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From: chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.xenix,comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: smail "front end" query
Message-ID: <42@ateng.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 16-Oct-87 12:45:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: ateng.42
Posted: Fri Oct 16 12:45:56 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 22-Oct-87 00:02:24 EDT
References: <838@seradg.Dayton.NCR.COM>
Reply-To: chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg)
Followup-To: comp.unix.xenix
Organization: A.T. Engineering, Tampa, FL
Lines: 58
Keywords: smail mailx Subject etc
Xref: mnetor comp.unix.xenix:1004 comp.mail.uucp:886

[Since this is a Xenix-specific question, followups have been directed
 to comp.unix.xenix.]

In article <838@seradg.Dayton.NCR.COM> pat@seradg.Dayton.NCR.COM (Patrick Pesch) writes:
>
>	I have just got "smail up on my SCO Xenix system and have a question
>	that somebody out there has probably encounterd.  Smail replaces
>	/bin/mail with a small front end called svbinmail (for systems
>	that do not have sendmail).  It moves the existing /bin/mail to
>	/bin/lmail, and uses it only when READING mail.  /bin/smail and
>	/bin/rmail (linked together) are used when sending mail.
>
>	My problem is that the smail interface seems pretty primitive,
>	compared to the Xenix mail that was there (mailx derivative).

I've installed smail here on an SCO Xenix 2.2 system.  I did _not_ rename
/bin/mail to /bin/lmail.  Instead, I installed a replacement for the
/usr/lib/mail/execmail program. (Execmail is Xenix's answer to sendmail).
This replacement program parses execmail's arguments and executes smail.
The arguments that execmail (and its replacement) understand are:

	-f user         This mail is from "user"
	-n              Perform no alias substitution
	-m              Mail to "me" too, if requested
	-r              Remote  [host!user instead of host:user?]
	-h count        Specify max hop count in bang path (default is 20)

(Perhaps some SCO wizards would care to clarify the usage of these options.
Specifically, I haven't been able to discern any actual affect from the
use of the "-m" and "-r" options.)

Xenix's /bin/mail, when it finally wants to deliver mail, calls execmail,
which on my system is actually smail in disguise.  And smail uses the old
execmail, which I've renamed to execmail.x, to deliver local mail.

About configuring smail for this setup:  I compiled smail without defining
SENDMAIL, and I defined ALIASES as "/usr/lib/mail/r_aliases".  All aliases
that go to remote users are in this file; all aliases to local users are
(still) in /usr/lib/mail/aliases. (Postmaster, usenet, network, Micnet
aliases, etc.) I'd have let smail do _all_ alias processing, except that it
doesn't understand "|pipeline" aliases. (i.e. rnews: "|/bin/rnews")

The fly in the ointment is /bin/mail, which seems to consider itself lord
and master of all it surveys.  When it sees a name like "larry@moe.curly",
it says "hey, there's no local user named `larry@moe.curly', and I don't
see a bang, so I'm not going to bother execmail with this one." As someone
wrote to me recently, /bin/mail is a hunk of junk.  So we don't use it --
we use mush and/or elm.  But if /bin/mail must be used, you can still mail
to `moe.curly!larry' and it works.  Barely.

Anyway, now that I can change routing at whim, I'll never go back to manual
bang paths.  Not willingly, anyway.

-- 
Chip Salzenberg         "chip@ateng.UUCP"  or  "{uunet,usfvax2}!ateng!chip"
A.T. Engineering        My employer's opinions are not mine, but these are.
   "Gentlemen, your work today has been outstanding.  I intend to recommend
   you all for promotion -- in whatever fleet we end up serving."   - JTK