[kdepim-users] Archive of emails

[Anne Wilson]

On Monday 23 Aug 2010 20:28:52 Llewellyn Lee wrote:
> Hi All,
> 
> Ingo wrote.
> 
> Hmm. Wouldn't it be easier to store the mail on a local IMAP server?
> Then you could access the mail from any of the 5 PCs. If you often need
> references to old emails then archiving those old emails on external
> media doesn't sound like a good idea because it will take several
> magnitudes longer to access those archived messages than it would take
> to access them if they are still stored on the PC (or the IMAP server).
> 
> FWIW, I keep all mail since I started to use mail in KMail. In my sent-
> mail folder there's a message from 1998 (!). I am not noticing any
> slowdowns due to this.
> 
> As I have explained in earlier mail A very small enterprise like mine gets
> a lot of mail and sends out a lot of mail.
> 	I and millions of others like me do not work in any network  we simply
> have one desktop. Even someone who has 5 computers (presumably in a
> network) sees the need to archive emails to removeable media.

I have run a small business, and I can tell you that the productivity you 
would gain by networking is unbelievable.

> 	I do not know what an Imap server is and because it would place my
> information in a place outside of my personal control I would prefer to
> stay away from such things.

No, you have the wrong idea.  A personal IMAP server, such as I have, is on 
one PC in my office.  All data that needs to be shared by the computers on the 
network lives on that server.  The IMAP server fetches your mail, in exactly 
the way you do it now (and you can use that server as one of your work PCs if 
you wish) and each computer, being networked, simply gives the IMAP server's 
address for fetching and sending mail, instead of the ISPs.  It would take an 
hour or two to get things working as you want it to, but it would solve most 
of your problems.

> 	It seems that for me and several others who have joined this discussion
> that being able to archive  to  say (for example) a cd is a highly
> desireable feature. When I use the word Archive in this instance I do not
> mean I want to compress them etcetc I just want copies with all the
> attachments and all the origional information on a cd or dvd  and be able
> to plug that dvd into the drive and veiw the emails as I would those that
> are on the internal hard drive.
> 
If you want to archive, merely as an archive, to be rarely or never accessed, 
then the mail can simply be copied to the CD - but that's much easier if the 
folders are in maildir format.  I don't know whether you know the difference, 
but mbox format concatenates messages into one long file - and slowdown is 
very noticeable when it gets too big.  Maildir format has single files for 
each message.  If you find you have mbox files, we can help you to change 
that.  At the same time you could separate your messages by date - you'll be 
surprised how easy it is - which will make your CD production easier.

> Ingo's point about the extra time it would take to access those externally
> stored emails is perhaps valid for some, but do remember these are emails
> that we will not look at so very often and when the need arises will check
> through our CD's looking for the ones we want.
> Without this facility I have all those emails keeping my daily backup
> bigger than it needs to be and I am having to print out and file them in
> the old fashioned way to reduce what is on the hard drive.
> 
> I late last year bought a new computer and the task of getting all those
> emails moved onto the new one became a nightmare task.
> 	Had I had a cd containing all of them  the whole thing would have saved me
> hours of struggle because I would have archived the lot and would have
> simply copied some current stuff into my new Kmail folders on the new hard
> drive.
> 
> Please Please we need this archive facility.
> 
> I will tell you what is also a nightmare. Try transfering the todo and the
> calendar and the address book to a new PC.

Everything you need to do is listed on 
http://userbase.kde.org/KMail/FAQs_Hints_and_Tips#Transfer_mail_and_settings_to_another_computer_.28or_another_user_account_on_the_same_machine.29 
- it should only take a few minutes to do it all.

> 	When I did the installation of the new Linux to my new PC I had learned a
> lot more about the programs and settings and at installation time made
> vastly different setting so I could not just load a backup copy straight
> in. It turned into a huge task wasting many days to get my system back in
> order.
> 
If you could use one box for the server, and it wouldn't need to be high-spec, 
I would recommend running CentOS on it and setting up the IMAP server as I 
described above.  CentOS is not a state-of-the-art distro, it's one designed 
for ultimate stability in a business environment, and uses less resources than 
most of the modern distros.  It uses rolling updates for years at a time.

> Kontact does not have an  export facility for Kontact files although there
> is an Import facility for them.
> 
By the way, could you turn off your Reply-To setting?  Unless you actually 
need to have replies to an address different from the one you post to, that 
setting isn't needed, and makes list mail management more clumsy. :-)

If you decide to go down this path we can answer your questions.

Anne
-- 
KDE Community Working Group
New to KDE Software? - get help from http://userbase.kde.org
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 198 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part.
URL: <http://mail.kde.org/pipermail/kdepim-users/attachments/20100824/ecdd278b/attachment.sig>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
KDE PIM users mailing list
kdepim-users at kde.org
https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kdepim-users