Turn an Ubuntu/Debian System Into an IMAP Mail Server

Just because your email account doesn’t offer IMAP access doesn’t mean you have to put up with reading and deleting the same messages ad nauseum. Web how-to site Webmonkey offers a detailed rundown on setting up the free Dovecot server on your system to pull in any kind of mail and dish it out in that synced, folder-sorted, always-accessible IMAP way. This guide is specific to Ubuntu and Debian-based systems, but Dovecot is available for lots of open-source platforms. If running your own box seems like a bit of overkill, you can always set up Gmail with IMAP as a go-between.