2 # INSTALL -- installation instructions
5 --------------------------------
6 Installing nmh, guided by script
7 --------------------------------
8 For routine installation on popular platforms, the shell script in
9 docs/contrib/build_nmh can be used to guide you through configuration.
10 It will then build and optionally (with -i) install in the configured
14 ------------------------
15 Installing nmh, manually
16 ------------------------
17 Please read all of the following instructions before you begin
20 You should check the MACHINES file to see if there are any specific
21 build instructions for your operating system. To build nmh, you will
22 need an ANSI C compiler such as gcc.
24 0) If you have obtained nmh by checking it out of the git repository,
25 you will need to run the GNU autotools to regenerate some files.
26 (If your directory already contains a file 'config.h.in' then this
27 has already been done and you do not need to do it.) You can
28 regenerate the files by running the command
32 (Note that if you're doing nmh development, you should look at
33 docs/README.developers, since there is other developer-friendly
34 advice there as well.)
36 If you have obtained nmh in the form of a tar archive and are
37 trying to unpack it with cpio: due to an apparent bug in cpio, it
38 might fail with "Malformed number" error messages. Try another
39 tool to unpack, such as tar or pax.
41 1) From the top-level source directory, run the command
45 This will check the configuration of your OS, and create the
46 include file config.h, as well as the Makefile.
48 The configure script accepts various options. The options of
49 most interest are listed in a section below. To see the list
50 of all available options, you can run
54 2) Look through the user configuration section at the beginning
55 of the generated include file `config.h'. You may
56 want to customize some #defines for your environment, though
57 that is usually unnecessary. Note the configure options below
58 control some of the #defines.
64 This takes a bit of time, around one minute on a modern machine,
65 but is highly recommended.
69 Note that if you have [n]mh files in your install directories with
70 the same names as the files being installed, the old ones will get
71 overwritten without any warning. The only directory that isn't
72 true for is the `etc' directory -- in that directory, the previous
73 copy of each <file> will be backed up as <file>.prev if it differs
74 from the newly-installed copy. Watch for any diff output while
75 make is processing that directory to see if you need to merge
76 changes from *.prev files into the new versions.
78 6) Edit the file `mts.conf' (installed in the nmh `etc' directory)
79 and make any necessary changes for the mail transport interface
82 The default `mts.conf' file assumes you retrieve new mail from
83 a local (or NFS mounted) maildrop, and send outgoing mail by
84 injecting the message to a mail transfer agent (such as sendmail)
85 on the local machine via SMTP.
87 If, instead, all your mail sending and receiving occurs on a
88 remote POP/SMTP server, you will need to look at the values of the
89 variables "localname", "pophost", and "servers":
91 a) "localname" defines the hostname that nmh considers local.
92 If not set, then nmh queries your OS for this value. You will
93 want to change this if you wish your e-mail to appear as if it
94 originated on the POP server.
96 b) "pophost" defines the server that runs the POP daemon, and to
97 which `inc' and `msgchk' will always query for new mail.
99 c) "servers" defines the server to which you send outgoing SMTP
100 traffic. See the discussion of the --with-smtpserver configure
103 If you don't want to hardcode pophost in `mts.conf', you can use
104 the `-host' and `-user' options to `inc' and `msgchk'.
106 Check the `mh-tailor' man page for a list of all the available options
109 7) Edit the file `mhn.defaults' (installed in the nmh `etc' directory).
110 This file contains the default profile entries for the nmh command
111 `mhn' and is created by the script `mhn.defaults.sh'. This script
112 will search a generic path (essentially your $PATH) for programs to
113 handle various content types (for example, xv to display images).
114 You can re-run this script and give it a more tailored path. You may
115 want to re-run this script later if you install new programs to
116 display content. An example of this is:
119 % ./mhn.defaults.sh /usr/local/bin:/usr/X11/bin:/usr/ucb > mhn.defaults
121 and then move `mhn.defaults' into the nmh `etc' directory.
123 The `mhn.defaults.sh' script only searches for a simple set of programs.
124 If you have specialized programs to handle various types, you will need
125 to edit the `mhn.defaults' file manually. The syntax of this file is
126 described in the man page for `mhn', and in section 9.4 of the book
127 "MH & xmh: Email for Users and Programmers", 3rd edition, by Jerry Peek,
128 on the Internet at <http://rand-mh.sourceforge.net/book/mh/confmhn.html>.
130 8) Add an optional global mh.profile, if desired. This profile should be
131 placed in the nmh `etc' directory with the name `mh.profile'. This
132 file will be used to construct the initial .mh_profile of a new nmh
133 user, but will not be consulted after that.
