From: [g j schmid] at [io.org] (Greg Schmidt)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.archives
Subject: RESOURCE: FTP Files (mail server help file)
Date: 14 Dec 93 02:10:06 GMT
Article-I.D.: rodan.2ekaeuINNb9n


Imagine my surprise when I logged on today, and found that my FTP files list
had been reposted!  Well folks, the list that was posted is rather out of date
(most of what's listed is still available, but the new stuff's missing), but I
am working on a newer version.  It should be posted around the New Year.  In
the meantime, to stem the flow of requests for help with my mail server, I am
posting the help file here.  Also around the New Year, I should be getting a
UUCP connection to my site, so that the "S" in "SAMS" will stand for "Simple"
instead of "Semi".  In the meantime, replies may take a couple of days, but
I will get back to you eventually.  A revised help file will follow at that
time.


Help file for SAMS (Semi-Automated Mail Server)
-----------------------------------------------

INTRODUCTION

The lines of your message will be scanned one at a time and processed according
to the following.  Each line must consist of a command, which may be followed
by various parameters.  Any blank line, or line beginning with # is ignored.
All requests should be sent to my new address ([g j schmid] at [io.org]), preferably
with a subject line which mentions "SAMS" (or "FTP" or "FILES" or "ARCHIVE" or
"MAIL SERVER").

The valid commands are: end, get, help, list, set.


END

The 'end' command indicates that this is the end of the file.  The archive will
be created, and the remainder of the file will be ignored.  Any gratuitous
thanks can safely go after this command.


GET

The 'get' command will get a file, or group of files.  Standard UNIX wildcards
are accepted.  If the 'set nopath' command has been executed, the pathname will
be discarded; otherwise the current directory will be added to the beginning.
If the argument is a directory, everything under that directory (including any
subdirectories) will be sent.  Take care with this command.

Examples:
    get *
    get [0-9]*.*
    get games/*

Invalid:
    get


HELP

The 'help' command will send the latest version of this file.  The output will
be stored in a file called 'help' in the root directory of the archive.

Example:
    help


LIST

The 'list' command will list the contents of the current directory.  The output
will be stored in a file called 'ls' under the current directory, overwriting
any existing ls file which may already exist (I will never name a news file ls,
so it will only be previous 'list' output).

Adding the 'long' parameter produces a long (ls -l) listing.

Adding the 'recurse' parameter produces a recursive (ls -R) listing.

Examples:
    list

    list long recurse

    list long [0-9]*

Invalid:
    list recurse long

    list [0-9]* long

    (actually, both of the above are valid; they just treat long as a filename)


SET

The 'set' command will set one of the parameters for the transfer.  This
command has several parameters: address, file, nopath, path, size, and type.


The 'address' parameter sets the address to mail the archive to.  It defaults
to the address of the sender.

Example:
    set address [g j schmidt] at [io.org]

Invalid:
    set address


The 'file' parameter sets the name of the archive file.  It defaults to 'news',
plus the appropriate extension due to the archive type.  Executing a 'set file'
when files have already been added through a previous 'set file' will start a
new archive.  This may be useful to reduce the size of messages if your mail
server chokes on large files.

Example:
    set file netbooks
    get ...            }
    get ...            } These will all go into the netbooks archive
    get ...            }
    set file misc
    ...                } Anything here will go into the misc archive

Invalid:
    set file


The 'nopath' parameter indicates that you do not wish to have pathnames saved
in the archive.  This may be toggled by a later use of 'set nopath' if you
want to include only some paths.  (The first instance turns off pathnames, the
second turns them back on, the third turns them off, etc.)

Example:
    set nopath


The 'path' parameter sets the current path to retrieve files from.  The path
given will be treated as absolute under the base news directory (ie. no
relative paths allowed).  Unless the 'set nopath' command is given, the
current path will be included in the archive.

Example:
    set path stories/misc

Invalid:
    set path

    set path ../net.books


The 'size' parameter sets the maximum size for return messages, in characters.
The uuencoded file produced by your request will be broken into pieces smaller
than this value, and each piece will be mailed individually, with appropriate
headers to make re-combination easy.  This is useful for people who live at
nodes which can't handle large mail messages, or for people who have small
disk quotas.  The default is to send the entire archive in one message, which
can also be specified by setting the size to 0.

Examples:
    set size 250000

    set size 0

Invalid:
    set size


The 'type' parameter sets the archive method to use.  Valid types are: arc
(version 5.21e), cpio (-c for ASCII headers), shar, tar, text, zip (info-zip
version 1.9, compatible with PKZip 2.04g), and zoo (version 2.1).
Additionally, compress, pack, and gzip are available to compress the archive
if you specify shar, tar, text or cpio format.  Note that arc cannot recurse
into subdirectories, so if you are using it, you must also give the 'set
nopath' command.  The default is to use a compressed tar archive.

Examples:
    set type zip

    set type tar
    set type compress

Invalid:
    set type

    set type arc,compress


EXAMPLE

Following is an example, which should hopefully make the jumble above a little
more comprehensible.

Suppose you want to request the entire net.items.book, saving the directory
structure, stored in a zip archive called "items.zip".  You also want chapters
1-10 of Navero, throwing away the path names (just saving by filename), stored
in a compressed tar archive called "navero.tar.Z".  Finally, you want to
request all of the adventures, again saving the directory structure, stored in
a zoo archive called "adventures.zoo".

The following request would handle this entire package, resulting in three
uuencoded messages being sent to you.  # lines are comments.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Set your return address
set address [g j schmidt] at [io.org]

# Get the items book
set file items
set type zip
set path frp/net.books
# getting a directory automatically recurses
get items

# Get the Navero chapters
set nopath
set file navero
set type tar
set type compress
set path stories/navero
# chapter numbers are padded with zeroes, so 1 is 01, 2 is 02, etc.
get 0* 10*

# Get the adventures
# the second "set nopath" toggles the setting back to saving pathnames
set nopath
set files adventures
set type zoo
set path frp/adventures
get *

# That's all
end
----------------------------------------------------------------------------