imapsync/README

NAME
    imapsync - IMAP synchronisation, sync, copy or migration tool.
    Synchronise mailboxes between two imap servers. Good at IMAP migration.
    More than 36 different IMAP server softwares supported with success.

    $Revision: 1.343 $

SYNOPSIS
    To synchronise imap account "foo" on "imap.truc.org" to imap account
    "bar" on "imap.trac.org" with foo password "secret1" and bar password
    "secret2":

      imapsync \
       --host1 imap.truc.org --user1 foo --password1 secret1 \
       --host2 imap.trac.org --user2 bar --password2 secret2

INSTALL
     imapsync works fine under any Unix OS with perl.
     imapsync works fine under Windows (2000, XP) with ActiveState's 5.8 Perl
     or as a standalone binary software.

    imapsync is already available directly on the following distributions
    (at least): FreeBSD, Debian, Ubuntu, Gentoo, NetBSD, Darwin, Mandriva
    and OpenBSD (yeah!).

     Get imapsync at
     http://www.linux-france.org/prj/imapsync/

     You'll find a compressed tarball called imapsync-x.xx.tgz
     where x.xx is the version number. Untar the tarball where
     you want (on Unix):

     tar xzvf  imapsync-x.xx.tgz

     Go into the directory imapsync-x.xx and read the INSTALL file.
     The INSTALL file is also at 
     http://www.linux-france.org/prj/imapsync/INSTALL

     The freshmeat record is at http://freshmeat.net/projects/imapsync/

USAGE
     imapsync [options]

    To get a description of each option just run imapsync like this:

      imapsync --help
      imapsync

    The option list:

      imapsync [--host1 server1]  [--port1 <num>]
               [--user1 <string>] [--passfile1 <string>]
               [--host2 server2]  [--port2 <num>]
               [--user2 <string>] [--passfile2 <string>]
               [--ssl1] [--ssl2]
               [--tls1] [--tls2]
               [--authmech1 <string>] [--authmech2 <string>] 
               [--noauthmd5]
               [--folder <string> --folder <string> ...]
               [--folderrec <string> --folderrec <string> ...]
               [--include <regex>] [--exclude <regex>]
               [--prefix2 <string>] [--prefix1 <string>] 
               [--regextrans2 <regex> --regextrans2 <regex> ...]
               [--sep1 <char>]
               [--sep2 <char>]
               [--justfolders] [--justfoldersizes] [--justconnect] [--justbanner]
               [--syncinternaldates]
               [--idatefromheader]
               [--buffersize  <int>]
               [--syncacls]
               [--regexmess <regex>] [--regexmess <regex>]
               [--maxsize <int>]
               [--maxage <int>]
               [--minage <int>]
               [--skipheader <regex>]
               [--useheader <string>] [--useheader <string>]
               [--skipsize] [--allowsizemismatch]
               [--delete] [--delete2]
               [--expunge] [--expunge1] [--expunge2] [--uidexpunge2]
               [--subscribed] [--subscribe] [--subscribe_all] 
               [--nofoldersizes]
               [--dry]
               [--debug] [--debugimap][--debugimap1][--debugimap2]
               [--timeout <int>] [--fast]
               [--split1] [--split2] 
               [--reconnectretry1 <int>] [--reconnectretry2 <int>]
               [--pidfile <filepath>]
               [--tmpdir  <dirpath>]
               [--version] [--help]
  
DESCRIPTION
    The command imapsync is a tool allowing incremental and recursive imap
    transfer from one mailbox to another.

    By default all folders are transferred, recursively.

    We sometimes need to transfer mailboxes from one imap server to another.
    This is called migration.

    imapsync is a good tool because it reduces the amount of data
    transferred by not transferring a given message if it is already on both
    sides. Same headers and the transfer is done only once. All flags are
    preserved, unread will stay unread, read will stay read, deleted will
    stay deleted. You can stop the transfer at any time and restart it
    later, imapsync works well with bad connections. imapsync is CPU hungry
    so nice and renice commands can be a good help. imapsync can be memory
    hungry too, especially with large messages.

    You can decide to delete the messages from the source mailbox after a
    successful transfer (it is a good feature when migrating). In that case,
    use the --delete --expunge1 options.

