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January 31, 2009
Tiger Mail to Leopard Mail... fixing the missing mail
I recently upgraded to Mac OS X Leopard on my Powerbook, but was shocked to see that all my Mail was missing, and the app wouldn't quit. After a few panicky moments, I searched on Google to see if others had the same problem.
Well they did, and luckily, thanks to the Apple Discussion Boards, I found a fix. So I thought I'd share it here in case other find it useful in their travels.
The problem:
After upgrading to leopard Mail has all the messages are missing. Account preferences seem to be OK but you just cannot see any messages. The app can't send, can't receive, and won't even Quit. The acual messages are still there in the user/Library/Mail folder, but the Mail app is blind to them and hangs.
The solution:
-Force Quit Mail.
-Navigate to your user/Library/Mail folder. Or, from the Finder's Go menu, choose Go to Folder. Go to this location (type or paste the tollowing, then click Go): ~/Library/Mail
-Remove the MessageRules.plist, MessageRules.plist.backup, MessageSorting.plist and MessageSorting.plist.backup (Note: you may not have the MessageRules files if you didn't make any in Tiger). Put them somewhere handy, dropping them on your desktop is fine.
-Start Mail again, let it launch, and then Quit it. Put the removed files back into that same Mail folder again. Replace any of the files if necessary.
You should be good to go again!
Posted by Snaggy at January 31, 2009 09:54 AM
Comments
Wow, I don't know how you ever figured that out, Snaggy, or why anyone should know that to begin with, but THANK YOU. I have freshly installed Leopard, and I already want to throw my computer off my balcony. I'm sure once I fix all the crap that is not automatic, I'll be happy.
Posted by: derek at January 31, 2009 10:41 AM
Hi Derek,
Yeah, I was just about to try loading all my old mail from a backup, or even move back to Tiger, but luckily I decided to google around for a solution first.
A few things I've had to tweak a bit, and the new Mail needed a few interface adjustments, but in general, most things about Leopard have been smooth. I like how it handles network drives, and I love Time Machine.
Posted by: Snaggy at February 1, 2009 09:41 PM