Using MH with POP

The msgchk and inc commands can work across the network to a mail server which runs POP. The details of handling POP are site-specific; there are too many different possibilities to cover here. Basically, once your host has been configured for one flavor or another of POP, you can use inc and msgchk as explained in this chapter -- but you'll also need to give a password in most cases. The POP support in MH 6.8 was enhanced to include more-secure ways of handling passwords called APOP and KPOP. Check with your system administrator.

The POP version of inc has a -pack switch, which is used with msh. Of course, inc with POP drops mail into a folder on the host where you run inc, not on the mail server host.

NOTE: xmh Release 4 may not work correctly with POP. If you have that problem, try this workaround. Set the following resources. The first (which is empty) is required. You'll probably need the other two, as well:

      Xmh.InitialIncFile:
      Xmh.CheckFrequency: 0
      Xmh.CheckNewMail: true
      

This problem was fixed in xmh Release 5.

Depending on how your POP support was configured and what the remote POP server can do, you may be able to use the commands and options listed in the following table.

Table: Some Changes to MH Under POP

inc(1)

Add -host, -user, -apop, -rpop switches

msgchk(1)

Add -host, -user, -apop, -rpop switches

pop(5)

List of POP users on a server

popauth(8)

Control secret code (like passwords) for APOP users

popi(1)

Interactive POP command

popwrd(8)

Set a POP user password