Accessing Email Using Pine

Pine is a very basic, text-based program (or client) for sending and reading email. Commands and shortcut keys display at the bottom of each screen. Pressing a shortcut key is just another way to move around without using the selection bar. In the instructions below, Enter means to press the Enter or Return key. The Control key (labeled Ctrl) is usually abbreviated as ^ ; e.g., Control+X is ^X.

If you get lost anywhere in Pine, press M to go back to the main menu.

  1. To start Pine, log into your account using SSH.
  2. At the prompt, type pine.
  3. At the main menu, choose options by using your arrow keys to move up and down the selection bar.

Pine Topics

  Sending Email Quitting Pine Attachments
  Reading Email Folders Signature Files
  Replying to Email Address Book Filtering Spam

Sending Email

  1. Move the selection bar up to Compose Message and press Enter (or use shortcut key: C ) .
  2. The Compose Message screen displays.
  3. Type the email address in the To: field.
    • For this tutorial, you’ll send mail to yourself.
    • Type your e-mail address in the To: field and press Enter to move to the next line.
  4. If you want to send this email to more than one person, use the CC: field to type other people’s e-mail addresses.
    • For this tutorial, leave this field blank.
    • Press Enter to move down.
  5. The Attchmnt: field is where you would place the name of a file that you want to attach to the email.
    • For this tutorial, leave this field blank.
    • Press Enter to move down.
  6. The Subject: field is where the you would type a description of the email that you are sending.
    • For this tutorial, type "this is a test message."
    • Press Enter to move down.
  7. In the body of the message, type the actual content of the e-mail.
    • For this tutorial, type "This is the body of the mail. Isn’t e-mail fun?"
  8. When you are finished with the message, press Control+X (^X) to send the email and return to the main menu.

Reading Email

  1. Move the selection bar to Folder List (shortcut key: L ) and press Enter.
  2. Move the selection bar to Inbox (shortcut key: I ) and press Enter.
  3. Your Inbox message list displays. Any new mail you receive displays here.
    • For this tutorial, you should see the message you sent to yourself.
    • If not, wait a minute or two and it will display.
  4. To read the mail, highlight the message, then press Enter.
  5. Use your arrow keys to scroll up and down in the message.
  6. Press I to return to your message list.
  7. To delete any mail from your Inbox, highlight the message and press D.
    • For this tutorial, highlight the message that you sent yourself, and press D.
    • Press M to return to the main menu.

Replying to Email

To reply to email without "composing a message," use these steps. Replies give you the option of quoting the message sent to you, and automatically fills in the To: and Subject: fields for you.

  1. Highlight or read the message.
  2. Press R to reply.
  3. Press Y if you want to quote the message, or N if you don’t.
    • Quoting a message copies the current message to your outgoing message.
    • Use this option with discretion.
    • If the original message is very long, edit to highlight pertinent parts of the message.
  4. If the message was sent to more than one email address, Pine asks if you want to reply to all recipients. Consider your answer carefully.
    • Press Y if you want all recipients to read your response.
    • Press N if you want to respond only to the sender.
  5. On the new screen that displays, type your message.
    • Notice that the To: and Subject: field are already filled in.
    • If you quoted the message, notice how the original message is copied in the body.
  6. When you’re finished, press Control+X (^X) to send.

Quitting Pine

  1. At the main menu, highlight Quit (shortcut key: Q) and press Enter.
  2. Press Y to confirm.
  3. If you are asked whether to expunge messages, press Y.
  4. This removes any messages that you deleted from your Inbox.

Creating Folders

A folder is a place where you can save messages that you don’t want to delete or keep in your Inbox. For example, you might create a folder called "jokes" to keep those types of messages.

Adding a folder:

  1. At the main menu, highlight Folder List (shortcut key: L ) and press Enter.
  2. Press A to add a folder.
  3. Type the name of the folder you want to create and press Enter.
  4. The new folder is now listed next to your Inbox.

Deleting a folder:

  1. At the main menu, highlight Folder List (shortcut key: L ) and press Enter.
  2. Highlight the folder you wish to delete and press D.
  3. Press Y to confirm the delete. (You may want to double-check to make sure you aren’t deleting something important.) Otherwise, press N.
  4. All messages in that folder are deleted.

Saving messages to a folder:

  1. Highlight the message to save to a folder and press S.
  2. To list your folders, press Control+T (^T).
  3. Highlight the folder where you want to save messageand press Enter.
  4. Press Enter again to save the message.

Pine folders are actually ASCII (plain text) files stored in the /mail subdirectory on the server. When a message is saved to a folder, Pine appends a copy to the existing folder. At the same time, it marks the message for deletion from the Inbox. Upon exit from PINE, you are asked if you want to expunge the message from the Inbox.

  1. Press Y to exit PINE and delete message from Inbox.

Using the Pine Address Book

You can save addresses in Pine’s address book, and recall them whenever you wish.

Viewing your Address Book:

  1. In the main menu, highlight Address Book (shortcut key: A ) and press Enter.
  2. Your address book is now on the screen.
  3. If you haven’t placed any addresses in your Address Book, it will be empty.

