[ < ] | [ > ] | [ << ] | [ Up ] | [ >> ] | [Top] | [Contents] | [Index] | [ ? ] |
IMAP is a network protocol for reading mail (or news, or ...), think of it as a modernized NNTP. Connecting to a IMAP server is much similar to connecting to a news server, you just specify the network address of the server.
IMAP has two properties. First, IMAP can do everything that POP can, it can hence be viewed as a POP++. Secondly, IMAP is a mail storage protocol, similar to NNTP being a news storage protocol--however, IMAP offers more features than NNTP because news is more or less read-only whereas mail is read-write.
If you want to use IMAP as a POP++, use an imap
entry in mail-sources
. With this, Gnus will fetch mails from
the IMAP server and store them on the local disk. This is
not the usage described in this section---See section 6.3.4 Mail Sources.
If you want to use IMAP as a mail storage protocol, use an nnimap
entry in gnus-secondary-select-methods
. With this, Gnus will
manipulate mails stored on the IMAP server. This is the kind of
usage explained in this section.
A server configuration in `~/.gnus.el' with a few IMAP servers might look something like the following. (Note that for TLS/SSL, you need external programs and libraries, see below.)
(setq gnus-secondary-select-methods '((nnimap "simpleserver") ; no special configuration ; perhaps a ssh port forwarded server: (nnimap "dolk" (nnimap-address "localhost") (nnimap-server-port 1430)) ; a UW server running on localhost (nnimap "barbar" (nnimap-server-port 143) (nnimap-address "localhost") (nnimap-list-pattern ("INBOX" "mail/*"))) ; anonymous public cyrus server: (nnimap "cyrus.andrew.cmu.edu" (nnimap-authenticator anonymous) (nnimap-list-pattern "archive.*") (nnimap-stream network)) ; a ssl server on a non-standard port: (nnimap "vic20" (nnimap-address "vic20.somewhere.com") (nnimap-server-port 9930) (nnimap-stream ssl)))) |
After defining the new server, you can subscribe to groups on the server using normal Gnus commands such as U in the Group Buffer (see section 2.4 Subscription Commands) or via the Server Buffer (see section 6.1 Server Buffer).
The following variables can be used to create a virtual nnimap
server:
nnimap-address
The address of the remote IMAP server. Defaults to the virtual server name if not specified.
nnimap-server-port
Note that this should be an integer, example server specification:
(nnimap "mail.server.com" (nnimap-server-port 4711)) |
nnimap-list-pattern
The string can also be a cons of REFERENCE and the string as above, what REFERENCE is used for is server specific, but on the University of Washington server it's a directory that will be concatenated with the mailbox.
Example server specification:
(nnimap "mail.server.com" (nnimap-list-pattern ("INBOX" "Mail/*" "alt.sex.*" ("~friend/Mail/" . "list/*")))) |
nnimap-stream
Example server specification:
(nnimap "mail.server.com" (nnimap-stream ssl)) |
Please note that the value of nnimap-stream
is a symbol!
The `imtest' program is shipped with Cyrus IMAPD. If you're
using `imtest' from Cyrus IMAPD < 2.0.14 (which includes version
1.5.x and 1.6.x) you need to frob imap-process-connection-type
to make imap.el
use a pty instead of a pipe when communicating
with `imtest'. You will then suffer from a line length
restrictions on IMAP commands, which might make Gnus seem to hang
indefinitely if you have many articles in a mailbox. The variable
imap-kerberos4-program
contain parameters to pass to the imtest
program.
For TLS connection, the gnutls-cli
program from GNUTLS is
needed. It is available from
http://www.gnu.org/software/gnutls/.
This parameter specifies a list of command lines that invoke a GSSAPI
authenticated IMAP stream in a subshell. They are tried
sequentially until a connection is made, or the list has been
exhausted. By default, `gsasl' from GNU SASL, available from
http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/, and the `imtest'
program from Cyrus IMAPD (see imap-kerberos4-program
), are
tried.
For SSL connections, the OpenSSL program is available from
http://www.openssl.org/. OpenSSL was formerly known as SSLeay,
and nnimap support it too--although the most recent versions of
SSLeay, 0.9.x, are known to have serious bugs making it
useless. Earlier versions, especially 0.8.x, of SSLeay are known to
work. The variable imap-ssl-program
contain parameters to pass
to OpenSSL/SSLeay.
For IMAP connections using the shell
stream, the variable
imap-shell-program
specify what program to call.
nnimap-authenticator
The authenticator used to connect to the server. By default, nnimap will use the most secure authenticator your server is capable of.
Example server specification:
(nnimap "mail.server.com" (nnimap-authenticator anonymous)) |
Please note that the value of nnimap-authenticator
is a symbol!
gsasl
or imtest
.
imtest
.
digest-md5.el
.
nnimap-expunge-on-close
Deleted
which doesn't actually
delete them, and this (marking them Deleted
, that is) is what
nnimap does when you delete an article in Gnus (with B DEL or
similar).
Since the articles aren't really removed when we mark them with the
Deleted
flag we'll need a way to actually delete them. Feel like
running in circles yet?
Traditionally, nnimap has removed all articles marked as Deleted
when closing a mailbox but this is now configurable by this server
variable.
The possible options are:
always
never
ask
nnimap-importantize-dormant
If non-nil
(the default), marks dormant articles as ticked (as
well), for other IMAP clients. Within Gnus, dormant articles will
naturally still (only) be marked as dormant. This is to make dormant
articles stand out, just like ticked articles, in other IMAP
clients. (In other words, Gnus has two "Tick" marks and IMAP
has only one.)
Probably the only reason for frobing this would be if you're trying enable per-user persistent dormant flags, using something like:
(setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-flag-alist) (format "gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name))) (setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-predicate-alist) (format "KEYWORD gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name))) |
In this case, you would not want the per-user dormant flag showing up as ticked for other users.
nnimap-expunge-search-string
This variable contain the IMAP search command sent to server when
searching for articles eligible for expiring. The default is
"UID %s NOT SINCE %s"
, where the first %s
is replaced by
UID set and the second %s
is replaced by a date.
Probably the only useful value to change this to is
"UID %s NOT SENTSINCE %s"
, which makes nnimap use the Date: in
messages instead of the internal article date. See section 6.4.4 of
RFC 2060 for more information on valid strings.
nnimap-authinfo-file
A file containing credentials used to log in on servers. The format is
(almost) the same as the ftp
`~/.netrc' file. See the
variable nntp-authinfo-file
for exact syntax; also see
6.2.1 NNTP.
nnimap-need-unselect-to-notice-new-mail
Unselect mailboxes before looking for new mail in them. Some servers seem to need this under some circumstances; it was reported that Courier 1.7.1 did.
6.5.1 Splitting in IMAP Splitting mail with nnimap. 6.5.2 Expiring in IMAP Expiring mail with nnimap. 6.5.3 Editing IMAP ACLs Limiting/enabling other users access to a mailbox. 6.5.4 Expunging mailboxes Equivalent of a "compress mailbox" button. 6.5.5 A note on namespaces How to (not) use IMAP namespace in Gnus.
[ < ] | [ > ] | [ << ] | [ Up ] | [ >> ] | [Top] | [Contents] | [Index] | [ ? ] |