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- POP3 Scan Mailbox V1.0 Release Notes
- ************************************
-
- This file contains:
-
- o A list of changes made to Scan Mailbox since V0.75 which was
- the last public beta release
-
- o The "wish list" of enhancements which may be implemented
- in future releases.
-
- -----------------------------------------------------------------
-
- The following changes have been made since version 0.75 Beta:
-
- o This version of the program does not expire and can be used
- indefinitely.
-
- o The command buttons have been replaced with a toolbar, complete
- with tooltips. Hover the mouse over each button to see what it
- does.
-
- o The toolbar may be switched off by means of a new option on
- the 'Miscellaneous' tab of Global Options for those who prefer
- a minimalist approach.
-
- o The 'Mailer', 'Retrieve' and 'Mail List' tabs have been removed
- from the Global Options dialogue and these settings are now
- available only in the Account Options dialogue. Any values
- already set in these tabs in Global Options will be lost when
- upgrading to this version and will need to be re-entered in the
- Account Options for each Account tab to which they apply. This
- change fixes a number of bugs concerned with the interaction
- between Global and Account Options.
-
- o Three new buttons have been added to the toolbar and a new
- checkbox has been added to the 'Retrieve' tab in Account
- Options. These provide more control over the amount of data
- retrieved from the POP3 server:
-
- The 'Retrieve' tab now contains three checkboxes marked
- "Retrieve Message Sizes", "Retrieve Headers" and "Retrieve
- SMTP Envelopes". The first two of these are ticked by default
- and the third is ticked by default if "Server supports *ENV"
- has been ticked, otherwise it is disabled.
-
- The settings on this tab can be set in any combination and
- control whether message sizes, headers and envelopes are
- retrieved automatically following a connection to the server.
-
- The three new toolbar buttons are labelled "Retrieve Envelopes",
- "Retrieve Message Sizes" and "Retrieve Headers" and these
- functions are also available from a new "Online" menu. Each
- button, and the corresponding menu item, is enabled only if the
- corresponding checkbox on the 'Retrieve' tab is unticked and
- allows each retrieve function to be controlled manually while
- online if the function is not performed automatically.
-
- Note that automatic mail kill is switched off for an account
- tab if any enabled checkboxes in the 'Retrieve' tab are unticked.
- In this situation, mail kill may be controlled manually by
- pressing the "Apply Mailkill Rules" button in the toolbar or by
- selecting the corresponding item in the 'Message' menu. Mailkill
- rules are aplied only to the message data which has been
- retrieved.
-
- A further related change is that the fields displayed in the mail
- list grid are now wholly controlled by the settings on the 'Mail
- List' tab in Account Options. Fields in the grid for data which
- is not retrieved automatically are initially blank and are filled
- in if the data is retrieved under manual control.
-
- o Three new columns have been added to the mail list grid
- and these are used to display the status of the message on the
- server (whether it is available, available but marked for deletion
- or deleted), whether it is selected, and the status of the message
- on the local system (how much of it, if any, has been retrieved).
- If "Resize Mail List Columns Automatically" has been switched off
- in File -> Global Options -> Miscellaneous, you will need to
- resize columns manually on the first run of a version which
- contains these columns. Alternatively, switch this option on
- before running this version for the first time. The new columns
- are described further below.
-
- o The new server status column is used to record the status of each
- message on the server. Symbols displayed in this field have the
- following meanings:
-
- Envelope:
- The message is available on the server and will be left on
- the server after disconnection
-
- Red cross superimposed on an envelope:
- The message is available on the server but has been marked
- for deletion. Unless the message is "undeleted" by the user
- before disconnection, it will be deleted on the server when
- the program disconnects
-
- Red cross without an envelope:
- The message has been deleted on the server and is no longer
- available
-
- Note that the use of this new column replaces the previous
- technique of overwriting the message number with an 'X'.
-
- o A green triangle is displayed in the 'Selected' column when a
- message is selected. Delete and Save functions apply to all
- messages which are marked as selected but Display functions
- apply to a single selected message.
