matthew@ooc.uva.nl (Matthew Lewis) (08/14/90)
Hello! We are looking for a way to provide mail directory services for a private wide-area network, in such a way that a user would be able to type in a name, and get back the person's mail address. In addition, or alternately, to be able to send to an ambiguous address, and have it delivered, or to get back a message with the correct address. In the ideal world, there would be a Macintosh and/or PC interface for use with POP or IMAP. I saw some discussion over such systems in news a while back, but discovered (to my horror :-) that I misplaced the messages. Thanks in advance, Matthew Lewis Net Admin, CICT/OOC Univ. of Amsterdam -- Matthew Lewis, University of Amsterdam Grote Bickersstraat 72 +31-20-52 51 220 1013 KS Amsterdam Internet: matthew@ooc.uva.nl The Netherlands UUCP: uunet!mcsun!hp4nl!uvabick!matthew
paul@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu (Paul Pomes - UofIllinois CSO) (08/15/90)
matthew@ooc.uva.nl (Matthew Lewis) writes: >Hello! We are looking for a way to provide mail directory services for a >private wide-area network, in such a way that a user would be able to type in >a name, and get back the person's mail address. In addition, or alternately, >to be able to send to an ambiguous address, and have it delivered, or to get >back a message with the correct address. The Computing Services Office at the University of Illinois at Urbana has created a university-wide mailing system. The system is comprised of three pieces. The largest is the white-pages system created by Steve Dorner of CSO. It's based on the CSnet central name server (qi - Query Interpreter). Each student and staff member is assigned a unique alias. The user is allowed to change the issued alias provided it remains unique. Associated with this alias is the user's preferred email address, office address, home address, phone numbers, etc. Everything that is in the paper phone book is also in the qi database. The user client is a program called ph. It searches on the unique alias and can fuzzy match on names. Providing ancillary information such as department or curriculum narrows the search. The whois client program can also be used. Try whois -h ns.uiuc.edu pomes The second piece is the 5.64+IDA-1.3.4 sendmail release. The ida/cf/Sendmail.mc file has been very slightly modified to invoke a new mailer, phquery, whenever an address resolves to <name>@uiuc.edu. This is configured with the ALTERNATENAMES option. Phquery is the third piece. It examines its arguments and calls qi to determine the preferred email address for the supplied name. At this time, name can be either the qi alias, full names (e.g., paul-pomes@uiuc.edu -> paul@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu), and amateur radio callsigns (e.g., ka9wgn@uiuc.edu -> phil@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu). In the case of ambiguous matches, phquery will return a list of possibilities that includes department and/or curriculum information that should allow the sender to make the next attempt successful. Future enhancements include automated printing and campus mailing of messages to those users w.o. email addresses, and automatic inclusion of Reply-To: <alias>@uiuc.edu in replies. Source for the qi (central server) and ph (user client) can be obtained via anon-FTP from uxc.cso.uiuc.edu:/net/{ph,qi}. The phquery code, is in the /mail/sendmail/uiuc directory. Sorry, we cannot email this code as it is much too large. Chocolate chip cookies with a postpaid tape will work wonders though. A mailing list has been established to discuss qi/ph/phquery enhancements and to announce new releases. Send mail to info-ph-request@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu to be added to the list. /pbp -- Paul Pomes UUCP: {att,iuvax,uunet}!uiucuxc!paul Internet, BITNET: paul@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu US Mail: UofIllinois, CSO, 1304 W Springfield Ave, Urbana, IL 61801-2987