General_Concepts

   Pine is an IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) client and
   POP (Post Office Protocol) client which can access local VMS MAIL
   mail files as well as other mail files served by an IMAP server
   or POP3 server.

   If only local mail is to be accessed, no network connection
   is created, and no IMAP server or POP server is needed on the
   local system. If your system does not have any TCP/IP software
   installed, then you will receive an error message when you
   attempt any operation requiring TCP/IP access. To access mail
   files on a remote OpenVMS system, an IMAP server such as the PMDF
   IMAP server, or a POP server such as the PMDF POP server, must be
   running on that remote system. To access mail files on a remote
   UNIX system, the remote system must have an IMAP daemon (server)
   or POP daemon (server) running.

   Pine is also an NNTP (Network News Transport Protocol, RFC 977)
   client, and can be used to read news from NNTP servers like the
   ANU News program or many common UNIX NNTP servers. Of course, you
   have to know the name of one such system before you can use this
   capability. Ask your system or network manager for help.

   The pine view is that messages are stored in folders, and
   folders are stored in folder collections. Folder collections
   can be physically located on the local system, or on any remote
   system with an IMAP server. Regardless of what system a folder
   collection is physically located on, a pine user sees it as
   just another folder collection: a pine user can read messages
   in any of their folder collections and can save (move) messages
   between different folder collections. See under PMDF Pine Folders
   and Folder Collections for more details on folders and folder
   collections.

   Or a read-and-delete-only pine folder can correspond to the "new
   messages" folder on a remote system with a POP3 server. (The
   POP3 protocol does not provide access to multiple folders-it only
   provides access to the "new" messages, usually those in a special
   "new" sort of folder. The POP3 protocol also does not allow for
   moving messages into a POP3 folder.)