    You can also just synchronize a mailbox A from another mailbox B in case
    you just want to keep a "live" copy of B in A (--delete2 may help)

OPTIONS
    To get a description of each option just invoke:

    imapsync --help

HISTORY
    I wrote imapsync because an enterprise (basystemes) paid me to install a
    new imap server without losing huge old mailboxes located on a far away
    remote imap server accessible by a low bandwidth link. The tool imapcp
    (written in python) could not help me because I had to verify every
    mailbox was well transferred and delete it after a good transfer.
    imapsync started life as a copy_folder.pl patch. The tool copy_folder.pl
    comes from the Mail-IMAPClient-2.1.3 perl module tarball source (in the
    examples/ directory of the tarball).

EXAMPLE
    While working on imapsync parameters please run imapsync in dry mode (no
    modification induced) with the --dry option. Nothing bad can be done
    this way.

    To synchronize the imap account "buddy" (with password "secret1") on
    host "imap.src.fr" to the imap account "max" (with password "secret2")
    on host "imap.dest.fr":

     imapsync --host1 imap.src.fr  --user1 buddy --password1 secret1 \
              --host2 imap.dest.fr --user2 max   --password2 secret2

    Then you will have max's mailbox updated from buddy's mailbox.

SECURITY
    You can use --passfile1 instead of --password1 to give the password
    since it is safer. With --password1 option any user on your host can see
    the password by using the 'ps auxwwww' command. Using a variable (like
    $PASSWORD1) is also dangerous because of the 'ps auxwwwwe' command. So,
    saving the password in a well protected file (600 or rw-------) is the
    best solution.

    imasync is not totally protected against sniffers on the network since
    passwords may be transferred in plain text if CRAM-MD5 is not supported
    by your imap servers. Use --ssl1 (or --tls1) and --ssl2 (or --tls2) to
    enable encryption on host1 and host2.

    You may authenticate as one user (typically an admin user), but be
    authorized as someone else, which means you don't need to know every
    user's personal password. Specify --authuser1 "adminuser" to enable this
    on host1. In this case, --authmech1 PLAIN will be used by default since
    it is the only way to go for now. So don't use --authmech1 SOMETHING
    with --authuser1 "adminuser", it will not work. Same behavior with the
    --authuser2 option.

EXIT STATUS
    imapsync will exit with a 0 status (return code) if everything went
    good. Otherwise, it exits with a non-zero status.

    So if you have an unreliable internet connection, you can use this loop
    in a Bourne shell:

            while ! imapsync ...; do 
                  echo imapsync not complete
            done

LICENSE
    imapsync is free, gratis and open source software cover by the Do What
    The Fuck You Want To Public License (WTFPL). See COPYING file included
    in the distribution or the web site http://sam.zoy.org/wtfpl/COPYING

MAILING-LIST
    The public mailing-list may be the best way to get support.

    To write on the mailing-list, the address is:
    <imapsync@linux-france.org>

    To subscribe, send a message to:
    <imapsync-subscribe@listes.linux-france.org>

    To unsubscribe, send a message to:
    <imapsync-unsubscribe@listes.linux-france.org>

    To contact the person in charge for the list:
    <imapsync-request@listes.linux-france.org>

    The list archives may be available at:
    http://www.linux-france.org/prj/imapsync_list/ So consider that the list
    is public, anyone can see your post. Use a pseudonym or do not post to
    this list if you want to stay private.

    Thank you for your participation.

AUTHOR
    Gilles LAMIRAL <lamiral@linux-france.org>

    Feedback good or bad is always welcome.

    The newsgroup comp.mail.imap may be a good place to talk about imapsync.
    I read it when imapsync is concerned. A better place is the public
    imapsync mailing-list (see below).

    Gilles LAMIRAL earns his living writing, installing, configuring and
    teaching free, open and gratis softwares. Do not hesitate to pay him for
    that services.

BUG REPORT GUIDELINES
    Help us to help you: follow the following guidelines.

    Report any bugs or feature requests to the public mailing-list or to the
    author.

    Before reporting bugs, read the FAQ, the README and the TODO files.
    http://www.linux-france.org/prj/imapsync/

    Upgrade to last imapsync release, maybe the bug is already fixed.

