ZMAILNOTIFY(1)

NAME
zmailnotify - retrieve mail headers from post office and transmit via Zephyr

SYNOPSIS
zmailnotify

DESCRIPTION
zmailnotify connects to the invoking user's POP post office and retrieves the From, To, and Subject fields of waiting messages, and then sends one Zephyr notice per message to class MAIL, instance POPRET, recipient <user@realm>, where <user@realm> is the invoking user's username concatenated with the local Zephyr realm (e.g. jruser@ATHENA.MIT.EDU).

zmailnotify is intended to be executed by zwgc(1) when notifications of spooled mail (such as those generated by zpopnotify(8)) are delivered. By default, these notifications are not delivered, nor are they acted upon. To receive the notices, you must subscribe to class MAIL, instance POP, recipient username@realm (see zctl(1)). Once you subscribe to these notices, by default they will be simply displayed on your display or terminal by zwgc(1). To have zmailnotify executed when they are delivered, you must copy the system default windowgram description file (/etc/athena/zephyr.desc) to your home directory as filename ~/.zephyr.desc and follow the directions contained in that file pertaining to MAIL NOTIFICATION.

zmailnotify only retrieves four headers at one time in order to reduce the competition for the mailbox lock on the post office. If more than four mail messages are waiting, zmailnotify should be run multiple times. If executed from a zwgc(1) description file, this will happen automatically.

To check for mail already waiting when you log in, use the standard MH program msgchk(1).

BUGS
zmailnotify only sends notification of mail which appears to be unique. Uniqueness is determined by comparing the To:, From:, and Subject: fields of the message with the last checked mail message; if the three fields match exactly, the new message is not considered unique. The To:, From:, and Subject: fields of the last message are stored in the file $HOME/.maillock.

FILES
$HOME/.maillock

SEE ALSO
msgchk(1), zctl(1), zephyr(1), zwgc(1), zhm(8), zephyrd(8), zpopnotify(8), popd(8)
Project Athena Technical Plan Section E.4.1, `Zephyr Notification Service'

AUTHOR

Robert S. French (MIT-Project Athena)

RESTRICTIONS
Copyright (c) 1987,1988 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. All Rights Reserved.
zephyr(1) specifies the terms and conditions for redistribution.