-
- o The new 'Message' column is used to record the status of each
- message on the local system. A rectangular message symbol is
- displayed in this column and the colour and contents of this
- symbol have the following meanings:
-
- Colour:
- Red : Message not displayed or saved to a file
- Blue : Message displayed to the screen
- Green : Message saved to a file
-
- Contents:
- None:
- Message available on the server but no part of
- the message has been retrieved. This symbol is
- seen only if header retrieval is switched off
-
- Two lines:
- Headers have been retrieved
-
- Four short lines:
- Headers and part of the message body have been
- retrieved
-
- Four long lines:
- The entire message has been retrieved
-
- o Additional ways of selecting messages have been provided,
- including a means of selecting non-contiguous messages:
-
- Using the mouse:
-
- o Left mouse click without any other keys:
- Selects the current message and deselects all other messages.
-
- o <Shift> + left mouse click:
- Deselects all messages and re-selects messages inclusively
- between the message which was selected first and the
- current message.
-
- o <Control> + left mouse click:
- Leaves selected any messages which were already selected
- and either deselects the current message if it was
- already selected or selects the current message if it
- was unselected.
-
- o Right mouse click with or without <Shift> or <Control> keys:
-
- 32-bit version:
-
- If no messages are already selected, selects the current
- message, moves focus to this message and displays the
- context (message) menu
-
- If a single message is already selected, deselects that
- message, selects the current message, moves focus to this
- message and displays the context menu
-
- If more than one row is already selected,
- (a) if the user has right-clicked on one of the selected
- messages, leaves all selected messages selected and
- displays the context menu
- (b) if the user has right-clicked on a message which is
- not already selected, deselects all selected messages,
- selects the current message, moves focus to this message
- and displays the context menu
-
- 16-bit version:
-
- Displays the context menu without changing the selected status
- of any rows
-
- Using the keyboard:
-
- o Up/down keys without any other keys:
- If no messages are selected, moves focus only.
- If one or more messages are already selected, selects the
- previous/next message and deselects all other messages (this
- is equivalent to a left mouse click).
-
- o <Control> + up/down keys:
- Moves focus but retains any selections.
-
- o <Shift > + up/down keys:
- Moves focus up/down, deselects all messages and re-selects
- messages inclusively between the message which was selected
- first and the current message (this is equivalent to <Shift>
- + left mouse click).
-
- o <Space>:
- Selects the current message and retains selections.
-
- o <Control>+<Space>:
- If the current message is unselected, selects it.
- If the current message is selected, deselects it.
- In both cases, any other selections are retained
-
- o <PgUp> and <PgDn>:
- Moves focus up/down by the number of messages
- displayed in the grid, deselects all rows and
- reselects the first/last row on display
-
- o <Control> + <PgUp> or <PgDn>:
- Moves focus up/down by the number of messages
- displayed in the grid but retains selections
-
- o <Shift> + <PgUp> or <PgDn>
- Moves focus up/down by the number of messages
- displayed in the grid, deselects all messages and
- re-selects messages inclusively between the message
- which was selected first and the current message
-
- o <Home> and <End>:
- Moves focus to the first/last message
- displayed in the grid, deselects all rows and
- reselects the first/last message
-
- o <Control> + <Home> or <End>:
- Moves focus to the first/last message
- displayed in the grid but retains selections
-
- o <Shift> + <Home> or <End>:
- Moves focus to the first/last message,
- deselects all rows and re-selects inclusively
- between the row which was selected first and
- the first/last message
-
- o The mail list grid now scrolls automatically by default when
- message details are added, when moving focus upwards or
- downwards within the grid and when saving messages to file.
-
- o Scrolling of the message list while retrieving message details
- is optional and is controlled by a new checkbox on the
- 'Miscellaneous' tab of Global Options. Users may wish to make
- a minor adjustment to the height of the program's window to
- ensure that the row displayed at the bottom of the grid is not
- truncated.
