On 10/22/2014 2:29 AM, Steffen Kaiser wrote:
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On Tue, 21 Oct 2014, deoren wrote:
What is the correct way to configure the mail_location option for Mailidr format?
mail_location = maildir:<path>
I've long had it setup this way:
mail_location = maildir:/var/vmail/%d/%n
Is that correct?
any path is OK, as long:
- it identifies the mail storage uniquely for the user,
- does not store any other information in it.
Here is an example error message I ran into:
stat(/var/vmail/example.com/username/.dovecot.lda-dupes/tmp) failed: Not a directory
That's because you use $HOME == Maildir root.
Looking at some other guides/tutorials shows something more like:
mail_location = maildir:/var/vmail/%d/%n/Maildir
"Maildir" is the default name for "Maildir"-type mail storeage root. No more, no less. If Dovecot is automatically detecting the type of storage, it probes for this directory name in $HOME.
I assume the latter is how it's supposed to be done? If so, that would
No, you are not "supposed" to do so.
I did review the official docs here:
http://wiki2.dovecot.org/MailLocation/Maildir
but I didn't find where it explicitly warns against setting home == maildir root. It should probably be apparent, but it wasn't to me when I first
it applies to all mail storages.
- -- Steffen Kaiser
Thanks for the reply and for answering my questions.
Just to make sure I understand properly, I have a few additional questions that I am hoping will cement really drive the point home so to speak. Regarding the guide that I followed, it suggests the following userdb and mail_location configuration:
userdb { driver = static args = uid=vmail gid=vmail home=/var/mail/vhosts/%d/%n }
mail_location = maildir:/var/mail/vhosts/%d/%n
This results in the $HOME == Maildir root situation which you mentioned shouldn't be done, correct? Instead mail_location should point to some other directory, perhaps one of:
- mail_location = /var/mail/vhosts/%d/%n/Maildir
- mail_location = ~/Maildir
If I understand properly the mail_location doesn't have to be a subdirectory within the home directory, it just typically is in common examples? If so, that guide should probably be updated to use one of the above mail_location settings. If you will confirm that is the case I'll submit a GitHub pull request as previously mentioned so it can be corrected.
Apologies if this is rehashing what you've already said, I'm just looking to make sure I understand this 100%.
So for cases where I have made the mistake like I mentioned above, how would I (properly) fix the problem?
After stopping Dovecot, I ended up doing this:
#1) service dovecot stop #2) cd /var/vmail/example.com/username/ #3) mkdir Maildir #4) mv -i * Maildir/ #5) mv -i .* Maildir/ #6) chown -R vmail:vmail /var/vmail/example.com/username/ #7) service dovecot start
which moved the content into the Maildir subfolder and fixed permissions back to what is specified in the conf files. I also adjusted mail_location like so:
mail_location = maildir:~/Maildir
and I made sure that the home setting is configured as /var/vmail/%d/%n
That seems to work fine, but I still got error messages like this when using doveadm search
"Error: Syncing mailbox dovecot.lda-dupes failed: Internal error occurred."
In my testing I found that I could move the file from this location:
/var/vmail/example.com/username/Maildir/.dovecot.ldap-dupesto this one:
/var/vmail/example.com/username/.dovecot.ldap-dupeschoosing to overwrite the file if it should be there and the error message would not be generated anymore. This suggests that I shouldn't have moved it in the first place.
Looking through the mailing list archives I found a message thread titled "Lifetime of redirect info stored by Sieve in .dovecot.lda-dupes" which indicates that the Message-ID and recipient of forwarded messages are stored in .dovecot.ldap-dupes files. I do forward mail daily from the two accounts where doveadm search generates the errors, so it sounds like I would probably be OK to just nuke the file in this location:
/var/vmail/example.com/username/Maildir/.dovecot.ldap-dupesand let it be auto-generated in the proper location the next time mail is forwarded. Can you confirm whether that is the case?
I appreciate your help.