Mail program sends old email

My husband's PowerBook - PPC G4/1.67ghz/Tiger 10.4.8/ Mail 2.1
intermittently sends out old emails previously sent to the same recipient. He found a fix in a help menu for an older version of the Mail program which said to make a change in preferences/composing. The option is not available in 2.1.
Has anyone (besides the one person who posted her in 12/2005 asking about the same problem who was never answered) else had dthis problem?
Thanks,
Gayle

This problem is caused by some index corruption that makes messages to randomly appear in a mailbox different from where they’re supposed to be. If that mailbox happens to be the Outbox, Mail thinks they’re waiting to be sent and dutifully proceeds to try to send them.
Verify/repair the startup disk (not just permissions), as described here:
The Repair functions of Disk Utility: what's it all about?
After having fixed all filesystem issues, if any, and making sure that there’s enough space available on the startup disk (a few GB, plus the space needed to make a backup copy of the Mail folder), try this:
1. Quit Mail if it’s running.
2. In the Finder, go to ~/Library/Mail/. Make a backup copy of this folder, just in case something goes wrong, e.g. by dragging it to the Desktop while holding the Option (Alt) key down. This is where all your mail is stored.
3. Locate Envelope Index and move it to the Trash. If you see an Envelope Index-journal file there, delete it as well.
4. Open Mail. It will tell you that your mail needs to be “imported”. Click Continue and Mail will proceed to re-create Envelope Index -- Mail says it’s “importing”, but it just re-creates the index if the mailboxes are already in Mail 2.x format.
Note: For those not familiarized with the ~/ notation, it refers to the user’s home folder, i.e. ~/Library is the Library folder within the user’s home folder.

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IPhone 4 spontaneously sends old emails to others (HUGE privacy concern)

Still trying to get my head around how this happened:
1. I took a photo of something using the Camera app.
2. I went to send it to a friend by hitting Email Photo.
3. I put in their address, filled out the Subject line, hit Send, picked my resolution, the usual.
Then I go to my Send folder to make sure it sent okay, and I see something very strange: instead of the photo I was trying to send, the body of the email is actually *an exact email I sent to someone else over four years ago.*
I was puzzled. Why was such an old email appearing on my iPhone out of NOWHERE? And why did Mail send THAT as the body instead of the picture I was trying to send? At no point did I ask it to go into my email and attach anything else but the photo in question.
As it turns out, the email itself was the VERY FIRST email I sent using my .Mac account, as it was then known. But I've only had my iPhone for six months! It simply makes no sense for that email to be even IN my phone, as I haven't set it to store messages that far back (because it would be absolutely pointless to do so). Just to be sure, I went to the very end of my iPhone's Sent folder -- and it stops at a month ago, just as I set it to. So I ask again: how did it fetch this text? And more importantly: why?
Somehow, my iPhone grabbed the body of this ancient email (presumably from the MobileMe server), pasted it into the new message I was trying to send, and did all of this covertly while I thought I was just sending a simple pic?? Remember I saw NO evidence of this in the Send window -- or else I wouldn't have sent it! "Wait, that's not my picture...that's an old email from 2006! What the **** is THAT doing there??"
Please someone explain what's going on here? If this is a bug, I would say it's massive. A mail client that randomly sends old emails to people who were never meant to see them??
And it gets weirder: when I check Mail on my laptop AND through the MobileMe web portal, neither show the message in my Sent folder. But on my iPhone, it's right there. So did it actually send or not?
I'm currently waiting to hear back from my friend to see if this was the case, so who knows. But I'm freaked out enough just seeing it there!
Thankfully none of the email was especially private or scandalous, but what if it had been? Apple cannot afford to have their products going haywire and accidentally sending messages to the wrong people. This is enough to make me not want to use Mail through my iPhone ever again. I don't want to be wondering what else it's digging up every time I go to hit the Send button, ready to ship off to some other acquaintance. Brutal!
I would love to know if anyone else has had this experience, and I'd especially like to hear from Apple staff on this potentially serious security bug.
I'll update once I find out if it actually sent or not.
So bizarre!
Message was edited by: SxCx

Update:
My friend claims he never got such an email, so perhaps it's just a glitch? It's still there in my Sent folder, however, although just on the iPhone and nowhere else.
Still curious to hear from Mac officials on this!

Weird: receiving and sending old emails

I am both receiving and sending old emails - from about a month ago.
Emails that I've previously received are turning up again in my inbox. They are flagged as newly received, but the send date is from about 6 weeks ago. No message appears more than once and they are appearing in the order they were originally sent.
In addition, my contacts are receiving emails from me again, also sent from that same period, about 6 weeks previously.
There's another thing. Often, an email will appear in the Outbox from nowhere. This can be either an email I previously sent, or an email I've previously received. When I delete it, it goes to trash. However, when I go to inbox, or another folder, then BACK to Outbox, another email will appear in its place.
Weird, huh?
I've talked at length with my ISP about this and they've had me rebuild my account, only for the problem to persist.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks!

