Re: email storage format

--- Mitch Kapor <mitch <at> osafoundation.org> wrote:
> Let me make sure I understand this use case.  It

> So far, we anticipate the local mail store will be
> the Chandler repository.
> 
> At 08:33 AM 5/6/2003, Jeff Mace wrote:

> >IMAP is different than reading pine format
> mailboxes.  When someone sends
> >me email it is immediately forwarded to my desktop
> machine and stored in a
> >local file for me to read.  I tend to keep pine
> open constantly so the
> >message will almost immediately show up in my inbox
> because pine is always
> >monitoring my mail spool.  In my case, and it's
> fairly common, I don't
> >retrieve mail using IMAP or POP and my other
> folders (i.e. sent-mail) are
> >stored locally.
> >
> >What I am describing would essentially be another
> method for accessing
> >email (IMAP, POP or Local Mail Spool).  This isn't
> something I would call
> >very important, but I can think of situations where
> it would be helpful.

> > > At 05:19 AM 5/6/2003, Jeff Mace wrote:
> > > >I was just reading through some of the docs on
> email in Chandler and
> > > >thought of something.  Will Chandler be able to
> use the pine format for
> > > >storing mailboxes?  I know people who are able
> to use the same
> > > >folders/mailboxes in different applications
> because of their standard
> > > >format and it would be nice if Chandler was
> another one.
> > > >
> > > >This would be similar to using more than one
> calendar server to make up a
> > > >complete view of your calendar.  Those who
> elected to use the repository
> > > >for email storage could, but it could also be
> an option to link to these
> > > >pine format mailboxes.  Similarly, I should be
> able to tell Chandler to
> > > >monitor my /var/mail/≤userid> file for incoming
> messages.  This way, I
> > > >could easily use pine to read email from remote
> locations and switch to
> > > >Chandler when I'm able to use a full client.

Jeff, is your Pine running on a remote shell account,
then forwarding your mail to your desktop mail app. or
on your local desktop machine? Are these other
applications accessing the Pine spool remotely over a
network, or are they all running o the same local
machine?

The way Chandler is going to work is in two parts, a
backend, the repository, and a frontend, the user
interface. The backend will feature a daemon that
controls access to the repository, by both the
frontend, and third party apps. It will also be
performing background tasks, such as downloading mail,
updating calendars, and transferring files among
contacts. It should be a fairly trivial matter to
develop an Agent that presents the email portion of
the repository as a /var/mail/≤userid> directory for
those third party apps that want to access your email
that way. Ideally, those apps would be upgraded to
speak RAP, the Repository Access Protocol, so they can
interact with the repository dirctly, which should
allow them a richer and more structured data interface
than a simple directory access would provide.

bkd

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