[dev] Horde and IMP with sendmail virtual users

[dimon@intellinetinc.com]

Hello,

I have an idea and I'm willing to implement to horde and IMP the support of 
sendmail virtual users feature. Since so many people using that feature I think 
it make sence to do that.

The concepts are:
1. Add option to horde.php or conf.php to enable sendmail virtual users 
(something like $conf['auth']['params']['option'] = 'virtual'; and name of the 
table stored in the same database where all other tables are stored)
2. Keep all the records for virtual users in that table (actually it will be 
the replication of /etc/mail/virtusertable and /etc/mail/genericstable and the 
table should be syncronized with those two files, for example using perl script)
3. The authentication if using imap would look like this: the user supplies his 
virtual user name (username before @ symbol in his email address) and select 
proper domain name (or it could be hidden), then horde (or IMP?) consults the 
table and converts virtual username and domain pair to real system account and 
authemticates via imap.
4. All actions regarding sending and receiving mail (imap and sendmail actions) 
would be done using system account. All actions regarding user preferences 
(options, identities, etc) would be done using user's email addres (virtual 
user name @ domain).

First I thought I can just go through the source code ang change something 
myself to make it work like that (if it's possible at all of course). But then 
I realized that it's better to implemet it properly in horde/IMP so I don't 
have to change code again after new release. And I think everybody will win 
with this implementation by getting fully (or almost fully) virtual users 
support.

So I need somebody to steer me to the right direction where I can find the 
documentation/specifications/help to understand how authentication mechanism 
works and so on. Or maybe somebody already working on that right now, so we can 
join our efforts to make it faster and better?

Thanks in advance,
Waiting for advise,
Dmitry