How to test for maildir 'folder' in Python?

[Barry]

> On 23 Jan 2022, at 17:08, Chris Green <cl at isbd.net> wrote:
> 
> Barry Scott <barry at barrys-emacs.org> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>> On 22 Jan 2022, at 21:26, Chris Green <cl at isbd.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>> I have a script that walks a quite deep tree of mail messages to find
>>> and archive old messages.  I'm trying to convert it from mbox to
>>> maildir (as I now store my mail in maildir format).
>>> 
>>> So I need to test whether a point I have reached in the hierarchy is a
>>> maildir mailbox or not.  Using mbox format it's easy because 'folders'
>>> are directories and mailboxes are files.  However with maildir the
>>> 'folders' have directories within them so the simple tree walking goes
>>> down a level too far and finds 'folders' which aren't mailboxes called
>>> 'cur', 'new' and 'tmp'.
>>> 
>>> Is there any 'ready made' way in python to tell whether a directory is
>>> a maildir mailbox?  If not I suppose I'll simply have to check if
>>> there are 'cur', 'new' and 'tmp' directories within the directory
>>> which may or may not be a maildir.
>> 
>> You do not need to walk the tree.
>> 
>> The structure is 
>>        Maildir/cur, new, tmp - The INBOX
>>        Maildir/<encoded-mail-folder>/cur, new, tmp
>> 
>> The encoding prefixed with a "." and uses a "." between folder name parts.
>> 
>> An example from my Maildir is ".Python.Users/" for a folder that client
>> shows as Python/Users
>> 
>> You can see this by doing:
>> 
>>         ls -a ~/Maildir
>> 
> You're talking about one specific (and IMHO not very good) way of
> creating a maildir hierarchy.  Here's what I see on my system:

Oh right! That is imposed by dovecot that I use for the imap service.

Barry

>    chris at esprimo$ cd mail
>    /home/chris/mail
>    chris at esprimo$ ls -a
>    .  ..  Gm  In  Ju  Li  Tm  folder
>    chris at esprimo$ ls -a folder
>    .         apexLodge     entertainment  greville  houseHome  maxMum    reshapers  tractor
>    ..        archive       family         hardware  internet   money     riding     travel
>    Scans     boating       france         health    isbd       pcc       software   ukraa
>    Shopping  buySellAdmin  friends        holidays  jrml       personal  telecoms   vehicles
>    chris at esprimo$ ls -a folder/Shopping
>    .          cabin       cycling      garden     maxine      pets         stationery
>    ..         car         diy          giftsEtc   maxmum      photography  telecoms
>    apexLodge  clothesEtc  electrical   groupon    medicine    riding       toolstation
>    boat       computer    electronics  houseHome  motorcycle  screwfix
>    books      cpc         food         jrml       music       sportsEtc
> 
> No dot prefixes and my maildir hierarchy is a *real* directory hierarchy so
> all the other file management utilities on my system can be used easily.
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Chris Green
> ·
> -- 
> https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list