[Techtalk] imap server

[jennyw]

Hi, Kathryn,

On Thu, Mar 25, 2004 at 11:36:31PM +1100, Kathryn Andersen wrote:
> Sorry, I don't follow.  Why is it easier to migrate servers?

Because if you store e-mail on a server, chances are that the new server 
understands IMAP. If the old server also understands IMAP, then it's a 
breeze to transfer files from the old server to the new server, such as 
by using the program Rasjid mentioned (imapsync). The alternative would 
be to convert from one file format to another (e.g. MailDir -> MySQL or 
mbx -> MailDir), which is much more difficult.

Even if you only ever pickup e-mail using a text client, your e-mail is 
stored locally, and you can always ssh to the machine you have e-mail 
on, there are advantages of an IMAP server.  Let's say you wanted to 
write a script that does after-the-fact filtering on your mail messages 
(or archiving old messages, or pulling out addresses in your "old" 
folder to use in your SpamAssassin white list, or what have you).  If 
you currently have your mail stored in mbx format, then you'd have to 
write your script to be able to access mbx.  If later you decide that 
you prefer storing your messages in MailDirs, then you'd have to rewrite 
your script to handle the MailDirs. However, if you had an IMAP server 
installed, you could write your utility scripts for IMAP. If you switch 
IMAP servers, it's no problem, since the way to access e-mail is still 
the same.  Also, if you change the underlying file format that the IMAP 
server uses, it's still no difference to the script (well, except for 
the IMAP separator and maybe a few other small things, but it's still 
much easier).

Also, even if you think that you might never want to use an e-mail 
client besides Mutt or Pine, you might change your mind if you're 
traveling and want to access e-mail. Sometimes it's just not safe to 
SSH.  That's when you might want to make an exception and use Web mail. 
Most open source Web mail clients want to access IMAP on the backend, so 
that's another reason to use IMAP.

I hope this helps and that us e-mail obsessives aren't overwhelming you 
... ;-)

Jen