Program for reading existing mail

oakley has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

I have seen loads of programs that use Net::POP3 and other misc things to *pop mail off of* servers to be read. I may be reading the docs wrong, or misunderstanding the whole POP3 concept and such, but that is the way I am taking it.

What I am curious of is this, is there an existing program anywhere that will read existing mail on a server? I have a linux server in which my mail ends up (surprise here) in /var/spool/mail/<username> - I just want to read that email, but have all the functionality of something like AtDot, Hotmail, YahooMail, and others... Basically, I want the whole being able to send, read, address book, etc, style of package

Does anyone know of such a program? If not, are there any recommendations for writing one?

Comment on Program for reading existing mail

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Re: Program for reading existing mail by ichimunki (Priest) on Jan 16, 2001 at 00:52 UTC
Try the CPAN repository at CPAN to see if there isn't a module for this sort of thing. There is MailTools. And Mail::Box looks like a good start on all the functionality. The mail in /spool/mail/<user> is all in plain text so you should be able to simply read the file, if nothing else.	[reply]
Re: Program for reading existing mail by AgentM (Curate) on Jan 16, 2001 at 03:49 UTC
A PerlMonk came up with the cool package NeoMail. It's ready to go in minutes. Give it a whirl. I think you're confused about POP and a web-based mail system. POP has a client-server relationship so the POP client downloads emails from the server. The Web-based thing may or may not involve POP but more usually does not since the web server can reside on the same server as the mail server, thus pulling them out the spool which is obviously faster. AgentM Systems nor Nasca Enterprises nor Bone::Easy nor Macperl is responsible for the comments made by AgentM. Remember, you can build any logical system with NOR.	[reply]
Re: Program for reading existing mail by lemming (Priest) on Jan 16, 2001 at 00:48 UTC
Well, you can often use pop on linux servers as well. Definitly, if it's your server. Update: There is a way if the server allows it, to leave the mail on the server. I know NS has a preference for that and the program fetchmail has an option as well.	[reply]
Re: Program for reading existing mail by Coyote (Deacon) on Jan 16, 2001 at 00:51 UTC
Are you looking for a mail client along the lines of Outlook, Eudora, Mutt, Pine, etc. or are you looking for a webmail style of program like Hotmail? ---- Coyote	[reply]
Re: Program for reading existing mail by oakley (Scribe) on Jan 16, 2001 at 00:55 UTC
Something like hotmail basically... just that it reads an existing file. Like I said, I may just not be understanding the intricate details of how POP3 works... The way I understand POP3, it removes the email from one server and locates it on the machine it's being popped to - well, my mail is already in place where I want it, and I currently am not checking any other servers... Sorry for such confusion...	[reply]
Re: Re: Program for reading existing mail by extremely (Priest) on Jan 16, 2001 at 01:29 UTC
Well it isn't perl but IMP may do what you want... -- $you = new YOU; honk() if $you->love(perl)	[reply]

AgentM Systems nor Nasca Enterprises nor Bone::Easy nor Macperl is responsible for the comments made by AgentM. Remember, you can build any logical system with NOR.