02 Aug 96 08:32, Jon Parise wrote to All:

 > Is there a prefered mailer style these days?

Difficult to say.  I don't even know which is more popular in my immediate
area, nor really pay much attention to what people are running.

 > All my experience has been on Binkley-style mailers (Binkley and 
 > Portal), but I here ArcMail has its merits, too.

I've used both, and currently using Binkley 2.60.

Mailers such as Bink and Portal are known as "static" mailers. 
File attachment lists, mail packets, mail bundles and file request lists
are stored in one or more directories.  The mailer can then determine the
destination address of the outbound mail based its filename and directory
location.

FrontDoor, MainDoor etc, are "dynamic" mailers.  A netmail file
attach (from "ARCmail") is generated by the mail processor to
specify the mail bundle(s) to transmit to a remote system.  Netmail is
packed on-the-fly by the mailer itself, rather than by a seperate mail
processor.  Outbound mail bundles are usually stored in a single directory,
and a bundle's filename may or may not be translatable to the address of
the remote system where it should be  sent.  File request lists are
normally generated on-the-fly before or during the call to the remote
system.

Dynamic mailers can be more convenient for sysops who are frequently
altering their netmail routing as the pending outbound netmail can be
unpacked and repacked/rerouted as routing requires.  Routing mistakes can
be more easily spotted and corrected.

When it comes to sending mail bundles with a dynamic mailer, however, there
can be problems as it's not difficult to accidentally delete its associated
netmail file attach.  The intended destination address is then lost until
the bundle is manually inspected.   Once a bundle's associated file attach
goes missing, the mailer no longer knows the bundle exists - and the mail
processor may even decide to truncate or delete the unsent bundle.

Static mailers allow the sysop to edit the file attachment list or file
request list with a plain text editor.  Routing mistakes can be difficult
to locate without a program capable of "debugging" mail bundles
and packets (such as David Nugent's InspectA).  Netmail unpacking and
rerouting can be difficult and is done manually (or at least, I don't know
of any publically-available netmail router for static mailers capable of
rerouting netmail automatically).

Regards
Andrew

-- randy{at}zws.com

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