Re: [exim] Planning MBOX to MAILDIR Migration

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Author: Marc Perkel
Date:  
To: Renaud Allard
CC: exim users
Subject: Re: [exim] Planning MBOX to MAILDIR Migration


Renaud Allard wrote:
> Marc Perkel wrote:
>
>> Thinking about going from mbox to maildir. Started with mbox way back
>> when but thinking about making the conversion. The main reason is that I
>> use rsync for backups and when these huge mailboxes are touched I have
>> to copy the whole thing. With maildir I only copy the files that change.
>>
>> So - my questions is - what's the easiest way to make this happan. I
>> assume there are conversion utilities. I'm using Dovecot for IMAP.
>>
>>
>
> Here is a script I used to migrate my boxes from mbox to maildir:
> http://batleth.sapienti-sat.org/projects/mb2md/
>
> I also use dovecot and it has no problems to recognize the change from
> mbox to maildir.
>
>
>> Also - using Ext3 for the file system on a Raid 10 array. Backup server
>> will run Ext3 Raid 1. Is the number of files in one directory going to
>> be a problem?
>>
>>
>
> I don't know about ext3 but ufs on OpenBSD and XFS on linux 2.6 don't
> have a real problem handling 20000+ files in one folder. My thought is
> that reiserfs is probably a better choice for a maildir setup as it is
> designed to perform well with thousands of small files.
>


Well, I used to be a big reiser fan but ext3 has caught up in many ways
and I'm leaning Ext3 because that's what I have and unless someone
convinces me that it's definitely a mistake I think I'm sticking with
it. Isn't there some new indexing feature that solves the big directory
issue?