Does anybody know anything about PMX/Term from AT&T?

[Paul S. R. Chisholm]

In article <1261 at neoucom.UUCP>, wtm at neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) writes:
> I've been on vacation, so I've been somewhat behind in  catching
> up on reading, Usenet, etc.  I just got around to looking at the
> June 6 issue of Info World.  On page 19, they describe some stuff
> related to AT&T Mail (that is, the service that bears that proper
> name).  One related thing they mention is:
> 
> "AT&T also announced PMX/Term, a PC version of its Unix-based
> electronic mail system for minicomputers.  PMX/Term runs on AT&T
> 6386 WGS PCs and MS-DOS compatibles, will be available in July and
> costs $1,295."
>...
> Can anybody elaborate on PMX/Term?...
> --Bill, impulse!wtm at neoucom.UUCP  <- temporary email address

Sure enough.  All of the products mentioned in that article were
developed in my group.  We do two things:  provide nice user interfaces
for existing electronic mail solutions, and develop new solutions
(e.g., STARMail, a STARLAN electronic mail application).

AT&T Mail Access PLUS is a new MS-DOS program that acts as a front end
to the AT&T Mail service (and to local mail servers, as described
below).  Access PLUS helps you create, send, receive, and organize your
electronic mail messages.  Access PLUS can also run in the background,
calling the AT&T Mail service periodically to look for new mail.

PMX/Term provides a similar user interface, but runs under the UNIX
operating system, and works with vanilla UNIX system E-mail.  PMX/Term
does *not* run under MS-DOS.

Both Access PLUS and PMX/Term let you organize your mail messages into
"folders", and provide an editor to create and revise messages.  You
can also "attach" files to a message when you create it, and "detach"
the files when you receive such a message.

What if you've got a 3B2 or 6386 running the UNIX operating system, and
a bunch of PC users who want to exchange mail?  In this case, you can
run PMX/PC on your UNIX system.  PMX/PC simulates just enough of the
AT&T Mail service user interface to work with the PC-based Access
products.  (Yeah, it's kind of confusing at first that PMX/PC doesn't
run on PCs.)

I don't know of any AT&T products that let a PC running MS-DOS
communicate with uucp on a UNIX system.  You could run PMX/PC on your
UNIX system, and send mail to it from Access PLUS.  AT&T Mail *does*
know uucp, so you also could run Access PLUS on your PC to call up the
service, and go through a UNIX system that's registered with the
service.

-Paul S. R. Chisholm, {ihnp4,cbosgd,allegra,rutgers}!mtune!lznv!psc
AT&T Mail !psrchisholm, Internet psc at lznv.att.com
I'm not speaking for my employer, I'm just speaking my mind.
UNIX(R) is a registered trademark of AT&T.