Re: large mbox files

On Wed, 22 Apr 2026, Marc wrote:

How are messages deleted from large mbox files, are these files completely rewritten? I can't really believe that as some are bigger than the free disk space available.

I think it's a little better than that: bytes are shuffled up to fill the deleted message hole. I gather this from noting the difference in operation time from deleting a message from the top vs bottom of a large mailbox.

Joseph Tam <jtam.home@gmail.com>