Ken Gunderson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on Thu, 25 Nov 1999:
> Okay, I admit it; I am brain deaded. I've read through the docs and sample
> muttrc's but am still confused about how to set up mutt to handle mailing
> lists. Yes defining the lists themselves is piece of cake, but how to best
> deal with sorting mail. For example, assume incoming mail for list1,
> list2, and list3 get delivered to /var/spool/mail. How to be setting up
> folder-hooks, mhooks, etc.?
Mutt doesn't do mail sorting, at least not mail filtering to different
folders on delivery, which is what you're talking of. You need to use
a different tool for that. The most commonly used filtering program
is procmail (which just came out with a new version that has Maildir
support natively, finally!). An alternative is the newer maildrop
toolset.
> mbox vs maildir, what's the pro/cons of each?
The primary advantage of Maildirs is that there is no need for folder
locking, therefore you can have (in theory) an arbitrary number of
applications accessing a Maildir mail folder. This is especially useful
if your mail folders are read over NFS, where file locking is typically
either nonexistent or unreliable, if implemented. I consider Maildir
the only option, in practice, for incoming mail folders which are
accessed over NFS (just IMHO).
Maildirs store each email message as a separate file, which is the
primary reason for all of the pros and cons as compared to mbox. All
of the speed issues listed below are only noticeable with large folders,
for small ones it doesn't really matter.
Maildirs compared against mbox:
- slightly slower to read in
- faster operations when operating on single messages -- no need to
write out the entire folder like with mbox when deleting a message from
the top, for example
- more reliable checking of whether the folder has new mail or not
(no need to play with file timestamps)
- no need for locking (see discussion above)
- much simpler to create custom tools for handling the mail that work
on individual messages, on the other hand it's slightly more complex to
create "mail filters" which operate on an entire folder
Hope this helps,
Mikko
--
// Mikko Hänninen, aka. Wizzu // [EMAIL PROTECTED] // http://www.iki.fi/wiz/
// The Corrs list maintainer // net.freak // DALnet IRC operator /
// Interests: roleplaying, Linux, the Net, fantasy & scifi, the Corrs /
Driver's mantra: To slow is to falter, to brake is to fail, to stop is defeat.
