Re: Make gnus-agent another mail backend?

[Harry Putnam <reader@newsguy.com>]

prj@po.cwru.edu (Paul Jarc) writes:

> Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> wrote:
>> prj@po.cwru.edu (Paul Jarc) writes:
>>> Could the Agent be changed to use a normal mail backend for its
>>> storage?
>>
>> It does -- nnagent is just a layer on top of nnml.
>
> Are the nnml groups exposed so they could be used like normal nnml
> groups?  Would it do any harm to remove or edit articles in those
> groups?  Could nnagent use a user-specified backend instead of always
> nnml?

I tried to outline a method without knowing doodoo about how any of it
works so may be way off the wall, but it seems one could intervene
directly in the agent download and syphon those incoming messages into
an existing mail backend.  Nnmaildir may be the best candidate,
because of the robustness of its way of taking in new messages.  And
generating nov as needed.  Ditto when the messages leave town. (are
deleted)

Maybe at first just copying them over, and leaving them to go to  the
normal agent as well.  It would mean parallel (duplicate) files but
only until agent-expiry axed the agent ones.  And would allow some
experimentation until a fuller implementation with no duplication
could be worked out.

Maybe about the same thing Lars suggested with Cache, except does
cache allow all the mail backend stuff, like editing etc and
convoluted (read advanced) expiry.