Only 77 out of 1584 mails can be viewed

Only 77 out of 1584 mails can be viewed

Hello Guys,

I have used Opera mail (pop3) for many years (in the beginning of this century). I have saved important mail's with attachment for the rainy day when I need the information.

Recently the rainy day come and I was chocked to discover that I could only open 77 of the 1584 mails I have saved can be viewed. The 1584 mails show up only in “Received” under “All Messages” in the mail panel but the actual mail and attachment cannot be viewed. I have tried “View all the messages option”.

I use Linux distribution SimplyMEPIS from version 6 up to 8.5 now in use. Every time I install a new version I do a clean install which means I delete my Home directory where Bookmarks (/home/arne/.opera/bookmark), Mails (./home/arne/.opera/mail/) and Contacts (./home/arne/.contacts.adr) is. In order to save it I copy it to another directory and then back to the new home for the new Mepis version.

I have done this procedure 7 times and somewhere along the line I must have done something wrong.
I have some very important information and documentation in these mail and I will be devastated if I cannot recover it.

I have no idea on what to do or where to start. I will appreciate any comment, tips or how to recover my precious mails.
Arne. worried

Welcome to the My Opera community!

Close down Opera, delete the cache, opcache, and temporary_downloads folders if they are present. See Help -> About Opera for the location.

Also, goto opera:config#consistency in the address field, set the setting to 0, save the setting and restart Opera.

If none of that helps, while one of the broken messages (one with an attachment for example that's missing), ctrl+ s to save as test.mbs. Open test.mbs in a text editor and see if the body of the messages and the attachment data are there.

Or, go in the mail folder (see Help -> About Opera), and in the store folder, go into the account folder in question and try to find the mbs file that represents the message. You should be able to find it by accountN/year/month and then by runnning a search in that folder for files containing some text where the text is something in the message. That you give you the mbs file. Open that in a text editor to see if all of the message is there. If it is, then when can go from there. If it isn't, you might be out of luck.

Do you have a clue as to what mail database store strategy you're using? See http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=403441&t=1273711104&page=1#comment4220941 (the default in the latest Operas is 2. Are you using something different. You can inspect accounts.ini to know for sure. I figured you might be since you've been using Opera for so long.)

Hello Burnout426,
Thanks for your reply. Just to clarify my configuration, I have 2 complete Mepis configurations both including Opera. (Mepis 8 and Mepis 8.5) and Opera 10.10 in each. The mails I cannot view is in Mepis 8.

Therefore I was able to compare the structure in both “.opera” folders. I can see that I have 2 mail folders. The second is inside the first mail folder. Furthermore I have 2 accounts in both mail folders. Account 1. has mails from late 2008 and 2009. Account 2. has mails from 2003 to 2008. The 77 mails I can view is from 2008 and 2009. Could it be that I cannot view the mails because they are in account 2. ?

The second mail folder are maybe not needed and /or make no harm?

So far I have not done anything you recommended. Can you please clarify “goto opera:config#consistency in the address field”, I don't understand.

Accounts.ini are set to 2 in both mail folders. Later on maybe its better to change it to 1. ref. Opera 7/8 style.

All in all I think this look promissing.
Can you please comment on this please

Arne

Originally posted by arnestpro:

So far I have not done anything you recommended. Can you please clarify “goto opera:config#consistency in the address field”, I don't understand.

Type opera:config#consistency into the address field as if it was a normal URL like http://www.cnn.com

Originally posted by arnestpro:

I can see that I have 2 mail folders. The second is inside the first mail folder.

That sounds weird. Not sure why it's like that.

Originally posted by arnestpro:

Furthermore I have 2 accounts in both mail folders. Account 1. has mails from late 2008 and 2009. Account 2. has mails from 2003 to 2008. The 77 mails I can view is from 2008 and 2009. Could it be that I cannot view the mails because they are in account 2. ?

It sure sounds like it. But, I'm not sure why things are split up like that.

Do this for now.