-
- o A "Select All Messages" item has been added to the Messages
- menu.
-
- o The 'Misc' tab in Account Options has been renamed 'Server'
- and the 'Server Supports *ENV' checkbox has been moved from
- the Account Configuration dialogue to the 'Server' tab.
- The state of this checkbox may be incorrect for User tabs
- after upgrading to this version (this applies ONLY to account
- tabs used with Demon Internet) and should be set appropriately
- after upgrading.
-
- o The number of messages deleted is now displayed in the status
- line after disconnection.
-
- o Message details are no longer written to the log file twice.
-
- o If the program is about to crash, diagnostic information is
- now written to the session log file even if the logging level has
- been set to zero (no logging) in File -> Global Options -> Log
- Files.
-
- o Message dates are now displayed in the mail list grid in a
- standard format of dd mmm yy. Conversion of dates and times
- to local time will be done in a later version.
-
- o When saving messages to a file with "Use Automatic File Names"
- switched on, the program will save messages addressed to
- <user 1> in the file used for <user 2>'s messages if one or
- more lines are inserted in the 'scanmail.ini' file with the
- format:
-
- Alias=<user1>,<user2>
-
- For example, the line:
-
- Alias=smb,scanmail
-
- causes messages addressed to 'smb' to be saved as if they had
- been addressed to 'scanmail'. 'Alias' lines may be entered
- at any point in the 'scanmail.ini' file, they have a global
- effect (across all Account tabs) and there is no means of
- setting or changing aliases within the program.
-
- o The deletion of messages on the server is now delayed until
- disconnection. If there are messages marked to be deleted when
- the user disconnects from the server, a new message box is
- displayed while the deletions are in progress giving a final
- chance to abort the deletions. Pressing the 'Cancel' button in
- this message box causes all messages to be undeleted and the
- program is left connected to the server.
-
- o The 'Undelete All' command button has been renamed 'Undelete'
- and now undeletes any selected messages which have been marked
- for deletion.
-
- o The 'Undelete All Messages' item in the Message menu has been
- renamed 'Undelete Message(s)' and has two subsidiary items which
- are 'All Message(s)' and 'Selected Messages'.
-
- o The 'Copy Field to Clipboard' item in the Message menu has been
- renamed "Copy Message Details to Clipboard' and the text,
- position and meaning of some of the subsidiary items has been
- changed.
-
- o The menu displayed from Message -> Copy Message Details to
- Clipboard -> Fields of Selected Message now contains a new item
- "Size".
-
- o Some items in the Message menu are now greyed out depending on
- how many messages are selected. The following table, in which
- E=menu item enabled and D=menu item disabled, lists the effects:
-
- Menu item Messages selected: 0 1 >1
-
- Display Headers D E D
- Display Message D E D
- Display Part of Message D E D
- Save Selected Messages to File D E E
- Delete Selected Messages D E E
- Undelete Selected Messages D E E
- Copy Message Details to Clipboard:
- All details of Selected Messages D E E
- Fields of Selected Message D E D
-
- o The program retrieves the headers of message number n from the
- server by issuing the POP3 command 'TOP n 0'. Some servers
- wrongly respond to this command by returning the entire message.
- To cope with these non-compliant servers, a new 'Misc' tab has
- been added to the Account Options dialogue with a check box
- labelled "Server supports TOP n 0". This box is ticked by
- default; if unticked, the program uses the 'TOP n 1" command
- instead and this is more likely to be interpreted correctly by
- broken servers.
-
- o The "Size", "Date" and "Time" headers in the mail list grid are
- now left-aligned.
-
- o The program name is now displayed correctly as "POP3 Scan Mailbox"
- in the list of applications displayed by <Ctrl> + <Alt> +
- <Delete>, <Alt> + <Tab> and <Ctrl> + <Esc>.
