Subject: Re: UW IMAP installation base and history

From: Raul Dias <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Apr 2000 19:30:39 -0300

Hi,

>Later, imapd added support for the traditional UNIX mailbox format.  I didn't
>want to do it, because of the limitations of that format, such as not being
>able to have multiple simultaneous access because of the requirements of
>external legacy UNIX programs.  Support for these legacy programs was the
>whole reason to implement traditional UNIX format.

Let me do a  few newbie questions.

What is the best file format for  imapd/pop3d ?

Reading the docs I suppect it is mbx, right?
If it is, it is possibe to use sendmail/procmail to save the files as mbx? 
Can I convert Unix milbox files easily?

Will this speedup performance for imapd and pop3d, specially with large mailboxes?

Before I start asking some more basic/nonsense/newbie questions, where can I find more 
documentation about it (mbx), besides the imapd package?

Thaks

Raul Dias

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From: Mark Crispin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 9 Apr 2000 15:37:29 -0700 (PDT)

> What is the best file format for  imapd/pop3d ?

mbx

> Reading the docs I suppect it is mbx, right?

Correct

> If it is, it is possibe to use sendmail/procmail to save the files as mbx?

Yes.  Look at the tmail and dmail programs, which are part of the imap-utils:
	ftp://ftp.cac.washington.edu/mail/imap-utils.tar.Z

> Can I convert Unix milbox files easily?

Yes.  Look at the mbxcvt program, which is part of the imap-utils.

> Will this speedup performance for imapd and pop3d, specially with large

Yes.

> Before I start asking some more basic/nonsense/newbie questions, where can I
> find more documentation about it (mbx), besides the imapd package?

I'm not aware of any third-party documentation.  mbx is a private format to
the UW IMAP toolkit.

---

From: Lee Shakespeare <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Apr 2000 13:17:11 +0100

> > What is the best file format for  imapd/pop3d ?

Speaking of mbx.  What's the best way of making imapd default to mbx for
all folders, not just the INBOX?  I've read the documentation about
.imaprc but don't particually want to get into all that.  Is there a way
of defining the default mailbox format for all folders to be mbx at
compile time?

Regards,
 Lee

-- 
Lee Shakespeare   :   [email-masked]
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From: Mark Crispin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Apr 2000 06:00:55 -0700 (PDT)

> of defining the default mailbox format for all folders to be mbx at

In the imap-4.[]/src/osdep/unix/Makefile, change
	CREATEPROTO=unixproto
to
	CREATEPROTO=mbxproto

This is, in fact, the preferred method over the imaprc kludge.