    Upgrade to last Mail-IMAPClient Perl module.
    http://search.cpan.org/dist/Mail-IMAPClient/ maybe the bug is already
    fixed.

    Make a good title with word "imapsync" in it (my spam filter won't
    filter it), Don't write an email title with just "imapsync" or
    "problem", a good title is made of keywords summary, not too long (one
    visible line).

    Don't write imapsync in uppercase in the email title, we'll know you run
    windows(tm) and you haven't read the README yet.

    Help us to help you: in your report, please include:

     - imapsync version.

     - output given with --debug --debugimap near the failure point.
       Isolate a message or two in a folder 'BUG' and use 

         imapsync ... --folder 'BUG' --debug --debugimap 

     - imap server software on both side and their version number.

     - imapsync with all the options you use,  the full command line
       you use (except the passwords of course). 

     - IMAPClient.pm version.

     - operating system running imapsync.

     - operating systems on both sides and the third side in case
       you run imapsync on a foreign host from the both.

     - virtual software context (vmware, xen etc.)

    Most of those values can be found as a copy/paste at the begining of the
    output.

    One time in your life, read the paper "How To Ask Questions The Smart
    Way" http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html and then forget
    it.

IMAP SERVERS
    Failure stories reported with the following 4 imap servers:

     - MailEnable 1.54 (Proprietary) http://www.mailenable.com/
     - DBMail 0.9, 2.0.7 (GPL). But DBMail 1.2.1 works.
       Patient and confident testers are welcome.
     - dkimap4 2.39
     - Imail 7.04 (maybe).

    Success stories reported with the following 36 imap servers (software
    names are in alphabetic order):

     - 1und1 H mimap1 84498 [host1]
     - Archiveopteryx 2.03, 2.04, 2.09, 2.10 [host2], 3.0.0 [host2]
       (OSL 3.0) http://www.archiveopteryx.org/
     - BincImap 1.2.3 (GPL) (http://www.bincimap.org/)
     - CommuniGatePro server (Redhat 8.0) (Solaris), CommuniGate Pro 5.2.17[host2] (CentOS 5.4)
     - Courier IMAP 1.5.1, 2.2.0, 2.1.1, 2.2.1, 3.0.8, 3.0.3, 4.1.1 (GPL) 
       (http://www.courier-mta.org/)
     - Critical Path (7.0.020)
     - Cyrus IMAP 1.5, 1.6, 2.1, 2.1.15, 2.1.16, 2.1.18 
       2.2.1, 2.2.2-BETA, 2.2.10, 2.2.12, 
       v2.2.3-Invoca-RPM-2.2.3-8,
       2.3-alpha (OSI Approved),
       v2.2.12-Invoca-RPM-2.2.12-3.RHEL4.1,
       2.2.13,
       v2.3.1-Invoca-RPM-2.3.1-2.7.fc5,
       v2.3.7,
       (http://asg.web.cmu.edu/cyrus/)
     - David Tobit V8 (proprietary Message system).
     - DBMail 1.2.1, 2.0.4, 2.0.9, 2.2rc1 (GPL) (http://www.dbmail.org/).
       2.0.7 seems buggy.
     - Deerfield VisNetic MailServer 5.8.6 [host1]
     - Domino (Notes) 4.61[host1], 6.5, 5.0.6, 5.0.7, 7.0.2, 6.0.2CF1, 7.0.1[host1], 8.0.1[host1]
     - Dovecot 0.99.10.4, 0.99.14, 0.99.14-8.fc4, 1.0-0.beta2.7, 
       1.0.0 [dest/source] (LGPL) (http://www.dovecot.org/)
     - Eudora WorldMail v2
     - GMX IMAP4 StreamProxy.
     - Groupwise IMAP (Novell) 6.x and 7.0. Buggy so see the FAQ.
     - iPlanet Messaging server 4.15, 5.1, 5.2
     - IMail 7.15 (Ipswitch/Win2003), 8.12
     - MDaemon 7.0.1, 8.0.2, 8.1, 9.5.4 (Windows server 2003 R2 platform)
     - Mercury 4.1 (Windows server 2000 platform)
     - Microsoft Exchange Server 5.5, 6.0.6249.0[host1], 6.0.6487.0[host1], 
       6.5.7638.1 [host2], Exchange 2007 SP1 (with Update Rollup 2), 
       Exchange2007-EP-SP2, 
       Exchange 2010 RTM (Release to Manufacturing) [host2]
     - Netscape Mail Server 3.6 (Wintel !)
     - Netscape Messaging Server 4.15 Patch 7
     - OpenMail IMAP server B.07.00.k0 (Samsung Contact ?)
     - OpenWave
     - Qualcomm Worldmail (NT)
     - Rockliffe Mailsite 5.3.11, 4.5.6
     - Samsung Contact IMAP server 8.5.0
     - Scalix v10.1, 10.0.1.3, 11.0.0.431
     - SmarterMail, Smarter Mail 5.0 Enterprise.
     - SunONE Messaging server 5.2, 6.0 (SUN JES - Java Enterprise System)
     - Sun Java(tm) System Messaging Server 6.2-2.05,  6.2-7.05
     - Surgemail 3.6f5-5
     - UW-imap servers (imap-2000b) rijkkramer IMAP4rev1 2000.287
       (RedHat uses UW like 2003.338rh), v12.264 Solaris 5.7 (OSI Approved) 
       (http://www.washington.edu/imap/)
     - UW - QMail v2.1
     - Imap part of TCP/IP suite of VMS 7.3.2
     - Zimbra-IMAP 3.0.1 GA 160, 3.1.0 Build 279, 4.0.5, 4.5.2, 4.5.6, 5.5.