Download another Opera (10.10 the 10.10 tar.gz one is fine for now) and extract it. Then, launch that Opera via the command line with the -pd "some directory" (I think it's -pd. Been a while since I've used Opera on linux) switch so that it uses a new, separate profile. Once, it's open, goto file -&g;t import and export -> import mail -> Generic Mbox import. Once that's loaded, choose "add folder" and pick the account2 folder from the other Opera profile. See what messages it imports and see if they fully open.

Originally posted by arnestpro:

Accounts.ini are set to 2 in both mail folders. Later on maybe its better to change it to 1. ref. Opera 7/8 style.

Nah, I'd just leave it as is so it doesn't mess up things.

Originally posted by arnestpro:

Can you please clarify “goto opera:config#consistency in the address field”

Set the Mail Database Consistency Check Time to 0, save the change and restart Opera.

Guys,
WildEnte and Burnout426 Thanks for reply.

I think I know how this happen. When I install a new Mepis version and new Opera. I open Mail account and enter the needed information. Opera will open the mail account1.
Then after that I copy the saved old mail directory into Opera and Opera will assign it account 2. Apart from that I am surprised that Opera cannot show both accounts.

I also think that “mail directory2 inside mail directory1” can happen if you copy the mail directory into the other mail directory. Please remember that I do this procedure more than one year in between so it's possible to forget.

I have checked some old mails (example 486.mbs) and all of the checked have the full mail text. I am not sure how to look for attachment, maybe because the one I have checked didn't have attachment.

The “opera:config#consistency” is set to 0 – saved - restarted Opera.

Eagerly awaiting your reply.

You can use the Generic MBOX importer to import the mbs files from the account2 folder into the account1 account. (back up your mail folders first though).

That should at least get you your mail back.

But, with things being so messed up, it's probably better to:

1. Make sure no messages are left on the server.
2. Install a new Opera as explained previously.
3. Set up the pop account in the new Opera.
4. Use the generic Mbox importer to import the mbs files from both the account1 folder and the account2 folder into the account you just created.

Then, you should have everything nice and clean. (You will lose some context like filters, labels, read status, what messages are trash, what messages are spam and what messages are sent and what messages are drafts etc. But, everything will be nice an clean and new messages that come in will show up in the proper views etc. And, for the messages that you imported, the importer will create filters so that you can differentiate all your old mail from new mail that comes in. You can even right-click on those auto-generated filters, go in their properties and set "mark messages as filtered" so all your old messages are not shown in normal views.)

You could play arround with the Opera 7/8/9/10 importer in the new Opera to import account1 into the new Opera. Then, you could use the Opera 7/8/9/10 importer again to import account2 into account1. That should allow you to keep al your context and fix your whole mail profile. But, I can't guarantee that. All you can do is backup your mail folder(s) and try.

Burnout426 Thanks for reply,

This is just a short message. I have been able to recover more than 2900 mails and as far I have seen the messages is complete and even the attachment Text, PDF and pictures is OK. I really appreciate your help as without it I may have failed.

The generic Mbox worked as a charm. The Opera 7/8/9/10 was tried but so far not OK.

The big question for me now is; I thought it was around 1500 mail and now I have over 2900 mail. It may be some duplicates and I will find out.
I have a lot to do now and I will revert to this post when finished.
Thanks again guys.
Arne

Glad something's working out for you. Sorry Opera's mail client was being a pain for you.

Hello guys,
I have finished cleaning up my old E-mail. I lost around 100 mail where only the headers was recovered. But all my most important was recovered OK.
I have started to set up filters but It doesn't seems to work for me.
I wonder if the recovered mails prevent me from doing it.

I will go trough this forum to see if I can find some help and maybe open a new tread.

Thanks for all help
Arne

what do you mean with "filters don't seem to work for me"? If you set up filter rules you have to click "apply filter" in order to have already received emails filtered into them. Also, maybe you don't need filters at all. Opera has extensive find-as-you-type capabilities. In my opinion, filters are usually not needed at all. See the section "How should I use Opera to get the best out of it?" in http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=513921&t=1271594533&page=1 (or read the entire thing if you so want (c:= )