Re: [Evolution] Using an IMAP Outbox

[Jerome Warnier <jwarnier beeznest net>]

Patrick O'Callaghan wrote:

On Sun, 2009-05-31 at 22:01 +0200, Jerome Warnier wrote:
  

Then the "sent folder" preferences could be left unchanged and a
outgoing filter "match all" and "copy to folder" could be used. The
      

key
    

trick still is to make Evolution believe that sending was
      

successful.
    

The other main goal of using an "Outbox" folder is to avoid sending
your
e-mail twice through the link (one using SMTP, and the second one
using
IMAP to store it in the "Sent" folder). This solution does not.
    

How does the use of an Outbox avoid this? At first glance it seems to me
that if both the destination and the Sent folder are non-local, the
message is going to end up being copied twice in any case (even when the
destination and the folder are on the same physical machine). I think
IMAP protocol extensions have been proposed to get round this, but they
aren't widely implemented AFAIK.
  

It allows to avoid sending twice because, instead of sending through SMTP, it sends once to the server using IMAP (in the Outbox folder), where the server notices the mail and sends it using its local MTA, then copies it (locally) to the right Sent folder.
That way, you avoid sending twice through the link between you and your server(s). Great for road-warriors or tele-workers.

It is true that it is not widely implemented (yet). However, as it is quite simple to do, maybe the missing incentive is that not all MUA support it...
Courier(-IMAP): some more information here: http://www.inter7.com/courierimap/INSTALL.html.

poc