From ncr-sd!hp-sdd!hplabs!sri-unix!rutgers!pyrnj!mirror!rs Wed Apr 1 22:57:15 PST 1987 People often ask me to recommend a "smart" mailer for them to use. I don't like making such recommendations because I'm not equally familiar with all the choices, and because, as moderator of mod.sources, I don't want to "push" one choice over the others. Some time ago I asked the maintainers of the more popular mail programs to write an "advertisement" for me that I could hand out as answers to people. This message is the somewhat-delayed result of the first round of replies. The software described below is all available through the mod.sources archives. If you have specific questions about a particular package, please do one of two things: get the source from an archive site and figure it out yourself; or ask the author. I will post revisions to this article as I receive new information. If you have a mail package, or know of one, that I've omitted, please tell me about it. If you have ideas on how this article could be made more useful (do people really need an intro on what domains are?), please let me know. I'll close out this introduction with a quote from Mark Horton: In general, it doesn't matter which package somebody runs; what matters is that it conform to RFC 976 and 822, and meet local needs. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- SMAIL >From: mark@cbpavo.cbosgd.ATT.COM (Mark Horton) Now-Maintained-by: lda@clyde.att.com (Larry Auton) Smail (simple mail) was designed primarily to be simple; to be easy to add to an existing site. It hooks in as a back end to sendmail, although it does not have to have sendmail to run. As distributed, it supports simple configurations: all UUCP links, or UUCP links plus a small local TCP/IP/SMTP network. Smail does offer full support for arbitrary domains and subdomains to any depth. It arranges that mail sent through the system to another UUCP host will not break From: headers, and will be passed directly to uux instead of going through sendmail, resulting in less load on the machine. Smail runs on three sorts of systems: Berkeley systems with sendmail, System V systems with sendmail, and System V systems without sendmail. It will generate the required headers for non-sendmail sites, and also handles aliases and ".forward" files. We expressly do NOT handle configurations involving CSNET, BITNET, gateways between UUCP and the ARPA Internet, or X.400. However, it might be possible to use smail as part of a general gateway between UUCP and some other network. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- SENDMAIL CONFIGURATION PACKAGE UK-1.4 >From: Jim Crammond This package provides you with the tools to generate a fully domain based sendmail configuration file from "human readable" domain and channel tables in a format similar to that used by MMDF. In addition there are a number of enhanced sendmail interface programs plus some useful utilities which may interest you whether or not you use the rest of the package. It works with vanilla BSD4.2 & BSD4.3 sendmail's; supports ethernet, uucp, janet, csnet and bitnet mail interfaces (janet is UK specific). It allows host hiding behind a general domain name and where several machines have an identical view of the network they can share the same configuration file (very useful for Sun file server type setup's). It handles RFC822 addresses, Percent style and uucp addresses. Within the restrictions of vanilla sendmail, it conforms to RFC822, RFC976 and Greybook (for Janet). I think it is accurate to say it is the most widely used package in the UK. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- UUMAIL >From: sob@soma.BCM.TMC.EDU (Stan Barber) Uumail comes with an rmail front end and does sendmail-like forwards. Uumail is not a user-agent. It is intended to be used as a "back-end" to take the mail from user-agents and correctly route it to its destination. Other examples of similiar programs include sendmail, delivermail, and MMDF. Features of uumail include: o RFC 976 Compliant (UUCP Mail Interface Format Standard) o uses pathalias(1) generated database in either text or dbm(3) format o MH-style aliasing support o sendmail-like .forward processing o can pipe mail output into other programs (e.g. uurec) o can be used under SYSTEM III, SYSTEM V or BSD o rn-like Configuration program for easy installation o returns undeliverable mail o usable as a mailer with sendmail(8) o does not require Unix sources to install o dynamically determines uucp neighbors without modification of the pathalias database o functions as uupath(1) to return paths from pathalias(1) database o logging of traffic supported o supports 4.3 BSD UUCP graded transactions No other programs are required to use uumail. Pathalias(1) is useful for generating a full database, but a full database is not required to make uumail useful. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ELM [ This is really "user agent" but it can subsume mailer functions as a compile-time option, or happily live with any of the mailers mentioned here. --r$ ] >From: Dave Taylor The Elm mail system is a replacement mailer for all Unix systems, and contains all the functionality of Berkeley Mail, /bin/mail, nmail, uumail, and a number of other popular packages in a unified and consistent format. The program also has a considerable amount of user testing behind it and is constantly being added to. Current features that it supports that no other mailers do - AT&T Forms Mode, for those of you who are part of the AT&T Mail system and don't want to use PMX/TERM, in-line encryption and decryption of mail using a non-DES algorithm, aliases that expand to the NAME of the user as well as the address, and support for both the pathalias database and the `domains' rewrite rule database. The main selling point of Elm, however, is that it is EASY to use. Many people have simply sat down and started reading their mail and writing messages to their friends. The Elm system allows you to concentrate on the MESSAGE not the MAILER! -- -- Rich $alz "Drug tests p**s me off" Mirror Systems, Cambridge Massachusetts rs@mirror.TMC.COM {adelie, mit-eddie, ihnp4, harvard!wjh12, cca, cbosgd, seismo}!mirror!rs