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Windows 2000 CLI Email Clients?

Posted by Cliff on from the CLI-programs-in-a-GUI-world dept.

man_ls asks: "I am running a TELNET server for myself and some friends out of my house using Windows 2000 Telnet Services, and would like to provide them with the ability to send and receive e-mails through the command line. I'm currently using fmail unregistered, which has send-only ability, and tried PC-PINE but it wouldn't run on the command line. Does anyone know of a command line mail program that will run under Windows 2000, and can both send and receive e-mail messages?" And we all know how popular usable Such a program would be a cool thing indeed! Are there such beasts, or has the rather un-popularity of CLI apps under Win32 rendered such things obsolete?

26 comments

  1. Sir Post, the first by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Your highness, Sir Post the First is here!

  2. Use Cygwin by ^me^ · · Score: 0

    Cygwin. Great stuff. allows you to run a great deal of GNU and other software on win32. :-)

    --
    No one ever says, 'I can't read that ASCII E-mail you sent me.'
    1. Re:Use Cygwin by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It even comes with Mutt (www.mutt.org), the one true perfect email client.

    2. Re:Use Cygwin by RGRistroph · · Score: 1
      I would use the Free Software Foundation's "GNU Software for MS-Windows and MS-DOS" cd. I just ordered the new edition from the gnu.org order page for $35.

      The previous edition of this CD was very good. It installed all the standard suite of GNU tools, including bash, emacs, gcc, perl, awk, grep, etc. It puts everything in one directory, no messing with the registry and shit, so it is easy to uninstall (just delete that directory). Also, using these tools does not restrict your freedom; you have the source code and the free use of it, and these same tools will be available to you should you work on other operating systems and architectures. For me, the advantage over cygwin was the nice package of stuff on the CD with the setup script, because most of the machines I was installing this on didn't have network connections.

      I would advise installing either that CD or the cygwin package and teaching your friends to use emacs and one of the mail readers in it, such as rmail or gnus (I personally use gnus but it was a bit of a learning curve). I know gnus can be configured to use a remote pop server such as a yahoo account, and the other mail readers probably can also.

      I am looking forward to using the new edition of this CD on a free operating system -- FreeDos -- for the first time, and I also supported the FSF by purchasing this (3 copies) and T-shirts as well.

      The page for ordering the CD (and other FSF stuff) is here, and the description of the CD is here.

  3. Couple of solutions... by 3waygeek · · Score: 2, Informative

    If you're running IIS5's SMTP server, you can use CDO for Win2K from JScript or VBScript to send messages. CDO is a set of COM objects that wrap around MIME-compliant messages, so you can build or parse email messages.

    If you don't have IIS SMTP, there are a number of SMTP client COM objects around; you can then write a JScript/VBScript/VB/C++ app that drives the COM object.

    You also might want to look into something called blat -- it's another SMTP client implementation (not COM-based, IIRC).

  4. Cygwin! by fm6 · · Score: 2
    If Cygwin is runnable from windows telnet, you're all set -- just run Pine, or any other Unix mail client. You could even support X apps, if the concept of GUI doesn't totally offend you.

    If Cygwin doesn't run under telnet, you might be able to run a telnet server under Cygwin. Same result.

    Here's a useful page that covers Pine, Cygwin, and other related topics.

    1. Re:Cygwin! by Enry · · Score: 2

      Bad admin, no donut. There's no reason why anyone should be using telnet. ssh has been ported to most platforms, and it's bundled with cygwin for you Windows people.

      Use the ssh server for win2k. Here's an e-mail that should help getting it set up:

      http://www.cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2001-06/msg01804 .h tml

    2. Re:Cygwin! by man_ls · · Score: 2

      I'm using Telnet because many of the places I've used to shell into my system don't have SSH clients. Airport web terminals, the local library, friends' computers. I'm less concerned about the security of my connection (I've changed the default port to an obscure one), since I don't have anything sensative, and only a handful of the accounts have administrator permissions.

      SSH would be just another thing I'd have to install and configure, and unless I wanted to run two servers, which would defeat the purpose of an SSH server at all, it would be relatively useless. I'm admining this for fun, not a paid position, mainly to increase my own knowledge about the system.

      J.Koebel

    3. Re:Cygwin! by jonesvery · · Score: 1

      Agreed. Bad telnet. Bad, bad telnet.

      Happily, info and resources for SSH appear to be increasingly commonplace. Haven't looked at the email link posted above, but just to be sure that you have more information than you want...the OpenBSD journal also recently pointed to an article here:

      http://www.win2000mag.com/Articles/Index.cfm?Artic leID=21992

      ...that walks through setting up OpenSSH on a Win2k box.

      --

      * * *
      It is a dada story -- it has no moral.

    4. Re:Cygwin! by Alan+Shutko · · Score: 2

      There are a few different ssh clients written in Java. (Such as this one.) Throw one of those on a web page, and you have a more secure connection from anywhere. Not as good as you can get, but at least everything isn't sent cleartext over the wire.

    5. Re:Cygwin! by Bishop · · Score: 2

      Grab the sshd server, run a simple httpd server, and use mindterm in java applet mode. Works for me.

