Roosl's Mail Filter - User Guide
Roosl's Mail Filter - User Guide
Introduction
Thank you for purchasing Roosl's Mail Filter. I'm certain you'll love this program, and support is just an e-mail away!
This program has nothing to do with your e-mail program. It doesn't matter what client you use to download, read or send mail. Hence, Roosl's Mail Filter does not integrate into your Outlook (or whatever you use). It does not know or care whether or not (or when) your e-mail client is running. This program can be left running in your system tray 24x7 (best if you have a broadband connection), or you can just start it up to go clean up your mail on the server before you start your mail client.
It will go check your mail at whatever frequency you want. You may always check the logs to see what it has been deleting for you, and easily see what it's missing and add new rules to keep up with new attempts.
Roosl's Mail Filter looks at e-mail headers at POP3 servers, and compares senders' IP addresses, e-mail addresses (and aliases) and message subjects with lists you define in simple text files. Senders (originating IP addresses, domains, users) and subject matter which match your lists cause the e-mail to be deleted from the server.
Designed for today's always on broadband users. If you use dial-up, just connect to the internet before running Roosl's Mail Filter.
This user guide is provided in HTML format and included with the program, available anytime on or offline.
The program is very easy to use, yet extremely versatile. This guide provides all the setup instructions and a description of the processes.
Overview
Preview Mail Headers remotely.
Allows you to preview your mail at the server.
Allows immediate auto-blocking and automatic rules update.
Simple Blocking Rules.
Block unwanted mail by IP address, sender and subject.
Blocking rules are easily maintained in plain text files.
Rich subject matter wildcard blocking.
IP address and Domain name wildcard blocking.
Add new rules on the fly while the program is running.
Auto Blocking/Unblocking
Built-in easy to use rule editor.
Safe list (Preferred senders)
Blocked Senders and Domains (users, aliases, domains, IP, wildcards)
Blocked Subjects (wildcards, words, phrases)
Sort feature
Special Sender Alerts.
Be alerted when you have mail from specified senders.
(This can also be used as your "safe sender" list)
Easy Setup.
Easily set up multiple e-mail accounts to scan.
Automatically works in the background.
Quietly works in your system tray.
Automatically scans your e-mail at intervals you set.
Set Passive mode to only delete blocked mail when you are looking (in Preview mode).
Optional "Gadget" displays latest scan results.
Detailed log keeping.
Logs all activity, including a record of each message deleted.
Logs all mail headers by date.
Hints, Tips and Suggestions:
Vista users please note:
Read through this User Guide to get an understanding of how the program works and what it does. Doing so will also help you to decide how best to set it up and use it to suit your needs. The extensive features add some complexity, but as you become familiar with those features, it is not that complicated. The more junk e-mail you receive, the more valuable you will find this program.
Extensive lists of Blocked Senders and Subjects (which I actually use, if you don't already have such) are provided with this program. You may also feel free to copy, edit and paste from (or download) my posted lists, which may be newer than those included with your download. Updates are available through this link at my website. My comprehensive list of subject matter (which contains some crude language) works great for most current spam language.
If you use (or began with) the bundled rules files, and get a program update later, keep in mind that the new rules files will not replace your original rules. You may decide whether you want to copy any of my new rules into your rules, or replace the previous rules with the newer set. Details about the included files are in the setup instructions below.
If you usually find your mail full of garbage in the morning, or after not having checked it for a day or so, run this first. If you have broadband (always connected) and use your e-mail once a day, you may want to leave it running and set to scan your server every hour. Not only will you be rid of a lot of junk before you start your client, you'll see how to also add more blocking rules and have it run again before you download what you actually want to read.
You may want to run in preview mode (recommended). After it makes its first pass through your account(s), you may then want to start your client.
You'll see how you may have this program just quietly monitor your mail, keep your receipts clear of garbage, alert you when you have mail from preferred senders, and not even run your e-mail client unless/until you want to go get your mail. Everything is logged, including which messages got deleted. As well, every mail header is logged and saved for each entire day, which you may easily review with the logs viewer.
