using kontact and IMAP

[Derek Broughton]

Lindsay Mathieson wrote:

>> Lindsay Mathieson wrote:
>> 
>> > On Thu, 2 Apr 2009 11:42:51 pm Derek Broughton wrote:
>> >> Essentially when you use IMAP nothing is downloaded
>> until you ask for it, >> so don't expect to be able to use
>> > it offline.
>> > That's what Disconnected IMAP mode in Kontact is used
>> for,
>> 
>> well, sure, but that's not IMAP :-)
> 
> Uh, well - yes it is. Its the IMAP protocol with an offline
> cache. Lookup the IMAP RFC, it specifically mentions a
> disconnected mode which Kontact has implemented.

OK, it _is_ using IMAP, but (a) you have to configure it as if it's a
special protocol in KMail, and (b) you've just thrown away a large part of
your IMAP functionality by downloading every single email instead of
keeping everything in a single location.
> 
>> 
>> > On the other hand, it
>> > would not be very practical for me to automatically
>> > download every (huge) e-mail folder. That's why, my question 
>> > is: it is possible to determine from case to case whether I 
>> > want to download 1 or more e-mails or not? 

>> >> Possible, yes; practical ?  I'm not sure.
>> > 
>> > I dunno if its even possible with IMAP, its just not
>> > designed that way. More the job for one of those POP
>> preview clients.
>> 
>> Hey, it's Linux - of course it's possible. :-)  That _is_
>> what dIMAP does.
> 
> No it doesn't. There is no way to selectively download
> messages with dIMAP, its all or nothing.

dIMAP chooses to download all the emails.  You could just as easily (this
was the "practicality" part :-) ) write a program that downloaded every
second email, or you could display the headers and download the messages
for every one the user selected.  So, yeah, it's essentially the same
thing.

>>Or you could write some kind of script
>> to get every message.  The "not practical" part is that
>> (a) you wouldn't want to do the latter and (b) last time I
>> tried dIMAP it wasn't that reliable - but that's a long
>> time back.
> 
> <shudders> I remember those days  ... its a *lot* better
> now. 

That's what I'd heard, but first I got out of the habit of using it, then
the client where I do most of my work started blocking IMAP connects (but
they still allow POP...).  Still, if you're confident it's reliable, that
may be Bas' best option.

> You still want to be cautious if doing mailbox 
> maintenance and sync between every folder move/delete
> operation. 
-- 
derek