mutt, courier imap and 10.000+ messages -> fatal error: atom size too small

[Michal Vitecek <fuf+mutt@xxxxxxxx>]

hello everyone,

i'm using mutt 1.5.12 which is configured to work on an IMAP server 
running courier-imap daemon. when working on many messages (cca 10.000) 
in a single operation (like D ~b some-text to delete all messages with 
body containing "some-text") i get the following error:

Fatal error: atom size too small: file exists.

from googling the internet i learnt the problem is caused by the email 
client sending too many message UIDs in a single request and the IMAP 
server accepting lesser number of them. is there any configuration 
option or patch which can make mutt split operations on large number of 
messages into several operations?

as a sidenote: deleting 10.000+ messages in thunderbird doesn't trigger 
this error.

        thanks in advance for any pointer,
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                fuf                                     (fuf@xxxxxxxx)