pdb@batserver.cs.uq.oz.au (Peter Barnes) (10/30/90)
I would like to solicit comments about the following mail
problem:
o You have a site with a mixture of PCs, workstations
(disked and diskless) and multi-user machines.
o You want peoples' incoming mail to be accessible to
them from as many platforms as possible, preferrably
all (other than by giving them all an account on the
"mail hub"). There are several ways to do this:
1. Using file-system sharing. You can deliver to a
mail spool area which is visible to all platforms,
or,
2. alternatively you can deliver to a user's home
area, and make their home globally visible.
3. Using a message-store and message-specific access
and delivery protocols (such as POP, or X.400 P7).
o You also want users to be able to (easily) tailor
actions to be taken when their mail is delivered (where
"delivered" is a bit vague...). Classic examples of
this are .forward or .maildelivery files.
So, where's the problem? Well, solution (1) means that
delivery takes place on a platform other than the user's
native machine. This means that if the .forward file speci-
fies execution of a program, the program will either be the
wrong type of executable, or run on the wrong machine.
Solution (2) means that you have to support (potentially)
large amounts of MTA and UA stuff on what might be small
diskless workstations or PCs (if you actually do the
delivery on their machine), or alternatively face the same
problem as (1), if you deliver on the fileserver.
Solution (3) means very restricted choice of UAs and/or MTAs
at the moment.
It's clear that classical UNIX solutions which implicitly
assume a single multiuser machine are stretched to the
breaking point. What is not so clear is the new solu-
tion...
So, what are people doing at the moment? Is there any con-
sensus on a clean solution? Is it available free :-)? Etc.
Thanks for your thoughts.
Peter
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Peter Barnes pdb@uqcspe.cs.uq.oz.au +61 7 377 2185 (voice) +61 7 371 0783 (fax)
Systems Programming Manager, Computer Science, University of Queensland
Queensland 4072, Australia