Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

Gmail's IMAP server says "System Error (Failure)"

287 views
Skip to first unread message

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 4:05:36 PM10/17/08
to
I am laughing myself silly at the recent Gmail outages, including reports
that CEOs, etc. are finding themselves unable to access their mail for
extended periods of time.

Right now, Gmail's IMAP server is either rejecting connections, or
returning the wonderfully informative error message "System Error
(Failure)". That's almost as good as Apple's "Unknown error (-4)".

I suspect that there will be more such incidents as more and more
organizations outsource their email to the cloud. Sometimes "free"
services are worth exactly what you paid for them; and sometimes they are
worth less.

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

Daniil Baturin

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 5:12:31 PM10/17/08
to
Hello!
Is your client configured corectly?
Gmail has non-standart ports, for example.
See http://mail.google.com/support/bin/topic.py?topic=12806

Sam

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 6:29:27 PM10/17/08
to
Mark Crispin writes:

> I suspect that there will be more such incidents as more and more
> organizations outsource their email to the cloud. Sometimes "free"
> services are worth exactly what you paid for them; and sometimes they are
> worth less.

Except that the outages affected mostly "Google Apps Premium Edition"
services, which are actually paid for.

Getting that, out of the way -- I am not surprised. It's just the logical
evolution of a more general outsourcing trend that began some time ago, in
IT in general, and specifically in my little neighborhood. The first time I
heard a pimp complain to me about being killed by all the offshore
"consultants" was actually twelve years ago.

Well, in my little corner, we've already figured out what I immediately
understood many years ago -- that outsourcing isn't all that it's cracked to
be, and it only really works in certain, very narrow, niche areas. There's
no replacement for having someone in the office who knows what they're
doing, and can fix it himself. So, I'll just watch, from the sidelines, as
software-as-a-service goes through the same outsourcing fad, and enjoy the
spectacle.


Sam

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 6:34:13 PM10/17/08
to
Daniil Baturin writes:

Once you finish reading http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10068189-93.html,
I'll give you the paper bag you'll need to wear over your head, for at least
a week, as punishment for choosing to completely ignore what 95% of the
message you've replied to actually says, or without even understanding what
it said, and for not knowing how to properly quote replies to Usenet
messages.

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 6:34:38 PM10/17/08
to
On Sat, 18 Oct 2008, Daniil Baturin posted:

Yes, the client is configured correctly. The problem was definitely a
Gmail outage, and it did eventually clear up.

On another note: if Mark Crispin says that an IMAP server has a problem,
it is a reasonably good assumption that the server does, indeed, have a
problem.

The Gmail IMAP server has problems. It fails to implement some mandatory
aspects of the IMAP specification. It incorrectly implements other parts
of the IMAP specification, both by returning incorrect data and in
incorrect results.

Google decided that Outlook was the only IMAP server that mattered, and
designed the Gmail IMAP server to make Outlook behave like the Gmail web
interface, without regard for the fact that doing so causes problems for
other clients.

It has become painfully clear that Google will not fix any of the
problems. They simply do not care as long as it is "good enough" to
support Outlook.

Now, on top of that, Gmail is experiencing outages. In addition to my
report, there are reports in the industry press, e.g.,
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9117322
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9112378

Google wants the world to believe that its "cloud" outsourcing services
are robust and reliable, and that organizations should shut down their
internal services in favor of Google's serves.

Email and other networking applications are mission critical. Google
claims that they are qualified, competant, and prepared to provide such
service. I feel that they should be held accountable to fufill their
claims.

Or, put another way: this bed is of their own making, and they should be
made to sleep in it.

Because if they don't fufill their promises, there are competitors who
will.

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 17, 2008, 7:05:41 PM10/17/08
to
On Fri, 17 Oct 2008, Sam posted:

> Well, in my little corner, we've already figured out what I immediately
> understood many years ago -- that outsourcing isn't all that it's cracked to
> be, and it only really works in certain, very narrow, niche areas. There's no
> replacement for having someone in the office who knows what they're doing,
> and can fix it himself. So, I'll just watch, from the sidelines, as
> software-as-a-service goes through the same outsourcing fad, and enjoy the
> spectacle.

Truer words are rarely spoken.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 20, 2008, 11:02:31 AM10/20/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Sat, 18 Oct 2008, Daniil Baturin posted:
>> Hello!
>> Is your client configured corectly?
>> Gmail has non-standart ports, for example.
>> See http://mail.google.com/support/bin/topic.py?topic=12806
>
> Yes, the client is configured correctly. The problem was definitely a
> Gmail outage, and it did eventually clear up.
>
> On another note: if Mark Crispin says that an IMAP server has a problem,
> it is a reasonably good assumption that the server does, indeed, have a
> problem.

