# IMAP, POP3 and NNTP Functions

## Introduction

These functions enable you to operate with the IMAP protocol, as well as the NNTP, POP3 and local mailbox access methods.

Be warned however, that some of IMAP functions will not work correctly with the POP protocol.

## Requirements

This extension requires the c-client library to be installed. Grab the latest version from » ftp://ftp.cac.washington.edu/imap/ and compile it.

It's important that you do not copy the IMAP source files directly into the system include directory as there may be conflicts. Instead, create a new directory inside the system include directory, such as /usr/local/imap-2000b/ (location and name depend on your setup and IMAP version), and inside this new directory create additional directories named lib/ and include/. From the c-client directory from your IMAP source tree, copy all the *.h files into include/ and all the *.c files into lib/. Additionally when you compiled IMAP, a file named c-client.a was created. Also put this in the lib/ directory but rename it as libc-client.a.

> Note: To build the c-client library with SSL or/and Kerberos support read the docs supplied with the package.

> Note: In Mandrake Linux, the IMAP library (libc-client.a) is compiled without Kerberos support. A separate version with SSL (client-PHP4.a) is installed. The library must be recompiled in order to add Kerberos support.

## Installation

To get these functions to work, you have to compile PHP with --with-imap[=DIR], where DIR is the c-client install prefix. From our example above, you would use --with-imap=/usr/local/imap-2000b. This location depends on where you created this directory according to the description above. Windows users may include the php_imap.dll DLL in php.ini. IMAP is not supported on systems earlier that Windows 2000. This is because it uses encryption functions in order to enable SSL connections to the mail servers.

> Note: Depending how the c-client was configured, you might also need to add --with-imap-ssl=/path/to/openssl/ and/or --with-kerberos=/path/to/kerberos into the PHP configure line.

Warning

The IMAP, recode, YAZ and Cyrus extensions cannot be used in conjuction, because they all share the same internal symbol.

## Runtime Configuration

This extension has no configuration directives defined in php.ini.

## Resource Types

## Predefined Constants

The constants below are defined by this extension, and will only be available when the extension has either been compiled into PHP or dynamically loaded at runtime.

`NIL` (integer)
`OP_DEBUG` (integer)
`OP_READONLY` (integer)
  Open mailbox read-only
`OP_ANONYMOUS` (integer)
  Don't use or update a .newsrc for news (NNTP only)
`OP_SHORTCACHE` (integer)
`OP_SILENT` (integer)
`OP_PROTOTYPE` (integer)
`OP_HALFOPEN` (integer)
  For IMAP and NNTP names, open a connection but don't open a mailbox.
`OP_EXPUNGE` (integer)
`OP_SECURE` (integer)
`CL_EXPUNGE` (integer)
  silently expunge the mailbox before closing when calling imap_close()
`FT_UID` (integer)
  The parameter is a UID
`FT_PEEK` (integer)
  Do not set the \Seen flag if not already set
`FT_NOT` (integer)
`FT_INTERNAL` (integer)
  The return string is in internal format, will not canonicalize to CRLF.
`FT_PREFETCHTEXT` (integer)
`ST_UID` (integer)
  The sequence argument contains UIDs instead of sequence numbers
`ST_SILENT` (integer)
`ST_SET` (integer)
`CP_UID` (integer)
  the sequence numbers contain UIDS
`CP_MOVE` (integer)
  Delete the messages from the current mailbox after copying with imap_mail_copy()
`SE_UID` (integer)
  Return UIDs instead of sequence numbers
`SE_FREE` (integer)
`SE_NOPREFETCH` (integer)
  Don't prefetch searched messages
`SO_FREE` (integer)
`SO_NOSERVER` (integer)
`SA_MESSAGES` (integer)
`SA_RECENT` (integer)
`SA_UNSEEN` (integer)
`SA_UIDNEXT` (integer)
`SA_UIDVALIDITY` (integer)
`SA_ALL` (integer)
`LATT_NOINFERIORS` (integer)
  This mailbox has no "children" (there are no mailboxes below this one).
`LATT_NOSELECT` (integer)
  This is only a container, not a mailbox - you cannot open it.
`LATT_MARKED` (integer)
  This mailbox is marked. Only used by UW-IMAPD.
`LATT_UNMARKED` (integer)
  This mailbox is not marked. Only used by UW-IMAPD.
`SORTDATE` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): message Date
`SORTARRIVAL` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): arrival date
`SORTFROM` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): mailbox in first From address
`SORTSUBJECT` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): message subject
`SORTTO` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): mailbox in first To address
`SORTCC` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): mailbox in first cc address
`SORTSIZE` (integer)
  Sort criteria for imap_sort(): size of message in octets
`TYPETEXT` (integer)
`TYPEMULTIPART` (integer)
`TYPEMESSAGE` (integer)
`TYPEAPPLICATION` (integer)
`TYPEAUDIO` (integer)
`TYPEIMAGE` (integer)
`TYPEVIDEO` (integer)
`TYPEOTHER` (integer)
`ENC7BIT` (integer)
`ENC8BIT` (integer)
`ENCBINARY` (integer)
`ENCBASE64` (integer)
`ENCQUOTEDPRINTABLE` (integer)
`ENCOTHER` (integer)
`IMAP_OPENTIMEOUT` (integer)
`IMAP_READTIMEOUT` (integer)
`IMAP_WRITETIMEOUT` (integer)
`IMAP_CLOSETIMEOUT` (integer)
`LATT_REFERRAL` (integer)
`LATT_HASCHILDREN` (integer)
`LATT_HASNOCHILDREN` (integer)
`TYPEMODEL` (integer)

