| Department of Planetary Sciences Lunar and Planetary Laboratory |
 | |
LPL Central Computing Systems (LCS) |
How to Configure Pine on Windows PCs
|
| Department of Planetary Sciences Lunar and Planetary Laboratory |
| |
LPL Central Computing Systems (LCS) |
Initial Start-up
When you start PC-Pine for the first time, the program will prompt you for certain information. That configuration data is written either to a
configuration file on the IMAP server (the default) or to PC-Pine's
configuration file (named PINERC in the directory you unpacked PC-Pine in),
so you will not have to enter it every time.
You should be prepared for the questions as PC-Pine can't really proceed
without the answers. If you make an error in any of these entries, you can
correct it in Pine's Setup/Config screen (type "S" then "C" from the Main Menu).
Inbox
When you read mail with PC-Pine, your mail is not delivered to your PC
directly. Rather, email is delivered to an IMAP server which has been
previously set up by your department/university/institution. When you first
start PC-Pine, you need to specify where your INBOX is.
The syntax is this: {imap-server.domain}INBOX
For most LPL users: {hindmost.lpl.arizona.edu}INBOX
User-id
This is the user-id part of your email address.
Personal name
Your name as you want it to appear on outgoing email. You may have spaces and punctuation in the name.
Host/domain
The "host" portion of your email address. This may be the full name
of the computer where your inbox resides or your departmental or
institutional domain if mail forwarding is set up. NOTE: You should
not put the name of your PC as the answer to this question -- your
PC is not where your INBOX resides.
SMTP server
Your PC does not have the software to interact with Internet email
directly. It must rely on an SMTP server to actually send your
message. You need to set this to the full name of the computer at
your site which provides SMTP service.
Example: Suppose the PC-Pine user is named "Joe User" and has
the login/email address of "juser". At LPL, we take advantage of
the general domain of "lpl.arizona.edu". He has set up his email so that
email is delivered to his inbox on the machine "hindmost.lpl.arizona.edu".
The main LPL Post Office's SMTP server is on the machine named
"hindmost.lpl.arizona.edu". The PC running PC-Pine is on the campus
network and is called "pc-joe".
That person would answer PC Pine's configuration questions like this:
INBOX {hindmost.lpl.arizona.edu}INBOX
User-id juser
Personal Name Joe User
Host/domain lpl.arizona.edu
SMTP Server hindmost.lpl.arizona.edu
Email coming from the account would look like this:
-------------- Sample Email -----------------
Date: Mon, 16 July 1993 08:45:43 -0700
From: Joe User < username@lpl.arizona.edu>
To: Pine Development Team < pine-bugs@cac.washington.edu>
Subject: My First Message
Local Support Files
The Release Notes (Press "R" on the Main Menu) contain a section on
Configuration, including default file names and environment variables.
In brief, PC-Pine uses the following rules for finding config and support
files:
1. The location of the PINERC is searched for in the following order of precedence:
a. File pointed to by PINERC environment variable
b. $HOME\PINE\PINERC
c. A file named PINERC in the same directory as PINE.EXE
2. The HOME environment variable, if not set, defaults to root of the current working drive.
3. The default for most support files (e.g. PINE.SIG and ADDRBOOK) is the same directory as the PINERC file.
4. The support files (PINE.HLP and PINE.NDX) must be in the same directory as PINE.EXE.
Descriptions of these files follows:
PINERC
The Pine configuration file. It contains all of Pine's configuration
information -- much more than just the essentials listed above. There are
comments in the PINERC to help you out. Also, PC-Pine comes with a sample
PINERC you can use as a model. See the release notes for this version (they
are compiled into the program) for more details.
ADDRBOOK
Your Pine address book. All the tools you need to manage the address book are
in Pine itself, so you shouldn't need to worry about this.
PINE.SIG
Your signature file. If this file exists, Pine will automatically
insert it into every outgoing message. You can specify a
different name for this file in the PINERC if you like.
NEWSRC
The NEWSRC is your subscription list for newsgroups. By default
Pine will create this file in the same directory as your PINERC,
but will recognize it in your $HOME directory as well. You can
specify a different name for this file in the PINERC if you like.
MAILCAP
The MAILCAP file is not required by PC-Pine for normal operation,
but is the configuration file that can be used to help PC-Pine
deal with types and subtypes of MIME attachments it doesn't
have builtin knowledge of. The MAILCAP file is automatically
recognized in either the same directory as your PINERC or the
same directory as PINE.EXE. You can specify a different MAILCAP
file (or files) using the MAILCAPS environment variable which
takes a semicolon delimited list of locations. A sample MAILCAP,
MAILCAP.SAM, is included in the distribution to help get started.
PC-Pine will search your PC's Registry database for attachment
handling information that cannot be found in the MAILCAP file.
MIMETYPE
The MIMETYPE file is not required by PC-Pine for normal operation,
but is the configuration file that can be used to help PC-Pine
apply the proper MIME type and subtype information to attachments
it sends. The MIMETYPE file's location is the same as that
described for MAILCAP above. A sample MIMETYPE, MIMETYPE.SAM, is
included in the distribution to help get started.
PC-Pine will search your PC's Registry database for attachment
handling information that cannot be found in the MIMETYPE file.
Local Directory for Folders
Another important directory to PC-Pine is the location for local mail
folders. By default, PC-Pine will create the directory $HOME\MAIL to use
as the directory to store mail you save to the local disk. If the $HOME
environment variable is not defined, PC-Pine will assume the root of the
current working drive. This location can be overridden by changing or
adding "folder-collections" definitions in PC-Pine's Setup/Config screen.
Common PC-Pine Installation Problems
Configuration settings aren't being saved
This problem can happen if you run pine from one directory and
then decide to move your pine directory to another location. PC-Pine
stores certain variables, including the configuration location, in the
Windows Registry (which you shouldn't ever need to manually edit). There
are a couple of ways to go about removing or resetting the values in the
registry.
1) Run PC-Pine's registry value deletion command. This can be done by
running: "< your pine directory>\pine.exe -registry clear" from the DOS
prompt. You could create a shortcut to pine.exe and change the "Target"
value to the above command.
2) Tell PC-Pine where to look for the configuration file. Configuration
information is stored in a file called the PINERC. With the "-p PINERC"
option, you can tell PC-Pine the location of your pinerc. An example of
this would be to run: "< your pine directory>\pine.exe -p C:\pine\mypinerc".
Again, you can use the DOS prompt or the shortcut method explained in (1).
Additionally, there is the "-registry set" option, which will actively
set registry values to the current setting, and is therefore useful with
the "-p PINERC" option.
Back to the LCS FAQ page
PtyS/LPL
Home Page