mystery "Incoming*" files

mystery "Incoming*" files

[Per Bothner]

I am ending up with a ton of files named things like Incoming00DsZR
in my ~/Mail directly.  This is making me nervous.  It looks like
most (maybe all) of this is old mail (i.e.mail I've seen).  If so,
why is it sitting there?  I'd like to delete it all.  However, I
do seem to have lost some mail, and I find some messages I don't
think I've seen.  This is making me *very* nervous.

Most of my mail is delivered by a direct IP connection, but some
is directed via pop.  Thus I have two mail sources:
        (setq mail-sources '((file) (pop :server "postoffice.pacbell.net")))

Sometimes the pop server hangs.  Somestimes it will hang, and
ask "mail source error - continue? (yes/no)".  This is *not*
a very helpful question!  Sometimes I give up and ctrl-G.  In such
cases I seem to have lost messages that arrived directly.  I.e. xbiff
(actually the Gnome equivalent) will show some messages waiting
in the spool area;  that count will go to zero, but these message will
not show up in the mail folders, even after I restart xemacs.

I assume I can reduce this problem by using fetchmail to get the
pop mail, which should eliminate the hangs.  Still, this is quite
scary.

But maybe I'm getting what I deserve, for using old alpha snapsots
of both gnus (pgnus 0.84) and xemacs (21.2 from May)?  Should I
upgrade to a newer version, or go to a stable released version?

If there were a utility that scanned through old Incoming*
files, deleted the duplicates, and incorporated anything
truly new, that would help.  Is there?
-- 
	--Per Bothner
per@bothner.com   http://www.bothner.com/~per/

Re: mystery "Incoming*" files

[Norbert Koch]

Per Bothner <per@bothner.com> writes:

> I am ending up with a ton of files named things like Incoming00DsZR
> in my ~/Mail directly.  This is making me nervous.  It looks like
> most (maybe all) of this is old mail (i.e.mail I've seen).  If so,
> why is it sitting there?  I'd like to delete it all.  However, I
> do seem to have lost some mail, and I find some messages I don't
> think I've seen.  This is making me *very* nervous.

Per,

you are using pGnus which is a development (alpha, beta) version of
gnus. By default incoming files are left on your disk, since sometimes
gnus eats your mail for lunch. 

You can delete them from time to time. Alternatively, although not a
very bright idea, you could 

(setq mail-source-delete-incoming t)

norbert.

Re: mystery "Incoming*" files

[Per Bothner]

Norbert Koch <n.koch@eai-delta.de> writes:

> you are using pGnus which is a development (alpha, beta) version of
> gnus. By default incoming files are left on your disk, since sometimes
> gnus eats your mail for lunch. 

OK - sounds reasonable.  I assume that in the "stable releases"
by default the incoming files are *not* left on disk?

> You can delete them from time to time. Alternatively, although not a
> very bright idea, you could 
> (setq mail-source-delete-incoming t)

And perhaps wen/if I *do* get pop hanging or other weird behavior
I should check the most recent Incoming* file ...
-- 
	--Per Bothner
per@bothner.com   http://www.bothner.com/~per/

Re: mystery "Incoming*" files

[Norbert Koch]

Per Bothner <per@bothner.com> writes:

> OK - sounds reasonable.  I assume that in the "stable releases"
> by default the incoming files are *not* left on disk?

Yup.
 
> And perhaps wen/if I *do* get pop hanging or other weird behavior
> I should check the most recent Incoming* file ...

You've got the drift ...

Norbert.