Biff
informs the system whether you want to be notified when mail arrives
during the current terminal session.
Options supported by
biff :
-tag -width 4n
Cm n
Disables notification.
Cm y
Enables notification.
When mail notification is enabled, the header and first few lines of
the message will be printed on your screen whenever mail arrives.
A
Li biff y
command is often included in the file
.login
or
.profile
to be executed at each login.
Biff
operates asynchronously.
For synchronous notification use the
MAIL
variable of
sh 1
or the
mail
variable of
csh 1 .