IMAP

[MendoDave]

Recently when I set up Thunderbird on a spare computer I wanted to leave the messages on the server so I can get them all on my Laptop. But try as I might I couldn't find the check box for leave messages on server in the account settings. After a while I figured out that I had set up the account as IMAP rather than post office protocol 3. I'm not familliar with IMAP at all but through this experience I gathered that the messages are left remotely, but I suspect there is a lot more to it than that.



Anyone know the ins and outs of IMAP Vs POP3? I could look it up of course but I'm lazy today and I'm sure somebody knows more than Wiki does.
And besides....

[ducpainter]

paging derby...

he knows everything.

[Slide Panda]

IMAP is what you want. The messages stay on the server - and you access them remotely from any client. So you can access the same email account from any number of devices and any message you send, delete etc will be samey same on any other device as the messages are on that mail server. Unlike POP you're not downloading them and erasing them off the server.

Another benefit is you can do stuff offline and when you reconnect the server will update.

IMAP is better... go forth with it.

[MendoDave]

OK the way I switched on the New machine was to delete the profile and  then and then add a new account (the same one) in POP3. But I don't want to do that on my Laptop. I have stuff saved and in different folder and so on. Is there an easy way to change from POP to IMAP?

[derby]

IMAP is what you want. The messages stay on the server - and you access them remotely from any client. So you can access the same email account from any number of devices and any message you send, delete etc will be samey same on any other device as the messages are on that mail server. Unlike POP you're not downloading them and erasing them off the server.

Another benefit is you can do stuff offline and when you reconnect the server will update.

it's a little more involved than that. you're still downloading the messages and you'll still maintain a local copy, but IMAP will synchronize read/not read, deletes, folders, etc. across all email clients configured for that account.

OK the way I switched on the New machine was to delete the profile and  then and then add a new account (the same one) in POP3. But I don't want to do that on my Laptop. I have stuff saved and in different folder and so on. Is there an easy way to change from POP to IMAP?

first of all, even if you remove the pop3 configuration from your client, all your email is stored locally so, unless you actually select all of it and delete it, you shouldn't lose anything.

secondly, did you have pop3 set to leave messages on the server? if so, it should re-download them into a folder structure that mirrors the one on the server when you configure it for IMAP.

who's your email provider, gmail?

[MendoDave]

I have a Gmail account and an MCN account.  ( http://www.mcn.org/ )

[Drunken Monkey]

What Derby said (he really does know everything)

POP3 is basically a mailbox protocol that is designed to temporarily hold messages until you download them. IMAP4 is designed to store messages "in the cloud" and instead clients synchronize activities (what's been read, what hasn't, etc.) against the remote store.

Best to switch all your clients to IMAP4 rather than much around with some pop3 / imap4 combo.

Here's what I'd do:

Assuming you were downloading messages locally with your pop3 account and not keeping them on the server:

Save your emails that you were getting via pop3 (just change the settings so it no longer points to the server. You'll get error messages, but ignore them)

Make a new account that points to the imap4 endpoint, then copy the 'old' emails back over from the pop3 account to the imap4 account. That should upload all the old, locally stored emails 'to the cloud'

Once all the old emails are copied over, delete the old pop3 account.

Beware, you will eventually run out of storage 'on the cloud' and you should consider making some local mail folders to in your email program to store ancient emails on.

What email client are you using?

[MendoDave]

Using Thunderbird. Ok that sounds like a good plan, I'll try it. I was worried that the current profile would revert back to POP 3 when I restore all the files But maybe not.

The file is 103 MB so hopefully that wont be too much. 

[MendoDave]

Well it seems to be working. machines both here and there are working over time downloading stuff to different folders. I must be using up all the bandwidth.

[derby]

Well it seems to be working. machines both here and there are working over time downloading stuff to different folders. I must be using up all the bandwidth.

google's imap implementation is, uh, "non-standard," so make sure you pay attention to their thunderbiird-specific settings here:

http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=78892#

[MendoDave]

  thanks for the config page.

I'm not sure what that last bit was about in the config editor but I did it anyway.

Namely "mail.server.default.fetch_by_chunks entry to set its value to false."

and "browser.cache.memory.capacity entry to edit its value.
Change the value to '30720' "

[Speeddog]

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