    Please report to the author any success or bad story with imapsync and
    do not forget to mention the IMAP server software names and version on
    both sides. This will help future users. To help the author maintaining
    this section report the two lines at the begining of the output if they
    are useful to know the softwares. Example:

     Host1 software:* OK louloutte Cyrus IMAP4 v1.5.19 server ready
     Host2   software:* OK Courier-IMAP ready

    You can use option --justconnect to get those lines. Example:

      imapsync --host1 imap.troc.org --host2 imap.trac.org --justconnect

    Please rate imapsync at http://freshmeat.net/projects/imapsync/ or
    better give the author a book, he likes books:
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1C9UNDIH3P7R7/ (or its paypal
    account gilles.lamiral@laposte.net)

HUGE MIGRATION
    Pay special attention to options --subscribed --subscribe --delete
    --delete2 --expunge --expunge1 --expunge2 --uidexpunge2 --maxage
    --minage --maxsize --useheader --fast

    If you have many mailboxes to migrate think about a little shell
    program. Write a file called file.csv (for example) containing users and
    passwords. The separator used in this example is ';'

    The file.csv file contains:

    user0001;password0001;user0002;password0002
    user0011;password0011;user0012;password0012 ...

    And the shell program is just:

     { while IFS=';' read  u1 p1 u2 p2; do 
            imapsync --user1 "$u1" --password1 "$p1" --user2 "$u2" --password2 "$p2" ...
     done ; } < file.csv

    Welcome in shell programming !

Hacking
    Feel free to hack imapsync as the WTFPL Licence permits it.

Links
    Entries for imapsync: http://www.imap.org/products/showall.php

SIMILAR SOFTWARES
      imap_tools    : http://www.athensfbc.com/imap_tools
      offlineimap   : http://software.complete.org/offlineimap
      mailsync      : http://mailsync.sourceforge.net/
      imapxfer      : http://www.washington.edu/imap/
                       part of the imap-utils from UW.
      mailutil      : replace imapxfer in 
                       part of the imap-utils from UW.
                      http://www.gsp.com/cgi-bin/man.cgi?topic=mailutil
      imaprepl      : http://www.bl0rg.net/software/
                      http://freshmeat.net/projects/imap-repl/
      imap_migrate  : http://freshmeat.net/projects/imapmigration/
      imapcopy      : http://home.arcor.de/armin.diehl/imapcopy/imapcopy.html
      migrationtool : http://sourceforge.net/projects/migrationtool/
      imapmigrate   : http://sourceforge.net/projects/cyrus-utils/
      wonko_imapsync: http://wonko.com/article/554
                      see also tools/wonko_ruby_imapsync
      pop2imap      : http://www.linux-france.org/prj/pop2imap/

    Feedback (good or bad) will often be welcome.

    $Id: imapsync,v 1.343 2010/08/15 18:02:11 gilles Exp gilles $