OS/2 Shareware BBS: 35 Internet/35-Internet.zip/popbif10.zip/POPBiff.DOC

Text File | 1995-03-25 | 12KB | 227 lines

               POPBiff V1.0 for OS/2 by Michele Marziani
               =========================================


Copyright:

    POPBiff V1.0 - Simple Unix-like Biff program for the POP3 TCP/IP
    protocol. Copyright (c) March 1995, Michele Marziani.


Warranty:

    This software comes with absolutely no warranty, expressed or
    implied, including but not limited to fitness for a particular
    purpose. You should realize that I am in no way responsible for
    any loss or damage that may occur due to the use of this software.
    The program is provided on an "as is" basis. Use at your own risk.


Distribution:

    This program is distributed as 'emailware': if, after using this
    software for a reasonable time (15 days), you feel that it is software
    that is useful to you and that you will continue to use, you're
    kindly required to 'register' the software with me. It will cost
    you *NOTHING*. Just send me an e-mail at the address below, telling
    me your praise (!), your impressions, your suggestions or whatever.
    Please mention the fact you're registering explicitly. This will
    help me keep a list of 'registered' users who will receive
    notification of new releases and bug fixes when they become
    available.
    There are very few restrictions on the distribution of this
    software, as long as it is not altered in any way. The ZIP
    archive file from which the program came from must be distributed
    in its entirety and not altered in any way. This software can't
    be distributed with or as part of any commercial program.
    However, it may be freely distributed by commercial vendors, user
    groups, BBS operators or individuals. No fee or payment may be
    charged or accepted, other than a small distribution fee.


Support:

    This software comes with absolutely no support.
    If you have a problem with the software, I'd very much appreciate
    receiving information about the problem and the circumstances under
    which it occurred. Just e-mail me at the address below. This will
    help me fix the problem (at least I'll try to) in a future release.
    Do not expect an immediate reply or a prompt bug fix, however.


Purpose:

    POPBiff is a Unix xbiff analogue. Only it has been designed to work
    with a POP3 server i.e. it doesn't monitor a file on disk. Instead
    it periodically checks your POP3 mailbox. It will raise its flag
    and optionally beep on incoming mail. It will lower the flag if the
    mail is read. An optional secondary window can show the total count
    of new mail messages and their total size.
    Current features:
      * compatibility with IBM TCP/IP 1.2.1, 2.0 and Warp IAK
      * usual flag down/flag up stuff (a la Unix xbiff)
      * display of new message count and total size
      * optional beep in response to new mail
      * mail checking every N minutes (N ranging from 1 to 120)
      * saving of settings (host, user, password) to an INI file
      * password encryption when saving to an INI file
      * saving of window positions/size/color
      * multithread design
    Features planned for future releases:
      * optional display of message headers
      * launching of your favorite e-mail reader
      * playing of a .WAV file in response to new mail
      * no mail/new mail icons configurable via drag & drop


Requirements:

    This software requires IBM TCP/IP 1.2.1 or 2.0 or Warp IAK with
    the REXX Sockets (RxSock) interface. This was a separate package
    distributed as EWS - 'Employee Written Software' - until the
    August 1994 CSD for IBM TCP/IP. Then it has been included with
    the corrective service disks. Since both IBM TCP/IP 1.2.1 and Warp
    IAK do not include the RxSock interface, I'm hereby including two
    copies of RxSock.DLL, one for the 16 bit TCP/IP stack (1.2.1) and
    the other for usage with Warp IAK.


Installation:

    Please follow these steps for manually installing POPBiff.
    - Unzip POPBif10.ZIP in a temporary directory. I'd like to suggest
      using Info-ZIP's UnZip version 5.12 or later since it can preserve
      OS/2 extended attributes.
    - Move POPBiff.EXE and POPBiff.ICO to a directory where you keep
      your executable files, e.g. \OS2\APPS or \TCPIP\BIN or whatever.
      It doesn't need to be a directory in your path, though, unless you
      wish to run POPBiff from any OS/2 command line prompt.
    - Move POPBiff.DLL to a directory listed in LIBPATH, e.g. \OS2\DLL
      or \TCPIP\DLL. The LIBPATH variable is defined in the OS/2 CONFIG.SYS
      file. Note that you must shutdown your system and reboot OS/2 before
      any changes to the LIBPATH will take effect.
    - If you are using IBM TCP/IP 2.0 with the August '94 CSD or later
      already applied, you can safely delete both RXSOCK.DLL and
      RXSOCK16.DLL. If your have either TCP/IP 2.0 without the CSD or Warp
      Internet Access Kit (IAK) delete RXSOCK16.DLL and move RXSOCK.DLL to
      the \TCPIP\DLL directory. Finally, if you have TCP/IP 1.2.1 delete
      RXSOCK.DLL, rename RXSOCK16.DLL as RXSOCK.DLL and move it to the
      \TCPIP\DLL subdirectory.
    - [Optional] Since POPBiff creates an OS/2 INI file (for storing its
      settings) in the same directory as its EXE file, this directory
      needs to reside on a writable disk. If you can't comply with this
      request, e.g. when POPBiff.EXE resides on a network server disk or
      on a CD-ROM, you can override the default path for the INI file by
      putting a SET POPBIFF=D:\PATH\WHATEVER statement in your CONFIG.SYS
      file. This will allow you to specify the drive and directory of
      your choice for the purpose of storing the POPBiff.INI file.
    - [Optional] You could create a Workplace Shell (WPS) object by
      dragging a Program template from the Templates folder and dropping it
      on the WPS. An icon can be assigned to the POPBiff executable using
      the General page of the program Settings notebook. You can use the
      supplied POPBiff.ICO or any other icon of your choice.
    There is NO need to modify the \TCPIP\ETC\SERVICES file since POPBiff
    addresses the POP3 TCP port (110) directly.


