greg hughes - dot net

Security, IT and anything else that matters... to me, that is

Try to be patient, Greg - IMAP will come...

Friday, October 26, 2007 2:53:06 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00) ( Mobile | Tech )

There's been a slight lack of specific information about the actual Gmail IMAP rollout timeframes (the phrase being thrown around - "a few days" - is sufficiently vague, yet it tends to make one think of the number "three"), as well as a lack of information about Google Apps email service and IMAP on that system (as opposed to the generic Gmail platform). Some people already have IMAP enabled. I don't yet. I'm a little bummed, but I know how these massive rollouts for a system this size can be. They don't just happen automagically. So I exercise patience and use this time to drive myself nuts, heh.

Anyhow, I went looking for some specifics over at the Google Help site today, and found some new content in the Apps for Administrators specific help, as well as a linked description of how long it may be before I see it show up in my Apps email accounts:

We're working hard to roll out IMAP access to all our users, but it'll take about a week.
To use IMAP, you must have your interface language set to 'English (US)'. You'll know that IMAP is available in your account when the Forwarding and POP tab in your settings becomes Forwarding and POP/IMAP.
Until then, thanks for your patience!

There's a variety of other IMAP Setup related topics there as well. And you'll want to check out these third-party resources for some details in configuring things like iPhone and Thunderbird (or any client, really) so it works just the way you want it to:

So, within less than a week it sounds like, and I have the info I need to optimize my clients when it does happen. Nice - that helps. :)

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Friday, October 26, 2007 8:47:18 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

Greg,

My IMAP feature finally showed up. Unfortunately, it seems those of us running Windows Mobile devices are out of luck for the time being. Message headers are being retrieved, but the bodies of the messages are blank. Seems this is being widely reported in the Gmail discussion groups. Ah well. As an iPhone user, it seems you'll be in luck though.

John Walker

Saturday, October 27, 2007 5:30:49 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

Take A Deep Breath. :)

Dave M

Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:41:20 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

Got IMAP yesterday. Had to logout then log in again.

Scott Hanselman

Sunday, October 28, 2007 8:01:47 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

Stil none for me. I've also tried the log out and back in thing. Well, it'll happen eventually!

Greg

Monday, October 29, 2007 11:05:30 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

If I turn on IMAP, does that mean that my entire inbox will sync onto my blackberry?

Jeff the Great

Tuesday, October 30, 2007 6:18:53 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)

@Jeff the Great

No, that's exactly what IMAP -doesn't- do. Those of us who have been doing network email since the dark ages generally have despised POP because it does that 'entire sync' process. IMAP has always been a superior remote mailbox methodology, it's just much more complex to implement.

I'm looking with much trepidation at googles imap rollout. It may spell the end of many 'personal' mail server configurations (including my own). Why run your own mail server when you can imap things off google?

dbs