Evolution is the personal information manager (PIM) for GNOME desktops, and includes Palm integration, todos, memos, contacts, email, and calendar.
Recently, I migrated from one desktop to another, and moved my data from my home directory over. Most applications were perfectly happy to find their data from their hidden directories preconfigured for them (VirtualBox was one of these).
Evolution refused to recognize the data as it was copied, and started by asking for all of the relevant information to set up a new mail account. To copy the data, it is necessary to first backup all information using Evolution’s backup process (from the File menu). This backup file can then be transfered to the new machine and restored. However, passwords are not restored as a part of this process; passwords are not included in the backup.
The passwords can just be re-entered again if necessary. If you’ve forgotten them (as I did) you can pull them from the GNOME keyring using the Seahorse application found in every GNOME installation. You can run seahorse from the command line or run it from the menu (inUbuntu Karmic Koala: Applications > Accessories > Passwords and Encryption Keys).
Patrick Ahlbrecht over at onyxbits.de has an excellent article about recovering the passwords from Evolution. Older versions of Evolution stored the passwords using base64 encoding in a plain text file (i.e., not encrypted at all).
Next time one saves passwords in an application, think about that base64 encoded password file…
UNIX Administratosphere 