Address book loses all data and DUPLICATES numerous times

Address book is broke. After installing 10.4.3 I lost ALL my 600 addresses, they just disappeared. I restored from backup database no problem. BUT, now my address book is all confused!!!! I has duplicated the addresses. I resest and zeroed .mac, I reset my iPod addresses and also my bluetooth phone. However, THREE times I have opened address book to find my addresses have been duplicated again! I "merge" and look for duplicate adresses but that does not catch them all. I hope Apple releases new design. Address book is not working very well right now on my 12 inch powerbook G4 with 700meg RAM. Maybe someone can review with me how I should wipe out all previous info on Address book and restore a clean database of addresses. I have gone in an looked in library/Application Support/Address Book and replaced that folder already.

Hello Mark, welcome to the discussions. I think the confusion lies with the syncing software rather than AB itself. Try turning of syncing, then delete and restore your AB on the powerbook. Observe it for a couple of days without doing any syncing and I think you will find it is stable.
AK

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Hi if I restore to factory settings will I lose all data and contacts?

Hi I just plugged in my Iphone to the computer to recharge and download pics and it asked me to update some software item... now its saying that itunes has detected an Iphone in recovery mode and if I want to use it with itunes I must restore to factory settings?? What the **** will I lose all my data and contacts??? It says all other media and DATA will be erased why does this happen to me??? I tried to just unplug and deal with it tomorrow but I can't get my screen to come up it just keeps showing the pic of charger to itunes!! Help thanks asap!

Yes you will lose everything on your iPhone. You can, however, recover data from a backup done either with iCloud or iTunes. Do you have any backups?

HT204053 I have a school ipad with iCloud using a different ID (my school email address) . I am leaving and want to buy my own ipad and transfer all my data and docs to my personal iCloud account but don't know how to do this without deleting all data and

I have a school ipad with iCloud using a different ID (my school email address) . I am leaving and want to buy my own ipad and transfer all my data and docs to my personal iCloud account but don't know how to do this without deleting all data and photos?

Heya Katie!!
So, the article you have there, HT4895, is pretty good. Just look at the FAQ section of it.
But basically, you will want to create a backup on your computer through iTunes...Just plug your current iPad into it and make sure your iPad and iTunes are logged in with the same Apple ID. At that point, just create a backup.
When you get your new iPad, and before you plug it in or set it up, follow the directions in this link to change your Apple ID. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5621?viewlocale=en_US
Once you have that done, plug your new iPad into your computer to sync up with iTunes. Follow the directions for Restore from Backup and it should bring all that info back to your new iPad.
And changing your Apple ID email info will allow you to have your own!!! This should solve all your issues and GL!!!

HT5957 !I i updatedmode and recommends 'restore' but I would lose all data! Any suggestions? Apple helpline is not 'taking calls at this time'!

I tried to update my iPad to iOS 7.0.2. and all I have now is screen asking to be connected to iTunes. Message tells me iPad is in 'recovery mode' and recommends 'restore' but that I would lose all data as this would restore factory settings. Any suggestions?
Apple helpline is 'not taking calls at this time'!!!

Your data is already gone. Why did you not take regular backups of your data? Now you know why you should.

HT1766 If I erase all data and settings on iPhone 4S will I lose my purchases

I have a iPhone 4S I bought on December 9th 2012 from sprint and I'm not sure if I will lose all my iTunes purchases like my movies TV shows and TV show seasons some I bought with a gift card and I'm low on gb so I want to know if I backup or reset all data and settings will I lose all my purchases movies apps etc?

Erasing all Content and Settings completely erases the phone. Your purchases should be in your iTunes library. If not, connect your phone to iTunes, make sure your computer is authorized for all Apple IDs used to purchase your media (in Store>Authorize This Computer), then go to File>Devices>Transfer Purchases to transfer your purchases to your iTunes library. You can then selectively remove media from your phone without erasing the entire phone, and sync it back later as desired.

Lion Address Book problem - all of over 2,000 contacts disappeared - one mysteriously reappeared - then they all reappeared during resync with Gmail!

