Copyright: ® aAsys Research and Development 1995


Contents
aAsys Courier Contents

Select a topic:

Introduction

Installation

Configuration

Sending mail to the Internet

Receiving mail from the Internet

Mail attachment considerations

Options Menu

Setup Menu

Help Menu

Log File Contents

Registration info

Registration Form

Support and Enquiries


Introduction

Welcome to aAsys Courier, the most efficient solution to linking the Internet to MicrosoftMail LANs.

The traditional way to link your MS Mail LAN to the Internet is to use a mail gateway.  The software used to implement these is expensive and requires a lot of administration adding to the burden on LAN managers.

aAsys Courier takes a completely different approach.  It allows any organisation to use just one account on the Internet.  Courier reads mail from this account and uses theInternet addressing to either forward it to the intended recipient via MS Mail or, if unable to identify the recipient, to a nominated Postal Clerk.  Similarly, users on the MS Mail LAN wishing to send mail to the Internet, simply forward their mail to a single MS Mail account.  At regular intervals, Courier reads the mail from this account and sends it to the Internet.  MS Mail users only have to follow a couple of simple rules to ensure that their mail is forwarded to the Internet properly.  The only administrative overhead is to ensure that the Postal Clerk account is browsed periodically for ambiguously addressed mail.

Courier's operations are fully automated.  It will contact the organisation's Internet provider at intervals determined in the configuration and send and retrieve mail passing it between the Internet and the MS Mail LAN.  However, if an administrator wishes to override the Timer facility then the Mail menu allows sending and retrieving of mail.  The Timer will continue to operate as usual.  It should only be necessary to use the menu overrides if the administrator is aware of urgent mail waiting on the Internet or waiting to be sent to it.


Installation

Courier runs on Windows 3.1 in 4MB RAM and requires at least a 386Sx/16.  To provide room for mail attachments to be saved temporarily to disk during operation, it is recommended that at least 10MB on hard disk space is available.

Courier is not compressed on disk at all.  Install it in its own directory using any of the usual Windows methods.  The files that come with the package are:

courier.exe	- executable program

uucode.dll	- uuencoding and decoding dynamic link library

base64.dll	- base64 encoding and decoding dynamic link library

quoprint.dll 	- quoted-printable decoding dynamic link library

binhex.dll	- binhex decoding dynamic link library

courier.wri 	- manual in Windows Write format

courier.hlp	- this file.

Winsock.DLL needs to be in the Windows system directory.  For automated operation a dial on demand Winsock is needed (e.g. Trumpet Winsock 2.1B).  Trumpet Winsock is widely available as shareware.

In addition Courier will create and use several other files during its operation.

Courier.ini - this is the initialisation file.  Upon the first successful configuration of the program this file will be created in the Windows directory.

Courier.log is the log file.  When Error Logging is activated, Courier will keep a diary of its major operations in this text file.  Administrators should occasionally erase the log file using the provided menu option, otherwise you will find your hard disk space slowly disappearing.

Various other files are created and deleted by Courier during its operations.  If, for some reason, the program terminates abnormally then you may see one because Courier didn't get a chance to delete it.  This should not affect future operation of the program.  Some of the names used are: 'courier.uue', 'courier.uud', 'courier.b64', 'courier.qp', 'courier.pop' and 'courier.smt'.

When reading mail from MS Mail various temporary files will be created by the Microsoft program.  Courier attempts to delete all of these.  MS Mail saves these files in the directory specified in the TEMP environment variable,  so if any are missed they are easily found.

Apart from the INI file, all other files can be stored or are created in the directory where Courier is installed.  So, if the program needs to be uninstalled, it is simply a matter of removing the directory where Courier resides and deleting the INI file from the Windows directory.


Configuration

IMPORTANT NOTE:  Before running Courier for the first time you must ensure that the Logon account and password have been set up on the MS Mail LAN and that the name and password of the Postal Clerk account have been decided.

