ghost@robecdc.UUCP (William Sneed) (06/26/90)
In article <102@rwing.UUCP> nanook@rwing.UUCP (Robert Dinse) writes: > I have a Tandy 6000 running Tandy's bizzare version of Xenix 3.02.00. >I would appreciate any help in understanding how mail works on this system, > I have smail and am trying to figure out how to interface it properly >with this version of Xenix. Having just recently done this I can commiserate with you. What you are looking at is an SCO product. Beyond mail and rmail, I've never seen the others do mush unless 'set execmail' is in /usr/lib/mail/mailrc or in $HOME/.mailrc. then mail calls execmail which then may call mail.local, or ... (begin to see the darkness at the end of the tunnel). These provide the tags into micnet and (with additional programs) xenix-net. If you have Smail 2.5 apply Chip's xenix patches (Chip, which Chip, him Chip, who Chip) and all is well with the world. Smail will handle everything on the other end of UUCP, and execmail will retain all of the original versitility of its original design.
chip@tct.uucp (Chip Salzenberg) (06/27/90)
According to nanook@rwing.UUCP (Robert Dinse): >I have a Tandy 6000 running Tandy's bizzare version of Xenix 3.02.00. >I would appreciate any help in understanding how mail works on this system, >specifically, how the various componenets, mail.local, execmail, main.mn, >daemon.mn, and /bin/mail itself all devide the labor of delivering mail. Okay, here's the rundown. Note that this description is based on SCO Xenix 2.2 and 2.3; your milage may vary. /usr/bin/mail: A user agent, aka user interface, with delusions of being a transfer agent. It should just show you mail and let execmail handle delivery. However, unless you say "set execmail" in the file "/usr/lib/mail/mailrc", it likes to deliver local mail on its own. Unfortunately, it thinks that everything without a bang or a colon is local. /usr/bin/rmail: Itty bitty program that runs execmail. Invoked only for incoming mail from your UUCP neighbors; not something you'd run yourself. It may be smart enough to run uux directly; I don't know. Smail 2.5 and 3.1 replace rmail with a link to smail. /usr/lib/mail/execmail: The brains [sic] of the outfit. The central part of the Xenix mail transport system. Execmail does aliasing, and then runs one of mail.local, mail.cln or uux to do the dirty work. Parameters include -m (me too on aliases), -n (no aliasing), -r (remote?), -h # (max UUCP hop count) and -f user (who the message is supposed to be from). /usr/lib/mail/mail.local: Delivery of local mail. I *think* it also understands UUCP addresses, but don't quote me on that. My Deliver program is a plug-in replacement for mail.local. (I suppose that this rates as a plug-in plug. :-)) Parameters include -r user (who the message is supposed to be from -- yes, that's "-r"). /usr/lib/mail/mail.cln: Deliver of Micnet or other network mail, i.e. mail with a CoLoN in the address. No details here, except that the parameters "-h 0 'targethost' 'sender' 'recipient'" seem to work for me on Micnet. (Gads, I hate Micnet.) > I have smail and am trying to figure out how to interface it properly >with this version of Xenix. I'll E-Mail my Xenix patches; that should fix you right up. -- Chip, the new t.b answer man <chip@tct.uucp>, <uunet!ateng!tct!chip>
kevin@iisat.uucp (Kevin Davies) (06/27/90)
In article <QE84GJC@xds13.ferranti.com>, peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes: > > /usr/bin/mail > calls /usr/lib/mail/execmail > which calls /usr/lib/mail/mail.local > > The calling sequences of the guys in /usr/lib/mail are undocumented. > > I'm doing the same thing. What I've done so far is stick smail and svbinmail > in /usr/bin, and made execmail a script to call smail. Problem is, lmail > now calls back to execmail. I guess that replacing lmail with mail.local > in smail (LMAIL(...)) is the thing to do, but what's the calling sequence? NOTE : this experience is based on Tandy Xenix/286. The mailing system under the T6000 3.2 seems to be the same as that under the Tandy Xenix for '286 machines. I just scraped /usr/bin/mail although I suppose I need not have. But, anyway, this is how I incorporated smail into the mail system while preserving local & micnet mailing. Configure Smail (in this case, 2.5) as you need, and make the local mailer (LMAIL) /usr/lib/mail/execmail with the options required as : execmail -f from_user to_user There are other options available, but I did not go into them. Providing an incorrect option will produce bounced mail back to you with proper execution syntax : ============ Transcript follows ============ usage: execmail [-mnr] [-f from] [-h hopcount] user ... ============== Message follows ============= To keep the current /usr/bin/mail (assuming its the dumb mailer, not xmail or mailx), you could move execmail to a different name, and move smail into its place. Then for local mail, have smail call the _real_ execmail by its new name. -- Kevin Davies International Information Service (IIS) UUCP: {uunet,utai,watmath}!dalcs!iisat!kevin Bitnet/Uucp: kevin@iisat.uucp Arpanet: kevin%iisat.uucp@uunet.uu.net
nanook@rwing.UUCP (Robert Dinse) (06/27/90)
> Chip Salzenberg has developed a set of patches for smail that > work beautifully with Xenix. I can e-mail if you want. > > Bill. > -- > ....microsoft--\ Bill Campbell; Celestial Software > ...uw-entropy----!thebes!camco!bill 6641 East Mercer Way > ....fluke------/ Mercer Island, Wa 98040 > ....hplsla----/ (206) 232-4164 Several people already mailed me those patches, and I appreciate that. But I'm really trying to gain a good understanding of how the mail delivery works. I'm trying to write some gateway software and would like to include some other facilities to interface with my software (Eskimo North). It's difficult to do that without having a good understanding of how the existing system works. Please don't take this as >I don't appreciate the offer<, I do, but I managed to get smail function some months ago. Now I am trying to figure out a way to implement a gateway to a local network. I might be able to gleem the information I need by studying the patches, but if someone actually understands it, it would make life easier. I am a little hesistant to use those patches anyway because they require execmail be set to work properly. I don't have it set because I occasionally use mail to mass mail users on my system of impending expirations or expected downtime or whatever. If you set execmail, it bombs as soon as you reach the per-user process limit and bogs the system, otherwise it just quietly chugs through the list.
peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) (06/27/90)
For Intel Xenix with OpenNET, things are a little bit more twisted, especially if the incompatibilities between Intel Xenix OpenNET mail (based on micnet, I guess) and Intel UNIX OpenNET mail (based on MMDF) are forcing you to switch to smail for *all* your routing. If anyone else out there is using OpenNET, I'll post a longer article once I have the docco done. -- Peter da Silva. `-_-' +1 713 274 5180. <peter@ficc.ferranti.com>