Contents

Welcome to OPMail. This is a Windows-based front-end for the UUPC/Extended E-mail package from Kendra Electronic Wonderworks.

The OPMail program makes handling and organisation of all your mail quick and easy. It is very easy to configure (it may not need any configuration at all), and with its Drag-And-Drop functionality the organisation of your mail couldn´t be simpler.

Main window

Configuration

Troubleshooting

MIME support

PGP support

RFC compliances

Future plans

Protect your right to privacy

Author

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Main window

The main window consists of the following sections:

A menu

A toolbar

A list of folders

A list of messages

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Main window, folder list

This multicolumn list shows all your message folders. They always include the InBox, the Drafts folder, and the OutBox.

The InBox is where all messages you receive appear. They will stay there until you delete them or move them to another folder.

The Drafts folder contains any messages that you have written but put on hold instead of sending them. When you view a message in this folder you will automatically get back to the Send window to continue where you left off.

The OutBox contains all the messages that you have sent but await a dial-up to your mail provider to be transmitted. After a successful dial-up the OutBox will be empty.

If a folder is empty its name is shown with gray text.

When you select a folder, its contents are shown in the message list.

If the folder list contains more folders than can be viewed at once, you can enlarge the list by dragging the space between the lists. When the cursor is between the lists it changes to a move-up-down arrow.

See also:

Main window

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Main window, message list

The message list shows all the messages in the selected folder, sorted by age with the newest first. (In the InBox, all unread messages, sorted by age, precede all the others, sorted by age).

Each message line shows the message date and time, converted to your local time according to the TZ environment variable, the sender (or the recipient preceded by To: if you sent the message), and the message subject.

Each line may start with one or more flags:

+	New message (InBox only).

-	Message is deleted.

M	Message has been moved to another folder.

R	A reply has been sent.

Double-click on a message (or select it and press Ctrl+V or Enter) to view the contents in a separate window. Normally, the message will be shown in the built-in viewer.

To move a message to another folder just drag it with the mouse or press Ctrl+M and choose the destination folder from the list. Messages in the OutBox and the Drafts folder cannot be moved, nor can you move messages into these two folders.

Note: To make OPMail more fluent to work with, actions like Delete or Move a message are not actually carried out until you choose another (or click on the same) folder or you leave OPMail.

Tip: You can adjust the width of the space used to show sender names by dragging horizontally from a point just before the subjects. When the cursor is in the right place it changes to a move-left-right arrow.

See also:

Main window

List of folders

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Main window, toolbar

The Send button lets you send a new message to someone. When you press it the Send window appears, where you can set the subject and recipient(s) of the message and start the message editor.

The Reply button lets you write a reply to the selected message. When you press it (or drag a message onto it) the Send window appears, where you can change the subject and recipient(s) of the message and start the message editor.

The Forward button allows you to forward the selected message to someone else. When you press it (or drag a message onto it) the Send window appears, where you can specify to whom it will be forwarded. The subject cannot be changed, and you cannot edit the message.

See also:

Main window

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Menus

File

Open to Send

Save Message As

Exit

Folder

Add

Rename

Delete

Update

Message

Send New

View

Forward

Reply

Move to Folder

Delete

Undo

Setup

Options

View raw

Help

Contents

About

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Open to Send (File menu)

Chose this command to select a file to send to someone. You will be prompted for a file to send in the Open To Send window.

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Save Message As (File menu)

Chose this command to save the currently selected message as a disk file. You will be prompted for the file name to store the message in the Save Message As window.

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Exit (File menu)

This command terminates OPMail. Changes in the selected folder are updated before the program exits.

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Add (Folder menu)

This command is used to create a new folder. When you select it the Add Folder window appears where you can enter the name of the new folder.

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Rename (Folder menu)

This command is used to rename an existing folder. When you select it the Rename Folder window appears where you can change the name of the folder.

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Delete (Folder menu)

Select this command if you want to delete the selected folder. You will be asked if you are sure before the folder is deleted. The InBox cannot be deleted.

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Update (Folder menu)

Select this command to commit any changes you have made to the current folder, like delete or move messages.

Shortcut: Click on the selected folder.

