More 3.4 calendar woes

[Timotheus Pokorra]

Hello Homer,

> No where can I find ANY documentation otherwise to tell me it should do
> this.  As the Kolab package REQUIRES a developer to administer it's
> operation because it is NOT capable of doing so on it's own after the
> initial installation, it seems to me that having this information readily
> available on line would be highly desired.  Particularly for anyone that may
> have an ability to contribute to fixes and patches.  If I have missed this
> information some how.... please point me to a url that contains it.
The community version of Kolab indeed requires the administrator to
know Kolab really well.
The enterprise version of Kolab comes with support by Kolab Systems.
At TBits.net, we use the community version of Kolab, and we also have
to work through some issues ourselves.
We contribute solutions back to the community, as does Kolab Systems.
The http://docs.kolab.org is open for contributions
(https://kolab.org/blog/timotheus-pokorra/2015/07/01/submitting-patches-kolab-phabricator).

> I know from the users Contacts directory for example that there are 1486
> sequenced files (contacts) in there for this particular user however the
> kolab_folders Contact record is showing only 18 (newly added since the
> symptom presented itself) and that the kolab_cache_contact table shows only
> the new 18 contacts in it for this user.
>
> It has been impossible for me to find any place on the internet that goes
> into detail on how all the files and the mysql tables relate... one of my
> biggest pet peeves of the Kolab email system.  Can ANYONE shine some light
> on how the kolab_cache_contact, or any other cache type folder can be
> reconstructed.  I have to believe this capability exists if all the original
> files still exist in the respective imap physical directories.
>

In general, you can delete the cache tables in the database, because
the data itself is stored in the IMAP folders.
You need to enable debugging to see what causes the failure for
roundcube to load the contacts or calendar information from the IMAP
messages. It might be a malformed event, or something that is correct
but Roundcube cannot handle (yet), and needs to be fixed. You might
need to add debug statements to the PHP code. I cannot find the proper
debug methods of Roundcube at the moment, what I do is to add this
method and just call it in several places to know what happens:

public function debug($msg, $withstacktrace=false){
  if(is_writeable("/tmp/mylog.log")){
    $fh = fopen("/tmp/mylog.log",'a+');
    fputs($fh,"[Log] ".date("d.m.Y H:i:s")." $msg\n");
    if ($withstacktrace) {
      fputs($fh, "[Log] ".date("d.m.Y H:i:s").".
print_r(debug_backtrace(0),true));
    }
    fclose($fh);
  }
}

Have a look at the code here:
https://cgit.kolab.org/roundcubemail-plugins-kolab/tree/plugins/libkolab/lib/kolab_storage_cache.php#n168
This is where the events and contacts get loaded from IMAP and put in
the cache tables in the database.
see also https://cgit.kolab.org/roundcubemail-plugins-kolab/tree/plugins/libkolab/lib/kolab_storage_cache_contact.php
and https://cgit.kolab.org/roundcubemail-plugins-kolab/tree/plugins/libkolab/lib/kolab_storage_cache_event.php

I just think of something: we had some problems with mailboxes
upgraded from Cyrus IMAP 2.3. But I guess you started with Kolab 3.4?
see my notes here:
https://github.com/TBits/KolabScripts/wiki/Debugging-IMAP

Just check all the logs, of Cyrus and roundcube, and see if anything
happens when the user loads roundcube and the events/contacts should
be parsed.

> A side note.... to date... I have really regretted standardizing on the
> whole Kolab environment.  For my company and for our clientele. Information
> pertinent to the operation of this package is non existent other than how to
> install it.  For novices to the package, the mail system has been a very
> poor source of finding all ready answered questions to issues.  There
> doesn't seem to be one central repository for issues and solutions.  Email
> links like the one above seemingly go unanswered despite the request for
> help.  It begins to beg the question, is this a viable solution or just
> one's hobby?  I can think of a lot less frustrating hobbies to get into...
> like... golf as an example.... and I have no use for golf.
As mentioned above: Kolab is used by companies, and also by individuals.
There is a bug tracker: https://issues.kolab.org/index.cgi
The mailing list is mainly run by the community, so it depends if
somebody has had the same problem and can make a suggestion, or if
people help each other out because they know each other.
The IRC channel #kolab on freenode can also be helpful.

> All that said.... being a developer for over 30 years I can see the
> potential in this package and still desire to give it a go. Please...
> somebody.... give me a reason to continue to believe that.
>
> Thanks for any assistance on this matter and indulging me through my rant.
I hope my post helps to debug your issue, and you can find a
reproducable test case so that it can be fixed for everyone!

Timotheus