Jones,
Here is a message I posted to the ProviderTalk v3 list last week regarding Dovecot and maildir recommendations and caveats:
"ProviderTalk,
By default, VPS and MPS accounts utilize the mbox email box format, where all emails in a given "folder" are stored in the same file. The default email server for POP and IMAP is UW-IMAP for FreeBSD and Dovecot for Linux. Verio has recognized that the Dovecot email server provides excellent features and performance. When these are coupled with the maildir email box format (where each individual email is stored as a separate file), performance is significantly improved.
Because of these improvements, we created the Dovecot vinstall. This vinstall will install the Dovecot email server for FreeBSD or configure it to run as a stand-alone process for Linux. It also converts all email boxes from the mbox email format to maildir. Because of the key performance improvements, Dovecot with maildir are the email server and email box format recommended by Verio. As has been pointed out, you can opt out of the conversion to maildir with the --mbox vinstall flag. However, many of the performance improvements depend on the maildir email box format.
There are a couple of things to keep in mind when moving to Dovecot with maildir. The initial conversion can take some time for extremely large email boxes (containing tens of thousands of email messages). Also, the conversion process requires that the VPS or MPS accounts are using less than 95% of the account quota, and that individual users are using less than 90% of their allotted user quota.
Another aspect to consider is that the actual location of the email boxes and folders will change when converting to the maildir email format. This may affect Procmail and other email program or filter configurations. However, the vinstall will update the settings for email filters and programs installed through vinstalls, such as CPX, ClamAV, and SpamAssassin.
For customers using iManager, it is not compatible with the maildir email box format.
There may also be other ancillary considerations depending on existing individual configurations of your account. Keeping the above considerations in mind, most VPS and MPS customers will see significant performance improvements in CPX, Enhanced webmail, and most other email and webmail clients, without experiencing troubles, by converting to Dovecot and maildir. Verio encourages customers who are comfortable with these caveats to consider moving to Dovecot with maildir.
Brad Haymond
Verio, Inc."
Dovecot is the default POP and IMAP email server for Linux VPS/MPS. So, for Linux, the vinstall for the most part simply converts the email boxes from the mbox format to the maildir email format.
Brad Haymond
Verio, Inc.
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-cpx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-cpx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Stormer's Cgi-Archive
Sent: Sunday, June 14, 2009 3:45 PM
To: cpx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [cpx] cpx address book
I'd call that one into support. I've never went from dovecot mbox to
dovecot maildir.
James
On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 7:43 PM, Jones<support@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
oh no he is not at 20gb yet. their entire account quota is 20gb, so his mail
will have to grow to 20gb before they have problems. right now he is at just
over 1gb, and I don't see him getting to 20gb
the mail server is Dovecot, but the mailbox format is not Maildir. is it an
easy conversion to go from mbox to Maildir?
Stormer's Cgi-Archive wrote on 6/12/2009 6:19 PM:
Grief, 20gigs? Better go DoveCot/MailDir at a minimum.
James
On Fri, Jun 12, 2009 at 3:19 PM, Jones<support@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I have found with email accounts, I tend to give them the zero disk
space option, so it quota goes against their entire hosting account
verses separate quotas. That tends to help.
that's what I ended up doing for this user. he is the only one on the
server
who's email often grows beyond his quota. I wasn't sure if it was wise to
do
that, but I forgot that their hosting account has a quota as well, and I
don't see him growing his mailbox beyond 20GB...
jmb
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