Filters

Services use filters to decide if they will accept the message.

The list of filters is displayed in the Filters tab of the service setup dialog.

When the message arrives, the service steps through the filters in the order of their ID values. Each filter is used to test the message against the conditions specified in the filter. If any of the filter conditions is not satisfied, the service skips to the next filter. If there are no more filters, the message is rejected. Note that if there are no filters at all, then all messages are accepted.

The filter contains the following conditions:

• Pattern specifies the pattern used to match the text of the message. See Wildcard Patterns for more information. If you wish to match binary messages, then set pattern to <BinaryMessage>.
• Account specifies the incoming account. In the Filter dialog, use selection button ( ... ) to select or clear the account field.
• From lets you specify the pattern used to match the address of the sender of the message. See Wildcard Patterns for more information.
• To lets you specify the pattern used to match the address of the recipient of the message. See Wildcard Patterns for more information.
  
  Alternatively, in the From and To fields you can specify a group of contacts by enclosing a group name in square brackets ( [ ] ). For example, if you enter [Friends], then all contacts from the Friends group will be accepted.

If all conditions are satisfied, then the following properties of the filter are used:

• Type specifies whether the message should be accepted or rejected.
• Remove prefix specifies whether the prefix should be removed from the message text.

Filters tab

The Filters tab displays the filters used by the service.

The Action menu contains the following options:

• Up/Down - Use to arrange the list of filters prior to using Tools - Renumber option.

The Tools menu contains the following options:

• Renumber - Use to renumber the ID values of the filters using their current order in the list.

Use Pattern Test Bar to test the pattern matching of the filters. While you type the text in the left field you can see in the right field if the text is recognized by any of the existing filters.