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--- old/usr/src/man/man1/mail.1.man.txt
+++ new/usr/src/man/man1/mail.1.man.txt
1 1 MAIL(1) User Commands MAIL(1)
2 2
3 3
4 4
5 5 NAME
6 6 mail, rmail - read mail or send mail to users
7 7
8 8 SYNOPSIS
9 9 Sending Mail
10 10 mail [-tw] [-m message_type] recipient...
11 11
12 12
13 13 rmail [-tw] [-m message_type] recipient...
14 14
15 15
16 16 Reading Mail
17 17 mail [-ehpPqr] [-f file]
18 18
19 19
20 20 Debugging
21 21 mail [-x debug_level] [other_mail_options] recipient...
22 22
23 23
24 24 DESCRIPTION
25 25 A recipient is usually a domain style address ("user@machine") or a
26 26 user name recognized by login(1). When recipients are named, mail
27 27 assumes a message is being sent. It reads from the standard input up to
28 28 an end-of-file (Control-d) or, if reading from a terminal device, until
29 29 it reads a line consisting of just a period. When either of those
30 30 indicators is received, mail adds the letter to the mailfile for each
31 31 recipient.
32 32
33 33
34 34 A letter is composed of some header lines followed by a blank line
35 35 followed by the message content. The header lines section of the letter
36 36 consists of one or more UNIX postmarks:
37 37
38 38 From sender date_and_time [remote from remote_system_name]
39 39
40 40
41 41
42 42
43 43 followed by one or more standardized message header lines of the form:
44 44
45 45 keyword-name: [printable text]
46 46
47 47
48 48
49 49
50 50 where keyword-name is comprised of any printable, non-whitespace
51 51 characters other than colon (`:'). A MIME-version: header line
52 52 indicates that the message is formatted as described in RFC 2045. A
53 53 Content-Length: header line, indicating the number of bytes in the
54 54 message content, is always present unless the letter consists of only
55 55 header lines with no message content. A Content-Type: header line that
56 56 describes the type of the message content (such as text/plain,
57 57 application/octet-stream, and so on) is also present, unless the letter
58 58 consists of only header lines with no message content. Header lines may
59 59 be continued on the following line if that line starts with white
60 60 space.
61 61
62 62 OPTIONS
63 63 Sending Mail
64 64 The following command-line arguments affect sending mail:
65 65
66 66 -m message_type
67 67 A Message-Type: line is added to the message header
68 68 with the value of message_type.
69 69
70 70
71 71 -t
72 72 A To: line is added to the message header for each
73 73 of the intended recipients.
74 74
75 75
76 76 -w
77 77 A letter is sent to a remote recipient without
78 78 waiting for the completion of the remote transfer
79 79 program.
80 80
81 81
82 82
83 83 If a letter is found to be undeliverable, it is returned to the sender
84 84 with diagnostics that indicate the location and nature of the failure.
85 85 If mail is interrupted during input, the message is saved in the file
86 86 dead.letter to allow editing and resending. dead.letter is always
87 87 appended to, thus preserving any previous contents. The initial attempt
88 88 to append to (or create) dead.letter is in the current directory. If
89 89 this fails, dead.letter is appended to (or created in) the user's login
90 90 directory. If the second attempt also fails, no dead.letter processing
91 91 is done.
92 92
93 93
94 94 rmail only permits the sending of mail; uucp(1C) uses rmail as a
95 95 security precaution. Any application programs that generate mail
96 96 messages should be sure to invoke rmail rather than mail for message
97 97 transport and/or delivery.
98 98
99 99
100 100 If the local system has the Basic Networking Utilities installed, mail
101 101 can be sent to a recipient on a remote system. There are numerous ways
102 102 to address mail to recipients on remote systems depending on the
103 103 transport mechanisms available to the local system. The two most
104 104 prevalent addressing schemes are Domain-style and UUCP-style.
105 105
106 106 Domain-style addressing
107 107 Remote recipients are specified by appending
108 108 an `@' and domain (and possibly sub-domain)
109 109 information to the recipient name (such as
110 110 user@sf.att.com). (The local system
111 111 administrator should be consulted for
112 112 details on which addressing conventions are
113 113 available on the local system.)
114 114
115 115
116 116 UUCP-style addressing
117 117 Remote recipients are specified by prefixing
118 118 the recipient name with the remote system
119 119 name and an exclamation point, such as
120 120 sysa!user. If csh(1) is the default shell,
121 121 sysa\!user should be used. A series of
122 122 system names separated by exclamation points
123 123 can be used to direct a letter through an
124 124 extended network (such as
125 125 sysa!sysb!sysc!user or
126 126 sysa\!sysb\!sysc\!user).
127 127
128 128
129 129 Reading Mail
130 130 The following command-line arguments affect reading mail:
131 131
132 132 -e
133 133 Test for the presence of mail. mail prints nothing.
134 134
135 135 An exit status of 0 is returned if the user has mail.
