Ubuntu Manpage: sendpage - submit a pager job for transmission

Provided by: hylafax-client_6.0.6-5_amd64

NAME

       sendpage - submit a pager job for transmission

SYNOPSIS

       sendpage [ options ] [ message...  ]

DESCRIPTION

sendpage submits a pager transmission request to a server using the Simple Network Paging Protocol (SNPP)
described in RFC 1861. Pager requests specified with sendpage are normally processed immediately,
although they may also be queued for transmission at a later time using a syntax identical to the at(1)
command. For each job that is queued, sendpage prints a job identifier on the standard output. A job
identifier is the token by which jobs are identified within HylaFAX. Job identifiers can be supplied to
the faxrm(1) command to remove the jobs or to the faxalter(1) command to alter job parameters.

Pages may be sent to one or more destination paging terminals and, optionally, include a text message
(depending on the capability of the receiving device). Each destination is identified by a Pager
Identification Number (PIN) specified with the -p option; for example, sendpage -p 12345 ``Help, the fax
machine is on fire!''. A PIN is typically a numeric string though it may also be an alpha-numeric alias
depending on the capabilities of the SNPP server.

Text messages can be specified on the command line or taken from standard input. The -n option must be
used if no text message is to be supplied with the page request—as for a numeric-only pager. Text
supplied to the paging system is sent exactly as submitted including any newline, carriage return, or
non-ASCII data. Message preparation including filtering and formatting must be done prior to submitting
the data to sendpage. Note that text supplied on the command line does not include a trailing newline
character.

The order of options on the command line is significant. Each page to be transmitted is assigned the
current value of parameters specified on the command line; e.g. whether or not to queue the request.
This means that options that specify parameters for a particular destination must precede the pager ID
specified with the -p option. For example,

sendpage -l 2 -p sam Your network is hosed

submits a page to ``sam'' that has service level 2 while

sendpage -p sam -l 2 Your network is hosed

submits the same page but with the default service level (1). Note also that parameter values persist
across -p options so the following

sendpage -l 0 -p sam -p 5551212 Your network is hosed

submits two pages, both of which have service level 0.

OPTIONS

-a time Schedule transmission at the indicated time. Times are specified using the syntax of the
at(1) command; e.g. ``now + 30 minutes'' to schedule transmission 30 minutes in the future.
By default, sendpage schedules pages for ``now''. (In SNPP parlance this option specifies
the ``hold time'' for the page; and may result in the page being delivered to the paging
terminal but not delivered to the user until the specified time.)

-D Enable notification by electronic mail when the page has been delivered to the service
provider. This option is meaningful only when communicating with a HylaFAX server.

-f from Use from as the identity of the message sender. Otherwise the sender is the user that
invoked sendpage. The sender is an account name to which the HylaFAX software should direct
email notification messages. The from identity may be a fullblown ``From:'' line, e.g. e.g.
``Joe Blow <joe@foo.com>'' and ``joe@foo.com (Joe Blow)'' are acceptable. If no host-part is
specified in the from string the local hostname is used. This option is useful when sendpage
is invoked on behalf of another user, such as in the implementation of an electronic mail to
pager gateway.

-h [modem@]host[:port]
Force the jobs to be processed on a specific host and, optionally, using a particular modem.
The host may be either a symbolic name or a network address. If no -h option is supplied,
sendpage uses the SNPPSERVER environment variable to identify the SNPP server to which the
pages should be directed. If no server is specified then sendpage attempts to contact a
server on the local host. If no modem is specified, the job will be submitted to any
available modem.

-I time If a job must be requeued because of a communication failure schedule the retry according to
the specified time. Times are given in seconds. Minutes, hours, and days can be specified
with ``min'', ``hour'', and ``day'' suffixes, respectively. By default HylaFAX reschedules
jobs using retry times that depend on the manner in which the job failed; this interface
permits a user to override this algorithm and specify a single fixed retry time for all
communication failures. This option is meaningful only when communicating with a HylaFAX
server.

-l level Specify a particular service level to use in delivering a page. A service level defines both
a scheduling priority and the time that a client is willing to wait to find out if delivery
is successful or not. Normal delivery is obtained with level 1 (default). The SNPP
specification identifies level 0 as the highest priority service level with levels 1-7 lower
priority and levels 8-11 vendor/server-specific. For HylaFAX server machines the mapping
between service level and scheduling priority is defined by the configuration of the SNPP
server process; see the PriorityMap parameter in hfaxd(8)

-n Send to a numeric-only paging device; i.e. do not send a text message in the paging request.

-N Do not notify the sender by electronic mail when the page has been delivered to the service
provider (default). This option is meaningful only when communicating with a HylaFAX server.

-p PIN The Pager Identification Number (PIN) for a terminal that is to receive the message. A
message can be sent to multiple destinations by specifying multiple -p options.

-q Mark pages to be queued on the server and do not wait for their delivery. By default
sendpage conforms to the SNPP spec by synchronously waiting for each page to be delivered.
This option instructs sendpage to submit one or pages and then terminate immediately without
waiting for their completion. When pages are queued it is advisable to enable email
notification with the -D or -R options. Job queueing is a non-standard function of the SNPP
implementation in HylaFAX and is not available when submitting pages to non-HylaFAX servers.