-
- o The 'Account has Users' dialogue, entered from File -> Configure
- -> Accounts and Users has been deleted and this menu item and the
- corresponding toolbar tooltip has been renamed 'Configure
- Accounts'.
-
- This change affects only those users of Demon Internet who have
- configured multiple users at their host. On the first run of this
- version, user tabs will be converted into account tabs and any new
- tabs for a specific user should be set up as new accounts,
- specifying the 'Login Name' as <user>+<hostname>.
-
- A side effect of this change is that the "U" command line option
- is no longer valid. If this is in use, the command line sequence
- '/C <account> /U <user>' should be replaced with
- '/C <account> : <user>'
-
- o A bug has been fixed which caused the program to crash when
- started in a minimised state and the '/C' command line option
- is used.
-
- o A bug has been fixed which causes the program to crash with
- 'Error 9 : Subscript out of range' if there is only one
- Account defined and command line options are used to connect
- to this account automatically.
-
- o There is a known bug which has not yet been fixed: when focus is
- on the mail list grid, it is not possible to switch applications
- with <Alt> + <Tab> or to close the program with <Alt> + <F4>.
-
- o A bug has been fixed whereby the 'Wait for [x] seconds' box on
- the 'Mailer' tab of Global Options wasn't always greyed out
- correctly.
-
- o A bug has been fixed which, in rare circumstances, causes the
- program to crash when clicking in the mail list grid.
-
- o A bug has been fixed which sometimes resulted in the wrong
- messages being selected when switching account tabs.
-
- o The 'Select All Messages' item in the Messages menu is now
- enabled after disconnection when messages are displayed in the
- grid.
-
- o It is now possible to view a message which has been marked
- for deletion.
-
- o The coloured dots on the account tabs have been moved down
- by two pixels to centre them in the tabs.
-
- o The text displayed in the status bar when messages have been
- selected for deletion now reads "..., <n> to be deleted"
- instead of "..., <n> deleted".
-
- o A bug has been fixed which caused the program wrongly to insert
- a warning in the headers of a saved mail message if the day of
- the week is omitted from the 'Date:' header in a mail message.
-
- o Although there is still a minimum size for the main window, it
- is now possible to make the window much smaller than before.
-
- o Details of deleted messages are now written to logkill.txt only
- after a successful disconnection. This avoids logkill.txt
- wrongly recording that messages are deleted if the connection
- is lost during the disconnection phase but before disconnection
- is completed.
-
- o The text of the "forced disconnection" message has been changed
- to distinguish a disconnection forced by the user from a
- disconnection forced by the server or a line drop.
-
- o The program now discards any data received from the POP3 server
- after it has forced a disconnection. This prevents repeated
- "protocol error" popup boxes appearing if the server provides
- invalid responses.
-
- o Several bugs have been fixed in the code which deletes account
- tabs. These could cause the wrong account details to be
- associated with a tab or the program to crash.
-
- o The mail program, if any, defined in Account Options is not now
- invoked on disconnection if all waiting messages have been deleted
- by the program.
-
- o The status box which displays the current command issued to the
- server is now cleared after a forced disconnection.
-
- o The word 'Mailkill' has been changed to 'Mail Kill' in tooltips
- and menus.
-
- o Parentheses have been dropped in menu items such as 'All Details
- of Selected Message(s)'.
-
- o "Display Headers" has been changed to "Display Message Headers"
- in the Message menu, in the corresponding tooltip and in the
- 'Double Click' tab in the Global Options dialogue.
-
- o The logo displayed on the 'Welcome' screen (seen when SMB is
- started without a scanmail.ini file) has been changed to reflect
- the SMB name. My thanks to Jim Hill for the logo.
-
- o Help -> Release Notes now displays the changes.txt file instead
- of opening Windows Help.
-
- o A rudimentary Help file has been included (in the Windows 95/98/NT
- version only) which offers advice on support and advises users to
- watch the Web sites or subscribe to the smb-announce mailing list
- to find out when full Windows Help is available.
