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imapsync/README
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NAME
imapsync - IMAP sync or copy tool. Synchronize mailboxes between two
imap servers.
$Revision: 1.94 $
INSTALL
imapsync works fine under any Unix OS.
imapsync works fine under Windows 2000 (at least) and ActiveState's 5.8 Perl
Get imapsync at
http://www.linux-france.org/prj/imapsync/dist/
You'll find a compressed tarball called imapsync-x.xx.tgz
where x.xx is the version number. Untar the tarball where
you want :
tar xzvf imapsync-x.xx.tgz
Go into the directory imapsync-x.xx and read the INSTALL
file.
The freshmeat record is http://freshmeat.net/projects/imapsync/
SYNOPSIS
imapsync [options]
imapsync --help
imapsync
imapsync [--host1 server1] [--port1 <num>]
[--user1 <string>] [--passfile1 <string>]
[--host2 server2] [--port2 <num>]
[--user2 <string>] [--passfile2 <string>]
[--folder <string> --folder <string> ...]
[--include <regex>] [--exclude <regex>]
[--prefix2 <string>]
[--sep1 <char>]
[--sep2 <char>]
[--syncinternaldates]
[--maxsize <int>]
[--maxage <int>]
[--skipheader <regex>]
[--skipsize]
[--delete] [--expunge]
[--subscribed] [--subscribe]
[--dry]
[--debug] [--debugimap]
[--timeout <int>]
[--version] [--help]
DESCRIPTION
The command imapsync is a tool allowing incremental and recursive imap
transfer from one mailbox to another.
We sometimes need to transfer mailboxes from one imap server to another.
This is called migration.
imapsync is the adequate tool because it reduces the amount of data
transfered by not transfering a given message if it is already on both
sides. Same headers, same message size and the transfert is done only
once. All flags are preserved, unread will stay unread, read will stay
read, deleted will stay deleted. You can stop the transfert at any time
and restart it later, imapsync is adapted to a bad connection.
You can decide to delete the messages from the source mailbox after a
successful transfert (it is a good feature when migrating). In that
case, use the --delete option, and run imapsync again with the --expunge
option.
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.
OPTIONS
Invoke: imapsync --help
HISTORY
I wrote imapsync because an enterprise (basystemes) paid me to install a
new imap server without loosing huge old mailboxes located on a far away
remote imap server accessible by a low bandwith link. The tool imapcp
(written in python) could not help me because I had to verify every
mailbox was well transfered and delete it after a good transfert.
imapsync started its life being 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).
EXAMPLES
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" on host "imap.src.fr" to the
imap account "max" on host "imap.dest.fr" (the passwords are located in
too files "/etc/secret1" for "buddy", "/etc/secret2" for "max") :
imapsync --host1 imap.src.fr --user1 buddy --passfile1 /etc/secret1 \
--host2 imap.dest.fr --user2 max --passfile2 /etc/secret2
Then, you will have buddy's mailbox updated from max's mailbox.
SECURITY
You can use --password1 instead of --passfile1 to give the password but
it is dangerous because 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 protected against sniffers on the network so the
passwords are in plain text.
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 a buggy internet connection, you can use this loop in a
Bourne shell:
while ! imapsync ...; do
echo imapsync not complete
done
AUTHOR
Gilles LAMIRAL lamiral@linux-france.org
LICENSE
imapsync is free, gratis and open source software cover by the GNU
General Public License. See the GPL file included in the distribution or
the web site http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html
BUGS
No known serious bug.
Multiple copies: Multiple copies of the emails on the destination
server. Some IMAP servers (Domino for example) add some headers for each
message transfered. The message is transfered again and again each time
you run imapsync. This is bad of course. The explanation is that
imapsync considers the message is not the same since headers have
changed (one line added) and size too (the header part). You can look at
the headers found by imapsync by using the --debug option (and search
for the message on both part). The way to avoid this problem is by using
options --skipheader and --skipsize, like this (avoid headers beginning
whith X-):
imapsync ... --skipheader '^X-.*' --skipsize
Flags : with some IMAP servers the flags are not very well copied the
first time. Run imapsync twice if you want the flags set correctly.
(fixed since 1.28 release but wait for a time before removing those
lines)
Report any bugs to the author: lamiral@linux-france.org
IMAP SERVERS
Success stories reported (softwares in alphabetic order) :
- BincImap 1.2.3
- CommunicatePro server (Redhat 8.0)
- Courier IMAP 1.5.1, 2.2.0, 2.1.1
- Critical Path (7.0.020)
- Cyrus IMAP 1.5, 1.6, 2.1, 2.1.15, 2.1.16, 2.2.1, Cyrus 2.2.2-BETA
- DBMail 1.2.1
- Dovecot 0.99.10.4
- Domino (Notes) 6.5
- iPlanet Messaging server 4.15, 5.1
- IMail 7.15 (Ipswitch/Win2003)
- MS Exchange Server 5.5
- Netscape Mail Server 3.6 (Wintel !)
- SunONE Messaging server 5.2, 6.0 (SUN JES - Java Enterprise System)
- UW-imap servers (imap-2000b) rijkkramer IMAP4rev1 2000.287
- UW - QMail v2.1
Please report to the author any success or bad story with imapsync and
don't 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:
From software :* OK louloutte Cyrus IMAP4 v1.5.19 server ready
To software :* OK Courier-IMAP ready
You can use option --justconnect to get those lines.
And please rate imapsync at http://freshmeat.net/projects/imapsync/
HUGE MIGRATION
Have a special attention on options --subscribed --subscribe --delete
--expunge --maxage --maxsize
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 content is :
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 GPL Licence permits it.
Links
Entries for imapsync: http://www.imap.org/products/showall.php
SIMILAR SOFTWARES
offlineimap : http://gopher.quux.org:70/devel/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/
pop2imap : http://www.linux-france.org/prj/pop2imap/
Feedback (good or bad) will be always welcome.
AUTHOR
Gilles LAMIRAL earn his living writing, installing, configuring and
teaching free open and gratis softwares. Don't hesitate to pay him for
that services.
$Id: imapsync,v 1.94 2004/06/15 03:42:56 gilles Exp gilles $
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