Courier is simple to configure.  After choosing Setup|Configure, the user is presented with a dialog box with five tabbed pages.

MS Mail

Internet

Dialing

Encoding

Other


MS Mail

The MS Mail tab has three options:

Logon account and password - This is the account Courier uses to logon to MS Mail at startup.  As this is the currently logged on account when Internet mail is forwarded, mail will accumulate in the Sent Mail box unless the MS Mail menu option is chosen to disable this.  In addition to this function, users on the MS Mail LAN send mail to this account. Courier then reads the mail at regular intervals and forwards it to the Internet.    This account can be password protected in accordance with normal MS Mail procedures. The password appears as asterisks on the screen and is encrypted in the .INI file.  For simplicity, the account should be called Internet.

Postal Clerk account -  If Courier cannot unambiguously determine the recipient of a message coming in off the Internet then it will forward it to this MS Mail account.  The person nominated as the Postal Clerk can then work out what to do with the mail at their leisure.

Incoming attachments directory - When retrieving mail from the Internet, Courier will save any attachments temporarily to this directory.  After an attachment is embedded in a MS Mail message, it is deleted.


Internet

The Internet tab has three options:

POP Account Name - This is the account on the server that holds the organisation's incoming Internet mail.  Note that this is only the top level user name not the full Domain Name.  Therefore, if the full account and Domain Name is: testing@courier.com.au then you would enter "testing" in this field.

SMTP Server Name - This is the machine that Courier contacts when forwarding mail from the MS Mail system to the Internet and vice versa.  Using the previous example, if the Domain Name is: testing@courier.com.au then you would enter "courier.com.au" in this field.

POP Account password - This password is used when logging onto the POP Account. This will appear as asterisks on the screen and will be encrypted in the .INI file.


Dialing

The Dialing tab provides two methods to regulate the sending and receiving of mail:

Timer - The first of these is a simple timer.  Using this method, Courier will automatically attempt to contact the Internet at intervals determined by this value.  It can be set at hourly intervals in the range 1 to 168.  Therefore, depending on how much Internet mail an organisation receives, Courier can be configured to check for it from once an hour to once a week.

Business hours - The second option is more flexible and is called a Business Hours option.  A starting time, ending time and interval are specified.  The start and end times are specified in 24 hour format and must be whole numbers (e.g. 5 o'clock in the afternoon is 17).  The interval must be a multiple of 15 and can be in the range 15 to 120 (i.e. between 15 minutes and 2 hours).  When this option is chosen, Courier will dial at the specified intervals between the specified hours.

Administrators should bear in mind that the Business Hours option can be used equally as easily as an Out of Hours option.  By specifying a start time of 0 (i.e. midnight) and an end time of 6, advantage can be taken of cheaper overnight rates provided by some Internet services.


Encoding

Courier can use MIME or the UUEncoding/decoding alghorithm when processing file attachments.  This configuration option is only meaningful for mail going from MS Mail to the Internet.  Courier will construct messages using the appropriate option.

Mail coming from the Internet is automatically checked.  If it is a MIME message, it will be processed as such, otherwise it will be processed as a basic text message with possible UUencoded or BinHex attachments.

While Courier can decode BinHex attachments it does not use this method to encode them.


MIME
MIME - (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)

This is a comprehensive protocol used to embed different types of files within an Internet email message


BINHEX

A method of encoding and compressing popular on Macintosh computers.


UUEncoding/decoding

This method of encoding and decoding data is popular among Unix users.


Other

The Other tab covers miscellaneous configuration options:

Stay logged in to MS Mail -  This is a simple yes/no choice.  Courier can log in to MS Mail when it first runs and stay logged in or it can log on and off as it needs to (i.e. when a timer operation is invoked).  This is purely a convenience option.

Error logging -  When this box is checked Courier will keep a log of its actions in a file called "courier.log".  Successful mail actions as well as errors are logged.  Administrators should use the Setup|Erase log file menu item to periodically delete the log file to prevent it from growing too large.


