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MAIL.LOCAL(8)


NAME

  mail.local - store mail in a mailbox


SYNOPSIS

  mail.local [-7] [-b] [-d mbdb] [-l] [-f from|-r from] [-h filename ] user
  ...


DESCRIPTION

  Mail.local reads the standard input up to an end-of-file and appends it to
  each user's mail file.  The user must be a valid user name.

  The options are as follows:

  -7	    Do not advertise 8BITMIME support in LMTP mode.

  -b	    Return a permanent error instead of a temporary error if a
	    mailbox exceeds quota.

  -d	    Specify this is a delivery (for backward compatibility).  This
	    option has no effect.

  -D mbdb   Specify the name of the mailbox database which is used to look up
	    local recipient names.  This option defaults to "pw", which means
	    use getpwnam().

  -f from   Specify the sender's name.

  -l	    Turn on LMTP mode.

  -r from   Specify the sender's name (for backward compatibility).  Same as
	    -f.

  -h filename
	    Store incoming mail in filename in the user's home directory
	    instead of a system mail spool directory.

  Individual mail messages in the mailbox are delimited by an empty line
  followed by a line beginning with the string ``From ''.  A line containing
  the string ``From '', the sender's name and a time stamp is prepended to
  each delivered mail message.	A blank line is appended to each message.  A
  greater-than character (``>'') is prepended to any line in the message
  which could be mistaken for a ``From '' delimiter line (that is, a line
  beginning with the five characters ``From '' following a blank line).

  The mail files are exclusively locked with flock(2) while mail is appended,
  and a user.lock file also is created while the mailbox is locked for
  compatibility with older MUAs.

  If the ``biff'' service is returned by getservbyname(3), the biff server is
  notified of delivered mail.

  The mail.local utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.


ENVIRONMENT

  TZ   Used to set the appropriate time zone on the timestamp.


FILES

  /tmp/local.XXXXXX	temporary files
  /var/mail/user	user's default mailbox directory
  /var/mail/user.lock	lock file for a user's default mailbox


SEE ALSO

  mail(1), xsend(1), flock(2), getservbyname(3), comsat(8), sendmail(8)


WARNING

  mail.local escapes only "^From " lines that follow an empty line.  If all
  lines starting with "From " should be escaped, use the 'E' flag for the
  local mailer in the sendmail.cf file.


HISTORY

  A superset of mail.local (handling mailbox reading as well as mail
  delivery) appeared in Version 7 AT&T UNIX as the program mail.

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