The CIS Unix systems provide you with tools to set up a reasonably effective spam filter, based on the SpamAssassin program, that diverts unwanted mail into an alternate mailbox. This is not (however) set up for you by default. If you would like to investigate and possibly start SpamAssassin-based spam filtering, please visit the Spam Filtering web page.

Some unsolicited commercial e-mail comes with directions on how to (allegedly) remove yourself from the mailing list. Following the instructions may work if the mail is coming from a reputable and responsible enterprise. All too often, however, your response is simply used to verify that your address is still working; this information is quickly passed on to other unscrupulous advertisers. You may get removed from that particular mailing list, but wind up with more unsolicited commercial e-mail than you would have otherwise.

You can set up advanced spam filtering with Bogofilter. This requires more work than the SpamAssassin method, but, in combination with SpamAssassin, it's extremely effective at keeping spam out of your INBOX. For more information, see the Spam Filtering with Bogofilter page.

First of all, don't delete or alter such messages. If the message may be in violation of law or UNH rules, they are important evidence.

If you would like our advice, forward the e-mail to the system administrators (<sysman@cisunix.unh.edu>). We'll attempt to give you our help and best advice on how to proceed.

At your discretion, you may want to contact the police or appropriate University authorities first. That's fine. Given your permission, we will devote maximum effort into cooperation with any legitimate investigation.

If you're getting continuing annoying messages that you would like to simply throw away unread, it may be possible to set up a “procmail filter”. Try to find something in the mail header that the messages have in common: the sender's address, a subject line. Use your favorite editor to create a .procmailrc file in your home directory. For example:

% pico .procmailrc

You place rules in the file to handle incoming mail that matches criteria you specify differently. For example, here's a .procmailrc file with one rule:

:0:
* ^From.*dimwit@annoy.me.edu
/dev/null

This throws away mail that is from dimwit@annoy.me.edu. (The /dev/null file is a Unix data sink.)

	Obviously, this is something you want to be careful with, since typing mistakes can cause mail you wanted to get thrown away. If you aren't comfortable with a Unix editor, the Help Desk can help. The .procmailrc file can do many other things besides this; if you're interested, a good place to start is the Procmail Quick Start page.

This method isn't useful for spam filtering, since spammers continually alter their subject lines and sender addresses. Speaking of which:

It's unfortunately common for spammers and virus writers to send mail with forged “From” addresses. Often they pick common names (joe, bill, bob), and sometimes they pick addresses found in Microsoft Outlook address books on infected machines. If your address is forged on such mail, and there's an error in delivery, then you'll receive the resulting error messsage.

There's not a lot you or we can do about this. Delete the message and move on.

WebMail obsesses over deleting things “safely” in order to be sure your mailboxes aren't accidentally corrupted. Which is fine, but it means (paradoxically) you need some more free space in your account to get rid of large volumes of mail. If you get UID COPY failed: Message copy failed: Disk quota exceeded messages while trying to delete mail, this could be the problem.

One thing to try is deleting smaller amounts of stuff first before you delete the big stuff. (The more free space you have in your account the more stuff you can delete.)

This may not work if you are absolutely out of space. In that case, please see Q: Q19.

WebMail can be a more than a little picky about your browser's add-ons or configuration. The most common problem is a conflict between so-called “popup blockers” and the ability to compose or reply to messages. If you're having a problem with WebMail, see if the same thing happens when you use a different computer. If the problem only occurs on your computer, here are some things to check:

This can be a symptom of a conflict between your web browser's "cache" and the current state of your INBOX. Often clearing your cache will make the problem go away. For Internet Explorer, please see Microsoft's How and Why to Clear Your Cache document.

It's under “Organizing” in the leftside menu (click the plus sign, if necessary). See, things are so organized now, they're hard to find. Ironic.

Open up the Address Book (see Q: Q9 if necessary); click the "Search Icon" in the upper icon menu if necessary; choose “CIS Unix Directory” from the “From” pulldown menu.

You can do a “Basic Search” to find your recipient if you know their exact name as we have it (including middle initial). You can also search on first name or last name by choosing appropriately from the “Find” pulldown menu. (You should be aware that common names may return a lot of results.) When you've composed your query, click “Search”.

More useful searches can be obtained by clicking the “Advanced Search” on the right side of the screen. Choose “CIS Unix Directory” from the “Directory” pulldown menu. Type (for example) your recipient's first and last names into the appropriate boxes and click “Search”.

In either Basic or Advanced Searches, any matches will be displayed. Clicking on the name will display the complete entry for the individual; clicking on the e-mail address will bring up a compose window with the address pre-entered.

You can also do a “Basic Search” of the User Directory from a compose window.

It used to be in the olden days that a little address book icon appeared next to addresses in mail messages; this allowed you to quickly add the addresses to your address book.

This is now an option. If you want it (or want it back):

Click the "Folders" icon, then it may be necessary to click "Expand All" to see them.

