Subject: EXAMINE

From: Lai Yiu Fai <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Dec 1998 14:34:48 +0800

Hi,

It found that the EXAMINE command in imap-4.4 doesn't grab any new mails in
system mbox into the home directory mbx INBOX.  It behaves differently as
SELECT command.   Though from the spec., "EXAMINE" should be identical to
SELECT and returns the same output; except that the selected mailbox is
read-only,  does it mean it can't grab any new mails into the mbx INBOX
and so no recent mails can be checked?  Or is it an implementation bug in
UW IMAPD?

Rgds,
=======================================================================
Lai Yiu Fai                       |  Tel.:       (852) 2358-6202
Center of Computing Services      |  Fax.:       (852) 2358-2737
 & Telecommunications             |  E-mail:     [email-masked]
                                  |
The Hong Kong University of       |  Clear Water Bay,
Science & Technology              |  Kowloon, Hong Kong.

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From: Mark Crispin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 9 Dec 1998 22:52:36 -0800 (PST)

On Thu, 10 Dec 1998 14:34:48 +0800, Lai Yiu Fai wrote:
> and so no recent mails can be checked?

Yes, that is correct.  EXAMINE is read-only, and read-write is needed to pull
new messages from the system mailbox into the home directory.

> Or is it an implementation bug in
> UW IMAPD?

Nope.  It's a permanent restriction.

What are you trying to use EXAMINE to do?  If it's to check for new mail, use
STATUS instead.

---

From: Lai Yiu Fai <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Dec 1998 15:20:27 +0800

> What are you trying to use EXAMINE to do?  If it's to check for new mail, use

Actually, EXAMINE is used in Netscape mail notificaton daemon to check new
mail.  After I change to mbx INBOX,  it doesn't work.  Also, I check RFC for
"STATUS" command, it states:

      The STATUS command provides an alternative to opening a second
      IMAP4rev1 connection and doing an EXAMINE command on a mailbox to
      query that mailbox's status without deselecting the current
      mailbox in the first IMAP4rev1 connection.

So, EXAMINE is used to opening up a new IMAP connection and query mailbox's
status,  STATUS can just provide an alternate solution but why these two
commands return different results.  Is it ambiguous?

Rgds,
Centre of Computing Services      |  Fax.:       (852) 2358-2737

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From: Mark Crispin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 9 Dec 1998 23:32:08 -0800 (PST)

> commands return different results.  Is it ambiguous?

STATUS doesn't open the mailbox.  It just report mailbox status.  By special
effort, it calculates the status that would happen after grabbing new mail
from the system INBOX into the mbx INBOX.