Vanishing emails....Mac OSX

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Geektastic

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#288642 14-Jul-2021 16:14

I have had several instances recently where email has arrived, I have read it, then when I try to find it again it simply does not exist anywhere.

Email is a bit complex on my iMac. I have in daily use Spark Email and Newton. Sometimes Apple Mail. The reason is a bit historic - I used to have Android phones and Apple on the desk. I wanted email programs that would work on both platforms and look the same. Now it is mainly habit as I have iPhone and iMac. Also I have Mac email, Gmail and email from my personal website.

Also I use Sanebox which automatically groups mail into folders before you see it. I have run this for ages.

The vanishing email thing is relatively new - within 12 months or so I would say. Does anyone have any ideas as to why it is happening? Sometimes I have found missing emails in one program that have gone from another but not always.

ProbablyAGeek

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#2744419 15-Jul-2021 10:03

I have noticed this issue as well, have noticed it for a couple years now but only notice it very occasionally.

i.e. I've seen the email sitting in my inbox go back later to read it and can't find it. I then check my companies outlook online and can see it sitting in there.

Groucho

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#2744425 15-Jul-2021 10:23

I haven't had disappearing emails other than me dropping them in the wrong subfolder or the accidental keyboard shortcut of 'cut' from the inbox and not pasting it anywhere. My annoyance is when an email comes in I might get a notification straight away... or might be an hour later or when I quit Mail. All very random timing and has spanned the last two major upgrades of OS.

AxisOfBeagles

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#2744536 15-Jul-2021 12:04

Just a thought. Check your Archive folder. See if the missing emails are showing up there.

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ProbablyAGeek

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#2744573 15-Jul-2021 13:45

Groucho:

... the accidental keyboard shortcut of 'cut' from the inbox and not pasting it anywhere.

Do you mean the command+x shortcut? That doesn't do anything in my inbox..

Groucho:

My annoyance is when an email comes in I might get a notification straight away... or might be an hour later or when I quit Mail. All very random timing and has spanned the last two major upgrades of OS.

Yeah I get the delayed notifications occasionally too. I never quit mail so don't get them then but have seen some emails come in without a notification so that might be it

FineWine

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Nurse (R)

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#2744682 15-Jul-2021 16:32

@OP - might be silly question but; if you are using a POP account, what server deletion period have you set in Apple Mail ?

On a similar coincidental note concerning Apple macOS 10.15.7 mail:

Twice this week when I woke up my iMac from 10 to 12 hr overnight sleep then go into Mail, when I open an email, new or old, the body of the text is missing.

Quitting mail then restarting again does not work. Restarting my iMac does.

Today I ran: First Aid on my Fusion drive in Safe Mode, then ran Onyx, then rebuilt my mac mail Envelope indexes by deleting previous ones.

How to remove the envelope files from ~/Library/Mail/V7/MailData and drag them to trash

1. Envelope Index
2. Envelope Index-shm
3. Envelope Index-wal

4. Empty your Trash and restart your Mac

5. Then restart Mail and Mail will rebuild your Indexes - Note: this may take some time depending upon size of your Mail Boxes.

We shall see what happens tomorrow morning after the nightly sleep.

Whilst the difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a bit longer. However, miracles you will have to wait for.

Groucho

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#2745092 16-Jul-2021 10:59

ProbablyAGeek:

Groucho:

... the accidental keyboard shortcut of 'cut' from the inbox and not pasting it anywhere.

Do you mean the command+x shortcut? That doesn't do anything in my inbox..

Yes that's it but appears they've finally disabled that keyboard shortcut from that location as just (consciously) tried it. I've only recently upgraded to 10.15 as had to phase myself out of a couple of 32bit apps.

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Groucho

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#2745096 16-Jul-2021 11:01

ProbablyAGeek:

Groucho:

My annoyance is when an email comes in I might get a notification straight away... or might be an hour later or when I quit Mail. All very random timing and has spanned the last two major upgrades of OS.

Yeah I get the delayed notifications occasionally too. I never quit mail so don't get them then but have seen some emails come in without a notification so that might be it

I've searched online and others have the same issue (including with Big Sur) but you guessed it, no resolution. I had already rebuilt the indexes using Onyx as @FineWine suggested. No joy for me but Mail does run quicker.

FineWine

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Nurse (R)

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#2745106 16-Jul-2021 11:24

FineWine:

We shall see what happens tomorrow morning after the nightly sleep.

Well all is working again this morning🤞

On the point about DELAYED Notifications pop outs and Notifications sound alerts for new mail, this bug has been around for several whole versions. I believe loads of people have reported it (https://www.apple.com/feedback/mail.html) including developers via their forum and their developers Apple reporting portal. It still has not been fixed ☹️

Whilst the difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a bit longer. However, miracles you will have to wait for.

MikeB4

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#2745118 16-Jul-2021 11:55

Geektastic:

I have had several instances recently where email has arrived, I have read it, then when I try to find it again it simply does not exist anywhere.

Email is a bit complex on my iMac. I have in daily use Spark Email and Newton. Sometimes Apple Mail. The reason is a bit historic - I used to have Android phones and Apple on the desk. I wanted email programs that would work on both platforms and look the same. Now it is mainly habit as I have iPhone and iMac. Also I have Mac email, Gmail and email from my personal website.

