path: root/archivemail.sgml

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<RefEntry>

<DocInfo><Date>2 November 2006</Date></DocInfo>

<RefMeta>
<RefEntryTitle>archivemail</RefEntryTitle>
<ManVolNum>1</ManVolNum>
<RefMiscInfo>SP</RefMiscInfo>
</RefMeta>

<RefNameDiv>
<RefName>archivemail</RefName>
<RefPurpose>archive and compress your old email</RefPurpose>
</RefNameDiv>

<RefSynopsisDiv>
<CmdSynopsis>

<Command/archivemail/
<Arg><Option>options</Option></Arg>
<Arg choice=req rep=repeat><Replaceable/MAILBOX/</Arg>

</CmdSynopsis>
</RefSynopsisDiv>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Description</Title>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ is a tool written in &python; for archiving and
compressing old email in mailboxes. 
</Para>

<Para>
By default it will read the mailbox <Replaceable/MAILBOX/, moving messages
that are older that the specified number of days (180 by default) to a
<application/mbox/-format mailbox in the same directory that is compressed
with &gzip;.  
</Para>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ supports reading  <application/IMAP/,
<application/Maildir/, <application/MH/ and <application/mbox/-format
mailboxes, but it will always write archive files to <application/mbox/-format
mailboxes that are compressed with &gzip;.
</Para>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ has some support for being run as the root user on
user mailboxes. When running as root, it will &seteuid; to the owner of the
mailbox it is reading, creating any archive files as that user. 
</Para>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Options</Title>

<VariableList>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-d <Replaceable/NUM/, --days=<Replaceable/NUM/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Archive messages older than <Replaceable/NUM/ days.  
The default is 180. This option is incompatible with the
<Option/--date/ option below.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-D <Replaceable/DATE/, --date=<Replaceable/DATE/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Archive messages older than <Replaceable/DATE/.
<Replaceable/DATE/ can be a date string in ISO format (eg '2002-04-23'), 
Internet format (eg '23 Apr 2002') or Internet format with full month names 
(eg '23 April 2002'). Two-digit years are not supported.
This option is incompatible with the <Option/--days/ option above.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-o <Replaceable/PATH/, --output-dir=<Replaceable/PATH/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Use the directory name <Replaceable/PATH/ to store the
mailbox archives. The default is the same directory as the mailbox to be
read.
</Para></ListItem>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-P <Replaceable/FILE/, --pwfile=<Replaceable/FILE/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Read <acronym/IMAP/ password from file <Replaceable/FILE/
instead of from the command line.  Note that this will probably not work if you
are archiving folders from more than one IMAP account. 
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-F <Replaceable/STRING/,
    --filter-append=<Replaceable/STRING/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Append <Replaceable/STRING/ to the <acronym/IMAP/ filter string. 
For <acronym/IMAP/ wizards. 
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-s <Replaceable/NAME/, --suffix=<Replaceable/NAME/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Use the suffix <Replaceable/NAME/ to create the filename used for archives.  
The default is <filename>_archive</filename>. For example, if you
run <Command/archivemail/ on a mailbox called
<filename>exsouthrock</filename>, the archive will be created
with the filename <filename>exsouthrock_archive.gz</filename>.
</Para>

<Para>
<Replaceable/NAME/ is run through the &python; <application/time.strftime()/
function, which means that you can specify any of the following special
directives in <Replaceable/NAME/ to make archives named after the archive
cut-off date:

