[Dovecot] IDLE timing issue - dovecot or fetchmail issue?

[Matt Doran]

Hi guys,

Thanks for the great product.  We've used dovecot for ages as our 
internal mail server and it works great!

I've recently started using fetchmail 6.3.9 (with IDLE enabled) to 
download mail from our ISP (Pair networks).   The ISP is running Dovecot 
1.1.16.  I am unable to get the info about the dovecot config at this time.

The IDLE support in fetchmail allows us to deliver mail near 
instantaneously without the need to poll (which is what we did 
previously using POP3).  However I've noticed an issue where if 2 mails 
are delivered in quick succession fetchmail will only download the first 
email, and the second will not download.   If I then send in another 
test email this triggers the download of 2 emails (the original that 
wasn't downloaded and the test email).

Now I'm wondering whether the issue lies with Dovecot (e.g. a timing 
issue), or is it fetchmail that isn't implementing the IDLE/download 
properly.

I've attached the output of a fetchmail session showing this problem in 
action (I've added some annotations to this file starting with >>>>>).  
The sequence of events are:

    * Start fetchmail with IDLE enabled
    * Send 2 emails in quick succession.
    * Dovecot notifies of the new message
    * Fetchmail downloads the message
    * Fetchmail initiates a new IDLE
    * Then nothing more is delivered. :(
    * I then send another email, which triggers the 2 to download.


I don't know enough about IMAP to understand whether the problem lies 
with Dovecot or Fetchmail.   Hopefully an IMAP expert will be able to 
see from the attached IMAP session.

Regards,

-- 
Matt Doran
PaperCut Software International Pty. Ltd.
http://www.papercut.com/

Phone:   +61 3 9809 5194

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