                                           VBBS 6.11 Documentation -- 6-B-1


         ͻ
          CHAPTER SIX ANNEX B    E-MAIL FUNCTIONS                        
         ͼ

                E-mail is the "private" version of messaging, and many of
         the functions within E-mail are very similar to their messaging
         counterparts.
                The VBBS mail functions are quite powerful.  When a user
         logs onto your system, VBBS will do a mailbox scan.  If the user
         has new mail waiting, he or she will be informed of the new mail
         and prompted to access the mailbox at that time.  The VBBS E-mail
         prompt offers choices to present a queue of new and unread mail,
         ALL mail, or to search for mail from a specific user by name or
         partial name.  Users may also access mail that has been sent and 
         not yet read by a local addressee, or not yet bundled into an 
         outgoing network packet for a network addressee.
                VBBS also offers the sysop a means for dealing with users
         who abuse E-mail privileges; all it requires is dropping the
         guilty user's SL below the minimum required to be able to send
         E-mail.


         Main Menu Commands and What They Do -- E-Mail
         

         [M] Mailbox Scan       Manually check mailbox for mail -- new,
                                 ALL, or by author search
         [Y] Mail You've Sent   Check mail you've sent BEFORE you log off;
                                 once you log off, network mail is bundled
                                 into the outgoing net packet.  If the re-
                                 cipient is local and has not read it, you 
                                 may still access it.
         [E] Write E-Mail       Write an E-mail to another user, network
                                 or local.
         [F] Feedback to        Automatically directs mail to the sysop.
              Sysop
         [G] Multi-Mail         Users with an appropriate SL may store up
                                 to 9 separate "mailing lists" which may
                                 include a number of local, FidoNet,
                                 VirtualNET, and/or WWIVNet/WWIVLink ad-
                                 dresses.  It is important that respon-
                                 sible network usage of this feature is
                                 maintained.


         Addressing E-mail
         

                VBBS has several methods of addressing E-mail; even if
         you're not sure of the recipient's name, handle, or user number,
         there's usually a way to get E-mail to him/her.

         1) If you're E-mailing a local user, you may send the mail to
            the user's handle, or user number.  If you're not sure of any 
            of this, you can type in a partial name; VBBS will prompt you 

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            for additional information.  If, for example, you were logged 
            onto VirtualNET node @6160 and wanted to E-mail "John Some-
            thing-or-other", you could type in JOHN as the addressee; VBBS
            would prompt back

                John Bok (John Bok) User #1?  (Yes/No/Enter=Yes)

            If the name rang a bell, you could simply press [Enter] and
            the E-mail process would be underway.  If not, and there were
            any other users with the handle "John ______", you'd be
            prompted for each one until you either got the right one or
            ran out of users.

            Note that it DOES make a difference if the board you're on
            allows handles; if you type in a user's real name and that
            user uses an alias, you WON'T be prompted for the correct
            name.

         2) If you're E-mailing over VirtualNET, you may address your
            E-mail to any user on any VirtualNET system, either by name
            or by user number.  If, for example, you were E-mailing
            "The Mighty Quinn" at VirtualNET node @2057, but weren't sure
            of his user number on that system, you could address the
            mail to "The Mighty Quinn @2057", and it would get there.
            You could also mail "1 @2057" with equal success.

            Note that if the addressee doesn't have an account on the
            system you sent the mail to, it's lost; there's no way for
            you as a user to re-route the mail to its proper recipient.
            There IS a provision for mail forwarding -- that will be 
            discussed shortly.


         Oneliners
         

                Whenever an E-mail is received by the addressee (local or
         network), the user that sent the mail receives a one-line "return
         receipt" that informs the sender that his/her E-mail was read and
         when it was read.  Oneliners are also sent to inform a user who
         has uploaded a file that the file has been downloaded by another
         user (local and network).
                On multi-user installations, if a user has written E-mail
         to another user who is on the system at the same time, that user
         will receive a real-time oneliner informing him/her that E-mail
         has just been sent to his/her mailbox.  If the user sending the
         E-mail was unaware that the other user was online, VBBS will in-
         form him/her that the addressee was online and a oneliner has
         been sent.