The subject iine pretty much describes what happened.
I am wondering if it is anything to do with what looks like an odd file in the directory ~ Library -> Application Support -> Address Book
As well as the "real" database file there is this zero bytes one:
AddressBook-v22.abcddb.0F392545-78F2-4AE6-8D30-457C138332B2.unknown
From the date, it might be something to do with installing and linking Cobook to Address Book maybe?
These are the files and folders in that directory (sub-directory files not shown):
I have enabled the debug menu in Address Book but have not been able to find any info about how to use it. I lie! I did read that I might possibly have been able to "retrieve" the contacts using the debug menu "Force Refresh" - however that was after I had started to resync with Gmail contacts.
I realised that something odd was going on during resync when I saw that there were over 4,000 contacts being processed rather than the 2,000 or so that I was expecting. Initially, none of the contacts groups from Gmail were showing in Address Book after this partial sync (I stopped it when I saw what was happening). However, after quitting and restarting Address Book, the groups appeared again.
I have not lost my contact data - as well as Gmail contacts I also have an Address Book backup from about two weeks ago and also the backup created by Cobook about two weeks ago. (Installed Cobook as it looked like a very efficient way of getting to view individual contacts quickly - Quicksilver just isn't finding them at all). I used third party app "Contacts Sync for Google Gmail" to link Address Book with Gmail as it gives you options about what to do for each duplicate card that it identifies.
I then spent a lot of time sorting through the contacts on Address Book, finding duplicates, updating data, etc. with the intention of managing contacts in Address Book from then on, rather than in Gmail. Not all of these changes are reflected in the Cobook backup or Gmail.
My worry is, with Lion being such a god-awful Pig's Ear in so many more ways than this, that this Address Book mess might happen again.
I seem to have spent most of my time over the last month wrestling with the numerous problems that keep cropping up with Lion and getting little to show for it.
WARNING! FOOT-STAMPING WHINGE ABOUT LION - LOOK AWAY AND DOWN TO THE HOWLING FACES - IT WON'T BE ANYTHING THAT YOU HAVEN'T HEARD BEFORE:
I gave up on OSX when I tried Panther - that was dreadful - but was lured back by Tiger, have used Leopard very comfortably for about 5 years, had a very happy couple of months with Snow Leopard and now - this mess that is Lion! I have repaired OSX install permissions and "home user" permissions time and again, TinkerTooled it until I am blue in the face and it seems that every few days I manage to fix something and then almost immediately something else screws up. I can't upgrade to Mountain Lion on this machine and am seriously considering installing or running Linux as these problems with Lion are just never-ending - and then there are all the other stupid changes that have subsequently been sensibly reverted, mitigated or worked around in ML).
I have never bothered much with Address Book or Mail in the past as I have found them too limited. I have used either the Gmail web interface or Thunderbird. However, Gmail has started crashing my favourite browsers (Seamonkey and Firefox), Thunderbird has got just a bit too complicated and I cannot get Quicksilver to play ball with Gmail. The Lion version of Address Book is better than Gmail Contacts and Mail Smart Folders can emulate Gmail filters and labels - a huge improvement. So, just when these apps look good enough to be worth bothering with, they come part and parcel with what I have seen mocked, and rightly, as "Apple Vista"!
Sorry for that but I am about at the end of my tether with it all ;-/
I would be very grateful if anyone can offer any advice about:
1) That strange looking zero bytes file in the Address Book folder.
2) Whether the Address Book debug menu options might be of any help in this situation?
There seem to be lots of people having problems with Address Book in both Lion and Mountain Lion, if not exactly this issue, so maybe the answers will help others too.
Fingers crossed!
Ms Mousette
ps. In the product list to tick for this question they are grouped so I cannot specify that this is actually nothing to do with the iPhone. I have got a load of contacts on my iPhone too but I am not going to sync them until I have got this issue sorted out.

Could this font be the cause of the problem?
Possibly, since that font is not the one that Address Book uses and there is no method to specify or change the font used by Address Book. You could have recovered your Address Book contacts without syncing, so that could also be part of the problem. You should always make a keep a backup of your Address Book on your computer and in another safe location whenever you make any change to it.
May I ask why you haven't updated to 10.4.11 yet, as it provides various bug fixes and security enhancements?
Mulder

What causes iPhone to lose all contacts, and how can I stop it happening again?

iPhone 3gs, still running 5.1.1 because I actually rely on the mapping software.
A few days back, it started randomly exiting various apps for no reason. Today, I tried powering off and re-starting, but when it re-started it had erased all contacts.
Last backup was a couple days before, so I won't have lost anything crucial, but this is the first such disaster since bying the phone 3 years ago. I see numerous complaints about this, and no real solution or explanation offered from Apple. I figure it's about time to replace my phone, so this will be a test: either there will be a clear explanation and a solution, or I'll switch to Android.

What are you syncing them WITH? Do NOT say iTunes. iTunes is NOT a contact manager.
If you're syncing them with your computer, your choices are MS Outlook or Windows Address Book on a PC, and Contacts / Address Book on a Mac.
If you are not syncing your contacts with a contact manager or cloud service, you are NOT syncing your contacts.
See this document: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4946
Particularly this item and disclaimer:
Contacts* and Contact Favorites (regularly sync contacts to a computer or cloud service such as iCloud to back them up).
* Your contacts are part of the backup to preserve recent calls and favorites lists. Back up your contacts to a supported personal information manager (PIM), iCloud, or another cloud-based service to avoid any potential contact data loss.