-
- o If an attempt is made to close the program while it is connected
- to a POP3 server, a message box is displayed advising the user
- to disconnect first.
-
- o The question "n messages have been marked for deletion - Are you
- sure you want to delete them?" is normally suppressed during
- automatic connections to enable a series of automatic connections
- to be performed without user intervention. This question is now
- asked on manual disconnection when the /S option has been used.
-
-
- -----------------------------------------------------------------
-
- The Wish List:
-
- 1 OPTIONS
-
- 1.1 Option to check for new mail every <n> minutes
-
- 1.2 Option to set the number of Account tabs per row in the
- 32-bit version with fixed tab widths
-
- 1.3 Option to specify that any named headers should be displayed
- on the grid
-
- 1.4 Option not to display in the grid mail from addresses on the
- 'accept' list, thus making it easier to see unexpected mail.
- Possibly by means of a 'Show All / Show Custom' toggle
-
- 1.5 Use locked tick boxes, a spinner control or a sliding
- indicator to set the logging level
-
- 1.6 Option to display details of new mail only (ignoring messages
- which the program has seen before).
-
-
- 2 MAIL KILL
-
- 2.1 Stop assuming a wildcard on each side of entries in the mail
- kill list and require it to be specified if required
-
- 2.2 Provide a means of temporarily disabling mail kill criteria
- on a per-tab basis
-
- 2.3 Allow kill rules based on any header
-
- 2.4 Allow kill rules based on a string occurring anywhere in any
- header
-
- 2.5 Provide a kill rule based on the result of reverse DNS lookups
-
- 2.6 Allow use of boolean operators: AND, OR and NOT
-
- 2.7 Provide 'send field to the kill list' feature with editing
- of the field
-
- 2.8 Allow different mail kill rules for each Account tab
-
- 2.9 Auto-reply or forward based on specified rules
-
- 2.10 Option to kill messages based on keywords found in the body
- with the program acting as a POP3 proxy server and client
-
- 2.11 Exclude mail addressed to "postmaster@" from automatic mail
- kill. Perhaps provide this string as a pre-configured 'accept
- criterion' and allow the user to delete it if desired
-
- 2.12 Implement mail bouncing
-
- 2.13 Implement a scheme for automatic mail kill based on usernames
- which expire after a configurable elapsed number of days
-
- 2.14 Mailkill to operate only on fields visible in the message
- grid
-
- 2.15 Perform mail kill in the idle time while waiting for the
- server to provide the headers of each message
-
- 2.16 Use a scoring system to determine which messages should be
- deleted
-
- 2.17 Allow marking of messages for deletion while offline to be
- actioned on the next connect to the server
-
- 2.18 If a message is selected when the mail kill dialogue is
- entered, insert information from the headers of the
- selected message in the 'Accept Mail' and 'Kill Mail'
- boxes.
-
-
- 3 MESSAGE OPERATIONS
-
- 3.1 Expand the message status symbols to indicate that a message
- contains MIME attachments
-
- 3.2 CTRL/Disconnect to prevent marked messages being deleted
-
- 3.3 <delete> key to mark a message for deletion and <shift/delete>
- to undelete a message
-
- 3.4 Provide a means of sorting messages in the grid and changing
- the order in which they are displayed
-
- 3.5 Allow the user to specify an editor program for use when
- displaying messages
-
- 3.6 Allow drag and drop of messages into other programs
-
- 3.7 Option to overwrite, instead of appending to, a file when
- saving messages
-
- 3.8 Allow printing of messages
-
- 3.9 Provide an automatic option to retrieve mail from the
- server and save it in text files
-
- 3.10 Derive SMTP envelope information from the headers where
- possible, especially the <MAIL FROM> value often recorded
- in the 'Return-Path:' header and Nyn Net's method of using
- an 'X-Nyx-Envelope-Data:' header.
-
- 3.11 Display 8-bit characters in header fields encoded using
- RFC 2047 MIME features.
