Help! Address Book Empty

My address book is completely empty. It was all there yesterday.
How can I restore it from a Time Machine backup?

first, did you happen to do a back up with file>export>address book archive? if so then the easiest way is to locate that archive and go to file>import>address book archive.
in the absence of an archive, you should be looking for the following:
com.apple.addressbook.abd.plist and com.apple.addressbook.plist which are files that should be located in homefolder/library/preferences on your back up and get them back in the same location on your computer.
the folder homefolder/library/application support/addressbook in your back up and get it back to the same location on your computer.
hope this helps

Similar Messages

Address Book empty iCloud is empty too?

MBP 2.66GHZ i7 OS 10.7.3 I had allot of duplicates and incomplete address cards after moving to iCloud so I decided to start over. On my MBP I did a back up of all contacts then proceeded to clean it up once I was done I did another back up and called it contacts_clean.abbu I selected all my contacts and deleted them in Address Book (AB) went into AB preferences and deleted all other accounts including iCloud account all that was left is "On My Mac" in "General" tab I changed "Default Account" to "On My Mac" Then I went to System Preferences I have both "Mobil Me" and "iCloud" so I read that you have to turn "Mobile Me" off so I signed out of it and went into "iCloud" and checked everything in the window. I logged into iCloud using Safari 5.1.5 clicked AB there selected all the contacts and deleted them. I selected the preference button and clicked on the import vCard option I chose the contacts_clean.abbu to import. It failed with an alert that said the vCard does not meet requirments with an option to find out what those requirments are. Apparently there is a limit to how many cards you can have and file size etc. nothing about contacts_clean.abbu met those requirments except for the fact that it was 2mb over the required limit. So I went back to my MBP and before I created an iCloud account in AB I imported contacts_clean.abbu I got a dialouge saying if I wanted to replace contacts even then there it was completely empty I clicked yes. For a second the contacts show up then they are gone and an iCloud account is created. So this time I figure I'll import but make iCloud my default account again same thing as befor with the exception that the iCloud account was not created. I thought this could be a cache thing so I flushed cache using Cache cleaner and rebooted repeated above this time the contacts where there I thought great I'm good then I noticed that iCloud began syncing it wiped everything out. I figured it's pulling from the iCloud that now has nothing in it and replacing it with nothing on my MBP. I did some research and did above flushed cache rebooted but this time I had no internet connection (Turned off WiFi/Unplugged ethernet) I launch AB on MBP and import contacts_clean.abbu into iCloud account contacts show up great there perfectly not problem. But I know the second I get on the interent and it sync's it will be gone and I will have to flush cash and start all over again. How can I get AB to retain contacts and upload to iCloud after that I want to blaze my iPhone and start from scratch. If I can get a clean version on iCloud I start over again no problem but right now I have a bloated version of contacts on my iPhone a clean version on my MBP and nothing in iCloud can anyone help me please.

Contact with iCloud because we can't recover them

Help, address book launches firefox

Everytime I launch address book, firefox boots too. I believe address book thinks Firefox is my default browser, and I'm guessing the "Add URL to <browser>" menu item in Address book wants to connect to Firefox even though it isn't running, because my menu item says "Firefox". However, Firefox is no longer my default browser, Chrome is. Firefox hasn't been my default browser for months, and I keep setting Chrome to be my default browser, but the Address Book just doesn't listen.
I hate having to wait for Firefox to book just to find an address. Help please.

Gaygilmore, have you had any additional insights into your problem, which I share? In my case I sync my address book through MobileMe and have the same data on two different computers. What's puzzling is that one computer launches Firefox when Address Book is launched but on the other I don't see this behavior. The two computers run the same OS X version, both have Chrome as the default browser and both have Firefox installed. Of course there are other variations with the apps, plug-ins and extensions installed on each computer so this is not a completely same to same comparison.
And are you really still running OS X 10.4.7?
Steps I've taken: 1) uninstalled Firefox and deleted the Firefox prefs file and emptied Trash. In this case when Address Book launches it is apparently still looking for Firefox so I get a dialog box asking me to indicate where Firefox is. 2) Deleted Quicksilver. No change. 3) checked selected URLs in the address book contacts after uninstalling Firefox. Clicking on a URL opens the page in Chrome. No love so far.

