Re: You may need more inodes if you store lots of emails locally in maildir format (was: Re: Buster Installation - Partition phase - Inode option to choose - SSD or Mechanical HD
On Sun 25 Aug 2019 at 08:10:07 (-0400), rhkramer@gmail.com wrote:
> Hmm, this raised a question in my mind (not for myself so much) -- I use mbox
> (vs. maildir) as much as possible to store emails.
>
> (kmail (the older version I use (on Wheezy) uses maildir for the inbox and
> maybe some other "kmail system" "folders", e.g., sent-mail (yes, just
> checked). For all the folders I set up, I set them up as mbox, but, it seems
> that kmail sometimes decides to convert them to maildir for some reason (maybe
> if the mbox file gets too big, for some definition of too big?) (Far aside: and
> for other reasons, I want to keep my "folders" in mbox format (for
> compatibility with some other applications.)
>
> Anyway, as many of us know, mbox keeps all the emails in a given folder in one
> file, while maildir stores each email in a separate file.
>
> I suppose that, for someone who was going to archive a lot of mail and store
> it in maildir format, they might have to consider more inodes (i.e., the news
> option).
>
> (Even further aside: I am worried that when I upgrade to Buster or such, the
> kmail included might no longer support mbox -- I got that impression
> somewhere, and I tried asking the question on a(n "official") kmail list, but
> did not get a clear answer (or I didn't really understand the answer -- I'll
> have to go back and look for that answer again and re-read it.)
grep -a '^From ' DIRECTORY/* | less
where DIRECTORY is wherever you keep your mail, will give an indication
of how many emails you have stored. Then add your INBOX. My own totals
around 70,000. My 40GB root filesystem has 2½million inodes (13% used),
and /home (180GB) has 11½million (3%). So I'm not too apprehensive
about any future demise of mbox format. (Obviously, running a mailing
list or news server would be a different matter.)
Cheers,
David.
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