On 15/09/2018 16:11:04, Java Jive wrote:
On 15/09/2018 14:47, Big Al wrote:

On 09/15/2018 09:17 AM, Java Jive wrote:

Actually Outlook *used* to be able to export account details to *.iaf
files, so you could export on one machine, copy the files to another, and
import there, but somewhere in between Outlook 2000 and 2010 the dickheads
at M$ decided that this, and those very convenient menus that we'd all
learnt to use, was far too convenient for their users, so when setting up
Office 2010, I had to reconfigure the accounts in Outlook 2010 from
scratch, which, as you say, was a convoluted time-wasting hassle.* I got
it all working, but to me it made the point again about the dangers of
having something as important as one's email history in an bespoke format
that few other programs can read, so that's why I
converted*it*all*to*T'bird,*and*now*use*that*as*my *email*client.

I've backed up the *.PST file for outlook 2007 on my wife's machine many
times before a reload and then just dropped it back and all is there, mail
wise.*** That file includes everything to get and send mail but IIRC it
lacks configuration of Outlook itself, so view, colors, etc need reset.**
Still, better than having to setup the POP info though.

Yes, AFAICR the evolution of the Outlook species between 2000 & 2010 was
roughly ...

2000: Kept all the contacts, calendar, mails, notes in a monolithic *.pst
file - I think it held everything *except* the account details, which were
held in the registry - hence the need to transfer them by exporting and
importing *.iaf files. If you had more than email account, they'd all be in
the one file.

2010: Everything, including the account details, is now in the *.pst files -
note the plural, if you have more than one email account, you now have more
than one *.pst file. There is nothing wrong with the new arrangement of
keeping the account details in *.pst files, but FFS why is it that 2010 can
import older *.pst files but not the corresponding *.iaf files? I could
import all my old emails from 2000, but not the corresponding account
details! Duh!

But, while I used Outlook 2000 for many years and 2010 for a while, I think
there are major problems with both versions ...

I really don't like the fact that all my emails are held in a single
monolithic file of a bespoke proprietary format and encryption. For one
thing, if it gets corrupted, it could prove very challenging to retrieve
anything useful from it. For another, if you want to clean out old mails,
you can't just delete them as individual files from your hard drive, but
leave them on your backup server in case of need, instead you have to backup
the entire file to a new name, and then delete the emails from the originally
named file, because otherwise when you next back up to the server, it'll
overwrite the version of the file with the old mails in it. Even now that
you've backed up the old version of the file with the old mails to a suitable
back up name, you've still got a devil of a job to find one particular old
mail which you now find that you need to refer to - is it in the current
file, last year's back up, just how many years' back up files are you going
to have to search to find it?

I'd rather mails were kept as individual files, so that if one gets
corrupted, only one email is lost, and in a format that is open source,
though obviously it still needs to be encrypted. That helps guard against
corruption, but you'd still need some method of searching a back-up directory
on a server from within your usual email client. AFAIK, no email client can
do this.

You don't have to have one large .pst file.

I archive my emails by year so I have 2010archive.pst, 2011archive.pst,
2012archive.pst etc., etc.
That way your current Outlook.pst file and your archive.pst never have
more than one years worth of info in them.

You just compact and back up your multiple archive files once the
ignore them on subsequent backups as they are unlikely to ever change.

To see all your archive pst files and be able to access the info in
them all you do is add those files under the data files tab in account
settings. They then show up in the Outlook folder hierarchy where they
can be searched normally providing that you have set to 'search all
items' in preferences.

I have been doing it this way for 17 years so thats 16 archived pst
files plus the current archive.pst and the Outlook.pst file. The
archive files vary between 120mb and 870mb, average size is about
450mb, Outlook opens quickly, runs smoothly and never crashes.

--
mick