Important note! I wrote this in about 2000, used it for a while, but then moved on to using IMAP instead (so I wasn't storing my mail locally). The site here is for archival purposes after migrating off SourceForge. Don't trust a word of it. You probably don't want to use this... for anything.

Introduction

SQmaiL is a MUA (mail user agent), written in Python, that stores all of its messages in a MySQL database, using Gnome. It's currently under heavy development (i.e. this morning I had to quickly add the ability to save attachments when my boss mailed me an image he wanted me to use and I suddenly realised I had no way of getting the image out of the database). Here's a quick list of features:

  • Can handle very large mail databases (>10000 messages) very quickly and easy,
  • Create VFolders based on SQL queries to painlessly sort your mail archive.
  • Ability to manually override VFolder selection for those messages that can't be automatically characterised.
  • Full-featured MIME support for both sending and receiving mail.
  • Single-click report-a-spam feature (using Spamcop).
  • Mail retrieval from POP3 servers or local spool files.
  • Picons and xface support.

It's currently in an alpha state. This means that you have been warned. I use it as my main mailer, but I know how it works and know how to avoid all the bugs. A number of features are missing (manual message filing, IMAP fetching, purging old deleted messages [on purpose, this one!]). Feel free to try it if you like; feel even more free to add enhancements. I recommend you keep backups of all your mail. Currently, SQmaiL does not have to ability to delete messages, and the actual mail handling part seems pretty stable to me; however, if you insist on using it in mission-critical situations, and it fails, I am not responsible. Read the license.


Current version: 0.3.1-alpha. New! Debian packages! Now installing SQmaiL is as simple as, um, a moderately simple thing! No more faffing around with the source to make it go. This is a huge improvement. This release is really just an interim: I'm off on holiday to Australia for three weeks, and I wanted to get the Debian patch out before then.

Also new in this release: an inline image viewer; the ability to incorporate messages from things like slocal or procmail scripts; lots of bug fixes. Get it before it's too late!

SQmaiL is released under the GNU Public License.

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