Re: Programs to Receive and filter mail
* On 2007.05.11, in <20070512043105.GA14271@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
* "Charles Cazabon" <mutt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> In my experience, most people find configuring and using getmail easier. I
I actually found fetchmail much easier to configure than getmail, but
that's partly because I began using fetchmail many years ago, when it
was easier to configure than it is now. And in fact, it's not as much
that getmail was hard to configure as that it was hard to figure out
how to configure it. Once I knew the rules, it was pretty easy to do
correctly.
> think fetchmail's abominable security record will likely improve under
> its new maintainers (they actually have some technical credentials),
> but they're still saddled with the design decisions and some code from
> its ... ahem ... wild years.
I know this makes me a bad person, but I haven't been much bothered by
fetchmail's security. However, I've found it mind-bogglingly buggy
over the years in more mundane ways. Every now & then it just stops
downloading my mail -- dumps core and leaves messages piled up on
the server, such that I can only dig myself out with another tool.
And I only know it's happening when I stop getting mail from certain
sources/to certain destinations. I've upgraded to fix this many times,
but it's always happened again after a few more months. It's been very
frustrating.
A POP downloader is one of the rare terminal-mode programs that I really
don't care to know anything about or to look at the code for. I'll
never care about new features, and I'm happiest if I never have to
update it. I just want it to do its job quietly, quickly, and without
engaging me. On these points, getmail has been a success in the several
months I've been using it.
Also, if I do need to dig in, python is tasty. Although there are C
programs whose code I like very much, fetchmail's is not among them.
--
-D. dgc@xxxxxxxxxxxx, an Element of NSIT University of Chicago