downloading web based email

[Skip Montanaro]

    Preston> I'm thinking of writing a Python program to download email from
    Preston> web-based services such as Yahoo mail, Deja, Hotmail, and so
    Preston> on, and deliever the mail in a format that standard unix
    Preston> mailers can use.

    Preston> I'm posting here to make sure that this work has not already
    Preston> been done.  If someone has already seen a program like this,
    Preston> that can be adapted for a variety of web based email services,
    Preston> please let me know.  I'm not writing this as a learning
    Preston> exercise, I just need the tool. ;-)

Presuming the services you're interested in support a standard mail transfer
protocol like POP or IMAP, you need look no further than Eric Raymond's
excellent fetchmail program:

    http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/fetchmail/

If not, perhaps you can train fetchmail to use whatever transport they do
offer. 

Skip Montanaro	| http://www.mojam.com/
skip at mojam.com  | http://www.musi-cal.com/~skip/
847-971-7098