ch14.htm

linux-unix130.linux.and.unix.ebooks130 linux and unix ebookslinuxLearning Linux - Collection of 12 E

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">k, &lt;UP&gt; </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Advances to previous undeleted message. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">l </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Limits messages by specified criteria. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Ctrl-L </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Redraws screen. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">m </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Mails a message. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">n </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Next message, displaying current, then increment. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">p </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Prints current message or tagged messages. </TD>

	</TR>

	<TR ALIGN="LEFT" rowspan="1">

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">q </TD>

		<TD ALIGN="LEFT">Quits, maybe prompting for deleting, storing, and keeping messages. </TD>

	</TR>

</TABLE>

<BR>



</CENTER>

<P>Let's try to send mail using <TT>elm</TT>.</P>



<P>To send mail, press <TT>m</TT> on the main screen. The header screen appears.

<TT>elm</TT> prompts you to enter the name(s) of the recipient(s) of the mail. Enter

<TT>calvin</TT> and <TT>root</TT> as recipients. Calvin is the primary recipient,

and a copy of this message is sent to root as well.</P>

<P><TT>elm</TT> then prompts for a subject. After entering the subject heading, <TT>elm</TT>

puts you in the <TT>vi</TT> editor to enter the body of the mail message. After you

are finished typing, use the <TT>vi</TT> command <TT>:wq</TT> to save and quit the

<TT>vi</TT> editor. You can now send the message by pressing <TT>s</TT>.</P>

<P>You can also forward mail to others on the system with the <TT>f</TT> command

or reply to a message with the <TT>r</TT> command.</P>

<P>To quit <TT>elm</TT>, type <TT>q</TT> at the main screen.</P>

<P>If <TT>elm</TT> is available on your system, try to use it. <TT>elm</TT> is very

convenient and simple and can greatly improve your electronic mail interaction. Using

Pine Pine, a trademark of the University of Washington, stands for Program for Internet

News and E-mail. Pine offers the capability to send local and remote messages using

a simple user interface, as well as the capability to send documents and graphics.</P>

<P>You invoke Pine by entering <TT>pine</TT> on the command line. The screen shown

in Listing 14.2 should appear.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading18<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.2. Pines main screen.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

$ pine   PINE 3.95   MAIN MENU                         Folder: INBOX  1 Message



       ?     HELP               -  Get help using Pine



       C     COMPOSE MESSAGE    -  Compose and send a message



       I     FOLDER INDEX       -  View messages in current folder



       L     FOLDER LIST        -  Select a folder to view



       A     ADDRESS BOOK       -  Update address book



       S     SETUP              -  Configure or update Pine



       Q     QUIT               -  Exit the Pine program



   Copyright 1989-1996.  PINE is a trademark of the University of Washington.

                     [Folder &quot;INBOX&quot; opened with 1 message]

? Help                     P PrevCmd                  R RelNotes

</FONT></PRE>



<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

O OTHER CMDS L [ListFldrs] N NextCmd                  K KBLock

</FONT></PRE>

<P>Pine is very easy to use, because it provides a full-screen interface with the

up and down cursor controls. Simply select the item you want by using the arrow keys

and press Enter at the selected line.</P>

<P>Let's send a message using Pine. Take the cursor to the Compose Message line and

press Enter. The screen shown in Listing 14.3 appears.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading20<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.3. Composing a message.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

  PINE 3.95   COMPOSE MESSAGE                     Folder: INBOX  1 Message



To      : &quot;Laurel N. Hardy&quot; &lt;[e-mail]&gt;

Cc      :

Attchmnt:

Subject : using pine

---- Message Text ----

Hi, I can do everything on one screen

.



Send message? [y] :

^G Get Help  ^X Send      ^R Rich Hdr  ^Y PrvPg/Top ^K Cut Line   ^O Postpone

</FONT></PRE>



<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

^C Cancel    ^D Del Char  ^J Attach    ^V NxtPg/End ^U UnDel Line ^T To AddrBk

</FONT></PRE>

<P>Pine takes you line-by-line through the mail header and the mail message. Press

Ctrl-X to end the message, as well as send it to the recipient. Just walk through

all the options to get a feel for this mail system.</P>

<P>The last two lines on the screen tell you what commands are available for the

current situation. Usually there are more commands than can be shown on two lines,

so use the O key to see what other commands are available. The O is optional; you

don't have to be able to see a command before you use it.</P>

<P>Pine creates a default configuration file, <TT>.pinerc</TT>, in your home directory.

You can edit this file to select various options. Pine also creates a <TT>mail</TT>

subdirectory for your saved-message folders. Type <TT>?</TT> from the Main Menu for

more help. Using mailx (Berkeley Mail) This section is about <TT>mailx</TT>, another

common mail program for Linux. This section covers the basics of <TT>mailx</TT>.

<TT>mailx</TT> has many options and features, most of which are listed in its man

pages. Discussing all these features would require a book in itself.</P>

<P>Let's see how to receive and send mail using <TT>mailx</TT>. Receiving Mail Suppose

someone has sent you a mail message. How would you know about it? The<TT> Mail</TT>

system deals with this by displaying a message when you log in. A sample login session

is shown in Listing 14.4.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading21<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.4. Login notification

of received mail.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

Welcome to Linux 2.0.0.



mpsi login: laurel

Last login: Fri Jan  6 13:28:06 on tty1

Linux 2.0.0.

</FONT></PRE>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

You have new mail.

</FONT></PRE>

<P>To read the mail message, invoke the Mail handler by typing mail at the prompt.

