Documentation - Email - Pine
Moving Mail From Pine to IMAP
Problem:
I have folders which I can see when I use pine, but I'd like to able to access them from Webmail or another mail program as well. What do I need to do?
Or
I just checked my mail with pine, now when I go to Webmail or another mail program, all of my messages are gone! Where did they go and how can I get them back?
Solution
By default, pine stores mail in a different location than is used by other NSIT supported mail clients. Users have a directory, IMAP, which is accessible by all mail clients, so the solution to the problems listed above is simply to move their mailboxes into that folder from their pine folders.
These instructions assume that you have successfully logged onto harper, our interactive-use server. If you need help doing this, we have instructions for logging into harper.
To transfer mail from the pine folders to the IMAP folders, you will have to use the "pineimap" command and enable a setting within the program for mass message transfer. If you type pineimap at the command prompt (instead of pine), it will enable access to the IMAP collections.
To move large groups of emails to another folder, you'll need to enable the aggregate command set. To do this, go into setup by pressing (S), then (C) for config. Look for
[ Advanced Command Preferences ]
[ ] enable-aggregate-command-set
Select enable-aggregate-command-set, and then set it by pressing the X key. Then exit, and save the changes.
Then to save messages into your IMAP collections, go into a folder of messages you want to transfer, and type the semi-colon (;) which will drop you into select mode. At this point you'll be able to select messages. Select all by pressing A. Then apply a command by pressing A, then press (S) to apply a save. It will then prompt you asking where to save the messages. To get to another collection, press ctrl-N> or ctrl-P. You'll probably want to change the collection to IMAP folders. Save the messages to a folder, and then the messages should be moved to your IMAP folders.
Repeat for each folder of messages you have under "Harper pine folders". This is necessary because there is no way to move folders between collections, only ways to move messages between collections. Once you've moved all the messages, simply check your mail from another mail program or Webmail and you should see all of the messages that were previously only viewable by pine.
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Last updated: 8/20/08