----- Original Message -----
From: "Tor Slettnes" <tor@???>
To: "Chris J. Babyak" <cjbst59@???>
Cc: <exim-users@???>
Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2004 2:54 PM
Subject: Re: [Exim] Question regarding migration to exim
>
> On Mar 23, 2004, at 07:40, Chris J. Babyak wrote:
> > Our old system was qmail and maildir mailstores. The new exim box has
> > been setup with mbox mailstores.
>
> Why? The Maildir format is slow, but mbox format is even slower.
> Plus, it has other problems associated with it, such as the need to
> escape lines that start with the word "From ".
I don't have a good reason for why this was done. Unfortunatley the new box
in question is a managed box. Apparently the person who set this box up
needs to learn a few things. I have read over some documentation though
that cpanel (the management interface to this entire mess) might dictate a
few things such as this, but I can't confirm that.
>
> I presume your users also access their mail through IMAP or POP-3? If
> so, you would also have to change your IMAP/POP3 server software
> (probably from Courier to something like UW-IMAPd or DoveCot).
The users do access mail via one of three webmail clients, straight pop or
straight imap.
> I would instead keep your mail in "Maildir" spools. Exim has built-in
> Maildir support. In the default configuration (at least on my Debian
> box), there is a "maildir_home" transport defined. Simply set
> LOCAL_DELIVERY=maildir_home.
>
> Or, if you want something with higher performance, migrate to the Cyrus
> suite of tools: Deliver mail via LMTP, read them via IMAP (preferrably)
> or POP-3.
I have advised the owner of this server of this already.
>
> > Some of the users have already been migrated with old mailstores still
> > sitting on the qmail box.
>
> Too bad. I would still have these migrate back.
I'm thinking about it.
>
> > What kind of migration technique would be the best for moving this old
> > mail? There's always drag/drop which is effective enough for a few
> > users, but not for more than 5 or 10. Mailstores could be converted
> > from maildir to mbox with qmail's maildir2mbox utility and then the
> > newly created inbox file transferred -this seems to work OK if the
> > user hasn't been already using the new box. But for the user who has
> > new mail already on the new box and needs their old mail, is just
> > appending the old mail (converted maildir2mbox file) to the new inbox
> > file OK? Or does that present problems for the way mbox format files
> > are read.
>
> I would try it out:
> cp /var/mail/someuser /var/mail/someuser.backup
> maildir2mbox <....>
>
> And if everything looks OK:
> rm /var/mail/someuser.backup
>
>
>
> > Popping the old mail over to the new box via SquirrelMail's mail_fetch
> > utility might work out, but I believe there's an issue with having
> > dates on the mail carried across.
>
> Correct me if I am wrong, but does not SquirrelMail use IMAP to access
> your mail? As such, that would be a function of the interaction
> between your IMAP client (squirrelmail) and your IMAP server.
SM does use IMAP via localhost, but mail_fetch (plugin) allows you to pop
another server inside of SM to keep all your mail in one place.
> -tor
>
>
