                     Spruce e-mail client, version 0.7.5
                   by Jeffrey Stedfast <fejj@helixcode.com>

                             Additional code by:
                    Kristoffer Brnemyr <ztion@swipnet.se>
                             and George Talusan


LICENSE INFORMATION
-------------------

The Spruce e-mail software is Copyright (C) 1999, 2000 Jeffrey Stedfast.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.


HISTORY
-------

The Spruce e-mail client started out as a project for Jeffrey Stedfast's
advanced programming class. Jeff isn't one to just meet the minimum 
requirements to get an 'A' (the best grade given at colleges and universities 
in the US), so he coded an e-mail client ;)


FEATURES OVERVIEW
-----------------

  - Designed for ease-of-use, with all of the basic features people have
    come to expect in an e-mail client.

  - Supports the capability to both send and receive e-mail.

  - Designed to maintain compatibility with existing RFC standards.

  - Capable of retrieving mail from multiple (unlimited) remote POP3
    and IMAP accounts.

  - Capable of retrieving mail from multiple (unlimited) local mailboxes.

  - Stores mail in the standard 'mbox' format.

  - Ability to send and receive MIME attachments.

  - A number of options related to addition of taglines ("signatures")
    on each e-mail.
 
  - A powerful filtering capability (including plain text matching,
    regular expressions support (regex) and shell wildcards (globbing)).


OBTAINING SPRUCE
----------------

The Spruce e-mail client is included in some operating system distribution
releases.  Sources to Spruce may be obtained from:
  ftp://spruce.sourceforge.net/pub/spruce

Information regarding Spruce may be obtained from the Spruce home page:
  http://spruce.sourceforge.net

Experimental CVS versions of spruce may be obtained by following the
directions at:
  http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=3355


REQUIREMENTS
------------

For proper compilation and functionality of Spruce, the following packages
are REQUIRED:

  - GNU gettext version 0.10.35 or above
    GNU gettext is used for NLS (National Language Support) and is included
    in most Spruce-supported operating system distributions.  GNU gettext
    sources may be obtained from: 
      ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gettext
         

  - Glib version 1.2.7 or above
    Glib provides a number of portability-enhancing functions and types.
    Glib _must_ be compiled with thread support in order to compile Spruce
    in a functional manner.  Glib is included in most Spruce-supported 
    operating system distributions.  Glib sources may be obtained from:
      ftp://ftp.gtk.org/pub/gtk/v1.2

  - Gtk+ version 1.2.6 or above
    Gtk+, the Gimp ToolKit, is a library used for the creation of graphical
    user interfaces (GUIs).  Gtk+ _must_ be compiled with thread support
    in order to compile Spruce in a functional manner.  Gtk+ is included 
    in most Spruce-supported operating system distributions.  Gtk+ sources 
    may be obtained from:
      ftp://ftp.gtk.org/pub/gtk/v1.2

  - libpthread
    libpthread is a POSIX-compliant threading library.  libpthread is included
    in most Spruce-supported operating system distributions.  libpthread
    is part of GNU libc (glibc).  glibc is included in most Spruce-supported
    operating system distributions.  glibc sources may be obtained from:
      ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/glibc


To enhance the operation of Spruce, the following OPTIONAL packages may
be installed:

  - metamail version 2.7 or above
    metamail is required for attachment viewing with Spruce.  metamail is
    included in most Spruce-supported operating system distributions.
    metamail sources may be obtained from: 
      ftp://thumper.bellcore.com/pub/nsb

Compilation and functional requirements are subject to change between releases.