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Send New (Message menu)

Select this command to send a new message to someone. When you select this command, the Send window will appear, where you can specify subject and recipient(s) of the message and write the message.

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View (Message menu)

Select this command to open a viewer window with the contents of the selected message. Text messages and multipart messages can be handled by the built-in viewer.

If the message contains something other than plain text you may want to set up a viewer that can handle this kind of data. However, OPMail can make an educated guess about many message types, based on what programs you have installed, so chances are that you do not need to define any new viewers.

This menu command has the same effect as double-clicking on the message in the message list.

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Forward (Message menu)

Select this command to forward the selected message to someone else. When you select this command, the Send window will appear, where you can specify recipient(s) of the message.

This command is the same as pressing the Forward button.

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Reply (Message menu)

Select this command to create and send a reply to the selected message. When you select this command, the Send window will appear, where you can verify the subject and recipient(s) of the reply.

This command is the same as pressing the Reply button.

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Move to Folder (Message menu)

Use this command to move the selected message to another folder. When you select this command, the Move To Folder window will appear where you can select the folder to move the message to.

To indicate that the message has been moved an M is shown to the left on the message line. The actual movement does not take place until you click on another (or the same) folder in the folder list or you leave the program.

Shortcut: Use the mouse to drag the message from the message list to its new folder.

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Delete (Message menu)

This command deletes the selected message. The actual deletion does not take place until you click on another (or the same) folder in the folder list or you leave the program.

To indicate that the message has been deleted a - is shown to the left on the message line.

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Undo (Message menu)

This command is available when the selected message has been deleted or moved to another folder. Select this command to cancel a deletion or movement.

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Options (Setup menu)

This command displays the Options window, where you can specify which editor and viewers to use to write messages and view messages, and define the fonts to use for different character sets.

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View raw (Setup menu)

This command is either checked or unchecked. Switch between checked and unchecked by selecting this command.

When this command is not checked, OPMail will apply all necessary handling of the contents of the message to bring it into the form prior to transmission from the sender. This handling includes Quoted-Printable decoding, Base64 decoding, conversion to the Windows character set, PGP decryption, and displaying the message in the appropriate viewer.

When this command is checked you will see the raw contents of the messages, including the complete e-mail headers, when you view them. The viewer used in this case will be the one set up for the Text/Plain MIME type.

This option also affects saving messages to files, allowing you to save messages either as the raw message or as the intended binary file or whatever it was before transmission.

See also:

Save Message As.

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Contents (Help menu)

This command brings up the Contents page of this help file.

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About (Help menu)

This command displays the programs About box.

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View Message window

This window shows the contents of the message you have chosen to view. If the message is composed of several parts, text and/or binary, this is reflected in the composition of this window. You can use the Tab key to walk between the message parts.

Text items are shown as such. You can select and copy parts of the text onto the Windows clipboard using the normal methods, but the text cannot be edited.

Binary items are shown as gray boxes with one or two buttons. If you have an appropriate viewer for the contents its icon will be shown on one button. Press the button to start the viewer. Another button with a diskette symbol allows you to save the binary contents to disk. When you press it you can select the directory and name of the destination file.

If the message contains only one binary item and there is an external viewer for this type of contents this window will not be shown. Instead, the external viewer will be invoked directly.

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Save Message As window
Save As window

In this window you enter a file name in which to save the selected message. OPMail will make an educated guess about which file type the message is and suggest an appropriate file extension if OPMail can find one.

If the file contains a Base64 encoded message it will automatically be decoded to its original binary contents, unless you have checked the View raw command in the Setup menu.

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Recipient window
Send window

In this window you specify the subject, primary recipient(s), and carbon copy (CC) recipients of the message to be sent.

The window contains entry fields for:

Subject

Recipient

CC

and these options:

Send As 8bit

Want Receipt

Authenticate

Encrypt

Press the Edit button to edit the message (not allowed for forwarded messages or when sending a file). The editor then pops up in another window.

If you are replying to a received message, the received message is shown quoted in the new message, i.e. each line of the old message is preceded by a > . You may remove as much of the old message as you like. If the old file contains binary parts they will be replaced with a line indicating this.

When you have finished editing the message, save it and leave the editor. You can edit it again by pressing the Edit button once more.

