The World of Computer Software/World_Of_Computer_Software-02-386-Vol-2of3.iso/c/cmail26q.zip/MAILPROG.DOC

Text File | 1992-10-30 | 12KB | 227 lines

USERS GUIDE

The four main functions on the main menu are read new mail, send mail,
transfer a file and view old mail.

The read new mail function allows you to use the arrow keys, Page Up,
Page Down, Home and End keys to move around as you read the message.
When you have finished reading the message, you can leave the reader by
pressing either Enter or F10.  When you do this, you will be prompted to
press enter to delete the message, or to type a filename.  If you don't
need to look at the message again, just press the enter key.  You will
be asked to confirm that you want to delete the message if it is a
particularly long one.

If you want to keep a copy of the message, type a file name (up to eight
letters plus an optional three letter extension).  The message can then
be viewed later using the view old mail function.  The file name can
include a path, in which it will be extracted to that directory.

The second function available allows you to send a message to other
users. If the user is logged into the network at the time, a message
will be sent to their screen.  Otherwise they will be informed of the
waiting message next time they log on.

On selecting the send message function you will be prompted to enter a
list of groups or users.  Users have names that are the same as their
login names.  Users are also allocated to different groups, and sending
a message to a group sends it to all members of that group.  The groups
have names of one letter in length.

After entering a list of groups or users, you will find yourself in a
text editor.  The controls for this editor are the same as for entering
comments in the various database programs.  Pressing F10 will leave the
editor and send the message.  Pressing Esc will leave the editor and NOT
send the message.  Pressing F1 will give a help screen (here and in many
parts of the program).  The keys F2 to F9 are programmed with useful
phrases which will be inserted into the text when these keys are
pressed.

Transfer a file allows you to move a file to someone else.  Having sent
a file, you will be asked if you want to delete the original.

The view old mail function allows you to view old messages rename (and
move) them, delete them and print them.  I hope it is fairly self
explanatory.

The fifth option allows you to see a list of the users, or to print that
list.

The "Xtra Features" option allows the network administrator to enter and
add users, assign strings to the function keys, set up printers and so
on.



MORE TECHNICAL STUFF

The program won't work unless the DOS enviromental variable MAILID is
set.

I have tried to make this program completely independant of the network
type. All mail is sent by copying files to the appropriate mail
directory, and then invoking a suitable command (under Novell I use SEND
to inform the user of the arrival of mail, but you can invoke any other
program, including a mail transport program or a comms program with a
script).

Commands, printer strings and function key definitions can contain
clipper expressions delimited by square brackets.  Of use in commands
are the variables "user", "filename", "name", and "maildir" which
contain the names of the user, the name of the file generated, the name
of the person to send to and their mail directory name respectively.
Thus the command

SENDBAT [maildir] [filename] [name]

could be used to invoke a batch file to send the mail on to a particular
user.

Clipper functions can also be used.  Of particular interest to users, is
the predefined command PROMPT(string), which prompts the user for input
and returns the user.  Thus the command

SENDFAX [fullfilename] [prompt("Phone number ... ")]

could be used to prompt for a phone number, and invoke the command
SENDFAX with the full file name (with path, stored in "fullfilename")
and the phone number entered.

If the ammount of memory required to run a particular command is
specified, the program will check that this memory is available.

Users should have open, read and search access only to the directory
with the mail program in, full rights to their own mail directory and
create and write access to each others mail directories.  As overlays
are created by the program, the program must be run from a directory
where the user has rights to create, write to and delete files.  The
best way to do this is to put the mail program in the path, and run it
from the users home directory.  An alternative is to SET
CLIPPER=SWAPPATH:'H:' (or whatever) in the environment.

The F1 key provides context sensitive help throughout the program.

The program can take one parameter; the word check causes the program to
check the user's mail directory, allows him to read any new mail and
then exits.  This should be used in people's login scripts, or better
still in a batch file called by their login script when it exits.

If the database is unavailable, the program will exit with the
errorlevel set to 1. If the program exits because of a problem, the
errorlevel will be set to 2.

Enjoy!

Peter Summers


VERSION HISTORY (from when I started keeping one):

2.4e:   Fixed a problem which caused the program to crash after using the Xtra
        features/Xamine database option.
2.4f:   Fixed an incorrect example of how to set up a printer in one of the
        help screens.
2.4g:   Cleaned up a few more help screens.
2.4h:   Centred a misalligned error message.

2.5:    Rewrote the code for Clipper 5.01.  This allows for better error
        handling, and therefore renaming (moving) files to other partitions
        is now supported.  Transfer a file now works from any disk.  The
        program now can (and should) be run from the path.

