javax.mail: public interface: UIDFolder

javax.mail
public interface: UIDFolder [javadoc | source] The UIDFolder interface is implemented by Folders that can support the "disconnected" mode of operation, by providing unique-ids for messages in the folder. This interface is based on the IMAP model for supporting disconnected operation.

A Unique identifier (UID) is a positive long value, assigned to each message in a specific folder. Unique identifiers are assigned in a strictly ascending fashion in the mailbox. That is, as each message is added to the mailbox it is assigned a higher UID than the message(s) which were added previously. Unique identifiers persist across sessions. This permits a client to resynchronize its state from a previous session with the server.

Associated with every mailbox is a unique identifier validity value. If unique identifiers from an earlier session fail to persist to this session, the unique identifier validity value must be greater than the one used in the earlier session.

Refer to RFC 2060 http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2060.txt for more information.

author: John - Mani

Nested Class Summary:
public static class	UIDFolder.FetchProfileItem	A fetch profile item for fetching UIDs. This inner class extends the `FetchProfile.Item` class to add new FetchProfile item types, specific to UIDFolders. The only item currently defined here is the `UID` item.

Field Summary
public static final long	LASTUID	This is a special value that can be used as the `end` parameter in `getMessagesByUID(start, end)`, to denote the UID of the last message in the folder. Also see: getMessagesByUID

Method from javax.mail.UIDFolder Summary:
getMessageByUID, getMessagesByUID, getMessagesByUID, getUID, getUIDValidity

Method from javax.mail.UIDFolder Detail:
public Message getMessageByUID(long uid) throws MessagingException Get the Message corresponding to the given UID. If no such message exists, `null` is returned.
public Message[] getMessagesByUID(long[] uids) throws MessagingException Get the Messages specified by the given array of UIDs. If any UID is invalid, `null` is returned for that entry. Note that the returned array will be of the same size as the specified array of UIDs, and `null` entries may be present in the array to indicate invalid UIDs.
public Message[] getMessagesByUID(long start, long end) throws MessagingException Get the Messages specified by the given range. The special value LASTUID can be used for the `end` parameter to indicate the UID of the last message in the folder.
public long getUID(Message message) throws MessagingException Get the UID for the specified message. Note that the message must belong to this folder. Otherwise java.util.NoSuchElementException is thrown.
public long getUIDValidity() throws MessagingException Returns the UIDValidity value associated with this folder. Clients typically compare this value against a UIDValidity value saved from a previous session to insure that any cached UIDs are not stale.