From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Giorgos Keramidas Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Thunderbird to Emacs migration Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2010 01:15:26 +0200 Organization: SunSITE.dk - Supporting Open source Message-ID: <87y6hxku7l.fsf@kobe.laptop> References: <87bpetp7sa.fsf@castleamber.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1272992939 16892 80.91.229.12 (4 May 2010 17:08:59 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 4 May 2010 17:08:59 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Tue May 04 19:08:57 2010 connect(): No such file or directory Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1O9Lc7-0005I5-EH for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Tue, 04 May 2010 19:08:55 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:49304 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1O9Lc6-0001ux-CG for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Tue, 04 May 2010 13:08:54 -0400 Original-Path: usenet.stanford.edu!goblin2!goblin.stu.neva.ru!news.net.uni-c.dk!dotsrc.org!filter.dotsrc.org!news.dotsrc.org!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1.92 (berkeley-unix) Cancel-Lock: sha1:X+BgTHPYJq82UiF72kXRqZ9JmpQ= Original-Lines: 52 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 94.64.236.208 Original-X-Trace: news.sunsite.dk DXC=H0AX_70^_IHlZiKmBn9NRLYSB=nbEKnkKAcJ3DFM`h5NGYG:0; 0_3?No_>`WUg<`1JoJZA^dLN@mMLCMUdgm79ONTaAP5^; X^7A@hFNKmgXMWE Original-X-Complaints-To: staff@sunsite.dk Original-Xref: usenet.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:177450 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:72967 Archived-At: On Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:08:37 -0600, John Bokma wrote: > I have been using Mozilla Thunderbird for many years. For the past > year or so I've been using Emacs more and more (first as editor, now > also to access Usenet), and I am wondering how easy migrating from > Thunderbird to Emacs would be and which Emacs email solution would be > the best. > Questions: > > - which package(s) do you recommend for reading/writing email (I have > several accounts, most POP3, and one IMAP. Some POP3 accounts use > SSL/TLS with CRAM) > > - is it possible to work directly with the email files Thunderbird > creates, or do I have to convert them? Gnus is the mail reader I use. I am still learning how to use it effectively after almost two years, but it is a very nice program with literally hundreds of options. I've even written some Lisp code to extend it and tweak its behavior in an automated manner. Gnus should be able to pull your messages from multiple IMAP and POP3 accounts, but see below before you pull everything into Gnus. > Ideally (for me) both programs should be able to use the same mail > files [1]. If not possible I would like to convert my current email to > something Emacs can handle, and start using Emacs for just reading my > email and see how it goes. > > Thanks for reading, > John > > [1] If I have to quit one program to be able to use the other one it's > not a major issue, as long as I can keep one set of mail files. One of the most efficient storage format for Gnus folders is nnml. Unfortunately this is Gnus-specific, so if you pull everything into nnml folders you won't be able to use Thunderbird to access the same files. One way that may work nicely for folder sharing is to use an IMAP server at localhost. Dovecot is a nice IMAP server that you can install on your local system. Then you can pull messages using 'fetchmail' or 'getmail' from multiple sources, stuff them into the IMAP server of the localhost, and use Gnus or Thudnerbird to access 'imap://localhost'. This way when one mailer updates the messages of a folder, or the read, unread, deleted marks of a message, the other mailers who access the same IMAP server at localhost will be able to see the same changes. Regards and good luck with your mailer experiments, Giorgos