Once the message is completed and you have filled in the Subject and Recipient values you can press the Send button. OPMail then hands over the message to the UUPC RMAIL program which enqueues it for transmission. You can now see your message in the OutBox. If you have set up UUPC to retain a copy of your message you can find this copy in the MailSent folder, see Configuration.

If you do not want to send the message now but want to retain what you have written so far you can put the message on hold by pressing the Hold button. The message is then put into the Drafts folder and the Send window is closed. To resume editing and sending the message simply open the Drafts folder and view the message; this will reopen the Send window with your message.

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Subject

Enter a short but accurate description of what the message is about. When the recipient browses through his list of received messages a well chosen subject makes it a lot easier for him to locate the particular message he is looking for.

For a message being forwarded, the subject cannot be changed.

Note: Many mailers only allow 7-bit characters in subjects. The MIME standard (RFC-1522) describes how to use 8-bit characters in subjects, allowing you to use various national characters and special symbols. OPMail is compatible with this standard. However, if you do not think that the recipient´s mailer program is compatible with it then do not use 8-bit characters.

See also:

Send window


Recipient

The recipient can be selected from a drop-down address list. Press the drop-down button next to the entry field to see it. The list is made up of all the senders and addressees that OPMail has encountered in the folders that you have viewed since OPMail was opened.

You may enter more than one recipient. Separate the recipients by commas.

Note: Many mailers only allow 7-bit characters in recipient addresses. The MIME standard (RFC-1522) describes how to use 8-bit characters in recipient addresses, allowing you to use various national characters and special symbols. OPMail is compatible with this standard. However, if you do not think that the recipient´s mailer program is compatible with it then do not use 8-bit characters.

See also:

Send window


CC

In this field you can enter Carbon Copy recipients. They receive the message just like the real recipients, but they can see that the message was not actually written for them.

A CC recipient can be selected from a drop-down address list. Press the drop-down button next to the entry field to see it. The list is made up of all the senders and addressees that OPMail has encountered in the folders that you have viewed since OPMail was opened.

You may enter more than one CC recipient. Separate the recipients by commas.

Note: Many mailers only allow 7-bit characters in CC recipient addresses. The MIME standard (RFC-1522) describes how to use 8-bit characters in recipient addresses, allowing you to use various national characters and special symbols. OPMail is compatible with this standard. However, if you do not think that the recipient´s mailer program is compatible with it then do not use 8-bit characters.

See also:

Send window


Send as 8-bit
Send as 8bit

From its birth the Internet was designed only to handle 7bit characters. This is a problem when you send messages with 8bit characters, such as accented, Greek, or Cyrillic characters, or binary files.

The MIME standard, which OPMail and many other mailers follow, describes how 8-bit characters can be translated into 7-bit characters and back using either Quoted-Printable or Base64 encoding. However, this presumes that the receiver also has a MIME-aware mailer.

Many mail gateways on the Internet can now handle 8-bit characters, but not all, so if the receiver does not have a MIME-aware mailer and you want to use non-ASCII characters you may try to send the message as 8-bit by checking this option.

See also:

Send window


Want receipt

If you want a receipt from the recipient´s mailer that your message has been received check this option (not applicable when forwarding a message)

Note, that not all mailers know how to do this, but OPMail does (of course).

See also:

Send window

Send receipts


Authenticate

When you check this option the message will be given a digital signature based on your private, secret key. Use this to allow the recipient to verify that you were indeed the sender of the message and that the message has not been tampered with.

When you send an authenticated message, you will be asked for the pass phrase to your secret key in order for PGP to be able to use it.

The recipient will need your public key to verify that the message really came from you.

This option is not available if you do not have PGP installed.

See also:

Send window


Encrypt

Check this option if the message is for the receiver´s eyes only.

This option is only available if you actually have the receiver´s public key on your public key ring. If you have entered more than one recipient the public keys of all recipients must be in your public key ring.

This option is not available if you do not have PGP installed.

See also:

Send window


Move Message window

Select the destination folder from the list and press Enter or click the OK button.

To leave without moving the message press Esc or click the Cancel button.

Shortcut: Use the mouse to drag the message from the message list to its new folder.

