[kdepim-users] Staus KMail/Akonadi POP3/SMTP support

[Ingo Klöcker]

On Sunday 28 February 2010, Benjamin Traut wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> first of all, let me say a big *thank you* for KMail and KNode, I use
> these two programs since about eight years and never regretted it.
> 
> I am on a Gentoo ~amd64 notebook and I use Qt 4.6 live from the
> qting- edge-overlay and KDE4 live from the kde-overlay and had
> almost no problems using them since the KDE4-alpha days back then.

What is used for the kde-overlay? Stable KDE SC 4.4.x? Or bleeding edge 
which will become KDE SC 4.5?


> Currently I update "around" the KDE-PIM-Module (last update
> yesterday), because of the transition of KMail to Akonadi, sometimes
> I update akonadi-server and libkdepim (or kdepimlibs - don't
> remember exactly) and KMail as of mid-January still keeps
> functioning.
> 
> But since I had to switch from KNode to that slow, memory-consuming
> monster, that is Thunderbird (because KNode had stopped working with
> leafnode around December for whatever reason - if I find some time, I
> might send a mail or to about this problem as well), I think it might
> be time for me trying out Akonadi for mail and news.
> 
> From what I understand, this is most likely a one-way-road, so - in
> order to decide, whether or not that time has come - I need answers
> (or pointers to answers) for the following questions:
> 
>   a) I am using POP3 and SMTP for retrieving or sending eMail
> (possibly secured via SSL/TLS). Are those protocols already
> supported well enough in Akonadi?

SMTP is independent of Akonadi. As such, SMTP works perfectly. We do 
have an Akonadi-based mail dispatcher which will be used for sending 
mail. It is already included in KDE SC 4.4, but is not yet used.

I do not know the exact state of the POP3 Akonadi resource, but it 
should be rather stable already. Main development of this resource was 
finished months ago.


>   b) Is KMail2 currently in a working state? I don't mind a crash
> sometimes, but the basic things should work: Reading Mails, sending
> mails and so on.

AFAIK KMail2 is not in a working state. Thomas McGuire, KMail's 
maintainer, has explicitly warned all KDE developers (and everybody 
else) that KMail2 (i.e. the KMail in svn trunk) should not be used. He 
has not yet given an all-clear, so it's probably safe to assume that 
it's not yet safe to use KMail2 for real mail.


>   c) Does NNTP work and is KNode ported? For my News-consumption I
> now use (see above) Thunderbird and I like to switch back to KNode
> ASAP, but...

It is unclear whether KNode will be ported. One or two developers wanted 
to look into this, but it's a rather huge task. There is already an NNTP 
resource for Akonadi. Maybe we will simply add news support to KMail. Or 
a new lightweight Akonadi-based news client (sharing many components 
with KMail2) will be written. I think at the moment everything is 
possible. All that's needed is someone to do the actual work. The KDE 
PIM core developers currently focus fully on KMail2.


>   d) How do I upgrade? I know, that there must be the KMailCVT(?)-
> Program, but does it work for my setup or should I do it manually
> (how)?

There will be a migration tool. It does not yet exist.


> Reading the Techbase/Userbase/ML/Blog-articles I get the impression,
> that IMAP will work (and get converted) but POP3/SMTP is not
> automatically converted and might be unstable.

Then you are better informed than me who only follows the mailing lists 
and visits the occasional meeting. :-)


> Having said/asked this, what are the opinions of the PIM-developers?
> If the answer is s.th. like "Do an upgrade and you will know, what
> hell feels like!"

That's a very likely answer.


> I ask you to write a short article (hopefully
> distributed via planetkde or the dot) when KMail has become usable
> again for the most usual use-cases, so that people could give it a
> try without having to worry about their mails.

This will certainly happen.

I suggest visiting the #akonadi channel at irc.freenode.org to get some 
first-hand answers from the KDE PIM core developers currently working on 
KMail2.


Regards,
Ingo
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