-R Enable notification by electronic mail when the message has been delivered and when it is
requeued for retransmission. HylaFAX will always notify the sender by electronic mail if
there is problem delivering a page (irregardless of the email notification setting). This
option is meaningful only when communicating with a HylaFAX server.

-s subject Set the ``subject'' for the specified pages according to subject. For HylaFAX subject is
used as the identifier string returned in any email notification messages (instead of the
usual job identifier number). This option is useful for applications that cross reference
notification messages against job submissions.

-t tries Make no more than tries attempts to send the page. By default, HylaFAX will terminate a job
if: 3 consecutive attempts to send a particular message fail, or it appears the receiver is
not a service provider. Otherwise HylaFAX places no limit on the number of attempts to send
a page, instead terminating a job if it is not completed within a fixed period of time
specified by the service level. Note that a try is a phone call in which carrier is
established and the IXO/TAP or UCP protocol is commenced; this is contrasted with a call
attempt that might have failed because the line was busy. This option is meaningful only
when communicating with a HylaFAX server.

-T dials Make no more than dials phone calls when attempting to send a page. By default, HylaFAX will
terminate a job if: 12 attempts to reach a service provider fail, or it appears the receiver
is not a service provider. Otherwise HylaFAX terminates a job if it is not completed within
a fixed period of time specified by the service level. This option is meaningful only when
communicating with a HylaFAX server.

-v Trace the protocol between sendpage and the SNPP server process that does the delivery work
on the remote machine. This information is directed to the standard output.

CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS

sendpage reads configuration information from the files /etc/hylafax/hyla.conf,
/etc/hylafax/sendpage.conf, and ~/.hylarc; in that order. Configuration files follow the conventions
described in hylafax-client(1). The following configuration parameters are recognized:
Tag Type Default Description
HoldTime string - hold time to assign to pages
Host string localhost host to contact for service
MailAddr string - mail address for notification messages
MaxDials integer 12 times to retry dialing
MaxTries integer 3 times to retry transmission
Notify string none control email notification
Port integer 444 port to use in contacting server
Protocol string tcp protocol to use in contacting server
QueueSend boolean No whether or not to queue pages
RetryTime string - delay between failed attempts to send
ServiceLevel integer SNPP service level for pages
Verbose boolean No whether or not to enable protocol tracing

The configuration parameters are explained below:

HoldTime The hold time to assign to pages. (Equivalent to the -a option.)

Host The host to contact for service. (Equivalent to the -h option.)

MailAddr The electronic mail address to direct notification messages from the server. If this
string is specified without an ``@hostname'' part then the local hostname will
automatically be appended. (Equivalent to the -f option.)

MaxDials The maximum number of times to dial the phone for each job. (Equivalent to the -T
option.)

MaxTries The maximum number of times to retry sending a job. (Equivalent to the -t option.)

Notify Control the email notification messages from the server. This string may be one of
``done'', ``none'', ``requeued'' or ``default'' with an optionally preceding ``when ''
(e.g. ``when done''). Note that ``when requeued'' implies ``when done''. (Equivalent to
the -D, -R, and -N options.)

Port The network port to contact for service. (Equivalent to the -h option.)

Protocol The name of the communication protocol to use when contacting a server. (Equivalent to
the SNPPSERVICE environment variable.)

QueueSend Control whether or not to wait for the pages to be delivered. (Equivalent to the -q
option.)

RetryTime The time to delay between job retries due to a communication failure. (Equivalent to the
-I option.)

ServiceLevel The SNPP service level to assign to each page. (Equivalent to the -l option.)

Verbose Control protocol tracing. (Equivalent to the -v option.)

ENVIRONMENT

       The following environment variables are used by sendpage:

       SNPPSERVER     The  identity  of  the  SNPP  server  to  contact for service.  This value is specified as
                      ``[modem@]host[:port]'' where host is either a host  name  or  the  Internet  ``.''  (dot)
                      address  of  the  host;  port  is  the  TCP port number or service name to use (default is
                      ``snpp'' or 444); and modem is an optional modem name or class on the  server  machine  to
                      use  in  processing  the  requests  (this  is  meaningful  only when the server is running
                      HylaFAX).

       SNPPSERVICE    The communication service specification for communicating  with  the  SNPP  server.   This
                      value is specified as ``port[/protocol]''; by default ``444/tcp''.

FILES

       /var/spool/hylafax/tmp/sndpageXXXXXX    temporary files

NOTES

       The  phone  number  of the pager service provider is stored on the server machine and is not specified by
       the user; this is a departure from pager support that was supplied with HylaFAX version 3.0.

       HylaFAX version 3.0 used to recognize a null text message and assume the destination  paging  device  was
       numeric-only.   This  is  no longer true; if a null text message is submitted then a null message will be
       included in the paging request.  This may cause paging requests submitted to ``real SNPP'' servers to  be
       rejected  if the paging device is in fact numeric-only.  When sending to a numeric-only paging device the
       -n option should be used.

BUGS

       It is not possible to page text- and non-text devices together; sendpage must be run twice, once to  send
       to text-capable devices and once to send to non-text devices.