Contents and Topics
Free Trial Period and Licensing
Initial Setup and Install Options
Program Setup and Defining e-mail Accounts
Monitored and Blocked Sender Rules
Blocked Subject Rules
Using Roosl's Rule Editor
How it works and What it does
Interaction/Preview/Autoblocking
Description of the Scan Monitor Gadget
Free Trial Period and Licensing
You may try the program free for 30 days. Anytime during the trial period (and certainly when it expires), you may purchase a permanent license if you like the program and want to keep it.
During the trial period, the following features (which are available with a purchased license) are disabled.
During the trial period, when you start the program, a reminder box will pop up which displays the number of days remaining in your trial period.
A license code can be entered into this box at any time during the trial period. If the 30 days have expired, this box will let you know, and the program will not run unless you enter a valid license code.
When you purchase a license (via PayPal) at my website, you will be sent a license code in an e-mail message. You simply paste this code into the box and press the "Accept" button. During the trial period, you may just press Cancel.
Once you have applied a valid license, all functionality is available, and the reminder box will stop annoying you. You may download the newest version anytime without purchasing a new license, and you'll receive news regarding updates.
You may purchase your license anytime via the PayPal button displayed on the page where you downloaded the program. The "Register" button on the license prompt box will open your browser and direct you to the web page.
Initial Setup and Install Options
I suggest you check the download page (if you didn't just read it) for newest information regarding Vista UAC and other notes I may have added since this guide was updated.
The first time you run the program (or a new download), the following screen appears:
You may keep the program where you have it, or have it installed elsewhere, such as the suggested location. Either way, you may also opt to have it automatically create a shortcut on your desktop. Once setup is complete, the program will restart from its installed location and be ready to go. The 30 day free trial period will then begin.
Everything the program needs is kept in the same folder. This includes the HTML User Guide file (and its images), the rule editor, the log viewer, the gadget, supporting libraries (DLL files), your setup and preferences data, and log files. Your data is initialized the first time, and updated with your other settings later. Log files and such are created as needed. (You'll learn about this stuff shortly.) All other files bundled with the program are extracted into this folder whenever the program is run.
If you get an updated program later, you may copy it directly into this folder. If you place it elsewhere and run it from there, it will be re-installed over the existing one. If the new copy contains other updates (to the User Guide for example), they will automatically be extracted again.
If you delete any of these files, the bundled files will re-appear the next time you run the program. If you delete your data file (.dat), you will lose all of your preferences and settings!
After setup, the following screen appears:
Review our agreement, and acknowledge by pressing "I Agree". If you do not accept the agreement, press Cancel. Once accepted, the agreement screen will no longer pop up and you may proceed.
Setup and Defining e-mail Accounts
Please note: In order to get the best use of this program, it is assumed that you already know and understand the following:
When you start the program, the following screen appears:
Each box is for you to enter information. The checkboxes and buttons are for you to set preferences and as explained below. The samples and defaults appear as shown only the first time, until you define your specifics. After you have set up your accounts and preferences, the program will load those and keep your defaults each time. The following describes the boxes and buttons for you. The full description of How it works and What it does below will help you see how to best set your preferences and decide how you want it to behave.
Button: Enter License Key
During the free trial period, this button allows you to enter your purchased license code (see Free Trial Period and Licensing above), and you are returned to the setup screen. This button disappears after a license is entered.
Check Box: Run Monitor Gadget
(Licensed copy only) This will also run the scan monitor gadget, a small window which monitors and displays the last scan results (number of messages, number deleted, number of safe sender receipts) for each account scanned.
Button: Open User Guide
Pressing this button starts your browser to display this user guide, and you are returned to the setup screen.
POP3 Accounts Setup
You may define up to 10 accounts. Note that the first account is considered your "primary" account. If you have more than one, and do not check the "Check All Accounts" box below, only this account will be scanned.
For each account, enter the following:
At least one account must be completely defined (all six fields). Incomplete accounts may be saved, but will be ignored when the program runs.
Check Box: Check All Accounts
If you have more than one account defined, this tells the program to look at them all, one by one. Otherwise, only the first (or only) account is scanned. During the free trial, this option is not available.
Check Box: Preview (Select/Block)
This runs the program interactively and provides the following: As each account is scanned, information, details and progress indicators appear on your screen. A window will appear displaying all the mail senders and subjects for the account currently stored on the server. This allows you to view what mail is on the server before any action is taken, and also displays whether the mail will be deleted based upon your blocking rules. Important details on interacting with this preview are below.
