are available, but you're probably better
- off installing deliver or procmail.
-
- smail 3: Author Ronald S. Karr* <tron@veritas.com> and Landon Curt Noll.
-
- Smail3.x is a domain-capable mail router and delivery program that
- works in the UUCP zone and on the Internet and that is capable of
- gatewaying between the two. It was written primarily by me (Ronald
- S. Karr) and Landon Curt Noll, with the blessings of the original
- Smail1 and Smail2 authors.
-
- Smail3 supports SMTP, UUCP mail, alias files, .forward files, mailing
- list directories, pathalias files, /etc/hosts files, the domain name
- system, and can also query uucp for neighboring sites, automatically.
- It also supports use of encapsulated SMTP commands for delivery over
- UUCP connections, which allows batching of multiple messages into a
- single UUCP transaction, and allows many addresses to be passed with a
- single message transfer, which can greatly decrease the traffic
- generated for large mailing lists. It is also very simple to configure
- with a reasonable certainty of correctness.
-
- Smail3 includes pathalias and a reliable map unpacker.
-
- Rather than using configuration files to resolve addresses based on
- their syntax, ala sendmail, Smail3 uses a database metaphore for
- resolving addresses based on their contents. The set of methods that
- Smail3 uses for resolving local addresses and hosts is configurable and
- extensible. Smail3's methods for parsing addresses are not
- configurable. It is the opinion of the authors that addressing on the
- Internet and in the UUCP zone has become sufficiently standardized that
- attempts to allow configurability in this area are now a hindrance to
- the correct working of the network.
-
- Questions related to Smail3 are usually discussed in comp.mail.smail.
- There are also two discussion mailing lists. To join the mailing
- lists, send mail to:
-
- smail3-users-request@cs.athabascau.ca
-
- The current release of Smail3 is 3.3.x, and can be found on uunet,
- in the directory /archive/networking/mail/smail/smail-3.1.29.1.tar.Z.
-
- Smail 3 is covered under the GPL (if it matters)
-
- sendmail: Original author Eric Allman
-
- Sendmail is the granddaddy of all intelligent MTA's. It can do just
- about anything. It's main problem is that it can do just about
- anything. Modification of sendmail's configuration tables (which is
- necessary with most vendor-supplied versions) is NOT for novices.
- The language of the sendmail.cf is cryptic, but that isn't really
- the problem. The problem is that it's extremely difficult
- to know when the rules you are implementing are the right thing--
- many sendmail configurations do slightly buggy, or even extremely
- buggy, or illegal things. Default configurations and minimal changing
- is the approach to take. The Sendmail 8.9 configuration environment
- is recommended.
-
- Worse, every vendor's version of sendmail is different, and many
- of their sendmail.cf's don't work at all. HPUX is one example
- of where the sendmail.cf is actually pretty sane. HP is to
- be congratulated. On the other hand, some vendors, who shall
- remain nameless, can't even get their sendmail to deliver to local
- users, let alone get their sendmail to speak SMTP on a LAN.
-
- The major problem with sendmail is that it tries to do too many
- things. Rather than confining itself to handling local mail, and
- simply routing external mail and leaving transport-specific
- format/standards conversions to transport software, it attempts
- (nay virually *insists*) that you have to do all of the
- format/standards conversions for different transports all at once.
- Which results in configuration files that are veritable nightmares
- to maintain. And that many sendmail.cf files depend on out-of-date
- standards for different transports, rather than trying to unify
- them (as in RFC976).
-
- Indeed, while common wisdom and practice mandates that MTAs don't
- rewrite headers, sendmail makes it extremely difficult to *not*
- rewrite headers. Which results in many major systems attempting to
- "be nice", yet, totally scramble return addresses and the like.
-
- There are several different sendmail lineages in the world but they
- seem to be coming together now with Eric Allman's work creating
- sendmail V8.x. Sendmail V8.1 was shipped with BSD 4.4 UNIX.
-
- It is strongly recommended that anyone contemplating running sendmail
- upgrade to at least 8.9.x (see www.sendmail.org), which has a number
- of serious security problems fixed, or at least configurable w.r.t.
