Here's how to send email on just one line: To send gail the file foo.txt in a mail message with the subject "Hi, gail" try: elm -s 'Hi, amy' amy < foo.txt That also works for regular (BSD-style) mail, eg mail -s "hello there" amy < hello.txt

Within a script, I'm using a command like this to send e-mail: /usr/sbin/Mail < messagefile -s "some subject" someone@somewhere.com Works fine, except that if the destination happens to be a local one (on the same system) then there is no domain name on the From: address when it arrives in that person's mailbox. If the recipient picks up their mail via POPmail while dialed in through another ISP, and then tries to reply, the reply fails due to the absence of a domain name. So to force the domain name to appear in the From: address do this (echo "From: myname@mydomain Subject: some subject "; cat messagefile) | /usr/lib/sendmail -t Is there a better way?

Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1998 15:59:36 -0500 From: Wietse Venema Subject: Wietse's Postfix (was VMailer) software release The Postfix mail system is to be released as open source code via the IBM AlphaWorks web site on December 14th, 1998. The URL is: http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/ (N.B. this site uses javascript) Postfix is my attempt to provide an alternative to the Sendmail program, which probably delivers billions of email messages daily. Postfix attempts to be fast, easy to configure, reliable and secure. The source code is released at no cost and with no strings attached. You are encouraged to install/use/enhance/sell Postfix anywhere. After the initial release by IBM, the Postfix software is expected to evolve under control by its users. Future releases are expected to happen from outside IBM. As the original author I will coach the Postfix evolution for a while. Additional information is available via a collection of web sites dedicated to the Postfix software: http://www.postfix.org/ Among others, these sites carry software that was contributed by the Postfix alpha testers, a small list with Postfix errata, and information about Postfix mailing lists. Happy Postfixing! Wietse