Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

[jozi]

I've recovered the internal hard drive from my old 2006 iMac (Lion o/s) that crashed.
Have since bought a 2011 iMac running Mavericks 10.9.5

Bought an enclosure for the old internal hard drive and connected it to the 2011 iMac.

Mavericks wont allow me to open the Mail app 5.3 on the old drive nor will it open my old address book.

How do I view the old Mail data (emails) and old contacts address book from the old hard drive?
(I believed that I had backed everything up on an external hard drive using time machine, but time machine did not back up Mail nor my address book)

 

[Bruno09]

I believed that I had backed everything up on an external hard drive using time machine, but time machine did not back up Mail nor my address book

Hi,

Time Machine did backup your mail and address book.

Both are saved in you Library (~/Library)

In the Finder, do : Cmd + Shift + g (= "go to folder")
Type in or paste : ~/Library
This will unveil the user's Library that is hidden by default.

Do "Enter in Time Machine".
In you Library, go to : "Mail"
Select that folder, right click, restore to --> Desktop or anywhere you want.

Still in your Library, select Application Support/AddressBook
Select that folder, right click, restore to --> Desktop or anywhere you want.

Quit Time Machine interface.

In Mail, do : File / Import / Apple Mail, browse to the Mail folder on your Desktop, select the .mbox files you want to import.
They will show up in an "Importation" folder in Mail's side bar.

For Contacts you can replace "AddressBook" by the one you restored to the Desktop.
If you do not want to lose your current contacts : first export all of them to the Desktop, then replace the Address Book folder with the old one, then import all the recent contacts from the Desktop.

If you wish to use your old (now external drive) instead of the Time Machine disk, you will need to unveil your Library on that disk.
Open TextEdit.
Prepare that command line, replacing external_drive with the actual name of that drive (keep the quote if there is a space in the name), and user_name with the actual user name :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/"external_drive"/Users/user_name/Library/

Example :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/"Macintosh HD"/Users/jozi/Library/

Open the Terminal (Applications / Utilities).
Copy/paste this command in the Terminal, hit the Enter key.
Now you can access your ~/Library and browse to the Application Support and Mail folders.

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

Hi Bruno009.
I'm having difficulty following your instructions and am not able to locate the library.

There are 3 drives.
1.) The internal drive of the current iMac.
2.) The recovered drive of the old iMac.
3.) The external drive back up drive that Time machine is supposed to back up to and which has been partitioned into two sections, one for back ups and one for storage.

Now in which of these 3 drives is the library that you advise me to find?
I assume it is not the current internal drive.

How do I direct Finder to the specific drive where the library is contained?

I attach a screen shot of the page I arrived at by following your instructions up until and including: Type in or paste : ~/Library

 

[Bruno09]

What drive to you want to recover the mail and contacts data from : the TM disk, or the old iMac disk ?

You forgot that step :
In the Finder, do : Cmd + Shift + g (= "go to folder")
Type in or paste : ~/Library
This will unveil the user's Library that is hidden by default.

This is to unveil the user's Library in your internal drive, which is necessary if you want to be able to see the Library in Time Machine interface, if you use the TM disk to restore the data.

If you wish to restore the data from the old disk, you will need to unveil its user's Library, which is hidden by default.
To do this on an external disk, you need to do the Terminal thing, because the step "you forgot" only works for the internal disk.

One question : are you still able to boot on your old disk ?
If yes, you can export your data from both Mail and contacts...
Mail : menu mailbox/Export
Adress book : File / Export

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

I not sure which disk to recover from. If Time machine backed up as it is supposed to do then I presume that the data should be on the external back up drive, but couldn't the data also be on the recovered internal drive from the dysfunctional iMac?

Assuming the data is on the external back up drive , how do I access this data?

I followed your instructions to the letter, I did not forget the first step. The screenshot I have posted is as far as I got after following your instructions, but I think Finder is accessing the current iMacs internal drive and not the external back up drive, so again I ask how do I access the library on the back up drive?

Your last response seems to indicate that the steps you provided are to access the library on the current internal drive but why would my data from a previous computer be on the current internal drive?

I've only had my current iMac for a couple of weeks, but the data I want is all my business emails from 2014, so my current internal drive and current mail app is not relevant to the data I am trying to recover and which data I received when I was using Lion o/s on the dysfunctional 2006 iMac.

On Time Machine Back Up on the external back up drive, I selected 01 December 2014 as a reference point and went through all the folders on that date. The Mail app and address book app and numerous other apps like Calculator and Chess and many others are all greyed out and have a diagonal stripe going through them so it seems they can't be opened with Mavericks. Only my documents are able to be opened.

I don't know what you mean by "the terminal thing".