135 -----------------------------------------------
136 Compiler options, or using a different compiler
137 -----------------------------------------------
139 By default, configure will use the "gcc" compiler if found. You can
140 use a different compiler, or add unusual options for compiling or
141 linking that the "configure" script does not know about, by giving
142 "configure" initial values for these on its command line or in its
143 environment. For example,
145 ./configure CC=c89 CFLAGS=-O2 LIBS=-lposix
147 If you wish to add options that are only used at compile time instead of
148 link time, you can use the CPPFLAGS variable:
150 ./configure CPPFLAGS='-Wextra -Wno-sign-compare'
152 If you want to add to both compile and link flags at build time
153 without putting them in the configuration, you can use the AM_CFLAGS
156 make AM_CFLAGS=--coverage
158 ----------------------------------------
159 Building nmh on additional architectures
160 ----------------------------------------
161 To build nmh on additional architectures, you can do a "make distclean".
162 This should restore the nmh source distribution back to its original
163 state. You can then configure nmh as above on other architectures in
164 which you wish to build nmh. Or alternatively, you can use a different
165 build directory for each architecture.
167 ---------------------------------
168 Using a different build directory
169 ---------------------------------
170 You can compile the nmh in a different directory from the one containing
171 the source code. Doing so allows you to compile it on more than one
172 architecture at the same time. To do this, you must use a version of
173 "make" that supports the "VPATH" variable, such as GNU "make". "cd" to
174 the directory where you want the object files and executables to go and
175 run the "configure" script. "configure" automatically checks for the
176 source code in the directory that "configure" is in. For example,
178 cd /usr/local/solaris/nmh
179 /usr/local/src/nmh-1.5/configure
182 ---------------------
183 Options for configure
184 ---------------------
185 --prefix=DIR (DEFAULT is /usr/local/nmh)
186 This will change the base prefix for the installation location
187 for the various parts of nmh. Unless overridden, nmh is installed
188 in ${prefix}/bin, ${prefix}/etc, ${prefix}/lib, ${prefix}/man.
190 --bindir=DIR (DEFAULT is ${prefix}/bin)
191 nmh's binaries (show, inc, comp, ...) are installed here.
193 --libdir=DIR (DEFAULT is ${prefix}/lib)
194 nmh's support binaries (post, slocal, mhl, ...) are installed here.
196 --sysconfdir=DIR (DEFAULT is ${prefix}/etc)
197 nmh's config files (mts.conf, mhn.defaults, ...) are installed here.
199 --mandir=DIR (DEFAULT is ${prefix}/man)
200 nmh's man pages are installed here.
203 Enable debugging support.
205 --with-editor=EDITOR (DEFAULT is vi)
206 specify the full path of the default editor to use. If this
207 option is not given, then the configuration process will search
208 for the `vi' command and use it as the default. If you wish to
209 specify an interface which is compatible with MH, then use the
210 nmh command `prompter'. If you specify `prompter', then you don't
211 need to give the full pathname.
213 --with-locking=LOCKTYPE (DEFAULT is dot)
214 Specify the locking mechanism when attempting to "inc" or
215 "msgchk" a local mail spool. Valid options are "dot",
216 "fcntl", "flock", and "lockf". Of the four, dot-locking
217 requires no special kernel or filesystem support, and simply
218 creates a file called "FILE.lock" to indicate that "FILE" is
221 In order to be effective, you should contact the site
222 administrator to find out what locking mechanisms other
223 mail delivery and user programs respect. The most common
224 reason not to use dot-locking is if the mail spool directory
225 is not world- or user-writeable, and thus a lock file cannot
228 --with-mts=MTS (DEFAULT is smtp)
229 Specify the default mail transport system you want to use. The two
230 acceptable options are "smtp" (which is the default), and
231 "sendmail". This value will be put into the mts.conf file. You
232 may find it convenient to specify a value at configure-time,
233 however, so that each time nmh is reinstalled, the right value will
236 If you use "smtp", this will enable a direct SMTP (simple mail
237 transport protocol) interface in nmh. When sending mail, instead
238 of passing the message to the mail transport agent, `post' will
239 open a socket connection to the mail port on the machine specified
240 in the `mts.conf' file (default is localhost), and speak SMTP
243 If you use "sendmail", then `post' will send messages by forking a
244 local copy of sendmail. Currently it will still speak SMTP with
245 this local copy of sendmail.
247 If you wish to use a transport agent other than sendmail, you will
248 need to use a `sendmail wrapper'.
250 --with-ndbm=LIB (DEFAULT is to autodetect)
251 --with-ndbmheader=HEADER (DEFAULT is to autodetect)
252 Specify the header file (eg ndbm.h) and library (eg ndbm) to use
253 to compile against the ndbm database library. By default, configure
254 will try various possibilities until it finds one that works; this
255 option only needs to be specified if the autodetection fails or
256 makes the wrong choice.
258 If either of these options is given then the other must also be
261 --with-pager=PAGER (DEFAULT is more)
262 Specify the default pager (file lister) to use. If this option
263 is not given, then the configuration process will search for the
264 command `more' and use it as the default.
266 --with-smtpservers='SMTPSERVER1[ SMTPSERVER2...]' (DEFAULT is localhost)
267 If this option is not specified, the mts.conf file will contain
268 the line "servers: localhost", which may be manually edited later.
269 You may find it convenient to specify a value at configure-time,
270 however, so that each time nmh is reinstalled, the right value will be
273 See the mh-tailor(5) man page for full documentation of "servers:".
277 nmh-workers@nongnu.org