Some if not all the problems you’ve described are caused by some index corruption (which in turn might be caused by some filesystem corruption) that makes messages to randomly appear in a mailbox different from where they’re supposed to be. If that mailbox happens to be Outbox, Mail thinks the messages are waiting to be sent and dutifully proceeds to try to send them.
Verify/repair the startup disk (not just permissions), as described here:
The Repair functions of Disk Utility: what's it all about?
After having fixed all the filesystem issues, if any, and ensuring that there’s enough space available on the startup disk (a few GB, plus the space needed to make a backup copy of the Mail folder), try this:
1. Quit Mail if it’s running.
2. In the Finder, go to ~/Library/Mail/. Make a backup copy of this folder, just in case something goes wrong, e.g. by dragging it to the Desktop while holding the Option (Alt) key down. This is where all your mail is locally stored.
3. Locate Envelope Index and move it to the Trash. If you see any other “Envelope Index”-named file there, delete it as well.
4. Move any “IMAP-”, “Mac-”, or “Exchange-” account folders to the Trash. Note that you can do this with IMAP-type accounts because they store mail on the server and Mail can easily re-create them. DON’T trash any “POP-” account folders, as that would cause all the mail stored there to be lost.
5. Open Mail. It will tell you that your mail needs to be “imported”. Click Continue and Mail will proceed to re-create Envelope Index — Mail says it’s “importing”, but it just re-creates the index if the mailboxes are already in Mail 2.x format.
6. As a side effect of having removed the IMAP account folders, those accounts may be in an “offline” state now. Do Mailbox > Go Online to bring them back online.
Note: For those not familiarized with the ~/ notation, it refers to the user’s home folder. That is, ~/Library is the Library folder within the user’s home folder, i.e. /Users/username/Library.

My itouch mail keeps loading old emails and displaying them as unread. If I delete them it just loads 50 more older ones

My itouch mail keeps loading old emails and displaying them as unread. If I delete them, 50 more load....old ones that I have long since read and discarded. Any suggestions. It appears to be only 1 of my email accounts that does this. I have deleted the account and resynced to get it back in use, but 50 old emails come up as if they are new unread ones. Thanks for any help.

I am having the same issue and it started the same day. My other mac does it as well but has been an issue for two years. I just gave up on it and stopped using email from that mac. I just spend 4 days trouble shooting ti myself when i had time and now spent 2 hours with apple on a chat and screen share and they couldnt solve it either.

Two days ago Mail stopped sending my emails.

Two days ago Mail stopped sending my emails. I am using OS 10.10.2. Connection Doctor shows the connections as green. I can send from my iPhone in iOS, but from my Mack Book Pro, nothing sends. What changed? How do I fix this. I get an error message saying "The identity of smtp.cox.net cannot be verified. The certificate for this server is invalid. … When I ask it to connect anyway, or try the send again, I get a second message saying "Cannot send message using server smtp.cox.net… Authentication required."
Connection doctor says "Connection to server succeeded; login not required."
How do I fix this?