Also I use Sanebox which automatically groups mail into folders before you see it. I have run this for ages.

The vanishing email thing is relatively new - within 12 months or so I would say. Does anyone have any ideas as to why it is happening? Sometimes I have found missing emails in one program that have gone from another but not always.

I had this issue a while back, I thought I was going nuts, OK more nuts. I was also using Spark email client at the time. I never really got to the bottom of it though I suspect it the way Spark handles Spam/Junk and archiving. I changed to using Microsoft Outlook with Office 365 and the issue has gone away.

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

ProbablyAGeek

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#2745128 16-Jul-2021 12:11

FineWine:

@OP - might be silly question but; if you are using a POP account, what server deletion period have you set in Apple Mail ?

On a similar coincidental note concerning Apple macOS 10.15.7 mail:

Twice this week when I woke up my iMac from 10 to 12 hr overnight sleep then go into Mail, when I open an email, new or old, the body of the text is missing.

Quitting mail then restarting again does not work. Restarting my iMac does.

Today I ran: First Aid on my Fusion drive in Safe Mode, then ran Onyx, then rebuilt my mac mail Envelope indexes by deleting previous ones.

How to remove the envelope files from ~/Library/Mail/V7/MailData and drag them to trash

1. Envelope Index
2. Envelope Index-shm
3. Envelope Index-wal

4. Empty your Trash and restart your Mac

5. Then restart Mail and Mail will rebuild your Indexes - Note: this may take some time depending upon size of your Mail Boxes.

We shall see what happens tomorrow morning after the nightly sleep.

Groucho:

I've searched online and others have the same issue (including with Big Sur) but you guessed it, no resolution. I had already rebuilt the indexes using Onyx as @FineWine suggested. No joy for me but Mail does run quicker.

Did you guys try the "Mailbox -> Rebuild" option?

I was also getting the issue where some new emails had no body, a rebuild worked fine, took an hour or so to finish but that's probably because I have quite a few emails

FineWine

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Nurse (R)

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#2745148 16-Jul-2021 13:20

ProbablyAGeek:

Did you guys try the "Mailbox -> Rebuild" option?

I was also getting the issue where some new emails had no body, a rebuild worked fine, took an hour or so to finish but that's probably because I have quite a few emails

Yes I did. I forgot to mention that step in my previous post.

Interesting in all the articles written about Rebuilding and/or Re-indexing Apple Mail, they always warn that rebuilding could take a long time depending upon the number of emails within your Mailbox/es.

Now I have seven account Mailboxes under the heading Mailboxes. (Inbox = 7 acc's) (Sent = 7 acc's) (Junk = 7 acc's) (Bin =7 acc's) We are constantly clearing our Inbox. This is done either by Deleting or Filing. Mail is left on the Server for one week. Erasure of the Bin & Junk are set to one month. (POP acc's)

We File our emails into Received Emails & Sent Emails Mailboxes which are broken down into Sub-Mailboxes which are locally stored "On My Mac". We started this strict regime way way back in Windows Thunderbird days mid nineties.

I know it is these file structures, "On My Mac", that are re-indexed, just over 20,000 of them and that only takes less than 5 minutes. (I know I should start culling) So I am assuming that the mail Rebuild function is only working on the seven account Mailboxes mentioned above. Anyway when I rebuild these seven account Mailboxes it all happens in a blink of an eye, there is not even a progress bar appearance.

So none of this indicates why two days in a row I was not seeing the text body of the emails and what caused it until I ran the previously mentioned maintenance.

Whilst the difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a bit longer. However, miracles you will have to wait for.

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Groucho

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#2745156 16-Jul-2021 13:37

FineWine:

ProbablyAGeek:

Did you guys try the "Mailbox -> Rebuild" option?

I was also getting the issue where some new emails had no body, a rebuild worked fine, took an hour or so to finish but that's probably because I have quite a few emails

Yes I did. I forgot to mention that step in my previous post.

So none of this indicates why two days in a row I was not seeing the text body of the emails and what caused it until I ran the previously mentioned maintenance.

Likewise I first tried the Mailbox -> Rebuild option first for my delayed notification problem, I then tried it with Onyx. Neither action fixed my specific problem but overall the Mail app is running smoother.

I don't recall ever having an email with no text body.

ProbablyAGeek

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#2745224 16-Jul-2021 15:56

FineWine:

I know it is these file structures, "On My Mac", that are re-indexed, just over 20,000 of them and that only takes less than 5 minutes. (I know I should start culling) So I am assuming that the mail Rebuild function is only working on the seven account Mailboxes mentioned above. Anyway when I rebuild these seven account Mailboxes it all happens in a blink of an eye, there is not even a progress bar appearance.

The Rebuild process runs in the background I'm guessing, there was no progress bar when I ran it. It didn't look like it was doing anything for a bit but then all my emails disappeared and then slowly started coming back, I could see the mail app was using ~20% CPU for about an hour after I started the Rebuild and it was very slow to do anything in the app while it was rebuilding.

FineWine

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Nurse (R)

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#2749854 26-Jul-2021 11:18

Have not had any more problems 🤞

Whilst the difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a bit longer. However, miracles you will have to wait for.