- email spam. Ie: anti-relay, HELO overflow etc.
-
- Another point to remember is that sendmail, historically, has been
- where a large number of severe security holes have been found. From
- the infamous RTM Internet Worm, to the latest ones "CERT"d in
- witthin the past few months. Indeed, if your application is
- security-critical, I recommend that you should *not* use sendmail on
- your security-critical systems, such as your firewalls.
-
- Unless your vendor has provided sendmail 8.9 or better, do not expose
- it to the Internet. In particular, SunOS and up to recent Solaris are
- extremely susceptable to abuse, _are_ being abused, and cannot be fixed
- without upgrading. The latest Solaris sendmail patch resolves these
- problems.
-
- Administrators wishing something easier to configure than sendmail,
- particularly with the addition of filtering rules, are best advised
- to consider using qmail, exim instead, or, using mailshield SMTP
- relaying to stand in "front" of sendmail.
-
- Theoretically, all of these problems have been removed from sendmail
- 8.6.5 (now 8.9) or later, but, there's bound to be more found. While
- some of this can be due to the much larger installed base of sendmail,
- other mailers with improved function partitioning (such as the
- channel-oriented MMDF or PP) will usually be inherently more secure.
-
- I am being harsh on sendmail - sendmail programming is, after all, a
- good source of revenue for consultants ;-) But, if you obtain a good
- sendmail 8.9.x, or are willing to spend the time to learn it,
- sendmail will do what you want. Well. Don't, however, even think
- of playing with the configuration files without a copy of the
- Sendmail book by Costales, Allman and Rickert mentioned in the book
- list above. It is *absolutely* essential.
-
- Sendmail is discussed in comp.mail.sendmail.
-
-
- ZMailer: Original author Rayan Zachariassen* <rayan@cs.toronto.edu>
- Current author Matti Aarnio <mea@nic.funet.fi>
-
- ZMailer is intended for gateways or mail servers or other large site
- environments that have extreme demands on the abilities of the mailer.
-
- Code and Design features:
-
- + Strong limits on host impact.
- + Secure design (and hopefully implementation).
- + Natural fit for client/server environments.
- + Extremely customizable configuration mechanism.
- + Flexible database interface with support for: sorted files, unsorted
- files, dbm, ndbm, gdbm, nis (yellow pages), dns (BIND resolver),
- /etc/hosts file, and in-core data.
- + Efficient message queue management.
- + Fast binary-transparent SMTP server and client.
- + MIME-facilities for message transport.
- + Low-technology implementation, with high-tech options for performance.
-
- Default configuration file features:
-
- + Default configuration will work for most sites.
- + Network protocol support for: smtp, uucp, bitnet, mail to news.
- + An easy way of overriding any external routing information.
- + Automatic handling of mailing lists.
-
- It is available by anonymous FTP from:
- ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/unix/mail/zmailer/ (Mr. Aarnio's versions)
- Alternate (some of them old) versions:
- ftp://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/edwin/zmailer2.2.e4.tar.Z
- ftp://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/zmailer.tar.Z
-
- MMDF: [reviewed by I.Sparry@gdt.bath.ac.uk, updated by Randall Atkinson
- 2000/02/21]
-
- MMDF is a MTA. It works on the principle that you have communications
- channels, both incoming and outgoing, and it arranges for messages to
- pass between them.
-
- Strong points include:
- * Ability to turn up and down debugging level on the fly
- * Very strong on authentication, and permission checking.
- * Can block mail based on who it came from, how it got there,
- who it is going to.
-
- It is older than sendmail, simpler than sendmail, and it is a great
- pity that it was not shipped as standard instead of sendmail.
-
- [MMDF is standard on some systems - primarily SCO UNIX.]
-
- It has one major advantage to people in the UK, in that it knows how to
- handle mail addresses in our 'correct' format (Most significant part first,
- e.g. net.uu.uunet), as well as the thing the rest of the world uses :-) :-)
-
- | A mailing list for MMDF discussion is at mmdf2@skymaster.c2-tech.com
- | requests for addition to the list to mmdf2-request@skymaster.c2-tech.com.
