Re: Mailbox format how-to
Mark Crispin wrote: dmail is built as part of the IMAP toolkit, so its behavior will be affected by the change to CREATEPROTO. Right. I knew that. I was just looking for a way to do it without compiling it in as the "default" format. Tho, I'm not sure there's a problem with doing that. It's messier than that; there are some security issues as well. The -I flag in tmail could be abused for some truly nasty purposes if it was allowed for non-privileged calls. Right. But if there were a "format" command-line arg that doesn't also specify the filename, that issue goes away. That was my point for having a format arg that wasn't -I. "mailutil create #driver.mbx/foo" will create an empty file named foo which you can then copy to "INBOX" in the home directory of all the users you want to convert to mbx. Cool. Thanks... I need to look at mailutil s'more. I've looked at mbx* tools, but they're confusing. Maybe I shouldn't be looking at those. :-) By the way, you do know that you can't use mbx format with NFS, don't you? Yup. I'm all on local filesystems here. - Chris
Re: Mailbox format how-to
On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Chris Ross wrote: CREATEPROTO=mbxproto Yeah, I knew about that method. I was just wondering if there was a way to make dmail (from procmailrc, for example) know to instantiate new mail folders as mbx instead of mbox. dmail is built as part of the IMAP toolkit, so its behavior will be affected by the change to CREATEPROTO. It seems not unreasonable to have command-line args for tmail/dmail (other than -I) that could specify format. But, what to do in the case that it doesn't match existing format might be an issue. It's messier than that; there are some security issues as well. The -I flag in tmail could be abused for some truly nasty purposes if it was allowed for non-privileged calls. Okay. How would you recommend creating this empty mbx mailbox? "mailutil create #driver.mbx/foo" will create an empty file named foo which you can then copy to "INBOX" in the home directory of all the users you want to convert to mbx. By the way, you do know that you can't use mbx format with NFS, don't you? -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Re: Mailbox format how-to
On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Erik Kangas wrote: #!/bin/bash if [ ! -e "$HOME/$1" ] && [ $1 != ".inbox" ]; then /usr/local/bin/mbxcreat "#driver.mbx:$1" fi /usr/local/bin/dmail "+$1" I recommend using "mailutil create" instead of "mbxcreat" since the latter program is no longer supported. We didn't find any easier way to accomplish this for arbitrary folders; it would be nice if dmail could do this itself. I'm not sure that I understand. dmail never creates a non-INBOX mailbox; if the destination mailbox does not exist then dmail will deliver to INBOX. Do you mean "convert mailbox format"? If so, mailutil can be used to convert, albeit to a different name. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Re: Mailbox format how-to
Chris Ross wrote:
Mark Crispin wrote:
The easiest way to do this is to edit file
imap-200?/src/osdep/unix/Makefile
to set
CREATEPROTO=mbxproto
instead of the current unixproto. Then rebuild the entire UW IMAP
toolkit.
Yeah, I knew about that method. I was just wondering if there
was a way to make dmail (from procmailrc, for example) know to
instantiate new mail folders as mbx instead of mbox. It seems not
unreasonable to have command-line args for tmail/dmail (other than
-I) that could specify format. But, what to do in the case that
it doesn't match existing format might be an issue.
You could do this with a little shell script, something like
"dmail-create.sh" we use:
#!/bin/bash
if [ ! -e "$HOME/$1" ] && [ $1 != ".inbox" ]; then
/usr/local/bin/mbxcreat "#driver.mbx:$1"
fi
/usr/local/bin/dmail "+$1"
Where this script takes 1 command line argument - the path of the folder in
which you want to save the message, relative to the user's home directory.
".inbox" is supposed to be in unix format so sendmail can deliver to it
directly "if all else fails", hence the exception.
Then, in your .procmailrc scripts, instead of delivering to dmail, you
deliver to dmail-create.sh. I.e.
LOCK=.lock.user.id
:0 :${LOCK}
| /usr/local/bin/dmail-create.sh INBOX
This way, the folder will be created in MBX format if it doesn't exist before
dmail tries to save the message.
We didn't find any easier way to accomplish this for arbitrary folders; it
would be nice if dmail could do this itself.
