[Dovecot] Move deleted to trash

[Timo Sirainen]

On 25.7.2007, at 16.02, Donald Nash wrote:

> I do have to point out that you didn't actually answer my  
> question. :-) You originally asserted as fact that a server-managed  
> trash folder is evil from IMAP's point of view.  However, when  
> asked to explain this, you changed from an assertion of fact to a  
> statement of personal preference: "I hate the move-to-Trash feature."
>
> Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say that your opinion is  
> wrong, nor am I trying to brow-beat you into implementing something  
> you don't think should be implemented.  I'm just curious to know  
> what your motivation is. Why is it evil?  Why do you hate it?

EXPUNGE command is specified to expunge the mails, not move them to  
another mailbox. This would make having the message really gone a 4  
stage operation: Mark deleted, expunge, mark deleted in Trash,  
expunge Trash.

In many clients when you mark a message deleted it also copies it to  
Trash. So a server side expunge-to-trash feature causes the message  
to get copied there twice.

A Trash mailbox also has the problem that all of your messages get  
there. There's no way to have an easy "unexpunge" operation, because  
the original mailbox isn't saved anywhere. You have to manually copy  
the message to the wanted mailbox.

Perhaps lazy-expunge is a bit similar, but it preserves the mailboxes  
and doesn't conflict with clients' move-to-Trash feature. Also the  
concept in general is about having easily restorable backups of mails  
and not some kind of a idea that mails should go to a Trash mailbox  
when they're deleted.

Maybe that whole Trash concept is the reason I consider it evil. I  
don't like that Trash concept in desktop environments either. I wish  
the undelete feature was in filesystems, so that when disk is full,  
the oldest deleted files would automatically get overwritten with new  
data, but until then the files would be undeletable.

>> I think having a virtual Trash mailbox that contained all messages  
>> marked
>> as deleted in all mailboxes would be a good solution for this.
>
> That's not quite the same thing.  All the trash folders I've seen  
> are for messages which have been expunged from other folders, not  
> just marked for deletion.  It's to give you one last chance to  
> retrieve a message that you realize shouldn't have been deleted.

I think I'd prefer the lazy-expunge way for that more than having  
everything go to Trash. The virtual Trash would make client-side  
"delete=mark deleted + copy to Trash" feature unnecessary.

>> It's not a requirement to subscribe to post. The messages to go to
>> moderation queue and I approve them from there.
>
> Quoting from your web site:
>
>      * You can post to the list without subscribing. The mail then  
> waits
>        in a moderator queue. However a lot of spam arrives there,  
> so it's
>        possible that your message gets accidentally discarded as spam.
>
> I didn't want to take a chance on my message getting lost in the  
> spam.  If you want, I will join the mailing list and we can replay  
> this discussion there so everyone else can benefit from it.

Well, I Cc'd the list now.

>   I hadn't anticipated that it would evolve into this much of a  
> discussion (I was hoping for a simple "It's evil because of X, Y,  
> and Z" sort of answer), or I would have done that in the first place.

Evilness is subjective. :)
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: PGP.sig
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 186 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
Url : http://dovecot.org/pipermail/dovecot/attachments/20070725/fee1121e/attachment.bin