Mac OS X Mail app config

robmueller · 20 Jun 2008, 08:52 PM

Over time, people have reported various issues with OS X Mail App and the whole INBOX prefix and syncing folders properly (eg http://www.emaildiscussions.com/showthread.php?p=452199).

I wanted to get some reports from people about.

1. Exactly what version of OS X you are using (eg 10.X.Y)
2. What you set their IMAP Path Prefix to
3. Do you have any subfolders of Inbox (well, what appear as subfolder of Inbox in the web interface, which is really INBOX.Inbox.foldername on the server)
4. If things work for you or not, whether you have any odd behaviour, etc

I want to see if there's any pattern to what people see.

Rob

wxkeith · 20 Jun 2008, 10:13 PM

1. 10.5.3
2. Inbox
3. No sub-folders of INBOX on the server.
4. Mail.app has been working for me this way since I signed up with fastmail last year.

Keith

Aimlink · 20 Jun 2008, 10:21 PM

I'm currently running OS X v10.5.3

My IMAP path prefix is Inbox

It's the same path prefix I've used since using Apple Mail in 10.4.x and since I started using Apple Mail in Leopard. I started using Leopard at v10.5.1.

I've never had problems with strange behaviour and no, I don't have any subfolders to the Inbox. I've always stayed away from Inbox subfolders when using IMAP. I always create folders separately and if I create subfolders, it's not of the Inbox.

I used a few Apple Mail addons while using Tiger, but not since switching to Leopard.

timgaden · 20 Jun 2008, 10:45 PM

1. 10.5.3

2. INBOX

3. yes, about nine.

4. I do find that Mail.app wants to refresh the local cache of my Fastmail account much more often than it does for any of my other two IMAP accounts. But I run a lot of plugins - in various degrees of "beta-ness" - over the top of my Mail.app, one of which writes tags back into emails on the IMAP server, so it might not be Fastmail's fault.

Tim

bogen · 20 Jun 2008, 10:48 PM

1) 10.5.3

2) IMAP prefix "INBOX" (actually set by Apple Mail automatically—in all caps, though!)

3) No INBOX.Inbox... subfolders

4) Everything works as expected!

JRobert · 20 Jun 2008, 11:39 PM

I just tried mail.app this morning:

OS-X 10.5.3, Mail.app 3.3
INBOX (set automatically by the app)
Yes, 1
Odd behavior: A progress bar at the bottom left of the window ran for a minute or two. Eventually I got a dialog saying that something had failed while offline (but I thought it was online the whole time - ?), and showed several lists of INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.[...]

I tried it once before, when I migrated to the Mac. I found odd behavior then too, but a slightly different manifestation, apparently also related to having a sub-folder of my Inbox:

OS-X 10.5.2, Mail.app (?)
(I don't remember)
Yes, 1
Odd behavior. That time, the folder tree on the left nested the Inbox-contained folders recursively in some fashion - sorry I don't recall the details now.

Matt Stevens · 20 Jun 2008, 11:44 PM

1. 10.5.3
2. INBOX (auto-detected)
3. No
4. For the most part things have worked great. Setup was automatic and my folders stay in sync.

I did run into the behavior described in the other post once while on the road. I was writing a couple of messages and lost network connectivity. I "sent" these messages (placing them in the outbox) and when the connection was restored my whole folder structure had been replicated under INBOX.Inbox on the server. Mail had saved the draft and outgoing messages under the INBOX.Inbox folders. To get things back to normal I ended up deleting the account in Mail, fixing everything on the server, then setting up the account again.

I've also noticed a couple of other minor issues that are most likely bugs in Mail:

- Mail auto-detects that SSL is available for SMTP, but selects port 25. This works fine at home, but on the road I would sometimes get errors about not being able to establish an SSL connection for SMTP. Setting the SMTP port to 465 fixed the problem.

- After Mail has been running for a while IDLE support seems to stop working and it reverts to polling.

danaleighton · 20 Jun 2008, 11:47 PM

1. 10.4.11
2. (blank)
3. Yes
4. Nothing strange.