-Erik Kangas
--
Erik Kangas, Ph.D. --- President of Lux Scientiae, Incorporated
[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- http://luxsci.com
Office Phone:1-617-507-2162
Cell Phone: 1-617-596-9558P.O. Box 326
Luxsci Toll Free:1-800-441-6612Westwood, Massachusetts
LuxSci FAX: 1-413-332-059802090, USA
Re: Mailbox format how-to
In regard to: Re: Mailbox format how-to, Chris Ross said (at 5:49pm on Nov...: Mark Crispin wrote: The easiest way to do this is to edit file imap-200?/src/osdep/unix/Makefile to set CREATEPROTO=mbxproto instead of the current unixproto. Then rebuild the entire UW IMAP toolkit. Yeah, I knew about that method. I was just wondering if there was a way to make dmail (from procmailrc, for example) know to instantiate new mail folders as mbx instead of mbox. It seems not unreasonable to have command-line args for tmail/dmail (other than -I) that could specify format. But, what to do in the case that it doesn't match existing format might be an issue. Are you planning on doing home directory mail delivery, or delivery to a spool directory for INBOX and other folders live under ~ or ~/mail? However, once created, an mbx-format mailbox shouldn't vanish. So, it should work just to create empty mbx-format mailboxes for everybody who doesn't have it. It works to create one, and then copy it to each user (there isn't any user-specific in an empty mbx-format mailbox). That way, you don't have to do any rebuilding. Okay. How would you recommend creating this empty mbx mailbox? mailutil create '#driver.mbx/foo' creates folder `foo' in MBX format. Tim -- Tim Mooney [EMAIL PROTECTED] Information Technology Services (701) 231-1076 (Voice) Room 242-J6, IACC Building (701) 231-8541 (Fax) North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164
Re: Mailbox format how-to
Mark Crispin wrote: The easiest way to do this is to edit file imap-200?/src/osdep/unix/Makefile to set CREATEPROTO=mbxproto instead of the current unixproto. Then rebuild the entire UW IMAP toolkit. Yeah, I knew about that method. I was just wondering if there was a way to make dmail (from procmailrc, for example) know to instantiate new mail folders as mbx instead of mbox. It seems not unreasonable to have command-line args for tmail/dmail (other than -I) that could specify format. But, what to do in the case that it doesn't match existing format might be an issue. However, once created, an mbx-format mailbox shouldn't vanish. So, it should work just to create empty mbx-format mailboxes for everybody who doesn't have it. It works to create one, and then copy it to each user (there isn't any user-specific in an empty mbx-format mailbox). That way, you don't have to do any rebuilding. Okay. How would you recommend creating this empty mbx mailbox? It would be a bit of a pain to make sure to create a spool mbx file for any new user I want to receive mail from, but not the worst problem. Most other folder creations will be done through IMAPd, tho, so may still require the above. So... - Chris
Re: Mailbox format how-to
On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Chris Ross wrote: - modify sendmail.cf (and friends: submit.cf?) to call tmail instead of mail.local. The tmail man page has a little info on this. - Modify by calls in my procmailrc to use dmail instead of just specifying the mailbox name (i thing. this right?) So far, so good. So, is there any way to tell tmail to deliver to an mbx format "main mail spool" if the file doesn't already exist? I know if it exists, it'll deliver in the correct format, but what if it vanishes? The easiest way to do this is to edit file imap-200?/src/osdep/unix/Makefile to set CREATEPROTO=mbxproto instead of the current unixproto. Then rebuild the entire UW IMAP toolkit. However, once created, an mbx-format mailbox shouldn't vanish. So, it should work just to create empty mbx-format mailboxes for everybody who doesn't have it. It works to create one, and then copy it to each user (there isn't any user-specific in an empty mbx-format mailbox). That way, you don't have to do any rebuilding. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Mailbox format how-to