Note that if you select "Tray/Rescan every..", the interactive preview will only occur during the first scan, not at every interval. This is so that it doesn't interrupt you later. If you don't check the preview box, the program will only run in the background. You can wake it from the tray at anytime to go scan, which also runs preview interaction (above).
Check Box: Save New selections
Within the Preview window, you may also select messages by clicking on them. Senders and subjects for each message you select are then saved for easy copy/paste into your rules, or can be automatically blocked and added to your rules (details below). This allows you to easily add any new blocked senders and subject strings to your rules files using whatever editor you choose. "Autoblock" will add them to your rules automatically whether this box is checked or not. Important details later on in this guide.
Check Box: Passive
When the program runs in background (in the tray), it wakes up at preset intervals and deletes e-mail at the server which matches any of your blocking rules. While effective, this can cause you to lose e-mail you may want, though weren't necessarily looking for. For example, a rule which blocks any mail from a block of IP addresses (known to send a lot of spam), while effective, may delete that one (of hundreds) message that you may want to see. This is also useful if you're watching for something, but don't know what address it might be sent from. You may still keep the filter running so that you'll get your safe sender alerts, and can glance at the gadget to see how many messages are there, and when it last scanned them. Then, when you wake it from the tray to run a scan, you may view and allow or disallow any deletions to occur.
When passive mode is selected, blocked mail will only be deleted when you are running attended preview mode. When the program is running in the background (in tray), it will not delete mail even if it is blocked (and would be deleted if passive is unchecked). This allows you more control over what gets deleted, in case something you might want happens to match a blocking rule. Note that by using this feature, you must check the Preview box when started (as recommended). Of course, this means that if left unattended for a length of time, all unwanted messages are still on the server, so be certain to look before you allow your client to download. Another benefit of this feature is that all the messages which would be deleted remain identified (tagged) as such and remembered. So when you do go check, that scan will be very fast.
You may want to use passive mode while the program is new to you, until you are comfortable with your blocking rules.
Check Box: Tray/Rescan every [N] Minutes
After the first run, the program will "sleep" quietly in your system tray (down by your clock) and rescan your mail every (N) minutes. The time between scans may be anything up to 60 minutes. You may use the up/down buttons next to the Minutes box to increment or decrement the minutes. You may also just type any number of minutes in the box (from 10 to 60). The initial default is set to 10, but you'll probably find 60 (an hour) is best.
Button: OK/Run
Press when you're ready for the program to start. If there are any problems, such as incomplete setup, a message will alert you.
Button: Save Setup Now
As you define accounts or make changes in the setup screen, you may save at any time. The program also saves your settings when it exits, except when you press Cancel/Exit in the setup screen.
Button: Cancel/Exit
This does what it implies. Any changes entered in the setup screen are discarded.
The Logo Button:
Pressing my logo button in the lower left corner brings up the "About" box. Alt-B will also do this.
Defining Monitored and Blocked Senders
Your monitored and blocked senders may be listed in any text file. The file must be plain text, one entry per line. It doesn't matter whether you use UPPER or lower case. "BOB" is the same as "bob".
Monitored (safe) and blocked senders are both put into the same file. If this is your first time, or you are using the included file, remember that the file (in the installation folder) is Block_Senders.txt. Go ahead and open it with notepad to see what it looks like as you read these instructions. A new download, and any rules file saved with the Rule Editor, will have all safe senders at the top.
Monitored (safe) Senders
You may monitor preferred senders by their regular e-mail address. When you define a monitored sender, that sender is not blocked. Instead, a message will pop up alerting you that there is mail from these senders. This message will appear once after each scan. For example, if you want to be alerted when you have mail at the server from the senders:
To monitor a sender, place an asterisk (*) at both the beginning and the end of the line. Safe sender alerts only match the complete, regular e-mail address format (name@domain WITH the @ sign) within asterisks as shown. Safe senders are safest when they match an actual known e-mail address. You may also define a safe sender as anyone at a particular domain by using "anybody"@domain (example: *anybody@roosl.com*). Use with caution, since spoofed spam (especially phishing scams) can appear to be from a domain it is not.
