Problems with connecting Thunderbird client to dovecot installed on Ubuntu
I am trying to connect a Thunderbird client to my dovecot server. The dovecot is installed on Ubuntu. I know that my server works (at least partially), since when I send a mail to a user in the server ([email protected]
), I see the new file created in /home/feedback/Maildir/new
.
However, when I try to connect with my Thunderbird to the server, It recognizes the server, but informs me that my user/password is wrong (they are not wrong).
The exact message is:
Configuration could not be verified - is the username or password wrong?
The server configuration it tries to connect to is: incoming - IMAP 143, outgoing - SMTP 587
The dovecot configuration file is located here: dovecot.conf
My PAM configuration is:
@include common-auth
@include common-account
@include common-session
In the log, I see:
May 23 06: 07: 20 misfortune dovecot: imap-login: Disconnected (no auth attempts): ? rip=77.126.236.118, lip=184.106.69.153
Dovecot -n gives me:
Log_timestamp: %Y-%m-%d %H: %M: %S
Protocols: pop3 pop3s imap imaps
Ssl: no
Login_dir: /var/run/dovecot/login
Login_executable(default): /usr/lib/dovecot/imap-login
Login_executable(imap): /usr/lib/dovecot/imap-login
Login_executable(pop3): /usr/lib/dovecot/pop3-login
Mail_privileged_group: mail
Mail_location: maildir: ~/Maildir
Mbox_write_locks: fcntl dotlock
Mail_executable(default): /usr/lib/dovecot/imap
Mail_executable(imap): /usr/lib/dovecot/imap
Mail_executable(pop3): /usr/lib/dovecot/pop3
Mail_plugin_dir(default): /usr/lib/dovecot/modules/imap
Mail_plugin_dir(imap): /usr/lib/dovecot/modules/imap
Mail_plugin_dir(pop3): /usr/lib/dovecot/modules/pop3
Imap_client_workarounds(default): tb-extra-mailbox-sep
Imap_client_workarounds(imap): tb-extra-mailbox-sep
Imap_client_workarounds(pop3):
Auth default:
passdb:
driver: pam
userdb:
driver: passwd
Solution 1:
Troubleshoot your IMAP server first. Just beware, do it over a secure connection, because all your credentials are sent plaintext.
telnet your.mail.server.com 143
. login username password
. list "" "*"
. select INBOX
. fetch 1:* flags
To read the body of the first message in the current selected folder:
. fetch 1 rfc822.text
Or just see here for more examples:
Accessing IMAP email accounts using telnet
If that stuff doesn't work, that's proof positive that Dovecot is not correctly configured.
Solution 2:
That mail is delivered to ~/Maildir does not mean Dovecot works at all – Dovecot only handles IMAP, not SMTP or delivery.
Fix your
mail_location
. You say that your mail is delivered to~/Maildir
, yet your Dovecot is configured to look in~/mail
and/var/mail/%u
. Changemail_location
tomaildir:~/Maildir
.Make sure your PAM configuration in
/etc/pam.d/dovecot
is correct.Look for any error messages in
/var/log/syslog
and/var/log/auth.log
(authentication errors usually go to the latter).