Hello there. I am investigating converting my mail server to using MBX format (vs. mbox) for everything. Using tmail for delivery (via sendmail 8.12), and uw-imap 2004 for access to INBOX and personal folders. So, my question is this. Is there some sort of how-to for building a system? I know I need to: - modify sendmail.cf (and friends: submit.cf?) to call tmail instead of mail.local. The tmail man page has a little info on this. - Modify by calls in my procmailrc to use dmail instead of just specifying the mailbox name (i thing. this right?) So, is there any way to tell tmail to deliver to an mbx format "main mail spool" if the file doesn't already exist? I know if it exists, it'll deliver in the correct format, but what if it vanishes? How hard is it to modify procmailrc's to use dmail? A single source of information would be nice, if there was one. Right now there seem to be a small number of sources of info for different parts of it, so I thought I'd ask. Thanks! - Chris -- -- For information about this mailing list, and its archives, see: http://www.washington.edu/imap/c-client-list.html --
Re: mailbox format
On Sun, 7 Nov 2004, Akmal Khodjanov wrote: I was wondering if there is any c-client driver to treat mail messages as separate files. I would like to fetch mail messages from a mail server and save them in separate files each. The closest would be either mx or mh format. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
mailbox format
Hello list, I was wondering if there is any c-client driver to treat mail messages as separate files. I would like to fetch mail messages from a mail server and save them in separate files each. Thanks. -akmal. -- Best regards, Akmal mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] --- "Classical physics has been superseded by quantum theory: quantum theory is verified by experiments. Experiments must be described in terms of classical physics." — C. F. von Weizsa"cker (1912- ), German physicist and philosopher. -- -- For information about this mailing list, and its archives, see: http://www.washington.edu/imap/c-client-list.html --
Re: mailbox format problems
The only thing that you need to do to avoid creating files in traditional UNIX format is to change CREATEPROTO. By setting EMPTYPROTO to mbx, you introduce a bug into imapd. Empty files can not be in mbx format, so what will happen is that you'll get an obscure error message (such as "indeterminate mailbox format"). -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Re: mailbox format problems
I do this not because it actually _does_ anything but because I don't want
any trace of mbox anywhere on my system. I also delete all traces of "mbox"
from the driver list. Just because it is meaningless does not mean it's
wrong, AFAIK. What would be wrong for me would be creating an mbox mailbox.
We had so many problems with mbox at my last large installation of UW-IMAP
that I want it nowhere near my servers.
>From what I can tell setting EMPTYPROTO to mbx is in fact meaningless but
won't hurt anything and will achieve my goal of removing mbox. I've run it
for four years or so with no ill effects. Someone care to comment?
n
- Original Message -
From: "David B Funk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Nick Hodulik" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: "Sebastian Hagedorn" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>;
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2003 10:36 PM
Subject: Re: mailbox format problems
> On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Nick Hodulik wrote:
>
> > There is a way. You have to dig down into the code and change
"CREATEPROTO"
> > and "EMPTYPROTO" from mbox to mbx. Assuming your in *nix you'll have to
go
> > to src/osdep/unix/env_unix.c or something similar to do this. If you
want
> > mail to live in a subdirectory called "mail" in each users home dir then
you
> > must change src/osdep/unix/Makefile to reflect this as well.
>
> Before you tell people to do this, you might want to go read the
> documentation to find out why setting EMPTYPROTO to "mbx" is meaningless
> and wrong.
>
> Dave
>
> --
> Dave Funk University of Iowa
> College of Engineering
> 319/335-5751 FAX: 319/384-0549 1256 Seamans Center
> Sys_admin/Postmaster/cell_adminIowa City, IA 52242-1527
> #include
> Better is not better, 'standard' is better. B{
>
>
Re: mailbox format problems
On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Nick Hodulik wrote:
> There is a way. You have to dig down into the code and change "CREATEPROTO"
> and "EMPTYPROTO" from mbox to mbx. Assuming your in *nix you'll have to go
> to src/osdep/unix/env_unix.c or something similar to do this. If you want
> mail to live in a subdirectory called "mail" in each users home dir then you
> must change src/osdep/unix/Makefile to reflect this as well.
Before you tell people to do this, you might want to go read the
documentation to find out why setting EMPTYPROTO to "mbx" is meaningless
and wrong.
