MultiMail

MultiMail compilation and installation procedure

These instructions assume that you’re compiling MultiMail from source. For precompiled binaries, see the README files that accompany them instead.

  1. Make sure any needed packages are installed – In addition to the MultiMail package itself, you’ll also need InfoZip or PKZIP (and/or LHA, ARJ, etc.) to uncompress the packets and compress the replies. InfoZip is available from:

    http://infozip.sf.net/

    (PKZIP is the default for DOS; InfoZip is the default for other platforms.) The programs should be installed somewhere in the PATH; otherwise, the full path must be specified in ~/.mmailrc.

    To compile MultiMail, you’ll need curses – either ncurses, SysV curses (e.g., Solaris curses), or PDCurses. You can get ncurses from:

    https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/

    PDCurses is available at:

    https://pdcurses.org/

    (If you’re using Linux, you probably already have ncurses and InfoZip.)

    If using PDCurses, MultiMail now requires version 3.6 or later.

    The 16-bit MS-DOS Turbo C++ port also uses Ralf Brown’s SPAWNO library:

    https://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/ralf/pub/WWW/files.html

  2. Configure it (for compilation) – Check the options and paths in the Makefile. If curses.h isn’t in the include path, change CURS_DIR as appropriate. You may also need to change LIBS. These can be set on the command line, e.g. “make CURS_DIR=/pdcurses”.

  3. Compile MultiMail – At the base directory, type: make

  4. Run it – Type: ./mm (For DOS, OS/2 or Windows, set the MMAIL or HOME variable, then run mm.)

  5. (Optional:) Configure it (for end user) – Edit the ~/.mmailrc file. (For DOS, OS/2 or Windows, mmail.rc.)

  6. (Optional:) Install it system-wide – Type: make install to install the manual and binary under /usr/local (requires root access). (This doesn’t work in DOS, OS/2 or Windows.)

See the man page and [README.md] for more information.

This package includes some example color schemes, in the “colors” directory. To select one, use the “ColorFile” keyword in .mmailrc .

Support for XCurses (PDCurses)

When MultiMail is compiled with XCurses, you can use the X resource database to set certain startup options. Here are some example resources:

XCurses*normalFont: 9x15
XCurses*boldFont:   9x15bold
XCurses*lines:      30
XCurses*cols:       80

For details, see the PDCurses documentation.

If you’re using a non-X text editor with an XCurses version of MultiMail, it will work better if you set MultiMail’s editor variable to “xterm -e $EDITOR” instead of just “$EDITOR” (the default).

Compile notes: Windows, MS-DOS, and OS/2

In the MultiMail source, separate makefiles are provided for these ports.

Makefile     - GCC (including DJGPP and MinGW)
Makefile.bcc - Borland C++ (Windows, MS-DOS)
Makefile.vc  - Microsoft Visual C++ (Windows)
Makefile.wcc - Watcom (All platforms -- Windows by default)

Point to your installation of PDCurses and compile with, e.g.:

make -f Makefile.bcc CURS_DIR=/pdcurs38 SYS=DOS

(Use “wmake” instead of “make” for Watcom; “nmake” for MSVC.)