User Commands vacation(1)
NAME
vacation - reply to mail automatically
SYNOPSIS
vacation [-I]
vacation [-a alias] [-e filter_file] [-f database_file]
[-j] [-m message_file] [-s sender] [-tN] username
vacation [-f database_file] -l
DESCRIPTION
The vacation utility automatically replies to incoming mail.
Installation The installation consists of an interactive program whichsets up vacation's basic configuration.
To install vacation, type it with no arguments on the com-
mand line. The program creates a .vacation.msg file, which
contains the message that is automatically sent to allsenders when vacation is enabled, and starts an editor for
you to modify the message. (See USAGE section.) Which editor
is invoked is determined by the VISUAL or EDITOR environment variable, or vi(1) if neither of those environment variables are set. A .forward file is also created if one does not exist in your home directory. Once created, the .forward file will contain a line of the form: One copy of an incoming message is sent to the username andanother copy is piped into vacation:
\username, "|/usr/bin/vacation username"
If a .forward file is present in your home directory, itwill ask whether you want to remove it, which disables vaca-
tion and ends the installation.The program automatically creates .vacation.pag and
.vacation.dir, which contain a list of senders when vacation
is enabled.SunOS 5.11 Last change: 20 Aug 2005 1
User Commands vacation(1)
Activation and Deactivation The presence of the .forward file determines whether or notvacation is disabled or enabled. To disable vacation, remove
the .forward file, or move it to a new name. InitializationThe -I option clears the vacation log files, .vacation.pag
and .vacation.dir, erasing the list of senders from a previ-
ous vacation session. (See OPTIONS section.)
Additional Configurationvacation provides configuration options that are not part of
the installation, these being -a, -e, -f, -j, -m, -s, and
-t. (See OPTIONS section.)
Reportingvacation provides a reporting option, -l. See OPTIONS.
OPTIONS The following options are supported:-I Initializes the .vacation.pag and .vacation.dir files
and enables vacation. If the -I flag is not specified,
and a user argument is given, vacation reads the first
line from the standard input (for a From: line, no colon). If absent, it produces an error message.Options -a, -e, -f, -j, -m, -s, and -t are configuration
options to be used in conjunction with vacation in the .for-
ward file, not on the command line. For example,\username, "|/usr/bin/vacation -t1m username"
repeats replies to the sender every minute.-a alias Indicates that alias is one of the valid
aliases for the user running vacation,
so that mail addressed to that alias generates a reply.-e filter_file Uses filter_file instead of
.vacation.filter as the source of the
domain and email address filters.-f database_file Uses database_file instead of .vacation
as the base name for the database file.SunOS 5.11 Last change: 20 Aug 2005 2
User Commands vacation(1)
-j Does not check whether the recipient
appears in the To: or the Cc: line. Warning: use of this option can resultin vacation replies being sent to mail-
ing lists and other inappropriate places; its use is therefore strongly discouraged.-m message_file Uses ~/message_file as the message to
send for the reply instead of~/.vacation.msg. message_file is a rela-
tive path to the desired vacation mes-
sage file. To prevent directory/file"not found" errors, message_file should
be on the same disk partition as ~/.for-
ward.-s sender Replies to sender instead of the value
read from the UNIX From line of the incoming message.-tN Changes the interval between repeat
replies to the same sender. The default is 1 week. A trailing s, m, h, d, or w scales N to seconds, minutes, hours, days, or weeks, respectively.The -l option is neither for initialization nor configura-
tion., but for reporting. The -foption can also be used in
conjunction with the -l.
-l Lists the addresses to which a reply has been sent
since the last invocation of vacation -I, along with a
date and time stamp.USAGE
.vacation.msg should include a header with at least a Sub-
ject: line (it should not include a To: line). For example:Subject: I am on vacation
I am on vacation until July 22. If you have something urgent,
please contact Joe Jones (jones@fB0).--John
SunOS 5.11 Last change: 20 Aug 2005 3
User Commands vacation(1)
If the string $SUBJECT appears in the .vacation.msg file, it
is replaced with the subject of the original message whenthe reply is sent. Thus, a .vacation.msg file such as
Subject: I am on vacation
I am on vacation until July 22.
Your mail regarding "$SUBJECT" will be read when I return.
If you have something urgent, please contact Joe Jones (jones@fB0).--John
will include the subject of the message in the reply. No message is sent if the To: or the Cc: line does not list the user to whom the original message was sent or one of a number of aliases for them, if the initial From lineincludes the string -REQUEST@, or if a Precedence: bulk or
Precedence: junk line is included in the header.vacation will also not respond to mail from either postmas-
ter or Mailer-Daemon.
In addition to the above criteria, if a .vacation.filter
file exists, it is used to constrain further the set of addresses to which a reply is sent. Each line in that file should be either a domain name, an email address, a negated domain name or a negated email address. A negated line starts with the single character !. Each line is compared in the order listed to the sender address. A line containing an email address matches if the sender address is exactly the same except for case, which is ignored. A line containing a domain name matches if thesender address is something@domain-name or
something@something.domain-name. A reply is sent if the
first match is an entry that is not negated. If the first match is a negated entry, or if no lines match, then no reply is sent. A sample filter file might look like the following: !host.subdomain.sun.com sun.com !wife@mydomain.comSunOS 5.11 Last change: 20 Aug 2005 4
User Commands vacation(1)
mydomain.com onefriend@hisisp.com anotherfriend@herisp.comBlank lines and lines starting with "#" are ignored.
FILES ~/.forward~/.vacation.filter
~/.vacation.msg
A list of senders is kept in the dbm format files.vacation.pag and .vacation.dir in your home directory.
These files are dbm files and cannot be viewed directly with text editors.ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attri-
butes:_____________________________________________________________
| ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
|_____________________________|______________________________|
| Availability | service/network/smtp/sendmail||_____________________________|______________________________|
SEE ALSO
vi(1), sendmail(1M), getusershell(3C), aliases(4), shells(4), attributes(5)SunOS 5.11 Last change: 20 Aug 2005 5