Note: Monitored Senders may also be used as your "safe list". These senders can even use subject matter that may be in your blocked subjects without being blocked. So for example, if you want mail from Walgreens, but you want to block subjects selling prescriptions or Viagra, enter the Walgreens sender as a monitored sender.
Blocked Senders, Domains, IP addresses
You may block a sender based on any part of an address, or the whole address string. You may use wildcards for domains. For example, in these addresses:
Omit "quotes", arrows (<, >) and (parenthesis). Any other visible characters including spaces may be entered. Note in the examples that all the senders @ domainxyz.com can be blocked by only having the domain in your list. Anyone at that domain would be blocked. Also, anyone with a user ID of "user2" would be blocked, from any domain (be careful here).
Of course, the domain wildcard feature can greatly reduce the size of your blocked senders list, by whacking all the spammers that use similar but different domain servers. For wildcards, use asterisk (*). An asterisk at the beginning of your entry will look for a match anywhere in the domain name. An asterisk at the end of the entry will look for a domain that only begins with that entry. Use carefully! For example, don't use "*.com". A wildcard entry that ends with a dollar sign ($) matches any entry that ends with that entry. An extremely handy use of this feature is to block all mail from any domain ending with a country code top level domain (CCTLD). For example, since a lot of porn seems to come from .de (Germany) domains, you may just have *.de$ blocked, and not need to have any more entries for anyone@anything.de in your list. So, to block all mail from the CCTLD .co (Colombia), be certain to use *.co$ so that you don't block *.com. Another example is *.in$ to block India without blocking .info.
IP address blocking is the fastest and most effective blocking rule. Remember that e-mail addresses are easily spoofed, and you will see spam from all kinds of "From:" senders, with all manner of various subject lines, but from the same IP address ranges. An originating IP address cannot be spoofed.
You may block individual IP addresses, or blocks of IP addresses. For example, spammers and virus mongers always spoof the sender name and/or domain, but the originating IP address is also in the mail header. I often see mail "from" various false addresses that originate from the same block (or range) of IP addresses, such as 86.112.128.150. With a little monitoring, I easily see that by blocking 86.112.*.* (all IPs in this range), all mail from any of these idiots is immediately deleted without even checking the sender or subject.
To block an IP address, place the IP address in brackets. Examples:
Defining Blocked Subject Content
You put your list of blocked subject matter into any text file. The file must be plain text, one entry per line. It doesn't matter whether you use UPPER or lower case. "PORN" is the same as "porn".
Blocked Subjects
If this is your first time, or you are using the included file, remember that the file (in the installation folder) is Block_Subjects.txt. Go ahead and open it with notepad to see what it looks like as you read these instructions.
You may block subject matter based on a word, entire subject line, or words and phrases. You may use wildcards. For example, in these subjects:
For wildcards, use asterisk (*) and/or question mark (?). An asterisk at the beginning of your entry will look for a match anywhere in the subject (any word, partial word or phrase). Note that "*appl" will block "applet", "apples and oranges", "application", "apply" and more. Consider possible matches you may not want to occur. An asterisk at the end of the entry will look for a subject that only begins with that entry. Don't use just "re:*", or you'll block all reply mail. You may embed asterisks in an entry to represent any (number of unknown) characters. You may embed question marks in an entry to represent any (one) character. Note that "*v?agra" will catch all the viagra, v1agra, v!agra, etc. "*prescri?" will block prescription and prescribe. Any entry without asterisks will match that specific word anywhere in the subject or that entire subject line. So, you can block "Get the Patch" without blocking "Security patch for Windows XP".
If you want to block mail with no subject (blank or spaces), simply enter this rule:
[null] (that's the word "null" within brackets).
You may find some subjects you blocked get through. Some mongers are using ISO and UTF standards to encode the subject string so that in text form, it isn't what it appears to be in your client's preview pane. For one example, a subject containing "penis" wasn't deleted because it was encoded in a subject line beginning with "=?iso-8859-1?b?QmlnZ2". These may be difficult to catch. You may not want to block all messages with iso-8859-1 (Latin support) subjects. I have found however, that the only e-mail I have monitored using them are all spam, so I block all of these types of subject, and if you use/download my list, you'll block these. Note however, since the program can see these as they actually are, you also have the ability to effectively select and stop specifics. Apparently, abusing these standards may help spammers dodge some filters. If e-mail has no meaningful subject line, or it's hiding behing foreign language encoding, I don't trust the sender anyway.
