Frequently Asked Questions about Email, not covered anywhere else in the Email Section

How do I find a damtp email address or the address of someone in the university

Finding damtp email addresses is covered in the Introduction to Damtp Email document. To find the email address of someone in the university who has consented to have their email address published look at jackdaw and read the information sheet with hints for finding email addresses. Or check the list of departments and colleges which have email lists.
I'm not on a departmental email list

The departmental email lists are generated automatically from the departmental database. You need to email dbadmin@damtp.ac.uk and not help.
I'm using my laptop, I don't have a local email address set and I'd like to send email. What setting do I use?

You need to use ppsw.cam.ac.uk for this. PPSW is configured to allow email from other addresses to be sent through it. Set your smtp or outgoing server to ppsw.cam.ac.uk
How do I change my settings so my damtp email address can be found/can't be found by either the damtp email searcher or the university email searcher.

From October 24 2001 we were not allowed make email addresses visible on the damtp webpage unless whoever owns the address has explicitly agreed that we may do so. To select if your address is visible or not run the script: visiblemail on any damtp unix computer, this will tell you what your current setting is and ask you if you would like a visible (ie searchable) email address. Again the university could not make your address findable via their email searcher unless you had explitily agreed. To change the settings for your @cam email address use the computing service web-based interface to administer your @cam email address.
```
        https://jackdaw.cam.ac.uk/cammail
```
This interface requires you to authenticate yourself with your Raven username and password. More information about this interface is at http:/www.cam.ac.uk/cs/docs/infosheets/is29.
I have received an attachment

Consult the attachment table to find out what to do with your attachment.
There is an attachment in the email but I can't extract it or open it

If the attachment is in the body of the email and you can't extract it, first save the email to disk. Next edit the saved copy of the email, removing all lines above the line that starts with begin followed by a 3 digit number followed by a filename. eg begin 660 schedule.doc. Save this copy of the email, for this example call the file attach. Run uudecode on this saved copy of the email eg uudecode attach. This will create a new file with the name that followed the begin 600 above ie schedule.doc in this example.
Then open the new file with whatever tool is appropiate for its type. Or save the message and use ripmime to extract the parts from the mail message.
How can I forward my @cam email to damtp (or to any other address)

Information about this service is documented by the UCS Information Sheet Number 29. The hermmail and cammail commands are no longer supported by the computing service.
Email comes with wrong date.

Normally the mail system won't alter any date header present in the message, normally added by the client software eg pine, mulberry etc. If the sender is running their email client on a pc with the wrong time/date this will cause the date header to be "incorrect" when received. Looking at the full header will allow you to see when the email was actually sent.
I don't want any more junk/spam email.

We do not reject spam messages, instead you are encouraged to filter your spam messages based on the X-Cam-Score header. If you are using Hermes for your email then the computing service have is a simple way to do this using hermes webmail. If your damtp account was set up before Michaelmas Term 2005 and you are using the damtp email system. Here is a sample filter file which you can copy into your homedirectory to a file called .forward. See the Exim filter documentation for more information about exim filtering. Do not reply to the email asking to be removed from the list as this only confims to the spammer that your email address is a live address. Also don't take revenge by sending the spammer loads of rubbish back its against the university's regulations. In particular note rules for the networks. The computing service have further information about junk mail and what to do/not to do with junk email.
I keep receiving unwanted mail from x address

Filter it into a black hole. To do this using damtp email facilities see the sample filter file for details or look at exim filters.
How do I view the complete header of an email for example to find out where it really came from

Spamcop has instructions for most email programs. The computing service have instructions for pine and mulberry.
My visitor needs access to his home email

If your visitor has access to a laptop, we can give your visitor access to our laptop network and they can use the laptop to check their email. Otherwise we can set your visitor up with a temporary damtp account which can be used to log into your group and public computers and from there access external systems. If possible email us with your visitor's name, dates they'll be visiting between and whether they'll prefer a laptop account, a damtp account or both before they arrive and then the account will be ready for them on arrival, and the details given to them once they have signed an account form (available from reception).

Please email any suggestions, corrections, broken links, or errors to itweb [itweb@damtp.cam.ac.uk]