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MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 1 ██ ██ ██ ███ ▐████▌ ███ ███ ███ ███ ██ ▐██ ▐█ ██ ██ ███████ ████▄ ███ ██ ██▌ ████ ██ ██ ███████ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ █ ██ █████ ██ ██ ██▌ █████ ██ ██ ██ ██ ▐█ ██ ██ ██ ▐██ ▐█ ▐█ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ███ █▌ ████ ████ ▐████▌ ███ ██ ████ ████ -=] M A I L C A L L [=- - A Squish and *.MSG compatible Mail-Waiting Notification Utility - SYSOPS AND POINT USERS VERSION Copyright 1990,1991,1992 by Rick Moore "EchoMail was invented at -my- pizza party" - John Summers (emphasis by the editor) -------------------------------------------- DESCRIPTION: Notifies the operator of any mail addressed to a name specified on the command line or a group of aliases specified in the configuration file. MAILCALL can be used just after tossing mail to check incoming messages or can be run at any other time. MAILCALL now also converts text files into netmail or echomail messages. It now offers *.msg and Squish compatibility thanks to Scott Dudleys release of the MSGAPI for Squish areas. The only file required at present is a Qmail/Confmail/Squish type AREAS.BBS file, even this is optional if you only use MAILCALL for the new message-post feature and are a FidoNet SysOp or point user. MAILCALL no longer requires ANSI.SYS or other equivalent display driver. It has been tested with ZANSI and NNANSI in both 80x25, EGA 80x43 modes and EGA Mono 132 col 1056 x 352 modes. -------------------------------------------- HOW TO USE: MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 2 Place MAILCALL.EXE anywhere on your path. Invoke it from the command line or a batchfile supplying the chosen command line switches. Switches may be grouped in any order and all parameters are case-insensitive. A file is built that contains a listing of the areas in which mail was found, the corresponding message numbers, the names of the senders and at least a part of the subject line of each message. MAILCALL is a fairly sophisticated utility that has so many options and interactions that I could easily confuse both myself and you beyond all hope of satisfaction if I try to explicitly document every detail. Instead, a minimum familiarity with Fido/Opus type message areas, echomail and FidoNet-style messaging in general and PC/MS-DOS will be assumed and a number of batchfile and command line examples will be provided in place of any attempt at a full user manual that most of us probably won't bother to read anyway. -------------------------------------------- COMMAND LINE SWITCHES: MAILCALL -O<output> -N<first_last> -C<areas.bbs> [more switches] -O<output> Your mail-waiting file. -C<areas.bbs> Path/name to your AREAS.BBS type file -N<first_last> Any first/last name separated by an underscore. -T<toss.log> Path/name to your echotoss.log/confmail.dat file -I<EchoName> Name of a single conference to search. -A Append to current Output file. -D[xx] Check ALL areas; Option: start xx msgs below high msg. -L Use LastRead pointer when scanning. -M<path> Path to your NetMail message directory. -W Use HighWaterMark when scanning. -Q Quiet most screen output. -R Include Recieved mail in report. -Z Ignore MAILCALL.CFG. Must be FIRST switch! -P Post a message. See documentation to use this option. All switches and filenames are case-insensitive, / or - allowed. Both '/' and '-' are allowed as switch separators. VERBOSE USAGE DETAILS: -O<output file> This is the file that will contain the conference names, message numbers, senders names and subject lines of any mail MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 3 found addressed to you (or someone with the same name as you) during the last run of MAILCALL. If you just want to watch the program run without building such a file, specify NUL as the output filename. Note that unless you actually read this file at some point, MailCall won't be of much use to you. I access it by using the POSTMAIL config file verb to turn the file into a netmail message. The -P command switch accomplishes the same result but requires a second program run. You may want to do the same thing or you could send it to the printer, a speech synthesizer, set up Binkley or MsgEd to access it via a function key, TYPE it to the console, or do whatever you want. Your problem, your pleasure. The easiest method of seeing the programs output for most is to use the POSTMAIL option in MAILCALL.CFG to cause the report to be automatically posted to a message. -C<areas.bbs> Enter the path and filename of your AREAS.BBS-type file. The program will look for entries in this file that describe the echo names and filepaths to your echomail message directories. Passthrough (#) directories are ignored. With v1.10 and above, Scott Dudleys SQUISH areas -are- supported. Up to 1024 non-passthrough conferences are supported at present, but testing of this claim has been only minimal. If you're keeping a truckload of conferences active and using MAILCALL, I'd like to hear about your experience with the program. On my systems the areas.bbs entries are found in this format: * ECHO BEACH * Manchester NH!Rick Moore ; any line preceded by a ; (semicolon) is a comment ; lines preceded by - (dash) will be ignored also -BOSSNODE=132/122 ; Now come all of the Conference Lines: ;Format: Directory Area Node 1 Node 2 Node 3 Node 4 G:\80XXX 80XXX 132/122 $G:\CECHO C_ECHO 132/122 #$G:\MSG\TECH TECH 132/122 $G:\CONSULT CONSULTING 132/122 Etcetera, etcetera. Tabs and spaces should be