IntlOrange · 21 Jun 2008, 01:26 AM

1. 10.5.3
2. "Inbox" (no quotes)
3. No
4. Yes, these settings have always been fine for me in Mail. (Adding the iPhone later, however, with the exact same settings, fouled things up for a while.)

lho · 21 Jun 2008, 01:42 AM

1. 10.5.3
2. INBOX (auto-detected)
3. yes, 3 subfolders
4. The inbox and all it's subfolders are not displayed in the folder tree. The emails in these folders are recognized by smart folders, though.

gothick · 21 Jun 2008, 02:34 AM

1. OS X 10.5.3
2. "INBOX". I think this got set for me when I moved from Tiger to Leopard, I think I had subfolders of Inbox before that point, then Mail.app threw some kind of tizzy after upgrading from Tiger, and I changed things. Sorry, it's been so long that I'm foggy on the details.
3. Not now; see above.
4. Yes, things work fine and have been working fine for months.

rabarberski · 21 Jun 2008, 02:46 AM

1) 10.5.3
2) INBOX
3) No subfolders
4) No issues

placebo · 21 Jun 2008, 02:53 AM

1. 10.5.3
2. INBOX
3. No subfolders of Inbox
4. No odd behavior (other than non-Fastmail-specific bugs in Mail)

My answers would have been the same when I was running 10.4 as well.

I seem to recall when I was running 10.3, I discovered that I had to set the IMAP path prefix to INBOX, not Inbox, to get Mail to work correctly, so that's what I've always used since then.

WaterGypsy · 21 Jun 2008, 04:50 AM

1. 10.4.11
2. Inbox (no dot, no quotes, capital I)
3. No
4. Only odd behavior is that new messages are reported twice in the subfolders (INBOX.etc.etc) until that folder is explicitly viewed when the count is corrected.

tonyB · 21 Jun 2008, 05:41 AM

1. 10.5.3
2. INBOX (caps as instructed by Apple)
3. 11 subfolders excluding Sent, Draft, Trash
4. Works now. I used to leave Path prefix empty, and then my subfolders would appear immediately under the FM Inbox icon. Putting INBOX in the path prefix means they appear further down, like my two other IMAP accounts where the other folders are on the same level as Inbox (not subfolders). Apple wants us to use INBOX, as that enables their (useless to me) 'Apple To Do' Items folders to work properly.
I had what turned out to be corrupted preferences in Mail, causing endless problems. One of the things I tried was to switch to INBOX in path prefix. I've kept it like that only so my FM subfolder icons behave like the others.

20 Jun 2008, 08:52 PM	#1
robmueller Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Melbourne, Australia Posts: 6,102 Representative of: Fastmail.FM	Mac OS X Mail app config Over time, people have reported various issues with OS X Mail App and the whole INBOX prefix and syncing folders properly (eg http://www.emaildiscussions.com/showthread.php?p=452199). I wanted to get some reports from people about. 1. Exactly what version of OS X you are using (eg 10.X.Y) 2. What you set their IMAP Path Prefix to 3. Do you have any subfolders of Inbox (well, what appear as subfolder of Inbox in the web interface, which is really INBOX.Inbox.foldername on the server) 4. If things work for you or not, whether you have any odd behaviour, etc I want to see if there's any pattern to what people see. Rob

20 Jun 2008, 10:21 PM	#3
Aimlink Master of the @ Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Here and Now... Posts: 1,078	I'm currently running OS X v10.5.3 My IMAP path prefix is Inbox It's the same path prefix I've used since using Apple Mail in 10.4.x and since I started using Apple Mail in Leopard. I started using Leopard at v10.5.1. I've never had problems with strange behaviour and no, I don't have any subfolders to the Inbox. I've always stayed away from Inbox subfolders when using IMAP. I always create folders separately and if I create subfolders, it's not of the Inbox. I used a few Apple Mail addons while using Tiger, but not since switching to Leopard. Last edited by Aimlink : 20 Jun 2008 at 10:55 PM.

20 Jun 2008, 11:39 PM	#6
JRobert Master of the @ Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: New Hampshire, USA Posts: 1,561	I just tried mail.app this morning: OS-X 10.5.3, Mail.app 3.3 INBOX (set automatically by the app) Yes, 1 Odd behavior: A progress bar at the bottom left of the window ran for a minute or two. Eventually I got a dialog saying that something had failed while offline (but I thought it was online the whole time - ?), and showed several lists of INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.INBOX.[...] I tried it once before, when I migrated to the Mac. I found odd behavior then too, but a slightly different manifestation, apparently also related to having a sub-folder of my Inbox: OS-X 10.5.2, Mail.app (?) (I don't remember) Yes, 1 Odd behavior. That time, the folder tree on the left nested the Inbox-contained folders recursively in some fashion - sorry I don't recall the details now.

21 Jun 2008, 02:34 AM	#11
gothick Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Posts: 18	OS X Config 1. OS X 10.5.3 2. "INBOX". I think this got set for me when I moved from Tiger to Leopard, I think I had subfolders of Inbox before that point, then Mail.app threw some kind of tizzy after upgrading from Tiger, and I changed things. Sorry, it's been so long that I'm foggy on the details. 3. Not now; see above. 4. Yes, things work fine and have been working fine for months.

