ftpmail Service Help Information

FTPMAIL SERVICE HELP INFORMATION This is a sample help response from the ftpmail service. To get your own, or a more up-to-date version, send mail to ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com with a single line ``help'' in the body of the message.

Date: Thu, 27 Oct 94 11:03:52 -0700
From: "ftpmail service on ftp-gw-1.pa.dec.com" <nobody@pa.dec.com>
To: sam
Subject: your ftpmail request has been received

      -- Help --
    >>> $Id: ftpmail-help.html,v 1.1.1.1 1998/10/12 20:47:51 root Exp $
    >>>
    >>> ftpmail is not a supported service. From time to time it stops working;
    >>> we will tend to it when we get the time. Outages of a week or more are not
    >>> abnormal.

    >>> commands are:

    	reply 	set reply addr, since headers are usually wrong
    	connect [HOST [USER [PASS [ACCT]]]]
    				defaults to gatekeeper.dec.com, anonymous
    	ascii			files grabbed are printable ascii
    	binary			files grabbed are compressed or tar or both
    	chdir PLACE		"get" and "ls" commands are relative to PLACE
    					(only one CHDIR per ftpmail session,
    					and it executes before any LS/DIR/GETs)
    	compress		compress binaries using Lempel-Ziv encoding
    	compact			compress binaries using Huffman encoding
    	uuencode		binary files will be mailed in uuencode format
    	btoa			binary files will be mailed in btoa format
    	chunksize SIZE		split files into SIZE-byte chunks (def: 64000)
    	ls (or dir) PLACE	short (long) directory listing
    	index THING		search for THING in ftp server's index
    	get FILE		get a file and have it mailed to you
    					(max 10 GET's per ftpmail session)
    	quit			terminate script, ignore rest of mail message
    					(use if you have a .signature or
    					 are a VMSMAIL user)

    >>> notes:

    	-> you should send complaints to the ftpmail-admin address.  our
    	   postmaster does not handle ftpmail problems and you can save her
    	   the trouble of forwarding your complaints by just mailing them to
    	   the right address.  the "ftpmail-request" address is gone; don't
    	   use it.

    	-> the "index" command depends on the "SITE EXEC INDEX" feature of
    	   some ftp servers.  Gatekeeper.dec.com originated this feature,
    	   and ftp.uu.net duplicated it (with a format change to the output,
    	   naturally).  Wuarchive.wustl.edu also has this feature, though
    	   their index seems to be empty.  The source for an ftpd that
    	   supports this feature is on Gatekeeper.DEC.COM in /pub/DEC/gwtools.

    	-> a password of "" or '' will be sent as a null string.  if you need
    	   this you will know it, if you don't, you won't.

    	-> the "Subject:" of your request will be contained in the "Subject:"
    	   of all of ftpmail's responses to you regarding that request.  You
    	   can therefore use it to "tag" different requests if you have more
    	   than one outstanding at any given time.

    	-> you must give a "connect" command, default host is
    	   gatekeeper.dec.com, default user is anonymous, default
    	   password is your mail address with a hyphen prepended.

    	-> binary files will not be compressed unless 'compress' or 'compact'
    	   command is given; use this if at all possible, it helps a lot.
    	   note that many files are already compressed.  if you use any of
    	   the binary-file qualifiers (compress, compact, uuencode, btoa)
    	   without setting 'binary' first, your session will abort in error.

    	-> binary files will always be formatted into printable ASCII
    	   with "btoa" or "uuencode" (default is "btoa").  if you don't
    	   use the "binary" command, ftpmail will cheerfully try to mail
    	   you the binary data, which will absolutely, positively fail.

    	-> all retrieved files will be split into chunks and mailed.  the
    	   size of the chunk is 64000 characters unless you change it with
    	   the "chunksize" command.  CompuServe users will need to set this
    	   to 49000.  there is no way to set it higher than 100000, so please
    	   don't ask.

    	-> if you ask for more than 10 files in a session, you will receive
    	   an error message and your entire request will be rejected.

    	-> VMS/DOS/Mac versions of uudecode, atob, compress and compact
    	   are available, ask your LOCAL wizard about them if you can't
    	   locate them (but try gatekeeper.dec.com in /archive/pub/VMS
    	   if you're still using a VMS system.)

    	-> several mail unsplitters are hiding on gatekeeper.dec.com in
    	   /pub/mail/ua/misc/unsplit.  there is one in c, one in perl,
    	   and one in VMS DCL.

    	-> there is no way to request only certain parts of a file and we
    	   do not plan to add one in the near future, so please don't ask.

    	-> there is no way to delete things from the queue or to find out
    	   the status of things in the queue, and we do not plan to add
    	   either feature in the near future, so please don't ask.

    >>> examples:

    	-> connect to gatekeeper.dec.com and get a root directory listing:
    		connect
    		ls
    		quit

    	-> connect to gatekeeper.dec.com and get the README.ftp file:
    		connect
    		get README.ftp
    		quit

    	-> connect to gatekeeper.dec.com and get the gnuemacs sources:
    		connect
    		binary
    		uuencode
    		chdir /pub/GNU
    		get emacs-18.58.tar.Z
    		quit

    	-> connect to ftp.uu.net as anonymous and get a root directory list:
    		connect ftp.uu.net
    		binary
    		chdir /index/master
    		get by-name.Z
    		quit

    Ftpmail was written by Paul Vixie while at the DEC Western Research Laboratory
    and at the DEC Network Systems Laboratory, from 1989-1993.  Ftpmail is not a
    product or service of Digital Equipment Corporation and no support or warranty
    is expressed or implied.
      -- End of Help --