Address book empty on mac, won't sync with iCloud

Hi everyone,
I've got a Macbook running Lion and an iPhone running iOS5, I'm using iCloud to sync. I discovered today that my Address book on my macbook is empty. On my iPhone, I have all of the sync services turned on in iCloud. I also have iCloud set up on the macbook, but the contacts box is unchecked. If I check the box in iCloud preferences, it won't stay that way. Once I close the preferences pane and reopen it, the checkbox is empty again.
I'm not sure if this is a related issue, but this is also driving me nuts. I have an exchange account that I no longer use that will not go away no matter how many times I delete it. I can delete it from "mail, contacts & calendars" and in my address book, but it comes back every time.
Any help is appreciated.
Thank you!!

Ok, I fixed it. I had to dump the entire ~Library/Application Support/AddressBook folder. Once I did it solved both of the issues I was having. Hooray!

HT1865 Address Book Empty

I played with sync settings in iCloud yesterday and today, my address book is EMPTY. Is there a file somewhere I can restore my addresses from? An entire business relies on this. We don't use TimeMachine. I don't see them in our iCloud. HELP!!!

This stopped happening; not sure why it happened. I'm assuming one of my upgrades fixed this.
I am being more careful about making backups now -- keeping copies of most files in my home directory as they were every day for the last week and once a week for the last month or so. This way, I can recover to a recent version, even if I don't notice the problem immediately; once I had to recover from a very old backup...

