From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Msuck: nntp://news.gmane.io/gmane.emacs.gnus.general/5430 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Stainless Steel Rat Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.gnus.general Subject: Re: Request for "maildir" support Date: 04 Mar 1996 10:21:20 -0500 Organization: The Happy Fun Ball Brigade Message-ID: References: <87ag1xj7hh.fsf@smart.ruhr.de> NNTP-Posting-Host: coloc-standby.netfonds.no X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1035146034 32764 80.91.224.250 (20 Oct 2002 20:33:54 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 20 Oct 2002 20:33:54 +0000 (UTC) Return-Path: ding-request@ifi.uio.no Original-Received: from ifi.uio.no (ifi.uio.no [129.240.64.2]) by deanna.miranova.com (8.7.3/8.6.9) with SMTP id IAA17236 for ; Mon, 4 Mar 1996 08:05:27 -0800 Original-Received: from amber.ccs.neu.edu (root@amber.ccs.neu.edu [129.10.111.100]) by ifi.uio.no with ESMTP (8.6.11/ifi2.4) id for ; Mon, 4 Mar 1996 16:21:39 +0100 Original-Received: from delphi.ccs.neu.edu (ratinox@delphi.ccs.neu.edu [129.10.112.101]) by amber.ccs.neu.edu (8.7.1/8.7.1) with ESMTP id KAA19485 for ; Mon, 4 Mar 1996 10:21:31 -0500 (EST) Original-Received: (ratinox@localhost) by delphi.ccs.neu.edu (8.6.12/8.6.4) id KAA25874; Mon, 4 Mar 1996 10:21:31 -0500 Original-To: "(ding) Gnus Mailing List" In-reply-to: tom@smart.ruhr.de's message of 04 Mar 1996 14:47:06 +0100 X-Attribution: Rat Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.gnus.general:5430 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.gnus.general:5430 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- >>>>> "TN" == Thomas Neumann writes: TN> qmail features a new mailbox format called "maildir", which is TN> different from std. UNIX mailbox files, different from MH folders TN> and different from whatever you care to name. So much for standards :). [...] TN> Secure: Security isn't just a goal, but an absolute requirement. Mail TN> delivery is critical for users; it cannot be turned off, so it must be TN> completely secure. (This is why I started writing qmail: I was sick of TN> the security holes in sendmail and other MTAs.) I would suggest someone inform this person about Eric Allman's v8 sendmail, 8.7, which is about as secure and reliable as you can get these days. And, when a weakness is found a patch is made available immediately. [...] TN> Even better, not only can a user safely read his mail over NFS, but TN> any number of NFS clients can deliver mail to him at the same time. Ahem. This is bullshit. NFS is infamous for it's inability to do exactly this, and no matter what you do to get around it you will still have file locking problems somewhere if you attempt to read the same mailbox or file from two different points. TN> Efficient: On a Pentium under BSD/OS, qmail can easily sustain TN> 200000 local messages per day---that's separate messages injected TN> and delivered to mailboxes in a real test! Now, how many Intel boxes are going to have 1000 users on it? Or who in their right mind uses an Intel box for a mail hub? Besides, anyone with a modicum of clues running large mailing lists uses a caching MTA like v8 sendmail with bulk_mailer, which I have found to work exceptionally well. [...] TN> Simple: qmail is vastly smaller than any other Internet MTA. Some TN> reasons why: (1) Other MTAs have separate forwarding, aliasing, and TN> mailing list mechanisms. qmail has one simple forwarding mechanism TN> that lets users handle their own mailing lists. Users handle their own mailing lists != "simple", from my experience both as a Majordomo list and server administrator. TN> (2) Other MTAs offer a spectrum of delivery modes, from fast+unsafe TN> to slow+queued. qmail-send is instantly triggered by new items in TN> the queue, so the qmail system has just one delivery mode: TN> fast+queued. Besides, v8 sendmail gives you the best of both worlds, allowing fast and safe "immediate" delivery or queued based on machine load. TN> (3) Other MTAs include, in effect, a specialized version of inetd TN> that watches the load average. v8 sendmail does it internally. All you need to do is configure a couple of options in sendmail.cf And then there's simple fact that in a "unified" system if one little thing breaks the whole thing goes down, whereas in an "modular" system if the mailing list manager breaks you can take it down without entirely disabling mail. TN> qmail's design inherently limits the machine load, so qmail-smtpd TN> can safely run from your system's inetd. Try this when your machine's load is up around 6, you have "fast+unsafe" as the default, and you get about 200 messages from a batch somewhere, and honestly tell me that your machine isn't going to throttle itself. This whole thing reminds me a lot of SMail and how it absolutely failed in many ways to "fix" perceived "problems" in sendmail. Not that I am saying that the format should not be supported, just that I will stick with an MTA that is written and maintained by someone I know knows to write and support a reliable, secure MTA. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3 Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBMTsKcZ6VRH7BJMxHAQGNkgP/X3dA5pwuvsJnl5p6vsJxwVvlpBQM9igE lEAXBfhYH1OkvGB8+kzlqy5xic1IGPtioyq2tTu2pLCj+AO5ZiJL+FEYkIsgh8nW +t7yiH221nc3m+l0REX/5emAeiVWu3fJo0V32L/whjOKKnIC6lGSBQ69OfY4MSIU rcS3ogfjIEg= =mHV8 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- Rat \ When not in use, Happy Fun Ball should be PGP Public Key: Ask for one today! \ returned to its special container and http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/ratinox/ \ kept under refrigeration.