handled with no problem, but I have no idea what other people may be putting in their version of this file. Leading digits on lines that contain path information are permitted and will be ignored, so an Opus-style ECHO.CTL -may- work. Speak up if it doesn't, and by all means send a copy. If your Fido/Opus/Maximus/whatever *.msg or Squish mail system is functioning properly but MAILCALL doesn't work for you, suspect a flaw in my handling of your file after checking everything else you can think of. Send me a copy of the file along with a failure description, or make your AREAS.BBS look like mine, or tell me what needs to be done to make it right, or find/write a better mail checker. Your choice. WARNING: lines that contain an exclamation point (!) MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 4 are ignored. I have never yet seen an echo with an exclamation point in its name and so have gotten away with assuming that such a line is the system!sysop line. If it's a problem, speak up. -N<firstname_lastname> The name entered on this line must be separated by an underscore character. Any combination of upper/lowercase may be used. The maximum allowable length of the name is 36 characters including the underscore. Note that it doesn't necessarily have to be -your- name... If you want to search for more than one name you should use the USERNAME option in MAILCALL.CFG, allowing up to 256 names to be used. -T<echotoss.log> QMAIL, CONFMAIL, OPUS, SQUISH and most anything else that can toss incoming mail is able to write a file that contains the names of the various echos that have just arrived. Using this file when processing mail speeds everything up by allowing the various programs to only process areas in which incoming activity has occurred. This switch is optional but recommended if you're going to check mail as it arrives. -I<echoname> You may specify the name of a single conference to check by entering the NAME of the echo (not the path) after the /I switch. MC will begin at the first message and check the entire subdirectory. -A This switch causes your current output file to be appended to rather than overwritten. -D[xx] This is one of the most powerful options in MAILCALL. If you specify just /D, ALL echomail areas will be checked starting from the lowest-numbered message in each conference regardless of wether -T has been used and the contents of echotoss.log. Adding a decimal specifier after -D (example: -D50) will cause MailCall to count backwards from the highest message in each area for xx messages and start searching forward for mail at that point. Failing to use a specifier after -D will result in very long waits unless you have small message directories or a very fast system. -L MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 5 Including this switch causes the program to access the LASTREAD pointer when deciding where to begin checking messages. This is a file contained in your actual message subdirectory which most message readers support. It contains in LS/MS format the number of the last message which you have read. If you want to be reminded of mail that's waiting for you which you haven't yet read you'll want to use this switch. There are actually two copies of the index kept in LastRead, MailCall accesses the first. SQUISH users are supported by the *.SQL file, used by Maximus and MsgEd/SQ. If a LASTREAD indice can't be found searches will start at the 1st message of an area. Using this -L switch in concert with the -T switch is the most useful method for those who insist on using single-pass tossing. -M<path> The path points to the directory where netmail messages are kept. It is recommended that this switch be used in preference to the NETPATH .cfg verb, since using it only when you need it will prevent unnecessary waits and redundant notices. Checking the netmail directory is optional, but if you choose to do it at all, you'll wait while every message after your netmail LASTREAD pointer is checked, every time the program runs. It's best to use this switch in your batch file, when incoming mail is tossed. -W This alternative to /L causes MailCall to use the HighWaterMark contained in 1.msg of each Fido/Opus style message directory. The HWM is contained in the Reply field and describes the last message your mail packer has scanned. Squish also maintains a highwater mark, using another technique. If you have 100 messages in a directory and 20 arrive, your HWM -should- point to message 100 if you are set up correctly and MC will then know to start checking at message 101. Note that to use this option succesfully you will have to run Mailcall BEFORE scanning for outgoing mail. This may mean a change of procedure for users of QM and SQUISH. You will have to alter your invocations of QM to allow MC to run before areas are scanned; this means no more TOSS SCAN PACK or SQUISH IN OUT SQUASH LINK runs; you'll need to TOSS or IN, run MailCall, and then scan/pack. ConfMail users can simply invoke MailCall in their existing batchfiles in between Importing and Exporting. -Q Did you ever want to tell a program to shut the heck up and just go do what it's supposed to without proving what horrible graphic artists the programmers were? Using /Q will eliminate most output to the screen except the copyright notice and any error messages. This option is especially useful for someone that invokes MailCall while calling remotely with a modem or other slow-performing MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 6 connection, or who has an especially slow display. -R