OfflineIMAP/offlineimap

introduce hook to track down any change to local Maildirs

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#367 opened on Aug 2, 2016

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 (13 comments) (1 reaction) (1 assignee)Python (1,765 stars) (373 forks)batch import
featuregood first issueneed contributor!

Description

Some programs like "mu-index" will consume the Maildir that offlineimap writes out. Currently many of them have to scan the entire Maildir on every invocation to find what files have changed.

It would be much more efficient if offlineimap could write a plain text file like:

NEW <path>
MODIFIED <path>
CHANGED <path>

And these other tools could simply atomically move that file out of the way (offlineimap would have to re-open the file for every write) and consume the file list.

If you're not interested in hacking this up I'd be interested in doing it myself with my limited experience of how offlineimap works, pointers about where in the code to put this would be most welcome.

Contributor guide

Tech stack
python
Domain
toolingperformance
Issue type
feature
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
3
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
1-2 days
Activity statusHow available the issue appears right now: fresh, active, stale, blocked, or waiting on maintainer input.
stale
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
clear
Prerequisites
Python basicsUnderstanding of offlineimap sync flow
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.
60
Research direction
The issue requests a hook to log file changes in Maildir for external tools. Look into the main sync loop in offlineimap, likely in `offlineimap/threadutil.py` or `offlineimap/folder/Base.py`. The hook should write to a plain text file after each sync action. Consider how to atomically handle file writes to avoid corruption. Check existing comments for implementation suggestions.