VACATION(1) — USER COMMANDS

NAME

vacation − reply to mail automatically

SYNOPSIS

vacation −I | −tN
vacation user

DESCRIPTION

vacation automatically replies to incoming mail. The reply is contained in the file .vacation.msg, that you create in your home directory (or the file /usr/lib/vacation.def by default).

This file should include a header with at least a “Subject:” line. For example:

From: John Smith <smith>
Subject: I am on vacation
Delivered-automatically-by: the Vacation Program
I am on vacation until July 22. If you have something urgent,
please contact Joe Jones (jones@sun).
--john

USAGE

To start vacation, create a .forward file in your home directory containing a line of the form:

\name, "|vacation name"

where name is your login name.

Then type in the command

vacation −I

To stop vacation, remove the .forward file, or move it to a new name.

OPTIONS

−I initialize the .vacation.pag and .vacation.dir files and start vacation.

If the −I flag is not specified, vacation reads the first line from the standard input (for a “From” line, no colon). If absent, it produces an error message.

−tN Change the interval between repeat replies to the same sender. The default is 1 week. A trailing ‘s’, ‘m’, ‘h’, ‘d’, or ‘w’ scales N to seconds, minutes, hours, days, or weeks respectively.

A list of senders is kept in the files .vacation.pag and .vacation.dir in your home directory.

Museum