Mail Servers

[jjohnson at sunrise-linux.com (miah)]

On Sat, Sep 20, 2003 at 06:23:23PM -0400, David Kramer wrote:
> I'm using Washington University's IMAP server right now, and am a little 
> sick of it getting confused when more than one client log on at the same 
> time (shouldn't that work???  Why should kmail get server access errors 
> because I bring up my webmail??).  wu-imap uses mbox files (a file for each 
> folder with all messages in that one file), and I want to switch to the 
> other format (forgot what it's called)(a directory for each folder with all 
> messages in their own file).  
> 
> I assume any will work file with any MTA.  Which will meet my needs needs?  
> Are there any big differentiators?

wu-imapd is another piece of software you should drop.  Its from WU, they also maintain pine, and wu-ftpd, and both are pretty notorious for security issues.  The other mailbox format you're thinking about is called maildir.  The reason you have problems with logging in twice is likely due to locking that huge mbox file.

Maildir isn't supported by all MTA's, or MUA's for that matter, the Pine developers refuse to implement support (though there is a patch).  Mutt works well with imap and maildir.  Postfix supports both mbox and maildir.  Courier-imapd supports maildir.. There are really many options.  I personally use courier and postfix + mutt.  I've been looking at 'dovecot' (which is supposed to be a secure pop3d and imapd), haven't got it working yet, or really looked at the source.

-miah