- |
- | MMDF is being maintained at the University Kaisers-Lauten in
- | Germany:
- |
- | http://www.mathematik.uni-kl.de/ftp/pub/Sources/mail+news/mmdf and
- | ftp://www.mathematik.uni-kl.de/pub/Sources/mail+news/mmdf
- |
- | The MMDF Users Group has a web site at http://www.mmdf.org
-
- PP: Author University College London
-
- PP is a Message Transfer Agent, intended for high volume message
- switching, protocol conversion, and format conversion. It is targeted for
- use in an operational environment, but may also be useful for investigating
- Message related applications. Good management features are a major
- aspect of this system. PP supports the 1984 and 1988 versions of the
- CCITT X.400 / ISO 10021 services and protocols. Many existing RFC 822
- based protocols are supported, along with RFC 1148 conversion to X.400.
- PP is an appropriate replacement for MMDF or Sendmail, and also supports
- SMTP and UUCP mail.
-
- For more information contact: support@xtel.co.uk or xtel@cs.nott.ac.uk
- The latest version is PP-6.0, which was posted in comp.sources.misc,
- volume 27.
-
- [Ed note:]
- PP is usually used in combination with the ISODE package, which
- also provides copious documentation for PP. PP itself is
- "freeware", but ISODE and the PP documentation is not - site
- licenses are rather pricy. PP is *very* large, and has quite a
- number of more esoteric functions, such as FAX transmission using
- the appropriate modems. PP is ideal for large organizations with
- demanding email requirements (eg: 100s of machines and 1000s of
- users), where PP would be used as "backbone mail servers", and something
- simpler on the "client" computers. It does have _substantial_
- learning and support requirements, and is *not* suitable for smaller
- installations. It does, however, shine in large production environments,
- where policy-based routing, high levels of security, or extensive
- gatewaying to different transports is required.
-
- SVR4 mail: Author AT&T (description written by Tony Hansen,
- hansen@pegasus.att.com)
-
- The System V Release 4 mail system is a domain-capable mail router and
- delivery program that works in the UUCP zone and on the Internet and
- that is capable of gatewaying between the two.
-
- SVR4 mail supports SMTP, UUCP mail, alias files, forwarding files,
- mailing list directories, /etc/hosts files, the domain name system, and
- can also query uucp for neighboring sites, automatically. (System V
- Release 4.1 also allows batching of multiple messages into a single UUCP
- transaction, and allows many addresses to be passed with a single
- message transfer, which can greatly decrease the traffic generated for
- large mailing lists.) It is also very simple to configure with a
- reasonable certainty of correctness.
-
- It also supports mail-to-pipe and mail-to-file.
-
- SVR4 mail uses configuration files to resolve addresses based on their
- syntax, somewhat similar to sendmail, but using regular expressions and
- a more easily understood syntax. The set of methods that SVR4 mail uses
- for resolving local and remote addresses and hosts is configurable and
- extensible.
-
- Questions related to SVR4 mail are usually discussed in comp.mail.misc.
-
- SVR4 mail is a standard part of System V Release 4; unfortunately, some
- vendors have not realized that SVR4 mail is not the same mailer as the
- SVR3 mail system, and have replaced it with other inferior mail systems.
-
- deliver: Author Chip Salzenberg* <chip@fin!chip@dg_rtp.dg.com>
-
- Deliver allows any user to write a shell script that processes all
- incoming mail messages for that user. The system administrator may
- also install scripts that process all messages by installing
- it as the Local Delivery Agent (lmail replacement).
-
- The output of a script is a list of mail addresses, files and programs
- that should receive the message. It has access to each message as it
- is processed, so the action can be content dependent. The script may
- also generate automatic replies, like the "vacation" program, or pass
- along a modified version of the original message.
-
- Deliver can be used to construct mail-based services (e.g. automatic
- mailing list maintenance). It can also be used to filter mail
- automatically in prearranged ways (e.g. encryption and decryption,
- tossing junk mail, or vacation notices).
