Using the UNIX Mail Program ~ Medicine, Health , Internet Technologies

Using the UNIX Mail Program

Introduction

The UNIX mail program is a basic e-mail program. It allows the
sending and receiving of text-only
e-mail. It is not MIME-compliant, and therefore is not suitable
for sending binary files such as images,
word processor documents, or spreadsheets. For such items, use
the Pine mail program, or one of the
graphical mail clients such as Netscape 7 or Outlook
Express 6. See Other Mail
Programs for more information.

For incoming mail, there are commands to read, save, delete,
and reply to messages. For sending mail,
you can edit, review, and make other changes to a message as it is
composed, and then send it to one or
more individuals, or to a list of people.

Conventions Used in this Document

Text style:	Usage:
italic	keywords, glossary entries and text that is emphasized.
bold	text that is emphasized.
`fixed`	a computer response or prompt as shown on screen.
`bold fixed`	commands you type in (commands should be typed in lower case-unless otherwise indicated).
`italic fixed`	substituting a required variable or command.

Sending Mail

To send e-mail to a person you need to know the person's
login name and host computer
system. This is known as the person's e-mail address.
To send mail type:

Mail login-name@hostname

Note:To call the UNIX Mail program in the WAM or
Glue UNIX systems, you must issue the
Mail command with an uppercase M.
Using a lowercase m will call a
different mail program. In the OIT cluster, you may use
either upper or lowercase.

Suppose you want to send mail to John Smith whose e-mail
address is jsmith@wam.umd.edu. At the
UNIX prompt you would type:

Mail jsmith@wam.umd.edu

and press Return. Here, jsmith is the login name
and wam.umd.edu is the address of
the host computer, or system, on which John has an account.

Note: To get more information about using UNIX
on the OIT cluster, refer to Introduction to
the OIT UNIX system.

It is not necessary to include the system address if the person
you are sending mail to has an account
on the machine from which you are sending mail. If sending mail
from your WAM account to another WAM
account holder, you only type:

Mail jsmith

and press Return. Otherwise, you need the full e-mail
address.

For help in sending mail to an e-mail address that doesn't look
like an Internet address, contact the
Help Desk at 301.405.1500 between 8:00 a.m. and 5:00
p.m. Monday-Friday.

After you issue the Mail command, the mail program will
prompt you for the subject of your
mail. If you wish to include a subject, type it and press
Return; if you don't want a subject,
press Return only. The mail program will then prompt you
with Cc: to send a carbon copy of
the mail item. If you want to send a copy of the message to
someone else, enter their login name/address or
aliases (see Using Mail Aliases) at the
Cc: prompt. If you do not want to send any
carbon copies, press Return.

You are now placed in the mail program's message editor. As you
type your message, remember to press
Return at the end of each line.

Note: If you do not press Return at the
end of each line, it may appear as though
the system is inserting Returns but, in fact, this
is not the case. If you do not press
Return your keyboard will lock up after 256
keystrokes, thus preventing you from
continuing.

Editing Your Message

If you make mistakes while typing your message and wish to
correct them, use the Delete (or
Del) key to erase them. You must make your corrections
before pressing Return.

Several functions can be invoked by typing a ~ (tilde)
followed by an option character at the
beginning of a blank line:

~?	gives you a list of the tilde escapes that are available.
~v or ~e	("visual" or "editor") each of these options, used at the beginning of a line, will invoke editors to create, modify, or add to your message. Editors make it possible to correct lines other than the one you are typing, move text, and perform other word processing operations that aren't possible with the message editor in the mail program.

If you have not customized your EDITOR or VISUAL environment
variables, on the OIT Cluster you'll get by
default:

~v	the vi editor.
~e	the ex editor.

On WAM and Glue, the default editor for both is
pico.

When you finish with your text and are ready to send the mail,
save the text and exit from the editor
using the commands appropriate for that editor.

If you have customized your EDITOR or VISUAL environment
variables, use the commands appropriate to that
editor.

For more information about text editors, see the documents at

http://www.helpdesk.umd.edu/documentation.

Note: On WAM and Glue, the default
.environment file contains lines which you can
uncomment and comment out to change from pico to
vi.

