are these error messages severe? and how to fix them?

[Simon Matter]

> On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 6:31 PM,  <mahecha at jsums.edu> wrote:
>> greetings all.
>>
>> This morning a user called me saying that he was using reading his email
>> (via squirrelmail) in one computer, then he logged out, and some time
>> later
>> went to another computer open squirrelmail, and his mail was gone....
>>
>> I checked directly in the mailstore and he had only a couple of
>> messages,
>> but he assures me that he did not delete anything....
>>
>> After some search on the log files, I found something like this:
>>
>> May 19 09:56:05 ccaix imaps[8619]: skiplist: recovered
>> /var/lib/imap/user/C/user^name.seen (3 records, 7316 bytes) in 0 seconds

I think skiplist files are always "recovered" when they are opened. So
that is not a sign of anything wrong.

Simon

>>
>> after some more digging, Ifind that a bunch of account have the same
>> type of
>> "error" messages.
>
> Is it always about the .seen file ? Or about a skiplist ?
>
>>
>> What do they mean? and how to fix them? are they serious?
>>
>
> - The .seen is an index that contains the state of emails, if you have
> already read it or not.
> - cyrreconstruct aka reconstruct is the tool to do the job, but it
> looks like cyrus do it by itself !
> - The .seen is only the .seen :-) This error is harmless, except if it
> appears to often and
> is the sign of something going wrong.
>
>
>> I read some info and it says to delete the .seen and athen reconstruct
>> the
>> db for all users, but I'm not sure I want to do that for all the system.
>
> Don't delete these files. Cyrus and cyrreconstruct are able to repair
> them!
> If you still get a problem after a repair then you could try to delete
> it, for a try,
> but the you loose all your "mail status"
>
>>
>> Is there a way to do it for a single user (or a smal group of users).
>
> Yes cyrreconstruct can work for one ore more user and also all user at
> once.
>
>>
>> Will cyrus delete emails during the process of recovering a user.seen
>> file?
>>
>
> No
>
> But the file that can be bring into play whe emailq are disappearing
> is the .index file,
> and a cyrreconstruct will repair it also.
>
>
> As you can see, running this command ,
> # man imapd.conf | col -b | grep _db
>        annotation_db: skiplist
>        duplicate_db: berkeley-nosync
>        mboxkey_db: skiplist
>        mboxlist_db: skiplist
>        ptscache_db: berkeley
>        quota_db: quotalegacy
>        seenstate_db: skiplist
>        subscription_db: flat
>        tlscache_db: berkeley-nosync
>
> cyrus use a lot of db with a lot of backend, some back-end are more or
> less reliable than other,
> depending the OS or the imap version. As a workaround it is possible
> to change the backend.
>
>> Currently using:
>> Cent OS 4 x_64
>
> If you look in previous post (1 year ago maybe)  theyr was post about
> probleme in the "map" function that was generating problem with old
> kernel.
> And a 64bits should not help.
>
> Was your system working well in the past ?
> Before to do something, be sure to have identified your problem.
>
>> Cyrus POP3 v2.2.12-Invoca-RPM-2.2.12-8.1
>> ESMTP Sendmail 8.13.1/8.13.1
>>
>> Thanks in advanced.
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>> ----
>> Cyrus Home Page: http://cyrusimap.web.cmu.edu/
>> Cyrus Wiki/FAQ: http://cyrusimap.web.cmu.edu/twiki
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>>
>
>
>
> --
> Alain Spineux
> aspineux gmail com
> May the sources be with you
> ----
> Cyrus Home Page: http://cyrusimap.web.cmu.edu/
> Cyrus Wiki/FAQ: http://cyrusimap.web.cmu.edu/twiki
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>