2.8.1.7. Delete old emails from your mailbox

The script allows you to delete messages for a certain time interval, which can be specified relative to the current day or fixed dates.

<?php
$Host           = isset($argv[1]) ? $argv[1] : "mail.adm.tools:143";
$User           = isset($argv[2]) ? $argv[2] : "user@example.com";
$Password       = isset($argv[3]) ? $argv[3] : "example_password";
$Before         = isset($argv[4]) ? date("Y-m-d", strtotime($argv[4])) :  date("Y-m-d", strtotime("-1 year"));
$After          = isset($argv[5]) ? date("Y-m-d", strtotime($argv[5])) :  date("Y-m-d", strtotime("1970-01-01")); //Older date
 
$Before = 'BEFORE "' . $Before . '"';
$After = 'SINCE "' . $After . '"';
 
$mbox = imap_open("{" . $Host . "/novalidate-cert}INBOX", $User, $Password) or die("Can't connect: " . imap_last_error());
 
try {
    if (empty(imap_check($mbox))) {
        throw new Exception("Error is occurred");
    }
    $emails = imap_search($mbox, "$Before $After");
    if (empty($emails)) {
        throw new Exception("Don't have mail " . strtolower($Before));
    }
    foreach ($emails as $email_id) {
        imap_delete($mbox, $email_id);
        preg_match_all(
            '/([^: ]+): (.+?(?:\r\n\s(?:.+?))*)\r\n/m',
            imap_fetchheader($mbox, $email_id),
            $matches
        );
        $headers = array_combine($matches[1], $matches[2]);
        print_r("$email_id : " . imap_utf8($headers['Subject']) . " => " . $headers['Date'] . "\n<br>");
    }
    imap_expunge($mbox);
    echo "Deleted " . count($emails) . " letters " . strtolower($Before) . "\n";
} catch (Exception $e) {
    echo $e->getMessage(), "\n";
}

The data required for the script to work can be specified both in the script itself and in the command line at startup:

• Host — address and port IMAPserver.
• User — title mailbox.
• Password — password mailbox.
• Before — letters earlier than the specified date will be deleted. The date can be specified by replacing -1 year for a specific date, in the format YYYY-MM-DD (2010-02-23) or subtracting a certain amount of time from the current date in the format -1 year or -1 month or -1 day.
• After — letters after the specified date will be deleted. The date can be specified by replacing 1970-01-01 for a specific date, in the format YYYY-MM-DD (2010-02-22) or subtracting a certain amount of time from the current date in the format -1 year or -1 month or -1 day.

Running the script in console or task cron executed by a command of the form:

/usr/local/bin/php /home/example/file.php mail.adm.tools:143 admin@example.com "password" "2022-03-24" "2015-04-28"