[Kde-pim] Re: Keep computers in sync

[Ingo Klöcker]

On Monday 06 December 2010, Philippe Clérié wrote:
> On Monday, 6 December 2010 14:42:07 Ingo Klöcker wrote:
> > On Monday 06 December 2010, Philippe Clérié wrote:
> > > On Sunday, 5 December 2010 16:08:06 Ingo Klöcker wrote:
> > > > Obviously, the best solution for synching local folders would
> > > > be a general synchronisation solution which does not only sync
> > > > email, but also calendar, contacts, etc.
> > > 
> > > In theory, I agree. In practice, I'm worried.
> > > 
> > > My understanding of Akonadi is/was that it only stores metadata
> > > of its own choosing without touching the standard way of storing
> > > the data. In other words, I thought that a maildir was a maildir
> > > and a icalendar was still a icalendar. If that were true, then
> > > synchronizing would not be a problem ( at least for the way I'm
> > > doing it -- rsync, unison -- ).
> > 
> > For Akonadi this is mostly true. It is not true for Nepomuk which
> > is used for things like tags. I'm not sure where information like
> > "replied", "forwarded", "important" is stored, but I think this is
> > also stored in Nepomuk.
> > 
> > > Right?
> > 
> > Mostly right. My point is that rsync and other low-level tools are
> > no suitable solution for many people.
> 
> __ mostly ? __
> 
> In this context that's not very reassuring.
> 
> The maildir format allows for 6 flags, only one of which is
> user-defined. The others are for replied, forwarded, seen, deleted,
> draft. The flags are stored in the file name.

This is all very nice, but nowadays databases are used for this. maildir 
supports neither an important flag nor a todo flag. Those two flags are 
the most important flags for me because they are the flags I actively 
set. The maildir flags just reflect different status of the messages but 
they are and never were intended to be used for user flags.


> Low level tools like rsync may not be the right solution for many or
> even most people. But they need to work in order to build higher
> level tools, or you're going to have to reinvent the wheel. Besides,
> it worked before. Now it does not and there are _no_ replacements,
> that I know of.

Who says rsync doesn't work anymore? Of course, rsync still works. What 
has changed is the files you need to rsync. In the past you didn't rsync 
the maildir files only. You also had to rsync KMail's proprietary index 
files because that's where the information about the flags and the 
mesage status was stored. Today, with Akonadi and Nepomuk, you have to 
rsync the corresponding databases instead. Of course, you have to take 
care that the databases are not running when you rsync them but 
otherwise nothing much has changed compared to pre-Akonadi.


> Finally, it looks like what used to be a known, open format  is being
> transformed unnecessarily into something else, even if only
> accidentally.
> 
> Say it ain't so!!! Please!

Well, it never was so. KMail never really updated the maildir flags 
properly regardless of what you may think.


Regards,
Ingo
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