4. Configuring PC-Pine

PC-Pine stores its configuration information in a text file called PINERC. Once PC-Pine is installed, the information in this file is normally modified from within PC-Pine via its SETUP/Config menu option. However, the initial configuration can be done (with care) in a text editor such as Windows Notepad. This is probably a less confusing method for new users and is the method described here.

A sample PINERC file is included with the Pine distribution under the name PINERC.ADV. It is recommended that you make a copy of this file under the name PINERC and edit this before running PC-Pine for the first time. To do this:

• Start up the Windows Notepad accessory and use File/Open to open PINERC.ADV
• Before modifying this file, use the Notepad File/SaveAs menu option to save a copy of the file as PINERC. (IMPORTANT - note that there is a dot at the end of the name PINERC.)
• Enter your basic email account information into the relevant lines of the sample PINERC file as indicated in bold below - this is for someone with username chem0123 on the Herald system. Explanatory notes are given below:

#Example: user-id=xyz123
user-id=chem0123 
#Example: personal-name=
personal-name=John Smith 
#Example: user-domain=u.washington.edu
user-domain=herald.ox.ac.uk 
#Example: smtp-server=smtp.foobar.edu
smtp-server=smtp.ox.ac.uk 
#Example: nntp-server=news.foobar.edu
nntp-server=
#Example: inbox-path={imapserver.foobar.edu}inbox
inbox-path={chem0123.herald.ox.ac.uk}INBOX 

#Example: incoming-folders= "WIDGETS"
#{imapserver.foobar.edu}widgets,
#"CompMailPine"
#{imapserver.foobar.edu}{news.foobar.edu/nntp}#news.comp.mail.pine
#Note: the second example requires a recent version of the UW IMAP
#server, which is acting as a news proxy in this case
incoming-folders=
#Example: folder-collections=MAIN {imapserver.foobar.edu}mail/[*],
PROJECTS {imapserver.foobar.edu}projects/[*]
folder-collections={chem0123.herald.ox.ac.uk}[]

• user-id - your login name to your account on the mail system, e.g. chem0123
• personal name - your own name in any form you wish, e.g. John D Smith
• user-domain - the domain-name of your mail server, e.g. herald.ox.ac.uk or ermine.ox.ac.uk
• smtp-server - for users directly connected to the Oxford campus or dial-up networks, this should be set to smtp.ox.ac.uk - if you're using another Internet Service Provider, use the smtp host that they specify
• inbox-path - the full server name (within curly brackets) and location (INBOX) of your incoming mail:
  • Herald user chem0123 would specify this as: {chem0123.herald.ox.ac.uk}INBOX
  • Ermine users omit their user-id, e.g. {ermine.ox.ac.uk}INBOX
• folder-collections - the full server name (within curly brackets) and location (followed by empty square brackets) of your read-mail folders.:
  • Herald users should leave the location blank, e.g. {chem0123.herald.ox.ac.uk}[]
  • Ermine users again omit their userid and should normally specify the location as ~/mail/ , e.g. {ermine.ox.ac.uk}~/mail/[]

NOTE - PC-Pine has no explicit setting for you to enter your email address - it constructs a system-specific email address from your user-id and user-domain, e.g. chem0123@herald.ox.ac.uk. While this is a valid email address, it is not the "canonical" form preferred at Oxford, e.g. John.Smith@chemistry.ox.ac.uk. However, the Oxford mail system normally rewrites a sender's system-specific email address into their canonical one. To explicitly specify a canonical email address to PC-Pine, you need to define a customized header. In a later part of the sample PINERC file, locate the line:

customized-hdrs=Reply-To:,

Enter your email address between the colon and comma, e.g.

customized-hdrs=Reply-To:John.Smith@chem.ox.ac.uk,

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