Ubuntu Manpage: archmbox - a simple email archiver

NAME

       archmbox - a simple email archiver

SYNOPSIS

       archmbox [ -h | --version ]
       archmbox MODE [ OPTIONS ] -d date mailbox [ mailbox ... ]
       archmbox MODE [ OPTIONS ] -o days mailbox [ mailbox ... ]

DESCRIPTION

       Archmbox  is  a  simple  email  archiver written in perl; it parses one or more mailboxes,
       select some or all messages and then perform specific actions on the selected messages.

       Four different MODES are available:

       •      list mode, which is useful to list all selected messages before  archmbox  performs
              the real operations (archiving or deleting)

       •      kill mode, if messages should be deleted from the mailbox(es) rather than archived

       •      archive mode, to archive the selected messages in a different mailbox

       •      copy mode, to copy selected messages from a source mailbox(es) without modifying it

       Messages selection is based upon a date criteria; an absolute date or a days offset can be
       specified.

       It is also possible to refine the selection using perl regular expressions on  the  header
       fields  of  the  message.  Keep  in  mind to quote the so called metacharacters, which are
       reserved for use in perl's regex notation. The metacharacters are

           {}[]()^$.|*+?\

       All archived messages are stored in a new mailbox with the same name of the original one +
       .archived  as extension (this is the default, but can be changed); the archive mailbox can
       be saved in gz or bz2 compressed format as well.

       Please note that the archive mailbox format is always mbox, regardless of original mailbox
       format. Moreover, mailboxes must be specified using the full path.

       Messages  are  appended  to the archive mailbox to allow multiple executions of the script
       against the same mailbox.

MODES

       -a, --archive
              Selected messages are archived in a different mailbox.

       -k, --kill
              Selected messages are deleted rather than archived.

       -l, --list
              List all selected messages.
              Warnings about skipped mailboxes (in use, empty ...)  are  printed  to  stderr.  So
              redirecting them to /dev/null won't clutter your list.

       -y, --copy
              Selected messages are copied from the source mailbox.

OPTIONS

-b, --backup
Creates a backup of the original mailbox before archmbox execution. The mailbox is
called mailbox.backup

--bzip2
Use bzip2 to compress the archive mailbox (use with -c).

-c, --compress
Compress the archive mailbox after script execution.

-d, --date <date>
Specifies the threshold date for messages. The date must be supplied in the
following format: yyyy-mm-dd

-D, --date-header
Force the use of the "Date:" header to age a message. If the header is somehow
corrupt, the date/time information are gathered for the beginning line of the
message.

-e, --extension <extension>
Specifies the suffix for the archive mailbox; the default is archived. If none is
specified, no suffix will be used (use carefully).

-f, --full-name
Prepends the path of the mailbox to the name of the archive mailbox. This option
overrides -n.

--format
Specifies the format of the mailboxes to parse. Legal values are mbox and mbx.
Defaults to "mbox".

-h, --help
Prints help.

-i, --ignore <regexp>
Any mailbox/directory matching <regexp> will be skipped while archiving.

--keep-flagged
Flagged messages will not be archived.

--keep-unread
Unread messages will not be archived.

-m, --minsize
Specifies the minimum size of the mailbox to be archived. Mailboxes smaller than
<minsize> will not be parsed for archiving.

-n, --archive-name
Specifies the name of the archive file (default: mailbox name)

--nosymlink
Do not follow symbolic links when processing mailboxes.

--nowarnings
Suppress mailbox related warnings. Use only if you know what you're doing!

--omit-prefix <prefix>
Omit <prefix> from the name of the mailbox when full name (option -f) is required.

-o, --offset <days>
Specifies the offset (in days) from today for threshold date of a message. This
option replaces -d. If you specify -1, archmbox will operate on all messages.

-p, --archive-path, --path <directory>
Specifies where to store the archive mailbox (default: "."). <directory> must be
specified using full path. The --path option is now deprecated and will be dropped
in future releases.

-r, --reverse
Reverse the sense of offset or date value. It usually means older than but with
this switch, it means newer than.

-R, --recursive
Act recursively on directories. If one or more directories are specified on the
command line, all mailboxes stored in those directories will be parsed for
archiving. Implies option -f.

