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C00002 00002	The MAIL program.				May 18, 1973
C00012 00003	The REMIND command.
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The MAIL program.				May 18, 1973

This document describes the use of the MAIL and SEND monitor
commands, which are used to send messages to users.  The
SEND command sends the message to the user's console, if
he is logged in, and optionally may also (or instead, if
he isn't logged in) send it to him as MAIL, so it will
be seen on login.  The second section describes the REMIND
command, for automatic delayed messages.

The basic format of the MAIL command is

	.MAIL <destination list> <message>

and that of the SEND command is

	.SEND <switch> <destination list> <message>

Another command, for complaining about system bugs, has the format

	.GRIPE <message>

This is a version of MAIL which is directed to a special system area.

There are three mutually exclusive switches which may optionally
be used with the SEND command.  All have to do with the option of
mailing messages. Normally, SEND will just send messages to
consoles of logged-in users (at all consoles where logged in), but if
a destination of the form PRG (see the next paragraph) is not
logged in anywhere, the user will be given the option of mailing
the message to that prg instead.  The switches /Y for Yes or
/N for No will assume that response whenever the situation
arises.  The switch /M for Mail will always mail to all
destinations on the list as well as sending to their consoles
even if they are logged in.

The destination list for MAIL can be just * , which will send the
message to the file NOTICE.TXT[2,2] so all users will see it on login.
Otherwise, it is one or more project and/or programmer names
separated by commas.  The elements of the list should be in
the form PRG or [PRJ,*] or [PRJ,PRG] .  Any PRJ or PRG can be
a dot (.) to mean the same as the user's prj or prg name (real
ppn, not alias).  List elements may also take the form
@<file specification> (default device DSK, default extension
DIS as in DIStribution list); the specified file will be read
and will replace the @ field in the command.  If such a file
contains an @ field, the newly specified file will be read and
the remainder of the old file, if any, will be ignored.  The DIS
file may have a TV/E directory and/or SOS line numbers, which will
be ignored.  (Note: if the file specification does not give an
explicit extension, the given file name with no extension will be
tried before the default extension given above.)  The DIS file
may have any number of lines; destinations are separated by any
combination of crlfs, spaces, and zero or one comma.  Lines in the
DIS file may contain comments started by semicolons, which will be
ignored; note that this is not true of the command line typed at
the console!  In the @ file specification, the notation [PRJ] may
be used to mean [PRJ,.].

For the SEND command, there are two special forms of destinations:
a job number, and a device name followed by a colon.  These special
forms can only be used alone, i.e., with no other destinations.
The form SEND * will send the message to all logged-in users.

The message part of the command may be a one-line message, which
will be sent as is; or an @file specification (default extension
TXT); or null, in which case the program will request a multi-line
message from the user.  Any TV/E directory, SOS line numbers, and
form feeds in a message file will be ignored.

Messages can only be sent to real consoles, or to pseudo-ttys
which are connected to the IMP (ARPA users).  This excludes
detached jobs and non-ARPA PTYs.  SEND * sends only to those
consoles at which someone is logged in.

Mail can only be sent to defined users, i.e., there must be a
UFD matching the destination prj and/or prg names.  The mail
is put in the front of the file <ppn>.MSG[2,2].  If the mail
is sent to all users via MAIL *, the program also scans the old
NOTICE.TXT[2,2] file as it copies it, and deletes any messages
more than two weeks old.  Also, TV directories and SOS line
numbers are deleted from the old messages in this case.

When a message is MAILed by the MAIL command (not SEND/M, etc.)
to a user who is logged in, a one-line notice is sent to his
console indicating that mail has arrived.  This also applies to
mail-only reminders (see REMIND/M, next section).

A sample command is
MAIL BH,@FOONLY,[S,*] TEXT OF MESSAGE
which will send the message "TEXT OF MESSAGE" to ↓    BH↓.MSG[2,2],
↓  S↓.MSG[2,2], and whatever users are listed in FOONLY.DIS in
the user's disk area.

Spaces may be used in all reasonable places in the command.  For
the benefit of any weird people who want to start messages with
a comma, there is another syntax in which the destination list
is enclosed in parentheses.  In this case spaces may separate
destinations instead of commas if you want.  This syntax is also
handy for SENDing to a numeric programmer name (otherwise it
would be considered a job number) and similarly useless things.

