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Has anyone here lost any mail?

I did a .mbox backup before the Catalina upgrade. After a clean install, I get errors on import that all my .mbox files are corrupted. Yet, I can browse and read the message in ~Library (the .eml file) and the .mbox's do import successfully on an older 10.14 build.

So, not 100% lost, but the saved .mbox is not importable (and thus readable) under Catalina.
 
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you can't import rules from Outlook for Windows to Outlook for Mac or Apple Mail near as I can tell.

So yeah, after spending so much time organizing things in *one* program and getting it to run *exactly* how I like, I'm not going to be bothered switching to a new program and having to go through that whole laborious process all over again - let alone on something that's half crippled like Apple Mail.

this is why I am debating now if I should maybe make my rules server side at O365 / Outlook.com. In theory everything gets pre-sorted at the cloud and regardless of client, you get the same filtered mail. The problem I've read is it makes reading mail on your phone a mess with all the subfolders.
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I had some version of this issue with Catalina upgrade. My Exchange emails disappear when moved to local folders ("On My Mac").

This existed occasionally in 10.14 but was prevalent 100% of the time in 10.15. Even after a clean install, the problem was there immediately.

If I move the folders under the server synched "Exchange" account, the mail reappears. Local mail folders seems to be the issue.

Exchange.png
 
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can anyone suggest a good, clean, basic Mail app replacement? Will be upgrading my mom to an Imac this fall from a windows pc.
 
can anyone suggest a good, clean, basic Mail app replacement? Will be upgrading my mom to an Imac this fall from a windows pc.
Airmail is good. If you want something free, EM Client is good, too. For the normal user, you're limited to two accounts on EM Client. I don't want to come off as an ass, but try sitting down with her and see what she might like? A lot of email clients these days use graphics in the way of actual options and it's a game to see what each one does. Airmail uses text and graphic icons that make sense, as in trash can for deleting or trashing emails. Otherwise, text is used whenever and wherever possible.
 
I don't doubt that but it doesn't seem to affect Windows 10 as much as MacOS. Why is that? I even had a 2007 Dell laptop running Windows 10 x64 with 2GB of RAM.
Windows 8 was a "clean slate" for Microsoft to remove old code in Windows that slowed down computers with lesser specs on previous Windows. Even though Windows 7 did surprisingly well on older hardware compared to Windows XP. Windows 8.1 and 10 continued to do this at launch, and continues to do this with each major update, twice a year. The more RAM you have, the more Windows will use at idle simply because it's faster and more efficient this way. However, Windows 10 made major improvements in how programs access and dispense of unused RAM. In other words, an identical setup on two computers with one using Windows 7 and Windows 10 may see anywhere from an 8-15% difference in RAM usage, with the latter being less, obviously.

Windows 10 handles RAM and does some clever things to speed it up on older hardware. I'm merely not a fan of Windows 10 because I don't like flat looks... I'll miss the glass aero theming in Windows 7.
 
I had some version of this issue with Catalina upgrade. My Exchange emails disappear when moved to local folders ("On My Mac").

This existed occasionally in 10.14 but was prevalent 100% of the time in 10.15. Even after a clean install, the problem was there immediately.

If I move the folders under the server synched "Exchange" account, the mail reappears. Local mail folders seems to be the issue.

View attachment 869510
Thanks for being one of very few people here who actually tries to demonstrate the problem. I tried to reproduce it myself but could not. I created a local mailbox, moved mail from Exchange to the local folder, but I see the content fine. This is not 'data loss' in any event. I wonder what condition could be causing your messages to be unreadable from a local mailbox.
 
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this is why I am debating now if I should maybe make my rules server side at O365 / Outlook.com. In theory everything gets pre-sorted at the cloud and regardless of client, you get the same filtered mail. The problem I've read is it makes reading mail on your phone a mess with all the subfolders.
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Using Outlook on my phone with the same 2 accounts, the list of folders has remained the same - because of the local rules though, everything just pops up on the one screen rather than in the specific folders.

Might give this a try though.
 
And.... Apple Music bugs leads to the loss of either album artwork or, even worse, music.

Catalina should never have been released to the great unwashed masses in its current incarnation.
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Has anyone here lost any mail?

If you go to Macintouch.com you'll read quite a few reports, or links to reports, of people losing email messages.
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Has anyone here lost any mail?

If you go to Macintosh.com you'll read quite a few reports, or links to reports, of people losing email messages.
Can all the people defending Apple like "it's ok to brick your system it's only beta" now wake up and see Apple has a software development problem that is getting worse and worse

Is it a software development problem or a QA problem? Or both?
 
Has anyone here lost any mail?

