ACAP Introduction

This is a site about ACAP. ACAP is a protocol that will store your settings in a central place.

What can ACAP do for you?

ACAP will let you store your settings (e-mail settings, e-mail address book, bookmarks, and the like) in one place. That will make it easier for you to use them on other computers anywhere in the world.

It also means that your ISP will be able to see your e-mail settings (but only of course, those you choose to store centrally). This means that they will more easily be able to help you with problems.

How is ACAP different than using webmail (ie. Hotmail)?

ACAP, together with its brother IMAP, have a lot of overlap with webmail services. However, ACAP/IMAP have a number of advantages over many webmails:

• Interface choice: Webmails have only one user interface. If you don't like the user interface, you don't have much choice as to what to do. With ACAP/IMAP on the other hand, there can be many different programs that will interact with them, and you can choose one whose interface you like.
• Local storage options: With an ACAP/IMAP setup, it is much easier to store e-mails locally
• Faster: Because of the nature of the web, locally executing programs will always be faster. ACAP/IMAP programs are local, whereas webmails are not
• All the advantages of webmail too: If your mail provider has ACAP/IMAP, and also has a webmail that supports them, you'll have all the advantages above, plus you'll have a webmail that's integrated with your normal e-mail.

If my ISP can access my settings, isn't that more insecure?

This may sound less secure, but as far as security is concerned, it's really just fine, because:

• Your ISP can only access the settings that you have stored on their servers. If you only store the default settings they originally gave you on the servers, then they can't access anything they shouldn't know already
• If you have a webmail, it's no different (security-wise) than having your address book or e-mail settings stored in your webmail.

Additional information

There is additional information in the ACAP FAQ. That also includes sections for technical staff and programmers. Programmers may also be interested in our Projects and Resources pages.