EasySpooler supports fax as it does email, by treating the fax as an output destination defined like any other EasySpooler destination. Accordingly, all document management functions are at your disposal for fax documents.
You should use VSI-FAX software, Version 3 or higher. If you are not using VSI-FAX, see the Technical Note below.
To create a destination for faxing with VSI-FAX, select Model Script as the Destination Type and VSIFAX as the Model Script when you create the destination. See Add a Destination.
To fax any text document, submit it as you would any other document, only direct it to the VSIFAX destination or to its alias. Specify the VSIFAX destination using the FAXMACH parameter and the phone number using the FAXNO parameter. The syntax for the former is
-ofaxmach=FAX1
where FAX1 is an example of an output queue in VSIFAX to which a modem is connected. The syntax for the latter is
-ofaxno=5551234567
where an up to ten digit number is a local number. Long distance or foreign numbers would use the appropriate area or country code.
The following command line sends a file called party to the fax number 214-555-4444 using the queue FAX1 to a destination named VSIFAX.
llp -dVSIFAX -ofaxno=2145554444 -ofaxmach=FAX1 party
Achieve the same results by submitting to an alias called fax defined in lpsalias:
fax:lp02:-ofaxno=2145554444 -ofaxmach=FAX1:
Now the command line is simply
llp -dfax party
When the despooler starts to output a document, it always calls the script lpsmodel (located in $LPSDIR/adm/bin). Then, if custom processing is required, the lpsmodel script executes the additional script necessary to affect the additional processing.
In this case, for fax, lpsmodel executes the VSIFAX script in $LPSDIR/adm/models and then exits.
NOTE: If the syntax of your fax command differs from that of the VSIFAX program vfx, you should edit a renamed copy of the $LPSDIR/adm/models/VSIFAX script. Be sure to use FAX at the beginning or end of the new file name for the script. Replace the vfx command with the command you want to use for your specific fax program, and then change the parameters as the new program requires.
EasySpooler’s default VSIFAX routine uses email to notify the user of any errors. (EasySpooler obtains the user’s name from the queue record.) The routine defaults to mailx as its mailer, but it first tests the environment variable, MAILER, to see if you have set it, enabling you to use whatever mail program you want by setting the variable to your mail program of choice at the front of the script and then changing the mailer command line as necessary.