Hello, In my search for a "perfect" offline IMAP client(TM) I have looked at isync vs mailsync.
Which one is better? Why is one better then the other? I have found that in fact both have limitations, so will describe the pros and cons here, in case in can help anybody else. I will not comment in detail the bug reports that have been filed for either package, to be fair you probably should read these, too. This is my first version of this, hopefully I haven't made too many mistakes... ISYNC: PROS - supports maildir. - fast, only needs to download messages that have changed. - supports reliably synchronisation of message flags, such as read, and previously read, important. - fast even if folder contains lots of messages that have already been transferred. CONS - supports only maildirs. IMHO, the use of maildirs in this application isn't really needed, and results in less efficient use of diskspace. - encodes message UID into the message filename, apparently this is against maildir specifications. - delete message on client => gets transfered again on next download. - create message on client => gets ignored by isync. MAILSYNC PROS: - supports bidirectional transfer of messages. - can delete deleted messages (not tested). - can create and delete folders (not tested). - could potentially support other services too, such as NNTP (doesn't work, see bug report). However, I imagine the slow down (see cons) would be large, as NNTP groups can be very large. CONS: - upstream author seems to be really anti-maildir, although maildir patches have been included in Debian version. - needs to retrieve the message-id of *every* message, which really slows the process down, especially on slow Internet link and/or if folder has lots of messages. - synchronisation of message flags doesn't work the way I would expect (bug has been reported). BOTH PROGRAMS: CONS: - no easy way to configure them to download messages in selected groups on remote server without duplicating a lot of configuration. I have filed bug reports on both programs, and supplied a patch to mailsync. - limited documentation. -- Brian May <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
