Gmail going into "All Mail" - not Inbox!

switters · 13 Jun 2008, 11:50 PM

For some reason today all my Gmail started going into my All Mail
folder but not appearing in my Inbox! I use Gmail IMAP with Mail 3.2
and I've never seen anything like this happen before.
What's even more strange is that the same thing is true in Gmail on
the web. My inbox there is completely empty! When I click on All
Mail I can see all of the emails I should have received in my Inbox
since about 11:00 AM today. They did not go into the SPAM folder -
they simply never appeared in my Inbox.

I should mention that no labels are being applied to the mails and
they are not part of a muted conversation. Also, I happened to notice
that an email came in just now. The inbox showed one unread message
very briefly, but as soon as I clicked on "Inbox" the "unread"
indicator disappeared and by the time the Inbox loaded it was empty.
I then went to my All Mail folder and checked, and it was in there.

What's happening???

war17 · 14 Jun 2008, 12:31 AM

switters,

Welcome to the EMD forums. Do you have a filter archiving emails? Turn all of them off and test.

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 01:06 AM

I have no filters at all set up in my Gmail webmail or Mail client.

In fact, I just moved the entire Mail folder (from my Library folder)
onto the desktop and deleted the preferences file. I started up Mail
again - this should be a completely fresh start. Then I set up the
Gmail account again. Now, I have a "triangle" warning next to the
Gmail folder and it is all greyed-out (indicating that it can't
connect to Gmail or Gmail IMAP is offline). This is very, very
strange and I have no idea what's happening. All of my settings are
correct in the Gmail account panel, and everything was fine until a
yesterday.
UPDATE: It gets weirder and weirder. I just quite Mail and re-opened
it to see if it would "refresh" my Gmail folders. Now, the Gmail
directory doesn't even appear in my Mailboxes panel! All I see is
Inbox, Sent, Reminders, and RSS. Nothing else!

What in the heck is going on here?

war17 · 14 Jun 2008, 01:20 AM

Looks like Apple Mail is not making good connection to Gmail server.

Lets troubleshoot the emails moving from Inbox first. What type of email? Are they copy of emails that you send to mailing list or YahooGroups? If it is, these emails go directly to All Mail folder.

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 01:26 AM

No, ALL of the mails I was receiving were bypassing the Inbox and going directly to All Mail.

Now I cannot even test it further, because apparently I've been "locked out" of my account. I imagine this is because I've deleted and re-established my Gmail account in the Mail client 5-6 times in the past two days in an effort to resolve the "All Mail" problem.

I now open Mail and none of my Gmail folders appear! The inbox has the "warning triangle" and it's greyed out, and "Taking accounts online" has no effect.

When I open Thunderbird, I get a "sector 4 lockdown" message.

Luckily I can still access mail in webmail interface.

This experience has been enough to make me want to go back to .Mac, even though it is $99/year.

**CyberSmurf** · 14 Jun 2008, 02:31 AM

Just to verify that you aren't Fetching e-mail from other accounts, and that is not the e-mail that is not appearing in your inbox?

Have you double-checked your "Filters" and "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" settings to make sure that something hasn't creeped in somewhere?

It sounds to me like you have POP enabled and the "When messages are accessed with POP" option is set to "archive GMail's copy".
Are you fetching/popping your GMail account from another account or client?

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 03:40 AM

POP is not enabled. IMAP is enabled in both my local Mail client and on Gmail webmail.

I have no forwarding or filters enabled at all in Gmail or in Mail.

That's why this is so strange.

**CyberSmurf** · 14 Jun 2008, 08:53 AM

It doesn't sound to me like your mail client could be at fault. After all, it wouldn't be showing messages in your IMAP inbox if they weren't there in your webmail inbox to start off with.

You could verify this by leaving your mail client turned off for a while and only accessing your account through webmail.

If your messages in your IMAP inbox were somehow being "deleted", then they would still show in "All Mail", because, in GMail IMAP, deleting a message only deletes the label, not the message. (Inbox is just a special label in GMail).

It could be a glitch in GMail. If it is, then it would probably sort itself out after a day.
If you've double and triple-checked your settings in webmail, I don't know what else to suggest.

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 08:58 AM

Well, you're right. Since Google has given me the "sector 4 lockdown" I haven't been able to access my account with my client, so it's been closed.

I was away from home and I had my iPhone with me. The Mail client on the iPhone wouldn't connect either, so I decided to access Gmail with Safari on the phone. I went into my inbox, and it was empty! Then I checked "All Mail", and there were SEVERAL emails in there that should have been my inbox.

None of these emails had any labels applied to them.

This is downright strange. I don't know what else to do. I've posted messages on the Google and Apple help forums, but no one knows what's going on.

I'm getting to the point where I'm ready to pay the $99 and renew my .Mac subscription, and just have my Gmail forwarded to .Mac.

