PACKAGE INFORMATION FORM ________________________ MAIL INFORMATION TO: DIGITAL EQUIPMENT CORPORATION LARGE COMPUTER GROUP / SOFTWARE REFERRAL CATALOG MRO2-2/8D2 1 IRON WAY MARLBORO, MA 01752 DATE: 5 March, 1985 SUBMITTED FOR PUBLICATION BY: Mark Crispin (via ARPANET electronic mail) PACKAGE NAME: MM - A DECSYSTEM-20 Electronic Mailsystem CONTACT NAME: Mark Crispin COMPANY NAME: PANDA PROGRAMMING ADDRESS: 1802 Hackett Ave. Mountain View, CA 94043-4431 PHONE: (415) 968-1052 DEC HARDWARE SUPPORTED: DECSYSTEM-20 (TOPS-20) APPLICATION AREA: OFFICE AUTOMATION ABSTRACT: MM is an electronic mailsystem that runs on the DECSYSTEM-20, similar in a number of ways to Digital's DECmail/MS-20, which was derived from an earlier version of MM. The MM mailsystem consists of a number of components, and is completely self-contained. MM's components include: - MM is the program that users run to compose and queue messages for delivery. It also provides for reading incoming messages and maintenance of a database of those messages. - Send allows TOPS-20 users to have the functionality of TOPS-10's "SEND" command, with several enhancements including multi-line sends, redisplay of prior sends, and reply to most recent send. - MMailr delivers queued messages to their intended recipients, including network mail and sends. - SndSrv delivers local sends. - MMailbox performs mailbox lookup and allows the system manager a great deal of flexibility in defining mailboxes (see below). - Cafard provides a means of delivering mail via TTY lines and/or dial-out modems. - Maiser and DMaser receive incoming messages from the ARPA Internet and DECnet. - Also included are several minor components to assist in mailsystem performance monitoring and debugging. A unique and powerful feature of the MM mailsystem is the capability for the system manager to define mailboxes above and beyond the level of user names. In the MM mailsystem, a mailbox is implicitly assigned to a user's MAIL.TXT, but can also be an auxillary file or an indirect file. In addition, by entry of a text line in a system file (MAIL:MAILING-LISTS.TXT) the system manager can define mailbox aliases, mail forwardings, and mailing lists. For example, the following entries in MAILING-LISTS.TXT: BILL= JONES SMITH= BOBSMITH@SYSTEM-B SECRETARIES= SALLY ANN LISA JOE RESEARCH= @PS:RES.DIS REMARKS= *PS:REMARKS.TXT declare BILL as an alias for JONES; SMITH's mail should be forwarded to BOBSMITH at another computer (SYSTEM-B); SECRETARIES as a mailing list with members SALLY, ANN, LISA, and JOE; RESEARCH going to the list of mailboxes found in PS:RES.DIS, and mail to REMARKS being appended to the file PS:REMARKS.TXT. Sites running a cooperating "Finger" system will find that they also have the capability of mailing to an individual by personal name, e.g. "Bill Jones" could be used as an alternative mailbox for JONES. The Stanford Finger system is included as part of the MM distribution, although it is not required for the operation of the mailsystem if mailing by personal names is not necessary. MM has the capability to have multiple specifications for message retrieval, to quickly isolate the message the user wishes to retrieve. This is especially useful for users who wish to keep hundreds of back messages online (the user can, of course, delete and permanently erase old messages at any time at the user's option). For example, suppose a corporate officer wishes to locate a message sent sometime in May or June 1983 from user JONES regarding the Paris subsidiary. Quite some time could be spent wading through hundreds of old messages. Or, the officer could invoke MM and give the command: READ SINCE 1-MAY-83 BEFORE 30-JUN-83 FROM "JONES" TEXT "Paris subsidiary" As distributed, MMailr supports local delivery and network delivery to the ARPA Internet, DECnet, Chaosnet, and Pup Ethernet. It also supports mail relaying between these networks. The network support has been implemented in a modular fashion so it is quite feasible for a site to add support for its own special network configuration. Some version or other of MM is in use on a large number of TOPS-20 sites. Stanford University is a good example; at Stanford MM supports a user community of several thousand users on 11 DECSYSTEM-20's connected via Pup Ethernet and ARPA Internet. Because of the operating system-independent protocols nature of the protocols used with Pup Ethernet and Internet, messages composed by the MM mailsystem can be delivered to (and received by) other operating systems. Stanford's environment includes a large number of VAX systems running both VMS and Unix; electronic mail between the VAX and DECSYSTEM-20 systems is fully supported and hundreds of pieces of electronic mail are transacted daily between these various systems. MM's DECnet support uses the ARPA Internet "SMTP" protocol. SOURCE LANGUAGE(S): MACRO-20 OTHER AREAS OF USAGE: Academic, management, etc. DATE OF FIRST RELEASE: 1978 DATE OF LAST REVISION: March 1986 MAJOR ENHANCEMENTS BEING PLANNED IN THE NEAR FUTURE: Use of TOPS-20 extended addressing Reimplementation in a high-level language for portability TOTAL NUMBER OF INSTALLATIONS (ALL HARDWARE): Greater than 100 NUMBER OF INSTALLATIONS ON DECSYSTEM-20s: Greater than 100 DEC-10/20 INSTALLATIONS: Most ARPA Internet sites Several universities Several commercial sites LICENSE OR RENTAL FEE (SPECIFY PERIOD AND INCLUDE DISCOUNTS IF ANY): $50 in US funds for shipping and media costs. MAINTENANCE FEE(S): Maintenance agreements are available by special arrangement with PANDA PROGRAMMING. Fees are established on a case-by-case basis depending upon the level of support desired. SERVICES INCLUDED IN PRICE: None. Maintenance available separately. Bug reports accepted from any site but no guarantee is made that any action is taken unless a maintenance agreement exists. TRAINING AVAILABLE: Available by special arrangement with PANDA PROGRAMMING. DOCUMENTATION AVAILABLE: Online documentation included.