This could be a complicated problem to solve, as there are several possible causes for it.
Back up all data, then take each of the following steps that you haven't already taken. Stop when the problem is resolved.
Step 1
From the menu bar, select
           ▹ System Preferences... ▹ Date & Time
Select the Time Zone tab in the preference pane that opens and check that the time zone matches your location. Then select the Date & Time tab. Check that the data and time shown (including the year) are correct, and correct them if not.
Check the box marked
          Set date and time automatically
if it's not already checked, and select one of the Apple time servers from the menu next to it.
Step 2
Start up in safe mode and log in to the account with the problem.
Note: If FileVault is enabled in OS X 10.9 or earlier, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a software RAID, you can’t do this. Ask for further instructions.
Safe mode is much slower to start up and run than normal, with limited graphics performance, and some things won’t work at all, including sound output and Wi-Fi on certain models. The next normal startup may also be somewhat slow.
The login screen appears even if you usually login automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.
If the problem is not reproducible in safe mode, then it's caused by third-party "anti-virus" or "security" software. If you know what that software is, remove it as directed by the developer after backing up all data. If you don't know what it is, ask for instructions.
Step 3
Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:
/System/Library/Keychains/SystemCACertificates.keychain
Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select
          Services ▹ Show Info
from the contextual menu.* An Info dialog should open. The dialog should show "You can only read" in the Sharing & Permissions section.
Repeat with this line:
/System/Library/Keychains/SystemRootCertificates.keychain
If instead of the Info dialog, you get a message that either file can't be found, reinstall OS X.
*If you don't see the contextual menu item, copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Open a TextEdit window and paste into it by pressing command-V. Select the line you just pasted and continue as above.
Step 4
Launch the Keychain Access application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
In the upper left corner of the window, you should see a list headed Keychains. If not, click the button in the lower left corner that looks like a triangle inside a square.
In the Keychains list, there should be items named System and System Roots. If not, select
          File ▹ Add Keychain
from the menu bar and add the following items:
/Library/Keychains/System.keychain
/System/Library/Keychains/SystemRootCertificates.keychain
Open the View menu in the menu bar. If one of the items in the menu is
          Show Expired Certificates
select it. Otherwise it will show
          Hide Expired Certificates
which is what you want.
From the Category list in the lower left corner of the window, select Certificates. Look carefully at the list of certificates in the right side of the window. If any of them has a blue-and-white plus sign or a red "X" in the icon, double-click it. An inspection window will open. Click the disclosure triangle labeled Trust to disclose the trust settings for the certificate. From the menu labeled
          Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
select
          no value specified
Close the inspection window. You'll be prompted for your administrator password to update the settings.
Now open the same inspection window again, and select
          When using this certificate: Use System Defaults
Save the change in the same way as before.
Revert all the certificates with non-default trust settings. Never again change any of those settings.
Step 5
Select My Certificates from the Category list. From the list of certificates shown, delete any that are marked with a red X as expired or invalid.
Export all remaining certificates, delete them from the keychain, and reimport. For instructions, select
          Help ▹ Keychain Access Help
from the menu bar and search for the term "export" in the help window. Export each certificate as an individual file; don't combine them into one big file.
Step 6
From the menu bar, select
          Keychain Access ▹ Preferences... ▹ Certificates
There are three menus in the window. Change the selection in the top two to Best attempt, and in the bottom one to CRL.
Step 7
Triple-click anywhere in the line of text below on this page to select it:
/var/db/crls
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. In the Finder, select
          Go ▹ Go to Folder...
from the menu bar and paste into the box that opens by pressing command-V. You won't see what you pasted because a line break is included. Press return.
A folder named "crls" should open. Move all the files in that folder to the Trash. You’ll be prompted for your administrator login password.
Restart the computer, empty the Trash, and test.
Step 8
Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:
open -e /etc/hosts
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.
Launch the built-in Terminal application in the same way you launched Keychain Access.
Paste into the Terminal window by pressing command-V. I've tested these instructions only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, you may have to press the return key after pasting. A TextEdit window should open. At the top of the window, you should see this:
# Host Database
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting. Do not change this entry.
127.0.0.1                              localhost
255.255.255.255          broadcasthost
::1                                        localhost
If that's not what you see, post the contents of the window.

Mail is sending old messages automatically.

Mail is sending old messages automatically. It's been doing this for about six months.
It only happens when open mail.
How can i stop this. I'm running tiger and have performed all the available software updates.
Thanks

First I'd backup your whole Mail folder.
Try trashing this file first, then logout/in...
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist
If that doesn't work try the .plists in...
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Mail/

How do I get my email in Apple's Mail program from old drive to new drive?

I can not determine from Apple's support info how to export my email in Apple's Mail program from the old drive to the new drive.
The old 60 GB drive was at 55GB and had 3 volume structure problems. It would not backup all files using SuperDuper!, but I could backup the user files onto an external 250GB Tintanium Fantom Drive. So I installed a new 120 GB in the iMac and took the old 60GB drive and put it in an external firewire drive housing, which mounts, runs and will even act as the startup drive. I installed 10.3.9 on the new 120GB drive. I was able to export the address book over to the new drive with no problems, but I don't know how to export the email.
There does not appear to be an export function in Apple's Mail program (This sounds kind of ???).
I have a lot of email (#???) in a lot folders and subfolders (60) in addition to the inboxes, plus all the sent mail (2,000)

The Mail.app preference file (which stores all account information and general Mail.app preferences) is located at Home > Library > Preferences > com.apple.mail.plist.
All Mail.app mailboxes and other data is stored in the Mail folder at Home > Library > Mail.
With the Mail.app quit on the new hard drive, place a copy of the Mail folder from the old hard drive at Home > Library on the new drive. If there is an existing Mail folder at Home > Library, this will replace it.
Place a copy of the com.apple.mail.plist file from the old hard drive at Home > Library > Preferences on the new hard drive. If there is an existing com.apple.mail.plist file at Home > Library > Preferences on the new hard drive (and there should be one if you have launched the Mail.app on the new hard drive), this will replace it.
Launch Mail on the new hard drive and the Mail.app should be completely restored or identical to the Mail.app on the old hard drive.

