MY MAILBOX IS FULL OF - NOTHING

By BRIAN GRAINGER: brian@grainger1.freeserve.co.uk

 

This article is of interest to users of Outlook Express, (and possibly other versions of Outlook).

I am a fairly tidy person. I like to read my e-mail, respond to it, file it if necessary and then delete it. I also use Outlook Express and I know this works by storing all the messages within a folder in a single file together with an index file. For example I instructed Outlook Express on installation to keep mail in a directory called \messages. Outlook Express then sets up 2 sub-directories, one called mail and one called news. In the mail directory there are files called:

Inbox.idx
Inbox.mbx

Outbox.idx
Outbox.mbx

Sent Items.idx
Sent Items.mbx

Deleted Items.idx
Deleted Items.mbx

Drafts.idx
Drafts.mbx

These correspond to the index file and mail file for each of the default folders within Outlook Express.

One day I noticed that despite my mailbox being empty some of these files were 0.5 Mb in size. As my hard disk was running out of space I was concerned about this. I assumed, quite rightly, that deleting mail does not actually delete the mail. I assume it just deletes the reference to it in the index.

The next problem was how to reduce the size of these files to reclaim the disk space. For once the help file did have something on this, although you have to know what you are looking for! It is referenced under compacting folders. What you do is:

Open Outlook Express

Select a folder to compact (e.g. Inbox)

From the File menu select Folder and then select Compact or Compact All Folders

That's it. 1Mb of space easily recovered.

There are a couple of interesting side issues here. Firstly, you will notice that if you do NOT select a folder you will not find Compact or Compact All Folders on the menu! In the days of Window 3.x when you had no idea how to do something you may get a hint by traversing the menus and seeing what was available. Things that were not available in the current context were greyed out, but at least you can see them. Now you cannot see them. How does Microsoft justify this as easier to use software. It is going to get worse in Windows and Office 2000. There the things you use most frequently use will be displayed and other items will be accessible from one final menu catch all. Consequently you will only easily see the things you already know about. How are you going to learn how to do things? Dancing paper clips I suppose!

The other side issue is that if you have deleted some mail, emptied the Deleted Items folder and then realised you need the mail again it may be possible to recover it. Use Windows Explorer to open up the Deleted Items.mbx file with Wordpad and you may still be able to see it. It will be in ASCII or HTML so can easily be cut and pasted. How I long for the days when 'Deleted - Are you sure - Yes' meant it was gone rather than 'well you cannot see it, but it is still there!' Just because hard disks are 4Gb in size does not mean we want them filled with garbage - or a snooper come along and find out what we wrote/received.

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