Mozilla 1.4 Addr book - Help!

Suddenly my address book randomly drops email addresses, leaving only the surname, e.g., "<George Johnson> Johnson@abc.com" becomes just "Johnson" and no other info. This might happen with one address or two or three at a time. Seems random.

All I did was clean out some temp files -- restored these from the recycle bin but no improvement.

Is this a bug in Mozilla 1.4 mail? Boy, if so, it's a killer or did I just do something stupid? (not too unusual)

Bob

 

This may or may not be useful (from Mozilla Help Contents):

==========copy/paste============
Changing the Address Book Window Display

To customize how the Address Book window and the cards are displayed:

1. Open the Tasks menu and choose Address Book. You see the Address Book window.
2. In the Address Book window, open the View menu and choose from the following display options:
* Choose Show Name As, and then select how you want card names displayed (first/last, last/first, or Display Name).
* Choose Sort, and then select a sort option (sort by Name, Email, Work Phone, or Organization).
==========end copy/paste============

Look through Mozilla Help, Help Contents under Using Mozilla Mail, Using Address Books to see what else you might find.

 

Alice, Thanks for the quick response.

Kinda-sorta did that after thrashing around trying to patch up things. My original description of the problem was sorely lacking and may have mislead you.

Here's another try:

The random surname appears in a list as a new card when opening a specific list. Under properties for that list, some of the cards were blank, usually showing only the surname in the email window. The cards affected vary and seem to be random.

Later discovered that, further down (fair amount of blank lines in between) the list, the original card was still in place. Simply deleting the entire list and recreating it with a slightly altered list name appears to have eliminated the problem -- at least for the moment.

Hating a situation that I don't understand, I'll keep playin' with it . At least I know how to put it right if it goofs up again. Any ideas come to mind from the foregoing symptoms?

Thanks again,
Bob

 

GPaDavis,

Not 100% certain, But I believe that it is a combination of things.

Be default, Moz collects "OUTGOING" email addresses in your personal addressbook.

Valid email address is added to Personal addressbook - NO first name or Last name.

When sorting addressbook via Address Book|view|sort by|name|ascending
Entries that are "Blank" (no name) are at the top of the list. 'cause that is how NS sorts, they are not case sensitive.

As you scroll down, you come to VALID name fields. -

You can either edit the bad entry to include fields required for display or you can simply delete them.

I do not think you have to do this.

But I could be wrong.

regards:

 

The closest I could find (old bug) was this:
http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=126153
======copy/paste========
I have mozilla 1.0.0.2002053012
It still has problems with the address book. Addresses appear, disappear, are
partially deleted. Blank addresses appear and disappear.

Highlighting a sub list in the PAB shows no addresses. Bringing up properties shows many addresses.
(snip)
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 96877 ***
========end c/p========

At least you now have found that the original entry containing first and last name and e-mail address still exists. Puzzling, how a new card was added to the list with no e-mail address, if that is the case.

So then, you are finding duplicate cards for a given last name within a mailing list? A mailing list will appear as a sub-category under a specific address book as shown in the following screenshot
http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/attachment.cgi?id=72137&action=view
from
http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=96877

 

I believe that the Bug refered to a previous build : not 1.4

http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=96877

I further believe that it is resolved - Fixed. last April

regards:

 

Yep, that's why I said,
"The closest I could find (old bug) "

 

So in reality, it has nothing to do with the problem and is pure rhetoric.

Is that correct ?

regards:

 

Incorrect.

I'm trying to understand the problem. Hopefully Bob will read the bug report and see if it comes close to describing his problem.

 

Alice,
The bug report is kinda - sorta close. After reading the thread and the bug report, took a look at my address book. Two of the three lists were OK, but the third (only six addees) revealed a blank card (not even a surname this time).

Checking the "Pers. Addr. Book ", revealed all the addee cards in tact (??). Easily fixed by deleting the "blank" and reentering the missing card.

So far, cannot duplicate the original symptoms. This was apparently, at least partially, cured when I reentered the original cards under a new list name. I should have left the faulty list (different name) for testing. But, then I'm prone to stupid moves from time to time.

