Subject: Re: corrupted mail box

From: [email-masked] (David R Givers)
Date: Sun, 4 Dec 1994 03:15:56 GMT

David R. Beam ([email-masked]) wrote:
: My wife has had trouble with her mail box being corrupted basically every
: time she opens it (using Pine).

I have a similar problem but it is sporadic or not related to any event 
that I am aware of.  I t does not happen every time.  Just once or twice 
a month.

: Necessary fix seems to be using an editor to get down to a line that
: begins with "From..."

That's news to me. Not that you are wrong.  just have not hard about 
that, but obviously there is some thing wrong somewhere that need fixing. 

: But, why does this happen so often?  I don't think it is anything she is
: doing, but the sysop doesn't seem to know what is happening, either.

Same story here for me.  The syssops say it has nothing to do with their 
system.  I thought I was the only quirk in the electronic universe.

: Help appreciated.
Sorry i can not help but help appreciated here too

: DRB
  DRG

---

From: Terry Gray <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 3 Dec 1994 23:25:16 -0800 (PST)

David and David:
This message usually means that Pine didn't recognize the first line of 
the file as a valid message delimiter line (e.g. "From ...")

This can either mean that Pine is not recognizing a valid format (in which
case we need to know about it), or another process (e.g. the mail delivery
process) is not writing the file correctly.  This last case would be most
noticeable if the INBOX was normally kept empty. 

File locking problems, or an undiscovered --but very subtle-- Pine bug in
rewriting the mailbox are other possibilities.  (I say subtle because in over
four years of intensive Pine use, I've never encountered the error myself.)

DRB: what do you find in the file before the valid "From " line? Perhaps the
following would help track down the culprit: after exiting Pine (in a session
where the inbox was opened successfully) make a copy of the inbox.  Then just
before starting Pine the next day, make another copy and do a diff.  If when
starting Pine, the error occurs, quit and make yet a third copy.  That way
you can both determine whether Pine is the cause of whatever it is
complaining about, and exactly what the bogus data looks like. 

Everyone: if this happens to you, send the first few lines of the file to 
"[email-masked]" so we can determine if there is any 
pattern.  It would be nice to get to the bottom of this problem.

Thanks.

-teg