Mail sends old emails to recipients

For a while now we have had people tell us that they receive old emails from us. There does not seem to be a pattern but every once in a while I look in my sent folder and I see that Mail has just sent an email that I previously sent days or weeks ago.
Does anyone know a fix for this problem?
Using Mail version 2.0.5 and Mac OS X 10.4.3
G4 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Update:
My friend claims he never got such an email, so perhaps it's just a glitch? It's still there in my Sent folder, however, although just on the iPhone and nowhere else.
Still curious to hear from Mac officials on this!

Mail re-sends old messages

old messages (~6 months) get re-sent???

My mail application is completely screwed up: it
re-sends old messages to people and it's becoming a
HUGE problem. It's completely random but it happens
at least once a day. I'm also having trouble with
attachments -- i often can't open them (even though
it's just a file or something).
I would like to trash the application and just
re-install it. Does anyone know how to do this?
The easiest way is to use a program called "Pacifist." It allows individual packages to be installed. Just Google the program name and mac and download it. ($20 shareware and totally worth it)
Use your original OSX 10.4 install disk and run pacifist and re-install the mail package using Pacifist. Download any updates (ie: OS X 10.4.5 combined) and repeat the process with the updated mail application included in the combination package.
You will now have a fresh, current install of mail.

Mail program sends from random accounts

i have 4 email accounts (gmail and aol) i manage with apple's mail program. Sometimes it randomly sends emails from the wrong email address (I do select the right address but it sometimes sends from the account I have not selected - it's random.
Is there seomthing I need to reset?

I have the same problem, although I'd say it happens much more frequently than randomly. Practically everytime if I don't actually select it myself. I have 8 varieties of Microsoft and Google accounts. I haven't found a solution other than to paying more attention, but I'd like to know why it does it.

Mail hangs sending an email, with attachment, to some Address Book entries

I have just upgraded to Snow Leopard.
Mail hangs when I send an email (with an attachment) to some contacts in my Address Book. If there isn't an attachment then it works fine.
If I type in their full email address (i.e. not their name) into the To: field, it sends it just fine.
Any suggestions please?

I am seeing the same thing with SL but without an attachment. If I create a new email and type an email address in the To field then either hit tab or enter the programs freezes for around 8 seconds.
I wonder if it is trying to lookup/verify the address with an external server? Apple mail is attached to an Exchange 2007 server here as well as Gmail. My address book contains both local and Exchange contacts.
For me the problem seems to be intermittent.
Message was edited by: DylanPenhale

How to use Apple Mail to send outgoing emails only?

Hello,
I haven't been able to find exactly what I'm looking for elsewhere on the interwebs.
I want to be able to set up the Apple Mail app on my Mac to send outgoing emails only from my Gmail account. I use the Gmail website and my iPhone for sending/receiving emails and I don't want or have a need for all of my Gmail emails to be downloaded into the Apple Mail app or for new emails to appear in the Mail app as they come in.
I just want to be able to send outgoing emails from the app so that I can send photos directly from iPhoto using the Email button. Any help is greatly appreciated!

Great news, thanks!

How can I get Mail to 'forget' old email addresses?

Several work contacts have recently changed their email addresses, but when I type their names in the To: box in Mail, it brings up both the new and old addresses.
None of these email addresses are in my Address Book, Mail is obviously just picking them up from previous emails I have sent and received to/from these people.
How can I get Mail to 'forget' these old email addresses and just bring up the current ones?
(I have already accidentally sent emails to the old addresses because they are coming up in the drop-down menu. I would much prefer it to be idiot-proof and not bring the out of date addresses up at all)

How to prevent Apple Mail from downloading old emails from Yahoo (Imap)

I started using Apple Mail and decided to use it to access my yahoo mail. Apple mail worked well in setting up my account but the problem is I have more than 10,000 emails in my yahoo account and Apple mail is downloading each and every one of them. Even if i choose for it not to download attachments, it will still take a long time to download. Is there a way or Mail to just download emails starting now, or at least within this year only?

Good question. I have the same issue. Too many old Yahoo emails. My iMac struggles to download the email to the client and it doesn't work - it seems to time out and stop downloading the old mail.

Mail is using old email address

Hello all,
Years ago I had email contacts with (let us say)
John Doe from Apple
Now, each time I want to send an email to « anybody » at Apple , mail uses the name John Doe/Apple.
So a few months ago, I took away John Doe AND apple from my address book.
But when I like to drop a line to Apple, the JohnDoe/apple address appears again and again.
Even if I modify the address in « mail to : »
How should I erase -for ever- that John Doe « associated » to Apple ?
Thanks. Have a nice day.
Richard

BINGO !
btw : have you ever calculate the number of kilograms of operation manuals we have to digest ? ;-))
btw : from time to time, I visit a friend in Chiang Dao (North West) and we go down the Mekong to Luang Phrabang :-)
Thanks ! Richard

Mail program sends old email

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