If you prefer to use a different editor from the default, you
can set either ~v or ~e (or
both) to call that editor. All you have to know is where the
editor you want to use is located on your
system. You can find this out by using the UNIX which
command. For instance, if you wanted to use
the emacs editor, you could find out where it is by
typing:

which emacs

On Glue, OIT UNIX cluster, or WAM, a pathname is displayed:

/usr/local/bin/emacs

You would then use this information to type one of the
following commands at the UNIX prompt before you
start the mail program to have either ~e or ~v
automatically put you into emacs:

for ~e:	`setenv EDITOR /usr/local/bin/emacs`
for ~v:	`setenv VISUAL /usr/local/bin/emacs`

If, instead of typing the setenv command, you place it
in the appropriate startup file
(~/.environment on WAM/Glue or appropriate shell
configuration file of the cluster,
i.e. .cshrc), your chosen editor will always be available
using the appropriate ~-option. You
can also do this by putting one of the following commands in your
.mailrc file (along with any other
mailer set commands you think would be useful).

for ~e:	`set EDITOR=/usr/local/bin/emacs`
for ~v:	`set VISUAL=/usr/local/bin/emacs`

If you are using one of these special editors, the
~-options described in this document (which
are part of the mail program's message editor) will not work until
you leave that special editor.

allows changes to your message
header (i.e., you can change the
To: (recipient) and Cc: (carbon
copy) lists and also change the
Subject: line).

~m message#

places a mail message you've
received from someone else into your current
mail message (Reading your
messages for a description of a message
number). The inserted message is
shifted to the right by a tab - usually
about 8 spaces. This may make the
text a bit difficult for the recipient to
read, since lines that are shifted
beyond 80 columns will wrap around on
the reader's screen, looking like
this:

Here is your note accompanying the forwarded message
 And here is the forwarded message, which is in-
dented
 8 spaces and then wraps around into the empty
area
 where the indentation is, making it hard to read

An alternative approach is to save the message you want to
forward, and put it into a file using the
s command (see Saving Mail Messages).
When you write to the person to whom you
wish to forward the message, you can place it in the e-mail with
the ~r option (see below), which
doesn't indent it. For clarity, it also helps to use a separator
to indicate where your mail ends and the
appended message begins:

-------------- forwarded message

~r filename	reads all contents of the file known as filename into your current message following the line you just typed before the ~r.
~s new-subject	changes the subject line to new-subject (it can be more than one word).
~t users	adds users to the To: list (the list of people receiving your message); users can be any combination of login-name@mailaddresses and aliases (see Using Mail Aliases).
~w filename	writes (saves) your message to the file known as filename. For example, ~w bob.feb12 would save the current message to a file called bob.feb12.
~! command	executes a UNIX command, but does not put the output in your mail message.
~~	includes a single tilde as the first character of a line.

Sending Your Message

Once the message has been entered and is ready to be mailed (be
sure to exit any editors you may have
called with ~e or ~v), there are two ways by which
to send the mail and then exit the mail
program. In either case, first press Return to place the
cursor on a blank line. Then, either press
Ctrl-d (hold down the Ctrl (Control) key and type
d), or type a period (.) in
column 1 and press Return.

Aborting Your Message

If you decide that you want to quit the mail program without
sending your message, press Ctrl-c
twice. This command can not be issued while you are in an editor.
After pressing Ctrl-c the first time,
the mail program will prompt you to confirm that you wish to exit
without sending your message. The message
will be saved in a file named dead.letter in your home
directory. This is useful if you decide to send
the mail message later. If you abort another mail message, the
mail program overwrites the previous contents
of the dead.letter file; so, if you wish to keep the
contents of the first file, you should either
rename it or move
it to another directory.

Sending Mail

While using the mail program to read mail messages, you can
also send a mail message. Refer to
Other Mail Commands, for details.

Receiving and Reading Mail

If there are mail messages waiting for you when you log in to
your UNIX account, you will see
the message:

You have mail

On the OIT cluster, you are automatically placed into the mail
program. On other machines, enter the
program by typing:

Mail

at the system prompt followed by pressing Return. A "new
mail has arrived" message appears (if you
received new mail while reading mail already in your mailbox).

When you first start the mail program, it tells you how many
messages are waiting and then displays the
header information for each message. The header information lists
the mail address of the sender, the date
and time the message was sent, the number of lines and characters
in the message, and as much of the
message's subject line as will fit on the screen.

The illustration in the next section indicates what a typical
UNIX mail account would display indicating
three new (N) mail messages and one old mail message which
was unread (U).

After the header information for the messages has been
displayed, you can read or issue mail commands at
the mail program prompt (&).

