1 07/27/83 The Mail Table
2
3 The mail table is a system-wide database which provides a translation
4 between an arbitrary character string and a mail system address. The
5 mail table contains an entry for each person registered on the system
6 using their Person_id and alias as the name of their mail table
7 entry. Thus, the mail table allows a user to send mail to another user
8 without having to know on which projects that user is registered. In
9 addition, the mail table may contain entries for system-wide mailing
10 lists and/or users whose mail is to be forwarded to other systems.
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12 For more information on addresses, type:
13 help addresses.gi
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15
16 Changing your mail table entry:
17 By default, a user's entry in the mail table specifies that mail be
18 delivered to that user's default mailbox on their default project. In
19 other words, if a user's Person_id is Jones and their default project
20 is RESOLUTE, then the mail table entry named Jones would specify that
21 mail be delivered to the mailbox
22 >udd>RESOLUTE>Jones>Jones.mbx
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24 If a user changes default projects via the "-cdp" control argument of
25 the login preaccess request, the system will automatically change the
26 value of their mail table entry provided that the previous value was
27 also the default value.
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29
30 A user may change the value of his mail table entry through the use of
31 the set_mailing_address command. For example, a user who is about to
32 go on vacation might change his mail table entry to automatically send
33 his mail to a colleague. Eg: the command line that Jones would use to
34 have his mail sent to Smith would be
35
36 set_mailing_address Smith
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38 When Jones returned from vacation, he would restore his mail table to
39 its default setting with the command line
40
41 set_mailing_address -default_project
42
43 For more information, type:
44 help set_mailing_address
45
46
47 Displaying mail table entries:
48 The display_mailing_address command may be used to display the content
49 of any user's entry in the mail table. For example, the user Jones
50 would ask to see the mail table entries of Smith and JQPublic with the
51 command line
52
53 display_mailing_address Smith JQPublic
54
55 For more information, type:
56 help display_mailing_address
57
58
59 Command/request line format:
60 The -user control argument is used on command/request lines to specify
61 that mail should be delivered to the address specified for an entry in
62 the mail table. The syntax of this control argument is:
63
64
65 -user STR
66 specifies either a user's default mailbox or an entry in the system
67 mail table. If STR contains exactly one period and no whitespace,
68 it is interpreted as a User_id which specifies a user's default
69 mailbox; otherwise, it is interpreted as the name of an entry in the
70 mail table. When interpreted as a User_id, STR may not contain any
71 angle brackets <> and must have the form Person_id.Project where
72 Person_id may not exceed 28 characters in length and Project_id may
73 not exceed 32 characters in length. In this case, this control
74 argument is equivalent to:
75 -mailbox >udd>Project_id>Person_id>Person_id.mbx
76 When interpreted as the name of a mail table entry, STR may not
77 contain any commas, colons, semi-colons, backslashes \,
78 parentheses, angle brackets <>, braces , quotes ",
79 commercial at-signs @, or whitespace other than spaces. The query
80 of the mail table is performed in a case insensitive manner. The
81 display_mailing_address command may be used to determine the actual
82 address corresponding to the STR.
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84
85 Printed representation:
86 The following printed representation is used by the mail system when
87 displaying a mail table address in a message:
88
89 STR
90 identifies an entry in the system's mail table. STR is the name of
91 the mail table entry. The display_mailing_address command may be
92 used to display the actual address corresponding to STR.