Always store your mail in (at least) two isolated places

nfortunately for most of us, there is rarely an option in mail clients which caters for one-click backup and restoration of E-mail. We still lack an embedment in a GUI, which makes backup trivial to all, as well as quick to invoke.

An alternative to explicit backup is duplication of data files. Owing to the use of Open Source applications, my mail gets backed up on the SAN every night and on another computer twice a week (in an open and raw MBOX format). I advise everyone to install a reliable mail client and set up a repeating job that can handle backups without any user intervention (see links below).

Microsoft applications (speaking of computer crashes when backups are truly needed) rarely seem to mind portability and safety of data. Outlook and Outlook Express would lock your mail in proprietary formats, which is the reason why I ceased to be their user (having started with Netscape Mail). Anything that served Microsoft’s purpose, namely my immobility, appeared to be the grand goal. Thunderbird will save your mail in a form that is extremely painless to back up. Furtherfore, it can also easily import mail from Outlook or Outlook Express, in a way that preserves all the data and even mail settings.

Another backup option is by converting mail to HTML, which is open and standard-compliant. There exists a Ruby script called eml2mbox which bridges a gap and helps towards the generation of Web pages from individual mail messages.

Older notes about mail management:

• Local or Web-based E-mail
• Public Mail Accounts and Filtering
• Urgent Mail Account
• E-mail Address Disclosure
• Managing Large E-mail Quantities
• Autoresponder Trick
• Solution to Junk Mail
• Managing E-mail on a Personal Domain

Thunderbird-related items:

• Outlook Versus Thunderbird
• Thunderbird Aqua – an attractive theme for Thunderbird

As well as links that are related to mail, lots of resources and tips on backup reside on this Web log.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 6th, 2005 at 12:01 pm and is filed under Internet, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.