Spurious IMAP warnings

[mere user]

First, a minor compilation problem from your obsessive user :-)

Symbol's function definition is void: hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer
make[1]: *** [vm-autoloads.el] Error 255
make: *** [all] Error 1

also, perhaps more interesting: I recently see many instances of a message "Warning: Only basic message flags available for the mailbox". That by itself is no big deal, although I am not completely sure what this means exactly, perhaps some additional explanation would help the ignorant user such as me.

More importantly, I see these messages while not reading mail, when just editing. it seems that vm is querying the imap server in the background to see if there is mail? This also seems to lead to freezing of emacs for a few seconds sometimes. there doesn't seem to be any benefit to this, as the mail status on teh mode line is not shown or updated unless I actually have vm open and am looking at the presentation/ summary buffers. would be nice to get rid of these freezes if they are indeed related to vm...

cheers, E

[Uday Reddy (reddyuday)]

mere user writes:

> Public bug reported:
>
> First, a minor compilation problem from your obsessive user :-)
>
> Symbol's function definition is void: hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer
> make[1]: *** [vm-autoloads.el] Error 255
> make: *** [all] Error 1

Hi Eli, that looks like a problem with your Emacs version. I don't
get this error.

> also, perhaps more interesting: I recently see many instances of a
> message "Warning: Only basic message flags available for the mailbox".
> That by itself is no big deal, although I am not completely sure what
> this means exactly, perhaps some additional explanation would help the
> ignorant user such as me.

Funny. That message has been there since Jan 2008! I will check.

> More importantly, I see these messages while not reading mail, when just
> editing. it seems that vm is querying the imap server in the background
> to see if there is mail? This also seems to lead to freezing of emacs
> for a few seconds sometimes. there doesn't seem to be any benefit to
> this, as the mail status on teh mode line is not shown or updated unless
> I actually have vm open and am looking at the presentation/ summary
> buffers. would be nice to get rid of these freezes if they are indeed
> related to vm...

Please check the variable vm-mail-check-interval. The default value
is 5 minutes, but my personal setting is nil.

Cheers,
Uday

[mere user (emacs-user)]

On Sun, Feb 27, 2011 at 5:24 PM, Uday Reddy <email address hidden> wrote:
>
> Hi Eli, that looks like a problem with your Emacs version.  I don't
> get this error.

you are right as always. this only happens if I compile from eshell
mode of emacs 24.XX, using --with-emacs=emacs-23.2. thanks for being
so patient...

>> also, perhaps more interesting:  I recently see many instances of a
>> message "Warning: Only basic message flags available for the mailbox".
>
> Funny.  That message has been there since Jan 2008!  I will check.

I think I started seeing this only recently...

> Please check the variable vm-mail-check-interval.  The default value
> is 5 minutes, but my personal setting is nil.

OK, I will set to nil too. good idea. why would it be using that
interval anyway when vm is not active and now showing that mail
status?

> Cheers,
> Uday
>

[Uday Reddy (reddyuday)]

mere user writes:

> > Funny.  That message has been there since Jan 2008!  I will check.
>
> I think I started seeing this only recently...

Well, nothing has changed at our end. It is possible that your ISP
has changed the server or decided to restrict flags. (These are
needed if you access the IMAP account from multiple locations and want
to keep track of what you read at each. They are not needed for just
retrieving mail.)

I have made some changes to the IMAP code which might help. Revision
1108. I haven't tested them fully. So, if you run into any problems,
please revert to revision 1107.

Cheers,
Uday

[mere user (emacs-user)]

On Sun, Feb 27, 2011 at 7:57 PM, Uday Reddy <email address hidden> wrote:
> mere user writes:
>
>> > Funny.  That message has been there since Jan 2008!  I will check.
>>
>> I think I started seeing this only recently...
>
> Well, nothing has changed at our end.  It is possible that your ISP
> has changed the server or decided to restrict flags.

yes, the university changed its imap server... will let you know if I
see this again. thanks!

[Uday Reddy (reddyuday)]

mere user writes:

> yes, the university changed its imap server... will let you know if I
> see this again. thanks!

That is sad. I didn't expect that your University would downgrade
services like that. They are setting a bad example to all the others!

Cheers,
Uday

[Tim Cross (tcross)]

On Mon, Feb 28, 2011 at 9:38 AM, mere user <email address hidden>wrote:

> On Sun, Feb 27, 2011 at 5:24 PM, Uday Reddy <email address hidden>
> wrote:
> >
> > Hi Eli, that looks like a problem with your Emacs version. I don't
> > get this error.
>
> you are right as always. this only happens if I compile from eshell
> mode of emacs 24.XX, using --with-emacs=emacs-23.2. thanks for being
> so patient...
>
> Hi Eli,

Just wanted to mention that you can get some unexpected results when using
eshell to run scripts. While eshell is a great interactive shell, it is a
bit unreliable for running shell scripts because it does not handle
redireciton of input/output. I've encountered problems where a sh script
appears to work, but in fact doesn't because it relied on i/o redireciton.
Often, you will get an error, but I've also had situations where it fails
silently and your left wondering why something is not working.

For shell scripts not written in elisp, I find it better to run them either
under M-x shell or M-x term.

Tim

[Uday Reddy (reddyuday)]

Actually even if I use unix shells with emacs shell-mode, unless I am using the same version of Emacs for both the shell-mode and the compiler, I get errors.

So, if you are compiling with Emacs23 using Emacs24 shell-mode, it may or may not work. Worse would be if the build goes through and you get wrong libraries installed or something.

Software used to be a lot more modular in the old days. It is all interconnected now.

[Uday Reddy (reddyuday)]

mail-check-interval issue to be continued in Bug 726543.