[GRASSLIST:4076] Re: GRASS5.03 vs GRASS5.7

[Glynn Clements]

Michael Barton wrote:

> Thanks for the information on error messages. Some commands also indicate
> that they have completed their processing by sending an email (r.proj for
> example).

r.proj doesn't do this. Are you thinking of photo.rectify (part of
i.ortho.photo)? That sends mail upon completion. But then the imagery
stuff never was particularly well integrated with the rest of GRASS.

> I *think* (but am not sure) that this goes to sendmail. Since I
> now have postfix internally--but only use it in some circumstances for its
> smtp server--I'm not sure where this ends up.

photo.rectify and the libgis error-handling code both use the "mail"
program to send notification messages; e.g. (from photo.rectify):

    mail = popen ("mail `whoami`","w");

The mail will end up wherever the "mail" program (assuming that you
have one) sends it, based upon the username returned by "whoami"
(whoami returns the username from /etc/passwd corresponding to the
effective UID).

For a traditional Unix mail program, it will probably go to
/usr/lib/sendmail or /usr/sbin/sendmail (which may or may not be the
"actual" sendmail program; most MTAs include a program/script named
"sendmail" for compatibility purposes).

FWIW, this is essentially the same mechanism used by daemons which
send email, e.g. crond.

Needless to say, this is all somewhat Unix-specific. If you aren't
using a "conventional" Unix system (e.g. you don't have a "mail"
program or an appropriate entry in /etc/passwd), it may not work.

-- 
Glynn Clements <glynn.clements at virgin.net>