[imapfilter-devel] IDLE and 'connection reset by peer'

[David DeSimone]

Lefteris Chatzimparmpas <lefcha at hellug.gr> wrote:
>
> That's interesting.  The 29 minutes select() timeout is there (and
> hard-coded) because the IMAP RFC specifies that servers MUST have an
> idle timeout of at least 30 minutes, and thus 29 minutes between
> refreshing IDLE is enough.  Apparently this server doesn't respect
> that.

The server probably is operating to standard, however, in today's
internet there are often other gateways and security devices between the
client and server, and they implement their own rules on how long
connections can stay idle.

In particular there are many NAT gateways which will drop session state
for any sessions that are idle for more than a few short minutes.  This
impacts many protocols, like SSH, telnet, anything that expects the
connection to stay active even if no data is flowing in either
direction.  IMAP when using IDLE fits this description, as well.

So, it is probably not the server's fault, but another device along the
path, and imapfilter would do well to become more flexible in letting the
user work around such brokenness.

-- 
David DeSimone == Network Admin == fox at verio.net
  "I don't like spinach, and I'm glad I don't, because if I
   liked it I'd eat it, and I just hate it." -- Clarence Darrow


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