If you go to Macintosh.com you'll read quite a few reports, or links to reports, of people losing email messages.
Can all the people defending Apple like "it's ok to brick your system it's only beta" now wake up and see Apple has a software development problem that is getting worse and worse

Is it a software development problem or a QA problem? Or both?
All the bugs in macOS, iOS and iPadOS are making me seriously consider alternatives. I am in the eco system for the short term, but I’m actively trying to switch over to cross platform services and apps so when the time is right, I can move away with the least amount of hassle.

I’ve always been happy paying Apple prices for the service and experience you get with Apple products. However, I use Windows on my gaming PC and it’s rock solid - the latest Android phones look great too and the Note 10 had me drooling for weeks before I decided against based on the ecosystem and camera. And then the Oneplus 7T got released with the amazing price to specs ratio and 90hz screen!

The only reason I’m “stuck” for now is that Banktivity has my data and I use it and it’s great and they refuse to make a cross platform product. However, I’ve been playing around with MoneyWiz and maybe I’ll go to them as I really miss the Thinkpad keyboards, etc


You're not alone. I've been an Apple "fanboy" since the early 80's and have stuck with Apple through thick and thin, good times as well as bad. I have more Apple gadgets than I can count. Ditto for other family members. However, I'm starting to rethink all that.
As a matter of fact, I recently sold my 2019 13" MacBook Pro as well as a 2017 5K 27" iMac as part of my initial efforts of divesting myself of Apple products.
In place of the aforementioned Apple products, I purchased an HP Spectre x360 laptop - an excellent device as well as an ASUS Zenbook Pro 15. Yeah, they both run Windows 10 but, you know what? Windows 10 has far less bugs than, for example, macOS Catalina. Or even Mojave for that matter.
 
Thanks for being one of very few people here who actually tries to demonstrate the problem. I tried to reproduce it myself but could not. I created a local mailbox, moved mail from Exchange to the local folder, but I see the content fine. This is not 'data loss' in any event. I wonder what condition could be causing your messages to be unreadable from a local mailbox.

Thanks. Yeah I am not sure either. I have client side email rules in the Mail.app that move messages as they come in from Exchange to folders "On My Mac" - I don't move them manually and didn't try that. We also subscribe to O365 vs a hosted Exchange server. The account was added in my settings as an Exchange account vs an Outlook account.

I ended up moving those folders under my "Exchange" account vs "On My Mac" and all the messages are coming in, filtering and rendering correctly. I do now (sometimes) get a new error where certain messages can't be moved but funny enough, they do still get moved.

I am hoping a patch comes out from Apple soon. Otherwise if it becomes unbearable my next move is either set up the rules server side in O365 or start using the Mac Outlook client.
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Using Outlook on my phone with the same 2 accounts, the list of folders has remained the same - because of the local rules though, everything just pops up on the one screen rather than in the specific folders.

Might give this a try though.

gotcha. Yes I was trying to avoid using Outlook for now and stick with the native client. In my twisted philosophy, I figure if I have to use Outlook, I might as well use a Windows PC. Kinda defeats the point of being all in with Apple.
 
gotcha. Yes I was trying to avoid using Outlook for now and stick with the native client. In my twisted philosophy, I figure if I have to use Outlook, I might as well use a Windows PC. Kinda defeats the point of being all in with Apple.


Pretty much. Maybe it's just the passage of time, but for me, the current O365 version of Outlook here on Windows isn't as clunky as I remembered (possibly because I have it set to empty my trash & auto-archive old items at least once a day)
 
I use and prefer MacOS here in my office but use a PC most of the time for the bulk of my sales engineer work. I have used iCloud / me / apple as my work e-mail provider for a very long time. I'm not a fan of Outlook either so I use Mailbird which is a paid app but works seamlessly with iCloud. Check it out!
 
Thanks. Yeah I am not sure either. I have client side email rules in the Mail.app that move messages as they come in from Exchange to folders "On My Mac" - I don't move them manually and didn't try that. We also subscribe to O365 vs a hosted Exchange server. The account was added in my settings as an Exchange account vs an Outlook account.

I ended up moving those folders under my "Exchange" account vs "On My Mac" and all the messages are coming in, filtering and rendering correctly. I do now (sometimes) get a new error where certain messages can't be moved but funny enough, they do still get moved.

I am hoping a patch comes out from Apple soon. Otherwise if it becomes unbearable my next move is either set up the rules server side in O365 or start using the Mac Outlook client.
Thanks for info, I also access O365. Normally I only keep mail on the server & move it around either manually or via 0365 rules. To test, I made macOS Mail rules that move messages from O365 to a local mailbox. I first verified the number of messages that the rule would apply to. The rule moved all the messages the rule applied to, none were lost and the contents were in tact. It seems there are more factors involved... let me know if you think of any to reproduce.
 