By default, messages already read are ignored even if they are addressed to you. If your message reader acts as it should, it flags any mail addressed to you as Recieved as soon as you read it. Using this flag causes MailCall to include such messages in its output file. The letters RCVD will be appended to the senders name in the report. This flag should usually be included when the -Dxx option is used and may be used at any other time. -Z When MAILCALL is invoked it searches all directories listed in your "PATH" environment variable (you do have one, right?) and the current directory for a file named MAILCALL.CFG. Using the -Z switch as the FIRST argument on the command line causes this search to be skipped. This is useful when you want to do something other than your usual operations, but note that you don't HAVE to set things up so that you have to use this switch every time you want to get weird. Many people will probably just have their name, node address and AREAS.BBS path in MAILCALL.CFG and will seldom need to use -Z at all, no matter what they're trying to do. Wether or not you need to use it depends on how closely you paint yourself into a corner with the configuration file. Note that since -P also expects to be the first parameter on the command line you cannot use both options at once. -P This recent addition is essentially a "program within a program". Using this as the first option activates a separate code section that uses its own set of command line switches to convert text files to netmail or echomail messages. Usage: -p outdir infile <switches> Outdir is the DOS subdirectory or Squish area in which you want to post a message. To post in a Squish area begin your outdir statement with a $ sign. Example for a Squish area in subdirectory D:\COMM: MailCall -p $D:\COMM\COMM textfile Example for the same procedure in *.MSG format: MailCall -p D:\COMM textfile MailCall is suitable for posting both echomail and MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 7 netmail. Infile is a complete pathname to a text file. Users are cautioned to adhere to all applicable conference rules when posting messages; for example, most conferences forbid use of IBM high-ASCII characters above decimal 128. This is especially true in Zone 1! The bytes from the input file are directly copied into the message with no translation. If there are tab, formfeed or illegal characters in the input they will be in the message, too. You have been warned. Failure to heed the wishes of the moderator of a FidoNet conference can result in your being banned from that conference; Read and Obey his wishes regarding IBM-ASCII characters and other special considerations. In addition there is a general proscription against inserting characters > ASCII 128 into FidoNet backbone conferences in Zone 1. Use this program with caution and good taste, or suffer the consequences. Message attributes default to zero (Public Normal mail) and are optional. To Transmit or Request a file, place the filename in the /Subject line and set the appropriate bits in the message attribute switch. If your mail packer supports the desired action it will generate the request when it sees your message. Please note that you must still supply an input filename. It is suggested that you take the opportunity to write the SysOp of the target system a nice letter. Some defaults have been specified, and the -p option has some idea of the contents of MAILCALL.CFG if it exists. In particular if you have used the ADDRESS statement in MAILCALL.CFG you can usually omit the /o switch when posting, this also applies to USERNAME and DOMAIN. But at the start, you should assume the program is dumb, and tell it everything until you are sure of what you can omit. If you do not supply a Subject parameter, the words "Contents Of" and the filename.ext will be used. Switches: -FFirst_Last Name of originator seperated by '_'. -TFirst_Last Name of Recipient, defaults to "All". -SSubject The subject of the message. Underscores are changed to spaces EXCEPT when a file request, file send or file update request are generated using the /B[rtu] switch. -OZone:Net/Node Origin node. Argument should always include zone now that full 4-d support is implemented. -DZone:Net/Node Destination node. This can be omitted for echomail messages but MUST be included when sending netmail. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 8 -Bpcstkhru Message attributes. Supported attributes are P Private C Crashmail S Sent (useful when you want msg to remain local) T Transmit an attached file K Kill (delete) after sending H Hold R Request a file U Update file request ABOUT KLUDGE LINES: At present, the INTL, PID and MSGID kludge lines are used. Other kludges such as FMPT may appear where appropriate. A PID line is inserted each time a message is generated: it consists of ctrl-A, the program name and version number. This kludge is intended to replace the ---Tearlines that many programs create, and that lately so many idiots abuse. A MSGID line is generated each time: it consists of ctrl-A, the origin systems zone:net/node@domain address, and a 32-bit hexadecimal timestamp that is derived from the number of elapsed seconds since Jan 1st 1970. It is intended to assist in detecting duplicate messages. An INTL line is only created when the Origin zone is different from the Destination zone. Since Destination addresses should ONLY be used for netmail, it is to be hoped that these INTL lines will only appear in inter-zone netmail messages. Got that? Good. The INTL line