michaelb@wshb.UUCP ( WSHB employee) (12/16/89)
Help.
I'm trying to find a way to automate sending and getting mail between an
SCO XENIX machine and a DEC VMS machine. The guys on the VMS end are very
tight with access to the machine and require me to figure out a way to
do everything by interfacing with the VMS MAIL utility. I've been trying to
figure out a way to use cu under the control of some input script but
find myself pretty much over my head.
The problems as I see them are:
1: Turning control of cu over to another program after it is started. I
can't figure out if this is a good idea even if it is possible.
If it isn't then I would have to start cu with the standard input
redirected to some control script. That leads to:
2: If I use something like awk or m4 ( neither of which I am good with )
then I will have to set their input to the tail of some file I
have tee'd out from cu. But that file won't exist until I start
cu with tee.
I seem to be in a circular situation. I guess I could write something in
C which would work fine and run forever, but I'm not much of a C programmer
either. Mostly I get things working others have written, not write them
myself.
If anyone has any experience with this type of stuff some help would be
greatly appriciated.
As always, send e-mail and I'll summerize to the group.
--
Michael Batchelor -- Systems/Operations Engineer
WSHB - An International Broadcast Station of
The Christian Science Monitor Syndicate, Inc.
uunet!wshb!michaelb 803/625-4880michaelb@wshb.UUCP ( WSHB employee) (12/23/89)
> I'm trying to find a way to automate sending and getting mail between an > SCO XENIX machine and a DEC VMS machine. Here is a summary of the responses I've gotten to my request for help connecting SCO Xenix mail to VMS MAIL. The most popular suggestion was to get some form of uucp running on the VMS end. Specifically, quite a few people suggested the UUCP suite from one of the DECUS tapes. Admittidly this is the most attractive solution from my view point because it allows us to integrate the systems more closely than some mechanism which just packages and transmits mail would allow. This may not get through the sysadmins on the VMS side. (A couple of people suggested the GNUUCP package as an alternative to the DECUS one.) The second most popular suggestion was a commercial package called TERM from Century Software in Salt Lake City, Utah. The literature I received describes it as a communications package similar to the various terminal emulators for MS-DOS. It includes a scripting language which could automatically call my corporate headquarters, login, start mail, and send the messages. This solution would require me to have the mail on my end packaged and ready to go before cron starts TERM. This appears to be a good solution if I can't get anything else going. The third most popular suggestion, probably because of my posting stating I have been given permission to transfer things with Kermit, was to package the mail and call up with C Kermit under control of a Kermit script. This is essentially a public domain equivalent of the TERM solution without the ability of demanding technical support from the vendor. (You get what you pay for.) I got one suggestion to use a package called dnamail. I have no idea what this is or how to implement it. I have also lost the address of the person who made the suggestion so I can't make any comment of the appropriateness of this suggestion. I had one suggestion to write a custom command interpreter for my login on the VMS machine. The VAX guys shot this down right away. They also shot down the suggestion to write a custom interface to the VMS Mailer. The last suggestion I received was from Bob Hallissy in Texas. He provided me with source code for a program to collect my outgoing mail, convert it to something VMS can understand, call the VAX, deliver the mail, get the mail waiting there for me, and deliver it on my machine. I haven't had time to look at the stuff closely yet, but on the surface it seems to be a very good solution. I have sent mail to Bob asking permission to redistribute the code. If I can freely distribute the code I'll send it to anyone who asks. If there is enough interest I'll post it to the net. Several people gave suggestions about TCP/IP and DECnet solutions. As my system is in South Carolina and the VAX is in Boston, I haven't seriously considered these. I'm sorry if my original posting didn't make it clear that I was using a dialup connection. In summary, the most frequent, and probably wisest choice, is to get uucp running on the VAX. This is the avenue I plan to pursue most vigorously. If I cannot get enough cooperation from the sysadmins on the other end to get this solution, then I will try to use the program from Bob in Texas. If I find both of those options unworkable I will begin pursuing the other suggestions. As a start of my quest to get uucp running on the VAX I would like some more help. Can I please get details from people who have installed uucp on a VMS system about exactly what is required on the part of the sysadmins. The VAX guys want a description of what is involved before they commit to using uucp. Also, I would like details from people who have gotten a unix machine to talk to a VMS box running uucp. What problems, if any, did you have getting the mail to flow correctly. Particularly, do I need to install some other mail package than the the one which comes with SCO XENIX 386 and, if so, what do I need to find and get running. XENIX comes with rmail as the remote mail interface. Do I need something like sendmail or smail. Again thanks for the help. I'll summerize what I find to the net. -- Michael Batchelor -- Systems/Operations Engineer WSHB - An International Broadcast Station of The Christian Science Monitor Syndicate, Inc. uunet!wshb!michaelb 803/625-4880