Least Common Denominator Mail (LCDMAIL) LCDMail is shareware. There are no critical limits, drop dead dates, or dire threats. If you want to keep using the software without paying for it, that's between you and your conscience. Be aware, however, that you REALLY SHOULD register it if you're going to use it. The price is quite reasonable - it doesn't matter how many users or servers you use LCDMail on, just send a check or money order (no cash in the mail please!) for $25.00 (USD) payable to MWC Enterprises and mail it to: MWC Enterprises 121 Hook Mountain Rd. Montville NJ 07045-9619 So, what is LCDMail anyway, and why the funny name? --------------------------------------------------- What LCDMail is, is a simple to install, simple to operate, e-mail system, suitable for interoffice memos and phone messages. It will work on any LAN (or WAN) that supports DOS file locking and access to a shared disk drive (in other words, pretty much any LAN that I've ever seen or heard of). I don't know how many e-mail programs you've looked at, but I've evaluated a dozen or so, and they uniformly range from complex to more complex. What ever happened to software that you didn't have to be a rocket scientist to install and use? The list of features that LCDMail does _NOT_ include is quite long. There is no security to speak of, there are no gateways to dozens of different e-mail systems, there are no complex maintenance and repair functions, there is no full screen graphical setup and configuration program, there are no detailed user records to enter... On the other hand, you should be able to get LCDMail installed and working in under 20 minutes, and you won't have to send your users to school for it, either. You also don't need to spend a hundred dollars or more for simple email capability. Support and enhancements policy ------------------------------- If you find a bug in LCDMail, I'd appreciate hearing about it so that I can correct it in future versions. You can e- mail me at mike.cocke@cencore.com, call my BBS (Central Core BBS, 201-575-8991 8N1 2400-57.6K), fax me at 201-575-8944, or drop me a letter at the address that sent your registration check to. Voice phone calls will not be accepted or returned under most circumstances. I have a few ideas for additional features that will be provided free of charge (via download from the BBS listed above) if and when I write them. Suggestions are also welcome. However, whether or not I ever write these additional programs is going to depend on registrations received - I'm not going to spend my life writing add-ons for a program that no one registers. You might keep that in mind when you're deciding whether to register LCDMail. FYI, the additional features that I'm already thinking about will be some type of security for the message files, a simple modem transport utility so mail can be transferred from one system to another, and a simple utility to check if the user has mail waiting. How to install LCDMail ---------------------- 1) Set up a directory that anyone can access (read/write/create/erase privileges) on your network. I strongly recommend that this directory contain nothing but the LCDMail program file(s). 2) Copy LCDMAIL.EXE into that directory. 3) On every machine that will run LCDMail, set up an environment variable named LCDMAIL that contains the drive and path to where you want e-mail messages for that machine stored. I strongly recommend that these directories be located off of the LCDMail executable directory. Example: Your LCDMail program is stored in Z:\LCDMAIL, and mailboxes are stored just off of that path. You have users named Sue, Mike, and Fred. On Mikes computer, put SET LCDMAIL=Z:\LCDMAIL\MIKE in the autoexec.bat file. On Sues computer, put SET LCDMAIL=Z:\LCDMAIL\SUE in the autoexec.bat file. On Freds computer, put SET LCDMAIL=Z:\LCDMAIL\FRED in the autoexec.bat file. That's it for installation - the first time each user runs LCDMail, they'll be shown a message indicating that their mailbox doesn't exist and that it will now be created. As soon as their mailbox is created, they can receive mail. Note that a user who has not created their mailbox in this fashion can NOT receive mail. Basic installation of LCDMail is now complete. I'll get into how to make it work under windows a little further on. For DOS and OS/2, keep reading. Using LCDMail ------------- As a ram-resident program under DOS ----------------------------------- LCDMail can be made to "pop-up" over other DOS applications. When used in this mode, LCDMail uses approximately 6K of RAM and approximately 350K of disk space. To start LCDMail as a "pop-up" program, use this command line to start LCDMAIL: LCDMAIL R (Note the space between the LCDMAIL and the R). To pop LCDMAIL up over your current program, just press the left- hand SHIFT key and the ALT key at the same time. If you should want to remove LCDMail from memory after you have loaded it, use the included SRREMOVE utility. This is the command: SRREMOVE LCDMAIL After you pop-up (or pop-down) LCDMail, there may be a pause of 1-2 seconds because LCDMail is swapping itself on and off of your disk drive. If your screen is in text mode, you may notice a small colored box in the upper left corner of your display - this indicates that LCDMail is swapping. As a normal "stand-alone" program under DOS or OS/2 --------------------------------------------------- Since OS/2 can multitask properly (do more than one thing at a time without crashing), all you really need to do is create a program icon for LCDMAIL.EXE on your desktop and make certain that your LCDMail environment variable is set properly. Contact your system administrator if you have problems with this. Under DOS, make sure your LCDMAIL environment variable is set properly and type LCDMAIL at a DOS prompt. As a normal "stand-alone" program under Windows 3.x --------------------------------------------------- Use the included .PIF file to set up a program icon for LCDMail on your desktop and make certain that your LCDMail environment variable is set properly. Contact your system administrator if you have problems