1FAX(1) General Commands Manual FAX(1)
2
6 fax - make, send, receive, view or print a fax
7
9 fax help
10 fax make [-l] file
12 fax send [-l] [-v] { -m | number } filename...
14 fax [ receive [-v] [ filename-prefix ] ]
16 fax { print | view | rm } filename...
18 fax { queue | status [t] | start | stop }
20 fax answer
22
25 -l use low (96 line per inch) resolution
26 -v display verbose messages for debugging
28 -m the phone call has already been dialed manually
30 The commands make, send, receive, view and queue may be abbreviated to
33 their first characters (e.g. ``fax q'').
34 Assignments of the form VARIABLE=value may appear before the command
36 name to temporarily change the values of most fax script variables
37 (e.g. ``fax PAGE=A4 print letter.001'')
38
42 fax provides a simple user interface to the efax(1) and efix(1) pro‐
43 grams. It allows you to send text or Postscript files as faxes and
44 receive, print or preview received faxes. The fax help command prints
45 a summary of the possible commands.
46 To send a fax, the original files need to be converted from ASCII or
48 Postscript into a particular bit-map format (TIFF with Group 3 encod‐
49 ing). This can be done automatically by the fax send command or you
50 can use the fax make command to do the conversion before sending the
51 fax. The conversion will create one file per page. These files will
52 have the name of the original file with the page number as an addi‐
53 tional suffix. For example, running fax make doc.ps on the two-page
54 postscript file doc.ps would generate the files doc.ps.001 and
55 doc.ps.002.
56 When sending a fax with the fax send command you may dial the number
58 manually and use the -m option or you may give the phone number on the
59 command line. The names of the files to be sent are given on the com‐
60 mand line, usually by using wildcards. For example, to send a multi-
61 page fax consisting of the files doc.ps.001, doc.ps.002, and so on, you
62 could use the command fax send 555-1212 doc.ps.0* (if you had already
63 run the fax make command) or simply fax send 555-1212 doc.ps. If the
64 number is busy the script will wait and try again.
65 Use the fax receive command to answer the phone and receive a fax. If
67 a file name is specified the received fax will be stored in files with
68 the given file name plus an extension equal to the page number. If no
69 options are given, the received fax will be stored in files having a
70 name given by the date and time and an extension equal to the page num‐
71 ber. For example, a fax received beginning on July 4 at 3:05:20 pm
72 will generate files 0704150520.001, 0704150520.002, and so on.
73 The fax print, fax view, and fax rm commands are used to print, preview
75 or remove received fax files. As with the send command the file names
76 are usually given using wildcards.
77 If efax has been installed for automatic fax reception you can use the
79 fax queue command to check for files in the incoming spool directory.
80 The fax script can also be configured to print received faxes or e-mail
81 them as MIME attachments with type image/tiff-f. For convenience the
82 fax print, view and rm commands will first check for the named files in
83 this spool directory. The fax status command shows the status of the
84 automatic receive process once, or every t seconds. Privileged users
85 can use the fax stop and fax start commands to stop and restart the fax
86 reception daemon.
87 The fax answer command is used for unattended reception of faxes. It
89 is normally placed in the inittab(5) or ttytab(5) file and is run auto‐
90 matically by init(8).
91 The -v option displays verbose messages.
93 Other features of the fax script are documented within the script:
95 - a directory that lets you specify recipients by name instead of num‐
98 ber
99 - the fax new command to create a simple cover page and start up a
102 text editor
103 - the fax makefont command converts a Postscript font to a bit-mapped
106 font for use in headers or text
107
110 Faxes can be created at low (98 lines per inch) or high (196 lpi) reso‐
111 lution. Almost all fax machines will operate at either resolution. By
112 default files are created at high resolution but you can use the
113 optional -l argument to create files at low resolution.
114
117 The modem commands and responses together with status and error mes‐
118 sages are written to file. If the fax is successfully sent or received
119 the log file is removed. Otherwise a message is printed showing the
120 log file name. Please send a copy of this file when reporting problems
121 with efax.
122
125 The fax script will `source' the optional shell scripts /etc/efax.rc,
126 ~/.efaxrc and/or ./.efaxrc before processing command-line arguments.
127 These files can be used to set script variables to custom values for a
128 particular system, user and/or directory.
129 The following files are created in the FAXDIR spool directory when
131 automatic fax reception is enabled (see the fax script). DEV repre‐
132 sents the name of the fax modem device file in /dev (e.g. cua1 for
133 /dev/cua1).
134 DEV.n the log file created by the fax answer daemon with process id
137 n
138 DEV.log contains collected log files for device DEV. Log files show‐
140 ing a termination status of 1 (device busy) or 4 (no response
141 from modem) are not added to this file.
142 DEV.stop created by the fax stop command to prevent the fax daemon
144 from starting up.
145
148 Fax was written by Ed Casas. Please send comments or bug reports to
149 edc@cce.com. Please describe the type of modem used and include a copy
150 of the log file.
151
154 Fax is copyright 1993 -- 1999 by Ed Casas. It may be used, copied and
155 modified under the terms of the GNU Public License.
156
159 Although fax has been tested, it may have errors that will prevent it
160 from working correctly on your system. Some of these errors may cause
161 serious problems including loss of data and interruptions to telephone
162 service.
163
166 efax(1), efix(1), ghostscript(1).
167
170 See efax(1).
1713rd Berkeley Distribution May 1996 FAX(1)