iredmail-doc/en_US/faq/1-why.append.timestamp.in.maildir.path.md

Why append timestamp in maildir path

iRedMail will append timestamp in maildir path by default, here's why.

Depends on the tools/scripts you used to create mail accounts, it's tunable in scripts shipped within iRedMail and iRedAdmin (file settings.py, variable MAILDIR_APPEND_TIMESTAMP = True or False).

Note: Deleting mail accounts with iRedAdmin will not remove the mailboxes on file system, so that you can keep user's mailbox for some time.

Think about this situation:

• Employee Michael Jordan has email address mj@domain.ltd. Without timestamp in maildir path, the maildir path of his mailbox looks like /var/vmail/vmail1/domain.ltd/mj/.

• Michael left company, and your company deleted his mail account. With iRedAdmin, it just deletes mail accounts stored in LDAP/SQL server, not delete his mailbox on file system (/var/vmail/vmail1/domain.ltd/mj).

• A new talent, Mike Jackson, joined your company, and he want to use mj@domain.ltd since mj@ is not used by others. And you created it for him. Without timestamp in maildir path, the maildir path of Mike's mailbox is the same as Michael's /var/vmail/vmail1/domain.ltd/mj/. iRedAdmin doesn't remove the mailboxes on file system, so Mike will see all emails in Michael's mailbox if Michael didn't delete them. To avoid this, we append a timestamp in maildir path to make sure all users will be assigned an unique maildir paths.