Old computer I had is OSX Snow Leopard with Entourage. New one is OSX Mavericks. Using Mail where are my addresses and old address book. Transferred old computer backup by Time Machine and other things work? Can't see a symbol for address book.

Old computer I had is OSX Snow Leopard with Entourage. New one is OSX Mavericks. Using Mail where are my addresses and old address book. Transferred old computer backup by Time Machine and other things work? Can;t see a symbol for address book.

Where are addresses kept on MAIL? I don;t like the new format at all. Frances
Begin forwarded message:
From: Frances Topping <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: - Old computer I had is OSX Snow Leopard with Entourage. New one is OSX Mavericks. Using Mail where are my addresses and old address book. Transferred old computer backup by Time Machine and other things work? Can't see a symbol for address book.
Date: August 25, 2014 at 9:46:01 AM EDT
To: discussions-replies <[email protected]>
Old Entourage is POP and new Mavericks MAIL is IMAP I believe. I don;t know how to export in the forms you mention. Frances

Address Book as a Data Base

I added a new name in Address Book of my Mac and Sync'd it to my Curve.
The "name" is Passport and I changed a phone # to Custom "number".
It moved the name over but none of the other data.
Any thoughts? I don't have enough data to go out and buy a data base program.
Gary

When I send an email to a smart group - nothing other than the email address is sent right?
Yes. You should set Mail not to show all the addresses in the group.
AK

Once Mac address book synched from iphone and contacts deleted they won't resynch back

I have a problem and have spent hours researching but to no avail
1. I got a new iphone 4S and put in my mail info from yahoo, gmail and low and behold I had a contact list now in my phone. I thought, "I just love Apple!"
2. I spent all afternoon on my iphone updating my contact list with contact photos, birthdays and all the stuff I never put in on my email program or my MacPro Leopard mac addressbook.
3. With trepidation, I synched via usb with itunes my contacts and suddenly I had 3 (or more versions of my contacts on every site or device). To see what was going on (as I wasn't sure if my mac would erase iphone contacts or add to them etc) I tried putting a test contact "iphone test" on my phone, yahoo test on my yahoo account, and mac test contact on my laptop address book, and gmail test in my gmail's contacts, and synched again.... For the most part every test contact showed up everywhere (not yahoo test in gmail's account mind you)
4. GREAT I thought. I will just DELETE the contacts in the mac address book, yahoo, gmail accounts, fix my iphone duplicate contacts so I have one perfect set on the iphone and resynch and I should have my iphone contacts filling in all the right places (yahoo, gmail, and mac address book from the iphone) and they will all now be identical... SO WRONG!
5. None of the prior contacts would sync. Only new contacts will synch (ones that were never before synched, ie, a new iphone test contact WILL show up in my Mac address book but the other 100 won't (apparently the computer knows they were already synced or something.)
I am now left with all my contacts on my phone and none in my computer! I have synched in itunes about 10 times with "contacts" checked trying different settings for yahoo, gmail but no source will retake my iphone contacts now that it was synced and the mac address book deleted...
Can anyone help???

Thanks for your timely response. I really appreciate the heads up on the My Contacts Backup App since when you have gone from 4 copies of contacts to one you are starting to feel insecure...
Unfortunately, after following this to a "T" (2x) no luck... The mac address book was empty to begin with so I added three new contacts, synched and then started from there...
I unchecked the sync box and synched. Deleted 2 of the 3 contacts and checked the "sync contacts"--all contacts (I have no groups). It synched without prompting me for a merge and the new single contact did not show up in the iphone... bummer. Any other thoughts would be appreciated.
SORRY, I ACCIDENTALLY GAVE MYSELF HELPFUL POINTS AND THEY WERE FOR RANDERS4....

TS1541 I tried importing email addresses from gmail and now my address book is locked up and will not work. Help please.

I tried importing email addresses from gmail and now my address book is locked up and will not work. Do I need to delete my address book software and reinstall? If so, what is the proper way to do this? New to Macbook software. I have tried several things and nothing has helped. I have backed up photos, movies, etc. My addresses are on my iphone so I can sync them later right if I loose my data?
Thanks for your time and expertise,
T.

