[Techtalk] imap server

[Rasjid Wilcox]

On Thursday 25 March 2004 23:27, Kathryn Andersen wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 24, 2004 at 10:15:23PM +1100, Rasjid Wilcox wrote:
> > With IMAP, the email stays on the server.
>
> So that's why I've never come across an ISP that uses it -- they don't
> want to give you the space for that.

Actually, pretty much any ISP that offers webmail will be using IMAP 
internally.  And sometimes they even forget to firewall it off.  But very few 
offer it as a publicly acknowleged service.

> > You can log in from anywhere, and
> > *all* your mail will be there, not just new mail.  All your mail will
> > also be shown with the same folder setup and structure, regardless of the
> > email client you use.
> >
> > You can also set up server-side delivery rules, so that your mail is
> > pre-sorted before you even log in to look at it.  The best bit about this
> > is that it is email client independant.  I can change email client, and
> > all my sorting rules continue to work.
>
> But what's the difference between that and simply logging in to your
> machine, where all your saved mail has "the same filder setup and
> structure, regardles of the email client you use".  I mean, this account
> here is my mailing list account, and I have maildrop (I used to use
> procmail, but recently changed over to maildrop -- it's so much
> simpler!) which pre-sorts all the different lists into different
> mailboxes, which I then look at -- what's the difference?

Because 'logging onto your machine' from a remote location may not always be 
an option, nor something you want to allow.  And it does not solve the 
problem of easily changing mail clients at all.

> > The ability to easily use multiple email clients is the main reason I set
> > up Courier IMAP with Maildrop on my desktop machine at home.  If someone
> > sends me a html formmated mail that I really need to reply to, but Kmail
> > messes up (Kmail 1.5.1 on SuSE 8.2 - perhaps newer versions are better
> > with replying to html mail) I can close Kmail, open Mozilla mail, and
> > reply to it there.  And if I at some point decide to use Evolution, or
> > Sylpheed or whatever, I don't have to re-create 30+ mail filtering rules
> > in my new email client to cope with all the lists in on, since my
> > existing rules (done with maildrop) continue to work.
>
> But I don't use filtering rules in the email *client*, so that's no
> advantage.  Wouldn't it be more of a disadvantage, since one would be
> limited to mail clients that understand IMAP, and surely that is a
> subset of the range of email clients around.

Yes, but having tried to convert my mail folders from the various different 
formats that are used by different mail clients several different times, I 
decided that limiting myself to mail clients that understand imap was more 
than an acceptable compromise.

> > And for a while I ran a server at home over my DSL connection.  So then I
> > could log in from work or from a friends place and check my mail - again
> > with all the mail filters already applied, so I didn't see the 50 new
> > email messges to the wxPython list unless I wanted to.  If I get around
> > to buying a quiet mini-itx system I may do this again, since then I get
> > ready access to *all* my mail (even stuff from months or years ago)
> > regardless of where I am.
>
> Again, I don't understand the advantage of using IMAP versus simply
> logging in to one's system, if one had an always-on system at home
> (which I don't, but I'd like to some day).

Because your always-on system and your desktop can be (and probably should be) 
different.

If I do get a mini-itx system, it will basically be a firewall and an imap 
server - with perhaps apache running too.  With Cyrus (and I think Courier?) 
you can set this up so that there are no user accounts on the system.  So you 
can lock the system down fairly tightly and keep it secure.  If I wanted to 
get really fancy I could run the imap server in a chroot jail, or even on a 
user-mode-linux system within the firewall and set up a DMZ.  Such a setup 
could be updated easily and remain very stable (particularly if running 
debian for example) for a long time.

Also, I would never provide 'always on' access to my desktop - I just don't 
trust it to be sufficiently secure or stable.  And when I'm not using it I 
want it off because it is noisy.

Anyway, these are my reasons for choosing to run an imap server at home.  The 
most important is that I like to be able to run multiple mail clients 
(sometimes at the same time) and change between them easily.  If you have 
found a way to do that without imap, or you don't have a desire to do that, 
then you probably don't need imap.

Cheers,

Rasjid.

-- 
Rasjid Wilcox
Canberra, Australia (UTC +11 hrs)
http://www.openminddev.net