.\" Copyright (c) 1980 Regents of the University of California.
.\" All rights reserved. The Berkeley software License Agreement
.\" specifies the terms and conditions for redistribution.
.\" @(#)msgs.1 6.3 (Berkeley) %G%
msgs \- system messages and junk mail program
is used to read system messages.
sent by mailing to the login `msgs' and should be short
pieces of information which are suitable to be read once by most users
is normally invoked each time you login, by placing it in the file
It will then prompt you with the source and subject of each new message.
If there is no subject line, the first few non-blank lines of the
message will be displayed.
If there is more to the message, you will be told how
long it is and asked whether you wish to see the rest of the message.
The possible responses are:
type the rest of the message.
and go on to the next message.
redisplay the last message.
the next time you run the program it will pick up where you left off.
append the current message to the file ``Messages'' in the current directory;
`s\-' will save the previously displayed message. A `s' or `s\-' may
be followed by a space and a file name to receive the message replacing
the default ``Messages''.
or `m\-' causes a copy of the specified message to be placed in a temporary
to be invoked on that mailbox.
Both `m' and `s' accept a numeric argument in place of the `\-'.
keeps track of the next message you will see by a number in the file
it keeps a set of files whose names are the (sequential) numbers
of the messages they represent.
shows the low and high number of the messages in the directory
can quickly determine if there are no messages for you.
is incorrect it can be fixed by removing it;
file the next time it is run.
option is used for setting up the posting of messages. The line
msgs: "| /usr/ucb/msgs \-s"
to enable posting of messages.
option is used for performing cleanup on
option should be placed in
to run every night. This will remove all messages over 21 days old.
A different expiration may be specified on the command line to override
Options when reading messages include:
which causes it not to say ``No new messages.''.
file since this is often the case here.
Queries whether there are messages, printing
``There are new messages.'' if there are.
The command ``msgs \-q'' is often used in login scripts.
to print the first part of messages only.
option causes only locally originated messages to be reported.
A message number can be given
on the command line, causing
to start at the specified message rather than at the next message
prints the first part of all messages.
messages back from the one indicated by your
file, useful for reviews of recent messages.
causes long messages to be piped through
you can also go to any specific message by typing its number when
requests input as to what to do.
~/.msgsrc number of next message to be presented
aliases(5), crontab(5), mail(1), more(1)