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I'm using Exim 4.72 and Dovecot 1.2.15 on Debian 6.0.9. Exim delivers emails to /home/username in a mbox file.

dovecot.conf

mail_location = mbox:~/:INBOX=/var/mail/%n

But -

dovecot -n

mail_location: maildir:~/.maildir

I can't recieve email to IMAP4 client (Thunderbird). Exim4 puts emails in my mbox file in my home directory.

dovecot.log

014-06-15 16:12:22 auth(default): Info: client in: AUTH 1   PLAIN   service=imap    lip=188.66.5.27 rip=83.139.155.115  lport=143   rport=51531
2014-06-15 16:12:22 auth(default): Info: client out: CONT   1   
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: client in: CONT    1   AGQuZnJpem5lcgBMb3IxMTExMTk3OCE=
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: passwd-file(d.frizner,83.139.155.115): lookup: user=d.frizner file=/etc/dovecot/dovecot.passwd
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: client out: OK 1   user=d.frizner
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: master in: REQUEST 1   18228   1
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: passwd-file(d.frizner,83.139.155.115): lookup: user=d.frizner file=/etc/dovecot/dovecot.passwd
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: master out: USER   1   d.frizner   uid=1001    gid=1001    home=/home/d.frizner
2014-06-15 16:12:23 imap-login: Info: Login: user=<d.frizner>, method=PLAIN, rip=83.139.155.115, lip=188.66.5.27
2014-06-15 16:12:23 auth(default): Info: new auth connection: pid=19868
2014-06-15 16:12:23 IMAP(d.frizner): Info: Effective uid=1001, gid=1001, home=/home/d.frizner
2014-06-15 16:12:23 IMAP(d.frizner): Info: maildir: data=~/.maildir
2014-06-15 16:12:23 IMAP(d.frizner): Info: maildir++: root=/home/d.frizner/.maildir, index=, control=, inbox=/home/d.frizner/.maildir
2014-06-15 16:12:24 IMAP(d.frizner): Info: Namespace : Using permissions from /home/d.frizner/.maildir: mode=0700 gid=-1

Any idea please?

Dimaf
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1 Answers1

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Before we begin, you should know that Debian frequently provides methods of reconfiguring your daemons using the dpkg-reconfigure command. You may be able to answer some questions during that reconfiguration process and solve your problem the Debian way. For dovecot, that command appears to be:

dpkg-reconfigure dovecot-common

I'll continue with the assumption that did not fix your problem.

First make sure that you are looking at the same file that dovecot is:

dovecot -n | head -n 1

Second, grep in that file for multiple mail_location specifications. I believe that it's not a syntax error for there to be more than one and it just uses one of them.

grep mail_location /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf

If you see more than one line that is uncommented, fix that.

Third, it is common for distros to use a modular approach when configuring daemons. They create a subdirectory that is searched for additional configuration files. Look in your dovecot.conf for something like:

!include conf.d/*.conf

I suspect there is a file in there that is setting/overriding your mail_location configuration, in opposition to what you are trying to do in /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf.

Why have this directory? Instead of modifying /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf every time you want to change or add something, you can simply drop a file in /etc/dovecot/conf.d/ named something.conf and it will import it when dovecot is restarted. The files are read in alphabetically according to filename, so it's also common to prefix the file with a two digit number, for example: 05-hosts.conf 29-maildirs.conf etc. So your configuration file is a skeleton with some basic configuration options, and the meat of the site specific configuration is in the conf.d/*.conf files.

Todd Lyons
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