I have no idea by what you mean re: booting from the old drive.
Sorry, I'm a complete novice with computers. What on earth does that mean?
The old drive is connected via usb to the current iMac and so is the back up drive.

 

[Bruno09]

I not sure which disk to recover from. If Time machine backed up as it is supposed to do then I presume that the data should be on the external back up drive, but couldn't the data also be on the recovered internal drive from the dysfunctional iMac?

Yes the data are on both, that's why I asked which one do you want to use.
Restoring data from a TM drive, or from an external (formerly internal) disk are 2 different ways.

Assuming the data is on the external back up drive , how do I access this data?

You need to access the user's Library on the external.
This Library is hidden, you must unveil it.

Follow these steps :

Open TextEdit.
Prepare that command line, replacing external_drive with the actual name of that drive (keep the quote if there is a space in the name), and user_name with the actual user name :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/"external_drive"/Users/user_name/Library/

Example :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/"Macintosh HD"/Users/jozi/Library/

Open the Terminal (Applications / Utilities).
Copy/paste this command in the Terminal, hit the Enter key.
Now you can access your ~/Library and browse to the Application Support/Address and Mail folders.

I followed your instructions to the letter, I did not forget the first step. The screenshot I have posted is as far as I got after following your instructions, but I think Finder is accessing the current iMacs internal drive and not the external back up drive, so again I ask how do I access the library on the back up drive?

Did you hit Cmd + Shift + g ?

A window will pop up, in the field paste : ~/Library, hit "Go"

Now your Library in unveiled (it was hidden).

Now enter Time Machine interface.

You can see your Library in Time Machine interface.

Select the data you want to restore as explained above.

Your last response seems to indicate that the steps you provided are to access the library on the current internal drive but why would my data from a previous computer be on the current internal drive?

You need to unveil the user's Library on your internal disk before you enter Time Machine interface, otherwise the user's Library would not show up in Time Machine.

You could also enter Time Machine interface, then hit Cmd + Shift + g, paste ~/Library to unveil the Library.

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

No luck. Keep getting a No such file or directory message in terminal. Tried over 40 different combinations entering either the old disc name or the back up drive name.

 

[Bruno09]

What is the name of the old disk ?

What is the name of the user (on the old disk) ?

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

Toni's HD is the name of the old disk.
I think my user name was admin but I've tried that and also tried entering Toni or toni or Tony or tony.
(I never had to enter a user name or password on Lion after starting up the computer so I'm not sure what my user name was.)

 

[Bruno09]

To know the user name, go to Toni's HD / Users : what are the folders there ?

You will likely see : admin + guest + shared, or toni + guest + shared, or admin + shared, or tony, etc...
You need that home folder name.

Then if toni is the username (replace with the actual one) :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/“Toni’s HD”/Users/toni/Library/

If this keeps not working, we will rename "Toni's HD" to : toniHD (the ' sign might be a problem)

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

I'm posting two screen shots. One is a shot of all the files under user which does not state what my user name was in the old disc.

The other is the message I got in terminal when I entered the command without the apostrophe sign.

The name Peter that you see in terminal is the previous owner of my current imac.

 

[Bruno09]

Right now I see that the "macadmin" Library is already visible.

Sadly your screen shot does not show if toni's Library is visible too.

The names you use in the Terminal must match the actual names.

The name of the disk is "Toni's HD", therefore you must use :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/“Toni’s HD”/Users/toni/Library/

Only if this does not work you will
1. rename the external disk to toniHD, then :
2. use :
chflags nohidden /Volumes/toniHD/Users/toni/Library/

First , please check the toni's folder : don't you see Library just under Documents ?
Why don't you show the whole toni's folder content ?

 

[jozi]

There is a Library folder under System with at least 60 sub-folders and also a Library folder under Macadmin with 22 sub-folders but none of the sub folders in either section are named Mail or Address Book.

Do you want to try Team View?

 

[Bruno09]

The question was : is there a Library folder under toni ?

If not, do in the Terminal :

chflags nohidden /Volumes/“Toni’s HD”/Users/toni/Library/

And the Library will show up.

I have checked that the ' sign in the disk's name in not an issue.

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

No library folder under toni.

I've tried the most recent command you sent but am just getting that no file/directory message.

The toni's folder content only has 4 folders, Applications which is empty, Conduit which has 4 text documents, Desktop and Documents.

 

[Bruno09]

The toni's account should have at least all the OS X default folders you can see under Macadmin.

So I would say that something's wrong with toni's account, hence the missing Library, that should show up with the last command...

May be you could try with the Time Machine disk ?

