mail(1)

NAME
Mail -- read and reply to mail

DESCRIPTION
This macro allows the user to send or read and reply to incoming mail. When the mail macro is selected, either from the Features menu or directly from the keyboard prompt, the mail macro checks your mail file. (The mail macro looks firstly at $MAIL, and then to see if /usr/spool/mail or /usr/mail exists, to ensure it runs both under System V and BSD). If there is no file by this name, then the mail macro simply says 'There is no mail for you.'

To send mail, simply type the name of the person to send to after invoking the 'mail' macro from the Command: prompt.

If the mail file exists and is not empty, then the mail facility pops up a window, similar to the 'Buffer List' window showing you the items in the mail file.

Each line of the list consists of four fields - a message number field; a field containing the Subject: line; the number of lines in the message (including headers) in square brackets. The last field is who the message is from. The usual cursor movement keys may be used to navigate through the selection menu. Hitting <Enter> at an entry pops up a window containing the message selected. The user may scroll through the message. The save ('s' or 'S') and write ('w' or 'W') commands may be used to save a message away. These commands are similar, except that the Save command does not include the header lines, whereas the Write command does. The user is prompted for a file name in which to place the file contents. The default file is ~/mbox. When the file is saved, the entry in the selection menu is marked as '<Message Deleted>'. The Delete command ('d' or 'D') allows the user to delete a message. The message entry in the window is marked with the "<Message Deleted>" message. Deleted messages cannot currently be undeleted. The message itself is not deleted until the user exits the mail selection menu (via <Esc>). If you delete a message and wish to un-delete the message, the best thing to do is use the Quit command. The Quit command ('q' or 'Q') aborts the mail reading session without updating the users mail file. To exit from the mail macro, use the '<Esc>' key. This will update the users mail file by deleting all read or deleted messages from it. The users spool mail is written back using the write_buffer() primitive and thus a backup file will be put in the standard place. This may be considered either a feature or a potentially serious security hole.

Once the mail macro has been run, it continuously monitors the users mail file in the background. When it detects a change to the mail file, the message: "There is new mail." is displayed.

The mail macro supports the concept of folders. A folder is simply a file which contains related mail messages. When saving or writing received mail messages away, simply precede the folder name with an '=' character. This gets translated into the folder located in the users Mail subdirectory in the home directory.

MENU/KEYS
This macro can be accessed from the CRISP features menu or by typing mail at the command prompt.

BUGS
Doesn't support the esoteric features of other mail readers. This may be considered a feature :-).