         Prepared Text Uploading
         

                As in the messaging functions, the VBBS full-screen edi-
        

                                           VBBS 6.11 Documentation -- 6-B-3


         tor [VFSE] will allow the insertion of prepared text through up-
         loading.  To upload text remotely, press "/U" or "[Esc][Esc] U"
         after positioning the cursor at the desired insertion point with-
         in the E-mail or post.
                Local uploads are simply pathed to the directory and file
         you would like to include.


         Attached Files to E-Mail
         

                VBBS features a unique ability to attach a file to an
         E-mail.  The sysop may choose to make this feature available to
         users by defining its minimum security level in VCONFIG.  If a
         user has been given an appropriate security level, VBBS will ask
         whether he/she would like to attach a file to the current mail
         before saving.  If the user selects "yes", then the upload prompt
         appears and the user may attach a file of any size.

         ͻ    This feature works across VirtualNET, as well; currently,
         ͼ    the generally accepted size limit for network attached
                files is around 30K.  Anything larger than that definitely
                nitely raises a few eyebrows on the systems through which
                the E-mail must pass, and may even be stopped in transit.

                When an attached file is "received" by a user in E-mail,
         the existence of the file is shown at the bottom of the message
         header giving the name of the file and file size; the user is
         prompted to press [T] to transfer (download) the file from the
         BBS.
                The local sysop may attach a file from anywhere on the
         system by simply providing the path and filename at the prompt
         after choosing "yes".


         E-Mail Forwarding
         

                According to security level, a user may forward a piece
         of mail he or she has either sent or received to another user.
         Mail forwarding may be done both locally and through any net-
         work in which the BBS participates.  If a piece of mail is mis-
         directed to the correct system but the wrong user, the sysop
         (or the user himself, if allowed) may forward the mail to the
         correct user, if the correct address is known.


         Carbon Copies
         

                According to SL, a user may send carbon copies (CC:s) of
         an unsaved E-mail to other users, both locally and across the
         network.  When that E-mail is received by each CC:d user, it
         shows each network address that received a carbon-copy.
                If the sysop allows users carbon copies but not multi-
         

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         mail functions (see below), this feature may be used as a "poor
         man's multi-mail"; the primary difference is that the mailing
         list for carbon copies is not saveable.


         Multi-Mail and Mailing Lists
         

                According to SL (and generally restricted to higher se-
         curity levels), a user can maintain up to 9 separate "mailing
         lists", which can include an unlimited number of entries, both
         local and on any networks in which the BBS participates.
                This feature can be quite useful if you're involved in
         a project involving many users, such as an online role-playing
         game, political activity, or writers' roundtable; once again,
         the importance of responsible use of this feature CANNOT be
         overstated.  Using multi-mail for networked "junk mail" will
         be brought to the Network Coordinator's attention; he will take
         whatever action he deems appropriate.


         Account Forwarding
         

                If you have a network address that you write to regularly,
         you might decide to create a local account for that user and then
         configure that user's mailbox (in [D]efaults) to forward mail 
         sent to it to the proper network address.  That way, you can use 
         "Mike" or "24" (or whatever the local ID is) in place of entering 
         the whole network address each time you initiate E-mail.


         Automatic New-User E-Mail
         

                Each time a new user logs onto your system, VBBS sends him
         a "welcome" E-mail that automatically appears in his mailbox.  
         The name of this file is NEWUMAIL.TXT, and it should be placed
         in your \TXT directory.  You may edit this file according to your 
         needs.


         Form Letters
         

                Form letters can be used anywhere you are sending mail --
         from feedback, from regular E-mail, from replying to E-mail,
         and also from multi-mail.
                When prompted for the title, the sysop enters "\" (a back-
         slash, without the quotes), followed by a number from 1 to 99.
         An example would be

                \31

         In the above example, VBBS would then look for a file named
         

                                           VBBS 6.11 Documentation -- 6-B-5

         FORM.31 in your \TXT directory.  The real message title is pul-
         led from the first line of the file; the rest of the file becomes
         the message text.  It should be noted that the filename should
         NOT have any leading zeroes in the extension (e.g., FORM.4 is
         okay, but FORM.004 is not); this is similar to the filename ex-
         tension rule for taglines (see "System Taglines" for details).
                When you've given the form letter a filename, follow the
         prompts for attached file and CC:s, and it is saved.  Quick,
         clean, and a minimum of keystrokes.