consists of ctrl-A INTL, the destination zone:net/node and the originating zone:net/node. COMMENTS ON THE COMMAND SWITCHES: Note that you MUST choose between -T<filename>, -Dxx or -I<echoname> when invoking MailCall unless you have specified the desired activity in MAILCALL.CFG or are posting a message with -P. There is no default activity at present. When run here without one of these options being specified, MailCall doesn't crash; it reads Areas.bbs, and Mailcall.cfg, does what it was asked to do (nothing) and returns to DOS. MailCall will exit with errorlevel 0 if it thinks the run was successful, or if it at least has no major gripes. Problems opening disk files or parsing the command switches may result in a quick exit and an errorlevel of 2, or they may not. I have in no way tried to idiot-proof this program. Be warned; MailCall will do what you asked it to do, not what you meant. There is at present no MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 9 code section that goes over everything you've told it to do trying to decide wether it should go ahead and try it or not, or wether it has enough information to run succesfully. A minimum level of competence is assumed. If you get into trouble MailCall WILL respond to control-C or control-break and exit cleanly. If MailCall runs to completion and mail-waiting has been found, it will exit with an errorlevel of 1. See the example batch files for hints on making use of the DOS errorlevel. Entering MAILCALL ? at the DOS prompt will cause the help screen for the mail-waiting section to be displayed. -------------------------------------------- SAMPLES: (DOS 3.3) I'll start out with some one-line examples, then give you a couple of batch files to think about. All examples assume MAILCALL.CFG does not exist; if you are using one, edit the examples to remove duplicated information, or use -Z to cause the file to be ignored. When information entered on the command line conflicts with that supplied in MAILCALL.CFG, the command switches take precedence. If the rest of the docs have just confused you, this will probably be the Good Part. 1. Check areas that have just been tossed using the High Water Mark to decide where to start checking in each directory, echotoss.log to decide which conferences to check, and ignoring mail that is addressed to the caller but which has already been read. This is the most common application of MAILCALL. MAILCALL -omail.txt /nRick_Moore /careas.bbs -techotoss.log -W 2. Check the top 100 messages in each area, reporting any mail addressed to the user even if it's already been read. MAILCALL /Omail.txt -nrick_moore -careas.bbs -d100 -r 3. Check all messages that haven't been read in all areas, ignoring any information in MAILCALL.CFG. MAILCALL -z /omail.txt /d /l /nrick_moore -careas.bbs 4. Check just one conference from the last message read sending file output to NUL. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 10 MAILCALL -cd:\bink\areas.bbs -onul /nRICK_MOORE -L -Ipoints 5. Post a private netmail message and send a file at the same time. The following would be all on one line: MAILCALL /p g:\netmsg d:\wp\text.txt /fRick_Moore /tAbe_Lincoln /sc:\files\stuff.lzh /btp /o1:132/122.1 /d1:132/777.0 6. Post an echomail message to "All" in a SQUISH message base. MAILCALL -p $f:\msg\tech urp.txt /fRick_Moore /sVGA_Card /o1:132/122.1 BATCHFILE EXAMPLES: Here is an excerpt from a possible implementation using QMail. ------------ snip snip snip ------------- echo off :Tossmail rem Check for mail packets. If found then toss them rem If we were still using ConfMail this stuff would be uncommented rem confmail import -k -f conf.tmp -a spaz /d rem if errorlevel 1 goto do_maint rem goto end_import rem QMail qm toss :do_maint rem Check for mail addressed to Rick Moore :inpacket del rm.tmp mailcall -orm.tmp -nRick_Moore -careas.bbs -techotoss.log -w if errorlevel 2 goto error if errorlevel 1 goto postmail goto endmc rem We've found mail; let's post the report to a message :postmail mailcall -p g:\netmsg c:\opus\rm.tmp /o1:30242/1.0 /d1:30242/1.0 /bs /fMail MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 11 goto endmc :error echo. echo Serious Error in MAILCALL! echo. pause :endmc replylnk -f echotoss.log :end_import qm scan pack -fechotoss.log if exist echotoss.log del echotoss.log goto runbbs -------- snip snip snip ------- Here is an ACTUAL implementation as used by myself on my point system. It is invoked using the CALL batch command when mail is recieved as "rickmail inpacket" but can be invoked at any other time with a minimum of command line input. Making use of the MAILCALL.CFG file would make this sort of thing even easier but full command lines are given here for clarity. --------- Slash/Tear -------- echo off for %%i in (c: cd\opus) do %%i @if %1X == X goto error goto %1 @rem check incoming mail :inpacket @del rm.tmp @mailcall -tc:\opus\echotoss.log -w -mg:\netmsg %2 %3 %4 %5 @if errorlevel 1 goto postmail @goto errlev :postmail rem Make SoundBlaster card say "There's mail for You" vplay %sound%\ismail1 @goto end MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 12 @rem check just one echo :ONE @mailcall -i%1 %2 @goto errlev :ALL @mailcall -d%1 %2 @goto errlev :ANY @mailcall -o%1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 @goto errlev :ERRLEV @if errorlevel 2 goto error @if errorlevel 1 goto found @goto end :found @echo @echo You have Mail Waiting! @pause @goto end :error @echo @echo Serious Error in MAILCALL! @pause :end ------ Slash/Tear ------ -------------------------------------------- MAILCALL.CFG: The Configuration File This file is no longer as "optional" as it used to be, is always recommended and may be located anywhere on your DOS command path or in the current directory. The program will look for it but won't crash if it doesn't find it, in most cases. Using the -Z switch as the first parameter on the command line will cause the program to ignore the file, for better or worse. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 13 All options and data are case-insensitive. A semicolon ';' begins a comment line. Comments on the same line as data are permitted. Nested comments are permitted. Empty lines are permitted but cause MC to complain. Data may be entered in any order and there is no minimum data set that must be entered in the file. See the example included in the package if you're not confused yet. Command-line equivalents are listed in brackets next to each verb. CFG Options: USERNAME Rick_Moore [-Nfirst_last] Your name. Note the underscore separating first and last name. Name may be no more than 36 characters including the underscore. You can use up to 256 entries; this allows you to search for both your name, SysOp, alternate spellings, aliases, whatever. ADDRESS Zone:Net/Node.point [/Oz:n/n.p for posting messages only] Your node address. This data is presently used only when posting messages with the -P option. Now fully 4-D aware, and I recommend you always specify the full address. DOMAIN @domain Your network domain. This is usually @fidonet, and that is the default if you don't use a config file or comment out the option. It is used in the MSGID kludge line. AREAFILE c:\opus\areas.bbs [-Cpathname] Complete pathname to your Areas.BBS file including drive letter. TOSSLOG c:\opus\echotoss.log [-Tpathname] Complete pathname to the file your mail tosser writes when it tosses incoming echomail. OUTPUT c:\opus\rm.tmp [-Opathname] Complete pathname to the desired output file. This file will be converted to a message if the POSTMAIL config verb is used. HIGHWATER [-W] Use the high water mark when scanning. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 14 LASTREAD [-L] Use LastRead or *.SQL when scanning. NETPATH [-M<path>] Path to NetMail message directory. POSTMAIL g:\netmsg Zone:net/node.point [No command line equivalent] If you want your output file automatically posted as a message, a path to a valid messsage directory and a net address must be noted after this flag. Usually this will point to your netmail directory. The net address will be the DESTINATION of the message generated; as always, a zone is optional but recommended. The reason you have to enter an address is that some persons use an address in their ADDRESS specifier that is different from the actual working address of their system; this is especially true of sysops running fakenet points. For example, when using QM by Greg Dawson I use ADDRESS 1:132/122.0 but POSTMAIL g:\netmsg 1:30242/1.0 on my point system. The message will be created with the SENT attribute on; it should always refuse to be sent out of the system unless you reset the attribute or post it to an echomail directory. QUIET [-Q] Disable most screen output. RECVD [-R] If you want to be notified of mail you've already read. BIOSVIDEO Screen handling is configurable to use the BIOS or to go direct to RAM. BIOSVIDEO is the slower of the two options. DIRECTVIDEO The default behavior and the faster method of video output. If you run DesqVue or DoubleDos and your screen is acting up during MailCall, try BIOSVIDEO. ORIGIN: 123456789.123456789.123456789.123456789. Your Origin line. Limited to 40 Characters. Excess will be truncated. Note the colon (:) at the end of the verb. Do NOT place your node address at the end of this line, the ADDRESS MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 15 statement controls what appears there. An example of a proper entry is ORIGIN: ......Net132 Echomail Coordinator....... -------------------------------------------- OUTPUT: MailCall no longer uses your ANSI device driver for cursor positioning. Direct screen writes are used by default but can be disabled. Although originally intended mainly for Points, MC can be used to good effect by SysOps and co-SysOps, especially if the system they maintain doesn't have an adequate mail-waiting utility such as MBASE (Opus) in service. If you connect by modem, you can still probably use MAILCALL but will likely want to use -Q to minimize screen output. (NOTE) I no longer have two phone lines, and would appreciate comments from anyone invoking MailCall over a modem connection regularly. Is it still working as it used to? Good. File output is in simple ASCII similiar to the sample shown below. It will usually be sent directly to disk. From there you can direct it to the printer, a speech synthesizer, or wherever your needs dictate. Far from being a problem, I see this as a major feature of the program. You are not locked into a set behaviour. Personally I cause the file to be posted as a netmail message but someone else might want it to be displayed when a function key is hit, or sent to a braille printer, or whatever. You also may of course use the POSTMAIL option in MAILCALL.CFG to cause the output to automagically go to the message subdirectory of your choice as either a *.msg or SQUISH format. Sample output edited for formatting purposes: POINTS 24 Bob Hay RCVD ............... AREAFIX POINTS 38 Charles Falconer RCVD ...... NEW MAIL-WAITING CHECKER PRIVATE 100 Nick Singh RCVD ............ C QUESTIONS PUBLIC132 36 Kathy Webb RCVD ............ MARRIAGE OF THE BOARDS All occurences of Re: in the subject line are stripped from the report. -------------------------------------------- ABOUT SOFTWARE COMPATIBILITY: MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 16 MAILCALL is entirely compatible with QM 1.0 by Greg Dawson and ConfMail by Bob Hartman, and should be fine with Opus systems. Squish areas are now supported. Starting with version 1.10, MailCall is compiled with the MSGAPI library generously given to the world by Scott Dudley. There is no doubt that Mr Dudley has done us all an incredibly generous favor by releasing his library code and any poor results are probably the result of my unfamiliarity with his work. Thanks, Scott. Squish is a trademark of Scott Dudley and MSGAPI is his copyrighted work. -------------------------------------------- ABOUT EXECUTION SPEED: While I have made every effort to both code and compile MailCall for maximum speed at the expense of filesize, my efforts haven't seemed to make much difference. If your computer is anything like mine (12 Mhz '286 with EGA, NNANSI286, some EGA speedup utilities and a relatively fast but not spectacular hard disk subsystem) you'll likely see very little difference between benchmarks made with screen output turned on or off, or file output sent to disk or directed to NUL. DOS seems to be the major factor here; it takes time to open and close files, and the more files contained in any directory the slower DOS becomes at handling them. Most machines slow down at some indeterminate number of around 250 files/directory. Disk optimization or even just "packing" directories to eliminate deleted files can often make a big difference, but won't eliminate the problem. An 80286 version is now distributed along with the 8086 executable; it is named MAILCALL.286 in the distribution file. Rename it to MAILCALL.EXE to use it. I see no difference in speed here, but the program is slightly smaller and it is the everyday version of choice in my personal usage. -------------------------------------------- NOTES FROM THE AUTHOR: I tried as many mail-waiting utilities for Point systems as I could find before deciding to write MAILCALL. One of the best was MYMAIL by Jacques Daguerre. Unfortunately it had the bad habit of checking every conference even when only two had arrived, and this slowed it down a wee bit. It would also post a netmail message to notify me of mail waiting, with no way to allow me to send the file somewhere else. Nonetheless I credit Mr Daguerre as the major inspiration for MailCall, MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 17 since he showed me it was possible to give point users the mail-checking capabilities they need without creating databases or taking 20 minutes to get the job done. MAILCALL is now written in large model, but should still run in as little as 128k or less free RAM without complaint. MailCall should behave politely in DoubleDos and DesqView partitions, but since I own neither program I cannot test for compatibility before release. MailCall was compiled with Borland C++ version 2.00 and tested on a Wells-American All-Star 12 MHz AT using PC-DOS 3.3 and an NEC PowerMate 10 MHz AT running NEC MS-DOS 3.3. By the way, it's too bad about Wells-American going under, eh? Let's hope we all learn that U.S. jobs depend on US consumers willingness to "Just Say No" to imports, at least as often as we can afford to. Think about it the next time you're headed for KMart; the job you save may be your own. -------------------------------------------- ABOUT SOURCE CODE: There are no plans to make source available for MAILCALL. I have released full source for other programs and recieved very little feedback from wiser heads concerning the way things were done in the code. Since this was about all I wanted out of the deal, it wasn't worth it. -------------------------------------------- ABOUT UPDATES: Chances are you recieved this file through the Software Distribution Service or by direct request from a participating system. One of my pet peeves about the S.D.S. involves authors who release a hastily concieved program and then start throwing bug fixes out for the SDS to distribute. I release updates to SDS only occasionally. Your best source for a current version is to wait for it to come around on the S.D.S. pipeline, or to send me a disk in a mailer, postage pre-paid for the return trip. -------------------------------------------- WARRANTY: MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 18 Rick Moore makes no warranty of any kind, express or implied. There is no guarantee or warranty of merchantability and/or fitness for a particular purpose. Rick Moore shall not be liable for any damages, whether direct, indirect, special or consequential arising from a failure of this program to operate in the manner expected by the user. Rick Moore shall not be liable for any damage to data or property which may be caused directly or indirectly by use of the program, even if he has been informed of the possibility of such damage. IN NO EVENT WILL RICK MOORE BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY LOST PROFITS, LOST SAVINGS, LOST DATA OR OTHER INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF YOUR USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM, OR FOR ANY CLAIM BY ANY OTHER PARTY. RUN WHAT YOU BRUNG AND LET THE DEVIL TAKE THE HINDMOST. IF IT BREAKS YOU OWN BOTH PARTS. -------------------------------------------- CREDITS: To Debbie - For Love, Devotion, and patient support day after day... and the 10,000 cups of coffee. Fred Riccio, 1:132/174 - For Beta testing above and beyond the call of duty. Aaron Brenner - For constructive criticism and advice when I'm stumped, which is often. Chuck Lemieux - For extensive assistance in testing, bug stomping and research. Colin Wheat, 3:690/613 - For releasing his MsgPost source code, which was invaluable to me by giving me something to compare against my own code after switching to the MSGAPI and having some trouble getting answers. