Re: Deleted Mail?

[Kyle Wheeler <kyle-mutt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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On Friday, December 14 at 08:47 PM, quoth Bill:
>What 'exactly' happens to an email message when it is deleted in Mutt?
>
>Is it at all recoverable?

That depends on how your message was stored. Generally, the answer is 
no, it's not recoverable.

If your message was stored in an mbox, then what happens depends on 
where in the mbox it was before it was deleted. If it was at the end 
of the file, the file is merely shortened (not overwritten), and 
sufficient disk forensics may be able to restore it. If it was in the 
middle or at the beginning of the mbox, the rest of the mbox is 
written over top of it, and recovery is very unlikely (though perhaps 
not impossible with sufficiently advanced magnetic technology).

If your message was stored in an MH folder or a Maildir, then the file 
containing that message is simply deleted, and given back to the 
filesystem. Thus, there is a greater potential for recovery, with 
sufficient recovery tools.

However, if your message was on a POP3 or IMAP server, then the 
recoverability all depends on the specific implementation of that 
server.

~Kyle
- -- 
Backups are for wimps. Real men upload their data to an FTP site and 
have everyone else mirror it.
                                                      -- Linus Torvalds
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