Please help -- Address Book Crashing on Launch, causing problems with Mail

Problem:
Address Book crashes on launch. Mail crashes on launch as soon as it tries to access address book. Can't use either program.
History:
First noticed problem after an out-of-hard-disk space problem. Had about 2 GB left on the 80 GB hard drive in my 1 GHz iMac G4. Was comparing two very large TIFF files in Photoshop when it crashed because it had used up all the available scratch disk space. Mail and Address Book were also open at the time, along with a number of other apps.
After re-starting, Mail began crashing on launch. There had been a message open at the time of the first crash, and it appeared that the crash was happening as soon as Mail went to Address Book to find the sender's image for that message. The crash report showed that Address Book was the thread that failed.
Tried to launch Address Book; crashes on launch.
Both applications refuse to launch.
(Have also noticed that Safari crashes when entering text in a field -- good thing I have an iBook to use to post this plea for help!)
Attempted Solutions:
Scoured these discussions for suggestions.
Trashed preferences, re-started & re-launched; no luck.
Repaired permissions and disk repeatedly until squeaky clean
Used Pacifist to re-install sync services, address book, mail; no luck
Re-run Combo Update PPC 10.4.6; no luck
Have now done a full Archive and Install, re-installed the 10.4.6 combo update and the most recent security update, and verified permissions and disk.
Problem still persists -- which suggests it's something in my User library, I presume, but I'm out of ideas. Very tired and frustrated -- please help!
I've copied the most recent pertinent information from Address Book's Crash Log and posted below. Let me know if I need to post anything else, or logs from other apps. Thanks for taking the time to look into my problem, everyone!
Crash Report:
Date/Time: 2006-06-17 09:21:16.256 -0400
OS Version: 10.4.6 (Build 8I127)
Report Version: 4
Command: Address Book
Path: /Applications/Address Book.app/Contents/MacOS/Address Book
Parent: WindowServer [71]
Version: 4.0.3 (483)
Build Version: 115
Project Name: AddressBook
Source Version: 4830000
PID: 285
Thread: 0
Exception: EXCBADACCESS (0x0001)
Codes: KERNINVALIDADDRESS (0x0001) at 0xe183c1fc
Thread 0 Crashed:
0 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c85708 c4_FormatB::Define(int, unsigned char const**) + 212
1 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c82db4 c4_HandlerSeq::Prepare(unsigned char const**, bool) + 372
2 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c83ae8 c4_FormatV::SetupAllSubviews() + 160
3 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c851e0 c4_FormatV::Get(int, int&) + 44
4 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c85150 c4_Handler::GetBytes(int, c4_Bytes&, bool) + 44
5 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c85108 c4_Sequence::Get(int, int, c4_Bytes&) + 88
6 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c85058 c4_ViewRef::operator c4_View() const + 76
7 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c844a4 c4_Storage::Description(char const*) + 96
8 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c85c04 c4_Storage::GetAs(char const*) + 100
9 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c86e6c cacheViews + 240
10 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c811f4 -[ABAddressBook nts_OpenContactManagerWithMode:cacheSchema:] + 452
11 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c7fd50 -[ABAddressBook nts_InitDefaultContactManager] + 1052
12 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c7f88c +[ABAddressBook nts_SharedAddressBook] + 76
13 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c7f7c0 +[ABAddressBook nts_CreateSharedAddressBook] + 76
14 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c7f6e4 +[ABAddressBook sharedAddressBook] + 80
15 ...apple.AddressBook.framework 0x94c9d990 -[ABUIController setupAsPeoplePicker:] + 300
16 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00008e68 0x1000 + 32360
17 com.apple.AppKit 0x936d3e50 -[NSIBObjectData nibInstantiateWithOwner:topLevelObjects:] + 928
18 com.apple.AppKit 0x936c003c loadNib + 240
19 com.apple.AppKit 0x936bfa94 +[NSBundle(NSNibLoading) _loadNibFile:nameTable:withZone:ownerBundle:] + 716
20 com.apple.AppKit 0x93716f64 +[NSBundle(NSNibLoading) loadNibFile:externalNameTable:withZone:] + 156
21 com.apple.AppKit 0x937aa930 -[NSWindowController loadWindow] + 204
22 com.apple.AppKit 0x937aa654 -[NSWindowController window] + 92
23 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00009224 0x1000 + 33316
24 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00008f68 0x1000 + 32616
25 com.apple.Foundation 0x92931ad8 nsnotecallback + 180
26 com.apple.CoreFoundation 0x90803010 __CFXNotificationPost + 368
27 com.apple.CoreFoundation 0x907fb0ec _CFXNotificationPostNotification + 684
28 com.apple.Foundation 0x9291bee0 -[NSNotificationCenter postNotificationName:object:userInfo:] + 92
29 com.apple.AppKit 0x936bc338 -[NSApplication _postDidFinishNotification] + 112
30 com.apple.AppKit 0x936bc224 -[NSApplication _sendFinishLaunchingNotification] + 92
31 com.apple.AppKit 0x936bbd6c -[NSApplication(NSAppleEventHandling) _handleAEOpen:] + 264
32 com.apple.AppKit 0x936bb914 -[NSApplication(NSAppleEventHandling) _handleCoreEvent:withReplyEvent:] + 92
33 com.apple.Foundation 0x92932ae4 -[NSAppleEventManager dispatchRawAppleEvent:withRawReply:handlerRefCon:] + 380
34 com.apple.Foundation 0x92932944 _NSAppleEventManagerGenericHandler + 92
35 com.apple.AE 0x914f2960 aeDispatchAppleEvent(AEDesc const*, AEDesc*, unsigned long, unsigned char*) + 208
36 com.apple.AE 0x914f27fc dispatchEventAndSendReply(AEDesc const*, AEDesc*) + 44
37 com.apple.AE 0x914f2654 aeProcessAppleEvent + 284
38 com.apple.HIToolbox 0x931db0e0 AEProcessAppleEvent + 60
39 com.apple.AppKit 0x936ba05c _DPSNextEvent + 856
40 com.apple.AppKit 0x936b9b48 -[NSApplication nextEventMatchingMask:untilDate:inMode:dequeue:] + 116
41 com.apple.AppKit 0x936b608c -[NSApplication run] + 472
42 com.apple.AppKit 0x937a6bfc NSApplicationMain + 452
43 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00008a98 0x1000 + 31384
44 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00008588 0x1000 + 30088
45 com.apple.AddressBook 0x00009f68 0x1000 + 36712

I'm no expert on Address Book, but I can tell you that the files involved in the crash could be HOME/Library/Preferences/com.apple.AddressBook.plist and anything in HOME/Library/Application Support/AddresBook/. It looks like you have ignored this latest folder so far. I would try moving both items to the Desktop, restart, and see whether that stops the crashes.

