autoexpunge clarification

[Michael Fox]

Thanks Philon,

I did read the extra bullets, as indicated in my email below.  But your "When the user quits and thus closes his mailbox/connection" is more clear than "after the client is already disconnected", since the latter is really anytime, rather than at the time they quit.

I can guess that the bulletin about LMTP similarly means at the end of each time LMTP delivers mail to the mailbox.

Assuming that is true, then the problem I see with autoexpunge is that it doesn't address the case of a user that has not logged in nor received mail in that mailbox for the specified time.  Those messages would apparently stay forever.  Correct?

And, if that's true, then the cron job seems like the only way to expunge all old messages.  Correct?

Thanks,
Michael


 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: dovecot [mailto:dovecot-bounces at dovecot.org] On Behalf Of Philon
> Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2016 12:41 AM
> To: Michael Fox <news at mefox.org>
> Cc: Dovecot Mailing List <dovecot at dovecot.org>
> Subject: Re: autoexpunge clarification
> 
> Hi Micheal,
> 
> the article is fine if you continue reading it to the next bullet points
> about IMAP, POP3 and LMTP. In short words…
> 
> When the user quits and thus closes his mailbox/connection, Dovecot
> quickly looks through the folders to clean up mails which are older then
> configured days.
> 
> In the past there was a cron job which could do this every n hours, days,
> … but this setting does this automatically. Still I prefer using cron
> which gives me more control over when this lookup happens.
> 
> User deinitialization is simply developer „slang" for user closes
> connection/quits his program.
> 
> 
> Philon
> 
> > Am 30.08.2016 um 14:41 schrieb Michael Fox <news at mefox.org>:
> >
> > I'm trying to understand autoexpunge, but the documentation is just not
> > clear.  Hopefully, someone can clear up a few questions.
> >
> >
> >
> > http://wiki.dovecot.org/MailboxSettings says the following:
> >
> >
> >
> > autoexpunge=<time>: (v2.2.20+) Automatically at user deinitialization
> > expunge all mails in this mailbox whose saved-timestamp is older than
> <time>
> > (e.g. autoexpunge=30d). This removes the need for expire plugin
> > <http://wiki.dovecot.org/Plugins/Expire>  if you don't care that the
> > expunging may not always happen in time.
> >
> >
> >
> > What does "at user deinitialization" mean?
> >
> >
> >
> > What does "if you don't care that the expunging may not always happen in
> > time" mean?
> >
> >
> >
> > I read the sub-bullets but they just aren't clear.  When exactly does
> > autoexpunge occur?
> >
> >
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > Michael
> >
> >