Some systems use the ">" symbol at the beginning of a line
which indicates this particular message is
the default message (i.e., the message that will be manipulated if
you do not specify a particular message
number). This message is the one referred to in the explanations
below as the "current message".

Reading Your Messages

To read a particular mail message, type the number of that
message at the mail prompt (&) and
press Return. For instance, to read the message from
akins@umd5.umd.edu below, type 2

at the & prompt and press Return:

& 2

Mail $Revision: 4.2.4.2 $  Type ? for help..  Type ? for
help. "/usr/spool/mail/userid":4 messages 3 new

 U 1 jdoe@umd5.umd.edu  Tue Aug 27 11:56 12/4182
>N 2 akins@umd5.umd.edu Wed Aug 28 09:12 13/33 "Good
 N 3 johndoe  Wed Aug 28 13:40 16/360
 N 4 johndoe  Thu Aug 29 10:14 82/1697 "lunch today?"

&

The mail message will be displayed on your screen. If the
message is more than one screen long, the
program will display a single screenful at a time. A -MORE-
message will appear at the bottom of the
screen to tell you that additional information exists. To view the
rest of the message, press the space
bar. Refer to the Using Set Commands section
in this document for information on
scrolling through text that appears on your screen.

Message List

If after reading any one mail item you wish to see the list of
messages again, type h at the
& prompt and press Return.

Replying to a Mail Message

To respond to an e-mail message that you have received, use one
of mail's two reply commands r or
R. Both commands are issued by typing the command followed
by the number of the e-mail message to
which you wish to reply. For example:

& r 2

would reply to message number two. If a reply command is issued
without a message number, a reply is
generated for the current message.

r	reply is sent to the original sender and all other recipients of the original mail message.
R	reply is sent to the original sender only, not other recipients.

The above commands differ only in who will receive the reply
message. Remember the difference between
the two reply commands. For example, if you are replying to a mail
message sent by your professor to the
entire class, you might prefer that only the professor receive
your reply. Since the r and R

commands are system dependant, the roles can change.

Cleaning Up Old Mail

If you read your mail and take no further action, then when you
exit from the mail program all of your
messages will remain in your system mail file. The next time you
read mail, the old messages will appear
with any new mail you receive.

You should save whatever mail you want to keep and make sure
that all mail is deleted as soon as
possible. On most systems, mail is held in a common area, and one
person's accumulation of large volumes of
mail potentially jeopardizes the ability of others to get mail.
(On WAM and Glue, on the other hand, mail
storage space comes out of your own personal quota, which you can
handle in whatever manner is convenient for
you.)

The mail program's keepsave setting determines whether
mail that you save elsewhere is
automatically deleted or not. Some systems at the University have
keepsave set to retain mail after
you save it; others have it unset to delete such mail. You can
check this with the set command, and,
if you prefer, change it.

Saving Mail Messages

To save a mail message in a file, you must issue the save
command (s), followed by the numbers of
the messages you wish to save and the name of the file you wish to
save them in. There is no standard
file-you must give a file name.

& s message_list filename

When using the save command, the message_list can
specify several message numbers, a single
message number, a range of numbers, or no message number. If you
do not specify a message number, the
"current" message is saved to the file. For example, to save two
messages (numbers 3 and
4) in a file named johnmail, type:

& s 3 4 johnmail

Deleting Mail Messages

Once you have read and/or saved a message, it is important to
remember to delete it (if it is still
there). The delete (d) command is used for this purpose.
Simply type the delete command followed by
the message numbers of the messages you wish to delete.

& d message_list

For example:

& d 3 4

This will delete messages 3 and 4 (which you
saved previously in a file named
johnmail). A range of numbers can be deleted by using a
hyphen. To delete messages
1 through 20 you would type the command as
follows:

& d 1-20

Undeleting Mail Messages

There is an undelete (u) command that you can use to
reactivate messages which have been
deleted; however the undelete command only works if you have not
yet exited the mail program. After exiting
the mail program, any messages that have been deleted cannot be
retrieved.

Exiting the Mail Program

There are two ways to exit the mail program:

Type q and press Return. This exits the
mail program and removes any deleted or
saved messages so that the next time you read your mail,
the deleted and saved messages will not
appear.

Type x and press Return. This exits the
mail program but does not remove any
deleted or saved messages. All messages will show up when
you next call up the mail program.