The Rule Editor is designed for those who are not comfortable with working in Windows and using tools such as notepad. As well, the editor does do some things for you, such as sorting, removing duplicate entries, placing your "safe senders" at the top of your list, and more. If you're confident working in Windows and using native tools, feel free. For you, it may actually be easier. Remember, the rules files are plain text files.
The Rule Editor presents a window with three list boxes: "Safe (Preferred) Senders", "Blocked Senders/Domains", and "Blocked Subject Matter". Although Safe and Blocked senders are stored in the same file, they are separated here for your viewing and editing convenience. Please remember that Safe senders are stored as *name@domain*.
The first account name appears in the title bar of the window. If you have more than one account defined, you may move among them with the Next/Previous Account button. As each account's lists are being loaded, an indicator will appear. You may move between previous and next without losing changes you have made.
For memory management purposes, if a list is very large, buttons will appear below that box allowing you to go to the "First", "Previous", "Next" and "Last" page. Use these buttons to view each part of the list.
Each list will have a scroll bar to page up/down when there is more than will fit in the box. New entries (via AutoBlock) to a list that has not yet been sorted will be at the end of that list.
As you would with a simple text editor, you position your cursor in the list, and may type at will, insert and delete lines or characters. Just observe the instructions above for the list you are editing (if you add or edit a Safe sender, remember the beginning and ending asterisk). When you first click in a box, it may select a block of text. Just click again where you want to be. A double-click on a word (or line) will highlight the entire word/line. You may select (highlight) entire blocks using standard select, drag, shift-select, etc. techniques.
If any changes are made in a list, the Save button for that list will become enabled. No changes are saved to your rules files until you click a Save button.
The Sort button will sort the list. Sorting senders will sort both Safe and Blocked senders (a huge list may take a few seconds, as it also checks for and removes duplicate entries). Sorting only affects the views in the editor, not the stored list. The Save button also sorts the list before it is written to the file.
The Save button will write the current account list to disk file. The list is automatically sorted when you do a save, and blank entries and duplicates are removed. When you save senders, your "Safe" senders will end up at the top of the rules file (simply for convenience when you open it with another editor). A dialog will appear asking for the save file name, which will default to the current existing rules file name. If you enter or choose a different file name, a message will appear, as this new name will not become your rules file unless you change it in the main setup screen. The current or last saved file name appears under the Sort and Save buttons for that list. After a save, the lists for that account are reloaded in the editor.
When you are finished (don't forget to save your changes), click the Done button.
General notes about your rules lists:
As well as the built-in rule editor and the Autoblock feature, you may of course use any text editor to edit your lists anytime, even while the program sleeps between recheck intervals. Whenever the program begins to scan e-mail, it will automatically re-load the rules if they have changed since the previous scan. In preview mode (when you wake it to check mail right after a change) it will ask if you want to reload, since this can take a minute for large lists. If you choose not to reload when asked, be aware that those recent rule changes will not affect that scan.
Remember, wildcards in the senders list will only work on domains, not users. Be careful you don't accidentally block mail you might want. For example, just entering "John" or *yahoo* as a sender might cause you to lose a friend's mail, and more. Entering "Great News!" as a subject might cause you to lose mail from home, even though some spam may include that string of characters in the subject.
I suggest you run interactive (Preview) mode at least the first few times to familiarize yourself with the process and to help you feel comfortable with what mail will or won't be deleted. Once it's deleted from the server, it's gone. It won't be downloaded to your PC client. Since deletions are logged, it's easy to see if a deletion occured which you didn't intend. For the best performance and use of features, I advise that you always start in Preview and check the Tray box. This will allow you to autoblock, view the logs, check messages at will, and edit your rules on the fly, etc. You may also want to check the Passive mode.
Once you have your account info and preferences set up, and click OK, the program works as follows...
Detailed Description of What Happens, and Your Control...
