Mail.app leaves mail on the server

A

astrodawg

Registered
I have a problem where Mail.app checks the mail and leaves mail on the server without downloading all of it. Most mesages are retrieved, but every day some are left.

I can recheck the mail with Entourage and it retrieves all the mail.. and deletes from the server.
 
In Mail go to the Preferences. Click on the account in question, then click the edit button. Click on the Account Options tab. Check the "Delete messages on server after downloading" (or something to that effect) button. That should do the trick.
 
Delete mail on server is already checked.

The problem is not that it will not delete messages, the problem is that it will not retrieve all messages. It just leaves some messages on the server.
 
There have been two perl scripts posted on macosxhints.com recently that will delete the mail off of a pop server.
 
While that script could be useful in some situations, I would prefer to be able to read the mail before deleting it.

The problem is that Mail.app is not READING the mail from the server. It reads most, but leaves some behind. Only the mail that is read is deleted. The rest is not read or deleted. I suspect that if I can get it to READ the mail, it will delete just fine.
 
I had the same problem before. What I had to do was to trash the ~/Library/Mail/ folder. Of course, I lost all my mails by doing so. I guess there's a better solution, like maybe only deleting some of the files in the folder.
 
Mine is also checked for deleting messages, and it retrieves all mail, but it doesn't delete them for some time afterward. Retrieveing my main always talkes forever because it must fetch 130 messages, and then display 20 of them.

Could this have anything to do with the use of rules, which I have 10 of?
 
Is your mail account a mac.com or other imap account? Sounds like it.

Mine is a standard pop3 account on a linux server. I don't think it is sever related as Entourage retrieves all the mail with no problem. I also have a simple web-based pop3 client that retrieves the mail with no problem. The problem seems specific to Mail.app.

Will check the rules.. I have a lot of them. I've also cleaned out a lot of old mail... I have about 50 accounts set up in Mail and it checks 12 accounts regularly. Probably around 100 folders set up too. So, maybe pushing Mail.app to it's limits??
 
Outlook express recieves the most recent mail again. I have a prefrence to delete my mail in the deleted messages folder after 1 day. I know that this doesn't seem like it should have anything to do with it, but it seems like I am keeping about 1 day's worth of mail on the server, though I would have to check that.
 
Several of my friend and I once had a similar problem on some PC's using Outlook Express. We all had Norton Anti-virus installed and set to scan incomming messages for viruses. The problem turned out to be an e-mail with a virus attached to it. When Norton detected certain viruses it would freeze. This would cause your computer to have to start back at the beginning to retrieve your messages.

Since e-mails are only removed from your service provider's server after your computer tell's it that it has successfully received all of the messages, the messages would not be deleted. Basically since the complete list of e-mails were not retrieved, the server would not be told to delete them.

The way we solved the problem was by checking our e-mails with a web based e-mail site. The one we used is: http://www.mailstart.com/

This site will allow you to check your e-mail account once a week for free, if you want to use it more frequently, they charge a fee. This will help in a couple of ways, first it will allow you to delete the problematic e-mail, second, it will allow you to read your message before you delete it.

All you need to provide them is your e-mail address and password, then it'll retrieve your mail. Works just like a hotmail account.

I don't know if there are other sites out there with similar capabilities, but atleast this might get you started.

Hope this helps.

Michael Hunter
hunters2@mac.com
 
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