<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body>
<p><font face="monospace">Hello,<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">We are running Dovecot 2.3.18 (together
with Postfix) on CentOS 7. It uses a Maildir structure.<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">We have a user who has organized his
mailbox as shows up at the end of this mail. The user had
forgotten that he had renamed his "Grants Active \ European" (</font><font
face="monospace"><font face="monospace"><font face="monospace">.Grants
Active.European</font></font>) folder to "Grants Active \
International" (</font><font face="monospace"><font
face="monospace">.Grants Active.International</font>), he
thought that it was lost and requested a restore of "Grants
Active \ European" (with all of its subfolders) from backup. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">Since we did that (using a simple "cp -rp"
from a backup, observing timestamps, ownership and permissions),
mail client software won't see "European" mail folder in </font><font
face="monospace">"Grants Active" mail folder; "International"
mail folder shows up but only with two folders, those which do
not exist in "European" branch (obviously, these were created
later). <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">I have tried to run the command "doveadm
index -u userx Grants\ Active" and likewise for each and every
mail subfolder under "Grants\ Active"; I have also tried
deleting the dovecot.index.cache and dovecot.index.log from the
latter (</font><font face="monospace"><font face="monospace">"Grants\
Active")</font> and then run: <br>
</font></p>
<blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace">doveadm -vD force-resync -u userx
Grants\ Active</font></p>
</blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace">but it didn't do the trick: Mail clients
are still stuck as I explained. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">In the end, I thought that the snag might
be that mail folders that are not appearing have identical
(duplicate) UIDs; As an example: <br>
</font></p>
<blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace">[root@mailx .Grants Active.European]#
cat dovecot-uidlist<br>
3 V1548680759 N1 G64e70a1130343f61003c0000715faa8d<br>
[root@mailx .Grants Active.European]# cd ..<br>
[root@mailx Maildir]# cd .Grants\ Active.International<br>
[root@mailx .Grants Active.International]# cat dovecot-uidlist<br>
3 V1548680759 N1 G64e70a1130343f61003c0000715faa8d<br>
</font></p>
</blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace">If so, how should we overcome this issue?
<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">I guess I could simply delete the restored
folders to return to an acceptable state? If nevertheless we
need to restore the ".European" mail folder from a backup (as it
was before getting renamed), what would be the right way to do
so?<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">Is there another way to resolve the issue
without deleting the restored mail folders?<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">Here is the list of mail folders in this
mailbox (I have intentionally removed lots of them, to reduce
irrelevant content; this mailbox includes a large number of mail
folders):<br>
</font></p>
<blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace"># doveadm mailbox list -u userx<br>
IGARSS 2024<br>
IAC2022<br>
Junk<br>
...<br>
Junk E-mail<br>
INBOX.EMISSION<br>
...<br>
Trash<br>
Trash.Equality<br>
Trash.sadf<br>
...<br>
Grants Active<br>
Grants Active.European<br>
Grants Active.European.URBAN RELEAF<br>
Grants Active.European.SMURBS<br>
Grants Active.European.SMURBS.In Kind<br>
Grants Active.European.SMURBS.Final Reports<br>
Grants Active.European.RI-URBANS<br>
Grants Active.European.QA4EO<br>
Grants Active.European.ATMO-ACCESS<br>
Grants Active.European.IGOSP<br>
Grants Active.European.GAUSS<br>
Grants Active.European.E-SHAPE<br>
Grants Active.European.CIROCCO<br>
Grants Active.European.InCASE<br>
Grants Active.European.EIFFEL<br>
Grants Active.European.ARSINOE<br>
Grants Active.International<br>
Grants Active.International.2324<br>
Grants Active.International.GAUSS<br>
Grants Active.International.CIROCCO<br>
Grants Active.International.IGOSP<br>
Grants Active.International.ATMO-ACCESS<br>
Grants Active.International.URBAN RELEAF<br>
Grants Active.International.InCASE<br>
Grants Active.International.ARSINOE<br>
Grants Active.International.RI-URBANS<br>
Grants Active.International.E-SHAPE<br>
Grants Active.International.EIFFEL<br>
Grants Active.International.QA4EO<br>
Grants Active.International.SMURBS<br>
Grants Active.International.SMURBS.Final Reports<br>
Grants Active.International.SMURBS.In Kind<br>
Grants Active.International.India<br>
Grants Active.Urban ReLeaf<br>
Grants Active.National<br>
Grants Active.National.ΑΓ ΠΑΡΑΣΚΕΥΗ<br>
Grants Active.National.ΠΕΤΡΟΥΠΟΛΗ<br>
Grants Active.National.CLIMATTICA<br>
Grants Active.National.ΝΑΥΠΛΙΟ<br>
Grants Active.National.ΕΔΒΜ<br>
Grants Active.National.PANGEA<br>
Grants Active.National.ΕΛΙΔΕΚ<br>
Grants Active.National.ΕΛΙΔΕΚ.OXONIAN - Δέσποινα<br>
Grants Active.National.ΕΛΙΔΕΚ.Νασια PhD<br>
Grants Active.National.CLIMPACT<br>
Sent<br>
...<br>
INBOX<br>
</font></p>
</blockquote>
<p><font face="monospace">Please, provide some guidance on what we
should do to make these mail folders work correctly again. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">Sorry, I am not very knowledgeable on mail
inner architecture and operations; please let me know if you
need additional info. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace">Thanks in advance,<br>
Nick<br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="monospace"><br>
</font></p>
</body>
</html>