How to set your mail to notify senders of your vacation/leave
How to turn off the vacation notification
Unix Manual page
for vacation command
From unix, use one of the login machines.
Create a plain text file called .forward in your home directory which should contain:
Next, create a plain text file in your home directory called .vacation.msg
Your email will be read
by that person when they return.
No need to resend.
This is an automated reply Now TEST IT! Send a mail to yourself. That's it!
This will send only ONE reply to anyone who emails you. So it's important to be sure there's no .vacation.db file when you want it started
Delete your .forward
file (or move it to something like .forward-inactive)
That's it!
vacation(1)
vacation(1)
NAME
SYNOPSIS
vacation -I
The vacation command
returns a message to the sender of a mail message,
FLAGS
-I Initializes
the $HOME/.vacation.pag and $HOME/.vacation.dir files.
DESCRIPTION
The vacation command
accepts standard input and attempts to send a vacation
\user, "|vacation user"
where user is
your username. This allows mail sent to you to be both
When vacation
is invoked without the -I flag, as in the .forward file,
it
You must initialize vacation
for your username by issuing the command vaca-
The vacation command
expects a $HOME/.vacation.msg file containing a mes-
The names of people who
have sent you messages are kept in the files
EXAMPLES
If you username is myra
and you want to send a message once a week to each
vacation -I
Next, add the following
line to your $HOME/.forward file (create this file
\myra, "|vacation myra"
If you want to send a
vacation message other than the system default mes-
From: myra@k.table (Myra Louise Minter)
I am on vacation until October 1. If you have something urgent,
-- Myra
FILES
/usr/lib/vacation.def
$HOME/.forward
$HOME/.vacation.dir
$HOME/.vacation.pag
$HOME/.vacation.msg
RELATED INFORMATION
Commands: mail(1)/binmail(1),
mailx(1)/Mail(1), sendmail(8).
From windows, create with notepad, and upload via samba "P" drive or use ftp. (NOTE: files starting with a . (dot) may be invisible on some windows setups.)
\user,
"|/usr/bin/vacation user"
(where you fill in your username)
Here's an example:
The user you
are trying to email is currently away,
either out of town or
on vacation.
If you get a Returned mail: unknown mailer error then you probably didn't create a .vacation.msg with the reply
How to
turn off the vacation notification:
Delete the .vacation.pag and/or .vacation.db
file
Man page
for vacation command:
vacation - Informs
senders of mail that recipient is absent
saying that the recipient
is on vacation or otherwise absent.
Execute this flag before you modify your $HOME/.forward file.
message to the user
specified in that input, which should be a mail mes-
sage. vacation
is usually invoked in your $HOME/.forward file, which is
used to forward your
mail to another username. When you wish vacation mes-
sages to be sent to
users who send you mail, enter the following in your
$HOME/.forward
file:
received by you and
piped to the vacation command; vacation reads the mail
message, determines
the sender, and sends a reply. The sender receives a
vacation message, and
the original mail is waiting in your mailbox when you
return.
reads the first line
from the standard input for a From line to determine
the sender. If
this is not present, an error message is produced. (All
properly formatted incoming
mail should include a From line.) No vacation
message is sent if the
From header line indicates that the message is from
Postmaster; from MAILER-DAEMON;
if the initial From line includes the
string -REQUEST@;
or if a Precedence: bulk or Precedence: junk line is
included in the header.
tion -I before
you can use the vacation command.
sage to be sent back
to each sender. The .vacation.msg file should be an
entire message, including
any desired headers, such as From or Subject.
This message will be
sent only once a week to each unique message sender.
(If this file does not
exist, vacation uses /usr/lib/vacation.def, a
system-wide default
vacation message, if it exists.)
$HOME/.vacation.pag
and $HOME/.vacation.dir. These files are created when
you initialize vacation
for your username with vacation -I.
person who has sent
you mail, initialize vacation by entering:
if it does not exist):
sage in /usr/lib/vacation.def,
create the file .vacation.msg in your home
directory and enter
the message in it. For example:
Subject: I am on vacation.
Delivered-By-the-Graces-Of: the Vacation program
please telephone Lucy or Sue.
System-wide default vacation message.
Contains address to which mail is forwarded.
Contains the names of people who have sent you mail while the
vacation command was being used.
Contains the names of people who have sent you mail while the
vacation command was being used.
Contains your personal vacation message.