Subj : ANNOUNCE: Mail::Procmail 1.00 is released
To   : All
From : Johan Vromans
Date : Wed Jan 17 2001 09:19 am

From: JVromans@Squirrel.nl (Johan Vromans)

Mail::Procmail version 1.00 has been uploaded to CPAN.

  http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/JV/Mail-Procmail-1.00.tar.gz

Mail::Procmail is a Procmail-like facility for creating easy mail filters.

procmail is a great mail filter program, but it has weird recipe format. It's 
pattern matching capabilities are basic and often insufficient. I wanted 
something flexible whereby I could filter my mail using the power of Perl.

I've been considering to write a procmail replacement in Perl for a while, but 
it was Simon Cozen's Mail::Audit module, and his article in The Perl Journal 
#18, that set it off.

I first started using Simon's great module, and then decided to write my own 
since I liked certain things to be done differently. And I couldn't wait for 
his updates.

Mail::Procmail allows a piece of email to be logged, examined, delivered into a 
mailbox, filtered, resent elsewhere, rejected, and so on. It is designed to 
allow you to easily create filter programs to stick in a .forward or 
..procmailrc file, or similar.

For example:

    use Mail::Procmail;

    # Set up. Log everything up to log level 3.
    my $m_obj = pm_init ( loglevel  => 3 );

    # Pre-fetch some interesting headers.
    my $m_from              = pm_gethdr("from");
    my $m_to                = pm_gethdr("to");
    my $m_subject           = pm_gethdr("subject");

    # Default mailbox.
    my $default = "/var/spool/mail/".getpwuid($>);

    pm_log(1, "Mail from $m_from");

    pm_ignore("Non-ASCII in subject")
      if $m_subject =~ /[\232-\355]{3}/;

    pm_resend("jojan")
      if $m_to =~ /jjk@/i;

    # Make sure I see these.
    pm_deliver($default, continue => 1)
      if $m_subject =~ /getopt(ions|(-|::)?long)/i;

    # And so on ...

    # Final delivery.
    pm_deliver($default);

DIFFERENCES WITH MAIL::AUDIT

Note that several changes are due to personal preferences and do not 
necessarily imply deficiencies in Mail::Audit.

* General

  Not object oriented. Procmail functionality typically involves one
  single message. All (relevant) functions are exported.

* Delivery

  Each of the delivery methods is able to continue (except pm_reject
  and pm_ignore).

  Each of the delivery methods is able to pretend they did it
  (for testing a new filter).

  No default file argument for mailbox delivery, since this is system
  dependent.

  Each of the delivery methods logs the line number in the calling
  program so one can deduce which 'rule' caused the delivery.

  Message IDs can be checked to suppress duplicate messages.

  System commands can be executed for their side-effects.

  pm_ignore logs a reason as well.

  pm_reject will fake a "No such user" status to the mail transfer agent.

* Logging

  The logger function is exported as well. Logging is possible to
  a named file, STDOUT or STDERR.

  Since several deliveries can take place in parallel, logging is
  protected against concurrent access, and a timestamp/pid is included
  in log messages.

  A log reporting tool is included.

* Robustness

  Exit with TEMPFAIL instead of die in case of problems.

  pm_pipe_to ignores  SIGPIPE.

  pm_pipe_to returns the command exit status if continuation is selected.

  Commands and pipes can be protected  against concurrent access using
  lockfiles.

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 * Origin: Prism bbs (1:2320/38)

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