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Add Folder window

Enter the new name, max. 20 characters, and press the Enter key or click on the OK button to create the new folder.

Press Esc or click on the Cancel button if you do not want to create a folder.

If you do not enter a name, a new folder will not be created.

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Rename Folder window

Change the name, max. 20 characters, and press the Enter key or click on the OK button to rename the folder.

Press Esc or click on the Cancel button if you do not want to rename the folder.

If you enter a blank name, the folder will not be renamed.

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Open To Send window

Select the file you want to send to someone and press OK. The Send window then appears, where you can specify the Subject and Recipient(s) of the file.

If the file contains binary data it is automatically Base64 encoded before it is sent. If the file appears to be DOS text with international characters from the current code page it is automatically converted to the Windows character set. Only the first 1024 bytes of the file are examined when the type is being determined.

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Configuration

Since this program is meant as a front end to the UUPC/Extended package from Kendra Electronic Wonderworks, it also uses the same configuration files etc. Before you can use OPMail you must install the UUPC/Extended package (but since you are interested in OPMail in the first place I assume that you have already done it.)

With UUPC installed chances are that you do not need to make any configuration of OPMail at all. However, in case of difficulties, this is what OPMail requires:

Four DOS environment variables must be defined:

UUPCUSRRC	Must point to a user settings file.

UUPCSYSRC	Must point to a system settings file.

TZ	Must specify your local time zone, like CET-1 for Central European Time, 1 hour ahead of GMT, or CET-1CED when daylight savings time is in effect. In general, the format of TZ is any 3 letters for your local time zone name, a number between -12 and 12 for hours relative to GMT and, when daylight savings is in effect, another 3 letters. You should, of course, use the official 3-letter names for your time zone. When daylight savings time begins or ends you must remember to manually add or remove the 3 letters for the daylight savings time zone.

TEMP	Must point to a directory that can hold temporary files. Make sure that this directory is on a disk with enough free space to hold even the largest messages you receive. Note, that many other programs also place their temporary files in this directory. (If this variable is not defined, temporary files will be placed in your Windows directory.)

If necessary, add these lines to your AUTOEXEC.BAT:

SET UUPCSYSRC=C:\UUPC\UUPC.RC

SET UUPCUSRRC=C:\USER\PERSONAL.RC

SET TZ=CET-1

SET TEMP=C:\TMP

Be sure to use the values relevant to your system.

For Windows NT users: The UUPC/Extended package for Windows NT allows you to put the values for UUPCSYSRC and UUPCUSRRC into the Windows NT registry instead of using DOS-style environment variables. This is also supported by OPMail, and just like UUPC/Extended OPMail always gets the settings from the configuration files even if their contents have also been added to the registry. See the UUPC/Extended documentation for details about defining UUPCSYSRC and UUPCUSRRC in the Windows NT registry.

The UUPC.RC file must include the following settings

Domain=mymachine.domain.net

MailDir=C:/uupc/spool/mail

SpoolDir=C:/uupc/spool

TempDir=C:/temp

MailExt=spb

Options=backup	(optional)

The PERSONAL.RC file must include the following settings

Mailbox=myname

Name=My Full Name

Home=C:/user

Folders=~/mail

FileSent=MailSent	(optional)

BackupExt=BAK	(optional)

Signature=signatur.txt	(optional)

ReplyTo=me@elsewhere	(optional)

Organization=My company	(optional)

Again, be sure to use the values relevant to your system in both files. You can find a detailed description of the settings in each file in the UUPC documentation.

With the values as shown, OPMail will place its folder files in C:/user/mail/*.spb. Notice that you can just use a tilde (~) in Folders to indicate a path relative to Home.

OPMail understands when there are several options per Options= line and more than one Options= line in the files, and also that an option may have a no prefix. OPMail always looks for an option in your PERSONAL.RC file first and then in the UUPC.RC file.

When OPMail searches for a setting, it first looks for Win16.Setting= before looking for Setting=.

See also:

   Options

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Options

In the Options window you can change some of the settings that OPMail uses:

MIME Type and Viewer Application

Editor Application

Virus scanner and Scan extensions

Character Set, Font and Enhanced

Max Send Size

Send receipts

Besides these settings, OPMail also uses your UUPC settings, see Configuration.