Sending Mail to the Internet

Before sending mail to the Internet, Courier retrieves waiting mail from the MS Mail LAN. MS Mail users send mail intended for the Internet to the special account set up by the administrator as mentioned earlier.

The "real" recipient of the mail is specified in the Subject field of the MS Mail message. For example to send a message to John Smith at account testing situated at courier.com.au, the MS Mail user would construct the subject field as follows:

testing@courier.com.au (John Smith)

Of course, the name in brackets is optional.

The Subject field in the MS Mail message can also be used to provide a subject for the Internet message.  The user types the subject heading followed by the | character (i.e. the character above the \ key on a standard US keyboard) and then types the name of the intended recipient of the message.  Therefore to send a message to John Smith, above, with a subject of Attached Business Plan, the user would type in the Subject field in MS Mail:

Attached Business Plan|testing@courier.com.au (John Smith).

Spaces are not necessary either side of the | character and should be avoided.

After reading the message from MS Mail, Courier sends it to the Internet using the SMTP.   Courier prepends two lines to the start of each message.  This message varies depending on whether the version in use is registered or not.

Courier appends the name of the person sending the message to the Originator line of the message.  Therefore, if Fred Brown has sent a message from his MS Mail account and his organisation's Internet address is workers@business.com.au then Courier will construct the message as coming from:

workers@business.com.au (Fred Brown)

Note that SMTP can only transmit 7-bit characters.  Courier scans the text of all mail messages and strips the eighth bit before transmission.  This will only affect special characters.  MS Mail users should stick to plain text when composing messages for the Internet.

Mail that is successfully sent from MS Mail is deleted by Courier from the Inbox of the Logon Account.


SMTP
SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol)

The protocol used on the Internet to send mail.


Receiving Mail from the Internet

Courier uses POP to retrieve mail from the Internet.  This is a simple protocol whereby a mail program contacts a remote POP server, issues some identification commands and retrieves any mail.

Courier scans each message and attempts to identify the intended recipient to forward the message to MS Mail.  Standard Internet mail addressing is in the format:

account@service-provider.organisation.country

However, more than one person may use an Internet account.  So a defacto standard of addressing has developed where the recipient's christian name and surname are appended to the address and enclosed by parentheses. An example would be:

testing@courier.com.au (John Smith)

Courier looks for these parentheses and attempts to resolve the enclosed name on theMS Mail LAN.  If successful, the mail will be forwarded directly to that person's MS Mail account.  If the person could not be identifed or the parentheses have not been used, Courier forwards the mail to the account of the Postal Clerk (set during configuration). The Postal Clerk can monitor this account and take whatever action he/she wishes with the message.  Using this method no database of names needs to be kept.  If an employee leaves the organisation and their MS Mail account is deleted, any mail will automatically start going to the Postal Clerk account.

It should be noted that all mail forwarded to the MS Mail LAN will appear in the Sent Mail box of the logged on MS Mail account unless MS Mail is configured not to do this.


POP
POP (Post Office Protocol)

The protocol used on the Internet to retrieve mail from providers


Mail attachment considerations

Courier is very flexible when processing mail attachments.  The administrator can choose to have MS Mail attachments UUEncoded or allow Courier to construct a MIME message.  Attachments in a MIME message will be encoded using the base64 method.  Courier does not encode messages using BinHex.

When reading mail from the Internet, Courier will recognise UUencoded and BinHex attachments and will also disassemble MIME messages for forwarding to the MS Mail LAN.  In addition to base64, Courier can decode messages encoded with the Quoted-Printable method. However, Courier does not use this method to encode messages as of this release.  A future version will make an assessment of the data to be encoded and if it is "almost" text, such as a Rich Text Format file, rather than a pure binary file, Courier will use the Quoted-Printable method rather than base64.

Please note that although the administrator specifies which method (UUEncoding or MIME) for the program to use, Courier automatically detects the type of encoding on incoming messages and takes appropriate action.