20 Jun 2008, 10:13 PM	#2
wxkeith Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: New Jersey, USA Posts: 5	1. 10.5.3 2. Inbox 3. No sub-folders of INBOX on the server. 4. Mail.app has been working for me this way since I signed up with fastmail last year. Keith

20 Jun 2008, 10:45 PM	#4
timgaden Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: Melbourne, Australia Posts: 1	1. 10.5.3 2. INBOX 3. yes, about nine. 4. I do find that Mail.app wants to refresh the local cache of my Fastmail account much more often than it does for any of my other two IMAP accounts. But I run a lot of plugins - in various degrees of "beta-ness" - over the top of my Mail.app, one of which writes tags back into emails on the IMAP server, so it might not be Fastmail's fault. Tim

20 Jun 2008, 10:48 PM	#5
bogen Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Düsseldorf, Germany Posts: 10	1) 10.5.3 2) IMAP prefix "INBOX" (actually set by Apple Mail automatically—in all caps, though!) 3) No INBOX.Inbox... subfolders 4) Everything works as expected!

20 Jun 2008, 11:44 PM	#7
Matt Stevens Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Posts: 11	1. 10.5.3 2. INBOX (auto-detected) 3. No 4. For the most part things have worked great. Setup was automatic and my folders stay in sync. I did run into the behavior described in the other post once while on the road. I was writing a couple of messages and lost network connectivity. I "sent" these messages (placing them in the outbox) and when the connection was restored my whole folder structure had been replicated under INBOX.Inbox on the server. Mail had saved the draft and outgoing messages under the INBOX.Inbox folders. To get things back to normal I ended up deleting the account in Mail, fixing everything on the server, then setting up the account again. I've also noticed a couple of other minor issues that are most likely bugs in Mail: - Mail auto-detects that SSL is available for SMTP, but selects port 25. This works fine at home, but on the road I would sometimes get errors about not being able to establish an SSL connection for SMTP. Setting the SMTP port to 465 fixed the problem. - After Mail has been running for a while IDLE support seems to stop working and it reverts to polling.

20 Jun 2008, 11:47 PM	#8
danaleighton Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 1	1. 10.4.11 2. (blank) 3. Yes 4. Nothing strange.

21 Jun 2008, 01:26 AM	#9
IntlOrange Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 20	1. 10.5.3 2. "Inbox" (no quotes) 3. No 4. Yes, these settings have always been fine for me in Mail. (Adding the iPhone later, however, with the exact same settings, fouled things up for a while.)

21 Jun 2008, 01:42 AM	#10
lho Junior Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 3	1. 10.5.3 2. INBOX (auto-detected) 3. yes, 3 subfolders 4. The inbox and all it's subfolders are not displayed in the folder tree. The emails in these folders are recognized by smart folders, though.

21 Jun 2008, 02:46 AM	#12
rabarberski Master of the @ Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Ghent, Belgium Posts: 1,024	1) 10.5.3 2) INBOX 3) No subfolders 4) No issues

21 Jun 2008, 02:53 AM	#13
placebo Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Jun 2004 Posts: 691	1. 10.5.3 2. INBOX 3. No subfolders of Inbox 4. No odd behavior (other than non-Fastmail-specific bugs in Mail) My answers would have been the same when I was running 10.4 as well. I seem to recall when I was running 10.3, I discovered that I had to set the IMAP path prefix to INBOX, not Inbox, to get Mail to work correctly, so that's what I've always used since then.

21 Jun 2008, 04:50 AM	#14
WaterGypsy Junior Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: England Posts: 10	1. 10.4.11 2. Inbox (no dot, no quotes, capital I) 3. No 4. Only odd behavior is that new messages are reported twice in the subfolders (INBOX.etc.etc) until that folder is explicitly viewed when the count is corrected.

21 Jun 2008, 05:41 AM	#15
tonyB Member Join Date: May 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 76	1. 10.5.3 2. INBOX (caps as instructed by Apple) 3. 11 subfolders excluding Sent, Draft, Trash 4. Works now. I used to leave Path prefix empty, and then my subfolders would appear immediately under the FM Inbox icon. Putting INBOX in the path prefix means they appear further down, like my two other IMAP accounts where the other folders are on the same level as Inbox (not subfolders). Apple wants us to use INBOX, as that enables their (useless to me) 'Apple To Do' Items folders to work properly. I had what turned out to be corrupted preferences in Mail, causing endless problems. One of the things I tried was to switch to INBOX in path prefix. I've kept it like that only so my FM subfolder icons behave like the others.