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From: sl@van-bc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix,comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: uucp mail inefficiency
Message-ID: <565@van-bc.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 4-Apr-87 14:57:26 EST
Article-I.D.: van-bc.565
Posted: Sat Apr  4 14:57:26 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 5-Apr-87 22:50:05 EST
References: <7326@boring.mcvax.cwi.nl> <2629@phri.UUCP> <18164@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Reply-To: sl@van-bc.UUCP (Stuart Lynne)
Distribution: world
Organization: Public Access Network, Vancouver, BC.
Lines: 29
Keywords: uucp uucico kermit
Xref: utgpu comp.os.minix:511 comp.mail.uucp:410

In article <18164@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> fair@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU (Erik E. Fair) writes:
>UUCP mail can be sent one copy for multiple recipients to any host
>except a 4.1 BSD UNIX (their "rmail" is screwed up). However, in all

A simple script to copy stdin to a temp file, and then copy to real rmail for
each arguement is a quick fix for this.

>If we really wanted to do this right, there is a version of the SMTP
>(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) for batched systems that BITNET uses
>called (strangely enough) BSMTP (for Batched SMTP). Someone could
>write a new command to be executed on the remote end of a UUCP link
>(let's say "bsmtp" with no arguments), and it can read standard input
>for the BSMTP protocol and the letter(s), which can be of arbitrary
>length, since we're getting it on stdin, rather than in the command
>line argument buffers.

Actually there is already a "standard" way to do this. According to RFC 976,
section 2.3 Batch SMTP, a conforming host should set up a mail ID called
b-smtp. All mail sent to this ID is interpreted as Batch SMTP commands. The
example given for BSD systems with sendmail:

	b-smtp: "|egrep '^#' | sed 's/^#//' | /usr/lib/sendmail -bs"

Of course we still need the bsmtp program to do the interpretation for non
BSD systems that don't have sendmail. Any volunteers!


-- 
Stuart Lynne	ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision!van-bc!sl     Vancouver,BC,604-937-7532