[Dovecot] Lots of pop3-logins

[V S Rao]

> Hello,
> 
> Doing a "ps aux" on my Slackware box, I have approx 100  PID's of "pop3-login's going on.  This is a production mail server, but it is getting VERY low traffic.  In fact, only 3 people can "pop3" into it.  I've check their e-mail clients, and they are not checking mail any more often than every 5 minutes.
> 
> This is a new installation and I've had the server up and running since Sunday.  If it matters, I'm using Postfix for the MTA and using the Dovecot SASL library to AUTH SMTP.
> 
> Is this a cause for concern?  Why does Dovecot need this many processes?
> 

>> Because dovecot preforks the *-login processes to speed-up the login.

>> No need to worry.

100 login sessions for just 3 connections? That is not right, no matter what. There is definitely some issue. Once the load increases the system will start timing out on POP3 connections or other network connections, such as IMAP, SSH etc. Better check out the system logs, utilization etc. for any abnormal values. 

Regards
Rao