Electronic Mail at CAL

Each user account in the CAL network has a mailbox, initially configured with 1GB of storage, which is accessible mainly through [imap://mail.astro.columbia.edu/ IMAP with TLS]/[imaps://mail.astro.columbia.edu/ SSL]. You can categorize your e-mail into subfolders within this mailbox. A ​webmail interface (secured via HTTPS) provides an alternative access method. The mail is filtered for spam and viral content before delivery.

IMAP, SMTP, and Webmail

Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) is a system by which your e-mail is kept on the server and can be accessed from any machine on the network. When you want to view, send or manage your messages, your e-mail program (client) connects to the CAL central e-mail server for access. Because your e-mail always remains on the server, you can easily retrieve it from virtually any location with Internet access. IMAP is useful if you travel frequently, access your e-mail at multiple locations, and/or use web mail as your main mail client.

Recommended Mail User Agents (Email clients)

You can access your mail through a variety of different IMAP clients. Some that we recommend are:

• Thunderbird
• Evolution
• netscape7 (on sun network)
• Mutt (text based)

Configuring Your Email Client

Detailed information regarding the email server settings and related information can be found on the MUA Configuration page.

Using Web Mail

Web mail is an alternative to accessing your email via an email client. It can be used at any time but is particularly useful when travelling. Simply point your browser to ​https://mail.astro.columbia.edu/ and log in.

• when using webmail, please note that there is an expiration/timout period (approx. 15min.). If creating an email of extended length or if you will be away from the browser for the given amount of time, save a copy of the text or use the 'save draft' button on the webmail interface to avoid losing the content of the email.

• please note: users have complained of multiple email messages being sent when using the Back button on browsers, this is true when using Safari 2.0.4 (from 2005) but this may aslo be the case when using other browsers.

A Note Regarding the Aug 1, 2006 Email Transition

On Aug 1, 2006, email sent to your username AT astro.columbia.edu started going to the new email server (mail.astro.columbia.edu) rather than the old server (usually jewels.phys.columbia.edu). We want to stress that both servers will remain functional and no email will be deleted. That means that you can read your old email on the suns as before, but email (sent Aug 1 or later) is now being delivered to the new mail server (we will eventually phase out the old email server).

It should be pointed out that we will NOT be transferring your old email from the sun system to the new system. In other words, as of Aug 1 your new email INBOX will be empty (ah, if only it would stay that way). However, this transfer is easy for you to do yourself. In your email client (e.g. thunderbird) you can have two or more inboxes active at the same time (i.e. two email accounts). That means that once you create your new account (using the new mail.astro.columbia.edu server), and provided that you have not deleted your old email settings, you can simply copy over the contents of your old INBOX -- and any folders --- from the old account to the new account. The exact way this is done depends on which email client you are using, but is generally very straightforward (just like moving folders on a desktop).

Managing Your Incoming Mail

Email Quotas

There is a 1GB storage limit for every CAL e-mail account. Your IMAP quota is visible from any IMAP client which supports the QUOTA capability (and most do). It can also be seen from the ​CAL webmail site. To view your quota in ​Thunderbird 1.5, for example, select the inbox of your CAL account in the "Folders" pane, and choose Edit|Folder Properties... from the menu. The Quota tab in the dialog box that appears shows your quota.

It is important to keep in mind that you have a limited amount of space on your CAL email account to store email. As mail addressed to your account comes in, it is placed in your Inbox mailbox, and it will stay there indefinitely, until you move it to your personal computer or delete it. When the total amount of email you have in your Inbox exceeds your account's Inbox allotment, new incoming email will be bounced. (Returned to its sender.) Each account has a reasonably large allotment, but if you get a a few -- or even one -- email messages with large attachments, your Inbox can fill up pretty quickly. You will receive a series of automated messages as the size of your Inbox approaches your Inbox quota.

Spam Filtering

CAL is running ​DSPAM to provide users with personalized spam filters that will adapt to your preferences. Mail messages determined by a user's filter to be spam will by default be routed into the user's spam subfolder (based on the X-DSPAM-* headers added by DSPAM).

If you find a non-spam message in your spam folder, you should tell the filter that it made a mistake. You can do that by simply forwarding the message to notspam-username@astro.columbia.edu (replace "username" with your CAL username, of course!)

Conversely, if you find a spam message in your inbox, you can retrain your filter by forwarding it to spam-username@astro.columbia.edu. If you conscientiously retrain your filter when it errs, it will be better able to anticipate your preferences in the future.

Personalized Filtering and Forwarding Email

Traditional UNIX-style .forward files are not used on the new CAL system. We're using ​sieve, an emerging standard for mail filtering. You can see an example sieve script here (this example script is installed by default for all CAL users, and can be found on Configured Workstations at /usr/share/doc/cal-base/examples/sieve/cal-default.script. It filters spam into the user's spam subfolder based on the X-DSPAM headers mentioned above).

If you want to write a new sieve script, simply put it in a text file on a Configured Workstation, and use sieveshell to import it to mail.astro.columbia.edu. For example, here is dkg importing a sieve script located at ~/newsieve.script:

[0 dkg@kalyke ~]$ sieveshell mail
connecting to mail
> put newsieve.script 
> activate newsieve        
> quit
[0 dkg@kalyke ~]$ 

You may also be interested in some Sieve Examples for CAL.

If you have trouble with sieveshell connecting to the mail server, make sure you have a valid Kerberos Credentials Cache.

Email Lists

A listing of all the public mailing lists on mail.astro.columbia.edu can be found ​here. Click on a list name to get more information about the list, or to subscribe, unsubscribe, and change the preferences on your subscription.