UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users

When i run this command on my linux machine:

mail -s "CVS ALERT-CRITCAL" sandy@xyz.com

The system hangs up producing a dead letter. What should i do to resolve this.

I am using :

mailx -s "CVS ALERT-CRITCAL" sandy@xyz.com

This cammnd works fine on another Linux machine but says" mailxcommand not found " in the first machine

Can someone guide me here please

Thanks,
Sandeep

It waits for you to type in the mail body, and when you press ctrl-C to break out, it produces the dead.letter because you didn't finish the message.

mailx </dev/null if you don't want the message to have a body.

"command not found" typically means that the package which contains this command was not installed. Talk to the admin, or if the admin is you, talk to yourself.

can you please let me know what this dev/null means.....(</dev/null)....also can you send the complete code?

Thanks again
Sandeep

What is this doing in the "UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users" forum if you are unfamiliar with even the most basic features of the Unix shell??

Code:

mailx -s "I am a newbie" sandy@xyz.com </dev/null

era,

I am not new to unix but i am only new to this command. I have written lot of shell scripts but never used something like </dev/null in my previous scripts. Most of the time my isssues have been complicated and hence i go this forum. Mistakingly this time ,since this being new thing i just went ahead and asked this in this forum.Thanks for the help anyways.

regards,
Sandeep

Hi,

i used your command and it did not hang and it came to prompt
-----------------------------------------------------
mail -s "I am a newbie" sandy@xyz.com </dev/null
Null message body; hope that's ok
You have new mail in /var/spool/mail/root
-------------------------------------------------------

But i have not recieved any mail yet. when i checked in /var/spool/mail/root i found this in the root file:


From root@blr.xyz.com Tue Mar 18 23:40:00 2008
Return-Path: <root@blr.xyz.com >
Received: from root@blr.xyz.com (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1])
by root@blr.xyz.com
(8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id m2IIA0Jb007195
for <root@blr.xyz.com>; Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:40:00 +0530
Received: (from root@localhost)
by root@blr.xyz.com (8.12.8/8.12.8/Submit) id m2IIA0xi007193
for root; Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:40:00 +0530
Date: Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:40:00 +0530
Message-Id: <200803181810.m2IIA0xi007193@root@blr.xyz.com >
From: root@blr.xyz.com (Cron Daemon)
To: root@blr.xyz.com
Subject: Cron <root@blr> /usr/lib/sa/sa1 1 1
X-Cron-Env: <SHELL=/bin/sh>
X-Cron-Env: <HOME=/root>
X-Cron-Env: <PATH=/usr/bin:/bin>
X-Cron-Env: <LOGNAME=root>

Cannot open /var/log/sa/sa18: No such file or directory




please help

As far as I can tell you have a cron job /usr/lib/sa/sa1 1 1 which produced this output. It seems unrelated to your question.