[Tickets #14810] Re: Server side email searching through ActiveSync doesn't work

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Ticket URL: https://bugs.horde.org/ticket/14810
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  Ticket             | 14810
  Updated By         | s.arcus at open-t.co.uk
  Summary            | Server side email searching through ActiveSync doesn't
                     | work
  Queue              | IMP
  Version            | FRAMEWORK_5_2
  Type               | Bug
  State              | Unconfirmed
  Priority           | 1. Low
  Milestone          |
  Patch              |
  Owners             |
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s.arcus at open-t.co.uk (2018-04-18 18:52) wrote:

"I'm not sure what you mean by an "old syntax" and you don't specify  
what your configuration actually was.... "

In my comment I mentioned that I was using the format:

servers['secure-imap'] ( ... )

The current horde/imp/config/backends.php sample config file only  
lists two types of syntax for IMAP backends:

servers['imap'] ( ... )

and

servers['advanced'] ( ... )

So, I can only assume that 'secure-imap' syntax has been deprecated at  
some point in time.

I have turned debugging all the way up in Dovecot, and when using  
'secure-imap', no SEARCH commands are sent to Dovecot. I have also  
enabled full text indexing in Dovecot, and searching initiated over a  
telnet session to Dovecot using the 'SEARCH BODY' imap command are now  
down from 5+ minutes on a large mailbox, to less than one second. In  
spite of all this, server side email searching through ActiveSync  
still didn't work and didn't send any SEARCH commands to the imap  
server.

"My guess is the search was timing out looking for the IMAP server"

If you mean that Horde couldn't connect to the IMAP server at all, I  
don't think that was the case, as emails were downloading fine on the  
phone and I could open them, send emails etc.

If you mean that the search was timing out waiting for a reply to the  
SEARCH command, again, I don't think that is the case, as no SEARCH  
command was showing up in Dovecot logs, and, as mentioned above, after  
enabling FTS indexing, the search results in Dovecot would have taken  
less than a second.

What I can only guess was happening (but this would need confirming by  
looking at the code) is that the 'secure-imap' syntax in  
backends.local.php was interpreted by Horde as a server of simple imap  
type (not advanced) - and somehow this doesn't support server side  
email searches. Or maybe something else was going on.

If the above is correct, what I think should happen is for Horde to  
detect that the selected IMAP back-end doesn't support server-side  
searching (because it is of simple type, not advanced) - and output  
some warnings or errors in the Horde log, when ActiveSync devices  
attempt to use search commands

Also, if it is correct that the 'secure-imap' syntax has been  
deprecated, again, maybe Horde should flag this in the logs - instead  
of silently accepting it (if that is the case).

Please find below the backend configuration which I was using BEFORE -  
which wasn't passing SEARCH commands to the imap server:

$servers['secure-imap'] = array(
     'disabled' => false,
     'name' => 'my_imap_config',
     'hostspec' => 'localhost',
     'hordeauth' => 'full',
     'protocol' => 'imap',
     'port' => 993,
     'secure' => 'ssl',
     'maildomain' => 'my_mail_domain.com',
     'smtphost' => 'localhost',
     'smtpport' => 587,
     'acl' => false,
     'cache' => false,
);