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   1 .TH MAILER 8 RAND
   2 .SH NAME
   3 mailer \- Send Arpanet mail
   4 .SH SYNOPSIS
   5 .B /etc/mailer
   6 [
   7 .B \-l
   8 ] [
   9 .B \-v
  10 ] [file ...]
  11 .SH DESCRIPTION
  12 .I Mailer
  13 is a program to send messages to remote Arpanet sites.  If one or more
  14 .I file\fRs
  15 are specified,
  16 .I mailer
  17 will process
  18 those files as its only task.  If no
  19 .I file
  20 is specified,
  21 .I mailer
  22 will attempt to process all files in the queue directory,
  23 /usr/spool/netmail.
  24 .PP
  25 The
  26 .B \-l
  27 flag causes output to be placed on standard output suitable
  28 for a log.
  29 .PP
  30 The
  31 .B \-v
  32 flag causes output to be placed on the standard output suitable
  33 for a user (as in the \-v option of
  34 .I deliver(8).
  35 The two flags should not be used together.
  36 .PP
  37 The format of message files is described in
  38 .I netmail(5).
  39 It should be noted that control lines for all of the recipients
  40 of a single message are maintained at the beginning of the file.
  41 Due to transient Arpanet failures, it is possible for some or
  42 all of the recipient lines to be marked as
  43 being in an as-yet-undelivered state.
  44 When all of the recipients have either accepted or rejected
  45 the message, it is removed.
  46 If a message has still not been disposed of after five days,
  47 it is considered undeliverable.
  48 .PP
  49 Messages may also become undeliverable for a number of other reasons,
  50 such as a "no such user" message from the foreign site.  In any case,
  51 if a message is undeliverable, it is returned to the sender
  52 via
  53 .I mail(1)
  54 with a note prepended to explain the problem.  Clearly, more than
  55 one such returned message may result from a single message file
  56 with multiple recipients.
  57 .PP
  58 .I Mailer
  59 should be invoked periodically by
  60 .I cron(8).
  61 Ten-minute intervals are not unreasonable.
  62 .SH FILES
  63 /usr/spool/netmail
  64 .br
  65 /dev/imp*
  66 .br
  67 /etc/hosttable
  68 .SH SEE ALSO
  69 deliver(8),netmail(5),mail(1),imp(4)