Mail disk usage increased drastically in Plesk GUI

Symptoms

• Plesk GUI Subscriptions > example.com > Statistics shows overuse by mail.

• In Plesk GUI Domains > example.com > Email Addresses usage is normal.

• Checking mail disk usage on the server shows different disk space usage from the one showed in Plesk GUI, e.g.:

  # du -sh /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/
  4.7G /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/

• Checking mail disk usage on the server with the command including hardlinks shows the same disk usage as in Plesk GUI:

  # du -shl /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com
  348G /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com

• The most part of disk usage belong to one directory, e.g. .Spam/tmpor .Trash/cur

  # du -shl /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/tmp
  345G /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/tmp

• Directory size differs when checking not counting hardlinks:

  # du -sh /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/tmp
  3G /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/tmp

Cause

There are numerous hardlinked files under /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/tmp or /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Trash/cur in the mailbox. These files are counted as separate files for the purposes of disk usage statistics.

Resolution

1. Connect to the server via SSH.

2. Clean the /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/ or /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Trash/curdirectory: 

   # rm -rf /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Trash/cur/*
   # rm -rf /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Trash/tmp/*
   # rm -rf /var/qmail/mailnames/example.com/user/Maildir/.Spam/*

3. Recalculate disk usage statistics