Wait everyone... 13 pages of 99.9% !#@% posts, about an article from a guy who says he's a Mac Developer who runs a fairly Apple bashing blog and writes lots of anti-Apple tweets (from way before Catalina) writes an article that gets cross posted all over social media, with a following of haters here who never tried Catalina and people with likely their own unrelated issues that are all over the map responding as if it's part of the same issue, 100s of posts echoing how terrible it is (but never tried it), a few actual users who cannot reproduce the issue are left shaking their heads. Then it just fizzles, but where is the real substance? If this problem were as described, it's a very serious issue. Wouldn't Apple have responded? Wouldn't there be reliable sources picking up this story by now?
 
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I had kind of been meaning to ask of Apple's Mail works these days (after hearing people talk about it on a podcast recently). I had given it up in the mid-2000s when it didn't really work with Gmail boxes. Look like I made a good decision. :(
(Apple Mail used to be one of my favorite apps.... like so many other apps I've slowly replaced over the years as Apple has ruined them.)

it’s fascinating how our economy works today, Apple on an all time high. Products are near an all time low.

Remember, the 'all time high' thing is Wall Street, which doesn't have a whole lot to do with actual reality.

That said, Apple has been making record profits, but the state of things like this won't show up in the numbers for years.

The fanboys just say, "Oh, you guys just have short memories. Apple has always had their problems and bugs." But, I think my memory is working fine, and they are just seeing things through Wall Street colored glasses.
 
No it's not. Bricking systems is sub-alpha software that should never leave the lab.

No. Alpha cycle is when software is released but the planned features are not complete. Beta cycle is when software is feature complete but is still not reliable. "Bricking" is not considered when distinguishing between those two cycles.
 
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I had kind of been meaning to ask of Apple's Mail works these days (after hearing people talk about it on a podcast recently). I had given it up in the mid-2000s when it didn't really work with Gmail boxes. Look like I made a good decision. :(
(Apple Mail used to be one of my favorite apps.... like so many other apps I've slowly replaced over the years as Apple has ruined them.)



Remember, the 'all time high' thing is Wall Street, which doesn't have a whole lot to do with actual reality.

That said, Apple has been making record profits, but the state of things like this won't show up in the numbers for years.

The fanboys just say, "Oh, you guys just have short memories. Apple has always had their problems and bugs." But, I think my memory is working fine, and they are just seeing things through Wall Street colored glasses.
macOS Mail works great, this entire thread that’s now 13 pages long is full of !*%# posts without a single person being able to provide steps to reproduce what would be a very serious problem if true but no one is able to provide a credible source. A few people have shared some info, I cannot reproduce any data loss trying various ways.

Gmail mailboxes are just labels, maybe in the mid-2000s it did not auto configure itself correctly for you but it was very easy to fix, as I recall you just had to add a prefix like “[gmail]/“ in settings... I used OS X Mail with gmail throughout the Mid 2000s with no issues.

Are there any mods looking at this thread? It’s like a circus spectacle.
 
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macOS Mail works great, this entire thread that’s now 13 pages long is full of !*%# posts without a single person being able to provide steps to reproduce what would be a very serious problem if true but no one is able to provide a credible source. A few people have shared some info, I cannot reproduce any data loss trying various ways.

Upgrade to Catalina --> Mail unusable, many mails no showing up, index/search completely broken
~/Library/Mail ~250GB
Closed Mail, removed index files in V7/Mail Data,
Envelope Index
Envelope Index-shm
Envelope Index-wal
Restarted Mail, standard import said importing somewhat 280.000 mail, but took only a few seconds...?? It's an iMac Pro, but...
Result: Most emails lost.
~/Library/Mail ~6,5GB
Yeah, 240GB of emails erased...

I don't know what bug that is, but it's frightening..
 
The good news is data removed beneath ~/Library/Mail does not mean you lost that data unless you’re using POP & delete downloaded messages from server...
 
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Most of that stuff was POP3 since.. no idea, 2001? There is only 1 IMAP account, which in fact is an Exchange 2013 account. All others are POP3.
We have a time machine backup and we're now trying to figure out what to do next. Killing Catalina is kinda work (erase partitions and restore from TM and restore new things manually) or waiting for Apple to provide an emergency update (which should be here already, but Apple is no longer the company I trust in) and later restore the mails from a state just before removing the indices. Apple does for sure won't comment on anything nor admit their shiny new OS has some severe and painful bugs. With this quality, I for sure could also run Windows 10...
 
Is there data loss on the mail server? if so good you have TM! If it were me I’d want to switch to imap ASAP and in meantime turn off the option that removes downloaded data from server. I don’t have pop nor that much data atm. You‘ll find similar complaints on Windows, here is one example: https://www.dell.com/community/Productivity-Software/Outlook-lost-data/td-p/6094164
(i.e., ”It also happens when the PST exceeds the size of 2GB”)

When you compare the install base to the number of people saying they have this issue, so far it seems there would have to have been some kind of combo of events like using Exchange configured with imap (not exchange) protocol & +200GB data & using a virus scanner & after installation messing around with settings before the system could finish reindexing.
 
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