136 136 Otherwise, an exit status of 1 is returned.
137 137
138 138
139 139 -E
140 140 Similar to -e, but tests only for the presence of new mail.
141 141
142 142 An exit status of 0 is returned if the user has new
143 143 mail to read, an exit status of 1 is returned if the
144 144 user has no mail, or an exit status of 2 is returned
145 145 if the user has mail which has already been read.
146 146
147 147
148 148 -h
149 149 A window of headers are initially displayed rather than the
150 150 latest message. The display is followed by the ? prompt.
151 151
152 152
153 153 -p
154 154 All messages are printed without prompting for disposition.
155 155
156 156
157 157 -P
158 158 All messages are printed with all header lines displayed,
159 159 rather than the default selective header line display.
160 160
161 161
162 162 -q
163 163 mail terminates after interrupts. Normally an interrupt
164 164 causes only the termination of the message being printed.
165 165
166 166
167 167 -r
168 168 Messages are printed in first-in, first-out order.
169 169
170 170
171 171 -f file
172 172 mail uses file (such as mbox) instead of the default
173 173 mailfile.
174 174
175 175
176 176
177 177 mail, unless otherwise influenced by command-line arguments, prints a
178 178 user's mail messages in last-in, first-out order. The default mode for
179 179 printing messages is to display only those header lines of immediate
180 180 interest. These include, but are not limited to, the UNIX From and
181 181 >From postmarks, From:, Date:, Subject:, and Content-Length: header
182 182 lines, and any recipient header lines such as To:, Cc:, Bcc:, and so
183 183 forth. After the header lines have been displayed, mail displays the
184 184 contents (body) of the message only if it contains no unprintable
185 185 characters. Otherwise, mail issues a warning statement about the
186 186 message having binary content and not display the content. This can be
187 187 overridden by means of the p command.
188 188
189 189
190 190 For each message, the user is prompted with a ? and a line is read from
191 191 the standard input. The following commands are available to determine
192 192 the disposition of the message:
193 193
194 194 #
195 195 Print the number of the current message.
196 196
197 197
198 198 -
199 199 Print previous message.
200 200
201 201
202 202 <new-line>,+, or n
203 203 Print the next message.
204 204
205 205
206 206 !command
207 207 Escape to the shell to do command.
208 208
209 209
210 210 a
211 211 Print message that arrived during the mail
212 212 session.
213 213
214 214
215 215 d, or dp
216 216 Delete the current message and print the next
217 217 message.
218 218
219 219
220 220 d n
221 221 Delete message number n. Do not go on to next
222 222 message.
223 223
224 224
225 225 dq
226 226 Delete message and quit mail.
227 227
228 228
229 229 h
230 230 Display a window of headers around current
231 231 message.
232 232
233 233
234 234 hn
235 235 Display a window of headers around message number
236 236 n.
237 237
238 238
239 239 h a
240 240 Display headers of all messages in the user's
241 241 mailfile.
242 242
243 243
244 244 h d
245 245 Display headers of messages scheduled for
246 246 deletion.
247 247
248 248
249 249 m [ persons ]
250 250 Mail (and delete) the current message to the
251 251 named persons.
252 252
253 253
254 254 n
255 255 Print message number n.
256 256
257 257
258 258 p
259 259 Print current message again, overriding any
260 260 indications of binary (that is, unprintable)
261 261 content.
262 262
263 263
264 264 P
265 265 Override default brief mode and print current
266 266 message again, displaying all header lines.
267 267
268 268
269 269 q, or Control-d
270 270 Put undeleted mail back in the mailfile and quit
271 271 mail.
272 272
273 273
274 274 r [ users ]
275 275 Reply to the sender, and other users, then delete
276 276 the message.
277 277
278 278
279 279 s [ files ]
280 280 Save message in the named files (mbox is default)
281 281 and delete the message.
282 282
283 283
284 284 u [ n ]
285 285 Undelete message number n (default is last read).
286 286
287 287
288 288 w [ files ]
289 289 Save message contents, without any header lines,
290 290 in the named files (mbox is default) and delete
291 291 the message.
292 292
293 293
294 294 x
295 295 Put all mail back in the mailfile unchanged and
296 296 exit mail.
297 297
298 298
299 299 y [ files ]
300 300 Same as -w option.
301 301
302 302
303 303 ?
304 304 Print a command summary.
305 305
306 306
307 307
308 308 When a user logs in, the presence of mail, if any, is usually
309 309 indicated. Also, notification is made if new mail arrives while using
310 310 mail.
311 311
312 312
313 313 The permissions of mailfile can be manipulated using chmod(1) in two
314 314 ways to alter the function of mail. The other permissions of the file
315 315 can be read-write (0666), read-only (0664), or neither read nor write
316 316 (0660) to allow different levels of privacy. If changed to other than
317 317 the default (mode 0660), the file is preserved even when empty to
318 318 perpetuate the desired permissions. (The administrator can override
319 319 this file preservation using the DEL_EMPTY_MAILFILE option of
320 320 mailcnfg.)
