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Existing IMAP notes not available in notes app after mountain lion installation

After today's mountain lion upgrade (from lion) my notes stored on an IMAP server are not available in the new notes app. The folder of the IMAP Account itself is shown but appears empty. On my Iphone all notes of the IMAP Account are shoen correctly as well as on another mac still running lion.


Any Suggestions?


Thanks in advance.

Posted on Jul 25, 2012 12:08 PM

Reply
30 replies

Jul 26, 2012 2:03 AM in response to Sankeyvis

Hi,


Similar problem here: I'm syncing notes on iOS5 with Gmail Imap account.

Works fine, but notes don't show in Mountain Lion after selecting sync with my Gmail account.


I noted that Apple creates a folder (or 'label' within Gmail) called 'Notes'. The problem is, I use an Imap prefix '[Gmail]', so my original notes are being synced with '[Gmail]/notes' and Mountain Lion created a new folder/label 'Notes' without the prefix.


Your issue might also have someting to do with the Imap prefix?


Removing the prefix would be a workaround, but I really thing this is a bug in Mountain Lion. Hope Apple will solve this?

Jul 26, 2012 12:45 PM in response to JSchoenberger

The following line appears in syslog, every time I'm trying to create a new note in the imap notes folder in m notes app.


Jul 26 21:34:12 server Notes[768]: folderProxy addNoteToRemote returned false


which might be indicating that notes is not able to put the new note to the server. This is confirmed by the fact that the new note appears under the recovered items in the "on my mac folder".



And additionally sometimes the following lines occurs in between (but not every time) -- very strange things happening


Jul 26 21:40:13 server sandboxd[810] ([809]): mdworker(809) deny file-write-owner /Users/paddy/Library/Containers/com.apple.Notes/Data/Library/Notes/NotesV1.stor edata-wal (import fstype:hfs fsflag:1480D000 flags:240000005F diag:0 uti:com.apple.notes.externalrecord plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Notes.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 24010898)

Jul 26 21:40:13 server kernel[0]: Sandbox: sandboxd(810) deny mach-lookup com.apple.coresymbolicationd

Jul 26 21:40:13 server sandboxd[810] ([809]): mdworker(809) deny file-write-owner /Users/paddy/Library/Containers/com.apple.Notes/Data/Library/Notes/NotesV1.stor edata-shm (import fstype:hfs fsflag:1480D000 flags:240000005F diag:0 uti:com.apple.notes.externalrecord plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Notes.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 24010898)

Jul 26, 2012 1:56 PM in response to MacielMeireles

[copy]


Similar problem here: I'm syncing notes on iOS5 with Gmail Imap account.

Works fine, but notes don't show in Mountain Lion after selecting sync with my Gmail account.


I noted that Apple creates a folder (or 'label' within Gmail) called 'Notes'. The problem is, I use an Imap prefix '[Gmail]', so my original notes are being synced with '[Gmail]/notes' and Mountain Lion created a new folder/label 'Notes' without the prefix.


Your issue might also have someting to do with the Imap prefix?


Removing the prefix would be a workaround, but I really thing this is a bug in Mountain Lion. Hope Apple will solve this?

Jul 26, 2012 2:56 PM in response to Sankeyvis

I'm seeing the same behavior. For the non-working IMAP service I get a log message of "Notes: folderProxy addNoteToRemote returned false" every time. The working IMAP service doesn't. I'm also seeing the sporadic sandbox messages, too.


I tried changing the IMAP prefix to be blank or INBOX to match the non-mountain lion clients but that didn't have any effect.


The other thing I noticed is that Mail seems to keep the IMAP Path Prefix parameter preference stored separately to when you bring up the account details under Preferences compared to accessing the mail account settings from System Preferences. I deleted and recreated the account for the non-working IMAP service - Mail deduced the setting of "INBOX" for the IMAP Path Prefix (which is what it's set to on my Lion and iOS devices), but system preferences shows it as being blank. I set it in System Preferences but it didn't help. Incidentally, the working IMAP service doesn't use a IMAP Path Prefix.


I've also noticed the check box to enable Notes for an IMAP account doesn't always accurately track the actual state that you've just selected.

Jul 31, 2012 12:32 PM in response to Sankeyvis

Okay, I assume there are some different reasons for the syncing problem.


I got my notes syncing again by just losing the prefix on my iPhone and renaming the existing notes folder. For those with a similar problem, here's how:


Old situation:

Within OS X Lion I used a Gmail account with notes (IMAP). To avoid a messy layout with the Gmail folders I used [Gmail] as IMAP Path Prefix (found under Accounts, tab Advanced).

Under iOS5, 'Notes' was ticked on under the Gmail account. The result: Apple created a IMAP folder '[Gmail]/Notes' to store all notes.


New situation:

After upgrading to OS X Mountain Lion I ticked 'Notes' under the Gmail account within system prefs, 'Mail, Contacts & Calendars'. The new Notes app remained empty and didn't show my existing notes that were still on my iPhone.

Logging in to www.gmail.com reveiled a new folder created by Mountain Lion: 'Notes'. The existing notes folder was named '[Gmail]/Notes' - because I used the [Gmail] prefix - and contained al the existing notes.

So Mountain Lion syncs with the IMAP folder 'Notes' and the iPhone syncs with the folder '[Gmail]/Notes'

In Lion the Mail settings were used for both Mail and Notes. So the IMAP prefix applied to both.

In Mountain Lion, the IMAP prefix only applies to Mail, not to Notes.


New situation, fixed:

As Mountain Lion can only use a folder called 'Notes' for syncing, I had to change the folder my iPhone was syncing with: '[Gmail]/Notes'. I removed the newly created folder 'Notes' via www.gmail.com under the label settings and renamed label '[Gmail]/Notes' to 'Notes'. After that I removed the IMAP prefix '[Gmail]' from my iPhone Gmail (advanced) account settings, making the iPhone sync notes with the folder 'Notes' instead of '[Gmail]/Notes'. That's it.


Btw, I maintained the use of the prefix within Apple Mail under Mountain Lion as that is totally separated from the Notes section.


Hope this helps.

Jul 31, 2012 12:56 PM in response to P_sl

Great analysis! This is exactly what I suspected after reading a good amount of threads. Unfortunately, my hosting provider (BlueHost) requires the use of the prefix INBOX. The notes folder cannot be created on the top level. It has to be a folder in the mail account. Tough luck for me, unless Apple changes the programming logic and also applies the prefix when looking for the Notes folder.

Existing IMAP notes not available in notes app after mountain lion installation

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