Need some kind of central mail system.

[Vyruz]

HI,

I'm using the email account provided by my provider, it uses a pop3 server.
Problem is, when i download my mails from that server, they're gone, and only visible on the computer i've downloaded them on.
I'd like to have them visible on several computers (laptop, desktop, PDA , maybe even a web-interface).

Currently i'm using mozille thunderbird as mail client, and i've tried to copy TB's mail database (local folderS) onto my network server, and then have my clients (laptop and desktop mainly) use the same database over a network share.
This worked well for about two weeks, but then ended up in a corrupted database (probably 2 clients using it at the same time or something).
So i need something more professional for this.

I've been looking into MS exchange server, but that seems a bit too much of a hassle just to be able to view my mails from everywhere...

So i'm asking whether someone has an idea about how to fix this...

cheers

 

[Drakkon]

look into if your provider gives you IMAP access...that leaves messages on the server until you tell it to purge them and doesnt download to any machine. Can still be viewed through thunderbird/outlook/etc

 

[corkyg]

Yes - in your email program (Outlook Express, Eudora, Etc.,) you can specify that mail will be left on the server for a specified period of days. During that time, it can be accessed by your authorized name and password from other machines.

A work around is to download the mail then forward it to yourself and it is back on the server's POP3 account.

 

[cleverhandle]

The complete and elegant solution to the problem is going to involve a more server-centric email system, like IMAP or Exchange. Like Drakkon suggested, check with your provider first to see if they offer IMAP, though I'm not sure many ISP's do.

If your ISP can't help you, then you're looking at setting up your own server. That wouldn't need to be a full-fledged mail server, though - all it would do is hook up to your ISP and download your POP messages into a mailbox. So any PC's or other mail clients would then use your new server for the "incoming mail server" but still use your ISP's SMTP server for outgoing.

As you said, you can definitely do this in Exchange. You can also do just as well in Linux, using fetchmail and your choice of IMAP daemon (I recommend Courier-IMAP). That would probably be a bit more work than Exchange, though not too much since you wouldn't be dealing with the messiness of setting up a "real" SMTP server. I would put it at about a "3" on the Linux difficulty scale (out of 10). There may be other options on Windows as well that I'm unfamiliar with, but Exchange or Linux IMAP would probably give you the most flexibility.

 

[GullyFoyle]

Consider switching to Gmail.

 

[Vyruz]

A seperate mailserver seems to much of a hassle to get this done.
I will try and see how Gmail works out.
in the meantime other ideas are welcome

 

[Zugzwang152]

I don't know of a free or ISP account that gives out free IMAP access.

I would suggest POP with the "leave a copy on server" option. Your changes won't synchronize between the online and local copies, but it's the easiest way to set up. Unfortunately, there is no way for you to get your already downloaded messages back up easily without IMAP.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: DanDeighan
Consider switching to Gmail.

Which only offers pop

 

[QED]

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: DanDeighan
Consider switching to Gmail.

Which only offers pop

I think he means just use GMail's web interface. You can access it from any machine with Internet access and you don't need to set up your own mail server to use it.

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: DanDeighan
Consider switching to Gmail.

Which only offers pop

But seems to work like Imap (All my messages download once on my main client, yet all are still in the Web interface)

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: nweaver

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: DanDeighan
Consider switching to Gmail.

Which only offers pop

But seems to work like Imap (All my messages download once on my main client, yet all are still in the Web interface)

I don't believe you can get them from multiple desktop clients though, which was his original requirement. Gmail's all fine and good, but I'd much rather run my own imap server and just move mail from various accounts into it and use desktop muas.