Press OK to accept the settings or Cancel to discard any changes.

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MIME Type

Here you specify the MIME Type for which you want to configure a viewer.

OPMail has a built-in knowledge about a number of predefined MIME Types and automatically detects if you have a suitable viewer for each of these types. The types for which a viewer has been found are shown in the list of MIME Types when the Options window is initially opened.

The MIME Type consists of a type and a subtype, as in "Text/Plain". The type should be one of "Text", "Application", "Audio", "Image", or "Video". The subtype should be one registered with IANA for the given type, or an X extension (such as "Application/X-MyType"). The currently registered types and subtypes can be found at this URL: ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/iana/assignments/media-types/media-types.

The MIME standard also defines the types "Multipart" and "Message", but you do not have to install viewers for these, as OPMail handles them internally. However, you can define your own viewers if you really want to.

The purpose of MIME types is to have a common set of types so that a receiver is able to view (or hear) the message you sent using whatever appropriate viewer (or player) he has on his system and vice versa.

See also:

   Options

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Viewer

Enter the name of the program you wish to use for viewing messages of the selected MIME Type or press the Browse button to locate one. It must be a program that can be started with the file name to be viewed on the command line. The Windows notepad.exe program is one example.

After the program name you must specify the extension that this program expects for its input files, as in: notepad *.txt. (Program name and extension must be separated by  *.).

notepad.exe has the limitation that it can only handle small files (<64kB). If you receive larger messages you will have to install another viewer that can handle large files.

As you will notice, OPMail can automatically find quite a number of the viewers you have installed. To do that OPMail consults the Windows Registration Database (have you ever tried the REGEDIT program in your Windows directory? Go ahead, try it.) and the [Extensions] section in your WIN.INI file. If OPMail suggests a wrong viewer, perhaps the contents of the registration database or the [Extensions] section in your WIN.INI file should be changed rather than defining another viewer in OPMail.

See also:

   Options

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Editor

Enter the name of the program you wish to use for writing new messages and replies. It must be a program that handles plain ASCII text files and that can be started with the file name to be edited on the command line. The Windows notepad.exe program is one example and is also the default.

See also

   Options

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Virus scanner

To protect your system against potentially harmful code and macros in messages you receive you can have OPMail scan certain types of messages for possible vira before handing the message over to the viewer application. For this, you need a virus scanner program that can detect such malicious contents and, if present, delete the file holding the message.

Type in the path and file name of your virus scanner program. Add an option that instructs the program to delete any file containing a virus (OPMail uses this to check if the message was infected).

To have the file name to be scanned inserted at a particular point in the command line type *.* at this location.

Example:

C:\virus\scan.exe *.* /del

See also:

Scan extensions

Options

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Scan extensions

Only certain types of files can contain virus code. Here you indicate which file extensions are candidates. Separate each extension with a space.

See also:

Options

Virus scanner

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Character Set

If you get messages from people in other parts of the world where they use some different characters than yours they may be using a different character set.

This option, together with the Font option, allows you to set up the fonts to use for the various character sets that messages can be written in. This lets you see the messages exactly as the sender wrote them, that is, with the same letters and symbols.

For the character set native to your system check the Default box. OPMail uses this in mail you send as an indication to the receiver, so that he will view your message with the same letters and symbols as you wrote it.

In most western countries the Windows fonts are based on the ISO-8859-1 (Latin 1) character set (Windows95 comes with some of its fonts in several character sets). Other possible sets recommended in the MIME standard are ISO-8859-2 through ISO-8859-10. The basis for them all is the US-ASCII character set, which defines the characters with codes 0 through 127. The ISO-8859-? sets use the same characters for these codes but vary in the definitions of the codes 128 through 255.

You should at least set up a font for the character sets US-ASCII and the ISO-8859-? set corresponding to your local character set, and let both use the same font.

See also:

   Options

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Font

This option allows you to define the font to be used to show text in the corresponding Character Set. To make text written in a particular character set look correct it is important to specify a font that is based on that character set. In most western countries all the fonts shipped with Windows are based on the ISO-8859-1 (Latin-1) character set. You may need to download fonts from somewhere on the Internet to get some that match other character sets.

