Aid4Mail

Aid4mail is a desktop application that, in few steps, can convert many email formats to a wide range of email formats, with a high degree of fidelity. Aid4Mail can also connect to IMAP and MAPI servers (such as Gmail and Microsoft Exchange) to harvest email directly. It includes a filtering system to exclude or include messages meeting stated criteria, and a scripting language to allow for custom export formats, including PDF/A. See Chris Prom’s article about email preservation (2011) for more information. The format selected for email preservation by the University Archives is MBOX.

Refer to the Aid4mail manual for more information on how to use the program, the email format options, and features.

• 1. Start Aid4mail: Find the application in your start menu. Aid4mail will start with its main window.

2. Select the mail source format: Identify the original format of the emails you want to convert, and find it within the format options provided in Aid4mail main start window. Select it as the “Mail source format”.

2.a. Given that you don’t know exactly what kind of emails are you going to be processing, or whether the email materials strictly comply the file source format that you have selected, verify you have turned off the “Strict File Format Check” feature, by clicking in the button “Software” > “Advanced Options” > “Strict File Format Check”, and unchecking the option. Note: Depending on the agreement with the donor, if you need to process deleted emails, make sure to mark the boxes “Include mail in trash” and “Include unpurged mail”. Also,

3. Find the mail source location: Click “next”. Use the browser to find the location of the emails you want to process. Aid4Mail will list all the files identified as emails in the format you have selected.

****NOTE: Although Aid4mail will create a new folder with the converted email and will NOT overwrite on the source folder, be aware that you are able of deleting files from your storing area through the Aid4mail windows. Use a working copy, not the original materials.

4. Select the emails and target formats:

4.a. Select the emails you want to convert from the list of files identified by Aid4mail at the “Source Location” window. You can select them manually or use “Ctrl +A” to select all files listed. Check “Select subfolders” in case your source location includes a folder structure.

Click “Next”. The following window allows you to filter the emails you want to convert, based on their dates, contents and locations (sent, received, deleted). As part of the workflow processing you would usually want to process and preserve ALL the email material obtained, so you may un-check the filter option. Click on “Next”. For more information about how to use the filters, please see Aid4mail manual.

4b. Select the “Target format” from the list displayed. The format selected for email preservation at the University Archives is .mbox. Select it from the Target format list. Click "Next". In the next window, ensure that the option "*.mbox" is selected at the box "File name". Click on "Next".

5. Export settings: The next window will allow you to choose how do you want your emails to be converted and stored. As in the electronic processing we want to preserve materials as original as possible, choose the options "Preserve full message" and “Restore source mail folder structure”.

Note: Attachments: As part of the e-mail processing, you want to save the attachments as independent files from the .mbox, in order to preserve them as binary files in their original format (i.e .doc, .pdf, etc). Ensure you check the box "Detach attachments and inserted files from email messages".

After clicking on “Next”, the following window will allow you to see the final command that you have entered, before the mails are processed. After reviewing, click “Start”.

6. Conversion results: After the email conversion is completed, Aid4mail will display a report listing the converted emails. At the bottom you will see the time used by the process, as well as the total amount of emails processed, and the amount of emails converted. Compare this with the number of files at the source folder, to ensure that you have the same amount of converted emails. Generally you will obtain one .mbox file per folder included in the source location. You will find the extracted attachments at an "Attach" folder within the target folder.

An Attach.TAB file will also be created along with the .mbox file, including an index of all messages extracted from the emails. This file lists the attachments names and formats as well as the message from where they were extracted, to enable you to connect the attachments with the email messages.

Note: You can choose to Launch the new target location after email conversion is completed. Please be aware that this report cannot be exported and saved.