I just want to backup all the data i have in kontact, so i can restore it in case something happens. How can i do it?
Thanks in advance

Most of that data will be stored as files/folders under ~/.kde ( or ~/.kde4 ). note that you will need to back up each component you use as well ( kmail, etc. )

you can use this command to locate all the KMail files: ls -aR | grep -i kmail
just backup everything it lists. you can repeat the same procedure for akregator, and kontact itself.

bcooksley wrote:Most of that data will be stored as files/folders under ~/.kde ( or ~/.kde4 ). note that you will need to back up each component you use as well ( kmail, etc. )

you can use this command to locate all the KMail files: ls -aR | grep -i kmail
just backup everything it lists. you can repeat the same procedure for akregator, and kontact itself.

That doesn't cover everything, since for example resource configs are in .kde/share/config/kresources, addressbook files are in .kde/share/apps/kabc, etc

Unless there is a specific reason not to backup other KDE settings and data, I'd rather recommend backup of .kde/ (or .kde4 or wherever $KDEHOME points to)

Cheers,
_

anda_skoa wrote:That doesn't cover everything, since for example resource configs are in .kde/share/config/kresources, addressbook files are in .kde/share/apps/kabc, etc

True. It would maybe be a good idea for someone to implement a "Make a backup archive of everything" from within Kontact, and the corresponding "Restore from backup"? I think Evolution implemented something like that relatively recently.

I, too, am not that happy with this solution that the data (mails, contacts, etc.) is mixed up with configuration files in the same folder. Is it possible to say Kontact where else to save its data?

I simply do a regular backup of /home. If, for any reason, there is a problem, it is usually only with one component and only that file needs to be restored from the backup.

I have just posted a possible solution for backing up all kontact data here:

showthread.php?tid ... 9#pid12629

Can someone check this?

There is a user data backup tool project called Kamion, however I am not sure about its current state.

The base idea was that it would operate on "backup recipies", i.e. application provided hints which files or directories belong to their data set.

As for paths, well behaved KDE applications should never put any data into the config directory or vice versa, i.e. data should go to share/apps/appname( and config to share/config/appnamerc

Some data storage frameworks allow to specify arbitrary locations, e.g. setting any .vcf file as the addressbook store, however sometimes (e.g. in case of the Mail folder), this is not settable through a GUI.

Cheers,
_

So, ok, i'll just try to back up everything from kontact. I dont want any other settings i have in .kde, so backing up the whole dir is out of question.
Thanks anyways guys!

hi all,

congrats for the forum!!!!

backuped my .kde (kde3) folder. switched to kde4 and imported the folder. now i can't see the identities of kmail? why? other stuff (kabc, kgpg, kwallet,...) works as i can see. the identity files are at ".../.kde/share/apps/kmail". whats wrong? where is my mistake?

ca and thanks testmg

You will probably find that KDE 4 stores it's settings in ~/.kde4 therefore it is completely unaware of your restored KDE 3 settings.You should be able to restore the KMail files however without problems as long as you manually only move those.
Because of the major changes between the two, I would not recommend copying your KDE 3 profile over your KDE 4 profile.

It is important to copy the files before KDE4 ever runs, otherwise the upgrade path as provided by KDE, e.g. automatic config updates, won't work.

Cheers,
_

Yesterday, I upgraded from kubuntu 8.04 (I used there KDE4.1.2 from the ppa repository - kubuntu-members) to 8.10. As you know 8.10 only updates KDE3.5 and deletes the packages from the "foreign" ppa-repository.

But I have used Kontact in KDE4.1.2 of 8.04 - so what I did to save my all data was:

I changed the backup script (linked above), by replacing all "$HOME/.kde" with "$HOME/.kde4". I started the backup script, which saved the whole data of pim, kwallet and some other applications.

After dist-upgrade to 8.10 I ran the restore script (also linked above). The script doesn't need to be changed, because the new kde4-config directory is now $HOME/.kde (if you have another one, so you have to change the restore paths in the script).

The script perfectly worked! All my data, all my accounts, everything was restored!!

Maybe, this script or tool could be included in the official pim-application?

I hope it will help some of you!

will "akonadi" take care of this backup "problem"? if everything is stored on one place it should be very easy to write a backup feature ....

It will be, actually I think it has already been done, through akonaditray. This will make backup of PIM settings and data very easy into the future ( and for applications to share ).