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Gmail, POP, IMAP

Ionut Alex. Chitu [PersonRank 10]

Friday, November 16, 2007
16 years ago4,435 views

Now that Gmail supports IMAP, why would you still use POP?

1. Mail fetcher

2. Clients that don't support IMAP.

Other reasons?

Avrohom Eliezer Friedman (AEF) [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Is it easy to switch over – does your e-mails get re downloaded? I didn't switch my clients over in my GApps accts 'cuz I didn't know how hard it was to switch over.

/pd [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Stealth Op's – POP the msg out and save on local node.

DPic [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Why doesn't mail fetcher now support IMAP too?

Rohit Srivastwa [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

I'm still using POP for backup

/pd [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

DPic : Googs' Mail fetcher works of RFC 1939.. and IMAP is a different protocol suite RC 3501.. both are disparate and methods.

IMAP is a full connection state and POP is a connectionless state...
IMAP – multiple clients::i inbox : POP single Client :: 1 Inbox

core and sutble diff's can be ref'ed within the LEMONADE working group!!

Tony Ruscoe [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

>> why would you still use POP?

Well, I actually organize my mails in Outlook in a totally different way to how I do it online. The reason being that Outlook's search is completely crap, so I need to do more filtering and have a lot of subfolders than I do labels in Gmail. I do this with loads of filtering rules which aren't necessary in Gmail because it has a decent search. Therefore, I actually don't want my desktop client to mirror my web one.

Oh, and I fear change... :-)

Mambo [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

I still don't fully understand how IMAP works in relation to how POP works. Where does mail actually get stored?

Reto Meier [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Mambo: Everywhere. The difference between POP and IMAP is state, both protocols result in your mail being stored both on the server and your client.

POP is stateless, you send a copy to your client, but any changes aren't reflected in the original. Reading, deleting, adding labels isn't reflected on the other copy. This is useful if you use a single client and your mail server has severe space limitations (my ISP for example only allows 20mb). Using POP I download the messages to my client and delete them from the server.

IMAP retains a reference, so reading your mail in your client will mark the message as read on your server, and vice-versa. Same for deleting or labeling. This is particularly useful if you use multiple clients – work computer, home computer, Windows mobile phone, web client as they're all kept in sync.

Rohit Srivastwa [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Tony
for a better outlook search you can try a tool called "lookout"
its worth a try

Ionut Alex. Chitu [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

... or even Google Desktop.

Tony Ruscoe [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Rohit and Ionut, thanks for the recommendation but due to my filters and organization, I rarely need to search as I can almost always find what I'm looking for by going to a folder and sorting by date / sender / subject.

I was considering using IMAP to import my old emails into Gmail though.

Has anyone tried this yet? Are all the original sender and date field in tact?

http://www.zoliblog.com/2007/10/24/simplified-guide-to-importing-all-your-archive-email-into-gmail/

Gina White [PersonRank 1]

16 years ago #

Tony-I did. The connection kept timing out so I could only do it in chunks. I also did this during my vacation time and had my "out of office response" enabled in my Gmail acct, well it sent over 6k emails to people I haven't spoken to in years! I still have not received a response from Google regarding this matter. I just disabled it until I was done.

Avrohom Eliezer Friedman (AEF) [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

<<I also did this during my vacation time and had my "out of office response" enabled in my Gmail acct, well it sent over 6k emails to people I haven't spoken to in years!>>

I don't mean to be mean, but that's really funny.

Gina White [PersonRank 1]

16 years ago #

I can laugh now too.

Avrohom Eliezer Friedman (AEF) [PersonRank 10]

16 years ago #

Shew! As long as your a good sport about it.

One day I'll tell my grand kids that I was there when Google products were anything but perfect. (It was also before they bought the Internet http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2007-04-14-n32.html and acquired complete world domination.)

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