Usage:

    POPBiff asks for configuration information the first time you start
    the program. If need be, you can easily change the configuration
    later. As a minimum you need to specify a POP3 server host name,
    your POP3 server username and your password.
    As regards the password you have two options, either an "Enter
    password" field or a "Read from plain text file" field. If you
    choose to specify your password in the entry field under the "Enter
    password" radio button you won't see your password as you type it.
    Instead, a series of asterisks will be shown. Furthermore, your
    password will be encrypted before saving it to POPBiff.INI for
    obvious security reasons. Keep in mind that if you later move your
    executable file to a different hard disk location you need to
    re-enter your password.
    Choosing the "Read from plain text file" option will allow you to
    have a single system wide location for storing your POP3 password.
    This could be useful for users of mail clients such as souper or
    popclient who might have customized their Rexx scripts in order to
    read their password from the same text file. Beware that it's an
    intrinsically unsecure option, of course.
    The other two options in the POPBiff setup dialog will allow you
    to specify the time interval between two consecutive mail checks
    and whether you want a beep when the new mail counter increases.
    Time intervals can range between 1 and 120 minutes. The default
    is to have POPBiff check your mail every 2 minutes and beep when
    there is more incoming mail.
    After a click on the "Save" pushbutton POPBiff will show its main
    window consisting of a single flag down bitmap and the title bar.
    Then it will try to contact your POP3 server for checking new mail.
    This task is always done in a secondary thread in order to avoid
    interfering with the user interface main thread.
    You can move the main Biff window over your WPS. If you wish you
    can drag a color from an OS/2 Color Palette and drop it on the
    Biff window so as to change its background color. These settings
    can be later saved to the POPBiff.INI file.
    If there is new mail POPBiff will raise its flag. It will lower
    the flag if the mail is read. POPBiff keeps a counter of all new
    mail messages and it will beep (if you chose this option) when
    new mail arrives.
    A double click on the flag (up or down) bitmap will open a secondary
    status window which will show you the new mail counter and the
    mail message total size in bytes. There is also a menu under the
    title bar of this status window.
    The File menu only has an "Exit program" item with a fairly obvious
    meaning. The Help menu only has an About menu item which opens a
    dialog box with info on the author and the development environment
    used for writing POPBiff. The Options menu has two items, "Settings"
    and "Save Position/Size/Color". The former will reopen the POPBiff
    Setup dialog thus allowing a change of the configuration information.
    The latter is for saving various settings to the POPBiff.INI file.
    Both the main POPBiff window position/background color and the POPBiff
    status window position/size are saved to POPBiff.INI for later re-use.
    You can leave POPBiff either by double clicking on the system menu
    of the main window or via the File/Exit program menu item of the
    status window.


Known bugs and caveats:

    Keep in mind that POPBiff is written in REXX and I had to cope with
    the limitations of the development environment I used and its tools.
    For example I couldn't get rid of the title bar in the main window
    without also preventing the user from moving the window itself.
    This is a standard PM behaviour to which POPBiff adheres. I know
    there are some tricks, allowed to C programmers, which can overcome
    these limitations. At present they can't be implemented in REXX,
    though. So don't blame me too much, please.
    A known bug is the following. If new mail arrives while you're still
    moving the main window around, you'll hear a beep but POPBiff won't
    raise its flag. This is due to the built-in REXX event dispatcher
    which is still servicing an event while it should start servicing a
    new notify event. Sorry people, I can't do anything to fix this. So,
    again, don't blame me too much.
    Both reading from and saving to the INI file is a bit slow. This is
    an intrinsic 'feature' of the SysIni Rexx utility function.
    Finally I'd like to warn you that POPBiff has been tested only with
    a VAX/VMS Multinet 3.0 POP3 server. I can't tell you its performances
    while interacting with different POP3 servers. We don't have them.
    POPBiff has been tested with the following configurations only: OS/2
    2.11 with TCP/IP 2.0, and OS/2 Warp 3.0 with either TCP/IP 2.0 or
    Warp IAK. It has been tested neither with OS/2 2.0 nor with TCP/IP
    1.2.1 but it should work, though.


Credits:

    POPBiff has been written using the DrDialog/DrRexx development
    environment created by David C. Morrill. Version 3.27 was used.
    Rexx routines for interacting with a POP3 server were 'borrowed'
    from MADPOP.CMD, an "Ultra-simple REXX-based POP3 Client for
    OS/2 2.X, Copyright 1994, Michael Alan Dorman".


Author:

    Michele Marziani
    Universita' di Ferrara       E-mail: [e-mail]
    Dipartimento di Fisica               Telephone: [phone]
    44100 Ferrara - ITALY                      Fax: [phone]