      There is also the older mindterm under the GPL if you aren't "non-comercial."

    6. Re:Cygwin! by Dahan · · Score: 2

      Does cygwin's telnetd support s/key one-time passwords? ssh would be much better, but at least s/key would prevent password sniffing. (Or at least make it useless, since as the name implies, the password only works once).

    7. Re:Cygwin! by stilwebm · · Score: 2

      Others pointed out some great reasons why you shouldn't use telnet, but also seem to think changing the port somehow makes you less vulnerable to the primary attach that ssh was designed to avoid: password sniffing. The port doesn't make a difference, if someone is using packet sniffing anywhere on your line, chances are that they aren't listing for traffic on a specific port. They are looking for things like "Login" and then "Password", which no matter what port you change telnet to is still being sent in plain text. You may think it is no big deal if someone sniffs your password, but many root exploits require user level access first. And once they get in to one system, they are going to sniff all of your other passwords too. Someone might even send an email to you boss, as you, saying how much you hate him.

    8. Re:Cygwin! by man_ls · · Score: 2

      I've got Cygwin, XFree86, and SSH Secure Server 2 running. Figured that if everyone suggested it so strongly, it would probably be a good idea to try. SSH won't accept any logins but I'm working on it. It tells me every account has an invalid password (This is the Windows version; I don't know how to install applications in Unix. Again, though, I'm learning.)

      JKoebel

  5. PC Pine does actually work (Microsoft still sucks) by gnugnugnu · · Score: 1


    you need to set your terminal type to ANSI and then it will work fine.
    i cant rememeber the command but a windows junkie put me in my place last week when i said how much windows telnet sucked rocks and he was using pine in no time.

    If you can you should use SSH instead, i strongly recommmend Putty (search google and its the first page).

    MS telnet still sucks rocks

  6. Telnet is evil by Spock+the+Vulcan · · Score: 1

    And there is no need to run it - Cygwin comes with an ssh daemon. It's fairly easy to set up, just run ssh-host-config. You can run it as a Win2K service if you want. Also, as I'm sure many others will mention, Cygwin includes the coolest text-mode email client, mutt. It's hightly configurable, with colors and split panes and whatnot.

    1. Re:Telnet is evil by Spock+the+Vulcan · · Score: 1

      s/hightly/highly/ :-(

  7. I would imagine elm or mutt would fit the bill by Anton+Anatopopov · · Score: 1
    Elm is an old favorite of mine, and some people prefer mutt. Both of them are unix programs, but as I understand it, Windows is POSIX.2 compliant, so there shouldn't be too much trouble building them on w2k.

    The real problem you may have is that confronted with a command line interface, many windows users get confused. I used to work in tech support and people were always trying to use the mouse on apps that were running in a command shell. Needless to say this caused a lot of frustration.

    1. Re:I would imagine elm or mutt would fit the bill by ivan256 · · Score: 2

      There are many levels of POSIX complance. To be POSIX complient in the basic sense you just have to have the system calls, and there are no requirements on the C library. Just because windows has the apropriate system calls, doesn't mean that they have all the apropriate system calls. Windows NT/2000 only supports 110 of the 149 POSIX C library routines, which means that there is a very good chance that any given POSIX application won't "just work", even though they can claim basic compliance.

    2. Re:I would imagine elm or mutt would fit the bill by ivan256 · · Score: 2

      Woops, I meant "doesn't mean that they have all the apropriate library calls."

      Must stop posting so late...

    3. Re:I would imagine elm or mutt would fit the bill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Microsoft Interix is UNIX certified and is the replacement for the crappy in box POSIX layer. Cost $99.

  8. Openxp by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


    Openxp (openxp.com) is working as a windows native console newsreader/email/fido.

    It is open source, 32bit and doesn't need unix emulation (cygwin) libraries

  9. vi? by Ratbert42 · · Score: 1

    vi /usr/mail/ratbert

  10. Security is not optional by Matthew+Weigel · · Score: 2
    I'm less concerned about the security of my connection (I've changed the default port to an obscure one), since I don't have anything sensative, and only a handful of the accounts have administrator permissions.

    read: it will take people an extra week or two to crack my system, putting my system into a state that I can not rely upon, and that can cause other people lots of annoyance through DDoS clients.

    It is unneighborly to leave your system open, because it lets people launch attacks from it. You do not need to check your email so often that you can't skip the airport terminals' telnet program.

    I'm admining this for fun, not a paid position, mainly to increase my own knowledge about the system.

    There is a cost associated with sticking a computer on the Internet, whether you are being paid to do so or not. Basic security is not optional, it is part of that cost. There are solutions by which you can use ssh (java ssh clients, cd-rs of ssh clients for popular operating systems, etc.).

    You'll have to do some work, so consider it part of increasing your knowledge about the system - knowledge of what you'll have to do any time you put a server on the Internet.

    And Windows users wonder what it is that gives them a bad name...

    --
    --Matthew
  11. Re:Nice by CMiYC · · Score: 2

    Nicely Put.

    I especially liked how he said he doesn't have anything senstive and only a handful of admin accounts. Imagine that. Its people like him that allowed Code Red to fill my apache logs.