Dave
--
Dave Funk University of Iowa
College of Engineering
319/335-5751 FAX: 319/384-0549 1256 Seamans Center
Sys_admin/Postmaster/cell_adminIowa City, IA 52242-1527
#include
Better is not better, 'standard' is better. B{
Re: mailbox format problems
On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Nick Hodulik wrote: > There is a way. You have to dig down into the code and change "CREATEPROTO" > and "EMPTYPROTO" from mbox to mbx. Assuming your in *nix you'll have to go > to src/osdep/unix/env_unix.c or something similar to do this. The CREATEPROTO and EMPTYPROTO definitions are in the src/osdep/unix/Makefile. It is meaningless to set EMPTYPROTO to mbx. You can do it, but it won't accomplish anything. It will make empty files unusable. > If you want > mail to live in a subdirectory called "mail" in each users home dir then you > must change src/osdep/unix/Makefile to reflect this as well. Now, that is in env_unix.c. > Which brings me to a question: why can't these options be passed in to > UW-IMAP as compile-time switches? You most certainly can set CREATEPROTO and EMPTYPROTO as compile-time switches. > Every single time there's a new release I > have to delve into the code and change these flags, and I'm sure I'm not the > only one. It would be one thing if they were really esoteric things, but > they aren't: they're very basic, important changes that make UW-IMAP usable > on production servers. How? If you have a shell access system, then by setting the subdirectory you are dictating to your shell users where they store their mail for use by IMAP. If the user runs a client that uses some other name, you've screwed him; you've unilaterally made the decision for *all* users that one, and only one, subdirectory name must be used. If you don't allow shell access to the IMAP server, then may be no real need to put mail in a subdirectory. The whole point of a subdirectory is to separate mail from other files that a user may have. But if it's a dedicated IMAP server, there shouldn't be any files. Of course there are systems which don't neatly fit into either of the above categories. However -- and this point bears emphasizing -- the cost of miscategorizing such a system is merely that the client has to have a "prefix" configured. The cost of making the opposite mistake is a denial of access to mail. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Re: mailbox format problems
On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Imre Gergely wrote: > and it works only _this_ way, no other way? i mean i have to create home > dirs for each and every user whom i want to use this mbx format? Correct. > there's > no way to tell imap/pop3/sendmail to use mbx directly in /var/spool/mail? Correct. You could hack the source, but the design of mbx format is *NOT* to use a mail spool directory. > another q: if i have .procmailrc, and i'm sorting my mail to ~/mail/* with > it, how can i use dmail/tmail to put those mailboxes in mbx format? and > will i be able to open them with imap? (ie in outlook, after subscribing > to those folders) procmail has a feature to pipe to a program. The program you would use for this purpose is dmail, not tmail. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Re: mailbox format problems
Hi, On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Nick Hodulik wrote: > There is a way. You have to dig down into the code and change "CREATEPROTO" > and "EMPTYPROTO" from mbox to mbx. Assuming your in *nix you'll have to go > to src/osdep/unix/env_unix.c or something similar to do this. If you want > mail to live in a subdirectory called "mail" in each users home dir then you > must change src/osdep/unix/Makefile to reflect this as well. > > Which brings me to a question: why can't these options be passed in to > UW-IMAP as compile-time switches? Every single time there's a new release I [snipp] you might want to read ./docs/imaprc.txt in the uw-imap tarball. If you are prepared to "accept the risk" :) you might find the runtime configuration options quite helpfull. Greetings Christian -- CK Software GmbH Christian Kratzer, Schwarzwaldstr. 31, 71131 Jettingen Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Phone: +49 7452 889-135Open Software Solutions, Network Security Fax: +49 7452 889-136FreeBSD spoken here!
Re: mailbox format problems
There is a way. You have to dig down into the code and change "CREATEPROTO" and "EMPTYPROTO" from mbox to mbx. Assuming your in *nix you'll have to go to src/osdep/unix/env_unix.c or something similar to do this. If you want mail to live in a subdirectory called "mail" in each users home dir then you must change src/osdep/unix/Makefile to reflect this as well. Which brings me to a question: why can't these options be passed in to UW-IMAP as compile-time switches? Every single time there's a new release I have to delve into the code and change these flags, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. It would be one thing if they were really esoteric things, but they aren't: they're very basic, important changes that make UW-IMAP usable on production servers. What can be done to change this so that these things can be made much easier to setup? I understand the goal of wanting