There is an error recovery feature for people who type in long
messages, only to discover that because of a typing error they are
trying to send it to a non-existent destination or something; to wit:
If, at the end of a multi-line message, you type <ctrl><meta><altmode>
instead of <ctrl><meta><linefeed>, the message will not be transmitted.
Instead, the original command will be loaded into your line editor,
and you can correct and re-enter it, but if it does not include a
message, the old message will be used instead of asking for a new one.
Also, the same effect can be gotten by giving a monitor REENTER
command after the program exits or you <call> out of it.  From a
non-display teletype, of course, the line editor feature is not
available, but you can still REENTER and retype the command line.
The REMIND command.
--- ------ --------

The REMIND command is used to tell the MAIL program to send and mail
your message at a specified later date and time, possibly repeatedly.
The basic syntax is

	.REMIND <switch> <destination list> <datime> <count> <message>

The allowable switches are /S for send only or /M for mail only.  If
neither is used, the message is both sent and mailed.

The destination list and message fields function like those of the
MAIL command, as described in the previous section.  Reminder
recipients must be users known to the system, i.e., they must have
a UFD.  The destination field may be omitted, in which case your
own programmer name will be used as if the destination field were
the character "."; NOTE, however, that some forms of datime (those
which start with a letter) could be confused with destinations, and
if you want to use such a form there must be an explicit destination.

The datime field may specify a date, a time, or both.  The formats
allowed for dates are illustrated here:

	4/28/75		28-APR-75	APR 28, 75
	4/28/1975	28-APR-1975	APR 28, 1975
	4/28		28-APR		APR 28
	4/28/*		28-APR-*	APR 28, *
	*/28		28-*		+3
	WED		WED*		W		W*

The forms without a year imply this year unless the date is today or
earlier, in which case next year is used.  Letters may be upper or
lower case; all after the first three are ignored.  The days of the
week have, for convenience, the single-letter names familiar to
Farmers' Alminac readers and former MIT students: M,T,W,R,F,S,D.
Asterisk as a month or year is wildcard; note that forms like */28
expire at the end of the current year.  WED* and W* mean every Wednesday.
The +3 form is the number of days later than today, i.e., three days
from now.  Spaces may generally be used or omitted as desired except
within a word or number, except for the APR 28 forms.  Certain mixed
notations such as "4/28, 1973" may work, or they may not.  If only a
time field is used without a date, today is assumed unless the time
is already past, in which case tomorrow is used.  The weekday forms
always imply a day between one and seven days from now as their first
or only instance, never today.  Here are the formats for times:

	1423		223pm		223p
	14:23		2:23pm		2:23p
	0223		223am		223a		223
	02:23		2:23am		2:23a		2:23
	2		2am		2pm		2a
	+2:23		+2:		+:23		2p

A date without a time means midnight.  The relative forms may only
be used without a date.  Letters may be upper or lower case.  There
may be spaces on either side of a colon, but NOT between the time
and the "am" or "pm"!  To use both a date and a time, they must be
enclosed in parentheses and separated by spaces: "(WED 3am)".

The optional count field is used to specify the number of instances
of a repeated request.  The format is #<number>.  If none is used,
#50 is assumed (the number is decimal).  The form #∞ may be used for
requests which are to live forever, but please don't leave these
around after you go away....

Here are sample commands:
	REMIND . (WED* 2:45P) #30 Go to 3:00 class!!
	Remind me, sir, to monitor your computer usage.
	REMIND * APR 15,* LAST DAY TO FILE INCOME TAX RETURNS

The messages will be both sent and mailed at the target time.  The
message header will say "(reminder)" to distinguish it from an
ordinary message.  All the features of MAIL work here, like @ fields
for destinations or messages, REENTER, etc.  There are the usual
syntactic ambiguities which are not expected to affect anyone in
practice: if the first nonblank after the command name is a digit,
it is taken as part of the datime field in REMIND, as opposed to
a programmer name in MAIL or a job number in SEND.

The monitor command CANCEL will run a program which will list and
selectively delete reminder requests from or to you, or all requests
if you are logged in as [RMD,SYS].  This program can also be used to
list requests without asking whether you want to delete them: after
the first request is listed, type the letter L in answer to the
deletion question and any remaining requests will be listed without
interruption.

Complaints regarding this program should be addressed to:
	Wastebasket
	Room 50-030
	Copernicus, The Moon  99973