It is safe to say, from my view point, that the address book remains buggy or at least unstable.

Wonder if 1.5A fixed this?

 

Alice,

Well the disappearing cards have come back to haunt again. This time four (4) names are missing form the list. This is another 6 name list that didn't have the symptoms before. The surnames have returned as well. They show up in the Mail List window and in the Pers. Addr. Book wiindow. Deleting them from both windows and reentering the proper card in the list is quite easy, but only results in another set of cards being deleted when I close out and reopen that list (?)! The number of cards were two the first time then the second time, four were lost (different names by the way).

This is getting crazy. Wish I could describe better but not that technically talented. Will try to get screen image and post it.

Bob

 

GPaDavis,

I am trying to replicate your problem.
Using:
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030624

So far I have not been able to do this.

What is the structure of your addbooks:
Something like:
Personal Address Book
? list 1
? list 2
? list 3
Collected Addresses

Are you collecting ANY addresses ?
Where are you collecting them to ?

How did you create the lists (list 1, list 2,list 3)?

It is an interesting anomaly

regards:

 

captjldavis,

Thanks for your interest. I used the Mail List drop window and typed parti of the address name, selecting from the pop up list. After completing the list I clicked OK button.

Lists are structured as you described. Yes it appears that collected addresses are operating. One or two of the addresses , however, are not ones that I understand. They seem to be generated from other existing cards with randomly assigned ISP names, e.g., yahoo.com. For example:

(1) contains in the address the first name, letter "d ", lastname@yahoo.com.

Have known this individual for many years. He has never used yahoo.com for email nor does he use the middle initial "d ". Yet he has two cards in the collected addresses (not the main list) -- one correct and the other "weird one ".

(2) totally unidentifiable; have had no communication with at any time, as for as I remember. It uses "aol.com ", e.g. "JohnqPublic@aol.com ".

Not sure what the purpose of "collected" addresses are in the first place. Is there a short, not too technical, description of the "collected" addresses?

Have created a "Test List" with five entries. Hope it will act up. Will try to better document w/screen displays what I see.

So far, it appears that using the OK button in the Mail List window might be involved. Those lists that I do not type in, but use drag&drop from the main list to the new list in the left hand menu column, seem to be stable.

At the moment all seems quiet.

Bob

 

I'm trying to picture the problem but it
s difficult! To clarify:

-The lists are mailing lists you create yourself, within the Personal Address book?

Please post a little more information on the steps you take to create a new mailing list... e.g. you open the Address book, highlight the Personal Address Book, click File New. Mailing list... create a blank list... drag/drop names to the list icon in the left pane from the Personal Address Book list? Or are you copying entries from dfferent address books, or from Collected Addresses?

2. There are some address cards within the mailing lists that you yourself created that have erroneous information, or which you do not recall adding to the mailing list? Or are you talking here about entries in Collected addresses?

Until you can pinpoint the problem, consider turning off address collection. In Mozilla 1.0.1 (1.4 should be similar) go to Edit, Preferences, Mail and Nrewsgroups, Addressing, and UNcheck the boxes for Incoming Mail, Outgoing Mail and outgoing newsgroup messages, then click OK.

Click the Help button on the Addressing preferences screen for more information.

Also, I was looing through the mozillazine Mozilla Bugs forum and found the followingi posted by Ramona (you might want to add your comments)

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=18308
Mozilla 1.4 drops name field in Address Book

 

GPaDavis

Have you made any changes in the UI "edit|preferences|mail& newsgroup|addressing|" ?
Moz 1.4 (by default) does not collect addresses from incoming mail- only "outgoing" addresses - unless you enable it....
By default, addresses are collected to your PAB. (again, unless you change it)
Go to: "edit|preferences|mail& newsgroup|addressing|" and uncheck the top box - this will disable "collection" of addresses.

By rights, unless you have selected to collect addresses to the "collected addresses" book in UI - there should be no entries in the "collected addresses" book. unless you put them there manually.

I suspect that somplace along the way, you abook.mab has become corrupted.
Do you have a backup of you abook.mab from a previous Moz. ?
Is rebuilding your Personal Address Book a viable option.?