Mark Crispin also feels that having to switch between collection lists in
pine to see your IMAP inbox vs. other folders is intelligent.

Mark Crispin has zero grasp of software usability.

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 20, 2008, 1:43:49 PM10/20/08
to
On Mon, 20 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:

> Mark Crispin also feels that having to switch between collection lists in
> pine to see your IMAP inbox vs. other folders is intelligent.

It's always amusing to observe sophomores bloviate on subjects which they
know not, and in particular when they jump to considerable leaps of
illogic.

I wrote none of the user interface in Pine. I deserve neither credit, nor
blame, for that user interface.

> Mark Crispin has zero grasp of software usability.

I have similar opinions about the user interfaces preferred by today's
children, especially diagnostics such as "System Error (Failure)" from
Gmail and "Unknown error (-4)" from Macintosh.

outsider

unread,
Oct 21, 2008, 4:08:46 PM10/21/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote in
news:alpine.OSX.2.00.0...@hsinghsing.panda.com:


> I have similar opinions about the user interfaces preferred by today's
> children, especially diagnostics such as "System Error (Failure)" from
> Gmail

Hey, nothing wrong here. At least we know they consider failure to be an
error.

Andy

Joel Reicher

unread,
Oct 21, 2008, 4:33:45 PM10/21/08
to
Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> writes:

> Mark Crispin also feels that having to switch between collection lists in
> pine to see your IMAP inbox vs. other folders is intelligent.

Switching between collection lists to view INBOX or other folders is
not necessary; you must have your collection lists misconfigured.

Cheers,

- Joel

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 27, 2008, 2:03:41 PM10/27/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 20 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
>> Mark Crispin also feels that having to switch between collection lists in
>> pine to see your IMAP inbox vs. other folders is intelligent.
>
> It's always amusing to observe sophomores bloviate on subjects which they
> know not, and in particular when they jump to considerable leaps of
> illogic.
>
> I wrote none of the user interface in Pine. I deserve neither credit, nor
> blame, for that user interface.
>
>> Mark Crispin has zero grasp of software usability.
>
> I have similar opinions about the user interfaces preferred by today's
> children, especially diagnostics such as "System Error (Failure)" from
> Gmail and "Unknown error (-4)" from Macintosh.

I don't use macs or gmail. I agree that both are stupid though.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 27, 2008, 2:06:27 PM10/27/08
to

Is this new in the past couple years?

If you dig around archives of this group you can see that it wasn't and
this behavior was defended as making sense, and that every other mail
client was in fact wrong to display either the IMAP inbox itself or it's
contents at the same level as other IMAP folders, according to a guy that
refers to himself in third person.


Joel Reicher

unread,
Oct 28, 2008, 12:07:52 AM10/28/08
to
Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> writes:

> Joel Reicher <jo...@panacea.null.org> wrote:
> > Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> writes:
> >
> >> Mark Crispin also feels that having to switch between collection lists in
> >> pine to see your IMAP inbox vs. other folders is intelligent.
> >
> > Switching between collection lists to view INBOX or other folders is
> > not necessary; you must have your collection lists misconfigured.
>
> Is this new in the past couple years?

I've no idea. I've never been a regular user of Pine or Alpine; when I
have need of a quick IMAP client installation on a Windows machine for
testing or temporary access I use them, but that's about it.

> If you dig around archives of this group you can see that it wasn't and
> this behavior was defended as making sense, and that every other mail
> client was in fact wrong to display either the IMAP inbox itself or it's
> contents at the same level as other IMAP folders, according to a guy that
> refers to himself in third person.

I can't see what you're trying to achieve. If you want to engage in a
general discussion of mail client UI design then it might be best to
quote or follow-up the posts you're referring to. Alternatively if you
want to make a request to the Alpine development group then posting to
their mailing list might be best.

Cheers,

- Joel

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 28, 2008, 12:17:07 AM10/28/08
to
On Mon, 27 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:

> If you dig around archives of this group you can see that it wasn't and
> this behavior was defended as making sense, and that every other mail
> client was in fact wrong to display either the IMAP inbox itself or it's
> contents at the same level as other IMAP folders, according to a guy that
> refers to himself in third person.

Digging around in the archives of this group comes up with your behavior
last winter. You misrepresented what people tried to explain to you,
acted like a know-it-all in spite of utter cluelessness, and generally
made an ass of yourself.

Try to control yourself. You'd do better by listening, trying to
understand, and not mouthing off.

