Re: [notmuch] notmuch and imap [musing, no code :)]

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+Date: Tue, 15 Dec 2009 19:54:11 -0500\r
+From: Alec Berryman <alec@thened.net>\r
+To: David Bremner <david@tethera.net>\r
+Message-ID: <20091216005411.GA28199@thened.net>\r
+References: <87pr6gcuiu.fsf@pivot.cs.unb.ca>\r
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+Subject: Re: [notmuch] notmuch and imap [musing, no code :)]\r
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+\r
+David Bremner on 2009-12-15 08:05:13 -0400:\r
+\r
+> Recent discussions on IRC (I forget with whom, sorry), brought me back\r
+> to thinking about syncing notmuch with imap.  In addition to the flags\r
+> \Seen, \Answered, \Draft, \Deleted, and \Flagged, imap servers can\r
+> optionally support user defined keywords (i.e. tags). At least courier\r
+> and dovecot do.  These keywords are imap "atoms", which, without tracing\r
+> though the BNF [1] completely look like they can can have (ascii)\r
+> alphanumeric, and punctuation other than brackets, quotes and "%", "*".\r
+\r
+I am also very interested in syncing tags between computers.  I started\r
+implementing storage of tags in message headers.  It's has been done\r
+before - several mutt extensions and systems use X-Label.  This approach\r
+offers several advantages to notmuch dump/restore and IMAP flags:\r
+\r
+  - compatability: most mail clients can search on headers, so even if\r
+    you're not using notmuch full-time (squirrelmail? phone?), you can\r
+    get some benefit from it\r
+\r
+  - works with offlineimap without further effort: no new transport\r
+    mechanism required\r
+\r
+  - a migration path: text-based mail sorting tools like procmail can\r
+    easily set headers\r
+\r
+  - backups are easy: you can't miss backing up your tags because\r
+    they're in the messages\r
+\r
+There are security concerns (need to strip incoming messages of tags so\r
+no one tags your mail for you), privacy concerns (if you forward the\r
+entire message as an attachment, may want to strip tags), and space\r
+concerns (how many flags?), but I think they can be worked around.\r
+\r
+I haven't gotten very far with my implementation due to time\r
+constraints.  It reads tags fine, but I haven't implemented writing,\r
+which is the involved part.  I hope to get to this between Christmas and\r
+New Years, but who knows.\r
+\r