Hi Timo,
Thanks for the instruction as to how to debug this.
You could try running imap manually with gdb:
gdb /usr/local/libexec/dovecot/imap r
I've not used gdb before. Reading MAN page, and some instructions online, I tried to launch as you had instructed, but it died off.
gdb --quiet /usr/local/libexec/dovecot/imap Reading symbols for shared libraries ..... done (gdb) r Starting program: /usr/local/libexec/dovecot/imap Reading symbols for shared libraries .++ done imap(root): Error: Ambiguous mail location setting, don't know what to do with it: /var/mail/root (try prefixing it with mbox: or maildir:) imap(root): Fatal: Failed to create storage with data: /var/mail/root
Program exited with code 0131. (gdb) q
Next, I instead tried to launch imap manually from the command line, with the goal of then 'attach'-ing the PID in gdb, but it also fails.
/usr/local/libexec/dovecot/imap imap(root): Error: Ambiguous mail location setting, don't know what to do with it: /var/mail/root (try prefixing it with mbox: or maildir:) imap(root): Fatal: Failed to create storage with data: /var/mail/root
Since dovecot starts ok when I do
/usr/local/sbin/dovecot -c /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
I thought it might need the configuration file, too.
But, the same error happens.
/usr/local/libexec/dovecot/imap -c /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf imap(root): Error: Ambiguous mail location setting, don't know what to do with it: /var/mail/root (try prefixing it with mbox: or maildir:) imap(root): Fatal: Failed to create storage with data: /var/mail/root
Any further pointers? Thanks for being patient.
-- Ben