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Q: Apple mail accounts & boxes Missing

After upgrading to El Capitan ALL my mail accounts and mail boxes have gone. It wants me to start afresh. I have 5 POP and 3 imap accounts and loads of Inbox & Outbox files.

 

How do I restore all of this.

Posted on Sep 30, 2015 3:36 PM

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Q: Apple mail accounts & boxes Missing

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  • by BobHallsworth,

    BobHallsworth BobHallsworth Sep 30, 2015 9:49 PM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (9 points)
    iPad
    Sep 30, 2015 9:49 PM in response to FineWine

    If I may tag along - Same problem. I have recreated the mail accounts, but now don't have the mail boxes (hundreds, all with content going back years). I do have Time Machine backups if that helps.

  • by _puckle_,

    _puckle_ _puckle_ Sep 30, 2015 10:20 PM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 30, 2015 10:20 PM in response to FineWine

    Yes have the same problem.

    My mailboxes are huge. Be great to have a solution so can get back to work.

  • by EVISCERATOR,

    EVISCERATOR EVISCERATOR Sep 30, 2015 10:40 PM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (117 points)
    Sep 30, 2015 10:40 PM in response to FineWine

    If the mail boxes still show up, then look next to them for a + and show and hide button.  click on show.   

  • by Plasadda,

    Plasadda Plasadda Sep 30, 2015 10:58 PM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 30, 2015 10:58 PM in response to FineWine

    Slame issue for me. Need to get the old messages back as have lots of important info stored.

  • by nokcomputer,Helpful

    nokcomputer nokcomputer Sep 30, 2015 11:00 PM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Sep 30, 2015 11:00 PM in response to FineWine

    Found it!  Go to the "mailbox" menu and choose "rebuild".  Missing mail is back.

     

    I have to say, this is a truly horrible bug.

  • by BobHallsworth,

    BobHallsworth BobHallsworth Sep 30, 2015 11:34 PM in response to BobHallsworth
    Level 1 (9 points)
    iPad
    Sep 30, 2015 11:34 PM in response to BobHallsworth

    I think I did it the hard way. Recreated the accounts, which was no bad thing as I took the opportunity to tidy them up.

    Then I used Time Machine to bring back all the "On My Mac" items.

    It did re-build sub-folders too, so I should probably have one top level folder with the others under it.

    Just glad I've been doing Time Machine backups

  • by sébastienfromlarochette,

    sébastienfromlarochette sébastienfromlarochette Oct 1, 2015 12:07 AM in response to nokcomputer
    Level 1 (0 points)
    iWork
    Oct 1, 2015 12:07 AM in response to nokcomputer

    Thanks you saved me my nerves this morning!

  • by Trisha Foster,

    Trisha Foster Trisha Foster Oct 1, 2015 12:56 AM in response to nokcomputer
    Level 1 (14 points)
    iPhone
    Oct 1, 2015 12:56 AM in response to nokcomputer

    That Rebuild suggestion didn't work for me , I tried.

    I am missing my "Saved Mail" Folder that I had created, and am missing my "iCloud" Folder too.

  • by jamesfromav,

    jamesfromav jamesfromav Oct 1, 2015 1:07 AM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 1:07 AM in response to FineWine

    Also having the same (but different?) problem. NONE of my x7 mail a/c's (imaps, pops, gmail, iCloud, personal website a/c, yahoo etc) are showing at all and the 'rebuild' option is unavailable as there are no mailboxes! I didn't do a clean install and everything else on my iMac is as it was. ARGH! Never had this issue in 24yrs of using macs. This doesn't mean I'm tech savvy though - can someone please help / anyone have same issue? Many thanks.

  • by surfandsand,

    surfandsand surfandsand Oct 1, 2015 1:11 AM in response to nokcomputer
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 1:11 AM in response to nokcomputer

    The suggestion...Go to the "mailbox" menu and choose "rebuild", did not work for me. Other ideas??

  • by EVISCERATOR,

    EVISCERATOR EVISCERATOR Oct 1, 2015 2:14 AM in response to sébastienfromlarochette
    Level 1 (117 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 2:14 AM in response to sébastienfromlarochette

    Glad I helped.  Pure luck that I found that switch.  a sigh of relief.

  • by EVISCERATOR,Solvedanswer

    EVISCERATOR EVISCERATOR Oct 1, 2015 2:28 AM in response to Trisha Foster
    Level 1 (117 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 2:28 AM in response to Trisha Foster

    Hi Trisha Foster.   I use classic view in my mail app and all of my mail boxes are in a column on the left, next to  iCloud there is a + sign and a hide or show button; click show.  Also, right click on an email and select copy to  and a menu of available mail boxes will appear even ones that are hidden.  If your missing mail boxes show up there, then they are just hidden.  If not there, then ask for more help.

     

    Good Luck: Tom

  • by FineWine,

    FineWine FineWine Oct 1, 2015 5:01 AM in response to FineWine
    Level 1 (19 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 5:01 AM in response to FineWine

    OK - I have solved my own problem by:

     

    1 -  recreated manually all my POP accounts & iCloud account. (decided I did not need my gmail imap accounts as hadn't used them in ages)

     

    2 - Using Time Machine from within mail restored all my 'Received' & 'Sent' filing mailboxes. NOTE: They will be restored under On My Mac, TimeMachine, I just dragged them out of Time Machine and dropped them under On My Mac as they where before, after they had been restored .

     

    3 - Rebuilt all accounts and filing mailboxes

     

    4 - Went through Preferences and reset-up all by previous settings. Though my Signatures were still there I just had to re-associate them to the appropriate accounts.

     

    We are now good to go

     

    Strange thing is that the ~user/library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist  was not  recreated so I do not know where the preference settings are any more. Plus allot of files that were in ~user/Library/Application support/Mail no longer used so I moved those into a Temp folder for the time being. All filed mail is kept in ~user/Library/Application support/Mail/Mailboxes and most of the settings & preferences are kept in ~user/Library/Application support/Mail/MailData with each actual account kept in an alphanumeric folder ~user/Library/Application support/Mail.

  • by nokcomputer,

    nokcomputer nokcomputer Oct 1, 2015 8:28 AM in response to surfandsand
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Oct 1, 2015 8:28 AM in response to surfandsand

    Note that you have to rebuild each individual mailbox.  I had to select the "sent" mailbox separately, and then choose "rebuild" to get back my sent messages.

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