-
- Deliver was last posted in comp.sources.reviewed, volume 1. The
- current version is 2.1.12.
- It can be retrieved from <ftp:ftp.cs.uni-sb.de/pub/mail/deliver>
-
- procmail: Author Stephen R. van den Berg*
- <berg@pool.informatik.rwth-aachen.de>
-
- Can be used to create mail-servers, mailing lists, sort your incoming
- mail into separate folders/files (real convenient when subscribing to
- one or more mailing lists or for prioritising your mail), preprocess your
- mail, start any programs upon mail arrival (e.g. to generate different
- chimes on your workstation for different types of mail) or selectively
- forward certain incoming mail automatically to someone.
-
- Procmail can be used:
- - and installed by an unprivileged user (for himself only).
- - as a drop in replacement for the local delivery agent /bin/mail
- (with biff/comsat support).
- - as a general mailfilter for whole groups of messages (e.g. when
- called from within sendmail.cf rules).
-
- The accompanying formail program enables you to generate autoreplies,
- split up digests/mailboxes into the original messages, do some very
- simple header-munging/extraction, or force mail into mail-format (with
- leading From line).
-
- Also included is a comprehensive mailinglist/archive management system.
-
- Since procmail is written entirely in C, it poses a very low impact
- on your system's resources (under normal conditions, when you don't
- start other programs/scripts from within it).
-
- Procmail was designed to deliver the mail under the worst conditions
- (file system full, out of swap space, process table full, file table
- full, missing support files, unavailable executables; it all doesn't
- matter). Should (in the unlikely event) procmail be unable to deliver
- your mail somewhere, the mail will bounce back to the sender or reenter
- the mailqueue (your choice).
-
- A recent version can be picked up at various comp.sources.misc archives.
- The latest version (3.03) can be obtained directly from the ftp-archive at:
- ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de (137.226.225.3)
- (g)zipped: pub/packages/procmail/procmail.tar.gz <160KB
- compressed: pub/packages/procmail/procmail.tar.Z <224KB
-
- [Ed note: I had noted reported difficulties in integrating procmail
- with System V and/or smail 2.5. The 2.70 version of Procmail eliminated
- these difficulties.]
-
- mailagent: Author Raphael Manfredi* <ram@hptnos02.grenoble.hp.com>
-
- The mailagent is yet another mail filter, written in perl, which
- will let you do anything with your mail. It has all the features
- you may expect from a filter: mailing lists sorting, forwarding to
- MTA or to inews, pre-processing of message before saving into
- folder, vacation mode, etc... It was initially written as an
- ELM-filter replacement, but has now enough power to also supplant
- MMDF's .maildelivery. There is also a support for @SH mail hooks,
- which allows you to automatically distribute patches or software
- via command mails.
-
- The mailagent was designed to make mail filtering as easy as it can
- be. It is highly configurable and fairly complete. Rules are
- specified in a lex-like style, with the full power of perl's
- regular expressions. The automaton supports the notion of mode, and
- header selection has many magic features built-in, to ease the rule
- writing process.
-
- To give a simple example, the two following rules:
-
- Subject: /cron output/ { SAVE cron };
- To Cc: dist-users { FORWARD friend@acri.fr; LEAVE };
-
- would save in a folder 'cron' all cron-related mail, and forward
- mail from the dist-users mailing list to a friend, leaving a copy
- in the system mailbox for immediate processing...
-
- It supports delivery to plain UNIX folder, to MMDF-style folders or
- to MH folders with built-in unseen sequence updates, as specified
- in your ~/.mh_profile. It may therefore replace MH's slocal program
- as well.
-
- Mailagent can be dynamically extended (that's the advantage of
- having it written in perl) with new filtering commands that will
- behave exactly like built-in ones; this operation being done
- without changing a single source line in the program itself, of
- course. It also provides a generic mail server layer, where
- user-defined commands can be easily plugged in, mailagent taking
- care of the lower-level stuff.
-
- The distribution comes with a set of examples, an exhaustive test
- suite, and naturally a detailed manual page. It should be noted
- that the mailagent will work even if your system administrator
- forbids "| programs" hooks in the ~/.forward, provided you have
- access to some sort of cron daemon.
