Elm on Xenix

[Chip Salzenberg]

[Cross-posted to comp.unix.xenix]

According to karl at ddsw1.UUCP (Karl Denninger):
>In article <169 at ness386.UUCP> mechsfm at ness386.UUCP (Shawn McDonald  512+377-6226) writes:
>>I think that the official release of elm 2.0 should support the
>>lastest release of Xenix.
>
>Try telling config you're a S5 VAX... it worked here, and we are using it
>daily (1.7b now, it was 1.5 originally).

No, no, NO!  You do _not_ have a working Elm!  It is only a reasonable
facsimile thereof. :-)

When "real" Unix /bin/mail locks fred's mailbox, it does it by exclusive
creation of "/usr/spool/mail/fred.lock".  Under Xenix, however, fred's
mailbox is locked by creation of "/tmp/fred.mlk".  This can be discerned
by running "strings /usr/lib/mail/mail.local" -- you'll find the string
"/tmp/%.10s.mlk" which is a printf-style format for the lock file.

Thus you are in *big trouble* if you are using stock Elm under Xenix and new
mail arrives -- or even worse, if Xenix's mail.local and Elm's "fastmail"
program both want to send mail to fred at the same time.  Ouch!
-- 
Chip Salzenberg                <chip at ateng.uu.net> or <uunet!ateng!chip>
A T Engineering                My employer may or may not agree with me.
        You make me wanna break the laws of time and space
                    You make me wanna eat pork