Adding an entry:

  1. While viewing your Address Book, press A to add a new entry.
  2. The Nickname: field is where you can place a one-word "nickname" for the address.
  3. The Full Name: field is where you type in a name for the e-mail address
  4. The Fcc: field is where outgoing messages to this person are copied. You can leave this blank if you are not sure how to use it.
  5. The Comment: field is where you can enter a brief description of the entry. You can leave this blank if you do not want to type in a description.
  6. The Addresses: field is where you type in the email address of the person.
  7. When you are finished filling this out, press Control+X (^X).
  8. Press Y to save the changes.
  9. Your address book displays again, but this time, the new entry is listed.

Deleting an entry:

  1. While viewing your Address Book, highlight the entry to delete.
  2. Press D to delete it.
  3. If you are sure you want to remove it, press Y to confirm.

Using the Address Book while composing a message:

  1. In the main menu, highlight Compose Message and press Enter. (shortcut key: C )
  2. In the To: field, you have 2 options:
    • Type the nickname of the Address Book entry, or
    • To list your address book, press Control+T (^T), highlight the entry you want to mail, and press Enter.
  3. The To: field now contains the email address of the Address Book entry.

Making a mailing list:

A mailing list is a collection of several email addresses placed into one entry in the Address Book to easily email several people.

  1. Follow steps 1-5 for Adding an address.
  2. In the Addresses: field, type the addresses you want on this mailing list separated by a comma between each address.
    Example: someguy@someplace.com, someone@other.com, me@myplace.org
  3. When finished, press Control+X (^X). Press Y to confirm the save.

Use mailing lists the same way as a normal Address Book entry. Typing in the nickname of the mailing list in the To: field of a message sends that mail to everyone on the mailing list.

Using Attachments

Attaching files to a mail message:

Attaching files to mail sends that file to the recipient along with the message. Use attachments to send word processing documents, spreadsheet files, and/or pictures via email.

  1. While composing a message, move to the Attchmnt: field, press Control+T (^T).
  2. Highlight the file you want to attach and press Enter.
  3. That file is sent along with the message to the recipient.
  4. Note: The file MUST be on the server. You may need to use the FTP client to move files from your local PC to the server; for Macs, use Fetch.

Detaching files from a mail message:

Pine notifies you if an email includes an attachment. You see a message similar to the following near the top of the message:

Parts/attachments: 1 Shown 10 lines Text 2 130 KB Image, ""
  1. While reading the message, press V to view the attachment list.
    • The first attachment listed is actually the body of the message sent.
    • Attached file(s) are listed as 2, 3, and so on.
  2. Highlight the attachment.
  3. You have 2 options:
    • If the attachment is text, press Enter to view it. When done, press E to exit.
    • If the attachment is not text (photo, word processing document, spreadsheet), press S to save it to your account.
      The file is saved to your home directory on the server. You made need to use the FTP client to move files from the server to your local PC (for Macs, use Fetch) before you can open it.
  4. Press E to exit the attachment viewer.

Using Signature Files

Tired of always typing the same information at the bottom of your email? Use a feature in Pine that allows you to automate the process.

Creating a signature file for UNIX Pine:

  1. Log into your email server via an SSH session.
  2. At the UNIX prompt (example: Equinox:26% or Fallon:26%), type: pico .signature (see pico and make sure to put the period '.' before signature).
  3. An editor window opens.
  4. Type the information to include with every email you send or reply to. You are limited to text characters only.
  5. To save the file, press Control+X,Y, Enter. (^X,Y, Enter).

Creating a signature file for PC-PINE:

Create a file named pine.sig in the same directory where you have installed PC-Pine. Use Notepad or Wordpad and save the file as plain text.

Example of a .signature file

Best wishes, Elizabeth Kelly Gardner University of Nevada, Reno Undergraduate 702/555-1212 home 702/555-1212 x1 work http://www.scs.unr.edu/~elizabethk/index.html

Filtering Spam

Setting your Pine email filter:

  1. Log into Fallon through SSH or similar and start Pine.
  2. Using your arrow keys (on the keyboard), highlight email and press Enter (on the keyboard).
  3. Using arrow keys, highlight Setup and press Enter.
  4. Press R (rules) on the keyboard.
  5. Type of rule set up appears at the bottom of the screen; press F (filter).
  6. At the top of the screen, you see Use add to add a filtering rule; press Enter.
  7. Under current folder type, highlight email and press Enter.
  8. Under Filtered message conditions begin here, use the arrow keys to highlight
    Subject pattern and press Enter.
  9. Enter the text to be added displays; type SPAM WARNING and press Enter.
  10. Using the down arrow key, move down the page to Actions begin here.
  11. Under Filter Action, highlight Delete and press Enter.
  12. Press E on the keyboard to exit and save these rules.
  13. Commit changes appears at the bottom; press Y on the keyboard for yes.
  14. Filter Rule appears at the top of the screen; press E to exit.
  15. Commit changes appears at the bottom of the screen; press Y for yes.
  16. You have now added filters rules that automatically delete any emails with SPAM WARNING
    in the subject field.

Finding Additional Pine Help

  • At any screen in PINE, you can type ? to get further help. It lets you browse more of PINE’s features, and tells you how to do certain tasks.
  • If you're really stuck, check the following web page which is maintained by the developers of PINE: http://www.washington.edu/pine/faq/.