out-of-the-box functionality but that really shouldn't come at the expense of ease-of-use and intuitive design. I find this frustrating, as UW-IMAP is literally the only mature software package I use with an antiquated build system. Mark, you tend to answer these sort of requests/constructive criticisms tersely; I respectfully ask that you consider making these kinds of changes, as they would benefit the entire community of users who depend on your otherwise excellent software. n - Original Message - From: "Imre Gergely" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Sebastian Hagedorn" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2003 1:02 AM Subject: Re: mailbox format problems > > On Mon, 8 Dec 2003, Sebastian Hagedorn wrote: > > > The mailbox in /var/spool/mail has to be in mbox format. If you want to > > have an mbx INBOX, you need to create an mbx file named /home/cemc/INBOX. > > Mail will be slurped into that file from /var/spool/mail each time the > > INBOX is accessed. > > ok, it works this way. thanks. > > and it works only _this_ way, no other way? i mean i have to create home > dirs for each and every user whom i want to use this mbx format? there's > no way to tell imap/pop3/sendmail to use mbx directly in /var/spool/mail? > > another q: if i have .procmailrc, and i'm sorting my mail to ~/mail/* with > it, how can i use dmail/tmail to put those mailboxes in mbx format? and > will i be able to open them with imap? (ie in outlook, after subscribing > to those folders) > > -- > Gergely Imre email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > sysadmin mobile: +40-745-105592, office: +40-266-317500 > Nextra Tele Com SRL str. Florilor 28/1, 4100 M-Ciuc, RO > http://www.nextra.ro/gimre ICQ# 101510959 > >
Re: mailbox format problems
On Mon, 8 Dec 2003, Sebastian Hagedorn wrote: > The mailbox in /var/spool/mail has to be in mbox format. If you want to > have an mbx INBOX, you need to create an mbx file named /home/cemc/INBOX. > Mail will be slurped into that file from /var/spool/mail each time the > INBOX is accessed. ok, it works this way. thanks. and it works only _this_ way, no other way? i mean i have to create home dirs for each and every user whom i want to use this mbx format? there's no way to tell imap/pop3/sendmail to use mbx directly in /var/spool/mail? another q: if i have .procmailrc, and i'm sorting my mail to ~/mail/* with it, how can i use dmail/tmail to put those mailboxes in mbx format? and will i be able to open them with imap? (ie in outlook, after subscribing to those folders) -- Gergely Imre email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] sysadmin mobile: +40-745-105592, office: +40-266-317500 Nextra Tele Com SRL str. Florilor 28/1, 4100 M-Ciuc, RO http://www.nextra.ro/gimre ICQ# 101510959
Re: mailbox format problems
--On Montag, 8. Dezember 2003 15:25 Uhr +0200 Imre Gergely <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: i downloaded the imap.tar.Z, and compiled the source. then, i converted my unix mailbox to mbx format. there was no problem, pine could open it. then i tried to open it through pop3: -ERR Unable to open user's INBOX Connection closed by foreign host. in syslog i get the following error: Dec 8 15:21:53 imi ipop3d[14112]: pop3 service init from 127.0.0.1 Dec 8 15:21:58 imi ipop3d[14112]: Can't open INBOX (file /var/spool/mail/cemc): not in valid mailbox format Dec 8 15:21:58 imi ipop3d[14112]: Error opening or locking INBOX user=cemc host=localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1] when i try through imap, it says no messages. what did i do wrong? The mailbox in /var/spool/mail has to be in mbox format. If you want to have an mbx INBOX, you need to create an mbx file named /home/cemc/INBOX. Mail will be slurped into that file from /var/spool/mail each time the INBOX is accessed. Greetings, Sebastian -- Sebastian Hagedorn PGP key ID: 0x4D105B45 Ehrenfeldgürtel 156 50823 Köln http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/
mailbox format problems
hi i downloaded the imap.tar.Z, and compiled the source. then, i converted my unix mailbox to mbx format. there was no problem, pine could open it. then i tried to open it through pop3: -ERR Unable to open user's INBOX Connection closed by foreign host. in syslog i get the following error: Dec 8 15:21:53 imi ipop3d[14112]: pop3 service init from 127.0.0.1 Dec 8 15:21:58 imi ipop3d[14112]: Can't open INBOX (file /var/spool/mail/cemc): not in valid mailbox format Dec 8 15:21:58 imi ipop3d[14112]: Error opening or locking INBOX user=cemc host=localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1] when i try through imap, it says no messages. what did i do wrong? [EMAIL PROTECTED] root]# gcc -v Reading specs from /usr/lib/gcc-lib/i386-redhat-linux/2.96/specs gcc version 2.96 2731 (Red Hat Linux 7.3 2.96-113) imap and pop3 runs through xinetd. thx. -- Gergely Imre email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] sysadmin mobile: +40-745-105592, office: +40-266-317500 Nextra Tele Com SRL str. Florilor 28/1, 4100 M-Ciuc, RO http://www.nextra.ro/gimre ICQ# 101510959 -- -- For information about this mailing list, and its archives, see: http://www.washington.edu/imap/c-client-list.html --