Address Book empty, not allowing imports

Following upgrade to Lion my desktop address book is empty. Big problem, because this is the one used by mail and for other purposes. The address book is successfully populated in iCloud and on my iPhone, it's just the desktop address book that is empty.
I exported all the address cards from iCloud to desktop, then double-clicked to open them in address book. Nothing happened.
Would like to populate the address book via import, but that option is grayed-out on the address book drop-down menu. Pressing option-O (the import shortcut) achieves nothing.
In systems settings > iCloud, "Contacts" is checked - so what appears in iCloud and iPhone should be appearing on my desktop.
I have no idea why my desktop address book is empty, or why it is refusing imports. Any ideas?

EDIT: Read next post first.
Create a new User go to System Preferences > Users & Groups > "+" (make it an admin acct) and test the appin this new account, if it works the problem is isolated to your User and not systemwide.
If you reinstall and migrate back your Users you'll be in the same place if the issue is isolated to your User.
If the issue is limited to your user account try starting up in Safe Mode (It will take more time to startup because it runs a directory check.)
If AB functions correctly that way, go to System Preferences >> Accounts >> Login Items and remove them.

Personal Address Book Empty

We are running GW 7.0.3. BES 4.1.6.23 I don't remember the mr number. The BES is running the GW 6.5.7 client. I have one user out of 40 that is experiencing this. The personal address book that the Blackberry (BB) is supposed to sync to is empty, however, all of the contact entries are on the BB. We tried to track this down the other day and while we were looking at her GW client the entries popped back in. Now they are gone again. We have not done anything that would cause the entries to pop back into the address book. We did notice that her BB had just synced in the last minute.
Thanks,
Bill

Filter on the BB is based on catagory, so I would suspect that it wasn't done on the device; now if the user could have don it on the GW client but I wouldn't expect that to effect the sync to BES? That's a odd one, I may have to try that myself and see if I duplicate it!
But no, if the filter was turned on in the GW address book, only the user could have done it or someone logged into GW as that user.
<[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
We found that the view filter in the GW client had been turned on so only groups would show. The problem is the user did not make this change. All of her addresses returned when she turned filtering off. Is there any way this could occur without manual intervention by the user? Thanks.
>>> <[email protected]> 2/4/2010 7:53:AM >>>
SOAP. Also we will be upgrading GW to 8.0.1 on 2/13/10. Are there issues with my system after the upgrade that I should be aware of? I will post back with test results. Thanks.
>>> Michael Rae<[email protected]> 2/3/2010 1:16:PM >>>
Are you running your BES in SOAP mode or OAPI? Soap on 4.1 has major issues.
Regardless, what you might try is in the properties of the user in the PIM sync, turn off address book sync, wait and then enable it. Also once the entries are in on one place such as the BB, select the sync to be one way such as device to desktop only. Remeber too that contact sync is a low priority function, it may take up to 4 hours to see results from any changes made so don't get to rushed with making changes and then not see them take effect so you change them again with no results after a few minutes. Stopping and restarting the BB Sync server can speed this wait up.
Another thing to look for is the devices radio coverage, make sure you have as much coverage on the device as possible as I have seen some really weird contact sync issues when a BlackBerry drops in an out of data coverage.
FYI - Hang in there, you may well see BES 5 for GW by late summer or early fall of 2010, it's moving along very well and it's a major improvement.
<[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
We are running GW 7.0.3. BES 4.1.6.23 I don't remember the mr number. The BES is running the GW 6.5.7 client. I have one user out of 40 that is experiencing this. The personal address book that the Blackberry (BB) is supposed to sync to is empty, however, all of the contact entries are on the BB. We tried to track this down the other day and while we were looking at her GW client the entries popped back in. Now they are gone again. We have not done anything that would cause the entries to pop back into the address book. We did notice that her BB had just synced in the last minute.
Thanks,
Bill

Help Address Book!!!!!