You can probably resolve this by removing some Address Book preference files rather than deleting your Address Book application.
First turn off Synchronize in Address Book Preferences if you can.
Next restart Address Book and try to export everything to your Desktop.
I have had a play and found my Address Book preference files. In the following ~/Library is the Library within your Home folder. Any numerals may differ on your Mac. Quit Address Book before doing anything with these.
1 - Display details and things set in Address Book Preferences
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.AddressBook.plist
2 - Has no data - not sure what this does
~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.AddressBook.abd.plist
3 - Has last sync date - may have more if I used sync
~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.AddressBook.sync.000393735c06.plist
4 - My contact details
/Library/Preferences/AddressBookMe.plist
5 - Individual addresses and groups stored as separate files within:
~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/Metadata
6 - All of these addresses are are also in this single database:
~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/AddressBook-v22.abcddb
If you wish to remove all addresses drag both 5 & 6 to your Desktop.
If you wish to reset preferences drag 1 your Desktop.
Removing 3 may resolve sync issues but I am unable to test this.
If you wish to reset everything drag all except 4 to your desktop.
Apple has an interesting page at: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2481
I hope this helps.

HT1212 Using the "if you have never synched with itunes" instructions, will I lose all data on the phone? That is the most important information, how to recover the data. The phone is fungible.

Using the "if you have never synched with itunes" instructions, will I lose all data on the phone? That is the most important information, how to recover the data. The phone is fungible.

Thanks @ KiltedTim, but losing "only" any data is really not acceptable and, in this case, the phone had not been backed up, but thanks for taking the time. Also, yes, fungible means what I think it means. An iphone is a completely substitutible commodity, unlike my data, so instructions that inform me as to how to fix a phone I could replace for a small sum of money while failing to address the more important issue of the data are almost useless - they potentially save me the $99 it would cost me to replace the phone if I were so inclined to trust another apple product. Not worth the hour it took to find them or the 35 minutes on the phone to confirm my suspicions about the data.

Separate address book for my wife and I

I reently switched to Mac and this is driving me crazy. I would like to keep our computer under one user so we don't have to switch user profiles to access her address book or if I update and address in my book, it doesn't get updated in hers. But, when I go to address e-mails I don't want her huge list of names being auto-suggested and me having to sift through all of her addresses in order to find the people I want to address the email to. The question: Is there a way to keep all of our addresses in one address book (one user profile), but when I am logged into my mail, Mail knows to only look in MY address group for the email addresses I specify, instead of pulling up my wife's rediculous sized (and often unorganized) bunch of addresses. I don't want to accidentally slip up with the arrow keys and add one of her recipients to an outgoing email. Sometimes my wife's friends wouldn't appreciate emails that guys send to each other if you know what I mean...
Thanks for any help...and please tell me there is a way to separate my wifes email address book from mine...please tell me Mac thought of this.
PS I've tried the whole 2 user profiles thing and the idea of seperate address books for updating sake and other reasons, I'd like to try the single profile thing.

I thought Mac would be better with their mail client than this.
But Mail has nothing to do with this at all. Address Book is a completely separate application, and it's that way for good reason; it's not merely a whim.
I can't imagine what Mac is thinking that if a family of 5 uses the family computer, that all 5 people's email addresses clog up the search for the person writing the email at the time.
Each user has a separate Address Book (and other applications like Mail and Safari) to keep that exact scenario from happening, as well as to keep people out of each other's accounts so things don't go missing, private emails aren't being read by overly curious people, and so your account doesn't get screwed up by someone else playing with things they shouldn't be touching.
Are there any third party apps or plugins I can download in order to tell Mail that when I am in my account to only search for the contacts in a certain group that I create?
Sorry, but there's no such things available. It would be impossible for your Mac to become sentient and know what you created versus someone else creating.

Address book does not launch and does not sync to iphone

When I had upgraded to 10.5.4, the permissions from my user profile got corrupted. Since then I have created another profile and rebuilt permissions. Now the address book is not launching, it just bounces in the dock and nothing happens. Also when I try to sync my iphone i get an error saying i don't have permissions to carry out a operation and it quits out. i think it has to do with the address book not launching. Is this a permissions problem or another quirky thing because of this 10.5 OS??
Thanks in advance

I'm not sure what you mean by your "user profile." Do you mean you recreated a new user account along with a new home folder?
If you create a second account, can you launch the Address Book from that one?
If you cannot launch Address Book at all, you may need to reinstall OS X.

I try to transfer my iture to a newer lap top. How I can do it without lose all data from my iphone4?

How I can transfer my itune to a newer lap top? Is that possible to aviod lose all data from my iphone4? I have over 50 apps and over 1000 song in my phone. Please advise.
Cheers

jyu88 wrote:
Thanks. Am I have to uninstall the original iTunes from my new laptop before that?
No.
Just copy everything from your old computer to your new one.

Address book loses all data and DUPLICATES numerous times

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