To use resolution enhancement for this font check the Enhanced box. You will see the effect immediately in the font name field.

Press the Browse button to choose the font to use. Note, that only the Font and Font Style you select is used; the Font Size is ignored. OPMail always uses the size of the system font for all fonts.

To undefine a character set and associated font press the Browse button and clear both Font and Font Style boxes. The font definition will then be removed when you press OK in the Options window.

See also:

   Options

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Enhanced

This option allows you to define if the selected Font should be shown using resolution enhancement. OPMail has a built-in anti-aliasing text display function, which can make many fonts appear much prettier by smoothing the edges. However, the degree of improvement depends a lot on the font; a well designed font may even look better without, since anti-aliasing tends to make text look a bit blurred.

Note: The enhancement is not effective everywhere, such as in entry fields.

See also:

   Options

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Max send size

This option lets you set the maximum message size that OPMail will send. If you try to send a larger message OPMail will split it into several messages, each no larger than this limit. This can be necessary when sending mail through some gateways, which cannot handle very large messages.

When OPMail cuts a message in pieces, each piece will have the MIME type Message/Partial. This is recognised by MIME-aware receivers, such as OPMail, which will reassemble the pieces into the original, single message. This way of splitting messages is therefore completely transparent to both sender and recipient as long as both use MIME-aware mailers.

If you try to set the size lower than 4kB or higher than 2MB, the size will be changed to 4kB or 2MB.

See also:

   Options

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Send receipts

When you receive a message it may have a tag indicating that the sender wants a receipt that you have seen the message. OPMail can automatically generate and send such a receipt if you let it. Choose Yes to let OPMail do it automatically, No to make OPMail ignore such requests, or Ask to have OPMail ask you each time a receipt is requested.

See also:

   Options

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Troubleshooting

So far I have only come across one question that might arise when you use OPMail. However, as people report their difficulties to me this topic will be expanded.

Q: OPMail seems to hang the computer when I press Send to send my message or I view a message.

A: Be sure that your PIF file settings for RMAIL (and PGP if you have it) and any other DOS program OPMail may run are set to enabled for Execution in the Background. Otherwise OPMail will wait forever for a program that will never even start. If you do not have a PIF file for these programs then you need to check the _DEFAULT.PIF file in your Windows directory.


MIME Support

OPMail is MIME-conformant beyond the basic requirements according to RFC-1521 and RFC-1522. It contains support for these MIME features:

-	Adds MIME header lines to messages being sent.

-	Automatically sends text messages Quoted-Printable encoded if they contain national characters.

-	Automatically sends binary files Base64 encoded.

-	Automatically decodes Quoted-Printable encoded messages.

-	Automatically decodes Base64 encoded messages.

-	Can launch message viewers according to MIME message types/subtypes.

-	Handles Multipart/Mixed, Multipart/Parallel, Multipart/Alternative, and Message/rfc822 types internally.

-	Transparently splits large messages into several Message/Partial messages before sending, and reassembles partial messages into the original message upon reception.


PGP Support

OPMail contains automatic support for PGP, if it is installed on your computer. OPMail detects the presence of PGP if the environment variable PGPPATH points to the directory where PGP.EXE is, or if PGP.EXE can be found in a directory in the PATH.

When you send a message, you will be given the opportunity to choose if the message should be signed with your private key (authenticated), and if the message should be encrypted with the recipient´s public key (provided you have a copy of it), see the Send window.

When you receive a PGP encrypted message OPMail will automatically detect this and let PGP decrypt the message before displaying it. If PGP indicates a problem, such as if you do not have the sender´s public key, OPMail will relay that to you.


RFC Compliances

OPMail complies with the following RFCs (Internet Standards):

RFC-822  Format of ARPA Internet Text Messages

RFC-1521  MIME Internet mail extensions

RFC-1522  MIME header extensions


Future Plans

Every application can be improved, and OPMail is no exception. There are many things on the list of possible enhancements, including:

-	MIME composer, where you can combine several types of data into one multimedia message.

-	Winsock interface for use with online Internet connections using the SMTP and POP3 protocols.