Please post back

regards:

 

Alice, Captjlddavis'

Thanks, so much, for your interest.

Collection of addresses in Preferences have always been unchecked. Do have "Auto completions of addresses" checked.

Have used both methods to create the lists. Made two test lists. They are exact duplicates as far as addees are concerned. One created by drag&drop and other by way of Mail List window, typing in the names of addees, selecting from the drop down list of similar names and closing with OK button.

I do have a backup of my profile, dtd 27 July 03. Do this periodically.

If it come to it, I won't mind recreating the entire addr book. Anything to explain what in the world is going on.

Up until now, one list would exhibit the symptom -- or it seems that was the case. When I would recreate the list, it would seem to be stable for a while. Then act up sometime later. It's truly a mess. I'm not outta biz but it's a real nuisance having to retype or drag&drop the addees into a new list. BTW, retyping or drag&drop names in the same list didn't work. The added name would remain but a another name in the list would be corrupted -- sometime more than one.

For the present, all seems quiet. All lists are behaving themselves. Have no idea what I did (nothing really) except as described above. Haven't gotten a screen display of the symptom because the d... thing won't act up now!

Might this be an Xp conflict?

Don't believe I mentioned my system: HP Laptop, ZT1130, 1.13 MHZ Celeron, 256K RAM, XP home.
(At my age, senility is not far around the corner, sorry.)

Bob

 

GPaDavis,
Encouraged to hear that things look stabilized.

If the problem returns, I would suggest that you do one of the following:

WITH MOZ CLOSED

1. re-name abook.mab to xabook.mab and history.mab to xhistory.mab

Start Moz -

This will create a new clean Personal address book and Collected addresses.

You can then re-create the addressbook.

or

2. Re-name as above and COPY the back-up abook.mab to your current profile.

This will replace your Personal Address Book with your back-up .

I would not copy the history.mab.

Leave the "Collect Addresses" unchecked for the time being.

Please keep us posted, as I am very interested in what is going on.

regards:


[color][/color]

 

Captjlddavis,

Get this in too you before I forget it.

Just went back to look at the lists. They all looked good. Double clicked on one of them in the left panel, opening the Mail List windows (properties, I think). Looked clean. Clicked on OK.

Back to Main list and there were three "surnames ". Back to the list in question and sure enough there were the "surnames" without details. The related card with details missing. The correct card still remains in the Main List along with the "surnames ". This is weird.

So it would seem to be related to clicking on the OK button in the Mail List window (?)!

Not touching anything 'til I hear from you.

Bob

 

GPaDavis,

This is very strange indeed, I am not sure what is going on, but it is a learning experience.........

Please try suggestion (1) above and see what effect,if any, that has.

I am starting to lean towards HOW Moz handles adding names to the list - and what it does with the data you enter.

Keep the faith, we will solve this thing.

Regards:

 

Set up test 1. All appeared stable. Entered a dozen dummy type addresses. Created test lists 1 and 2. List 1 was made by drag&drop, 2 by double clicking on list name (properties) and typing in first part of address name and pressing OK.

All remained stable. Up and down with browser and address book didn't affect it. Remained stable.

Imported original addr book into a Test Addr book. Then copied addresses from this orig. listing to the Pers. Addr book. Still no symptoms.

Finally, entered names into Test list 1 with Mail List window (properties), clicking OK and Mail List window would not close but locked up, flickering on and off (new symptom). Calling up task mgr and immediately cancelling stopped the flicker and closed out the Mail List window. But, the new entry was not recorded in the list.

Drag&drop of same name into Test List 1 worked ok.
Problem still seems to be pointing to the OK button in the Mail List window. hmmmmm?

Collected Addee remain empty.

What next?

Here's what I have set up (glad to change in in any way you wish (all backed up):

PERS ADDR BOOK:List of dummy addresses and legitimate addees.

ListTest2
Test list 1
TPS Off Test

TEST ADDR BOOK; Original legitimate addresses

Condo Board List (normal)
PDF IAA List (contains three(3) blank entries)
TestList (normal)
Test2List (normal)
TPS Officers (normal)
Word - IAA (normal)