-
- 3.12 Convert dates and times to local time before display and
- provide a setting for the local time offset in the 16-bit
- version.
-
- 3.13 Allow retrieval of specified headers only, such as the
- first <n> headers or marked headers.
-
-
- 4 LOG FILES AND STATUS
-
- 4.1 Provide a tab status field on the display as well as a
- program status field, to be placed below the tab and
- above the message grid
-
- 4.2 Automatic archiving of logs, possibly with a date-based
- naming scheme
-
- 4.3 Allow the user to specify where log files are located
-
- 4.4 Include date and time on each line when writing grid
- message details to the session log file and include
- place-holding tabs for missing fields
-
- 4.5 Revise the format of the mail kill log
-
-
- 5 ACCOUNT CONFIGURATION
-
- 5.1 Allow Account tabs to be renamed
-
- 5.2 Warn if the user tries to create a new Account with the
- same name as an existing Account
-
- 5.3 Add "Save password" option to the dialogue displayed when
- connecting without a password having been defined
-
- 5.4 Allow Account tabs to be re-ordered
-
-
- 6 HELP
-
- 6.1 Update Windows Help to reflect the current program
-
- 6.2 <shift/F1> should invoke context sensitive Help
-
- 6.3 Provide a "mouse pointer with a question mark"
-
- 6.4 Dynamically add items to the Help menu on startup if
- alternative manual formats (such as HTML) exist
-
-
- 7 GENERAL
-
- 7.1 For use when an ISP provides multiple email addresses
- routing into a single POP3 mailbox: provide a means of
- connecting to the POP3 server once and distributing
- messages to the appropriate user tabs, perhaps with user
- tabs as children of the main tab
-
- 7.2 Add a [Debug] section in the scanmail.ini file to replace
- the '/OV' option
-
- 7.3 Provide a 'white tab' on the very first start of ScanMail
- listing configuration information
-
- 7.4 Allow multiple concurrent connections to several POP3 servers
-
- 7.5 Allow use of multiple '.ini' files with the required file
- specified on the command line and an 'Export ini file' menu
- item
-
- 7.6 Allow command line options to be specified in the '.ini'
- file
-
- 7.7 Provide a 'Mail Action' option offering the user a choice of
- actions if there are more than <n> messages on the server
-
- 7.8 Optionally play a tune when there is new mail on the server
-
- 7.9 Allow the program to run in the system tray
-
- 7.10 Make use of spare processing time while downloading headers
- to mail kill, allow marking/unmarking of messages for deletion,
- sort and view header or body
-
- 7.11 Allow a list of accounts for automatic connection to be
- supplied in a file and referenced by a command line "/F"
- option
-
- 7.12 Allow multiple instances of the program to be run concurrently
- with a configurable directory to hold the ini file, log
- files and kill files
-
- 7.13 Measure the elapsed time the program spends connected on a per
- tab basis and cumulatively; provide reports on time, number
- of messages processed and number killed
-
- 7.14 Measure throughput
-
- 7.15 Review keyboard accelerators and possibly replace some of
- them with <CTRL/Fn> or add a <shift> modifier
-
- 7.16 Replace the hourglass "busy" cursor with a rotating seahorse,
- a blinking red connected indicator or a flashing lightning
- indicator on the toolbar!
-
- 7.17 Allow the user to specify which toolbar buttons are displayed
-
- 7.18 Detect automatically a server which fails to respond correctly
- to 'TOP n 0'
-
- 7.19 Provide a progress indicator
-
- 7.20 Replace the Configuration, Mail Kill and Options dialogues with
- tabs on the main display.
-
- 7.21 Use balloons (similar to tooltips) to display all of a field
- when the mouse hovers over a truncated field in the mail list
- grid.
-
-
- 8 MAILBOMBS
-
- 8.1 Warn if more than <n> messages received on a single connect
- which are (a) each greater in size than <x> bytes and (b)
- from the same source and (c) not from an address on the
- 'accept' list and (d) to the same address and (e) of the
- same size
-