Address shortcuts: using mail aliases

To reduce the number of characters you must type to send mail to a certain user, you can create an alias for that user. Suppose that you regularly send mail to the address "bovik@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu" and would rather type "bovik" instead of the full address. Under your MH directory, $HOME/Mail, create a file called MailAliases. In that file, place this line:

bovik:bovik@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu

You could then type "bovik" where you would normally type the full address ("bovik@ux4.sp.cs.cmu.edu"). Once you have created aliases, check them with the ali command.

To define aliases that substitute for more than one mail address, use commas between the addresses. For instance, my MailAliases file might look like this:

mygroup: thisguy@a.gp.cs.cmu.edu, thisgirl@b.gp.cs.cmu.edu, \
somebody@c.gp.cs.cmu.edu, nobody@f.gp.cs.cmu.edu
hergroup: thatguy@a.gp.cs.cmu.edu, thatgirl@b.gp.cs.cmu.edu, \
somebody@c.gp.cs.cmu.edu, nobody@f.gp.cs.cmu.edu, \
anybody@g.gp.cs.cmu.edu
harry: bovik@k.gp.cs.cmu.edu

Notice that the aliases "mygroup" and "hergroup" take up more than one line. To extend an alias past a certain line, you must end that line with a backslash (\), followed immediately by a [RETURN].

For more information on the format of alias files, type "man mh-alias" to view the mh-alias online manual page.