From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jan 2 15:55:13 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4D8D716A419 for ; Wed, 2 Jan 2008 15:55:13 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from mail.potentialtech.com (internet.potentialtech.com [66.167.251.6]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1E2B113C461 for ; Wed, 2 Jan 2008 15:55:13 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from vanquish.pitbpa0.priv.collaborativefusion.com (pr40.pitbpa0.pub.collaborativefusion.com [206.210.89.202]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mail.potentialtech.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id EEE5BEBC3B; Wed, 2 Jan 2008 10:55:11 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2008 10:55:11 -0500 From: Bill Moran To: Chuck Robey Message-Id: <20080102105511.d4f5470b.wmoran@potentialtech.com> In-Reply-To: <477AA507.1090000@chuckr.org> References: <477AA507.1090000@chuckr.org> X-Mailer: Sylpheed 2.4.7 (GTK+ 2.12.1; i386-portbld-freebsd6.2) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: FreeBSD Questions Mailing List Subject: Re: Howcome mail deletion time varies? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2008 15:55:13 -0000 In response to Chuck Robey : > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > I use, for my imap-based mail, a combination of postfix, dovecot, > thunderbird, enigmail (for gnupg), and openssl for browser security. When > I delete mail messages, the majority of them delete (what seems to me to > be) instantaneously, but a small minority of mails takes quite a bit > longer, about maybe 20 seconds. Any idea what might be occurring on those > mails, to trigger this really long delete time? In my experience, this is most commonly caused by network glitches. Keep in mind that most (perhaps all?) mailers do not delete an email in a single step. Have a look at how Sylpheed deletes an email on a Cyrus-IMAP server: [10:49:24] IMAP4> 2697 UID COPY 137056 INBOX.TrashDontDelete [10:49:25] IMAP4< 2697 OK [COPYUID 1181242467 137056 39152] COPY completed. [10:49:25] IMAP4> 2698 UID STORE 137056 +FLAGS.SILENT (\Deleted) [10:49:25] IMAP4< 2698 OK STORE completed. [10:49:25] IMAP4> 2699 EXPUNGE [10:49:25] IMAP4< * 258 EXPUNGE [10:49:25] IMAP4< * 257 EXISTS [10:49:25] IMAP4< * 0 RECENT [10:49:25] IMAP4< 2699 OK EXPUNGE completed [10:49:25] IMAP4> 2700 STATUS INBOX.TrashDontDelete (MESSAGES RECENT UIDNEXT UIDVALIDITY UNSEEN) [10:49:25] IMAP4< * STATUS "INBOX.TrashDontDelete" (MESSAGES 39146 RECENT 0 UIDNEXT 39153 UIDVALIDITY 1181242467 UNSEEN 26099) [10:49:25] IMAP4< 2700 OK STATUS Completed. This is a lot of back/forth between the two systems. If you network is busy or lossy, you could easily get an odd delay in the overall process. So, I'd start by investigating/ruling out network issues first. Second, if the server in question is doing other things (it looks like it is from your post) then you never know when an incoming email via postfix has something locked, or the drives are busy, etc. So, if your network investigations come up empty, you may want to investigate just what's going on with this machine and whether it may be more heavily loaded than you think. -- Bill Moran http://www.potentialtech.com