I have some saved mail in Outlook Express that I would like to edit. Where are the files located? Can I use a text editor, or is a hex editor required?
I think your mail is saved in a file with a .pst extension. Do a search for all files with a .pst extension and you should find your mail box file. The PST file however is not a simple text file, it is your entire mail box complete with whatever folders you had, and the mail within those folders, also includes your contacts/address book.
You will at least need a hex editor because this is a binary file.
Why can’t you just copy and paste it into a text file and save it as text. Or maybe you could reply to it and add bits to it that way. Or you could email to yourself an adjusted copy.
I don’t have Outlook Express here to check, but I think this holds for the express version.
If you really want the mail in your ‘sent items’ folder to be changed (rather than just to store the text somewhere) then you can export the file as something human readable (File/Export/Text or something) and then edit that exported file and then import the file back in.
WARNING: I’ve never done this, and it’s entirely possible you could screw up your entire mail archive, or various other nastiness. Someone will be along shortly to shout at me if this is a stupid idea.
Barring that I’d just reply to your self, if you want to add sensitive information and don’t want it to go over the internet then hit reply, delete the To: field, do your edits, save the mail message and close it. Then just drag it from the Unsent to the Sent folder.
Hope that helps,
SD
Jeez - such bad information in this thread!! First of all, a PST file is your mailbox in Outlook, not Outlook Express. Next to edit a saved email, simply open the email in OE, click File > Save As… and save it as an .EML file somewhere. Open with a text editor such as Notepad and save the resulting edited .EML
I don’t know if you can drag-and-drop the .EML back to your inbox or not.
Thanks for the replies - I’ll look around and see if can come up with something.
Several years ago, using Netscape on a Mac, I could just open the folders with a text editor and go to town.