Another piece of friendly advice: if you expect to be taken seriously in a
technical forum, use your real name. Pseudonyms may be appropriate when
talking about "warez" with other "kewl d00dz", but are non-professional in
adult company.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 28, 2008, 10:25:31 AM10/28/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 27 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
>> If you dig around archives of this group you can see that it wasn't and
>> this behavior was defended as making sense, and that every other mail
>> client was in fact wrong to display either the IMAP inbox itself or it's
>> contents at the same level as other IMAP folders, according to a guy that
>> refers to himself in third person.
>
> Digging around in the archives of this group comes up with your behavior
> last winter. You misrepresented what people tried to explain to you,
> acted like a know-it-all in spite of utter cluelessness, and generally
> made an ass of yourself.

So tell me, can I view on one screen my IMAP inbox as well as all my
other folders in alpine, or pine, without changing collection lists?

> Try to control yourself. You'd do better by listening, trying to
> understand, and not mouthing off.
>
> Another piece of friendly advice: if you expect to be taken seriously in a
> technical forum, use your real name. Pseudonyms may be appropriate when
> talking about "warez" with other "kewl d00dz", but are non-professional in

I'm not sure what "warez" or "kewl d00dz" are supposed to be, but if you
want to taken seriously, not changing subjects when asked a fairly simple
question helps.

So, today, is it possible to have pine/alpine act like a normal mail
client yet?

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 28, 2008, 10:52:35 AM10/28/08
to
On Tue, 28 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:

> So tell me, can I view on one screen my IMAP inbox as well as all my
> other folders in alpine, or pine, without changing collection lists?

Yes.

That has always been the case.

Your problems are self-inflicted.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 11:37:59 AM10/29/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 28 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
>> So tell me, can I view on one screen my IMAP inbox as well as all my
>> other folders in alpine, or pine, without changing collection lists?
>
> Yes.
>
> That has always been the case.

bullshit

Even the Nancy person here mentioned running two copies of pine at once so
they could see their inbox and their folders without having to change
collection lists and navigate all over the place when using IMAP.


Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 12:37:48 PM10/29/08
to
On Wed, 29 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:

> bullshit
>
> Even the Nancy person here mentioned running two copies of pine at once so
> they could see their inbox and their folders without having to change
> collection lists and navigate all over the place when using IMAP.

Sigh. Not only do you lack a clue, but you are immune from receiving one.

Do you still believe that synchronization is solved by mail forwarding?
You did last winter, when you last made an ass of yourself in this
newsgroup.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 3:30:45 PM10/29/08
to
Mark Crispin <markrc...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
>> bullshit
>>
>> Even the Nancy person here mentioned running two copies of pine at once so
>> they could see their inbox and their folders without having to change
>> collection lists and navigate all over the place when using IMAP.
>
> Sigh. Not only do you lack a clue, but you are immune from receiving one.
>
> Do you still believe that synchronization is solved by mail forwarding?
> You did last winter, when you last made an ass of yourself in this
> newsgroup.

Mark Crispin likes to change topics when confronted.

so, what's the trick to view my IMAP inbox as well as all other imap
folders, without having to change between collection lists in either pine,
or alpine?

Everytime I ask, I'm referred to irrelevant things like people with
exchange server problems, and other small talk.

Mark Crispin

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 4:50:47 PM10/29/08
to
On Wed, 29 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
> so, what's the trick to view my IMAP inbox as well as all other imap
> folders, without having to change between collection lists in either pine,
> or alpine?

Ask someone else, or read the documentation and figure it out for
yourself. It's not rocket science.

> Everytime I ask, I'm referred to irrelevant things like people with
> exchange server problems, and other small talk.

You have a very strange way of asking questions. People generally respond
better to polite inquiries.

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 5:56:45 PM10/29/08
to
Mark Crispin <m...@panda.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Oct 2008, Cydrome Leader posted:
>> so, what's the trick to view my IMAP inbox as well as all other imap
>> folders, without having to change between collection lists in either pine,
>> or alpine?
>
> Ask someone else, or read the documentation and figure it out for
> yourself. It's not rocket science.
>
>> Everytime I ask, I'm referred to irrelevant things like people with
>> exchange server problems, and other small talk.
>
> You have a very strange way of asking questions. People generally respond
> better to polite inquiries.

Mark Crispin can't answer questions. He instead changes the subject, every
single time.

Joel Reicher

unread,
Oct 29, 2008, 5:22:02 PM10/29/08
to
Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> writes:

> so, what's the trick to view my IMAP inbox as well as all other imap
> folders, without having to change between collection lists in either pine,
> or alpine?

Configure one collection list to contain all the folders you want.