Here is how to access the toni's Library (if it exists) in Time Machine :

- enter Time Machine interface

- hit : Cmd + Shift + g

- a window will pop up, in the field paste : /Users/toni/Library , hit "Go"

Now toni's Library in visible (it was hidden).
In that Library you will find a Mail folder and Application Support/AddressBook

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

When you say time machine disk, I presume you mean my external back up drive.
When I click on my external back up drive, I get a Backups.backupdb folder.
Open that and I get Toni's iMac.
Open on that I get a long list of folders with back up dates from 2014.
I select a date in, say, late 2014 and open it, I get folder named Toni's HD.
Open that I get 4 folders being:
Applications
Library
System
Users

Open Library I get 57 folders, not one of which is either Address Book or Mail.
Now at which point in this process should I enter command +shift +G?

 

[Bruno09]

You must not browse the Time Machine disk from the Finder.
You must use Time Machine interface.

The Toni's HD/Library is not the user's Library.
The user's Library is : Toni's HD/Users/toni/Library

Do this :
- connect the Time Machine disk (the backup disk you use for Time Machine (TM))
- hold the Alt key down, click on the TM icon in the menu bar
- select : "Browse other TM disks"
- select : Toni's iMac
- once in Time Machine interface, select the date you want to restore from
- hit : command +shift +g
- a small window pops up, type in : /Users/toni/Library, click "Go"
- now the toni's Library is visible
- go to : (toni's)Library/Application Support/AddressBook
- select AddressBook, right click, "restore to" : choose your desktop
- this will copy your AddressBook to your desktop
- now go to : (toni's)Library/Mail
- select Mail, right click, "restore to" : choose your desktop
- this will copy your Mail folder to your desktop

If your Mail folder is large, you need to have enough space on your internal disk to restore the folder to your Desktop.

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

Nothing happens when alt is pressed.
My back up drive is permanently connected.
I don't understand how to get the back up drive or TM interface without using finder.
The only way I know how to access Time machine is by searching for it in the Applications folder of the current internal drive.

When I click on Finder, a list of Favorites and a list of Devices appears in the menu bar.
Under the list of DEVICES is my Verbatim BU and my Verbatim Storage and Toni's HD. (The verbatim drive has been equally partitioned into Back up and Storage)
So if I select Verbatim BU and press alt, nothing happens- no TM icon appears.
If I double click Verbatim BU then I get a Backups.backupdb folder as per my earlier response.
Whenever I enter the command+shift+g option it seems I am accessing the library of the current internal drive of the iMac.

 

[Bruno09]

Do you have a Time Machine icon in the menu bar, on top of the screen ?

If yes click on it then select Enter Time Machine.

If no go to System Preferences, Time Machine, tick the box Display TM icon in the menu bar.

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

I clicked on TM icon in top menu bar and pressed alt to browse and selected my back up drive.

In the TM window that opened was a display of my current mailbox.

There was a menu of dates on the right hand side of display going back to 2013 but when I selected any date and clicked or double clicked or right clicked nothing happened.

I also tried entering command +shift+ G but nothing but the fail sound effect.

The restore button on the right hand side bottom corner of TM display is faded out and not operational.

The current button in the bottom centre of display was fully lit.

 

[Bruno09]

You need to be in the Finder, not in Mail, before you "Enter Time Machine".

Do this :

- be in the Finder
- click on TM icon in top menu bar, press alt to browse and select your back up drive.
- once in the TM window, hit : Cmd + Shift + c (= go to the computer)
- now from the menu of dates on the right select the date you want to restore from
- now hit Cmd + Shift + g (= go to folder)
- type in : /Users/toni/Library

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

Managed to access the TM interface as per your instructions.

Selected my back up drive and then selected a date from 2014, but after entering Command+shift+G and then go, I got ~/Library/Application Support/ with a "The folder can't be found" message.

I got to thank you for sticking with me through this, but I think it's time to throw in the towel as I don't think TM backed up my emails or address book.

The only other option is to contact my service provider and see if my 2014 emails might still be on their server which I doubt.

Thanx again for your assistance, truly appreciated. Toni

 

[Bruno09]

Selected my back up drive and then selected a date from 2014, but after entering Command+shift+G and then go, I got ~/Library/Application Support/ with a "The folder can't be found" message.

After hitting Command+shift+G, did you enter : /Users/toni/Library ?

If the (toni's)Library shows up, you can now see the Application Support/AddressBook and the Mail folders, and restore them to the Desktop.

If the command returns "The folder can't be found", then Time Machine did not backup the Library.
(the same that is missing in toni's account on your old drive)
Or try an older date...

 

[jozi]

Unable to open Mail 5.3 in Mavericks

Yes, I tried typing in the /Users.....command, but same story - file not found.
I've tried numerous old dates but no luck.

In future, I'll drag important emails to a document folder because TM does back up my documents, but apps is a different story.

Thanks again.