Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

[David Masterson]

I have a number of questions...

I've been trying to set up my mailing list environment using Gnus with
IMAP/SMTP via zohomail.com.  I can read gnu.org mailing lists via IMAP fine.

1. SMTP thru zohomail.com to gnu.org gets bounced as "Undeliverable" due to
a "550 - bad domain" error.  Zoho support says the email looks fine.  I've
been trying to get an answer from sysadmin@fsf.org (email sent from my
gmail account) for several days, but no reply.  Anyone seen anything like
this?

2. Due to limited space in a free account on zohomail.com, I want to clean
up old mail on both my system and the server.  I assumed the way to do
that was (mostly) by "catchup", but that just marks all the mails in the
summary buffer as read.  How do you delete old email?

3. I thought 'expire' was the way to delete, but the manual implies that
expired email can be deleted by Gnus at some future time.  How is that
controlled?

4. I found that the expired email wound up being tagged with "gnus-expire"
on the IMAP server.  Is there an assumption that the IMAP server will
delete emails tagged with "gnus-expire"?  If so, how does that work?

5. Is this documented in the Gnus manual?  At least the assumptions of how
the IMAP server should work around "deleting emails".

--
David Masterson
Programmer at Large

Re: Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

[Joel Reicher]

David Masterson <dsmasterson@gmail.com> writes:

> I have a number of questions...
>
> I've been trying to set up my mailing list environment using 
> Gnus with IMAP/SMTP via zohomail.com.  I can read gnu.org 
> mailing lists via IMAP fine.
>
> 1. SMTP thru zohomail.com to gnu.org gets bounced as 
> "Undeliverable" due to a "550 - bad domain" error.  Zoho support 
> says the email looks fine.  I've been trying to get an answer 
> from sysadmin@fsf.org (email sent from my gmail account) for 
> several days, but no reply.  Anyone seen anything like this?

If you think Gnus/Message is responsible (i.e. sending with some 
other client is fine), then a faulty From: address is all I can 
think it might be.

> 2. Due to limited space in a free account on zohomail.com, I 
> want to clean up old mail on both my system and the server.  I 
> assumed the way to do that was (mostly) by "catchup", but that 
> just marks all the mails in the summary buffer as read.  How do 
> you delete old email?

There are a few ways, but you might want to start by reading

(info "(gnus) Expiring Mail")

You don't have to use expiry - the important part is what is done 
when Gnus actions the expiry, and this can be done without the 
expiry process - but personally I quite like it because setting 
marks is fast, and the actual deletion (server command) is done in 
bulk. It feels a lot like commit vs push in git to me.

> 3. I thought 'expire' was the way to delete, but the manual 
> implies that expired email can be deleted by Gnus at some future 
> time.  How is that controlled?

That's covered by the info page above. I use nnmail-expiry-wait 
immediate.

> 4. I found that the expired email wound up being tagged with 
> "gnus-expire" on the IMAP server.  Is there an assumption that 
> the IMAP server will delete emails tagged with "gnus-expire"? 
> If so, how does that work?

No. Expiry is actioned by Gnus. If you want to skip it completely 
(which I do at the moment in certain situations) you can do B DEL.

> 5. Is this documented in the Gnus manual?  At least the 
> assumptions of how the IMAP server should work around "deleting 
> emails".

I think you will find there's no working around; it's just that 
Gnus tries to unify the news and mail experience as sensibly as 
possible, which is a little nontrivial since deletion doesn't 
really exist for news. This is also not specific to IMAP.

A (possibly unnecessary) word of warning: the IMAP expunge 
operation has nothing to do with any of this, but it's easy to 
think it does.

Cheers,

        - Joel

Re: Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

[David Masterson]

 ---- On Sat, 14 Dec 2024 04:04:23 -0800  Joel Reicher  wrote --- 
 > David Masterson dsmasterson@gmail.com> writes:
 > 
 > > I have a number of questions...
 > >
 > > I've been trying to set up my mailing list environment using 
 > > Gnus with IMAP/SMTP via zohomail.com.  I can read gnu.org 
 > > mailing lists via IMAP fine.
 > >
 > > 1. SMTP thru zohomail.com to gnu.org gets bounced as 
 > > "Undeliverable" due to a "550 - bad domain" error.  Zoho support 
 > > says the email looks fine.  I've been trying to get an answer 
 > > from sysadmin@fsf.org (email sent from my gmail account) for 
 > > several days, but no reply.  Anyone seen anything like this?
 > 
 > If you think Gnus/Message is responsible (i.e. sending with some 
 > other client is fine), then a faulty From: address is all I can 
 > think it might be.

This may be a policy problem between zohomail.com and gnu.org.  I think
the sysadmins at gnu.org fixed if this email goes through.

Fingers crossed
--
David Masterson

Re: Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

[Joel Reicher]

David Masterson <dsmasterson@zohomail.com> writes:

>  ---- On Sat, 14 Dec 2024 04:04:23 -0800  Joel Reicher  wrote 
>  ---
>> David Masterson dsmasterson@gmail.com> writes:

[...]

>>> 1. SMTP thru zohomail.com to gnu.org gets bounced as 
>>> "Undeliverable" due to a "550 - bad domain" error.  Zoho 
>>> support  says the email looks fine.  I've been trying to get 
>>> an answer  from sysadmin@fsf.org (email sent from my gmail 
>>> account) for  several days, but no reply.  Anyone seen 
>>> anything like this?
>>
>> If you think Gnus/Message is responsible (i.e. sending with 
>> some  other client is fine), then a faulty From: address is all 
>> I can  think it might be.
>
> This may be a policy problem between zohomail.com and gnu.org. 
> I think the sysadmins at gnu.org fixed if this email goes 
> through.

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-gnu-emacs/2024-12/msg00383.html

Looks like it worked. (Had to check on the archive because you 
also emailed me directly.

Regards,

        - Joel

Re: Gnus IMAP Qs: catch-up vs delete vs expire & "gnus-expire" tag ?

[James Thomas]

Joel Reicher wrote:

> David Masterson writes:
>
>> 2. Due to limited space in a free account on zohomail.com, I want to
>> clean up old mail on both my system and the server.  I assumed the
>> way to do that was (mostly) by "catchup", but that just marks all
>> the mails in the summary buffer as read.  How do you delete old
>> email?
>
> There are a few ways, but you might want to start by reading
>
> (info "(gnus) Expiring Mail")
>
> You don't have to use expiry - the important part is what is done when
> Gnus actions the expiry, and this can be done without the expiry
> process - but personally I quite like it because setting marks is
> fast, and the actual deletion (server command) is done in bulk. It
> feels a lot like commit vs push in git to me.
>
>> 3. I thought 'expire' was the way to delete, but the manual implies
>> that expired email can be deleted by Gnus at some future time.  How
>> is that controlled?
>
> That's covered by the info page above. I use nnmail-expiry-wait
> immediate.
>
>> 4. I found that the expired email wound up being tagged with
>> "gnus-expire" on the IMAP server.  Is there an assumption that the
>> IMAP server will delete emails tagged with "gnus-expire"? If so, how
>> does that work?
>
> No. Expiry is actioned by Gnus.

Just to clarify: This means that if you're using delayed expiry, the
message would have to be loaded in the Summary and old enough so that
'q' etc. will make Gnus delete it.

I too, mostly, simply expire immediately to the Deleted folder.

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