Cheers,

- Joel

Cydrome Leader

unread,
Oct 30, 2008, 5:06:28 PM10/30/08
to

If you configure a collection list in alpine, it cannot see both your
inbox and other folders in it at the same time, unless you do screwy
things like symlinking a fake name for your inbox to . on your mailserver
so it can see anything one level above the IMAP INBOX

Here's an example, on a courier imap server (courier is stable, that's all
it has going for it).

ls -l run on the imap server, to show how things are arranged. Alpine has no direct access to this
filesystem, in this case it uses IMAP for all access.

drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Oct 13 13:54 .lists
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Sep 6 16:47 .Drafts
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Sep 9 23:08 .Junk
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Aug 23 20:16 .Sent
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Oct 30 15:44 .Sent Items
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Mar 7 2005 .craigslist
lrwxr-xr-x 1 root wheel 1 Oct 30 15:42 .huh -> .
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Oct 23 2006 .old
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Dec 11 2005 .old.2002
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Dec 11 2005 .old.2003
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Feb 16 2006 .old.2004
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Oct 17 2006 .old.2005
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Feb 13 2007 .old.2006
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Mar 18 2008 .old.2007
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Mar 7 2005 .saved-messages
drwx------ 6 postfix postfix 512 Mar 7 2005 .test-files
-rw------- 1 postfix postfix 0 Jan 30 2003 .uidvalidity
-rw-r--r-- 1 postfix postfix 17 Oct 30 15:43 courierimapacl
drwxr-xr-x 2 postfix postfix 512 Mar 7 2005 courierimaphieracl
drwx------ 2 postfix postfix 164864 Oct 30 08:00 courierimapkeywords
-rw-r--r-- 1 postfix postfix 326 Mar 18 2008 courierimapsubscribed
-rw-r--r-- 1 postfix postfix 119732 Oct 30 15:44 courierimapuiddb
drwx------ 2 postfix postfix 199680 Oct 30 15:44 cur
-rw-r--r-- 1 postfix postfix 17 Oct 30 15:45 maildirsize
drwx------ 2 postfix postfix 4608 Oct 30 15:44 new
drwx------ 2 postfix postfix 512 Oct 30 15:50 tmp

You can view all the folders by making a collection list like this, from .pinerc

folder-collections=Mail mail/[],
"IMAP folders" {mailhost.com/notls/norsh/user=r...@mailhost.com}INBOX.[],
"imap folder test" {mailhost.com/notls/norsh/user=r...@mailhost.com}[]

The "IMAP folders" collection list will show all folders and email except what's in the IMAP inbox, located
in cur/new/tmp on the IMAP server.

The "imap folder test" collection will list what's in the actual inbox, but nothing else.

So, if there's a way to in one collection list the contents of both the above collection lists, I'd love to
see how it's done.

Now, if you navigate into the awful "huh" (.huh pointing to .) folder in "IMAP folders" you can see what's
in the inbox, but such hacks are simply not cool to use.

No other IMAP clients seem to have this issue. You just specify an inbox prefix and things appear in a
logical way.


Joel Reicher

unread,
Nov 2, 2008, 6:05:40 AM11/2/08
to
Cydrome Leader <pres...@MUNGEpanix.com> writes:

> You can view all the folders by making a collection list like this, from .pinerc
>
> folder-collections=Mail mail/[],
> "IMAP folders" {mailhost.com/notls/norsh/user=r...@mailhost.com}INBOX.[],
> "imap folder test" {mailhost.com/notls/norsh/user=r...@mailhost.com}[]
>
> The "IMAP folders" collection list will show all folders and email except what's in the IMAP inbox, located
> in cur/new/tmp on the IMAP server.

Just to make sure I understand, are you saying that all your mailboxes
(other than INBOX) are children of INBOX?

> The "imap folder test" collection will list what's in the actual
> inbox, but nothing else.

This I don't understand. I expected the "imap folder test" collection
to list only the INBOX mailbox at the first level; what other
mailboxes does it list? You should be able to navigate down a level if
your other mailboxes are children of INBOX.

I should add that I don't know Courier's storage system. The result of
the command

list "" *

from an IMAP session might be more useful.

> So, if there's a way to in one collection list the contents of both the above collection lists, I'd love to
> see how it's done.

What do you have "inbox-path" set to at the moment?

> Now, if you navigate into the awful "huh" (.huh pointing to .) folder in "IMAP folders" you can see what's
> in the inbox, but such hacks are simply not cool to use.

That makes it sound like Courier regards the top-level directory as
your INBOX (in maildir format by the look of it), and this would
explain why all other mailboxes are children. How odd.

Cheers,

- Joel

Message has been deleted
0 new messages