[Dovecot] Using Push IMAP to trigger POP3 download

[Mark Sapiro]

On 11:59 AM, Aaron Whitehouse wrote:
> 
> To set up POP3 on my HTPC, I understand that the norm is to set a time
> interval (say, every 10 minutes) for clearing email.  What I would
> prefer to do, if possible, would be to have Dovecot on my HTPC keep a
> Push IMAP connection with Dovecot on my webhost.  When a new message
> is available on the webhost, my HTPC would be "pushed" a notification
> and it could do a POP3 download.  This would allow it to clear emails
> with POP3 (and reduce storage requirements on my webhost), mean that I
> received emails instantly and not require me to have it poll for
> messages on a very-regular basis.
> 
> Does anybody know if this is possible?


Dovecot is a POP3/IMAP server, not a client, so I doubt that it can do this.


> As an alternative (not solving my space problem on the webhost, but
> solving the others), is it possible to set up Dovecot to "piggy back"
> off an existing IMAP server?  In my example, my webhost does not offer
> good spam-checking and webmail.  Would it be possible for me to set up
> a Dovecot server on my HTPC that received messages by Push IMAP,
> processed them with SpamAssassin (say, moving all of the spam messages
> to a subfolder) and provided a good web interface, all the while
> providing updates to the webhost's server?  In some ways, this is
> almost more like an IMAP client than a server.


I think you should be looking at fetchmail/procmail for all these kinds
of things.

Also, deleting messages from the server does not necessarily require
POP3. You can receive a message via IMAP, flag it deleted and expunge it
from the server just as you can retrieve and delete it from the server
via POP3

-- 
Mark Sapiro <msapiro at value.net>       The highway is for gamblers,
San Francisco Bay Area, California    better use your sense - B. Dylan