It's in RFC3501 (e.g. http://www.rfc.net/rfc3501.html#s5.4.) that any inactivity autologout timer must be at least 30 minutes, so a client ought to send something every 29 minutes to be sure of not getting disconnected. RFC2177 says this autologout may happen during an IDLE command.
I guess most servers take this as meaning 30 minutes is what's expected, and that Mark Crispin left it up to server implementors to have longer timeouts, but put this limit to warn/protect client writers (and Microsoft and others ignored it!).
Chris
Sim Harbert wrote:
OK, I am turning on the outlook-idle workaround and will try that. How did someone come up with 30 minutes? Why not 60 minutes? Outlook obviously acts oddly in relation to the server IDLE disconnect thing, but it does seem like there should be some sort of allowance for clients which want to stay in IDLE mode for longer than 30 minutes.
-Sim
-- --+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+- Christopher Wakelin, c.d.wakelin@reading.ac.uk IT Services Centre, The University of Reading, Tel: +44 (0)118 378 8439 Whiteknights, Reading, RG6 2AF, UK Fax: +44 (0)118 975 3094