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 19 The term WhineWare is the intellectual smegma of Harry Lee. Charles Falconer, Jeffrey Nonken, Harry Lee, Doug Boone, and many others - For comments, suggestions, complaints, example source code, and especially for responding in ways that convinced me that this program was eagerly awaited. All trademarks and copyrighted works mentioned are the property of their respective owners. -------------------------------------------- BUG REPORTS: If you encounter a situation where MAILCALL fails to perform or returns inaccurate data, a detailed report should be sent to the author. If you are (un)lucky enough to see MailCall fail catastrophically in a message area; compress the subdirectory, a copy of your AREAS.BBS-type file and if possible your ECHOTOSS.LOG using the easily-available compression utility of your choice and send it to me on 1.2 meg diskette along with a COMPLETE description of your system including your equipment list and the names of ALL memory resident programs in use at the time of failure, and as complete an account of the failure as you can provide. Do not expect a personal reply unless you send by mail a self-addressed stamped envelope, with sufficient US Postage attached to cover the cost. I can be reached in the following ways: Via NetMail to Rick Moore at FidoNet 1:132/122 My system is a mail-only node; that means netmail should only be sent during Zone 1 ZMH. If this is a problem, for your software or competence level, please route through the NC of my net at 132/0 who will then forward it to me. By US Mail: Rick Moore PO Box 823 Manchester New Hampshire USA 03105-0823 Via GEnie: Username ECHOBEACH -------------------------------------------- MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 20 RELEASE NOTES: V0.02 June 06 1990 First release. No bugs known or reported. Fingers firmly crossed. It works here. Support for AREAS.BBS lines that contain leading digits added at literally the last minute. V0.03 June 09 1990 Minor cleanup and optimizing, minor changes to docs. v0.04 June 12 1990 Added a display() routine by William Beebe to call DOS Int 21h service 6 to subsitute for printf(). After seeing no improvement in throughput most of the routine was converted to assembler by Chuck Lemieux, working over the telephone. It must be Good to be a Guru. Speed increase in local usage minor but noticeable, while still fully supporting remote use. v0.05 June 16 1990 Fixed minor bug in AREAS.BBS handling to allow trailing spaces after pathnames. Changed the Help storage. Increased speed by getting rid of some (hopefully) redundant errorchecking. Massaged the documentation. Sang the Blues; "If it wusn't fo' weird usahs, Ah would not ob hab no usahs et all". v0.06 July 01 1990 Added assembler call to int 10h to turn off the cursor while program is searching directories. This didn't speed anything up but it looks prettier. Added support for path to netmail directory. v0.07 Thu 08-08-1991 Switched to Borland Professional C. Gained immediate 28 percent increase in speed, probably due to a more efficiently written I/O library. To Hell with MicroSoft, and the slow mule they rode in on. Minor change to code that seeks high message number in a subdirectory, in case anyone is using numbers higher than 9999 the program should now be ready to handle higher numbers. Maybe. v0.08 Wed 08-14-1991 MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 21 Added -P option to post messages. Added the ADDRESS line to the configuration file. v0.09 Fri 08-16-1991 Firmed up the file I/O calls for internal consistency with ANSI C. Gave up a little bit of speed in doing so. Bulletproofed the routine that opens LASTREAD to deal with zero-length files. Improved code that copies text to a message. Added support for FidoNet kludge lines INTL, MSGID and PID. Added DOMAIN line to config file. v0.10 Sat 08-17-1991 Bug Stomping. Prior versions should be deleted on sight due to occasional confusion over address destinations for netmail. Minor cleanup of error messages and docs. Fixed code that prevented messages from being posted to root directories. v0.11 Sat 08-24-1991 Added ctrl-break detection to allow user to gracefully terminate execution. v0.12 Sat 08-29-1991 Added ability to search for multiple names. Fixed bug in message posting. Sang the blues: "She's a toy for the boy, She's a 300lb bundle of joy". Thank God for Mae Kramer and "Blues After Hours" on NPR-WGBH in Boston. v0.13 Mon 09-02-1991 Cleanup preparatory to feature freeze. If this doesn't break it'll be 1.0 in a bit! v0.15 Tue 09-10-1991 What feature freeze? Switched to C++, added free memory, total message tally and elapsed time report, switched to compact memory model so that people with lots of msg areas and/or aliases wouldn't run out of room. Also fixed a glitch that would only surface if someone typed MAILCALL -P with no further switches... not sure why anyone would do that, but now you can do it all day long. Sent inline ASM code mentioned in 0.04 back to straight C for ease of switching memory models. v0.17 Sun 09-15-1991 Squashed bug that allowed screen output to occur while checking netmail directory even if -Q was used. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 22 v0.18 Wed 09-18-1991 Added code to attempt to save cursor state and gracefully restore your cursor at end of run. Guaranteed not to always work, but should be an improvement especially for Hercules users. v0.19 Sat 10-05-1991 Changed kludge lines to append colon to conform to FTS spec, thanks are due to Pat Vallier of 132/127 for pointing this one out. v0.21 Sat 10-12-1991 We now insert the Origin address as the Destination when no destination is supplied at the command line, for both netmail and echomail. This is preferable to rejecting the attempt to post. Squashed bug that would allow Mailcall to create a 1.msg in a "virgin" message subdirectory; QM would then refuse to handle it. Only msgs > 1 will now be created. Thanks to Jim Webb of 132/137 for these two. v1.00 Wed 11-27-1991 Dropped INTL and EID support, to get a long overdue version 1 out the door. v1.10 Sun 12-22-1991 Converted to Scott Dudleys MSGAPI SQUISH interface. Temporarily dropped all Kludge support in echomail messages due to problems working with the MSGAPI, while kludges still occur in netmail despite being "disabled" in the program code. In other words, the MSGAPI has a mind of its own and this is a known bug in this release which I don't think will cause most users any trouble. Added BIOSVIDEO and DIRECTVIDEO config verbs, ORIGIN line support, and got rid of all calls to ANSI screen device drivers. v1.12a Wed 01-08-1992 Changed screen output; anything 80 columns or wider should work now, any number of rows. v1.13 Mon 01-20-1992 Finally regained control of Kludge lines after inspecting Colin Wheats MSGPOST code. Thanks, Colin! MSGID, PID and INTL kludge lines are back and working. v1.14 Thu 01-30-1992 Cleanup. Supplying inadequate or incorrect arguments to MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 23 Post causes less of a crisis than it used to. Help screens improved. Better error checking. Output screen format tightened. v1.20 Sun 02-02-1992 Support for persons using 2 or more lines of the Areas.bbs file for the same echoname. General release. v1.20a Mon 02-03-1992 Buglet causing MC to return false errorlevels when the Postmail option is used. Squashed with prejudice. -------------------------------------------- FUTURE VERSIONS: Current plans for future releases of MAILCALL include the following improvements: Faster execution Enhanced message posting abilities Extract matched messages to a file or message base We may mutate the program into a message reader/editor Support for Squish.cfg -------------------------------------------- DISTRIBUTION NOTICE: MAILCALL is a copyrighted work. It is not in the Public Domain. I grant limited use and distribution rights to any and all PRIVATE persons subject to the following restrictions: You may not charge money for access to MAILCALL whether the distribution medium is electronic or physical. This includes but is not limited to Bulletin Board systems, disk copying or distribution services, Packet Network services such as GEnie(TM) and Compu$erve(TM), or any other entity that restricts and grants access to data based on a transfer of funds or services. If you or someone you know has been required to pay for the privilege of accessing this file even if said requirement for payment was presented as a "copying", "access", or "distribution" fee, I want to hear about it. TeleCommunications networks or individual sites that require access fees or registration fees may distribute MailCall PROVIDED that they place the package in an area that a first-time unregistered, unknown person or persons may access and download from without incurring ANY charge whatsoever from the host system. MAILCALL.TXT Monday, February 3, 1992 1:31 pm Page 24 Entities conforming to the above restrictions may distribute MailCall freely if and only if the package is distributed in unedited, complete form. Translation from the original compression format to another is permitted but I disclaim all responsibility for the result. If you are not sure wether you should be distributing copies of MailCall after reading the above, you probably don't qualify. MailCall's user agreement is NOT granted to businesses without a Site License. Contact the author directly if you are using or see someone else using or distributing MailCall in a commercial setting without a Site License. Don't be shy; it'll be cheap. -------------------------------------------- ┌────────────────────┐ │ WHINE-WARE NOTICE: │ └────────────────────┘ This is by far the hardest part of these docs to write. I don't really believe in writing FidoNet utilities for money when so many fine people have given us all so much for so long with absolutely no compensation asked for. But my personal life has taken a turn that dictates that I ask for contributions from individuals that use this software. After much hemming and hawing and banging about, MailCall is now a ShareWare. A Registration Fee is requested. This program is not in the Public Domain. It is and always has been a copyrighted work that may be freely reproduced and distributed subject to restrictions set forth clearly in the Distribution Notice. I ask that if you use and enjoy this program, please do not fail to support its continued development by sending a voluntary registration of $10.00 American to the author. I thank you in advance for your honesty and support. EOF