[lug] Mail Daemon (pop/imap)

[Michael J. Pedersen]

On Sun, Feb 04, 2001 at 08:14:48PM -0700, Timothy C. Klein wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I recently put a hole through the wall and let my mother-in-law share my
> broadband connection (we live in a duplex).  I have her up and running 
> fine as far as 'net  traffic goes, but I need to give her an account on 
> my Linux machine so she can get email.  I have a static IP and a domain
> name, so the email is going to be delivered directly to my machine.
> 
> What is a good choice for an email server to allow her to download her
> mail messages from my box to her winblows machine?  I have always used POP3
> for email, but I would suppose IMAP or something other would do fine.  
> Something better than plain text passwords would be nice, even though this
> network is firewalled, because this is MY network ;-).  
> 
> Any recommendations on specific software packages?  

I personally recommend IMAP with an SSL tunnel (all of which is doable fairly
easily, but I set mine up months ago, and can't remember how I did it).
Anyway, some strong advantages of IMAP over POP3:

1) Download headers only. You can download only email headers, delete the ones
you don't want, and save yourself some overall download time.

2) Online folders, instead of offline. You can always have access to all of
your email, all the time, with online folders. Nice feature for users.

Using an SSL tunnel (stunnel), the passwords don't go in cleartext. This
advantage applies to POP3 as well as IMAP, though. Most email clients can use
this, as well, including (on Windows):
	Eudora
	Outlook
	Outlook Express
	Mozilla

That's my $.02 worth on the topic, anyway.

-- 
Michael J. Pedersen
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