Okay.........How do I recover an address book that had about 20 entries in it, but is all of a sudden empty?????
Thanks in advance

Scotty,
since no-one in charge is replying to you, the simple answer is go to your own backup- if you have any- because the AddressBook app is a dbase that is gone if its gone.
This is a very recent problem obviously- I've hardly ever relied on AB for anything, except remembering all my contacts in Mail and offering me alternate email addresses when necessary.
Now every custom address I've created has vanished- as of a new 'file' created yesterday at 0918 hrs; and maybe like you my actual database backup is about 6 months old, but since I dont have many that I store the damage is less than 20 contacts.
Bloody annoying all the same! dave

Frustrated HELP Address Book

I have been trying to figure out how to add groups to my address book and I have just realized that when I bring the address book up I am missing the buttons on the outer edge of the address book. In other words, the + button to add groups and contacts is not there. There should also be 2 buttons on the top left corner and they are not there. I am sure that this is a very simple fix but I cannot find it and am getting super frustrated right now.
Please help before I blow a major fuse.
Thanks
Linda

Go to Menu bar > file > New group
or use shift-comand-N

Address book empty...

...and not for the first time. Actually its happened three times now which has prompted me to try and get to the bottom of it.
I have Address Book on my PowerMac (main computer) that syncs with .Mac and I have a PowerBook that also syncs up with .Mac. The final peice of the jigsaw is Entourage on my PowerMac which I use for work mail. This has sync services and syncs with Address Book.
Currently my Powermac Address Book is empty, as is .Mac. My PowerBook is set for manual syncing and has a full Address Book so I don't see that being the culprit. Entourage has a full Address Book but this doesn't tell me much as while it syncs on new contacts it doesn't empty on this error such that when it happened last time I ended up with two of every contact after restoring the Address Book from my backup.
update: Entourage now has three of everyone after restoring my Address Book. Does this mean that since Entourage never loses the addresses then its not the one causing them to go missing. That leaves my PowerMac address book, or more likely .Mac as the culprit?

I don't use Entourage, but today, after I got Mail, Safari, iChat and Address Book all simultaneously freezing (applications not responding), I had to force quit all of them. When relaunching Address Book I had the really annoying surprise to get an empty address book, all my contacts are lost.
This already happened in the past, and digging the discussions I'm not alone. There is a bug somewhere and it's annoying !!!!
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.7)

How to synchronize address book (empty) with contacts in icloud (ok)?

All my contacts appear in iCloud. None of them show in the Dock's address book. How do I synchronze one with the other?

I think some third party solutions can solve your problem, here is one, just found it on VersionTracker : http://www.slamslash.com/address-o-sync

Itunes sync erased ALL contacts from my phone and address book empty

So I must have chose something wrong when I ran a sync and it erased my address book from my iPhone.
What do I need to check or change before my next sync to make SURE all my address I re-entered on my iPhone are synced with address book on mac instead of mac overwriting my phone and wiping them all out again?
Thanks in advance!!!
Patrick

I am VERY dissappointed that the alleged 'smart' operation of iTunes sync would so nonchalantly and impulsively erase ALL the contacts on my iPhone. Can't it at least WARN YOU... "Hey, I'm doing something that most likely 99.9% of people doing this don't want to do, but, screw you, I'm going to do it all the same" -- bye bye contacts.

Help me please with Outlook Express address book recovery

I reloaded windows and after restarting I could not find the Outlook Express address book. I looked in my docs and settings/"name"/localsettings/applicationdata/identities.
There are a bunch of .DBX files t, but the contacts file is only 59kb. I don't know how to do anything with these files to recover them.
Thanks for your help

Did you happen to check here
C:\Documents and Settings\%username%\Application Data\Microsoft\Address Book\*.wab.
I found some info here
http://www.filerepairforum.com/forum/other/other-aa/address-book/673-how-can-i-recover-address-book-file-help
Address Book Recovery
is recommended in this forum See more:
http://www.oemailrecovery.com/address-book-recovery.html

Address Book - All

On 4.5 there are multiple address books. When I upgraded, it moved my desktop address book into "address book - all", making the desktop address book empty and unable to synch

Hello ccuccolo and welcome to the Forums!
Could I get a bit more info from you so I can try and help you out.
Are you on a BES?
Are you using Desktop
Redirector?
Are you using BIS?
Do you have multiple Desktop[sync]
service books?
What is the difference in the number of contacts between
"Address Book" and "Address Book All" databases?
Once I have this info I will be able to better assist you!
Cheers!
SR
-SR
Come follow your BlackBerry Technical Team on twitter! @BlackBerryHelp
Be sure to click Kudos! for those who have helped you.Click Solution? for posts that have solved your issue(s)!

Help! Address Book Empty

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