[2017] in athena10
Re: Mail folder policy
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Tim Abbott)
Fri Apr 3 16:08:19 2009
Date: Fri, 3 Apr 2009 16:07:48 -0400 (EDT)
From: Tim Abbott <tabbott@MIT.EDU>
To: Evan Broder <broder@mit.edu>
cc: debathena@mit.edu
In-Reply-To: <49CF3A4C.40401@mit.edu>
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.1.10.0904031606010.19656@vinegar-pot.mit.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
It seems to me that there are transition issues with changing the
sent-mail folder from the default, as it would result in any existing
users having their sent mail in two different places.
Or am I missing something?
-Tim Abbott
On Sun, 29 Mar 2009, Evan Broder wrote:
> I started trying to hammer out a config file for Thunderbird, and I'm
> kind of unsure about how to deal with mail folders. Different
> applications like to put things in different places. In particular,
> alpine saves sent mail and drafts on the IMAP server, while Thunderbird
> and Evolution both default to saving them within their profiles.
>
> So there are, I guess, four options:
> - Configure the MIT mail server, but leave all other folders at their
> default
> - Configure Evolution and Thunderbird to use IMAP folders for sent and
> drafts, but match the local config and use the names "Sent" and "Drafts"
> - Configure Evolution and Thunderbird to use IMAP folders with the same
> name as alpine uses - "sent-mail" and "postponed-msgs"
> - Configure Evolution and Thunderbird to use IMAP folders, and
> configure alpine to use their folder names ("Sent" and "Drafts")
>
> This is a bit of a balancing act between taking a hands-off approach to
> configuration vs. making it easy for users to go back and forth between
> mail clients. Given those two options, I have a strong preference for
> the latter. If someone who usually uses Evolution logs in over ssh and
> uses alpine, it seems pretty sucktastic that their sent mail wouldn't
> normally be available to them.
>
> Those 4 options are ranked in increasing order of my personal
> preference, because I have a preference for the Evolution/TB-style names
> over the alpine-style ones, but that's not for any reason other than the
> fact that I'm used to them.
>
> Another similar issue to this is what to do when a user deletes a
> message - whether to mark them as deleted in the same folder or move
> them to a trash folder.
>
> At this point I have a fairly specific view of how I want /my/ mail
> client to act, and I'm having a hard time telling if that's crowding my
> design decisions, so I'd appreciate feedback.
>
> - Evan
>
