Just a question more to clarify what I believe is the case rather than something I need to know.

Having recently switched to using Evolution as my primary Mail reader over Thunderbird, I came to the point of wanting to make some backups of my inboxes and address books (primarily - tasks and calendars are secondary) and found none of the 'expected' options for the address books (ie exporting to *.ldif or similar).
Is there a way to do this or is it just a case of gzipping the contents of the .evolution folder in the home directory? Browsing through there seems to show all the main points, although again, the addres books in a format I don't recognise from the point of view as to what would happen if I were to switch clients again.

Am I right? Have I lost the plot? Should I go sleep?

Thanks for the comments.