        I haven't got Ralf Brown's swapping spawn routine to run with Clipper
        5.01 yet, so commands are now run using Clippers own swapping.  This
        will typically give about 150k of available memory.  The amount of
        memory required to run a user's command can be specified in the user's
        database entry, and the program will check this before proceeding.
        If you have an old version of the program, you want to use this feature
        and you want to keep your old database, you may need to use dBase or
        something equivilent to add a numeric field of length 3 called MEMREQ.
2.5a    A bit of tweaking and documentation prior to release of v2.5.
2.5b    The editor now defaults to insert mode on.  Clipper's Alt-C break out
        of the program is now re-enabled.
2.5c    Now allows up to 1024 items in the mail directory, rather than
        the previous 256.
2.5d    The program no longer gives the SET MAILID message if the check
        parameter is set.  If the program is called without the check
        parameter, the user no longer gets the "You have new mail..."
        message, but a discrete flashing warning in the top left hand
        corner of the screen.
2.5e    The program now checks that the user's mail directory exists,
        and optionally creates it if it doesn't.
2.5f    Fixed the help function, which didn't work within memoedit after
        the change to Clipper 5.01.
2.5g    Fixed a problem which occured if help was called within help and
        provided seperate help screens for reading and writing mail.
        Also fixed the problem with with prompts on the bottom line of
        the screen which didn't scroll in Clipper 5.
2.5h    Fixed the program so you can't overwrite existing files when
        renaming a file from various parts of the program.  Also, the
        the startup screen is now cleared when the user presses any key.
2.5i    Overwriting of existing files is now possible but requires
        confirmation.  Also fixed a problem with renaming old mail onto
        another volume.
2.5j    Discovered that I could make the message edit and display
        windows one character wider, so I did.
2.5k    Reduced the edit window width by one character, to stop blank
        lines appearing in messages when the line wrapped on the last
        character.  Also spaced out the messages associated with doing a
        file transfer.
2.5l    Fixed a bug associated with deleting the last file in the mail
        directory while viewing old mail.
2.5m    Recoded the fix for 2.5l slightly.
2.5n    Removed the clearing of all but the first character in the
        keyboard buffer when the program started.
2.5o    Changed the startup code to improve the speed on slow machines.
2.5p    Cleaned up the code for renaming files.
2.5q    Cleaned up the code for transfering files.
2.5r    A bit more tweaking of the rename file code.
2.5s    Fixed a potential problem with mail messages of length between
        65,519 and 65,535 bytes.
2.5t    Fixed the "You have mail..." code so that it clears the keyboard
        buffer before asking the user if they want to read it.
2.5u    Fixed the "No unread mail..." message so that it times out after
        two seconds and returns to the main menu.
2.5v    After a save/rename fail, the file name is cleared if the user
        presses a non-editing key first when prompted for a different name.
2.5w    Indicates the number of messages remaining when reading new mail.
2.5x    Made the size of tabs consistant throughout the program (4 spaces).
2.5y    Made the size of tabs equal 8 spaces to be consistent with other
        mail programs.
2.5z    Minor alterations to the "You have new mail..." message, and
        fixed the mail display window to avoid blank lines appearing in
        messages.

2.6     Allows the use of alternative new mail extensions, for
        communication with other mail programs (notably Pegesus).
2.6a    Allows the new mail extension to be defined from within the
        program.
2.6b    Renames any existing new mail when the new mail extension is
        redefined.
2.6c    Allows incorrectly typed mail directories to be retyped without
        having to return from the main menu.
2.6d    Fixed the Date: field to be RFC822 compliant, with optional time
        zone specification.
2.6e    Wrote the help code for the setting the new mail extension and
        time zone.
2.6f    Cleaned up the code that postions the selection bar when viewing
        old mail.
2.6g    Turned snow supression on.
2.6h    Turned snow supression on only for color graphics cards, because
        it hangs with Hercules cards.
2.6i    Prevents the new mail extension from being changed while others
        are using the mail program.
2.6j    Improvements to the function of the Del and Backspace keys in
        the editor, which now do reformating automatically.
2.6k    Improvements to the left arrow, right arrow, control left arrow
        and control right arrow functions.
2.6l    Fixed a problem with the program not finding the setup file when
        running form a local disk.
2.6m    Fixed a problem users who weren't in the database.
2.6n    Minor improvments to the handling of users not in the database.
2.6o    Recompiled the same code with the 5.01a patch applied to Clipper.
2.6p    Recompiled the same code with the fixed version of the 5.01a
        patch applied to Clipper.
2.6q    Sets the errorlevels appropriately if it won't run.