You will see the output shown in Listing 14.5.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading23<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.5. Receiving mail.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

mpsi:~$ mail

Mail version 5.5 6/1/90.  Type ? for help.

&quot;/var/spool/mail/calvin&quot;: 1 message 1 new

&gt;N  1 [e-mail]        Fri Jan  6 13:38  12/374   &quot;just checking&quot;

&amp; 1

Message 1:

From [e-mail] Fri Jan  6 13:38:06 1995

Date: Fri, 6 Jan 1995 13:38:06 -0600

From: &quot;Laurel N. Hardy&quot; &lt;[e-mail]&gt;

To: [e-mail]

Subject: just checking



the body of the message

bye



&amp; exit

</FONT></PRE>



<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">You have mail in /var/spool/mail/calvin

</FONT></PRE>

<P>In this example, the user Calvin has received a mail message from another user,

Laurel. This message is the first message in the message queue and is declared as

new, which means it has not been read yet. The message queue has an <TT>&gt;N</TT>,

indicating that it is a new message, followed by a message number (1), the sender's

login ID (<TT>[e-mail]</TT>), the day of the week, the date and time the

message was sent, and the subject of the message.</P>

<P>The ampersand (<TT>&amp;</TT>) is the mail system prompt. You can now read the

message by typing the message number at this prompt.<FONT COLOR="#0066FF"></FONT>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF"> &amp; 1

Message 1:

From [e-mail] Fri Jan  6 13:38:06 1995

Date: Fri, 6 Jan 1995 13:38:06 -0600

From: &quot;Laurel N. Hardy&quot; &lt;[e-mail]&gt;

To: [e-mail]

Subject: just checking



the body of the message

bye



&amp;

</FONT></PRE>

<P>Mail Options All the available options in the <TT>Mail</TT> system can be listed

by typing a <TT>?</TT> after the <TT>&amp;</TT>. The listed options are shown in

Listing 14.6.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading25<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.6. Mail options.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

&amp; ?



    Mail   Commands

t &lt;message list&gt;                type messages

n                               goto and type next message

e &lt;message list&gt;                edit messages

f &lt;message list&gt;                give head lines of messages

d &lt;message list&gt;                delete messages

s &lt;message list&gt; file           append messages to file

u &lt;message list&gt;                undelete messages

R &lt;message list&gt;                reply to message senders

r &lt;message list&gt;                reply to message senders and all recipients

pre &lt;message list&gt;              make messages go back to /usr/spool/mail

m &lt;user list&gt;                   mail to specific users

q                               quit, saving unresolved messages in mbox

x                               quit, do not remove system mailbox

h                               print out active message headers

!                               shell escape

cd [directory]                  chdir to directory or home if none given



A &lt;message list&gt; consists of integers, ranges of same, or user names separated

by spaces.  If omitted, Mail uses the last message typed.



A &lt;user list&gt; consists of user names or aliases separated by spaces.

Aliases are defined in .mailrc in your home directory.

&amp;

</FONT></PRE>

<P>Replying to a Message Suppose you have three mail messages from different users

and you want to reply to the one sent by Jeremy. Just invoke mail as before, as shown

in Listing 14.7.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading27<FONT COLOR="#000077">Listing 14.7. Three received messages.</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">

mpsi:~$ mail

Mail version 5.5 6/1/90.  Type ? for help.

&quot;/var/spool/mail/laurel&quot;: 3 messages 3 unread

&gt;U  1 [e-mail]      Fri Jan  6 13:27  12/429   &quot;Format for a mail hea&quot;

 U  2 [e-mail]      Sat Jan  7 15:25  72/23291 &quot; Please reply soon&quot;

 U  3 [e-mail]      Wed Jan 11 12:29  12/373   &quot;message # 3&quot;

</FONT></PRE>

<P>The <TT>U</TT> in front of the second message specifies that the message is still

unread. You can read the message by typing the message number.<FONT COLOR="#0066FF"></FONT>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">&amp; 2

Message 2:

From [e-mail] Sat Jan  7 15:25:00 1995

Date: Sat, 7 Jan 1995 15:25:00 -0600

From: &quot;friend22&quot; &lt;[e-mail]&gt;

To: [e-mail]

Subject: Please reply soon

What's up?

</FONT></PRE>

<P>You can reply to the message by typing <TT>r</TT>.</P>

<PRE><FONT COLOR="#0066FF">&amp; r

To: [e-mail]

Subject: Re: Please reply soon

Replying to your mail message # 2

I am too busy to reply to you now. Go away.

.

EOT

</FONT></PRE>

<P>The <TT>Mail</TT> daemon automatically sets up the header in the reply mode, so

all you have to do is type the text. Sending and Forwarding Mail Sending and forwarding

mail can be done with the <TT>s</TT> and <TT>f</TT> commands, respectively. The procedures

for creating the header and text of the message are similar to that of replying to

a message.</P>

<P>The ~<TT>/signature</TT> file is appended to every mail message you send. You

should place text in here that you want to send with every message. Some examples

are your phone number or an alternative e-mail address (your recipient might not

be able to reply to certain hosts). <TT>Mail</TT> etiquette requires that you keep

you signature files short--four lines or less. Most recipients do not like to see

pages of information about you in every mail message.

<CENTER>

<H3><A NAME="Heading29<FONT COLOR="#000077">Using news</FONT></H3>

</CENTER>

<P>Using <TT>news</TT> is perhaps the best way of getting into what is probably the

world's best online forum: the Usenet news service. There are literally thousands