How can I combine Popfile (SMTP) with custom email processing rules on Dovecot?

Question

I host my own mail server using Postfix and Dovecot on a virtual ubuntu server. In order to keep on top of my inbox, I use Popfile on the server to sort emails into categorized folders in my IMAP mailbox.

Now I want to forward all email that Popfile puts into that specific folder to somebody else. As far as I unterstand it, a filtering framework such as Sieve evaluates the processing rules only on delivery.

Is it possible to somehow make the server watch a folder for emails to refilter? Or is there another elegant approach to solve my problem that I have not considered yet?

Answer 1

While it is possible to do this unnatural thing you are asking for (i.e. rerunning dovecot local delivery on messages in a Maildir folder to force reprocessing of those messages by Sieve), the "elegant approach" would be getting rid of Popfile altogether and replacing it with spamassassin for spam detection and Sieve scripts for the rest of your sorting rules.

If you insist on redelivering a message the command is:

/usr/lib/dovecot/deliver -d <mailbox_name> -p <path_to_the_message_file>

to redeliver all messages in IMAP folder "Filtered" of user "john":

find /home/john/Maildir/.Filtered/cur/ -type f -exec /usr/lib/dovecot/deliver -d john -p {} \;

Answer 2

This thread is so old but I do have something to pass on to Jannik. Popfile does not direct any email to any folders. All it does is put a classification tag in the email. Something else directs the mail to a folder. Whatever you are using to filter on that popfile tag should be instructed to do the forwarding of the mail elsewhere rather than to the folder the mail is presently being directed to.