## See Also

This document can't go into detail on all the topics touched by the provided functions. Further information is provided by the documentation of the c-client library source (docs/internal.txt). and the following RFC documents:

- » RFC2821: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP).
- » RFC2822: Standard for ARPA internet text messages.
- » RFC2060: Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) Version 4rev1.
- » RFC1939: Post Office Protocol Version 3 (POP3).
- » RFC977: Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP).
- » RFC2076: Common Internet Message Headers.
- » RFC2045 , » RFC2046 , » RFC2047 , » RFC2048 & » RFC2049: Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME).

A detailed overview is also available in the books » Programming Internet Email by David Wood and » Managing IMAP by Dianna Mullet & Kevin Mullet.

## Table of Contents

- imap_8bit — Convert an 8bit string to a quoted-printable string
- imap_alerts — Returns all IMAP alert messages that have occurred
- imap_append — Append a string message to a specified mailbox
- imap_base64 — Decode BASE64 encoded text
- imap_binary — Convert an 8bit string to a base64 string
- imap_body — Read the message body
- imap_bodystruct — Read the structure of a specified body section of a specific message
- imap_check — Check current mailbox
- imap_clearflag_full — Clears flags on messages
- imap_close — Close an IMAP stream
- imap_createmailbox — Create a new mailbox
- imap_delete — Mark a message for deletion from current mailbox
- imap_deletemailbox — Delete a mailbox
- imap_errors — Returns all of the IMAP errors that have occured
- imap_expunge — Delete all messages marked for deletion
- imap_fetch_overview — Read an overview of the information in the headers of the given message
- imap_fetchbody — Fetch a particular section of the body of the message
- imap_fetchheader — Returns header for a message
- imap_fetchstructure — Read the structure of a particular message
- imap_get_quota — Retrieve the quota level settings, and usage statics per mailbox
- imap_get_quotaroot — Retrieve the quota settings per user
- imap_getacl — Gets the ACL for a given mailbox
- imap_getmailboxes — Read the list of mailboxes, returning detailed information on each one
- imap_getsubscribed — List all the subscribed mailboxes
- imap_header — Alias of imap_headerinfo
- imap_headerinfo — Read the header of the message
- imap_headers — Returns headers for all messages in a mailbox
- imap_last_error — Gets the last IMAP error that occurred during this page request
- imap_list — Read the list of mailboxes
- imap_listmailbox — Alias of imap_list
- imap_listscan — Returns the list of mailboxes that matches the given text
- imap_listsubscribed — Alias of imap_lsub
- imap_lsub — List all the subscribed mailboxes
- imap_mail_compose — Create a MIME message based on given envelope and body sections
- imap_mail_copy — Copy specified messages to a mailbox
- imap_mail_move — Move specified messages to a mailbox
- imap_mail — Send an email message
- imap_mailboxmsginfo — Get information about the current mailbox
- imap_mime_header_decode — Decode MIME header elements
- imap_msgno — Gets the message sequence number for the given UID
- imap_num_msg — Gets the number of messages in the current mailbox
- imap_num_recent — Gets the number of recent messages in current mailbox
- imap_open — Open an IMAP stream to a mailbox
- imap_ping — Check if the IMAP stream is still active
- imap_qprint — Convert a quoted-printable string to an 8 bit string
- imap_renamemailbox — Rename an old mailbox to new mailbox
- imap_reopen — Reopen IMAP stream to new mailbox
- imap_rfc822_parse_adrlist — Parses an address string
- imap_rfc822_parse_headers — Parse mail headers from a string
- imap_rfc822_write_address — Returns a properly formatted email address given the mailbox, host, and personal info
- imap_savebody — Save a specific body section to a file
- imap_scanmailbox — Alias of imap_listscan
- imap_search — This function returns an array of messages matching the given search criteria
- imap_set_quota — Sets a quota for a given mailbox
- imap_setacl — Sets the ACL for a giving mailbox
- imap_setflag_full — Sets flags on messages
- imap_sort — Gets and sort messages
- imap_status — Returns status information on a mailbox
- imap_subscribe — Subscribe to a mailbox
- imap_thread — Returns a tree of threaded message
- imap_timeout — Set or fetch imap timeout
- imap_uid — This function returns the UID for the given message sequence number
- imap_undelete — Unmark the message which is marked deleted
- imap_unsubscribe — Unsubscribe from a mailbox
- imap_utf7_decode — Decodes a modified UTF-7 encoded string
- imap_utf7_encode — Converts ISO-8859-1 string to modified UTF-7 text
- imap_utf8 — Converts MIME-encoded text to UTF-8