-	Mail-FTP interface, automating file retrieval from FTP servers.

-	Mail filters, sorting your incoming mail according to your criteria.

-	Message Search feature to locate particular messages.

-	Folder hierarchy for a complete file-manager type structure.

-	Auto-localised texts (so OPMail speaks your language (translators wanted!))

-	Built-in Richtext viewer/editor for nicely formatted messages.

-	Usenet News reader.

-	OLE interface for easy access to OPMail from other applications.

Which will get done first depends on my own needs as well as on your feedback.


Protect your right to privacy

Mail on the Internet is like postcards. Anyone who get hold of a message can read it without leaving a trace, including the mailman and anyone else in the postal service.

Most of your mail is probably quite harmless and of no interest to anyone but you and the sender or recipient, but occasionally you may want to send a message that you do not want anyone but the intended recipient to see. This may be because it contains information that could be embarrassing or even a threat to you in the wrong hands, or maybe it is commercially sensitive information that you do not want your competitors to get hold of. What makes matters worse is that the Internet is not a trusted service and you have little chance of knowing who runs the computers through which your messages are routed. It could be your biggest competitor or your worst enemy.

Whatever your reasons, you need a way to put the information into an electronic envelope that only the intended recipient can open. The electronic equivalent of a sealed and tamper proof envelope is encryption, and PGP is a fine example of a cryptographic program that can give you a very high degree of privacy. With PGP you can encrypt a message so that only the correct recipient can recover the original text, and you can authenticate the message by adding a digital signature that proves that only you could have created the message and that the message has not been changed.

Some governments do not like the use of electronic cryptography, and a few have even made it illegal to use. Their reason is that it makes crime prevention more difficult since it makes e-mail `phone taps´ useless.

However, cryptography can also prevent crimes by making it impossible for criminals to get access to information they need for their criminal activity like blackmail and industrial or military espionage.

Banning cryptography because it can be used by criminals is like banning cars because they can be used as getaway vehicles by thieves. Just because a device can be used by criminals it does not mean that it is a crime to use it.

Protect your right to privacy. Protest against laws that prohibit encryption. Do not let your government make it a crime to have some privacy!

Just because I am paranoid it doesn´t mean they aren´t out to get me.


Enviraware

So, what is Enviraware ?

It is software, which you earn the right to use by being environment aware, that is, you do your part to preserve our environment. That includes one or more of the following items:

-	Help save the whales, dolphins, sharks, pandas, tigers, and other endangered or abused animals.

-	Help preserve the rain forests of the world.

-	Stop the pollution of our atmosphere, lakes, rivers, oceans, forests, and the rest of the nature around us.

-	Participate in environment restoration projects.

-	Recycle as much as you can, and support or take initiatives to more recycling projects.

-	When you visit our wonderful nature, do it in a minimal impact fashion.

-	Save natural resources, like clean water and rain forest timber.

-	Buy only green products (but don´t trust everything they write on the labels, get a second opinion).

-	Give financial and moral support to organisations that work for these topics.

-	Spread knowledge to others about the importance of doing all of these things.

When we all participate in every way we can, perhaps there is still time to keep the world in a healthy state and to undo some of the abuse that we and our ancestors have done to this world in ignorance. Do your part to assure that the trees are still green and the sky is still blue when we get old and our children grow up. The nature is free, but priceless!

NB: Even if you do not want to use this program, and therefore do not need to pay the price for it, these issues should still have enough justification of their own.


Write to me at:

Ole Perch Jensen

Harløsevej 55

DK-3400 Hillerød

Denmark

or even better, mail me at:

<oleperch@zaphod.ping.dk>


RFC stands for Request For Comments. It denotes a numbered document about a proposed or accepted standard for use on the Internet.


Base64 is a MIME standard for safely sending binary data through a mail system that may have a 7-bit limitation. In this encoding scheme the data are split into groups of 3 binary bytes which are encoded as 4 characters that are all within the 7-bit ASCII character set.


MIME stands for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions. It is an Internet standard (RFC-1521) for sending all kinds of data through 7-bit limited Internet mail systems. MIME defines a variety of text and data types and formats, and specifies how different character sets and data types can be handled within the frames of existing Internet mail systems.


