maildirmake — create maildirs and maildir folders
maildirmake [options...] {maildir}
The maildirmake command creates maildirs, and maildir folders and performs some routine maintenance on them. This documentation describes the maildirmake command from the Courier mail server, which creates an extended form of maildirs that implements additional extensions beyond the basic maildir properties that were first implemented in the Qmail mail server.
-S-q quota-f folder-F folder-f option, except
that the folder's name is given using the system locale's
character set. Non-Latin characters in the folder's name
must be given to the -f option using IMAP's
UTF8 encoding. The -F option
takes the folder name specified using the console's character
set.-s mode-S option to
create a sharable maildir.
Then, run maildirmake again with the
-s option to create
publicly accessible folders.
mode is a comma-separated list of
the following keywords: read - readonly folder, only you can
write messages to this folder;
write - anyone can read and
write messages to this folder;
group - only allow members of
your own system group to access messages in this folder (instead of
everyone).--add name=pathname,
--del name--checkutf8 maildir maildirfilter--convutf8 maildir maildirfilterThis maildirmake command supports enhanced maildirs that contain folders.
By itself, maildirmake makes a new subdirectory
maildir,
and creates all the necessary structures.
The -f option
creates a new "folder" within an existing
maildir. maildir must
already exist, and the maildirmake command will create a new
folder in the maildir.
Folders are simply subdirectories inside the main maildir whose names start
with a period, and which are themselves maildirs.
For example, the command
"maildirmake -f Drafts mail/Maildir" creates
mail/Maildir/.Drafts,
that has the usual tmp,
new and cur.
You MUST use the -f option, instead of
specifying mail/Maildir/.Drafts directly,
in order to correctly
initialize certain enhanced maildir features.
Folders cannot be created directly within other folders.
Running
maildirmake -f Urgent mail/Maildir/.Drafts will not work.
Instead, the period character is designated as a hierarchy separator, run
maildirmake -f Drafts.Urgent mail/Maildir instead.
This creates
mail/Maildir/.Drafts.Urgent, and all mail software
that supports
enhanced maildirs will interpret it as a subfolder Urgent of the Drafts
folder.
This is another extension to the Maildir format that allows folders to be shared between multiple clients.
The Courier IMAP server implements two types of shared folders: filesystem permission-based shared folders, as well as virtual shared folders based on IMAP access control lists. Use the maildirmake command to implement shared folders based on filesystem permissions. The maildiracl(1) command manages access control lists, which are used by virtual shared folders.
See the Courier IMAP server documentation for more information.
First, you need to create a collection of sharable folders, as a separate maildir:
maildirmake -S /usr/local/share/maildirs/notices
Then, create individuals folders that will be accessed in shared mode:
maildirmake -s write -f Weekly /usr/local/share/maildirs/notices
In this example, the "Weekly" folder is created,
with read/write access to everyone.
Multiple folders can be created in the same maildir, with different access
permissions. Everyone can create a sharable maildir. The access privileges
for individual folders are set by the -s option, and are
implemented using traditional filesystem permissions.
Use the --add and
--del options to add a sharable maildir to
an existing maildir. Client software that implements this extension will now
know where to find sharable folders:
maildirmake --add notices=/usr/local/share/maildirs/notices $HOME/Maildir
$HOME/Maildir is your main maildir.
The argument to -add
is nick=path.
nick is a nickname for this collection of
sharable folders, and path is the location of the
sharable maildir.
All folders in the sharable maildir that you have access to -- such
as "Weekly", in this case, will now be accessible.
Multiple sharable maildirs can be added, by giving each one a unique
nick.
The --del option "disconnects" the sharable maildir from
the main maildir.
Normally -add command must be run for every maildir
which needs
to access the sharable maildir. Alternatively the file
/usr/local/etc/maildirshared can be created,
to specify a default set of sharable maildirs.
Each line in this file takes the following format:
nick<tab>path
nick is a short nickname for
the sharable maildir, <tab>
is a single tab character, path
is the pathname to the sharable maildir.
You may have read or write access to a shared folder. If you have write access, you can add messages to the shared folder. You can also delete messages that you've added.
Anyone can create a sharable maildir, so if the sharable maildir is actually created by you, can can delete any message, not just your own.
This section is relevant to:
Updating Courier-IMAP to version 5.0, and later, from prior versions of Courier-IMAP, or:
Updating SqWebmail to version 6.0, and later, from prior versions of SqWebmail, or:
Updating Courier to version 1.0, and later, from prior versions of Courier.
These versions have been updated to implement native Unicode support in several E-mail-related protocols. It is already expected that updating Internet standards to use native Unicode-formatted E-mail messages will not be 100% backwards-compatible, in terms of E-mail client support. Given that, this major update to Unicode will also introduce some backwards-incompatible changes to the internal structure of maildirs, as a major upgrade to simplify Unicode support going forward. Might as well go through the pain of a major upgrade once.
maildirmake's --checkutf8 and
--convutf8 options are tools to aid in conversion of
existing mailboxes to the new Unicode-based naming standard.
Mail folders in a maildir are hidden subdirectories. For example:
a folder name “Mailing list” is a maildir subdirectory
named $HOME/Maildir/.Mailing list
($HOME/Maildir is the main mailbox).
Prior to the unicode update, non-English characters in folder names
used a convention based on the
non-standard “modified-UTF7” encoding used by IMAP.