1. If your system is not connected to the internet, the program will present an error message when it attempts to logon to a POP3 server, as it will assume you're online. If this occurs, it will simply go to the tray and wait until the next scheduled scan.
2. For each POP3 account to check, it logs on, and counts the number of messages on the server. If there are more than a defined maximum number of messages (see next paragraph), it will run multiple scans of no more than that many headers each until it has deleted all blocked messages, or reached the end of the list of headers at that account. This is to help prevent time-out problems at the server, and helps improve performance when there are large numbers of messages. During an attended (preview) scan, each "chunk" is displayed for your interaction (see paragraph 4 below). This feature was added following an incident which caused my DSL to be down for an extended time. Of course, at some point, your mail must be either deleted or downloaded.
The preset (default) maximum messages per scan is 50. You may adjust this number to anything from 10 to 500. Whenever the number of messages to scan exceeds this value (during an attended/preview scan), a box will pop up describing this, and you may adjust your maximum. If your connection is slow, or you experience time-out problems, set your maximum lower. I've found that with DSL, 100 works fine. Keep in mind that if the server times-out (too much time passes) before the program goes back to send a delete request, the messages won't get deleted, and will still be there on the next scan.
If numerous messages invoke automatic multiple scans, keep in mind that on each subsequent scan, the message numbers change (they "shift up" in the list) if a scan deletes any messages. So, for example, on the 1st scan of 200, 80 of 100 are deleted, the next scan will look at messages it did not see on the previous scan. So if messages 21 - 100 were all deleted, on the second scan message #21 was message #101. This is why it may appear that a subsequent scan is looking at the same messages. It is not. They are now renumbered. On the 2nd scan, it will also start with what is now #21, having already seen the 1st 20. In any case, on each scan, it jumps to the 1st unseen message, past any unblocked messages it already saw.
If there are messages, your blocked senders and subjects files are then loaded. (If these files don't exist, a message will alert you in preview mode. It will still continue, but no messages will be marked for deletion. It may be pointless to run this without blocking rules though, unless all you want to do is see what mail you have.) The initial loading of the rules may take several seconds if you have many rules. If rules are changed, they will be reloaded during the next scan.
3. It then retrieves each message header, which includes the sender, subject, and other information. The sender is compared with your blocked senders list. If a match is found and it is a blocked sender, IP address or domain, it is marked for deletion. If the sender is not known, the subject is compared with your blocked subjects list. If a match is found, it is marked for deletion. If no match is found, the mail will remain on the server until (a) your client downloads and deletes it or (b) you add the sender or subject to your rules.
Remember, during unattended scans (not running Preview), blocked messages are not deleted if Passive mode is checked.
The IP address, sender and subject for each message are remembered during a scan so that subsequent scans can check them first before all other rules. This improves the performance of each subsequent scan, as it doesn't need to search all the rules again for messages it recognizes. However, if your rules are modified and reloaded, these remembered items are erased and recreated during the next scan.
The Preview Window - Selecting headers for Autoblocking - Adding new blocking rules
This feature may be the most important part of this section for you to understand and use!
4. Previewing Messages
In preview mode, a window then appears with two list boxes. Each box has a line for each message: One box contains each message's sender. The 2nd box lists each message's subject. Both boxes show each message number, so side by side you see both items for each message. Each list also shows by what rule (if any) a message is found to be blocked. If a message is not blocked, it will display "No" or "Safe".
Note: Since mail can actually have no sender info, these are displayed as "?@?". If you see very many of these in one preview (notably if the program and/or your connection seems slow), click the "Skip it" button (see below) and then (also see below) wake it to go check again. This can be caused by server problems or timeouts, or such CPU hogs as automatic virus definition "Live Update" running at the same time.
As you'll find, the two selection boxes are so that you may easily delete messages and add new entries to your blocked lists, allowing you to select senders and/or subjects. You may use Page Up/Down and arrow keys in these boxes, or the scroll bar if one appears.
At this point, the program is waiting for you to do something, whether it's an action described below, or to just click OK. Since it is now connected to your mail server and displaying a snapshot of the mail messages currently on the server, it is best not to wait too long at the preview window or a time-out may occur at the server. If the preview window displays for more than 2 minutes with no response from you, the program will automatically proceed as if you clicked "OK". Simply clicking any sender or subject will cause the preview window to wait for you.