David · 14 Jun 2008, 10:53 AM

Why not try enabling forwarding and setting 'keep Gmail's copy in my Inbox' - just as a test, to see what happens.

David · 14 Jun 2008, 11:03 AM

Also, just in case someone else is accessing your account (or trying to even though POP and IMAP are disabled) you might want to try changing your password... these are just suggestions, that might not make a lot of sense, but they may help eliminate a few possibilities....

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 02:29 PM

I really appreciate you guys sticking with me on this. The Google Gmail forum has been absolutely no help. They did reactivate my account so I am able to access it via Mail; however, even after completely deleting my Mail folder and preferences file and setting up my account from scratch, new emails are still going directly into my All Mail folder and bypassing my inbox.

This time, however, they are appearing in my Inbox on Gmail. I cannot for the life of me figure out what's happening here and no one else seems to have a clue. Since I can't get "tech support" for Gmail I'm basically out of luck.

I'll try forwarding to my .Mac account and see what happens. Hopefully that works at least, though I'm not crazy about changing my email address yet again (just changed to Gmail three months ago).

war17 · 14 Jun 2008, 02:53 PM

Check the mapping of your incoming emails. Do you have them going to Inbox or All Mail?

As a workaround, use the Recent Mode
http://mail.google.com/support/bin/a...y?answer=47948

BTW, it is no equivalent to compare Gmail, a free service, to .MAC, a paid service. You will get minimal help on any free service. I post quite a bit on the Gmail Help Discussions groups, and there is no widespread problem with Mail.apps or any email client.

switters · 14 Jun 2008, 02:57 PM

I don't know what you mean by checking the "mapping" of incoming mail? It seems that right now about 50% of them are going to Inbox, 50% going to All Mail.

Thank you for the suggestion on "recent mode"! I didn't know there was such a mode.

I guess it's a workaround for now, but I sure would love to know why this is happening - especially since I was using Gmail without a problem up until yesterday.

David · 14 Jun 2008, 03:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by switters

This time, however, they are appearing in my Inbox on Gmail. I cannot for the life of me figure out what's happening here and no one else seems to have a clue. Since I can't get "tech support" for Gmail I'm basically out of luck.

I have (over the years) read a lot (here on EMD) about MailApp bugs..... I used 'MailApp' for a long time myself, before I switched to Linux totally......

If mail is now appearing in your INBOX (in the web interface) - as it should, I would suggest setting up an account on a client other than 'MailApp' .... and monitoring it...

13 Jun 2008, 11:50 PM	#1
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	Gmail going into "All Mail" - not Inbox! For some reason today all my Gmail started going into my All Mail folder but not appearing in my Inbox! I use Gmail IMAP with Mail 3.2 and I've never seen anything like this happen before. What's even more strange is that the same thing is true in Gmail on the web. My inbox there is completely empty! When I click on All Mail I can see all of the emails I should have received in my Inbox since about 11:00 AM today. They did not go into the SPAM folder - they simply never appeared in my Inbox. I should mention that no labels are being applied to the mails and they are not part of a muted conversation. Also, I happened to notice that an email came in just now. The inbox showed one unread message very briefly, but as soon as I clicked on "Inbox" the "unread" indicator disappeared and by the time the Inbox loaded it was empty. I then went to my All Mail folder and checked, and it was in there. What's happening???

14 Jun 2008, 02:31 AM	#6
CyberSmurf Moderator Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: British Columbia Posts: 4,011	Just to verify that you aren't Fetching e-mail from other accounts, and that is not the e-mail that is not appearing in your inbox? Have you double-checked your "Filters" and "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" settings to make sure that something hasn't creeped in somewhere? It sounds to me like you have POP enabled and the "When messages are accessed with POP" option is set to "archive GMail's copy". Are you fetching/popping your GMail account from another account or client? Last edited by CyberSmurf : 14 Jun 2008 at 02:45 AM.

14 Jun 2008, 12:31 AM	#2
war17 The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: California Posts: 3,452	switters, Welcome to the EMD forums. Do you have a filter archiving emails? Turn all of them off and test.

14 Jun 2008, 01:06 AM	#3
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	I have no filters at all set up in my Gmail webmail or Mail client. In fact, I just moved the entire Mail folder (from my Library folder) onto the desktop and deleted the preferences file. I started up Mail again - this should be a completely fresh start. Then I set up the Gmail account again. Now, I have a "triangle" warning next to the Gmail folder and it is all greyed-out (indicating that it can't connect to Gmail or Gmail IMAP is offline). This is very, very strange and I have no idea what's happening. All of my settings are correct in the Gmail account panel, and everything was fine until a yesterday. UPDATE: It gets weirder and weirder. I just quite Mail and re-opened it to see if it would "refresh" my Gmail folders. Now, the Gmail directory doesn't even appear in my Mailboxes panel! All I see is Inbox, Sent, Reminders, and RSS. Nothing else! What in the heck is going on here?

