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MBUTIL PACK
Usage:
MBUTIL Pack [-Backup] [-Force] [-Overwrite] [-Renumber]
[-Delete] [-Recover]
The Pack command can be used to pack the message base files by
removing deleted messages.
Pack will by default rewrite the message base file and delete
the old files if the message base was packed successfully. If you
use '-Backup', it will keep MSGHDR.BAK and MSGTXT.BAK. Note that I
don't keep a backup of the index files. If you should ever need to
use your backup message base, just run 'MBUTIL Index' to create new
index files. By using '-Overwrite' you can choose to overwrite the
existing files if there's not enough disk space to create new files.
I personally always use and recommend using '-Force' to overwrite
the existing message base files, which has the following advantages
and disadvantages:
+ It requires no free disk space at all, which is actually the
reason why I always HAVE to use overwrite mode. :-)
+ It is much faster (especially since MBUTIL won't rewrite text
blocks that don't need to be moved)
+ It causes less disk fragmentation, and thus prevents message
base access from slowing down.
- It is a little bit more dangerous, because if MBUTIL is
interrupted while overwriting, it will probably damage your
message base beyond repair. 'MBUTIL Index -Delete -Renumber' is
the best you can do when this should happen. MBUTIL will
temporary ignore the Ctrl-Break and Ctrl-C keys when it is in
overwrite-mode so you can't accidentally interrupt it.
When MBUTIL has renumbered the messages, it will update the
LASTREAD pointers in LASTREAD.BBS. If USERS.BBS exists it will also
update the 'highest read' pointers in the user records and reformat
LASTREAD.BBS if necessary. I recommend using '-Renumber' regularly.
MBUTIL will automagically renumber if the highest message number is
higher than what you defined using the 'AutoRenumber' keyword in the
control file.
See 'MBUTIL Index' on the next page for details on using '-Delete'
and '-Recover'.
Switches:
-Backup Keep the original MSGHDR.BBS and MSGTXT.BBS as .BAK
-Force Force overwriting of the existing message base files
-Overwrite Overwrite existing files only if short of disk space
-Renumber Renumber messages and update LASTREAD pointers
-Delete Delete messages crosslinked in MSGTXT.BBS
-Recover Move messages in invalid boards to the RecoveryBoard
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