[MickeyZ]

Hi all,
Recently I've started having problems with Mail application. I have MacBook Pro 2.16GHz running latest Mac OS X Leopard and latest version of Mail. After launching Mail it opens up its main window, I can access all the folders (including INBOX), display their contents (list of messages), I can access all the menus. But as soon as I click on any message to display its contents only the header of the message is displayed and Mail stops responding. The only thing I can do is to Force Quit Mail application. I have searched the web, read about other people having similar problems and I tried the following:
1. removal of ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist
2. removal of ~/Library/Mail/Envelope Index
3 removal of ~/Library/Mail/MessageRules.plist (and its backup)
4. moving ~/Library/Mail to Desktop, starting Mail, then when Mail asks about importing messages, deleting the newly created ~/Library/Mail folder and putting the original one from Desktop back to ~/Library
5. removing Mail from my MBP with AppZapper and installing it again from Leopard installation disk and then updating to the latest version through Software Update

Unfortunately none of the above fixed the problem, which can be observed on 2 different accounts on my MBP. I would like to keep using Mail and would like to avoid the clean installation of Mac OS X. Is there anything else I could try?

[JKT]

Try to Rebuild your Mailbox(es) - however, I think it might do the same thing as deleting the Envelope index. Might still be worth a shot though:



If that doesn't work, I would start looking for things outside of Mail such as any hacks you are using on your system (e.g. does it work OK if you launch and use Mail after performing a "safe" log-in - hold down shift as you log into your account and keep it held down, which clears font and other caches, and disables any third-party apps, extensions and fonts until the next time you log-in).

[MickeyZ]

Thanks for the tips JKT. I've tried rebuilding a few of my Mailboxes, but that didn't help. I didn't know about logging with Shift key held down. I tried that (I assume I can release Shift key as soon as I see the top menus and Dock), but again I got the same problem after opening Mail. Is there any way (through Console or other debug/log tool) to check what process is blocking Mail from displaying the contents of my email messages?

I inspected Mail process in Activity Monitor and in Open Files and Ports I noticed the following 2 lines:
->0x6477660
->0x6477550

All other lines indicate a valid path to file/directory on the disk, but those 2 show some pointers. Could this be a problem?

[JKT]

No idea about that, but Console (in /Applications/Utilities) displays the logs of everything that is going on on your Mac (select the All Messages log and leave it visible as you launch Mail - see what gets recorded at the time).

[MickeyZ]

Unfortunately Console doesn't show any errors, actually there are no new messages logged after I open Mail. However I did an interesting test. I created a new account on my MBP and started Mail there. I configured my POP account details and was able to download emails from server and display their contents, Mail didn't hang. Then I copied the ~/Library/Mail from my account to the newly created account and Mail launched on that new account could display contents of all the messages (after rebuilding mailboxes) without problem. So I suspect that the Mail application itself is not corrupted, it must be something on my account. What are other files/folders that Mail uses apart from those:
~/Library/Mail
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist

I already deleted the 2 above, but that did not help.

[JKT]

~/Library/Caches contains one or two folders related to Mail (one for a database - com.apple.mail, the other for Stationery - just Mail). ~/Library/Application Support/Mail can also exist for Stationery.

I imagine the Cache files would be a good thing to delete.

[MickeyZ]

My Mail problem is fixed. Unfortunately I don't know what caused Mail to hang, but after booting up my MBP in safe mode Mail worked without problems. So then I rebooted and started MBP in normal mode, logged in to my account and after starting Mail it worked fine too. Starting in safe mode was suggested by Apple support after I called them. They also suggested to delete both system and my account caches, but that didn't help. When Mac OS X is started in safe mode it doesn't load any additional fonts or kernel extensions installed by the user. I never installed any extra fonts, but I might have installed some extensions in the past. Anyway, I'm glad I could avoid the whole system re-installation.

[JKT]

Be aware that the disabling of third party stuff only works for the boot where you hold the shift key down. Next time you boot without the shift key, they are loaded again so you need to delete them permanently to get rid of them. I would check any "extensions" you have installed for Mail and get rid of them.

[MickeyZ]

Fo the time being I won't be getting rid of anything as Mail works fine now. If it starts hanging again I'll go through the extensions and review them.