<itemizedlist mark='none'>
    <listitem><para><option>%a</option> 
    Locale's abbreviated weekday name.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%A</option> 
    Locale's full weekday name.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%b</option> 
    Locale's abbreviated month name.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%B</option> 
    Locale's full month name.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%c</option> 
    Locale's appropriate date and time representation.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%d</option> 
    Day of the month as a decimal number [01,31].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%H</option> 
    Hour (24-hour clock) as a decimal number [00,23].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%I</option> 
    Hour (12-hour clock) as a decimal number [01,12].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%j</option> 
    Day of the year as a decimal number [001,366].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%m</option> 
    Month as a decimal number [01,12].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%M</option> 
    Minute as a decimal number [00,59].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%p</option> 
    Locale's equivalent of either AM or PM.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%S</option> 
    Second as a decimal number [00,61]. (1)</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%U</option> 
    Week number of the year (Sunday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]. All days in a new year preceding the first Sunday are considered to be in week 0.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%w</option> 
    Weekday as a decimal number [0(Sunday),6].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%W</option> 
    Week number of the year (Monday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]. All days in a new year preceding the first Sunday are considered to be in week 0.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%x</option> 
    Locale's appropriate date representation.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%X</option> 
    Locale's appropriate time representation.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%y</option> 
    Year without century as a decimal number [00,99].</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%Y</option> 
    Year with century as a decimal number.</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%Z</option> 
    Time zone name (or by no characters if no time zone exists).</para></listitem>
    <listitem><para><option>%%</option> 
    A literal "%" character.</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>

</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-S <Replaceable/NUM/, --size=<Replaceable/NUM/</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>Only archive messages that are <Replaceable/NUM/ bytes or
greater.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-n, --dry-run</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Don't write to any files -- just show what would have been done. This is
useful for testing to see how many messages would have been archived.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-u, --preserve-unread</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Do not archive any messages that have not yet been read. <command/archivemail/
determines if a message in a <application/mbox/-format or
<application/MH/-format mailbox has been read by looking at the
<application/Status/ header (if it exists). If the status
header is equal to 'RO' or 'OR' then <application/archivemail/ assumes the
message has been read. <command/archivemail/ determines if a
<application/maildir/ message has
been read by looking at the filename. If the filename contains an 'S' after 
<filename>:2,</filename> then it assumes the message has been read.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>--dont-mangle</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Do not mangle lines in message bodies beginning with "From ".  When archiving
a message from a mailbox not in <application/mbox/ format, by default
<command/archivemail/ mangles such lines by prepending a '>' to them, since mail
user agents might otherwise interpret these lines as message separators.
Messages from <application/mbox/ folders are never mangled.  See &mbox; for more
information.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>--delete</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Delete rather than archive old mail. Use this option with caution!
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>--include-flagged</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Normally messages that are flagged important are not archived or deleted. If
you specify this option, these messages can be archived or deleted just like
any other message.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>--no-compress</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Do not compress any archives using &gzip;.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>--warn-duplicate</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Warn about duplicate <application/Message-ID/s that appear in the input
mailbox.</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-v, --verbose</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Reports lots of extra debugging information about what is going on.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-q, --quiet</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Turns on quiet mode. Do not print any statistics about how many messages were
archived. This should be used if you are running <Command/archivemail/ from
cron.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-V, --version</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Display the version of <Command/archivemail/ and exit.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>

<VarListEntry>
<Term>
    <Option>-h, --help</Option>
</Term>
<ListItem><Para>
Display brief summary information about how to run <Command/archivemail/.
</Para></ListItem>
</VarListEntry>
</VariableList>

</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Notes</Title>
<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ requires &python; version 2.3 or later.
</Para>

<Para>
To archive an <application/IMAP/-format mailbox, use the format
<command>imap://username:password@server/mailbox</command> to specify the
mailbox. You can omit the password from the <acronym/URL/; use the
<option>--pwfile</option> option to make <command/archivemail/ read the
password from a file, or just enter it upon request. Substitute '<acronym/imap/'
with '<acronym/imaps/', and <command/archivemail/ will establish a secure
<acronym/SSL/ connection. 
</Para>

<Para>
When reading an <application/mbox/-format mailbox, <command/archivemail/ will
create a lockfile with the extension <filename>.lock</filename> so that
procmail will not deliver to the mailbox while it is being processed. It will
also create an advisory lock on the mailbox using &flock;.
<command/archivemail/ will also complain and abort if a 3rd-party modifies the
mailbox while it is being read.
</Para>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ will always attempt to preserve the mode,
last-access and last-modify times of the input mailbox. However, archive
mailboxes are always created with a mode of <application/0600/.
</Para>