You don't have to save copies of mail messages you send out to others, but it's an option. If you want to do that:

Some people like to have a signature on their sent mail: a block of text containing your full name, contact information, affiliation, pithy quote, etc. To do that:

If incoming messages do not appear where you expect them to in the INBOX, probably you have (accidentally) specified a sort-order for your messages that you don't want. To (for example) sort on reverse-received order, click on the '#' at the top of the message-number column, then click on the little triangle next to that to get it to point down.

(You can sort on any column, up or down, this is just an example.)

Thanks for looking here. For further information, you might try (a) checking out the CIS Unix WebMail Infrequently-Asked Questions document; (b) looking at the Horde User's FAQ, written by the people who wrote the WebMail software; or (c) using the “Problems” link from within WebMail to send us mail.

You can set up, remove, or change e-mail forwarding on the web at https://webmail.unh.edu/cisunix/emailforward.html.

To set up (or change) forwarding in a normal login session, give the Unix shell command:

% echo me@somewhere.else.com > ~/.forward

Substitute your desired forwarding address for me@somewhere.else.com in the command you actually type.

	You should test mail forwarding by sending yourself e-mail to your CIS Unix address and making sure it goes to the address you expect.

To remove forwarding and start receiving mail on your CIS Unix account again, give the Unix shell command:

% rm .forward

There is a vacation program on the CIS Unix mail delivery hosts that will send an automatic reply to messages sent to you while you are away. You can configure or remove vacation auto-replying on the web at https://webmail.unh.edu/cisunix/vacation.html.

To set up auto-replying in a login session:

There is no one-size-fits-all answer. Here are some guidelines:

The staff at Dimond Academic Commons Information Technology Support Center (DAC ITSC) in the Dimond Library is available to help anyone with account quota issues. The hours of operation are Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. You may also call 862-4242 for additional support.

Almost always this is due to a corrupt or missing .login file. You can customize your Unix computing environment in many ways by editing your .login, .cshrc, and source.in files in your home directory. (Most commonly, you can set up command aliases to make typing common commands faster and easier to remember.)

However, you can also cause problems for yourself if there are syntax errors in your changes, or if you just delete any of these files. Possible symptoms: being logged out immediately or normal commands becoming unavailable.

If you think you've made a mistake in (or deleted) one of your startup files, you can recover things yourself (if you can log in). First, rename your existing startup files so they won't be read at login:

%  /bin/mv .login login.save
%  /bin/mv .cshrc cshrc.save
%  /bin/mv source.in source.in.save

	You'll get an error message if these startup files don't exist. Ignore that.

Then give yourself a fresh copy of the default .login file:

% echo source /usr/local/etc/generic.login > .login

Then log out and back in again. Things should work. You should be able to try doing your customizations again, if you still want to.

If your startup files are preventing you from logging in on one machine (say Euler), try the others (Pascal and Zeno). Sometimes minor differences between the machines can make one more "forgiving" of startup file problems than another.

If you can't log in anywhere, you'll have to contact the Help Desk (call 2-4242) or use the CIS Help Desk Questions form to have a system administrator fix your account.

Sometimes the system scrolls the “message of the day” (/etc/motd) file by fast enough so that it can't be read by mortal human beings, even ones with a college education. If you think you may have missed something important, give the command:

% more /etc/motd

During your session, you may have (accidentally or on purpose) typed Ctrl+Z to suspend a process. Suspended processes remain “in the background” as long as you are logged in, or until you start them up again, whichever comes first. If you attempt to log out with a suspended process in the background, the system will warn you:

% logout
There are suspended jobs. 
% 

To clean up a suspended job, give the fg command to “bring it to the foreground.”

% fg

At this point, you can either let the process run to completion, or exit from the program properly, for example by typing Ctrl+C. Then attempt to log out again. If you still get the suspended jobs message, repeat the above.

	If you are in a hurry, a second logout command given immediately after the first will log you out. However, this will also kill the suspended jobs, which may not be what you want to do.

Give the command:

% chsh

and follow the prompts.

For most users who leave the University at the end of a semester, your account will be removed approximately five weeks after the first day of classes in the following (Fall or Spring) semester. An e-mail notice will be sent to your account two weeks before your account is scheduled to be removed. We try to post the exact date on the End of Semester Notes page.

If you leave the University during Fall or Spring semesters (for example, if you are a student, and your registration is deleted), then you will probably receive an e-mail notice soon afterward notifying you of your account's expiration in two weeks.

It's possible for your account to be removed outside this timeframe in accordance with policies described in Section 3, “CIS Unix Accounts”.

Yes. Departments and organizations can get CIS Unix accounts for a yearly fee. You can contact the CIS Help Desk (2-4242) for more information.

If you'd prefer not to pay a yearly fee: oftentimes what people really want when they ask for such an account is one to which mail will be delivered separate from their personal mail. To accomplish this, you can set up a “non-personal e-mail alias” for your department or organization. (See the Non-personal Alias Policy web page for more information.)

Once the alias is set up, you can divert mail incoming to that address to a separate mailbox using a procmail filter, and configure your mail software to handle it specially. More information on that is also available; see the generic mailing address web page.

You can (if you wish) share access to the mailbox with other Unix users of your choice. This is just a specific application of Unix “group” file sharing, described in the document Sharing Information with Others.