Restore an evolution file

Question

I would like to use my Evolution package on a laptop. To do this I used Evolution to make a backup copy to a memory stick and attempted to use that memory stick from the laptop, in Evolution to do a restore.

The laptop (Ubuntu 11.10) version of Evolution doe not recognize the file. The error message is

Invalid Evolution back up file

I checked further and the evolution backup file has zero bites?

Answer 1

Looks like the backup file was not saved correctly on the USB pen.

Try to make a new one and check the size of it or if possible use another USB pen, when broken they have a tendency to corrupt files. Make sure to eject the drive before removing it from the computer.

Answer 2

If backup doesn't work, as a last resort you could just copy the data folders to the laptop (provided you want to do a fresh setup there with the data from the other machine). To do so:

Backup:

1. make sure Evolution is closed, and it's server processes are shut down
2. make an archive of the following folders:
   • ~/.local/share/evolution
   • ~/.gconf/apps/evolution
   • ~/.config/evolution
3. copy the archive to the laptop

Restore:

1. make sure Evolution is closed, and it's server processes are shut down
2. remove/empty/move above mentioned directories if they exist
3. unpack your archive to bring the folders in position
4. startup Evolution again

Example syntax to create the archive:

cd ~
tar czf my-evo-backup.tar.gz ~/.local/share/evolution ~/.gconf/apps/evolution ~/.config/evolution

Example to unpack -- provided the archive resides in your home directory:

cd ~
tar xzf my-evo-backup.tar.gz

Remark: This way it is even possible to "revive" your evolution data from a crashed machine (while the disk is readable) to your new installation, though you may be unable to fire up Evolution on the old installation to create a backup. That's what I had to do recently...