Re: [TCLUG:5689] GUI email apps

[John R Sheets <dusk@smsi-roman.com>]

Scott Dier wrote:
> 
> Your better off doing what I do between Microsoft Outlook, IMP (Web based
> IMAP messaging client (www.horde.org/imp)), and Pine.  Run IMAP. :)

What's involved with setting up IMAP?  I've toyed with the idea,
but haven't had a chance to look into it yet.  Does Redhat 5.2
come with a decent IMAP setup?

> I use IMAP and procmail to have several folders that I can sort about and
> check my mail from anywhere.  

I dug into fetchmail and procmail a little this weekend. 
Fetchmail was pretty straightforward, but I couldn't really find
decent instructions for running procmail.  Or rather, I found
instructions and plenty of examples, but not how or when to
invoke it best.  The man page mentioned something about using the
.forward mechanism.  What's that about?  Does procmail pull the
mail directly out of the mail spooler and stick it into a bunch
of different folders?

> Bonuses are that I can use my mail from any
> computer and check the old and the new stuff and check folders (such as
> this tclug folder), and its just-so-friggin-neat. :)

Communicator doesn't distinguish between previously-seen and new
mail, so I end up having to go through by hand every evening and
mark everything I've already seen to "unread".  At 100+ mails per
day, this is a pain.  Any thoughts on how to improve this?  Does
IMAP handle it better, or should I just get a better mailer?  Or
will running it through fetchmail strip this info out?  Basically
I'm thinking of going

 POP3(work)->fetchmail(home)->/var/spool/mail(home)->???

Is there a better way?  How will IMAP change this?  Or is IMAP
post-spooler?  I'm still trying to fit all the pieces together,
so any insight will be gratefully appreciated.  (c:

John