Re: [cobalt-users] a question about pine

[Ryan Verner <xfesty@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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On Mon, 07 Oct 2002 16:23:51 -0400 jale@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
| 
| >On Mon, 07 Oct 2002 14:04:12 -0400 jale@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
| >| Pine is just an email client, correct? If so, the files are the same for
| >| Pine or any other email client   - if you have openwebmail installed, it is
| >
| >That statement isnt completely correct.  There's several standard unix 
| >mailbox formats, not just one.
| 
| There can be specific files *about* your email, but the file itself - would 
| there really be any difference? Email is, in every email system I have 

There certainly is.  You've got a whole bunch of unix mailbox format standards - probably the three most common being mbox (all contents of mailbox stored on one large file), Mailbox (one folder, each message in its own file), and MBX (mbox, but indexed).  The most common by far is mbox, although I prefer Mailbox (I find it to be a hell of a lot faster).  Most MTA's will store information in mbox format, although there are ones out there that do other formats (for example, courier will do Mailbox, and a few others off memory).

| worked on, and there are MANY (on the server side, I'm not speaking about 
| clients) and they are just flat sequential files. TO:, FROM:, are just 
| headers that need to be parsed.
| 
| Where would there be/could there be differences in the email file itself - 
| email programs do no manipulation on the data, just parse it and move it 
| from place to place. That is why you can read your mail with about any 
| program - I can read my mail with Eudora, Outlook, openwebmail, and 
| probably Pine without doing anything differently.

You're talking protocol there - I'm assuming you mean IMAP.  All because a mail client can talk to a server the same way certainly doesn't mean the way the mail is stored has to be the same.  Last time I checked, Outlook wont read/store information in unix Mailbox format :-)
 
| The differences are in the possibility of required headers, the order of 
| headers, etc. The only thing that is needed to make an email go is either a 
| TO:, CC: or BCC: - it only needs to know where it is going. All other 
| headers are optional, body, subject, from:, etc., all optional. Attachments 
| are just in-line binary data with a header telling information about what 
| is to follow, it is just like an extended length message body, there is 
| nothing sacred about an attachment other than how it is decoded.

I dont understand... how would these headers change the format the emails are stored?

| I am really curious about *standard unix mailbox formats* - where are the 
| differences. I need to know if there are, this is not just raising a point. 
| We write our own mail-moving programs for delivering print-jobs to any 
| printer from anyplace, ie: a wireless handheld in a medical exam room 
| running off our ASP - not .asp - and printing someplace on a networked printer.

Cool :-)  Wireless is fun stuff.  My .htaccess thread I posted earlier today involves a bunch of wireless applications, which I hoped to get working with our Cobalt... seems not :(

R
 
| Thanks,
| Jale
| 
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