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Flagged folder in Mail, in Mavericks

In Mavericks on my iMac, I have a "Flagged" Mail folder that shows "7", but it's empty. This started with Mavericks. I don't think I have any flagged messages, but if I do, I can't find them because of the empty folder. Is there any way I can resolve this, so I don't have that "7" hanging around? (I've restarted Mail, to no avail.)

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.2), Mail

Posted on Oct 24, 2013 4:51 PM

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37 replies

Oct 26, 2013 3:39 PM in response to yaychemistry

I have the same problem in that it shows I have 2 Flagged mail messages (which I did prior to upgrading to Mavericks), but when I click on the Flagged tab, there are no e-mails contained in it. I tried rebuilding all of my individual inboxs (icloud, gmail and yahoo) and I even rebuilt the Main Inbox (for all accounts) and it still have not fixed the problem.

Nov 6, 2013 1:39 AM in response to stayingaliveuk

Hi Michael, The Library folder is hidden by default. Open the "Go" menu and press the Option key that will show the link to it in the menu.


I use this folder frequently so I place a shortcut to it on the Finder Sidebar but bear in mind it is a folder that one needs to be smart about 😉


PS. The folder in question is your Home folder Library, not the System's Library folder.

Nov 8, 2013 1:38 AM in response to obscurity

@obscurity


Thank you I found it and followed the instructions.


The re-indexing took about 15 minutes in the end and at first glance it looked great.


The flags that had a number against them but no messages, didn't any longer and the ones that did have a flag appeared correctly.


But...only for a few minutes and then the numbers started to increase steadily. It pulled in old messages that may have had flags against them in the past.


So I'm back to status quo. Yellow flag says 1, no messages there. Blue flag says 3, nothing there either.

Red flag, I removed the flags from the old messages and now the count is correct, which it wasn't previously.


Oh by the way after the re-index, it showed up approx. 100 messages in various folders as unread. Very bizarre.


Any other ideas. I didn't reboot after the re-index, so maybe I will try that?


Many thanks

Nov 9, 2013 3:31 PM in response to lahaina

I realised afterwards that the envelope files were in my trash still, I'm guessing it may pull in those old phantom flags from there? But when I tried to empty trash it said that files were in use and couldn't be deleted. So maybe I need to re-do the whole thing. Empty trash, reboot machine and then open mail for re-indexing.


Wish me luck!


Michael

Nov 11, 2013 7:45 PM in response to rha90272

For what it's worth, I had 74 flagged messages listed though only 44 were there. When I transferred everything to my new iMac, it said 44 - but eventually it became 74 as well.


Following things in this thread, I tried rebuilding everything without success. Then I tried the idea of deleting the "envelop index" files as described in a link here. That didn't help much - the number only changed to 73. So then I tried rebuilding the inbox again and got 44. I don't recall, but I may also have quit mail someplace in this process.


Then I read where some people had the wrong number come back and theoritized that the files still in the trash could be an issue. When I tried to empty the trash, I had the some problem another poster reported (said they were in use). So I quit mail and restarted the computer. That let me empty the trash and then I relaunched Mail.


So far it is okay, but it hasn't been very long!

Nov 13, 2013 12:32 AM in response to dbk9999

@dbk9999 thanks for the follow up, I appreciate that.User uploaded file

I have done a rebuild from within the mail app, but I haven't deleted the envelop index files again, should I do that again?


After doing the rebuild from within the app, it still numbers 7 flags that are ghosts and don't really exist.


I guess it is not too bad, just a bit annoying. Let's hope a proper fix is on its way soon.


Many thanks for your support.

Flagged folder in Mail, in Mavericks

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