max mailbox size - best practice

[comptekki]

Is there a max mailbox size for zimbra? If quotas are put on mailboxes allowing a reasonable high max - what is this for zimbra?

thx

[JoshuaPrismon]

Originally Posted by comptekki

Is there a max mailbox size for zimbra? If quotas are put on mailboxes allowing a reasonable high max - what is this for zimbra?

thx

I have several users with 2GB+ mailboxes. Doesn't seem to have any problems. I ended up putting a quota on their mailboxes, just so they would get the pretty little bar in the upper right corner reminding them that disk space ain't free.

[Nutz]

I am working on migrating users over to zimbra, and many of them currently have 3-5 gig .psts.

I will not be allowing them to import those things, but I can assume that their mailboxes will be that large again shortly... At what point will Zimbra freak out???

Thank you,
Nutz

[dkarp]

We're running some 6GB mailboxes on our internal zimbra mailserver and things are just fine.

Your Zimbra Desktop initial sync will take a while, though!

[Krishopper]

Originally Posted by Nutz

I am working on migrating users over to zimbra, and many of them currently have 3-5 gig .psts.

I will not be allowing them to import those things, but I can assume that their mailboxes will be that large again shortly... At what point will Zimbra freak out???

I would imagine it would take awhile for Zimbra to freak out. Prior to running Zimbra I ran a Postfix config using Maildir (one file per message, just like Zimbra does), and loading folders were slow through IMAP since the IMAP server had to open every file and read the headers to know the From/To/Subject headers and such... but being Zimbra stores all that in a MySQL database, it should be pretty fast and efficient.

I dumped 65,000 emails (8 GB) into my account to test it when I first setup my test machine, and things were no slower than having 100 messges in a 1 MB mailbox. Searching was very fast as well.

[Nutz]

That is awesome to hear...

So, Like I said, I won't be letting users import their old mailboxes, but people like to send huge attachments around.

[keffa]

The bandwidth generally isn't free either!!

Anyone who sends huge files via email oughta be dragged out and shot!

I once got a 111mb attachment from a publisher, after much gnashing of the teeth waiting for it to download I rang him up and said "Hey, them new JPEG's, wonderful things so I hear...".

[Nutz]

Yeah... I typically do drag them out and shoot them... but sometimes them folks don't listen!

And then there's the people who never empty their deleted items folder... GAR!

[Vimm]

So nobody has yet to see a practical limit? Is there a theoretical limit? Has anyone ever tested it?

Somebody pointed out to me that if you know the quota size you can initiate a DoS attack on Zimbra by mailing the person a file of that exact size. Since their mailbox will then be full, all new mail will be bounced. If the account already has mail in it you can just dial down the size until it succeeds. So, always make sure your max message size is less than your inbox size. That way if some idiot mails you a 50MB bmp they'll get a bounce error once they cross the limit and your inbox won't get punished.

[keffa]

That would be true of most mail servers and accounts that impose quota's. Unless you have a really small account quota this shouldn't really be a problem because as an administrator you would have to be a bit of a glutton for punishment to accept emails over 15mb in size (Zimbra defaults at about 10mb I think).

I should point out though when I got my 111mb attachment I wasn't the mail admin although I would have probably hated to have been him at the time....111mb was probably a fair substantial portion of the disk!