On 9/15/2024 10:54 PM, Reprobus via dovecot wrote:

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Hi, I'm in a situation whereas I need to backup my email from an IMAP server to a POP3 email client of my choosing. I'm hoping Dovecot can do such a task and is there a container to which I can run to set this up from ?

My IMAP email server is maxed and I need to dump all the emails off the IMAP to POP3 as to clear it up.

Hi, so your question is a bit confusing because IMAP and POP3 are different protocols.  So let's focus on what you need to do which I gather is to clear some space on the server.

You can do this with either IMAP or POP3.

For example, if you use Thunderbird, you can create a local folder and drag emails from folders on IMAP to that local folder. Then compact the folder on the IMAP server to make sure they are actually deleted.

Most hosts support both IMAP and POP3 and you'll get access with POP3 to your Inbox.  You can do the same thing where you download all the email from the server Inbox via POP3 and it will clear up space.

However, you might want to look into your IMAP folders and A) make sure you need them all and B) make sure they are compacted. Most IMAP servers don't delete things until you actually compact the folders.  It's possible you've been deleting things but not compacting so you have some space available.

I hope this helps,

KAM

• Reprobus via dovecot:

I'm in a situation whereas I need to backup my email from an IMAP server to a POP3 email client of my choosing.

Since ancient times (cough), people have been using Fetchmail [1] for related tasks. The author may be considered a controversial figure, but that does not take anything away from the software itself.

[1] https://www.fetchmail.info/

-Ralph