-
- The mailagent program is available from any comp.source.misc
- archive and thanks to Christophe Wolfhugel
- <Christophe.Wolfhugel@grasp.insa-lyon.fr>, from ftp.univ-lyon1.fr
- (134.214.100.6) under /pub/unix/mail/tools, file
- mailagent-3.0.tar.gz
-
- pathalias: Author Peter Honeyman
-
- [Not recommended anymore, due to the shift away from UUCP. Included
- for historical interest, and the occasional use in very special
- situations.]
-
- Pathalias reads the UUCP Map Project maps (they need to be extracted
- from the postings first) and constructs a database containing the
- minimum cost route to any machine in the maps. This database can
- then be used with any mailer that knows how to search the database
- (eg: smail 2.5, Zmailer?, and some versions of sendmail. Smail 3
- comes bundled with pathalias).
-
- There were previous versions of this program. You must use
- pathalias version 10 (latest version), because some map format
- changes have been made and only pathalias 10 can parse them.
- If your pathalias doesn't give a syntax error on:
- echo "file {foo}" | pathalias
- It's the new one.
-
- There were other route-generating programs, but all (as far as
- I know) are very obsolete, and none run as fast as pathalias
- (still, which can be rather hard on machines with smallish virtual
- memory or RAM capacities).
-
- pathalias 10 is available from comp.sources.unix archives,
- volume 22. A patch was just released in comp.sources.unix
- (vol 25) that addresses an oddity when used with smail (not that
- I've ever noticed it).
-
- uuhosts: Author John Quarterman
-
- [Not recommended anymore. Included for historical interest.]
-
- The "defacto" standard UUCP Map Project map unpacker. Includes
- a program to arbitrarily view individual map entries. Uuhosts
- implements trojan horse/virus security by running under
- a "chroot()" system call. Uuhosts does not appear to be
- actively maintained, and the last versions that I have inspected
- were unable to easily compress the maps (a full set of maps
- is >6000 blocks), had no provision for automatically
- running pathalias, and will not work with the newest version
- of cnews. Further, uuhost's header checking is so picky
- that the slightest change in the map format will cause
- uuhosts to reject map updates.
-
- Use of uuhosts now will require some minor hacking - and this
- hacking will stretch your knowledge of Bourne shell programming.
-
- The last edition, "uuhost4" (version 1.69) appears to have
- been posted in comp.sources.unix in volume 3, 1986.
-
- Do not be confused by Jan-Piet Mons "uuhost 2.0" program posted
- in alt.sources. This is not a map unpacker. It is just
- a map viewer, and is a subset of the real uuhosts.
-
- unpackmaps: Author Chris Lewis* <clewis@ferret.ocunix.on.ca>
-
- [Not recommended anymore, sniff ;-)]
-
- Unpackmaps is a superset of the functionality of uuhosts.
- It obtains its security by doing the map unpacking with
- a specialized parser that knows the map article format
- rather than invoking a shar/shell. Compression and pathalias
- invocation is automatic, correctly takes into account
- the change date of local configuration files, and will
- work with the latest Cnews.
-
- The newest version of unpackmaps, version 4.1, has been
- released to comp.sources.misc, and appeared in volume 34.
- This version is entirely written in C, is considerably faster
- than unpackmaps 3 or uuhosts, has considerably more features,
- and will work with Brian Reids PostScript net maps too.
-
- unshar: Author Lee Ward, modified by Mark Moraes* <moraes@deshaw.com>
-
- unshar is evolved from getmaps by Lee Ward. It is has a specialized
- and limited parser that understands most simple shar formats. It is
- capable of automatically unpacking new files from a newsgroup spool
- directory, and requires no interaction whatsoever with the news
- system. Apart from UUCP maps, it can be used to automatically and
- safely unpack shar files from the sources newsgroups. It does not
- handle some of the newer, esoteric shar formats that do automatic
- uudecodes, etc. Ftp'able from
- ftp.cs.toronto.edu:/pub/moraes/unshar.tar.gz.
-