5. Selecting Senders and/or Subjects from the Preview
If there are any messages that are not blocked, but you want to block them and optionally add the senders and/or subjects to your rules lists, you may select them here. Selected messages will also be deleted right away if you click "AutoBlock", even if the sender and subject are not saved. Otherwise, they will not be blocked during this scan, but will be blocked as soon as they are added to your blocked rules lists.
Note: You may also select messages that are blocked, which will cause them to NOT be deleted on the current scan. Doing so will NOT remove the rule which caused the message to be blocked. It will simply allow the message to remain so that you may download it. If the message is still on the server the next time the program performs an automatic scan, it will be deleted per the original rule.
6. If you make selections, and click "AutoBlock" (see *AutoBlock* below), another selection window will appear, similar to the preview window. In the AutoBlock window, the senders are sorted so that it's easy to avoid saving duplicate rules. If you are blocking multiple messages from the same IP address or sender, you only need to have one rule. All the messages selected before you got to the AutoBlock window will be deleted. In AutoBlock, you edit the senders (in the left) and the subjects (in the right) so that they are as you want them to appear in your rules. Remember to separate the IP address and sender info if you are adding both to your rules, each to it's own line. Example: You might edit this sender info:
[12.13.14.192] ghhdftr@whatever.biz
so that you have the following two lines (which will be added to your rules):
[12.13.14.*]
whatever.biz
Note that you may also have selected messages be deleted this time without saving the senders or subjects to your rules. Just delete those selections from the second Autoblock window. Those messages will still get deleted, as the program remembers the messages by number, but no rules will be added. This is to delete the occasional unwanted mail which may have no need for a permanent rule.
Editing these lists is done in the same manner as in the Rule Editor. Using the info above for defining rules, you will want to "clean them up". For example, if you selected the sender "xhgdergarbage@poopoo.com" at IP address 12.13.14.15, you'll probably want to remove the "xhgdergarbage@" from that entry to block the domain "poopoo.com", or perhaps just save the IP address [12.13.14.*] in your rules. Click OK when you're done. The new rules will be appended to the end of your existing files. The selected messages will also be deleted right away.
If you don't use autoblock, and/or don't edit these, you may then use the Rule Editor, or any editor (such as notepad) to view or edit your selections to copy and paste them into your blocked lists.
Make your selections as follows:
In each box, you may make selections with your mouse (to select multiple lines, hold the "Ctrl" key). A line is highlighted when selected. To de-select, just hold the "Ctrl" key and click it again. If you select any senders, each one you select will be written to a text file (if you checked that box earlier). If you select any subjects, each one you select will be written to a 2nd text file. Hence, you may select senders, subjects, or both senders and subjects, in one or both boxes. Any selected senders and subjects may be from the same or different messages. After you've used this feature a few times, you'll appreciate it.
If you checked the box "Save New selections" at startup, your selections are saved in a pair of files for each account name (these files are NOT your existing rules files). If you fully use the autoblock feature and the rule editor, you may ignore these files (in fact, you need not check the box at setup). For example, for an account named "MSN", the file names will be "Saved_MSN_Senders.txt" and "Saved_MSN_Subject.txt". They will be created in the same folder where the program is. Previously saved selections are overwritten. Be certain that you get any wanted selections into your rules before you repeat this action at a later time.
*AutoBlock*: If you click AutoBlock (see below), your selections will be added to your blocked lists immediately. (They may also be saved as mentioned above.) So, you may want to remember to edit your blocked list ASAP to be certain that these entries are as you want them. See the sections on Defining Monitored and Blocked Senders, Defining Blocked Subject Content and Using Roosl's Rule Editor above. AutoBlock is useful for immediately adding new entries to your rules. This saves you the step of opening the saved selection files to paste them into your rules.
When you click "OK" OR "AutoBlock" on the Preview window, any selections you made are saved (a message will appear telling you the names of the files they are saved in), and the currently blocked messages are then deleted*. An indicator will appear as each message is marked for deletion. If you click "Skip it" on this window, no messages are deleted, no selections are saved, and the program will proceed to the next account (if any).