321 321
322 322
323 323 The group ID of the mailfile must be mail to allow new messages to be
324 324 delivered, and the mailfile must be writable by group mail.
325 325
326 326 Debugging
327 327 The following command-line arguments cause mail to provide debugging
328 328 information:
329 329
330 330 -x debug_level
331 331 mail creates a trace file containing debugging
332 332 information.
333 333
334 334
335 335
336 336 The -x option causes mail to create a file named /tmp/MLDBGprocess_id
337 337 that contains debugging information relating to how mail processed the
338 338 current message. The absolute value of debug_level controls the
339 339 verboseness of the debug information. 0 implies no debugging. If
340 340 debug_level is greater than 0, the debug file is retained only if mail
341 341 encountered some problem while processing the message. If debug_level
342 342 is less than 0, the debug file is always be retained. The debug_level
343 343 specified via -x overrides any specification of DEBUG in
344 344 /etc/mail/mailcnfg. The information provided by the -x option is
345 345 esoteric and is probably only useful to system administrators.
346 346
347 347 Delivery Notification
348 348 Several forms of notification are available for mail by including one
349 349 of the following lines in the message header.
350 350
351 351
352 352 Transport-Options: [ /options ]
353 353
354 354
355 355 Default-Options: [ /options ]
356 356
357 357
358 358 >To: recipient [ /options ]
359 359
360 360
361 361 Where the "/options" can be one or more of the following:
362 362
363 363 /delivery
364 364 Inform the sender that the message was successfully
365 365 delivered to the recipient's mailbox.
366 366
367 367
368 368 /nodelivery
369 369 Do not inform the sender of successful deliveries.
370 370
371 371
372 372 /ignore
373 373 Do not inform the sender of failed deliveries.
374 374
375 375
376 376 /return
377 377 Inform the sender if mail delivery fails. Return the
378 378 failed message to the sender.
379 379
380 380
381 381 /report
382 382 Same as /return except that the original message is not
383 383 returned.
384 384
385 385
386 386
387 387 The default is /nodelivery/return. If contradictory options are used,
388 388 the first is recognized and later, conflicting, terms are ignored.
389 389
390 390 OPERANDS
391 391 The following operand is supported for sending mail:
392 392
393 393 recipient
394 394 A domain style address ("user@machine") or user login name
395 395 recognized by login(1).
396 396
397 397
398 398 USAGE
399 399 See largefile(5) for the description of the behavior of mail and rmail
400 400 when encountering files greater than or equal to 2 Gbyte ( 2^31 bytes).
401 401
402 402 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
403 403 See environ(5) for descriptions of the following environment variables
404 404 that affect the execution of mail: LC_CTYPE, LC_MESSAGES, and NLSPATH.
405 405
406 406 TZ
407 407 Determine the timezone used with date and time strings.
408 408
409 409
410 410 EXIT STATUS
411 411 The following exit values are returned:
412 412
413 413 0
414 414 Successful completion when the user had mail.
415 415
416 416
417 417 1
418 418 The user had no mail or an initialization error occurred.
419 419
420 420
421 421 >1
422 422 An error occurred after initialization.
423 423
424 424
425 425 FILES
426 426 dead.letter
427 427 unmailable text
428 428
429 429
430 430 /etc/passwd
431 431 to identify sender and locate recipients
432 432
433 433
434 434 $HOME/mbox
435 435 saved mail
436 436
437 437
438 438 $MAIL
439 439 variable containing path name of mailfile
440 440
441 441
442 442 /tmp/MLDBG*
443 443 debug trace file
444 444
445 445
446 446 /var/mail/*.lock
447 447 lock for mail directory
448 448
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449 449
450 450 /var/mail/:saved
451 451 directory for holding temp files to prevent loss of
452 452 data in the event of a system crash
453 453
454 454
455 455 /var/mail/user
456 456 incoming mail for user; that is, the mailfile
457 457
458 458
459 - var/tmp/ma*
459 + /var/tmp/ma*
460 460 temporary file
461 461
462 462
463 463 SEE ALSO
464 464 chmod(1), csh(1), login(1), mailx(1), uucp(1C), uuencode(1C),
465 465 vacation(1), write(1), attributes(5), environ(5), largefile(5)
466 466
467 467
468 468 Solaris Advanced User's Guide
469 469
470 470 NOTES
471 471 The interpretation and resulting action taken because of the header
472 472 lines described in the Delivery Notifications section only occur if
473 473 this version of mail is installed on the system where the delivery (or
474 474 failure) happens. Earlier versions of mail might not support any types
475 475 of delivery notification.
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476 476
477 477
478 478 Conditions sometimes result in a failure to remove a lock file.
479 479
480 480
481 481 After an interrupt, the next message might not be printed. Printing can
482 482 be forced by typing a p.
483 483
484 484
485 485
486 - July 24, 2008 MAIL(1)
486 + May 17, 2020 MAIL(1)
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