A folder named “Résumé” is a maildir subdirectory
named $HOME/Maildir/.R&AOk-sum&AOk-.
The current versions of Courier,
Courier-IMAP, and SqWebmail,
now creates $HOME/Maildir/.Résumé
using the UTF8 encoding. This appears as plain
“.Résumé” (hidden) subdirectory on modern
UTF8-based systems.
Consequently, any existing maildirs with folders that use non-English names must be converted as part of updating to the current version of Courier, Courier-IMAP, and SqWebmail from pre-unicode versions. This does not happen automatically when updating to the current version. This must be done manually given the wide variety of individual mail server configurations that are possible.
Updating from pre-unicode versions involves:
Renaming the actual maildir folders,
$HOME/Maildir/.
into unicode names (using UTF8).
names
Updating the
$HOME/Maildir/courierimapsubscribed file,
which is a list of subscribed IMAP folders, if it exists.
Updating any
maildrop
mail filtering recipes,
$HOME/.mailfilter, if it exists, to reference
the unicode maildir folders; or updating any custom site mail
filtering engine that delivers to maildir folders, to reference
the correct subdirectory names.
The --checkutf8 and
--convutf8 options to
maildirmake convert a single maildir to the new
unicode format:
$ ./maildirmake --checkutf8 ~/Maildir ~/.mailfilter Checking /home/mrsam/Maildir: Mail filter to INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- updated to INBOX.Résumé Subscription to INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- changed to INBOX.Résumé Rename INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- to INBOX.Résumé Verified /home/mrsam/Maildir/courierimapsubscribed Verified /home/mrsam/.mailfilter $ ./maildirmake --convutf8 ~/Maildir ~/.mailfilter Checking /home/mrsam/Maildir: Mail filter to INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- updated to INBOX.Résumé Subscription to INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- changed to INBOX.Résumé Rename INBOX.R&AOk-sum&AOk- to INBOX.Résumé Updating /home/mrsam/Maildir/courierimapsubscribed Updating /home/mrsam/.mailfilter
--checkutf8 goes through the motions of converting
a single maildir to Unicode, but without making any actual changes.
--convutf8 does the conversion for real.
The first required parameter is the maildir to convert. The
second parameter is optional, and specifies the corresponding
maildrop filtering recipe,
but only if SqWebMail
generates the mail filtering recipes.
SqWebMail's mail filtering recipes are
parsable, and can be automatically-converted.
Non-SqWebMail-generated
.mailfilters cannot be converted automatically.
The second parameter must be omitted, and the mail filtering recipe
must be converted by hand.
All this work is only needed if maildirs have folders with
non-English names. Ignore everything you've just read if all
folder names are English-only.
--checkutf8 and
--convutf8 will not do anything, and nothing
needs to be done.
To convert all mailboxes to Unicode all at once:
A shell script needs to run the --checkutf8
option for every mailbox. A list of all accounts' maildirs
needs to be prepared in advance, together with the corresponding
.mailfilters (where appropriate).
courier-authlib's authenumerate command is usually
a good starting point.
It's ok to explicitly specify each mailbox's
.mailfilter, when using
SqWebMail even if a particular
mailbox does not use it. It will be ignored.
The list of all accounts' maildirs gets converted to a shell
script that runs maildirmake with the
--checkutf8 option. The script should report
any maildir whose --checkutf8 option reports
an error, and
maildirmake exits with a non-zero status.
It is safe to run --checkutf8 without shutting
down your mail server. A non-zero exit from
--checkutf8 indicates a problem (see below)
for a particular maildir.
Once --checkutf8 does not find any problems
with any mailbox, shut down the mail server, run
--checkutf8 one more time for all mailboxes,
then if everything goes well, upgrade
Courier,
Courier-IMAP, or
SqWebMail and
run
--convutf8 on every mailbox before restarting
the server.
--convutf8 is a one-shot deal. Do not run
--convutf8 a second time after it successfully
converted a maildir. In nearly all cases nothing will happen,
but there are rare edge cases where some folder names may
get garbled, or it fails completely.
The only likely problems that might be encountered is the fall-out from buggy IMAP clients that did not follow the pre-Unicode naming convention for non-Latin folder names. The customized IMAP “modified-UTF7” encoding convention for non-Latin folder names is mostly an IMAP client convention, and the pre-Unicode version of Courier-IMAP did not enforce it. The server took the name from the IMAP client, as is.
Unicode conversion (--checkutf8 or
--convutf8) fails if it finds a folder name that
does not correctly use IMAP's
“modified-UTF7” encoding. This can only be resolved
manually, by renaming the folder. This may also involve manually
editing courierimapsubscribed and
.mailfilter if they exist. The bad folder name
should be removed from
courierimapsubscribed. For
.mailfilter it is sufficient to remove only
the comments that precede the actual maildrop rule,
and --convutf8 will remove the entire rule, by itself.
--convutf8 actually reads only the machine-parsable
comments in SqWebMail-generated
.mailfilter (plus a few other things in the
file), and replaces the
.mailfilter with the Unicode version based
solely on the parsed data.
The current, Unicode version of Courier-IMAP supports both Unicode and non-Unicode IMAP clients; however unlike the pre-Unicode version, Courier-IMAP rejects requests from non-Unicode IMAP clients to use or create folders that are not properly encoded.
Encountering a bad folder during conversion strongly suggests the presence of an IMAP client that does not correctly encode non-English folder names. Such an IMAP client will likely have problems after the conversion.