[fetchmail-users] Re: reasonable poll intervals (was: Re: Rotating the log file)

[Matthias A. <mat...@gm...>]

On Wed, 12 Jul 2006, Uli Zappe wrote:

> Am 11.07.2006 um 11:37 schrieb Matthias Andree:
> 
> >checking new mail every 3 minutes [is] abusive
> 
> Oooops!?! How so? I use 30 seconds as poll interval. Admittedly, most  
> of the people I know that use fetchmail use something between 60 and  
> 120 seconds, but personally I don't know anyone who would use an  
> interval longer than 120 seconds.

And I even considered warning of deamon intervals shorter than 5
minutes. In fact, with many sites, polling in shorter intervals just
earns you a lockout. And it's not like a polling interval of 5, 10 or 15
minutes made a real difference.

Trying short poll intervals with "keep" doesn't work too well either.

> >(if you need real-time delivery, either use IMAP with IDLE or SMTP  
> >or UUCP over TCP/IP
> 
> As far as I can see, none of these protocols is a functionally  
> identical replacement for fetchmail.

I don't claim they are.
In fact, SMTP and UUCP don't require fetchmail at all.

> I don't know IMAP more closely,  
> but to update the local mail client with regard to new emails, I  
> figure some constant polling must go on, too.

That's what IMAP's IDLE extension is for, with that, the client will be
notified of new messages without having to reconnect often.
Unfortunately, this works only well in 6.3.4 and only if fetchmail is
polling one account only.

-- 
Matthias Andree