Bayesian Filter Resets

[gretchendv]

Every 3 to 6 months the settings for my bayesian filter are reset. This includes the database of spam and non-spam emails. The entire bayesian filter is disabled and all of my configurations are gone.

I don't know why this happens, but it is very inconvenient as it takes time to re-train the filter to work appropriately. This has been going on for 2 years, so I know it's not just a fluke. Has anyone else experienced this? Is there a solution? Is it a bug in Ability 2?

Thanks in advance
Gretchen

[rob]

This can be caused by the database being corrupted, which could be caused by third party software (antivirus usually) or hard drive access issues (I recommend you perform a surface scan to be confident the hard drive is ok). I should note that in 2.70 we fixed the software so any problems with the bayesain do not result in the SMTP going offline so highly recommend updating. However, we do recommend that you also reguraly run backups of your installation and these would protect you against any kind of failure. This way, you can restore an older bayasian database file should this occur again.

[gretchendv]

Which files in particular would I need to backup in order to preserve my Bayesian settings and database?

[rob]

The files you should back up should be all the INI's within the config folder, and also the contents of the spam folder (the bayesian database is stored in bayesian.tdb). Also, the INI's located within the accounts folder. This will only be a few MB's worth of data bit will allow you to store your entire server configuration as well as the user / domain / ML settings.

[gretchendv]

Thank you so much for the help! I have configured my AV scanner to disregard the folders that contain spam configuration and database files. As an extra precaution I also setup a batch file to execute in a scheduled task. This batch file simply copies the ini files and spam database file to another drive. I also excluded the backup location from the AV scan so that my backups won't be corrupted! Thanks again.

Gretchen