I have a somewhat urgent need to start using PROCMAIL to bounce unwanted
mail (harassment) back to its source, with a few lines of warning text. I
understand from my ISP's tech spt that PROCMAIL is ideal for this (among
many other things). They have version 3.11pre3 installed.
I would really appreciate some quick-start help getting this set up, then
I'll fine tune and expand my use of procmail later, and when proficient,
come in here and help other newbies.
I am familiar with the concepts of filtering mail, if using Eudora's
filters can qualify for that. I have dozens of Eudora mailboxes and about
as many working filters. With Eudora I've set up a system for anticipated
annoying incoming mail (from the e-mail address of a persistent, annoying
person). I filter the messages into the trash mailbox. Trash gets emptied
every time I exit the program. Plus, I can "Reply With" a template message
describing that their mail is not being read by any humans. (I'd like to
configure this to also send a copy of the bounced messages to their ISP.)
This system works very well, but anyone who knows how to read the message
header of the reply can see that their messages are from Eudora, and
therefore are getting to my system, and they probably figure the messages
are being read anyway. This tends to encourage, rather than discourage them.
I'd like to make this filtering (just for this one type of message) and
autoresponse happen on the server, so the messages don't even get to my
system.
I am somewhat familiar with UNIX (was a self-taught UNIX System
Administrator by necessity at one job for a year and a half). I use some
UNIX when telnetting to my home directory - created a .plan file, can get
around in the command prompt (ksh), have transferred files, and have
several web pages. So, at least I'm not a totally ignorant novice.
Not to be critical of all the very fine work, but the procmail man page and
what I've seen on Alan Stebbens' E-Mail Software Page are not geared for
someone in my position. They, like so much documentation out there, are
good as a reference for someone who already knows how to do it - and could
be used to get started after a very lengthy analysis and study of the mass
of technical information.
To me, a recipe is something used in the kitchen, not on my computer - and
I haven't seen anything out there that simply tells you what a procmail
recipe really is and where it goes (recipe is just one example), so you can
at least get an idea of what's going on.
I need to get my feet wet with a simple installation, get an overall
understanding of how the whole thing is structured, then build on it
gradually. Can someone help?
In case it helps, procmail reports:
Locking strategies: dotlocking
Default rcfile: $HOME/.procmailrc
System mailbox: $HOME/.incoming_mail
Thank you very much in advance.
______________________________________________________________________
Tom Held Voice: (520)459-2411 Fax: (520)459-2412
132 Judd Street E-Mail: ............. tomheld(_at_)primenet(_dot_)com
Sierra Vista, AZ 85635 URL: .... http://www.primenet.com/~tomheld
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