INSTALLATION
------------

  1. Unpack Spruce sources and change directory (cd) to the source directory


  2. Run the configure script:

       ./configure

     Optional flags which may be passed to configure in order to enable
     PGP and GNU Privacy Guard support, use of the gtk_text_insert workaround,
     and a number of other options, may be viewed by executing:

       ./configure --help


  3. Build Spruce:

       make


  4. Install Spruce:

      make install


  5. A sample set of taglines ("signatures") which may, at your request, be 
     included at the end of your outbound mail are provided in sprucesig.sample
  
     Copy sprucesig.sample to your spruce directory (~/.spruce) as sprucesig
       
       mkdir ~/.spruce
       cp sprucesig.sample ~/.spruce/sprucesig

     Alternatively, copy sprucesig.sample to /etc/sprucesig so as that multiple
     users may use the sample taglines.

       make install-extras

     It should also be noted that you may create your own tagline ("signature")
     file; simple create a file containing one signature/tagline per line.


  6. Clean up the sources to conserve space (or remove the sources, now that
     Spruce is installed).

       make clean


  7. Execute Spruce

       spruce


USAGE INFORMATION
-----------------

Usage: spruce [options ...]

options:
  --bindings           show key bindings and exit
  -d,--debug-info      print debug information and exit
  -h, --help           output this help and exit
  -i, --icons          use icons in toolbars
  -t, --text           use text in toolbars
  -o, --both           use both text and icons in toolbars
  -v, --version        print version information and exit

special:
  --mailto  <address>  specify a mail-to (TO) address
  --cc      <address>  specify a carbon-copy (CC) address
  --bcc     <address>  specify a blind carbon-copy (BCC) address
  --subject <subject>  specify a subject (must be in quotes if it has spaces)


DOCUMENTATION
-------------

This is the README file for Spruce.  Additional documentation related to
use and development of Spruce has been included within the source release
of Spruce.

  doc/                  Contains SGML and HTML versions of the Spruce manual

  man/                  Contains the spruce (1) man page

  rfc/                  Contains HTML-ized versions of the RFCs for the
                        protocols Spruce supports

  ABOUT-NLS		Provides details related to adding support for new
                        languages to Spruce and other free software

  AUTHORS               List of primary authors (source code developers)

  COPYING               The GNU General Public License, version 2

  ChangeLog             Log of changes made to the source code

  INSTALL               In-depth installation instructions

  NEWS                  Release notes (Overview of changes)

  README.freebsd        Notes related to the install of Spruce on FreeBSD

  README.mbox           Details of Spruce's mail spool support

  README.redhat         Notes related to issues for RedHat Linux 5.x to 6.0

  README.tools          Overview of the extra tools provided with Spruce

  README.SSL            Notes related to building Spruce with SSL support

  THANKS                Full list of Spruce contributors

  TODO                  Description of near-term planned Spruce development

  WISHLIST              Description of long-term planned Spruce development


TESTED PLATFORMS
----------------

Reports have been received from end-users who are successfully using Spruce
on the following platforms:

   GNU/Linux (kernels 2.0.3x and 2.2.x)
   FreeBSD (http://www.freebsd.org/ports/mail.html)
   NetBSD  (in the ports collection)
   IRIX
   Solaris
   Digital Unix
   HP-UX 11.00
   SCO UNIX
   OS/2


REPORTING BUGS
--------------

Bugs may be reported to the Spruce development team through the use of
our automated bug tracking system located at:
  http://sourceforge.net/bugs/?group_id=3355

Once your bug has been submitted, you may return to the same URL to check
on the status of its resolution.


OBTAINING SUPPORT
-----------------

Two public mailing lists are provided for the Spruce e-mail client.
Details related to both of these lists may be obtained from:
  http://sourceforge.net/mail/?group_id=3355

spruce-list is provided as a general discussion list for end-users and
developers alike.  Notice is sent to this mailing list when new releases
of new Spruce versions occur.  spruce-list is archived at GeoCrawler:
  http://www.geocrawler.com/redir-sf.php3?list=spruce-list

spruce-devel is provided for discussion of Spruce development.  spruce-devel
is archived at GeoCrawler:
  http://www.geocrawler.com/redir-sf.php3?list=spruce-devel


$Revision: 1.12 $