7-bit characters include the letters A though Z and a though z, and the digits 0 though 9, and symbols like parenthesis, brackets, comma, and period. You can see exactly which symbols using the Character Map program that comes with Windows. The first 3 lines of characters in the table are the 7-bit ones.


Code pages is a technique used by DOS to support various national character sets. A code page is identified by a number, for instance 437 for US and 850 for Scandinavian. See your DOS manual for more information.


The Windows character set is identical to the character set defined in one of the ISO-8859-? standards. This is also the one of the legal character sets to be used for MIME compliant mail messages.


Quoted-Printable is a MIME defined method of encoding non-7bit characters into 7bit sequences. The method replaces a character by an `=´ followed by the character´s binary value represented by 2 hexadecimal digits. For instance, an `A´ would become `=41´ (although most characters valued between 20 and 7E may be represented by themselves).


PGP stands for Pretty Good Privacy. It is a free Public Key Cryptography program originally written by Philip Zimmerman, and it is available for a variety of computers, including PCs with MS-DOS.

PGP lets you encrypt your messages so that only the intended receiver can read them, or it lets you sign the messages with a digital signature so that the receiver can verify that the message did indeed come from you, or you can both encrypt and sign.

PGP can be downloaded from all major Anonymous-FTP sites, but beware of US export restrictions. If you live in the US, you must get a version from a site in the US; if you live outside, you must get a version from outside.

If you have access to the World Wide Web, you should take a look at the URL: http://www.ifi.uio.no/~staalesc/PGP/versions.html, for information about the latest versions of PGP.


Uniform Resource Locator. This is a way to tell where an electronic document can be found on the Internet and which method to use to get it.


Internet Assigned Numbers Authority. This is the Internet committee in charge of ensuring that everyone on the Internet have their own unique Internet address, and that there is a general agreement on what to call things.


A message of type Multipart/Mixed contains several independent message parts. OPMail handles such messages in the built-in viewer by displaying the messages one after the other.


A message of type Multipart/Parallel contains several messages to be viewed simultaneously. OPMail handles this type of message by starting a viewer for each contained message.


A message of type Multipart/Alternative contains several versions of the same message, ordered by increasing preference by the sender. Usually, the first version will be in plain text, so that a receiver without special viewers can read it, while the last message will be in the most advanced format.

OPMail handles this type of message by starting a viewer for last version for which OPMail knows a viewer.


A message of type Message/Partial is one of a set of messages which make up a larger message. When a message is too large to send as one, it can be split into several smaller messages of type Message/Partial, each containing a piece of the whole message.

OPMail transparently handles splitting and reassembling of large messages using this technique.


Normally, a character is shown on the screen using a pattern of dark and light dots. For small fonts or on low resolution displays this pattern of dots can be clearly visible in slanted lines as in an A or a w. Anti-aliasing not only uses dark and light dots but also intermediate shades to make slanted and round edges appear smoother.


A Character Set is a relation between binary codes and characters. It does not define how each character looks.

A Typeface defines the glyphs, i.e. the graphical appearances, for a set of characters, but does not assign binary codes to each character.

A Font is a combination of a character set and a typeface, that is, it directly defines the relation between binary codes and character appearances.

When you choose a font to represent a character set, be sure to use a font that is based on the character set you want it to represent. Most western versions of Windows come with fonts that are all based on the ISO-8859-1 (aka. Latin-1) character set.


ISO-8859 Character sets

The ISO-8859 character sets are:

ISO-8859-1	Latin-1 (Western European)

ISO-8859-2	Latin-2 (Slavic, Central European)

ISO-8859-3	Latin-3 (Esperanto, Galician, Maltese, Turkish)

ISO-8859-4	Latin-4 (Baltic)

ISO-8859-5	Latin/Cyrillic

ISO-8859-6	Latin/Arabic

ISO-8859-7	Latin/Greek

ISO-8859-8	Latin/Hebrew

ISO-8859-9	Latin-5 (Latin-1 + Turkish)

ISO-8859-10	Latin-6 (Nordic, incl. Inuit and Sami)

Note, that in Russia KOI8-R is preferred over ISO-8859-5.