GLOBAL1 said:
I want to make sure that if I compact my files both my present and archived
folders/files do not get lost or changed in any way. I need to make sure my
labeling and formatting remain the same. Does "compacting" just reclaim the
space a file has left or does it impact anything else? Will I view and/or
retrive all files the same as I do now?
When you delete an item, it isn't deleted. It just gets moved into the
Deleted Items folder. The item merely got moved into a different folder
so it never did get actually deleted.
When you permanently delete an item by deleting it from the Deleted
Items folder or using Shift+Del, the item's status is changed to Deleted
and hidden from you seeing it anywhere in Outlook's UI. The item still
exists in the database. Delete-marked items are not displayed by
Outlook but they still physically exist in the database.
When you compact the database, you physically purge all delete-marked
items from it. Whitespace and delete-marked records are physically
removed from the database and then there is some reindexing and
management to make the database file smaller in size.
Do deleting items, even when permanently deleting them, does not reduce
the size of the database file. Not until you compact that database to
physically purge the delete-marked items will the file get smaller.
Anytime you write to a file, there is chance of corruption. If you
don't do regular backups, you deem your data as worthless or
reproducible. Compaction or just the normal use of Outlook, the OS file
system, file indexing utilities, etc., could cause the file to get
corrupted. So do you do backups so you can restore your data files?
Start thinking about it. It you don't back it up, it's not important to
you because you deemed it unnecessary to protect your data. What are
you going to do when your hard drive dies someday?
