Solved POP3 / gmail polling support
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So that I can set up a low-volume email account on a Cloudron-hosted domain, and then poll that account from Gmail (where most of my email is).
This has come up a number of times in the forums.
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If there was a down-vote facility, I would down vote this.
Nothing personal.
But the whole underlying point of Cloudron / self-host / FOSS is to escape the clutches of abusive BigTech.
Various posts elsewhere in forum about how to co-exist and maintain a Gmail capability. But they're just simply the wrong direction.There's nothing to fear and a lot to gain from leaving the dark side and getting Gmail free.
@nebulon and @girish and any one else in prioritising features and work, please do not divert effort into things like this. There are far more important features to be implemented and apps to be supported.
Just my 2p
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@timconsidine said in POP3 / gmail polling support:
But the whole underlying point of Cloudron / self-host / FOSS is to escape the clutches of abusive BigTech.
True to an extent, but keep in mind that not every SaaS tech company is "abusive" or "evil". Of course I think we'd all agree Google & Facebook are, haha, but not all of companies are that way. Also, not every tool / app has a competitive self-hosted alternative.
More importantly, at the heart of this feature request by the OP is simply the ask for including POP3 support in the Cloudron mail server functionality.
There can be legitimate needs/use-cases for needing to use POP3. While rarely used in most cases and is a poor protocol to use for mail clients that are both sending and receiving, there are some valid use-cases that would benefit from POP3 support. For example: I believe (but I may be a bit out of date knowing) that some hosted ticketing / support systems use POP3 access to a hosted support mailbox to turn them into tickets in their ticketing systems automatically. POP3 is more efficient than IMAP when it comes to checking for new mail, so often tools or services that only need to receive and not necessarily send (or send using a different SMTP server) will opt to support the use of POP3 only for their service.
While I'd never use POP3 personally as a user and have no need for POP3 in my workflows (yet) and would not care if it's added or not, I would caution denying any feature requests simply because "something something Google", lol, it's always important to look at the heart of the request and understand other use-cases that may add to the desire to have that feature added.
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Dustin Dauncey
www.d19.ca -
@d19dotca Yes, I understand and defer to your points.
Although I still feel time-limited Cloudron resource should NOT go on 'edge cases' like that. Why enable a bad way of doing things?
While I do accept the validity of the use cases you mention, I would still suggest that way of doing things is poor strategy. Email is an unreliable transport mechanism, and if there is a workflow involved, then something imapfilter or IFTTT or Zapier or n8n should be involved.
And really I was questioning (badly obviously) how GxxxL seems to brainwash all its users that somehow it is essential to their business processes, and/or that it has special features, and/or that its browser interface is so special that it is essential and nothing else will do.
I probably need therapy because just seeing the word GxxxL raises my blood pressure dangerously. Not just because of what it is or who they are or how abusive they are, but because they seem to hold back popular understanding of technology and tech solutions. They are not tech-enablers, they're tech-constrainers. On that basis alone, they should be nuked. The world would be a better place.</rant>
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@timconsidine said in POP3 / gmail polling support:
Why enable a bad way of doing things?
Again though, POP3 is not "bad" and there are legitimate use-cases for using POP3. I think you're just fixated on the Google aspect and immediately dismissing it, but that's not fair to other legitimate uses that are not "a bad way of doing things".
Remember too that not everyone has a choice in the tools they have to integrate with (sometimes those decisions are not our own), and so their hands are often tied and they're just trying to do the best they can with the tools they are required to use. POP3 is a valid email protocol, so it makes sense to add it - as time permits of course.
Naturally, I doubt the Cloudron team will invest heavily in any feature that very few people really want or would benefit from if it means extra functionality to support and debug from their side, etc.
I should add that I have no real skin in the game here since I don't have any need for POP3 myself (I also don't care if it is added though), I just think we can all benefit from being open minded, and recognizing other possible use-cases outside of just one stated use-case in particular that we may disagree with.
(with that said, I do agree with most of your rant on Google, haha)
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Dustin Dauncey
www.d19.ca -
@d19dotca Yes I agree with you.
The "open mind" is exactly what I am arguing for ... even though it's biting me in this specific instance.
The constraints you refer to are very real ... but come down to "bosses" being technically ignorant (that's the polite version of what I wrote and deleted).
I'll shut up now and get back in my box. -
I’ve been asking for POP3 support a couple of times as it allows to keep old email addresses alive without leaving your mail on the provider‘s server
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@necrevistonnezr forward and auto-delete on old server?
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It seems that if Cloudron would like to grow its user-base and ease the adoption of FOSS, then helping people migrate services they wish and being flexible on those they're not yet ready to bring over is a great way to do it.
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I have my Gmail mail forwarded to my Cloudron based email. IIRC, you can have the original copy be deleted on the Google side if you want too.
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@humptydumpty what do you use as the mail reader?
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@robi One is being imported into Roundcube and the other into Freescout.
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@humptydumpty ok thanks. Was hoping you had a more pleasant Gmail replacement
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@robi haha if I did, I would be calling out its name from the rooftops. The word "hate" isn't strong enough to describe my feeling for RC.
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@humptydumpty you try any Desktop clients instead?
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@robi I looked at some options before and the really nice ones either compromised on privacy or cost too much for what they offered. Thunderbird was the only choice for me last time I checked but I only use that now for managing my locally saved archived emails.
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@timconsidine said in POP3 / gmail polling support:
@necrevistonnezr forward and auto-delete on old server?
This is not an option with all providers, e.g. GMX.net or Web.de
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@necrevistonnezr No doubt but it'll work for the OP's specific use-case.
Btw, I'm voting yes for this feature simply because it'll open the door for others to migrate over to CR.
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@necrevistonnezr what about using imapfilter ?
I believe it can work with any mail provider to suck out and delete original host, and put it where you want -
@timconsidine said in POP3 / gmail polling support:
@necrevistonnezr what about using imapfilter ?
I believe it can work with any mail provider to suck out and delete original host, and put it where you wantThat’s an extra app that needs running. POP3 is still built in into most (all?) providers. It would allow easy migration as you could keep old email addresses as an empty but still reachable shell.
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POP3 support is quite easy to add. It's just some lines in dovecot config and some adjustments to the firewall.
Anyone know why gmail only supports only POP3 but not IMAP? After all one can fetch mails using IMAP and then delete the mail to get POP3 style functionality no?
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@necrevistonnezr True, but imapfilter ( or another workaround ) is here today for you to achieve what you want. Beats waiting for the feature you're asking for which might be available sometime soon, later .... or never.
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More things than gmail use pop3 - eg the Discourse
https://meta.discourse.org/t/configuring-reply-via-email/42026
https://forum.cloudron.io/topic/2409/discourse-and-incoming-email/23?_=1633594660752
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@girish so it improves interoperability, eases adoption hassles, and makes other Cloudron apps more functional ... if it's just a few lines of code, is there a blocker to rollout in the next release?
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@eddowding It's not a few lines of code.. but I am investigating because I want to add this at a per mailbox level and not for the whole server.
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I have enabled POP3 support in the next release.
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@girish WHOOP!!! Thank you!!