         VBBS DIRECTmail Interface
         

                Using the VBBS DIRECTmail interface, any VBBS sysop may
         send E-mail, with or without attached file, to another VBBS
         sysop.  When you want to use this feature, select [D]IRECTmail
         at the E-mail prompt; then enter the full data phone number of
         the system you wish to send mail to.  You will get an "Unknown
         System" message back; ignore it and go on with the process.
         Multiple DIRECTmail to different destinations may be sent during
         the same session.

                Once you've written the DIRECTmail, drop to WFC and use
         the [N] command to force a callout to that system; if the line
         is busy, VBBS will retry as many times as you have specified in
         VCONFIG.

                The beauty of this system is that when the other system
         answers, your computer sends the DIRECTmail and hangs up imme-
         diately.  Again, it's quick and clean.

         --> IMPORTANT NOTE: To use DIRECTmail, BOTH sysops must have 
                             this feature enabled in VCONFIG.


         File Requesting - FREQing
         

                VBBS also has the ability to request files in conjunction
         with the DIRECTmail function.  To request files, simply enter the
         appropriate information on the title line of e-mail sent by
         DIRECTmail using the following format:

         Title:  FREQ  <filename.ext> <filename.ext> <filename.ext>

                FREQ must be the first word entered on the line, followed
         by one space, and then the complete name of the file requested,
         including the extension.  Multiple files may be requested as long
         as there is one space between each of the filenames.

                                           VBBS 6.11 Documentation -- 6-B-6

         E-Mail Sub-Menu
         

                Below is the hard-coded E-mail sub-menu; again, altering
         this menu requires a source-code modification.

         [Enter] Next E-Mail            Advances to next E-mail.                                        
           [R]   Reply to E-Mail        Reply to the E-mail you're cur-
                                         rently reading.
           [A]   Re-Read E-Mail         Redisplays the current E-mail.
           [D]   Delete E-Mail          Delete the current E-mail.  It's
                                         a good idea to encourage users
                                         to delete their E-mail once
                                         they've read and/or replied to
                                         it, because old E-mail DOES
                                         take up hard-drive space.
           [Q]   Quit Reading E-mail    Quits to communications menu.
           [T]   Download Attached      If a file is attached, this will
                  File                   allow the remote user to down-
                                         load the attached file.



          [###]  Read Mail Number ###   Jump to E-mail number entered.

          Sysop 

         [X]  Extract Text              Allows sysop to save message as a
                                         text file.  Again, it's a good
                                         idea to NOT use the .TXT exten-
                                         sion on E-mail.
         [F]  Forward                   Forward E-mail to another user,
                                         either locally or across any
                                         networks in which the BBS par-
                                         ticipates.
         [V]  Validate User             Jumps to the author's account in-
                                          ormation in the user editor.
                                          Useful when reading new-user
                                          feedback.


                Just a few parting words about E-mail -- sysops should
         encourage their users to take advantage of this feature of VBBS
         (or any networked BBS system, for that matter), especially if
         the BBS does not charge for its services.  The communications
         potential here is enormous but, sadly, is one of the most under-
         utilized features of BBS software.

                                         VBBS 6.11 Documentation --6-B-7




         ͻ    Another important use of E-mail that is seldom addressed
         ͼ    in reference manuals (until now) is in resolving "flame
                wars".  On occasion, discussions in local and networked
                message bases will deteriorate into name-calling and
                "bashing"; on such occasions, the issue is best resolved
                in E-mail, rather than on public message bases.  Please
                encourage your users to not engage in flaming, and if
                they happen to become involved in a flame war, please
                instruct them to take it into E-mail, rather than con-
                tinuing to spew vitriolic garbage across the network,
                where it can have detrimental effects on the message subs
                (these are strong words, but having seen the effects of
                flaming on more than one message base, I wanted to get
                your attention).