with this. You'll need to make a few changes in the .PIF file (entering the correct drive and path for where you have located LCDMail, for example), but LCDMail must remain as a full screen application. Trying to use LCDMail as a windowed application will have unpredictable results. ------------------------------------------------------------ LCDMail is pretty much menu driven (except for the editor, which I'll explain later), and is mouse aware. The menus work either with the mouse or the cursor arrow keys. The main menu: Create Message(s) Read Message(s) WhoAmI Exit is, I think, pretty self-explanatory, so I'll just cover WhoAmI. WhoAmI is a tool for the system administrator and for the insatiably curious. Remember the LCDMail environment variable we discussed while installing LCDMail? This menu choice displays your current LCDMail environment variable on the screen. That's it. Menu choices may be selected by pressing or by clicking the right mouse button. By the way, the key will usually exit you from wherever you are. ------------------------------------------------------------ Creating Message(s) - This choice will display the following sub-menu: Editor Load saved file Return to main menu The "return to main menu" should be pretty obvious. You can send someone a previously prepared text file as a message, which is what the "load saved file" choice is about. If you select this choice, you'll be asked for the name of the file and, after the file has been loaded into the editor, you'll be looking at the... Editor - This editor is a little simplistic, but should be pretty easy to use. It will hold over 800 lines of text and supports automatic word wrap. Unfortunately, it is not mouse-aware. As the bottom line of the editor window reminds you, you can press the F1 key for a list of the commands that are available to you in the editor, so I'll skip summarizing them here. After you exit the editor, you'll see another menu - this one will have the choices: Abandon message Save message to disk Send message to recipient Abandon message does just what looks like - the message is tossed in the trash, never to return. Save message to disk allows you to save the file from the editor to a regular disk file, so you can work on it later if you wish. Load saved file (from the previous menu) and save message to disk also allow you to use LCDMail as a simple notepad. Send message to recipient brings us to the next screen: To: Subject: Let me do this out of order so I can do the simple part first. Subject is up to 35 characters of text. This will display on the list of messages waiting in the recipients mailbox, so the more descriptive the better. To: is the name (as specified in the LCDMAIL environment variable mentioned elsewhere) of the person that you want to send the message to. If you make a mistake or specify a mailbox that doesn't exist, you'll see the following menu: OOOPS - try again Save to disk List mailboxes Selecting OOOPS - try again will ask again the questions regarding subject and recipient. Save to disk allows you to save the message as a regular text file. You will be asked for the filename. This may be any valid drive, path, and filename for your system. If the file already exists, it will be overwritten. If the drive or path does not exist, you'll receive an error message. List mailboxes displays a scrolling list of available mailboxes. The cursor arrows or mouse can be used to move the highlighted choice. Select the currently highlighted mailbox by pressing . After entering a valid recipient and subject, you'll see a display indicating that the message has been successfully sent, after which you'll be returned to the main menu. At this time, LCDMail doesn't support carbon copies (you can always save the message to a disk file and send it to multiple recipients manually). If anyone thinks this would be useful, it's a fairly trivial addition to make - let me know. ------------------------------------------------------------ Read Message(s) - Selecting this choice from the main menu will display a scrollbox of messages in your mailbox, or else you'll see a display indicating that you have no mail waiting. This list, by the way, is of the subject information that the sender typed when the message was sent. In the scrollbox, the cursor arrows or mouse can be used to move the highlighted choice. Select the currently highlighted message by pressing . If the message is longer than fits in the screen window, you may use the up and down cursor arrows and/or the pageup and pagedown keys to scroll the text. When you have finished reading the message, press the key to see the disposition menu. The disposition menu consists of just two choices. You may delete the message, or you may print the message. After you have printed the message, you will be asked if printing was ok. If you answer yes, the message will be deleted. if you answer no, the message will be printed again, and so on into eternity. If enough people ask for it, I'll include a choice for leaving messages in the mailbox in a future version, but I honestly don't see a need. Misc. Comments -------------- LCDMail has a maximum capacity of 256 messages in a mailbox at a time. If this turns out to be insufficient, let me know and I'll double it - it just seemed like a reasonable maximum. On the subject of registrations and bug reports: If you find a bug in LCDMail, please let me know - whether or not you have or are planning to register LCDMail. Even if you don't find it useful (or are just going to use the program without paying for it), I'd like to fix the problem before someone else (possibly a paying customer) hits it. On the subject of registrations and suggestions/requests for features: If you have a feature you'd like to see added to LCDMail and you have NOT registered LCDMail, please enclose a check or money order for $25.00 payable to MWC Enterprises, along with a clear and complete description of the idea or feature, and mail it to this address: MWC Enterprises 121 Hook Mountain Rd. Montville NJ 07045-9619 Of course, if you HAVE registered LCDMail, you can omit the check. Mike-