problem converting mailbox to maildir with doveadm

[Aki Tuomi]

Please also see https://doc.dovecot.org/admin_manual/migrating_mailboxes/ if you already haven't.

Aki

> On 05/02/2023 22:16 EET Kenneth Irving <ken at fq.edu.uy> wrote:
> 
>  
> Patrick: thanks a lot!
> 
> So it's not enough to do a 'backup', it's also necessary to 'sync' the 
> mailboxes, but using the old mail_location, that is
> 
> mail_location = mbox:~/mail:INBOX=/var/mail/%u
> 
> Otherwise the command doesn't find the mailbox. It said source and 
> destination were the same! That was one of many errors I was getting.
> 
> I had tried using '-o mail_location=/var/mail/' but also got errors and 
> wasn't able to transfer the emails. I finally restored mail_location to 
> it's former value, restarted dovecot, and it worked!
> 
> I wasn't aware that I had first to backup and then sync to transfer all 
> emails.
> 
> Thanks again!
> Best regards
> 
> Kenneth
> 
> On Sun, 5 Feb 2023, Patrick Domack wrote:
> 
> > #copy mailbox, using new mail_location setting
> > doveadm backup -u "${USER}" maildir:/home/${USERNAME}/Maildir/
> > doveadm sync -u "${USER}" maildir:/home/${USERNAME}/Maildir/
> >
> > #Update user to use maildir instead of old method, update sql?
> > .... mail_location=maildir:/home/${USERNAME}/Maildir/
> >
> > doveadm auth cache flush
> > doveadm proxy kick "${USER}"
> >
> > #copy any late additions to mailbox, using old mail_location setting
> > doveadm sync -u "${USER}" mbox:/var/mail/${USERNAME}
> >
> > #remove old format mailbox
> > rm /var/mail/${USERNAME}
> >
> > I do this one user at a time, then when done adjust my config file, and 
> > remove the mail_location setting from sql, though my script has a few other 
> > fixups and error checking
> >
> >
> > Quoting Kenneth Irving <ken at fq.edu.uy>:
> >
> >> Hello. I have an email server for testing purposes, using postfix 3.5.17 
> >> and dovecot 2.3.13.
> >> 
> >> Initially, I configured postfix to use mailboxes, but now I've changed it 
> >> to maildir.
> >> 
> >> Emails arrive fine, and dovecot manages them well by pop3 or imap. No 
> >> problems there.
> >> 
> >> But I still have a lot of emails in different mailboxes which I'd like to 
> >> convert to maildir.
> >> 
> >> I found mb2md, which seems to do a pretty good job. Once the mailbox is 
> >> converted, dovecot manages the emails without a problem.
> >> 
> >> But I also wanted to learn how to use doveadm to convert mailboxes to 
> >> maildir format.
> >> 
> >> I read all the documentation I could find and tried to learn how this 
> >> command works. I tried different combinations, but couldn't convert 
> >> mailboxes to maildir. I always get error messages. I've been unable to 
> >> understand why.
> >> 
> >> I tried to sync, backup, and import, to no avail. I also tried dsync, which 
> >> seems to have a different syntax, with the same result.
> >> 
> >> Sorry for bothering you, but if you could explain to me how this command 
> >> works, I'd be very grateful.
> >> 
> >> Example: I have a user, let's say joe, who has a mailbox in /var/mail/joe 
> >> and I'd like to transfer those emails to /home/joe/Maildir
> >> 
> >> How do I use doveadm in this situation?
> >> 
> >> Best regards
> >> 
> >> Kenneth
> >
> >