<Para>
If <Command/archivemail/ finds a pre-existing archive mailbox it
will append rather than overwrite that archive.
</Para>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ attempts to find the delivery date of a message by
looking for valid dates in the following headers, in order of precedence: 
<application/Delivery-date/,
<application/Date/ and
<application/Resent-Date/.
If it cannot find any valid date in these headers, it
will use the last-modified file timestamp on <application/MH/ and
<application/Maildir/ format mailboxes, or the date on the 
<application/From/ line on <application/mbox/-format mailboxes.
</Para>

<Para>
<Command/archivemail/ will refuse to operate on mailboxes that are symbolic 
links or create tempfiles or archives in world-writable directories.
</Para>

</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Examples</Title>

<Para>
To archive all messages in the mailbox <filename>debian-user</filename> that
are older than 180 days to a compressed mailbox called
<filename>debian-user_archive.gz</filename> in the current directory: 
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail debian-user</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To archive all messages in the mailbox <filename>debian-user</filename> that
are older than 180 days to a compressed mailbox called
<filename>debian-user_October_2001.gz</filename> (where the current month and
year is April, 2002) in the current directory: 
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --suffix '_%B_%Y' debian-user</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To archive all messages in the mailbox <filename>cm-melb</filename> that
are older than the first of January 2002 to a compressed mailbox called
<filename>cm-melb_archive.gz</filename> in the current directory: 
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --date'1 Jan 2002' cm-melb</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
Exactly the same as the above example, using an ISO date format instead:
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --date=2002-01-01 cm-melb</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To delete all messages in the mailbox <filename>spam</filename> that
are older than 30 days:
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --delete --days=30 spam</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To archive all read messages in the mailbox <filename>incoming</filename> that
are older than 180 days to a compressed mailbox called
<filename>incoming_archive.gz</filename> in the current directory: 
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --preserve-unread incoming</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To archive all messages in the mailbox <filename>received</filename> that
are older than 180 days to an uncompressed mailbox called 
<filename>received_archive</filename> in the current directory:
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail --no-compress received</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

<Para>
To archive all mailboxes in the directory <filename>$HOME/Mail</filename> 
that are older than 90 days to compressed mailboxes in the
<filename>$HOME/Mail/Archive</filename> directory:
<screen>
<prompt>bash$ </prompt><userinput>archivemail -d90 -o $HOME/Mail/Archive $HOME/Mail/*</userinput>
</screen>
</Para>

</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Tips</Title>
<Para>
Probably the best way to run <Command/archivemail/ is from your &crontab;
file, using the <Option>--quiet</Option> option.
</Para>

<Para>
Don't forget to try the <Option>--dry-run</Option> option for non-destructive
testing.
</Para>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Exit Status</Title>
<SimPara>Normally the exit status is 0. Nonzero indicates an unexpected error.
</SimPara>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Bugs</Title>
<SimPara>
There is no support yet for reading <application/MMDF/ or
<application/Babyl/-format mailboxes. In fact, <Command/archivemail/ will
probably think it is reading an <application/mbox/-format mailbox and cause
all sorts of problems.
</SimPara>

<SimPara>
<Command/archivemail/ is still too slow, but if you are running from &crontab;
you won't care. Archiving <application/maildir/-format mailboxes should be
a lot quicker than <application/mbox/-format mailboxes since it is less
painful for the original mailbox to be reconstructed after selective message 
removal.
</SimPara>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>See Also</Title>
<SimpleList>
<Member> &python;, &gzip;, &mutt;, &procmail;</Member>
</SimpleList>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Url</Title>
<SimPara>The <Command/archivemail/ home page is currently hosted at 
<ulink type="http" url="http://archivemail.sourceforge.net">sourceforge</ulink>
</SimPara>
</RefSect1>

<RefSect1>
<Title>Author</Title>
<SimPara> This manual page was written by Paul Rodger &lt;paul at paulrodger dot
com&gt;. Updated by Nikolaus Schulz <email>microschulz@web.de</email></SimPara>
</RefSect1>

</RefEntry>