Eponymous

Gmail and mutt
I like mutt. Of all the mail clients I've used over the years, it sucks the least. It works well with my mail server.

Despite having my own domain and mail server, I still use gmail for certain things; things I don't mind being retained for 3 years after I delete them, or more specifically, things I want retained for 3 years after I delete them.

I don't like the gmail web interface. I find checking my gmail to be annoying because of this. I remembered gmail offering POP and IMAP. I figured I could use that to get my gmail. Shouldn't be too hard right?

A quick search of Mr. Yahoo and Mr. Google gave me two good starting points: Lifehacker.com and MattCutts.com.

I read the sites and the getmail man page and figured out what I needed to do. First I enabled IMAP for my gmail account. Next, I created the .getmail directory in my home directory then created a getmailrc file there. I want all gmail mail to be delivered to a specific mbox file without going through my normal mail delivery channels. The contents of the getmailrc file are quite simple:

[retriever]
type = SimpleIMAPSSLRetriever
server = imap.gmail.com
username = username@gmail.com
password = usernamespasswordgoeshere
mailboxes = ("inbox",)

[destination]
type = Mboxrd
path = /usr/home/mforde/Mail/GMAIL

The retriever section defines how getmail will retrieve the mail. In this case it uses IMAP over SSL to connect to imap.gmail.com. The mailboxes setting can be used to specify only certain gmail labels to retrieve, but I want anything in the inbox.

The destination section tells getmail what to do with the mail once it has grabbed it from gmail. This configuration dumps it into an mbox file I've named GMAIL.

I chose IMAP over POP because of the slightly-less-than-documented "feature" of gmail only allowing 99 messages at a time over POP.

So to get the initial batch of 7000+ emails, I ran

> getmail -vvv -l

to get verbose output and to leave messages on the gmail server. When that was done I pointed mutt at the GMAIL mbox and like magic, there was my gmail, organized nicely in my terminal.

Now, I want to check to get the latest mail fairly often, and I don't want to download messages already copied over. To accomplish this, I added a crontab to run every 10 minutes and invoke

getmail -l -n -q

This tells getmail to leave copies on the server, only get new messages it hasn't already retrieved, and be quiet about it.

This has worked out well for me. If you're interested in setting up something like this, I highly recommend reading the article at matcutts.com. That article also links to several sample getmailrc files.

[/unix] [permanent link]

Eponymous

	About My Infrequently Updated Blog. The web-based journal of M. Forde, computer nerd, endurance athlete, and DeLorean owner contact Subscribe Subscribe to a syndicated feed of my weblog, brought to you by the wonders of RSS. Flavors There's more than one way to view this weblog; try these flavors on for size. index circa 1993 Sections main musings running DeLorean code unix album TBM Archives 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 Disclaimers, Copyrights, Privacy, Etc. ToS Copyrights Links olix0r.net netmeister.org Giraffes Eat. Run. Sleep.	02 Dec 2015 1449069975 https://www.instagram.com/p/-ywsdLrXFZ/ ================================================================== This mobile text message is brought to you by AT&T [/mobile] [permanent link]

Eponymous

	About My Infrequently Updated Blog. The web-based journal of M. Forde, computer nerd, endurance athlete, and DeLorean owner contact Subscribe Subscribe to a syndicated feed of my weblog, brought to you by the wonders of RSS. Flavors There's more than one way to view this weblog; try these flavors on for size. index circa 1993 Sections main musings running DeLorean code unix album TBM Archives 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 Disclaimers, Copyrights, Privacy, Etc. ToS Copyrights Links olix0r.net netmeister.org Giraffes Eat. Run. Sleep.	02 Oct 2009 Gmail and mutt I like mutt. Of all the mail clients I've used over the years, it sucks the least. It works well with my mail server. Despite having my own domain and mail server, I still use gmail for certain things; things I don't mind being retained for 3 years after I delete them, or more specifically, things I want retained for 3 years after I delete them. I don't like the gmail web interface. I find checking my gmail to be annoying because of this. I remembered gmail offering POP and IMAP. I figured I could use that to get my gmail. Shouldn't be too hard right? A quick search of Mr. Yahoo and Mr. Google gave me two good starting points: Lifehacker.com and MattCutts.com. I read the sites and the getmail man page and figured out what I needed to do. First I enabled IMAP for my gmail account. Next, I created the .getmail directory in my home directory then created a getmailrc file there. I want all gmail mail to be delivered to a specific mbox file without going through my normal mail delivery channels. The contents of the getmailrc file are quite simple: [retriever] type = SimpleIMAPSSLRetriever server = imap.gmail.com username = username@gmail.com password = usernamespasswordgoeshere mailboxes = ("inbox",) [destination] type = Mboxrd path = /usr/home/mforde/Mail/GMAIL The retriever section defines how getmail will retrieve the mail. In this case it uses IMAP over SSL to connect to imap.gmail.com. The mailboxes setting can be used to specify only certain gmail labels to retrieve, but I want anything in the inbox. The destination section tells getmail what to do with the mail once it has grabbed it from gmail. This configuration dumps it into an mbox file I've named GMAIL. I chose IMAP over POP because of the slightly-less-than-documented "feature" of gmail only allowing 99 messages at a time over POP. So to get the initial batch of 7000+ emails, I ran > getmail -vvv -l to get verbose output and to leave messages on the gmail server. When that was done I pointed mutt at the GMAIL mbox and like magic, there was my gmail, organized nicely in my terminal. Now, I want to check to get the latest mail fairly often, and I don't want to download messages already copied over. To accomplish this, I added a crontab to run every 10 minutes and invoke getmail -l -n -q This tells getmail to leave copies on the server, only get new messages it hasn't already retrieved, and be quiet about it. This has worked out well for me. If you're interested in setting up something like this, I highly recommend reading the article at matcutts.com. That article also links to several sample getmailrc files. [/unix] [permanent link] Happy Anniversary The Twilight Zone premiered 50 years ago tonight. Slashdot has a bit about it. [/musings] [permanent link]