-t, --tmpdir <directory>
Specify a temporary working directory. This value overrides the default one, which
will be set in descending order to the first defined one of: the environment
variables $TMPDIR and $TMP, the compiled in one and, as a fallback, '/tmp'.
To see the default value used by archmbox, do: archmbox --help.
<directory> must be specified using full path.

--time <time>
Use <time> in conjunction with <date> (option -d) to refine the threshold age for
archiving. <time> must be specified in the following format: hh:mm:ss.

--totals
Prints an overall summary of the archiving operations. The summary contains the
number of parsed and skipped mailboxes, the total number of messages parsed and
saved, the total space used and saved.

-v, --verbose
Verbosity level. Default is 1 (line per message) in --list output. So, if set to 1
it only lists msgid, sender and subject. With -v=2, it also prints date.

--version
Prints version number.

-x, --regexp <header=regexp>
It is specified in form -x field='regexp', where field can be any header. The
header part is case sensitive. The regexp part is case sensitive if the regexp
contains at least one upper case letter, and case insensitive otherwise.
If message satisfies date range, but does not satisfy regexp match on specified
field, it won't be archived.
The option can be specified more than once; in this case, the message is regexp
matched against all the given rules, and if it satisfies any, it will be archived.

-X, --Regexp <header=regexp>
Same as -x, --regexp except that for matching the regular expressions a logical
'and' mode is used for all regexp including the regexp given by -x, --regexp.

CONFIGURATION

       Archmbox is completely written in perl, but it uses some shell helpers to perform its  job
       (fuser, rm, gzip/gunzip etc.).

       The  correct  path  for  the  helpers  (both  required  and  optional  ones)  is probed at
       installation time. If one required helper is missing the installation will not take place.
       If  one  optional  helper  is  missing,  the  feature  provided  using that helper will be
       unavailable, but the script will be installed anyway.

       All other relevant configuration options can be specified at installation time or  at  run
       time using the command line switches.

USAGE EXAMPLES

       A complete example:

       archmbox -a -b -c -e 01 -f -d 2002-01-01 -p ~/mail-archive ~/Mail/personal-stuff

       This  will  archive  all  messages  older  than (received before...) Jan 1st 2002 from the
       personal-stuff mailbox in the Mail directory. Archive messages  are  saved  in  a  mailbox
       called  Mail-personal-stuff.01.gz in the ~/mail-archive directory. After execution, you'll
       find a mailbox called personal-stuff.backup in ~/Mail.

       Complex examples, using perl regular expressions:

       archmbox -a -o 1 --keep-flagged --keep-unread \
          -x From='(nagios|arpwatch|logcheck)@host\.net' \
          -x Subject='^(Security Events|Syslog Summary|\[SNORT\])' \
          ~/Mail/inbox

       This will archive all unflagged, read messages older than 1 day where the  sender  address
       matches  nagios@host.net,  arpwatch@host.net  or  logcheck@host.net or whose subject field
       starts with either 'Security Events' or 'Syslog Summary' or  '[SNORT]'  from  the  mailbox
       ~/Mail/inbox.  Messages  will  be  saved  in  inbox.archive in the current directory where
       archmbox was started from.

       archmbox --archive --offset 1 --keep-flagged --keep-unread \
          --Regexp From='@(host1|host2).example\.com' \
          --regexp Subject='^(Security Events|Syslog Summary|\[SNORT\])' \
          --archive-path ~/Mail/local-network.archive \
          --archive-name system-msgs \
          --extension 'none' \
          ~/Mail/inbox

       This will archive all unflagged, read messages older than 1 day where the  sender  address
       matches  @host1.example.com  or  @host2.example.com  and  whose  subject field starts with
       either 'Security Events' or 'Syslog Summary' or '[SNORT]' from the  mailbox  ~/Mail/inbox.
       Messages    will    be    archived    to   the   mbox   system-msgs   in   the   directory
       ~/Mail/local-network.archive.

