topic Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ? in Operating System - Linux

howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

'chris' — Mon, 27 Jun 2005 17:30:53 GMT

hi

howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line under linux ?

greetings
chris

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Ross Minkov — Mon, 27 Jun 2005 17:40:13 GMT

Chris,

One way to do it is -- be root and type mail to read the root mail. See the man page for mail for details. BTW,
root mail is stored in /var/spool/mail/root by default.

Regards,
Ross

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Stuart Browne — Mon, 27 Jun 2005 19:09:45 GMT

Yup, you can use any console based mail reader.

'mail' (that ross suggested) is one.
'mutt', 'pico' and 'elm' are other options (if you have them installed).

Or if you want to really old-school it, you can just vi $MAIL (all as root).

If you don't want to do things as root, I suggest you re-alias the user 'root' to another user.

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Steven E. Protter — Mon, 27 Jun 2005 23:49:20 GMT

You can install elm ,which is a pretty nice tool

The mail itself is readable with vi or cat on the /var/mail/root file

elm is my tool of choice.

SEP

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Gopi Sekar — Tue, 28 Jun 2005 00:05:00 GMT

mail is for simple and basic command line usage. if you want full featured text mail client, you can use either pine or mutt.

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Stuart Browne — Tue, 28 Jun 2005 00:25:16 GMT

hrm.. yea.. pine.. not pico.. typo..

pico is the editor that comes with pine.. from washington uni..

Re: howto read root mail /var/mail/root from command line ?

Chris Eubank — Tue, 28 Jun 2005 11:20:44 GMT

I use "mutt". :)

C