Re: [Evolution] (no subject)

[Mark Gordon <mtgordon ximian com>]

On Sun, 2003-06-08 at 14:46, Philip Parzygnat wrote:
> If this is a support list can some body help me my linux system crashed im 
> totally new i would like to read my mail from the line prompt which is thye 
> only user interface left available to me. My question is where are my 
> messages store or can a use a non gui version of the software to read these 
> messages.
> my email is philipparzygnat hotmail com please help

The best solution would be to get X working again.  For help with that,
you may want to ask on a different list.  Until that time, various
mail-reading solutions are possible.  Answer to question(s) follows:

1) Where are the messages?

By default, local messages (e.g. downloaded from POP servers) are stored
in ~/evolution/local/Inbox and its subdirectories.  All messages are in
files named "mbox"; the parent directory defines the name of the folder,
in case you have a folder hierarchy for your mail.  Mail may be stored
in different formats, but that's a relatively advanced option, and you'd
know if that were the case.  If you're not downloading mail from POP
servers, the mail won't necessarily be stored there.  IMAP mail will
typically be kept on the server; in such cases, one may be able to ssh
to the IMAP server and run a command-line client there, but that's
making some assumptions about the IMAP server.  A local spool will
certainly be usable from a command-line client; the file is typically in
/var/spool/mail.

2) What can I use to read mail if only have the console?

There is no command-line or terminal-based Evolution.  If you don't have
access to X, I'd suggest mutt.  It's kinda tough if you don't know vi,
though, and vi is not a good choice for novices. pine may be a better
choice in your case, especially if you intend to write a lot of mail
between now and the time X is working again.  If all you need to do is
read the existing mail, it's stored in a plain text format, and
text-based mail can be read easily enough with less.  HTML mail poses
problems, though that's going to be the case with pretty much any
text-based mail client as well.

Summary of options:

pine -F mbox
mutt -f mbox
less mbox

(other options exist: cat, grep, etc., but aren't good choices for
novices).

-Mark Gordon