14 Jun 2008, 01:20 AM	#4
war17 The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: California Posts: 3,452	Looks like Apple Mail is not making good connection to Gmail server. Lets troubleshoot the emails moving from Inbox first. What type of email? Are they copy of emails that you send to mailing list or YahooGroups? If it is, these emails go directly to All Mail folder.

14 Jun 2008, 01:26 AM	#5
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	No, ALL of the mails I was receiving were bypassing the Inbox and going directly to All Mail. Now I cannot even test it further, because apparently I've been "locked out" of my account. I imagine this is because I've deleted and re-established my Gmail account in the Mail client 5-6 times in the past two days in an effort to resolve the "All Mail" problem. I now open Mail and none of my Gmail folders appear! The inbox has the "warning triangle" and it's greyed out, and "Taking accounts online" has no effect. When I open Thunderbird, I get a "sector 4 lockdown" message. Luckily I can still access mail in webmail interface. This experience has been enough to make me want to go back to .Mac, even though it is $99/year.

14 Jun 2008, 03:40 AM	#7
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	POP is not enabled. IMAP is enabled in both my local Mail client and on Gmail webmail. I have no forwarding or filters enabled at all in Gmail or in Mail. That's why this is so strange.

14 Jun 2008, 08:53 AM	#8
CyberSmurf Moderator Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: British Columbia Posts: 4,011	It doesn't sound to me like your mail client could be at fault. After all, it wouldn't be showing messages in your IMAP inbox if they weren't there in your webmail inbox to start off with. You could verify this by leaving your mail client turned off for a while and only accessing your account through webmail. If your messages in your IMAP inbox were somehow being "deleted", then they would still show in "All Mail", because, in GMail IMAP, deleting a message only deletes the label, not the message. (Inbox is just a special label in GMail). It could be a glitch in GMail. If it is, then it would probably sort itself out after a day. If you've double and triple-checked your settings in webmail, I don't know what else to suggest.

14 Jun 2008, 08:58 AM	#9
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	Well, you're right. Since Google has given me the "sector 4 lockdown" I haven't been able to access my account with my client, so it's been closed. I was away from home and I had my iPhone with me. The Mail client on the iPhone wouldn't connect either, so I decided to access Gmail with Safari on the phone. I went into my inbox, and it was empty! Then I checked "All Mail", and there were SEVERAL emails in there that should have been my inbox. None of these emails had any labels applied to them. This is downright strange. I don't know what else to do. I've posted messages on the Google and Apple help forums, but no one knows what's going on. I'm getting to the point where I'm ready to pay the $99 and renew my .Mac subscription, and just have my Gmail forwarded to .Mac.

14 Jun 2008, 10:53 AM	#10
David Ultimate Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Canada. Posts: 10,355	Why not try enabling forwarding and setting 'keep Gmail's copy in my Inbox' - just as a test, to see what happens.

14 Jun 2008, 11:03 AM	#11
David Ultimate Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Canada. Posts: 10,355	Also, just in case someone else is accessing your account (or trying to even though POP and IMAP are disabled) you might want to try changing your password... these are just suggestions, that might not make a lot of sense, but they may help eliminate a few possibilities....

14 Jun 2008, 02:29 PM	#12
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	I really appreciate you guys sticking with me on this. The Google Gmail forum has been absolutely no help. They did reactivate my account so I am able to access it via Mail; however, even after completely deleting my Mail folder and preferences file and setting up my account from scratch, new emails are still going directly into my All Mail folder and bypassing my inbox. This time, however, they are appearing in my Inbox on Gmail. I cannot for the life of me figure out what's happening here and no one else seems to have a clue. Since I can't get "tech support" for Gmail I'm basically out of luck. I'll try forwarding to my .Mac account and see what happens. Hopefully that works at least, though I'm not crazy about changing my email address yet again (just changed to Gmail three months ago).

14 Jun 2008, 02:53 PM	#13
war17 The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: California Posts: 3,452	Check the mapping of your incoming emails. Do you have them going to Inbox or All Mail? As a workaround, use the Recent Mode http://mail.google.com/support/bin/a...y?answer=47948 BTW, it is no equivalent to compare Gmail, a free service, to .MAC, a paid service. You will get minimal help on any free service. I post quite a bit on the Gmail Help Discussions groups, and there is no widespread problem with Mail.apps or any email client.

14 Jun 2008, 02:57 PM	#14
switters Junior Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Posts: 8	I don't know what you mean by checking the "mapping" of incoming mail? It seems that right now about 50% of them are going to Inbox, 50% going to All Mail. Thank you for the suggestion on "recent mode"! I didn't know there was such a mode. I guess it's a workaround for now, but I sure would love to know why this is happening - especially since I was using Gmail without a problem up until yesterday.