Address Book

Add me to the list... I just got off the phone w/Apple support, as I too have lost all of my data - twice in two days. I'm doing regular backups now and Apple's resolution was to backup after every entry or phone number update...? Seriously?

This is CATASTROPHIC... its a text file for pete's sake!! Can anyone let me know if this has been addressed? I'm thinking of getting a paper daytimer.

MacBook 2.0 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

yeah, that was their suggestion to me, too. 😟

Yikes!!! Me too! First time. Like the rest I sure hope Apple is working on a fix for this one.

OK. Now it has happened to me. I was entering a new address and then, suddenly, nothing. By the time I got to dot mac, it had already synced the empty book, so nothing there either. I tried to restore from a backup of a month ago; still empty. My last hope is my Blackberry, which is up to date, but I'm scared as **** to attempt a transfer for fear of losing everything on that, too.
WILL APPLE PLEASE TELL US WHAT IS GOING ON?

Further to my previous comment -- I have just tried again to restore my address book, using "Backup" , from a backup in December. The download bar flashed for about one second (far too short a time) and then gave me the message "successful restore." But it was not successful because my address book is still empty. I'm beginning to suspect a major problem here. I'd be grateful if anyone could explain what's happening. Thanks.

Fortunately, I've never had a problem restoring the address book once it has "disappeared" even though I must have needed to do it 20-30 times. I wonder if the last time you backed up the address book, the contents "dissappeared" just as you created the back up copy and hence you have an empty file. It might be worth trying an older back up...

The only way I can get the address book to "function" is to back up after EVERY entry.

2 x GHz Dual-Core - Intel Xeon Mac OS X (10.4.8) 1 GB 667 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM

I have not had great success with Apple's Backup program. I'd recommend instead selecting "Backup Address Book" from within the program. I've never had issues reverting that way.

I thought I've gone crazy, looking for names Im sure Ive put in the address book, and re-entering them... today I saw the address book loos a new entry I put in... tried to click on this entry under the left collumn, it brought up another entry, after a few tries I quit and reopened the program and entry now is gone.

Anyone else feeling like theyve lost their mind and sum addressbook entries?
version 4.04 of address book OSX 10.4.8

Thanks

This just happened to me, too. I was adding contact info and they all disappeared. Brilliantly, I tried to sync to my PDA/phone to retrieve, but it erased all of those, too.

I have gone into Library/Application Support/ and there is NO Address Book folder. Any ideas?

This is going to really stink if I've lost everything....

OK, I found ~/Library/Application Support/Address Book, but this is all I had in there:

ABPerson.skIndexInverted
ABSubscribedPerson.skIndexInverted
AddressBook.data
AddressBook.data.previous
Images

I changed the name of the 'previous' file to 'data', but no luck. Obviously, I don't have a 'before save' file. I could sure use some help.

I thought I've gone crazy, looking for names Im sure
Ive put in the address book, and re-entering them...
today I saw the address book loos a new entry I put
in... tried to click on this entry under the left
collumn, it brought up another entry, after a few
tries I quit and reopened the program and entry now
is gone.

Anyone else feeling like theyve lost their mind and
sum addressbook entries?
version 4.04 of address book OSX 10.4.8

Thanks

Your issue sounds like a very different issue from the one others are having here. Our problem is that ALL the address book contacts disappear. If you have any contacts to click on, then it sounds like a very different problem (no less concerning). I would recommend starting a new topic for your issue and see if anyone else is having the same problem.

Thanks, gujamin. Will do.

Oops, sorry. You were replying to NorcalTim. I'm a bit distracted....

the vanishing address book glitch is spreading on my site!!! :-\

FYI: 16th January I rolled out 26 new Core 2 iMacs running OS 10.4.8, then subsequently rolled out about a further 6 x OS10.4.8 PowerPC mini....only Tiger machines are being effected.

22nd January (4 working days later) I got my first reported case....271 addresses lost 😟

Since then I've had 6 reported blank address books.

All vary in size, all vary in Was Address Book Open at the Time? all have the same common...one minute its contents was there, next its gone!

AHHHHHHHH!

Having experienced this myself on my home machine and having always blamed my iSync process with my mobile phone, I've been on a two-a-day backup of my personal settings ever since.



Well thanx to the numerous posts here, I was able to perform the rollback trick.

Opened ~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook folder
copied out AddressBook.data.beforesave which has always been larger than AddressBook.data (in my experience)
renamed copied file to .data
removed original AddressBook.data
replaced with the renamed file

and change my personal standing in the company to HERO OF THE DAY! 🙂

Success rate is 6 failed 6 recovered so far!

now all we gotta do is figure out WHY? and prevent it

...THANX TO ALL WHO POST IN DISCUSSIONS, YOU ROCK!



iMac 20" MacIntel Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2GHz/512/250/SD/ATI/Airport X/BlueTooth

Fortunately, I used to used Entourage, so I was able to save that address book to my desktop and drag it into Address Book and the list was repopulated.

Why do I not have a folder called 'beforesave'?