mail / mailx question

[Scott.Chandler-VQAUrahS1b5BDgjK7y7TUQ at public.gmane.org (Chandler, Scott)]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the ideas but I really don't want to change my current config, it's working fine. All I need is a different command to run when the end user mail server is down. Our installation of Nagios uses the mail command for other alerts so I'd like to stick with that if I can. 

I know it's possible to write a mail command to send to an alternate SMTP server, I just don't know how to form it properly and I haven't been able to find any clear and concise documentation online (no, I don't find the man page to be clear and concise...).

Is anyone out there an expert on the switches for the command "mail" (or mailx)?

Scott

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org [mailto:discuss-bounces-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org] On Behalf Of Chandler, Scott
Sent: Wednesday, December 23, 2009 10:33 AM
To: 'discuss-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org'
Subject: mail / mailx question

Greetings,

I'm new to the list so I'm not sure if this is the proper place to post questions like this. If not, please let me know the right place.

We're using Nagios to monitor our equipment. It sends alerts through a locally installed copy of sendmail to our (end user) email server which then goes out to a pager. If the email server goes down, it won't do much good to send the alert to that server so I need an alternate alert which sends email through an outside address.

Does anyone know the syntax for the mail command to send to a different SMTP server? It looks like there are a couple ways to do this, use the account switch, use an alternate .mailrc/mail.rc file, maybe more.

Ideally, I'd like to have a standalone command without using a config file or script.

Thanks in advance,
Scott