Other Mail Commands

There are many other commands you can use to manipulate your
mail messages. Some of the most useful mail
commands are briefly described in this section.

In the following descriptions, a message_list may
consist of a single mail message number, a list
of message numbers separated by spaces, a range of message numbers
whose numbers are separated by a hyphen
(e.g., 2-4), or a combination of any of these. For
example:

d 3 d 3 5 6 d 3-5 d 3-5 7 10-14

If a message_list is not given, the mail program uses
the current message.

A user_list consists only of user names and mail
addresses separated by spaces, such as:

m jdoe@wam.umd.edu carol@umd5.umd.edu

Command	Explanation
?	displays a list of some of the mail commands.
! command	executes a UNIX command then returns to the mail program.
d msg. #	deletes the # message.
e message_list	edits listed messages with the EDITOR text editor (see Editing Your Message).
h	displays header information for the twenty most recent active mail messages.
m user_list	sends a mail message to the listed users (this works the same as sending mail from the command line).
n	displays the next message.
q	exits the mail program and removes any deleted or saved messages. The next time you read mail, the deleted and saved messages will not appear.
r msg. #	replies to the message numbered #. The subject line is the same as the original message #, but a "Re:" will be prefixed to show that it is a reply. Reply is sent to the original sender and all other recipients of the original message.
R msg. #	sends a reply only to the original sender. This is similar to the r msg command. Note: The r and R commands act as described above on some systems (WAM and the UNIX cluster), and the opposite way on others (Glue-where you can set the replyall setting, not available on most other systems, to reverse their meaning if you wish-see Using Set Commands). It is a good idea to do a man mail command on your system to make sure you know how these two commands behave.
s msg.# filename	saves the numbered message to a file.
u message_list	undeletes listed message(s). Note: The undelete command only restores messages if you have not yet quit the mail program. If you have quit the mail program, deleted messages cannot be restored.
v message_list	edits listed messages with the VISUAL text editor.
x or ex	exits the mail program, but does not remove deleted or saved messages from the mail file.

Customizing Your Mail Environment

The UNIX mail program allows you to customize your mail
environment to make it easier to send and
receive mail. These commands can be issued from the mail prompt
(&) or made automatic by placing
them in a file named .mailrc in your home directory.

Using Mail Aliases

The mail program provides a timesaving feature called
alias. Aliases are abbreviated names that
represent the mail address of a single user or several users. They
allow you to send mail to a group of
people quickly without requiring you to remember all of their
individual mail addresses, or to a single
user with a long or difficult-to-remember address. The
alias command is used to define aliases. For
example, a simple alias could look like:

alias rob rob@wam.umd.edu

and a group alias could look like:

alias class rob@umd5.umd.edu mark sue@wam.umd.edu

The latter would create an alias named class that
consists of the three class members listed. A
group alias can consist of actual addresses, aliases or a
combination of both. If you use the alias
command to define an alias while in the mail program, it will
exist until you exit the mail program; if
you put the alias command in your .mailrc file, it
will be available every time you send
mail.

To use a mail alias after you create it, substitute the alias
name for the login name and mail address
you would normally provide when sending mail. For example:

Mail class

sends mail to all the users listed under the alias class
in the .mailrc file.

If you have more names in your alias list than will fit on one
80-column line, you have three
options:

Keep typing without pressing Return, allowing
the text to wrap around from line to
line. You can do this for up to 255 characters-a little
over 3 lines-but it is sloppy.

Type the list on several lines, but end each line with
a \ (backslash) and press Return
(the word alias only goes on the first line).

Make aliases for subsets of your list, and then make a
final alias consisting of a list of
these "sub-aliases".

Using Set Commands

Many mail program options can be set with the mail program
set command. These options can be
used temporarily by issuing the set command while using the
mail program, or permanently by placing
the desired set commands in your .mailrc. The
default system options for the mail program
are set in the file /etc/mail/Mail.rc for WAM/Glue and
/usr/share/lib/Mail.rc on the
cluster. You can set additional options, or unset system defaults
with the unset command, in your
.mailrc.

Set command options are either binary or valued.
Binary set options are either set or not
set (on or off), there is no value associated with them; valued
set options are set to a particular
value. Binary options can be set simply by using the set
command and the option name.

set option

For example:

set keepsave

Binary options can be unset by using the unset command
and the option name. For example:

unset askcc

Valued options are set using the set command with a
slightly different format.

set option=value

For example:

set crt=24

would signal the mail program that you are working within a 24
line screen and it will pause every
screenful of text accordingly.

