Apple Releases Mail Update for Mavericks to Address Gmail Issues

[rdlink]

Have you thought about moving to Outlook.com? You can have a custom domain there, I think.

I've given it some thought. But I'm an Apple ecosystem kind of guy, and I don't want to move to MS, and have different issues.

 

[rvinny]

A new problem I haven't experienced before is I can't add a Google Apps mail account in 10.9

If you add the account under System Preferences > Internet Accounts (choosing Google) it will add the contacts and calendar but the mail checkbox won't go. You get a popup error "Mail couldn't discover settings for account..."

If you go to Mail > Preferences > Accounts and add it there, you get an error message about not being able to verify u/n and pwd.

If I use Airmail, the account sets up on the first try.

The only way I can get it to work in Mail is to duplicate the auto populated settings from Airmail. Mail > Preferences > Accounts and add it as "Add other email account". If you select Exchange that doesn't work either.

Two other points, (1) this is for a Google Apps Gmail account not regular Gmail. My regular Gmail account sets up fine and (2) This did not happen in 10.8. It's new in 10.9. I also tried the Mail patch. No help.

 

[SimonTheSoundMa]

Makes no difference. All 13 of my Gmail accounts on three macs are all the same.

Regardless of Apple vs Gmail incompetence, this is something you control, not Apple.
Go to your Gmail page in a web browser, choose settings, then choose labels.

Essentially the first group of labels, the "System labels" are the equivalent of Smart Mailboxes --- they are synthetically generated folders that an IMAP user may or may not wish to view through their IMAP mail viewer.

If you DO wish to view any of these synthetic mailboxes, click the "Show in IMAP" checkbox --- in your case, in particular, click that checkbox for the "All Mail" synthetic mailbox. Whether this is checked or not is very much a matter of choice. Contrary to what people claimed at the start of the Gmail/Mavericks disaster, I do not believe ANYTHING depends on the setting of this label apart from what I have claimed --- it does (or does not) display an "All Mail" mailbox, which you may (or may not) want to see in Apple Mail.

More significant is that life is much easier if
(a) the Sent/Drafts/Spam/Trash synthetic mailboxes are all checked AND
(b) Apple Mail is hooked up to use these particular Gmail mailboxes for these particular tasks. Before 10.9 OSX did NOT hook these up correctly (neither did iOS). An individual COULD have hooked them up correctly if they knew what they were doing --- but obviously most people did not have any reason to know how and why to do this.
10.9 DOES hook them up correctly. (I'd guess iOS7 does as well, but I haven't yet tested that.)
What this means in practice is that life is much easier if in Apple Mail you destroy and recreate every Gmail account you use.

For each such account
(a) make sure that EVERYTHING that you care about, associated with the account, is stored on Gmail servers --- NOTHING in an "On My Mac" folder
(b) in Mail.app destroy the account (which will probably lead to a detour into Preferences to destroy the account)
(c) in Mail.app create a new account of type Google with the same email address+password as before. Unlike in 10.8 and earlier, Mail will assume a whole lot of defaults (which are correct, unless you have really weird needs) and will not ask more questions --- it will just set things up.
(d) Now wait for all your mail to get pulled in again --- it helps to open the Activity Windows cmd-opt-0 --- to keep track of that.
(e) when all mail is in, repair the damage of the past by moving mail from the PREVIOUS (non-Gmail synched) deleted/spam/junk/sent mailboxes to the new Gmail synched ones.

If you don't understand what I'm talking about here, wait for someone who has more time than me to create an article with pictures and suchlike. You will not destroy any mail by following the instructions I've given above --- but you WILL THINK you have destroyed mail if you don't understand my point about where Mail.app is CURRENTLY storing its deleted/spam/junk/sent mail, as opposed to where Gmail wants it stored.

Also I don't sync notes/calendar/contacts/anything else on any of my Gmail accounts so if you do, I have no idea of the consequences to those features of deleting then recreating your Gmail account on Mavericks.

Finally, if you DO search for better instructions (with pictures etc) of what I am talking about, be sure that whatever you read is 10.9 appropriate (and written by someone who appears to know WTF they are talking about). There are plenty of such pages from the past about how to set things up which are NOT appropriate for the new world. The new world has Apple trying very hard to do things Google's way (while still working as a user would expect). It makes no sense to fight this; you might as well adapt to it.

 

[Tech198]

i'm one happy chappy

All except after the update, and completion of the wizard, i had to remove/re-add my signatures. Even though they appeared in Preferences still, they had no effect on Composing a new mail.. It was still blank.

This, plus a few viewing issues, closing mail reverted back to default look, "not classic view", but after trashing everything all looks good

Apple may need to do some more work of this though.

 

[satcomer]

Those with Gmail problems still I stubbled across Apple discussions by a Steve R and seems to work. So you might want to try it.

 

[S G]

Too many syncs

Despite the fix for Mail 7.0 (1822), there are still a couple of major issues:

- I have over 100 mailboxes (i.e., labels) in Gmail, some containing up to 5000 messages. Ever since Mavericks, Mail is constantly trying to synchronize all of these mailboxes, one by one, even when no changes occurred to them. It often takes several minutes for all mailboxes to be synced, even on a super fast internet connection. If a new message arrives in my Inbox, I will get the "bell" arrival sound only once all mailboxes have been checked and synced, which can mean a delay of 5 minutes or more.

- The draft folder is also a mess. I had to disable IMAP drafts as indicated in the thread of the reply above, because my trash would fill with partially completed emails.

I have never enabled "All Mail" and I was happy to see the fix for duplicate messages in Mail 7.0 (1822). Although Gmail now technically works, this constant syncing is slowing down my computer, using bandwidth, and delaying my sound notifications.

I never had these issues in Mail with OS 10.6 or 10.8 - the sync always seemed nearly instantaneous. This is something Mavericks messed up. Other mail clients work better, but I am used to Mail. Anyone else seeing the constant sync activity across all mailboxes, and would know how to fix it?

 

[terryzx]

In System Preferences in my 2012 MBP home main user NONE of the Advanced buttons work. I have to go to another user to adjust anything. Also in that same Users & Groups it's impossible to make a new user or to delete an old one.

Also in my main home folder I am unable to change settings to allow software from anyone. It just keeps kicking back to Apple Only.

BTW….why to we have enter the App Store password for NUMEROUS apps that were bought on an earlier computer???

Why does iMovie have an update that says my older iMac video card won't work, and keeps on asking me to install it and won't dim out that it is not available? There needs to be an update that works for those Macs also.

 

[zen]

Is anybody still having gmail problems? I run Apple Mail with two IMAP accounts, one of which is gmail. For the gmail account, it'll random stop checking it for new mail, even if I click the Get Mail button. I have to go to Mailbox > Synchronize > my gmail account to get it to refresh.

Annoying as hell.