Hey Julius, great to hear from you!
In regards to your query I highly recommend a good professor or book on computer science on computational complexity and more specifically network communications and e-mail protocols, then look into the implementation for each. That would help you out on your quest for a deeper understanding of what goes on. I don't have enough space in my tiny text buffer to answer your question, but the information is out there. Regards --------- Julius Hamilton <julkh...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hey, > > I was wondering if someone could help me understand the key relevant factors > in the speed of accessing your > email inbox (in my case Gmail) via IMAP. > > What really happens when the command mail -f imaps://imap.gmail.com is > executed and the user logs in? > > IMAP is a protocol, so what does that mean for how the key information - the > login info - is sent over the internet? > Is there some fundamental difference between IMAP and HTTP, for example? > Ultimately, the info is transmitted as > bits, but on a higher level, is IMAP a certain language, for example? > > The contents of the email inbox are sent back, but in what format? Does the > IMAP protocol take a certain raw > format and build it into an email inbox interface? > > Most importantly, how can we optimize the speed of this process? What are the > most important factors - internet > speed, CPU of computer, RAM, or something to do with networking - and why? > > Thanks very much, > Julius >
