[wplug] IMAP-secure and Postfix ?

[Poyner, Brandon]

Generally speaking the MTA and the MUA (IMAP in this case) have little
to do with each other.  The MTA takes in mail from various sources and
if it is destined for delivery on that host it hands the mail over to
the LDA (local delivery agent).  The LDA spools the mail however it
likes, such as mbox, MailDir, or cyrus format.  The MUA must be able to
read the spool format, i.e. you can't spool with the cyrus LDA and read
it with the WU IMAP server which only reads mbox.  The LDA and MUA have
the ability to lock spool files to prevent overwriting each other.  So
essentially the only real trick here is to use the proper MUA for your
LDA.  Knowing what LDA you use or want to use is important.  

O'Reilly has a book on IMAP which goes into Cyrus and WU IMAP, but
doesn't seem to cover Postfix.  However the MTA is mostly irrelevant,
except for getting it to properly communicate with the LDA.

Brandon Poyner 
Network Engineer II 
CCAC - College Office 
412-237-3086 



-----Original Message-----
From: Brandon Kuczenski [mailto:brandon at 301south.net] 
Sent: Tuesday, October 05, 2004 6:24 PM
To: WPLUG
Subject: [wplug] IMAP-secure and Postfix ?


I am currently running Postfix (it happens to be on FreeBSD, but in
application-space it shouldn't matter, right?) and my users would like
me
to add IMAP.  My understanding is that imaps (port 993) is authenticated
IMAP and so the increased security risk is minimal.  I would then be
required to install OpenSSL.

The problem is, I don't understand where the MTA ends and the IMAP
behavior begins.  I've seen a couple quick-and-dirty howtos for IMAP and
Sendmail, but they aren't enough to explain the nuts and bolts.  I'm
currently working my way through the TLDP's "Postfix-Cyrus-Web-cyradmin"
howto (even though I don't want to use Cyrus), and in parallel I'm
re-reading the postfix and Courier-IMAP documentation, but this is a
long
hard slog.  I'm reluctant to just dive in, since I and (at least one,
soon
two) people sorta depend on this system for mail.

Can anyone recommend a good IMAP primer?  Particularly a postfix-related
one?

-Brandon

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