When using preview interaction, blocked messages will be deleted whether or not you have checked Passive mode.
*Note: Some servers may "time out" if a period of time passes before you click OK, and the server may not delete the messages. This is OK, as it will delete them the next scan. For instance, if there are many messages which take some time for you to review, this can occur with some servers.
When all accounts are done, the program does the following...
6. If any monitored senders were found, a window will pop up to display these. This occurs even when the program is working quietly in the system tray. (The alert won't pop-up at every scan, unless a new message from a monitored sender appears since the last alert.) During the free trial, you will not get alerts. The alert window will automatically disappear after 1 minute (as if "OK" were clicked), in case you leave your PC unattended. You may also click "Clear" which will erase all current alerts.
7. If you don't set it to recheck at intervals, it will close. Otherwise, it will sleep in your system tray for the number of minutes you specified and run again.
If you started in preview mode, it will not run preview mode when it awakes itself for subsequent runs. This is so that you can go on about your work without being interrupted. You will still be alerted if there is new mail at the server from any monitored senders. When you wake it up, it will reactivate preview mode (see below).
Interaction while the program Sleeps Between Scans
Passing your cursor (mouse) over the icon in the system tray will display (a tool tip) whether the program is "Active" or "Sleeping".
At any time it is sleeping, you may click the icon in the system tray to wake it up (it may take a couple of seconds to sense you). This will "pause" the nap period, and it will ask you if you want it to continue (sleeping) or wake up. If you click Continue, it will go back to sleep. If you click Wake Up, you may choose:
The time paused is added to that nap period, so it can be paused as long as you like (to view the log, edit rules, etc.).
Note: Clicking the icon while it's active has no effect (although it may sense such a click the next time it goes to sleep and it will then wake up right away).
The Log Files
The program writes a log each time you run it, which you may view while the program is sleeping (or anytime it's not active). This log may be found in the same folder you have the program. The log is in two parts: The first contains a timeline of actions (.log file). The second (.del file) is a list of all the messages (by sender and subject) deleted. The log is erased when the program starts, so history beyond the current session is unavailable.
Another very handy log is also written, named "HdrsYYYYMMDD.log" where YYYYMMDD is the current date. This log contains a list of every mail header seen on your server each time the program does a scan. They're useful for examining and tracking all received mail. Each header entry shows what time the header was seen, and if it caused a rule hit. This log is not erased, and a new one is created each day. You may delete these anytime you wish, and the log viewer allows easy access to view and delete these logs.
The Scan Monitor Gadget - Optional companion app (licensed users only)
Note: This is not a Vista Sidebar gadget. You may optionally run the gadget when you start the program from the setup screen. The gadget may also be started from within the installation folder after Roosl Mail Filter is running. If the gadget is started alone, and does not see scan activity (or the last completed scan), it will timeout and close. It will also close if an instance of itself is already running, or if the main application is not running or is not licensed (trial). If a previous completed scan is known, it will simply display that data until a new scan takes place.
It monitors program scan activity and displays, in a small separate window, the number of messages scanned, deleted, and the number of messages from safe senders for each account, and totals. The window title displays the time of the last scan, and indicates when it detects a new scan in progress. The values displayed are those of the last scan, not cumulative counts. With the gadget, you don't need to mouse-over the taskbar icon or view the log just to see this information. It's available at a glance.
The gadget window is sized depending on the number of servers (accounts) you have defined. You may resize it to some degree without losing displayed information, and position it anywhere on your desktop. If you move it or resize it, it will return to that size and desktop location next time. If you change the number of servers to scan, you may need to adjust the gadget to readjust the display. It supports the standard minimize, restore, maximize and close title bar buttons (though maximizing it is a silly thing to do). The gadget can be closed anytime, and will close when the main application is closed.
Support from the Author
If errors or problems occur, please let me know. A box should appear in the event of internal program errors which has a button to connect you with my website. I want to know of any problems you have, as well as suggestions. Several features have been added since the initial release based on feedback from folks like you. You may also e-mail me with the link (animated mailbox) at the end of this guide. This version has been fully tested on: Workstation running XP pro 64bit, laptop running Vista Home Premium 32bit with UAC enabled.
Enjoy!
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