Network Supervisor's Toolkit/Network Supervisor's Toolkit.iso/e-mail/mailbox/manual.doc

Text File | 1996-07-10 | 6KB | 331 lines

                               Mailbox SKIMMER v 1.1
                               ---------------------
                           ShareWare by Ernesto Garcia.

                                  User's Manual.



         Thank you for using Mailbox SKIMMER. This instructive is rather

       short, but it's everything you need to know how to use the program.

       If you are in a hurry, read the file MSKIM.TXT, as it has straight-

       to-the-point instructions for setup and use.



         DISCLAIMER

         Mailbox SKIMMER (the program) comes with no warranty of any kind,

       neither implicit nor explicit. The Author of this program shall not

       be responsible for any effect of the use of this program. You use it

       at your own risk.

         All the names of commercial products and software programs

       mentioned in this document are trademarks of their respective owners.



         WHAT IS MAILBOX SKIMMER?

         This is a program designed to select messages from a mailbox, by

       eliminating those ones that contain a specific string in the Subject:

       line of the header of its message. I wrote it because I was

       subscribed to a mailing list of my interest, but about half of the

       messages in the mailing list were about a particular subject I wasn't

       interested in.


















         REQUIREMENTS

         Mailbox SKIMMER should run in any PC with 128k of RAM, but the more

       memory you have, it will be able to handle larger mailbox files. Your

       mailbox file should be in DOS text format, that is, with car returns

       and line feeds. A native Unix textfile won't work propperly with the

       program, but don't worry: if you are downloading your mailbox file

       from a Unix System, there should be a command in your Unix system

       which will let you convert from Unix to DOS type (unix2dos, aix2dos,

       or whatever). Use this command before copying or downloading your

       mailbox file. Then, it will be ready to be used by Mailbox SKIMMER. (

       There are also many commercial and ShareWare programs designed to

       convert files )



         HOW TO USE IT?

         Mailbox SKIMMER works under the assumption that we are working with

       a typical mailbox file: This is the general structure of a mailbox:


         ------------------------------------------------------------------
                          From [e-mail]
                          (lines...)
                          Subject: topic of the message
                          (lines...)

                          Beginning of actual message.
                          (lines...)
                          last line of message
         ------------------------------------------------------------------



         The upper half of the message (the header) contains many

       informational lines; The Subject: line is the one which can by

       analysed to find the topics you want to eliminate.















         Command Syntax:

             mskim [ -A file ] [ mboxfile: ]   unwanted topics



         Options:          -A   Another destination; Default is MBOX.DEP.

                     mboxfile   The name of your mailbox. Default is MBOX.

              unwanted topics   All strings that appear on the messages
                                you don't want to read.

         Note : Brackets mean it's optional.



         This is the only order in which parameters will work.

         It is *VERY* important to write the name of your mailbox followed

       by a colon ' : '. The colon is the only mean to tell a mailbox name

       from an unwanted topic. So, an unwanted topic may be any word, but it

       can't end with a colon.



         Examples of use:


           mskim  -A c:\personal\readmail.txt f:mbox: greetings buy returned



         The example above would perform this: From file mbox stored in the

       F: drive, eliminate all messages containing the words 'greetings',

       'buy', and 'returned', outputting the results to the file

       c:\personal\readmail.txt (Note the colon after the mbox filename)



         If your mailbox is named MBOX., is in the current directory, and

       you want the skimmed mail to be named MBOX.DEP in that very same

       directory, the command would be as simple as this:


                            mskim  greetings buy returned












         mskim will return the following DOS ERRORLEVEL after execution:



                                0 :  Everything's ok

                                1 :  No parameters were typen

                                2 :  mailbox file does not exist

                                3 :  Invalid name for output file

                                4 :  mailbox and output file are the same





         FEEDBACK

         To submit questions, suggestions, register, or tell me anything

       concerning Mailbox SKIMMER, please contact me at the following

       adresses:

                      Internet :     [e-mail]

                       Fidonet :     rainman@4:975/1

                    Snail mail :     Ernesto Garcia
                                     Loma Hermosa 22-B-107.
                                     Mexico, D.F. 11200
                                     MEXICO



         SHAREWARE

         You are encouraged to copy and distribute this file freely to

       colleagues, BBSs, and FTP sites. If you find this program useful,

       please register it by sending U.S. $5.00 to this adress:


                                     Ernesto Garcia
                                     Loma Hermosa 22-B-107.
                                     Mexico, D.F. 11200
                                     MEXICO
















         WHY REGISTER?

         Registering the ShareWare you use will encourage us, the ShareWare

       authors, to write more and better programs, available to you at a

       reasonable price.