Here is a
quick and
dirty guide to
directy accessing your
POP3 server.
1. Go to
any telnet program.
2.
Connect to your
mail server, on
port 110.
3. You should see a
welcome message.
4.
Type "user xyz" (xyz = username, no quotes, you may need to turn on
local echo to see what you are typing.)
5. It should
respond "+OK".
Type "pass foobar" (foobar = password).
6.
Again it should say "+OK".
In fact from now on
assume it should
always say "+OK". If you type
something wrong, it will
say "-ERR".
7.
Type "list" to see a
list of the
message numbers and their
sizes.
8.
Type "retr x" (x = message number) to
read a
message. *
9.
Type "dele x" to
mark a
message for
deletion when you
quit.
10.
Type "rset" to
unmark all
messages so they will not be
deleted.
11.
Type "quit" to
quit and
delete all
marked messages.
* If it is a
long message it may
scroll off the
screen. You could
turn on
logging and look at it
later.
This is not the
whole POP3 protocol, just what you will probably
use.
What is this good for? You can
quickly read your
mail from
just about any
computer on the
internet. And if your
mail program breaks, you can use this as a
emergency backup. You can also
impress people.