Several options can be set on a single line, such as:

set append dot ask hold askcc crt=24

You can see a list of the binary options that are on/set and
value options that have a value by simply
typing:

set

Some of the more useful set options are briefly described
below. Valued set options are indicated
as such, all other options are binary.

Set option	Function
ask	prompts you for a subject whenever you mail a message.
askcc	prompts you for a carbon copy list whenever you mail a message.
crt	tells the mail program how many lines long your terminal screen is so that mail messages are displayed appropriately. The system default is 24 lines. (crt is a valued option.)
dot	allows you to use a . (period) alone on a line to send your message and quit the mail program.
EDITOR	specifies the text editor to invoke when the ~e or e commands are used to edit a mail message. EDITOR is a valued option. Remember to specify the full pathname. On WAM and the OIT cluster, the paths for the emacs and vi editors are: `/usr/local/bin/emacs /usr/ucb/vi`
hold	messages that have been read but not deleted or saved are left in your system mail file.
keepsave	messages that have been saved to a file and are left in your system mail file instead of being deleted.
metoo	allows you to receive a copy of the message.
noheader	header information for messages in your system mail file is not displayed when you start the mail program.
record	specifies the name of a file to which all outgoing mail messages are appended (record is a valued option).
replyall	(Glue and Sun workstations) reverse the meaning of R and r to be like other systems in which r replies to all recipients and R replies to author.
save	aborted messages are saved in the dead.letter file.
VISUAL	specifies what text editor is invoked when the ~v or v commands are used to edit a mail message. VISUAL is a valued option. Remember to give the full path name of the editor as mentioned previously in the EDITOR description above.

Forwarding Your Mail to Another Computer

If you have accounts on several computer systems, and you would
like to be able to read your e-mail on
only one system, you can forward your mail from your UNIX account
to another computer system. To do this,
simply create a file named .forward in your home directory
that contains your e-mail address on the
other system. For example, if you have a UNIX cluster account and
a WAM account, and you wish to forward all
your mail to the WAM system, use a text editor to create a
.forward file on the cluster that contains
the line:

your-loginname@wam.umd.edu

As long as the .forward file exists on the cluster, all
mail sent there will be forwarded to the
WAM system. To stop mail forwarding, simply delete or rename the
.forward file.

Note: If you wish to forward mail from your WAM
or Glue account to your cluster account,
you must place the .forward file in your mail
directory.

Other Mail Programs

The standard UNIX Berkeley mail program described here
is only one of many mail programs. Other
easier to use mail programs with more or better features are
available. Most of the publicly available UNIX
systems at the University have mailers available.

One example is the Pine mail program. Pine is the
more popular of the mail programs because
it can be used from any kind of computer. It has many advanced
features including a graphical interface for
reading mail, a help utility, and the ability to "attach" files to
mail messages. To use it, type
pine at the UNIX prompt.

Another example is the mail-handler (mh) system. The
mh system is a group of independent
programs that are called separately from the Unix prompt to
perform mail handling functions - sending mail,
or retrieving, reading, saving, replying to and forwarding
incoming mail. The mh mail handler has
facilities to set up aliases and can send blind carbon copies to
others within the mail program. Each mail
item is maintained as an individual file and can be placed in a
folder (directory) of choice.

Graphical mail clients, such as Netscape 7 or Outlook
Express 6, are a convenient way to check your
e-mail, and are the preferred alternative to
Berkeley mail and Pine. See
http://www.helpdesk.umd.edu/documents/0/690 for more
information about which client would work best for
you.

Getting Help

On-line help is available via the man command. From the
UNIX prompt, type man
mail to view the on-line manual entry for the mail
program.

Documents on the basics of the three OIT-supported text
editors, Using the Vi Text
Editor,Using the Emacs Text
Editor, and Using the Pico Text
Editor are available on-line.

For assistance with the standard Berkeley mailer
described in this document call or visit the Help
Desk (CSS, room 1400, 301.405.1500), Monday through Friday, 8:00
a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

For a printable PDF version of this document,
refer to
http://www.helpdesk.umd.edu/documentation/unix/mail.pdf.

Last Date Modified: 01-18-05 - JLG

Return to the top.

Posted in:

Pages

Blog Archive

Download

Favorite Blogs

OuterLink

Aggregators

Subsc My blog

Thursday, March 01, 2007