In this version Courier encodes and decodes while on line to the Internet.  If desired, time on line can be reduced by ensuring that the program runs on at least a 486Dx/66.


base64

The most popular method to encode data for sending in MIME messages


Quoted-Printable

A method of encoding data used in MIME messages when the data to be encoded is "almost" text (e.g. a word processing document).


Options Menu

The Options Menu provides the following commands:

Send Mail

Receive Mail

Send and Receive Mail

Exit


Send Mail Menu Command

This menu command will initiate a SMTP session with a remote server.  It is used only as a manual override of the timer system.

See:

Sending Mail to the Internet


Receive Mail Menu Command

This menu command will initiate a POP session with a remote server.  It is used only as a manual override of the timer system.

See:

Receiving Mail from the Internet


Send and Receive Mail Menu Command

This command will initiate a POP session immediately followed by a SMTP session.  It is used only as a manual override of the Timer system.

See:

Sending Mail to the Internet

Receiving Mail from the Internet


Exit Menu Command

This command ends the current Courier session.

If Courier is logged onto MS Mail then a log off will be initiated.


Setup Menu

The Setup Menu offers the following commands:

Configuration

Erase log file


Configuration Menu Command

This command produces a dialog box with five tabbed pages:

MS Mail

Internet

Dialing

Encoding

Other


Erase Log File Menu Command

If Error Logging is turned on as a configuration option then Courier will keep a log of its actions.  Choosing this command does not actually erase the file from disk but empties it.

See:

Log file contents


Help menu

The Help menu provides the following commands:

Contents

Search for help on

Using help

About


Contents Menu Command

This command displays the Contents page of this help file.


Search for help on Menu Command

This command displays the search box for finding help via a keyword.


Using help Menu Command

This command displays Windows help on help for instructions on how to drive the help system.


About Menu Command

This command provides a dialog box with the current version number and the Courier logo.


Log File Contents

Courier keeps a comprehensive log of its actions in a file called 'Courier.log'.  The file will be kept in the same directory as Courier unless a different Working Directory is specified in the Properties box from the Program Manager.

Users are advised the delete the log regularly as it does build rapidly.

The contents of the log file are not intended for end users but are to help us with bug reports.  Therefore, it is requested that a copy of the log be sent to us when reporting bugs.


Registration info

Courier is designed as a commercial product designed to meet the needs of small and large organisations.  However, we can supply it as shareware to enable you to try before you buy.

If, after 30 days, you decide to buy then either:

- fill out the Registration form and post or fax it to us; or

- email us; or

- ring us; or

- register on the World Wide Web page.

Addresses for all of the above methods are on Support and Enquiries.  We will send you a fully registered version immediately.  Pricing is included in the Write file but may not be up to date.  Contact us for current details.

If you don't decide to buy then you must cease use of the product.

For full shareware usage details and legal issues see: Legal issues


Registration Form

If you wish to register then fill out your details and post, fax or email this form to us:

aAsys Courier Registration

Name:

Postal Address:

Town/Suburb:	State:	Postcode/Zip:

Country:

your Phone Number:	Your email address:

Mastercard/Visa/Bankcard	(cross out options not applicable)

Expiry date:

Licence required:  1 user / 10 users / 50 users / 100 users

Where to send it:  Support and Enquiries


Support and Enquiries

aAsys Courier is a product of aAsys Research and Development.  Contact us at:

aasys@ozemail.com.au.

Send bug reports to our email address if possible.

Or have a look at our page on the World Wide Web: 	http://www.peg.apc.org/~pecs/courier/courier.htm

Or write to us at:

aAsys Research and Development

GPO Box 1739T

HOBART       7001

Tasmania

Australia

Telephone us: +61 02 369567 (outside Australia) or (002) 369567 (within Australia).

Fax us: +61 02 369551 (outside Australia) or (002) 369551 (within Australia).

We are happy to hear from you.

aAsys Courier and this documentation are Copyright © aAsys Research and

Development, 1995.