fetchmail: bring remote mail to local system

Note: fetchmail is fine, but, if possible, we recommend people use a POP/IMAP capable mail client, and connect directly to the mail server, as shown above.

In some instances, people want to use a non-POP/non-IMAP mail application, but still want to read their mail locally, even if their workstation is not a mail server. fetchmail is used to connect to a remote mail server, and bring your email to your local mailbox. You then may use your favourite mail client to browse through your mail.

As with using the POP/IMAP protocols to read your email off a remote server, fetchmail will need to be configure so it is tunneled through SSH.

This is done by first enabling the SSH-tunnel, then using fetchmail to use that tunnel to access mail on the remote server.

Two ways will be shown here. Both will use the .fetchmailrc configuration file to perform the SSH-tunneling of the protocol desired. The first method is simpler while the second one more graceful and more permanent.

In both cases, the configuration file, .fetchmailrc will look similar to:

defaults
fetchall
keep
mda "/usr/bin/procmail -d %T"
poll mail_server.inst.nrc.ca via localhost port l_port with proto protocol:
preconnect "ssh -f -L l_port:mail_server.inst.nrc.ca:r_port mail_server.inst.nrc.ca sleep 20 /dev/null";

where

• fetchall means all mail will be transfered. Use that line only the first time you transfer your mail over.
• keep means that the mail will by copied, not moved.
• The poll and preconnect lines log you onto the server and copy the mail over to the local system.
• protocol is either pop3 or imap.
• l_port is a number between 1024 and 65536.
• r_port is the port number on the remote system you would like to tunnel through SSH. For mail uses, this is either 110 (POP) or 143 (IMAP).
• mail_server.inst.nrc.ca is the name of the system where your mail resides.

Permissions on .fetchmailrc should be 600 (rw----).