Attached to this message are the meeting notes I took from the IMAP/POP
presentation given by Peter Murray, Kent Covert, and John Harlan on January
26.
 
As a reminder, our next meeting is set for Wed. 2/23 at 1:30 in Room 2
Hughes.  Joe will present the MS Mail option.
 
Thanks,
 
Debi
 
 
<<<<<< Attached TEXT file follows >>>>>>
1-26-94                         Email Project
 
IMAP/POP - Peter Murray, Kent Covert, John Harlan
 
Pieces of the solution:
        1.  Directory Server "Qi" from Univ. of Ill. at Urbana/Champaign.
 
                Runs under UNIX.
                Kent working on port to VMS under Alpha.
 
        2.  Mail Redirection
 
                2 Types:
                        a) incoming mail o (everyone would have a common format
                             for an address.)
                        b)  outgoing - involves rewriting FROM address.
 
                Reads info from Qi to do readdressing.  People see same address                 no matter
where the message is coming from.  But -                                LISTSERV's depend on those
names.
 
        3. IMAP Post Office (POP)
 
                - Peter thinks IMAP technically is a better solution.
                - Client/Server mail relationship.  Think about MIME for enclosures
                - We may want to investigate a commercial solution, for support
reasons in the event of problems.
                -  Many different implementations are available in public domain.
 
Eudora is a POP client for the Macintosh.
 
<<Qi server (campus directory server with name, address, preferred email
address)>>
 
 
        POP                                     IMAP
- Client / Server                       - Client / Server
 
- mail is downloaded            - mail is stored on
  on client side                          on server side ( only message you read is
downloaded to local machine.
- Adv.: can play into
  portable network and
  download all messages;
  then can answer in
  stand-alone .
 
- Disadv:  if you connect from
  another station - messages are downloaded to that machine.
 
Requirement: *  Need to see if commercial ability to download to a portable
        and work when not connected to the client.
 
Attractive platform for IMAP Post Office is the Alpha - with user accounts
and space already allocated.
 
[  Where is the weak link in this structure?
        1.) Mail redirection is a critical box.
                might want a VMS machine to rewrite its own FROM address and            send to
internet directly rather than put the load on the mail          redirector.
 
        2.) IMAP Post Office - needs to provide for thousands of connections.
              Could have a machine dedicated to it , but could be in a cluster with
              OCEAN.
 
We can implement pieces of this.
 
Could add soft switch.  It would do the directory service, but it can't help
with SMTP mail.  Soft switch takes P-mail and MS mail directories and
synchronizes them.
 
Qi server, mail redirector, & IMAP P.O. could all be on the same machine.
 
All people have same address format.  Can query Qi to find matched.  Only one
client (Eudora) has query capability built in;  others have a query
application as a separate application. ( Okay for Windows clients, but not
convenient for DOS clients.)
 
Mailstorm 1.04 - IMAP client.  Doesn't appear to offer enclosures.
 
Eudora 1.41 - POP client.  Built-in Phone Client to query a Qi directory.
 
Wollongong Group - may be only one with IMAP clients for MAC, Windows &
UNIX.  Desirable - to have one vendor's product for support
                        purposes.
 
Notre Dame - uses Eudora for MAC and NEWPOP for DOS.
 
Can set POP client up not to delete messages from server once downloaded.
 
PINE - UNIX IMAP client - folders stored on server.
 
These don't have integrated filtering, but can build filtering rules from
another application.
 
POP - disadvantage - Must wait until all messages are downloaded.  If you get
a lot of mail this can be cumbersome.
 
PINE is getting Netnews integration so one can see a newsgroup as a mail
folder.
 
Where to go from here?
 
        Peter's suggestions:
 
                - look at MS mail solution next week.
                - Revise our requirements
                - Draft RFP without product names.
                        Prefer treatment to one
                        vendor with DOS, ... , clients
                        Miami reserves the right... list public domain products
                        that meet our specs.