Skype uses SQLite too! Even if you don’t believe it, but it’s one of the most handy things for getting data structured; But as every database, even sqlite needs some love every now and then.

On a linux box, the databases of Skype are in ~/.Skype// and their extension is .db; Contacts, Logs and all that jazz in there changes and you should take the time to optimize for a small speed boost – just like we did with Firefox:

find . -name ‘*.db’ -print -exec sqlite3 {} VACUUM \;
find . -name ‘*.db’ -print -exec sqlite3 {} REINDEX \;

… and we’re rolling smoothly again. But there’s more fun in those databases like exporting chatlogs:

sqlite3 main.db “SELECT author,timestamp, body_xml FROM messages WHERE dialog_partner = ‘skype-id'” > skype_chat_history.txt

… or clean them out a little:

DELETE FROM Messages where dialog_partner = “skype-id”

But keep in mind: Skype shouldn’t be running while doing so!