dovecot - Sep 2007 - Delete mails in dovecot POP3 has a bug/feature

When a mailbox has abt 40 mails with 4-5 mb attachments , it is quite
common for the pop3 connection to get timed out or disconnected esp. if
user has dialup modem.

In this case , dovecot seems to REALLY HIT the user hard. Because it
simply DOES NOT delete mails , even if user requested so. It only
deletes the mails if users succesfully logs out. No other pop3 server
has this problem so i would request this bugs is fixed ASAP.

Effect of this bug - user has to retry multiple times and download
multiple copies of mail before it finally deleted.

Server Using ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn + standard apt-get dovecot.

Client end tested using getmail+BrokenUIDLPOP3Retriever


To be Fixed - dovecot should delete mail even if the client connection
gets "broken" or disconnects "ungracefully". e.g. user hits
CTRL+C with
getmail.


Package: dovecot-pop3d
Priority: optional
Section: mail
Installed-Size: 960
Maintainer: Ubuntu Core Developers <ubuntu-devel-discuss at
lists.ubuntu.com>
Original-Maintainer: Dovecot Maintainers <jaldhar-dovecot at debian.org>
Architecture: amd64
Source: dovecot
Version: 1.0.rc17-1ubuntu2.1
Replaces: pop3-server
Provides: pop3-server
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.5-0ubuntu1), libssl0.9.8 (>= 0.9.8c-1),
dovecot-common (>= 1.0.beta3-1)
Filename: pool/main/d/dovecot/dovecot-pop3d_1.0.rc17-1ubuntu2.1_amd64.deb
Size: 552280
MD5sum: cffa97e43063a8c27382b302541cf00b
SHA1: bd60dad4cbec299f060f672ce46ca24423417d9f
SHA256: 99327399e58de4491d2c98dd91ae23cba586f6a45103a0ab389d29331f04d20a
Description: secure POP3 server that supports mbox and maildir mailboxes
  Dovecot is a mail server whose major goals are security and extreme
  reliability. It tries very hard to handle all error conditions and verify
  that all data is valid, making it nearly impossible to crash. It should
  also be pretty fast, extensible, and portable.
  .
  This package contains the dovecot POP3 server.
Bugs: mailto:ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
Origin: Ubuntu

Package: dovecot-pop3d
Priority: optional
Section: mail
Installed-Size: 960
Maintainer: Ubuntu Core Developers <ubuntu-devel-discuss at
lists.ubuntu.com>
Original-Maintainer: Dovecot Maintainers <jaldhar-dovecot at debian.org>
Architecture: amd64
Source: dovecot
Version: 1.0.rc17-1ubuntu2
Replaces: pop3-server
Provides: pop3-server
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.5-0ubuntu1), libssl0.9.8 (>= 0.9.8c-1),
dovecot-common (>= 1.0.beta3-1)
Filename: pool/main/d/dovecot/dovecot-pop3d_1.0.rc17-1ubuntu2_amd64.deb
Size: 552070
MD5sum: 70f6954c9938250f1b213b675a51a64e
SHA1: 9f8f2ccc372d901cdafec6f26c0ff8146ae4e5d5
SHA256: e5abb284858cf1bdc86157e3f19ae680e7400cc49b4292786ef0c3562fd6db7d
Description: secure POP3 server that supports mbox and maildir mailboxes
  Dovecot is a mail server whose major goals are security and extreme
  reliability. It tries very hard to handle all error conditions and verify
  that all data is valid, making it nearly impossible to crash. It should
  also be pretty fast, extensible, and portable.
  .
  This package contains the dovecot POP3 server.
Bugs: mailto:ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
Origin: Ubuntu


-- 
*************************************************************
Chetan Chauhan
Software Architect         Email: chetan at chauhan.org
Nulite Infotech            Email: support at nuliteinfotech.com
Chennai
TN,India                   Phone: (+91) 9840968020
*************************************************************

Nuilte Infotech escribi?:
> When a mailbox has abt 40 mails with 4-5 mb attachments , it is quite
> common for the pop3 connection to get timed out or disconnected esp. if
> user has dialup modem.
> 
> In this case , dovecot seems to REALLY HIT the user hard. Because it
> simply DOES NOT delete mails , even if user requested so. It only
> deletes the mails if users succesfully logs out. No other pop3 server
> has this problem so i would request this bugs is fixed ASAP.
Well that's how rfc 1939 mandates it. Quoting section 6:

"If a session terminates for some reason other than a client-issued
 QUIT command, the POP3 session does NOT enter the UPDATE state and
 MUST not remove any messages from the maildrop."
> Effect of this bug - user has to retry multiple times and download
> multiple copies of mail before it finally deleted.
> 
> Server Using ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn + standard apt-get dovecot.
> 
> Client end tested using getmail+BrokenUIDLPOP3Retriever
> 
> To be Fixed - dovecot should delete mail even if the client connection
> gets "broken" or disconnects "ungracefully". e.g. user
hits CTRL+C with
> getmail.
Then don't use pop3 then, getmail supports imap too. Every *sane* pop3
server out there behaves this way; emphasis in sane :)

Regards,
-- 
Angel Marin
http://anmar.eu.org/