Ronni, James - thanks for the tips. Yes Ronni, have tried manual synchronisation. makes no difference. I don't have "Automatically Synchronize Changed Mailboxes" as an option in the Advanced tab, what I do have is "Include when automatically checking for new messages". I always have this unchecked because I have several IMAP accounts set up, and for IMAP accounts there is a server-side limit to how many IMAP accounts can access the server at the same time from the same IP address (something like that).
This does beg the question though, why don't I have "Automatically Synchronize Changed Mailboxes"? It sounds like something you read exactly from the screen, Ronni. The Account Type is definitely IMAP, and I have the latest version of Mail on 10.6.2. James, regarding your suggestions, I tried File > Import Mailboxes, both using the "Apple Mail" option and the "Files in mbox format" option. I wasn't certain which folder to select in each case, so tried all options. None of them worked. With the IMAP account in question remaining empty, at least in terms of the view from Mail's main window, I sent the account a test message. Sure enough the message did show up, and appeared as an emlx file in INBOX.imapmbox > Messages, along with what I see as the other 290 messages. That number of messages raises a question also. I'm fairly certain that there was less than 100 messages in the account before accidental deletion. This makes me wonder how synchronised this Messages folder is , compared to what you see from the main Mail window. If I check the size of the INBOX.imapmbox folder, it is 69.7MB. All of these messages couldn't have been on the server because there is an account limit of 50MB imposed by the server provider, and when mailboxes reach this capacity, the account won't receive additional messages. So it seems that despite deleting messages from the IMAP account from the main Mail window, they are not deleted from the INBOX.imapmbox folder. Having said that, I just did a test by sending the IMAP account a message, then deleting in the usual manner, and the corresponding emlx file does disappear from INBOX.imapmbox > Messages. My problem is now compounded by the fact that I don't know which of 290 messages currently sitting in INBOX.imapmbox > Messages were the messages which were there when the account was last in order. So I can probably recover all of the content, but it would require a whole bunch of re-work going over old ground. Ho hum. I think I'll give up on this one - wasted too much time on it already. As handy as IMAP accounts are for working on by multiple parties, things never seem to go smoothly with them, especially with Mail. Cheers, Steven On 01/12/2009, at 4:00 AM, James Devenish wrote: > > Hi Steven, > > On 30/11/2009, Steven Knowles <emai...@knowles.net.au> wrote: >> I have an IMAP account set up, in which were quite a few messages. >> However, if I check the folder at Library > Mail > >> imap-acco...@domain.com@mail.domain.com > INBOX.imapmbox > Messages, it's >> full of emlx messages. Intuitively I would have thought such a folder would >> be empty, in line with the empty IMAP account. > > Both the INBOX and INBOX.imapmbox folder are relevant. One latter > contains the INBOX messages, the former contains the folders that are > nested within the INBOX. (It won't be like this or everyone...it > depends on the underlying setup of the brand of IMAP server.) > > I'd suggest the reason the .emlx files are still there because > basically it is a cache, and Apple Mail hasn't yet 'purged' the cache. > If you synchronised the account, the .emlx files would probably > disappear to match the server. > > You are in a somewhat tricky situation, because you need to convince > the server that the messages are not deleted, even though the server's > index says those message IDs have been deleted. Restoring from backup > *might* work, or on the other hand it could fail if the server will > see the restored message IDs as 'zombies' and instructs Apple Mail to > delete them again. You may find that you have to restore from backup > into a folder on your Desktop, then 'Import' into Mail, then drag > across from the Import folder to the IMAP account, to basically tell > the server to add all the old messages as though they were new > messages. But I'm just speculating. Wait for someone else with more > definitive information (or check on Google). I've never had this > problem and haven't tested it out. > > James On 01/12/2009, at 3:48 AM, Ronda Brown wrote: > > On 30/11/2009, at 11:58 PM, Steven Knowles wrote: > >> >> I have an IMAP account set up, in which were quite a few messages. >> >> A 3rd party also accesses this same IMAP account, and this 3rd party >> inadvertently deleted all of the messages. The account synchronised at my >> end, and so my view is also empty. >> >> However, if I check the folder at Library > Mail > >> imap-acco...@domain.com@mail.domain.com > INBOX.imapmbox > Messages, it's >> full of emlx messages. Intuitively I would have thought such a folder would >> be empty, in line with the empty IMAP account. >> >> However, there is another folder - Library > Mail > >> imap-acco...@domain.com@mail.domain.com > INBOX, but in this folder the >> subfolders are only Apple Mail To Do.imapmbox, Deleted Messages.imapmbox, >> Drafts.imapmbox, Sent.imapmbox, Trash.imapmbox. >> >> With a view to recovering the lost messages which were in the IMAP account, >> which folder is the correct one to be looking in? I have all backing up to >> Time Capsule, so recovery shouldn't be a problem as the prior to deletion of >> the messages, the IMAP account had been sitting stagnant for a while. But I >> want to be sure I'm looking in the right place. >> >> Also, once I know which is the right place to find the deleted messages, >> what do I drag and where do I drop? >> >> Many thanks, Steven > > Hi Steven, > > I don't know how you have your IMAP Account setup to synchronize. > Do you have it Automatically Synchronize Changed Mailboxes in the Advanced > tab of your IMAP account? > Or do you synchronize messages manually? > > Have you tried choosing Mailbox: Synchronize: Account Name (or Mailbox: > Synchronize All Accounts). > > > Cheers, > Ronni -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Unsubscribe - <mailto:wamug-unsubscr...@wamug.org.au>
