# Control PyKota by email with pkmail

Last modified on $Date: 2005-10-09 22:39:06 +0200 (So, 09. Okt 2005) $

`pkmail` is an email gateway which allows you to control PyKota using email messages.

For now, this command can't do more than print quota reports, but more powerful functionnalities are planned for a future release.

## Installation

Contrary to other commands included with PyKota, `pkmail` is not meant to be used from the command line, but instead launched from your mail server when particular messages are received.

In order to achieve this, the easiest way is to define a special email alias. Every message received on this address will cause your webserver to automatically launch `pkmail`, passing the message's content on `pkmail`'s standard input.

The name of the email alias is completely free, let's call it `pykotacmd` for example. Now edit `/etc/aliases` with your favorite text editor and enter the following :

    pykotacmd :     "|/usr/bin/pkmail"

Finally, tell your mail server that new aliases are available. To do so, at the command prompt just type :

    $ newaliases

But to be useful, `pkmail` must be able to read PyKota's `pykotadmin.conf` configuration file. A simple way to do so is to put the system user your mail server runs aliases commands as into the `pykota` system group, then restart your mail server software.

### Tip

Depending on the software you use as the mail server, additional work may be needed. For example Exim doesn't by default initialize all the groups when launching a command from the `/etc/aliases` database. Please refer to your mail server's documentation for details.

## Usage

Now that `pkmail` is installed, we can use it by sending email messages to the address `pykotacmd@yourmailserver.example.com`. This command will then process your request, and send the result back to you by email.

For now, `pkmail` only accepts commands in the `Subject:` field of the email message you send to it.

`pkmail` is still in a pretty experimental state, and only recognizes a single command : `report`

The `report` takes an username as its only optional argument. So for example to receive a print quota report for user `jerome`, you'll just have to send an email message with `report jerome` in the subject.

## Reference

            pkmail
            -v--version
            -h--help