The queue to e-mail symbiont is a single threaded server symbiont which accepts, via the OpenVMS print subsystem command, messages to be sent as e-mail. Sending e-mail in this fashion has many inherent limitations and for this reason this symbiont is considered to be experimental at present; (e.g., if the message is entered into the print queue via a remote system, it can not be possible to verify the name of the sender or to return error notifications).

Messages sent with the queue to e-mail symbiont are entered into the PMDF mail system through PMDF's callable SEND interface. Consequently, the behavior of the queue to e-mail symbiont is identical to that of the PMDF SEND utility described in the PMDF User's Guide, OpenVMS Edition.

The queue to e-mail symbiont can also be configured to use an addressing channel. Mail which lacks any forward addressing information (e.g., To: , cc: , or bcc: addresses), can be passed on to an addressing channel. The addressing channel will then attempt to extract addressing information from the body of the message. Addressing channels are described in Chapter 26.

As described in Section 27.4, the symbiont can relay PostScript files to PMDF-FAX for transmission as facsimiles. This allows users of word processors to send FAXes directly from their word processing applications. This functionality works with Pathworks thereby enabling users of Macintoshes and PCs to print their documents from applications on their micro computers.

This symbiont is not part of the PMDF Process Symbiont and thus the installation of this symbiont does not require or depend upon the PMDF Process Symbiont.