Author: Ted Cooper Date: To: exim-users Subject: Re: [exim] imap vs pop contemplations
On 31/05/11 05:13, prad wrote: > 1. no one uses imap for it's advantages - eg access is always through
> the same computer(s) and people are encouraged download stuff onto their
> own machines so as not to clutter up the server. i download my stuff
> right way rather than connecting to the imap server via gnus.
>
> 2. many people (especially my wife) are too lazy to transfer things from
> the server to their machines so i have to chase after them anyway to get
> the stuff off (she presently has 2.8G worth stored up there!).
>
> therefore, we're seriously thinking of changing everything to pop and
> forgetting about the next debate dovecot vs courier vs cyrus ...
I've just had the same issue here. I'm forcing users to over to POP
because no-one, and I do mean no-one uses IMAP properly. They either
don't keep any mail on the server at all (essentially POP), or they only
keep their Trash and Drafts on the server and somehow don't have
anything in their inbox. Or, they never check their email all. Or they
just have a 2Gb inbox in which only the most recent emails are accessed.
Some have unread emails from 2 years ago sitting around!
A single user screamed until blue in the face that they wanted to use
the "newer" IMAP protocol because their local IT guru says it's the way
to go. That particular user had no sub-folders, and kept no email on the
server. Everyone else just wanted to know what settings they needed to
change to keep getting email.
The _only_ reason that anyone was connecting to IMAP was because
Thunderbird auto-magically sets up an IMAP accounts when it finds the
ports open on the server. I now run IMAP on different ports, just in
case anyone wants it, but not a single user has asked for the ports yet.
Other advantages - greatly reduces backups (of mostly useless crap),
reduces liability (you are no longer the keeper/archiver of all their mail).
As for daemon, I scrapped courier for dovecot earlier this year. The
ability to tie into Exim directly and share the authdb meant
rationalising my super-duper old courier userdb file and separate SMTP
AUTH files. I know I could have done it in the newer courier setup, but
dovecot isn't just an add on to a different MTA and I found a few
benchmarks somewhere that rated it as much faster. So far, it's been
pretty damn awesome. Config was simple too.
