[Dovecot] Zlib plugin - when does it make sense?

[Jan-Frode Myklebust]

On Mon, Nov 25, 2013 at 09:53:14AM +0100, Frerich Raabe wrote:
> 
> I run a small IMAP server for a dozen guys in the office, serving
> about 55GB of Maildir. I recently became aware of the Zlib plugin (
> http://wiki2.dovecot.org/Plugins/Zlib ) and wondered
> 
> 1. given that there is about zero CPU load on my IMAP server, is
> enabling the plugin a no-brainer or are there other things (except
> CPU load) to consider?

Yes, it's a no-brainer. I can't remember how the cpuload was before we
enabled zlib, but our cpus are running 80% idle (6 servers, mix of IBM
x3550 and x346, serving 15TB mdbox, but was serving maildir with zlib a 
year ago).

> 
> 2. For enabling the plugin, I suppose you compress all the existing
> mail just once and then add 'zlib' to mail_plugins in order to have
> all future incoming mail saved?

You don't strictly need to compress existing mail. It should handle a
mix of compressed and non-compressed messages in the same maildir. 



  -jf