I am interested in finding out your experiences with using the dbox format (especially mdbox) if you use this format. I am contemplating changing my maildir setup to mdbox but I still need to make a case for it against maildir which has become a de-facto standard and provides sort of a secure basis in case of software changes. Your input will be appreciated. -- Andreas Kasenides Senior IT Officer Dept. of Computer Science, University of Cyprus Tel: 22892714, Fax: 22892701 (5B4ANK)
Andreas,> I am interested in finding out your experiences with using the dbox > format (especially mdbox) if you use this format.mdbox is THE reason why I am trying Dovecot. With mailboxes of several (tens of) GB with several k of messages I hope mdbox will speedup backups. Also SIS for attachments sounds very good, but still doesn't follow the altstorage rules (while messages go to altstorage, the extracted attachment stays in the SIS partition).> I am contemplating changing my maildir setup to mdbox but I still need > to make a case for itMy current interest is to keep live mailbox data in Maildir format and "archive" in the altstorage in mdbox after 30 days or so. I will experiment that configuration next week. Nevertheless I am still puzzled by the lost data I got yesterday in my mdbox+SIS+altstorage combination (see my message and the one from Daniel Miller). I am also interested to hear real life stories. 73 Paolo Cravero
27.02.2015 17:42, Andreas Kasenides ?????:> I am interested in finding out your experiences with using the dbox format (especially mdbox) if you use this format.I am using mdbox+SIS on small production server about 2 months. It works well for me. But I have had some difficulties using doveadm tools in particular situations. Mostly because of some parts of documentation wasn't clear enough for me.> I am contemplating changing my maildir setup to mdbox but I still need to make a case for it > against maildir which has become a de-facto standard and provides sort of a secure basis in case of > software changes.You can convert from mdbox to maildir at any time. Also you can use both formats on the same server simultaneously. -- Alexander
27.02.2015 18:14, Paolo Cravero ?????:> > mdbox is THE reason why I am trying Dovecot. With mailboxes of several (tens > of) GB with several k of messages I hope mdbox will speedup backups.What backup method are you using? I am doing one-way synchronization to mdbox+SIS at separate ZFS filesystem of the backup server and make snapshots to have backup history. I used to backup with rsync previously. After was I switched to doveadm-backup the backup speed increased dramatically.
Am 27.02.2015 um 15:42 schrieb Andreas Kasenides:> I am contemplating changing my maildir setup to mdbox but I still need > to make a case for it > against maildir which has become a de-facto standard and provides sort > of a secure basis in case of > software changes.Pros of Mdbox: * uses less files, meaning MUCH faster backup, faster fsck * you can use ALT storage, namely saving certain folders on a faster/slower storage (e.g. Inbox on fast RAID and rest on slower RAID) * you can compress it, making it even faster (zlib and so on) * uses much less I/O-operations compared to Maildir Cons: * you need to use the doveadm-toolchain, so you need to learn it; no longer mingling with emails on file system level anymore! * you need a snapshot for a consistent backup * if you lose the index file, all information on folders/mails is lost