[Dovecot] Namespace, prefix questions

[Steve Campbell]

On 3/27/2012 10:40 AM, Steve Campbell wrote:
> We've got some users who are using Outlook Express version 6. The 
> client allows me to specify the root folder, but not a prefix or 
> namespace. I'm still struggling with some users on our new server that 
> have crazy imap folder layouts, so I've got a few questions.
>
> When I specify the root folder, does that bypass any namespace/prefix 
> definitions on the imap server?
>
> On some clients, like Thunderbird, I have the option of specifying 
> namespace OR prefix. How do these differ? I thought that the prefix 
> was the "name" of the namespace.
>
> It appears that I have to delete and re-create the account on these OE 
> 6 clients to make the list of folders show properly. Does that sound 
> right?
>
> This all came about because one of these OE 6 users was not able to 
> use their imap folders (server errors). Turns out it was one of the 
> users that had their folders directly under ~. So I moved them to 
> ~/mail, created a .subscriptions file from their .mailboxlist file and 
> tried everything in the world to get the folders to list properly. 
> Only after specifying the root folder as ~/mail after recreating the 
> account and restarting OE did it show properly and the folders 
> remained listed. My default config has this setup as the 
> "mail_location" parm, but blanks as the root folder don't seem to work 
> in this situation. I'm also wondering where I specify the "list", 
> "hidden" and other parms that are usually set in namespace blocks.
>
> dovecot -n
> # 2.0.9: /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
> # OS: Linux 2.6.32-220.4.1.el6.x86_64 x86_64 CentOS release 6.2 (Final)
> disable_plaintext_auth = no
> listen = *
> mail_location = mbox:~/mail:INBOX=/var/spool/mail/%u
> mbox_write_locks = fcntl
> namespace {
>   hidden = yes
>   inbox = yes
>   list = yes
>   location = mbox:~/mail:INBOX=/var/spool/mail/%u
>   prefix =
>   separator = /
>   type = private
> }
> namespace {
>   hidden = yes
>   list = no
>   location = mbox:~/mail:INBOX=/var/spool/mail/%u
>   prefix = "#mbox/"
>   separator = /
>   type = private
> }
> namespace {
>   hidden = yes
>   list = no
>   location =
>   prefix = mail/
>   separator = /
>   type = private
> }
> namespace {
>   hidden = yes
>   list = yes
>   location = mbox:~/mail:INBOX=/var/spool/mail/%u
>   prefix = ~/mail/
>   separator = /
>   type = private
> }
> namespace {
>   hidden = yes
>   list = no
>   location =
>   prefix = ~%u/mail/
>   separator = /
>   type = private
> }
> passdb {
>   driver = pam
> }
> protocols = pop3 imap
> ssl_cert = </etc/pki/dovecot/certs/dovecot.pem
> ssl_key = </etc/pki/dovecot/private/dovecot.pem
> userdb {
>   driver = passwd
> }
> protocol pop3 {
>   pop3_uidl_format = %08Xu%08Xv
> }
>
>
> Thanks
>
> steve campbell
>
>
>
> Thanks
>
> steve campbell
>
>
After googling a bit, it seems that all 3 can come into play in the same 
or different meanings. Seems that prefix and namespace mean the same 
thing. Root folder can mean the same as above, but can also stand alone 
as an individual pointer to a personal folder that differs from from 
what the imap server uses.

It's still not clear to me, but at least I'm getting an idea of what may 
or may not work. Still not sure why the null or blank prefixed namespace 
doesn't take precedence when nothing is set in the client.

steve