IMAP IDLE / Push IMAP support for NON-Yahoo!

Question:
How do we (or worst case, when will we be able to) tell the iPhone to use IMAP IDLE for non Yahoo! IMAP accounts? I have two accounts that handily support IMAP IDLE, and yet the iPhone only actually USES it with Yahoo!. For now I'm grudgingly using a throwaway Yahoo! account to notify me of incoming, but this is silly. Really, really silly.

I assumed that IMAP IDLE support, since it's in for Yahoo!, would be automatic for other IMAP accounts. Am I missing something? Was this an oversight? Is it a bug?

Please tell me it's not just a push (HA!) for Yahoo!, and that they have some kind of "exclusive" deal....

17" MBP C2D, Mac OS X (10.4.10), iPhone! :)

Posted on Jun 30, 2007 5:35 PM

17 replies

Tweekme

Level 2

195 points

Jul 22, 2007 10:09 AM in response to Masque

Yahoo does NOT use IMAP IDLE. It uses P-IMAP.

See these URL's for additional info:

http://blog.ferris.com/2007/07/iphone-imap-vul.html

http://dmiessler.com/archives/1435/feed

Thanks, Scott K.

Tweekme

Level 2

195 points

Jul 22, 2007 11:49 AM in response to Tweekme

Some additional info on this topic:

From Wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_iPhone#E-mail

E-mail

The iPhone also features an HTML e-mail program, which enables the user to embed photos in an e-mail message. PDF, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft Excel attachments to mail messages can be viewed on the phone.[17] IMAP and POP3 mail standards are supported, including Microsoft Exchange. The iPhone will sync e-mail account settings over from Apple's own Mail application, Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Entourage, or can be manually configured using the device's Settings tool. With the correct settings, the e-mail program can check many IMAP or POP3-enabled web based accounts such as Yahoo!, Gmail, .Mac mail, and AOL.[18].

In the case of Yahoo!, the IMAP service is restricted to the iPhone and suffers from significant security issues. The IMAP exchange is not protected from eavesdropping and the XYMPKI authentication mechanism used is subject to a replay attack [19]. The provision exchange for this service also exposes the user's IMEI number to eavesdroppers [20]. This service supports some sort of push e-mail facility, though it is not based on standard IMAP facilities such as IDLE.

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IMAP IDLE / Push IMAP support for NON-Yahoo!