       Some simpler examples:

       archmbox -a -o 15 ~/Mail/personal-stuff

       This will archive all messages older than 15 days in personal-stuff.archived (uncompressed
       mailbox).

       archmbox -a -r -o 15 ~/Mail/personal-stuff

       The same as above, but only messages newer than 15 days will be archived.

       archmbox -k -o 15 ~/Mail/personal-stuff

       This will delete all messages older than 15 days from Mail/personal-stuff

       archmbox -a -o 15 ~/Mail/* -c

       This  will  archive all messages older than 15 days in every mailbox found in ~/Mail.  All
       the archive mailboxes will be compressed.

       archmbox -l -r -c /tmp/mbox -o 20

       List all messages in /tmp/mbox which are newer than 20 days.   Option  -c  is  meaningless
       (and so ignored...).

       archmbox -l -r -c /tmp/mbox -o 20 -a --bzip2

       Same as above, but archiving is forced (-a) and bzip2 is used for compression.

       archmbox -a -x Subject='archmbox' -o 7 ~/mbox

       Select  for  archiving all messages older than 7 days whose subject field satisfies regexp
       match Subject =~ /archmbox/ (Subject is case sensitive, archmbox is is case insensitive).

       archmbox -l -x Subject='archmbox' -x From='fritz' -o 7 ~/mbox

       Select for archiving all messages older than 7 days whose subject field contains  archmbox
       or the sender is fritz (matches are case insensitive).

       archmbox -l -x Subject='archmbox' -X From='fritz' -o 7 ~/mbox

       Select  for archiving all messages older than 7 days whose subject field contains archmbox
       and the sender is fritz (matches are case insensitive).

       archmbox -a -o 5 -R /tmp/mbox ~/Mail

       archmbox will archive all messages older than five  days  in  /tmp/mbox.   It  then  start
       parsing  all  mailboxes stored in ~/Mail (recursion is active, and ~/Mail is a directory).
       If one or more directories will be found in ~/Mail, those directories will be explored  as
       well.

       archmbox -a -o -1 ~/Mail/my_mbx_mailbox --format mbx

       archmbox   archives   all   messages   stored   in   my_mbx_mailbox  and  puts  them  into
       my_mbx_mailbox.archived.  The source mailbox is a mbx mailbox (--format mbx is used).  The
       archive mailbox will be a mbox mailbox.

NOTES

When the script has to decide if a message needs to be selected from the mailbox, it looks
for the header From generated by the mail server (this is the first line of the message)
and doesn't care about the date specified by the sender's mail client. This is useful to
avoid removing messages sent from misconfigured mail clients. This behavior can be
changed by forcing the use of the "Date:" header (option -D).

Not all options are meaningful in all modes, ie compression is meaningless in list or kill
mode. If you specify a useless option for a particular mode, archmbox simply ignores it.

Archmbox uses a working directory to store temporary mailboxes. A default value for that
directory is hard coded in the script, but can be changed during the
configuration/installation process (see INSTALL for details). It might happen that your
mailboxes are too big for the partition holding this temporary directory, or you might
want to perform archiving on too much mailboxes at the same time. In other words, you may
run out of space. Use the -t option to specify a suitable working directory at runtime.

If you see some differences in the mailbox's dimension (size/free space), keep in mind
that your mailbox may contain a special message (512 bytes in size) with internal
information related to the mailbox. This message is meaningless for you, though archmbox
recognizes it and lets you be aware of it. That message is left untouched in your source
mailbox.

A few words about locking. There has been a discussion about archmbox handles file
locking. The answer is simple: no mailbox is ever locked. The reason behind this behavior
is that I want archmbox to be as least invasive as possible, so other kind of checks are
performed to ensure that no data is lost (mailbox has changed/mailbox is in use by another
program). I will surely add some locking mechanism in the future.

You don't need to execute archmbox as root... just take care to have write permissions for
the directories you use.

LINKS

       Archmbox can be downloaded from:

       http://adc-archmbox.sourceforge.net

       Archmbox is distributed under the terms of the GPL

AUTHOR(S)

       Copyright (C) 2001-2005

       Alessandro Dotti Contra <adotti@users.sourceforge.net>

       Parts of the code were contributed by:

       Alex Aminoff, Brian Medley, Buck Holsinger, Davor Ocelic, Fabrice Noilhan, Jayanth  Varma,
       Juergen  Edner,  Laurent  Cheylus,  Nicolas Ecarnot, Paco Regodon, Scott Thompson, Juergen
       Desher.

       The FreeBSD port is maintained by Talal Al-Dik.
       The OpenDarwin port is maintained by Markus Weissman.
       The Debian package is maintained by Alberto Furia <straluna@email.it>

BUGS

       Please report bugs to <adotti@users.sourceforge.net>