1.\" $NetBSD: comsat.8,v 1.13 2004/06/25 17:36:04 wiz Exp $ 2.\" 3.\" Copyright (c) 1983, 1991, 1993 4.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 5.\" 6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 8.\" are met: 9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 13.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 14.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 15.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 16.\" without specific prior written permission. 17.\" 18.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 19.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 20.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 21.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 22.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 23.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 24.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 25.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 26.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 27.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 28.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 29.\" 30.\" from: @(#)comsat.8 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/4/93 31.\" 32.Dd June 25, 2004 33.Dt COMSAT 8 34.Os 35.Sh NAME 36.Nm comsat 37.Nd biff server 38.Sh SYNOPSIS 39.Nm 40.Op Fl l 41.Sh DESCRIPTION 42.Nm 43is the server process which receives reports of incoming mail 44and notifies users if they have requested this service. 45.Nm 46receives messages on a datagram port associated with the 47.Dq biff 48service 49specification (see 50.Xr services 5 51and 52.Xr inetd 8 ) . 53The one line messages are of the form: 54.Pp 55.Dl user@mailbox-offset 56.Pp 57If the 58.Em user 59specified is logged in to the system and the associated terminal has 60the owner execute bit turned on (by a 61.Dq Li biff y ) , 62the 63.Em offset 64is used as a seek offset into the appropriate mailbox file and 65the first 7 lines or 560 characters of the message are printed 66on the user's terminal. 67Lines which appear to be part of the message header other than the 68.Dq From , 69.Dq \&To , 70.Dq Date , 71or 72.Dq Subject 73lines are not included in the displayed message. 74.Sh OPTIONS 75The 76.Nm 77program supports this option: 78.Bl -tag -width 12345 79.It Fl l 80The 81.Fl l 82option turns on 83.Xr syslogd 8 84log messages. 85.El 86.Sh FILES 87To find out who's logged on and on what terminals 88.Nm 89consults: 90.Pp 91.Bl -tag -width /var/run/utmpx -compact 92.It Pa /var/run/utmp 93.It Pa /var/run/utmpx 94.El 95.Sh SEE ALSO 96.Xr biff 1 , 97.Xr inetd 8 , 98.Xr syslogd 8 99.Sh HISTORY 100The 101.Nm 102command appeared in 103.Bx 4.2 . 104.Sh BUGS 105The message header filtering is prone to error. 106The density of the information presented is near the theoretical minimum. 107.Pp 108Users should be notified of mail which arrives on other 109machines than the one to which they are currently logged in. 110.Pp 111The notification should appear in a separate window so it 112does not mess up the screen. 113.Pp 114.Nm 115runs as root so that it can open the users maildrop. 116