Re: Maildir backend

[prj@po.cwru.edu (Paul Jarc)]

Jérôme Marant <jerome.marant@fr.thalesgroup.com> wrote:
>   I mean that it creates a .nnmaildir directory in the mail box
>   directory.

Right...

>   And it seems that all files from the cur directory
>   are duplicated there.

No.  Different files with similar names are created there.

>   Why aren't directories new, cur and tmp plus a marks file (a kind
>   of index file used to store the status of messages) enough to
>   handle maildir ?

new/, cur/, and tmp/ alone would be enough to provide the necessary
Gnus functionality.  nnmaildir maintains two additional sets of
information: NOV data and marks.  Storing NOV data speeds things up.
Storing marks adds flexibility when working with mailboxes from
outside Gnus.  Storing marks in a single file per group, as is done
with nnml and nnfolder (which I assume is what you were referring to
above), would also add flexibility, but not as much.  If we give up
the extra flexibility, what do we get in return?


paul