Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!sun-barr!ames!elroy!gryphon!vector!telecom-gateway From: avr@mtgzx.att.com (a.v.reed) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: AT&T Mail vs MCI Mail Message-ID: Date: 28 Jun 89 17:30:28 GMT Sender: news@vector.Dallas.TX.US Organization: AT&T, Middletown NJ Lines: 35 Approved: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 218, message 6 of 6 In article , ficc!peter@uunet.uu.net writes: > Would anyone care to give me some feedback on the relative merits of MCI > Mail and AT&T Mail? I'd like to be able to send FAXes to my father in > Australia, and the two companies charge about the same amount for the > service. I've used MCI Mail in the past and wasn't overly fond of the user > interface back then, but my brief examination of AT&T Mail didn't lead me > to believe it'd be any better. I can't comment on the comparison (and since I work for AT&T you probably would be justified in discounting any comaprisons I made anyway), but I'd like to point out that the "user interface" of AT&T Mail is just a "backup" kind of capability - it's there so you can still get to your mail if your UNIX(r) system is down. For normal use, you register your machine with AT&T Mail (no need to buy any special software if you are running UNIX with UUCP), and then use your favorite UNIX mailer to send mail to an AT&T Mail address, such as attmail!adamreed/paper for a hardcopy letter (delivered via USPS) to yours truly. There is also a special address, attmail!dispatcher, for mail to people (or FAX machines etc) without registered AT&T Mail addresses. For example, I use the following sh script to send nroff -mm letters via FAX: NUMBER=$1;ATTENTION=$2;shift;shift (echo "To: attmail!fax!$NUMBER(/$ATTENTION)";\ nroff -mm -rL60 -rW65 $@ | col -bx)|\ /bin/mail attmail!dispatcher I can't comment on how you would do this with MCI Mail, but if I were choosing an electronic mail service my key question would be, "can I use it, transparently, from my usual UNIX system, with mailers and tools I already know?". Could someone comment on how MCI Mail, and other commercial E-Mail services, compare in this regard? Adam Reed (Adam_V_Reed@att.com, attmail!adamreed)