recurring "MessageRules.plist" corruption = message retrieval hangs

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recurring "MessageRules.plist" corruption = message retrieval hangs

every two days or so mail.app hangs during message retrieval. a force quit seems to be the only way to get mail to stop/quit.

anyone know of a permanent, elegant (i.e. not a complete OS reinstall) solution to this recurring problem?

MY TEMPORARY FIX:
for now, after trial and error and help from this forum i have determined that the following procedure temporarily fixes the situation (but the same crap happens a couple days later, usually (but not always) when a message with "undelivered mail..." in its subject line shows up).

0. exit mail.app

1. move "MessageRules.plist" and "MessageRules.plist.backup" to the desktop

2. relaunch mail.app

3. permanently delete messages in both the "junk" and "deleted" folders

4. quit mail.app

5-v1. move "MessageRules.plist" back and relaunch
OR
5-v2. relaunch and rebuild my "rules" from scratch

thank you!

PowerPC G5 4 x 2.5 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.6)

PowerPC G5 4 x 2.5 GHz, Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Posted on Jun 21, 2006 9:26 AM

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Answer 1

Jun 21, 2006 3:31 PM in response to MRG-SF

Try the following to determine whether the junk filter has a bearing on this:

1. Either tell Mail to go offline immediately after opening it, or shut down your Internet connection and open Mail afterwards.

2. Disable junk mail filtering in Mail > Preferences > Junk Mail.

3. Go online again.

If Mail doesn't freeze now, then you know there is a problem with the junk filter. Do this now:

4. Quit Mail, then open it again.

5. Enable junk mail filtering.

Does Mail start freezing again?

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