Hi hunykitten...
Your sent mail should be located in Outlook
Express on the folders view. It will say
'Sent Items'. This will only have mail there
if you have selected under Options; 'Save copy
of sent messages in the 'Sent Items' folder'
checked. Mine is set up like this, and I just
confirmed several emails sent over a year ago
from this computer.
Certain things can knock the messages out,
such as aggressive file cleanup, reinstalling
Outlook Express (sometimes), reinstalling
the operating system (sometimes), viruses,
and general HD corruption.
If you want to find the particular file that
has your sent email, you can do it 1 of a few
ways. First way, look for it directly. On NT
and XP the folder locations are on my
computers at:
D:\Documents and Settings\(username)\Local Settings\Application
Data\Identities\{string of characters}\Microsoft\Outlook Express
On my Windows 98 computers it's at:
C:\windows\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook Express
If there aren't any files there you can try the
second method... do a file find (WindowsKey + F)
type in the search box: inbox
It should come up with the location for any Inbox
files. This is just to verify the existence of the
mailbox files. Since you are looking for your sent
items... you can replace the word inbox in the
search box with: Items.dbx
That will show the file that holds your sent items. If you
drag this file to a text editor, like Notepad, Wordpad
or my favorite:
[ http://www.ultraedit.com/downloads/ ]
You will see the contents of this file. The search probably
also turned up any other sent items files and even any
deleted items files you might have.
Most other email programs will have a file like this,
my info was particular to your mail program, Outlook
Express. If you wish to find where the sent mail file is
located for other applications, you can either do another
file find or depending on the size of hard drive partition
you are searching through, you can do a search for known
text in the file. Using the File Find in Windows, on the
line that says: 'Containing Text' (win2k, 98) or 'A word or
phrase in the file' (XP); place the text you know to exist
in the sent mail file. Such as an email address you know
mail has been sent to. blah@somewhere.com. If the mailbox
file is encrypted on-disk, by the application, you can't
do this type of search.
Now in regards to your hotmail, if you are using the Outlook
Express to access it, everything above holds true. If you are
using the web interface for hotmail, I believe you have to
select 'Copy Message to Sent Folder' to make the sent email
persist. If you do select the copy message... and you have
email synchronization set for the sent items in hotmail, the
sent email sent by the web mail client will also be in your
Outlook Express too.
-Search techniques-
None, b.t.d.t. ;-)
Hope this provided what you are looking for.
-AI |
