Eudora 7.1.0.9 crash :(

[Tomasz Szumski]

Hello,
A few days ago... just suddenly... my beloved Eudora 7.1.0.9 (paid mode) that I used for a few decades crashed and I no longer can download / read my e-mails as:

'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx

Cause: No such file or directory exists. (2)

It then starts 'building mailbox 'In' table of contents' but the last messages I see are December 17th.
How - if it all - may I recover my 'in' mailbox, please? I wouldn't like to loose (too many) e-mails if possible...

Kind regards

Tomasz

[JA]

Post by Tomasz Szumski
Hello,
'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx
Cause: No such file or directory exists. (2)
It then starts 'building mailbox 'In' table of contents' but the last messages I see are December 17th.
How - if it all - may I recover my 'in' mailbox, please? I wouldn't like to loose (too many) e-mails if possible...
Kind regards
Tomasz

For In.mbx and Out.mbx there are 2 backups in your Eudora directory; .001 and .002

Rename In.mbx to .OLD or similar, Choose either of the backups that seems most reliable and change
its extension to just .mbx.

If you need to go back further, see what is on any backup drives that you *may* have made.

I don't think you have to worry about the .TOC file, it will just get rebuilt - others can correct
me if I am wrong.

[Tomasz Szumski]

I did what you'd said and then sent message to myself. It was somehow downloaded but was not visible. When I closed Eudora and started it again the same thing happened... no 'in.mbx' :(

[Rick C]

Post by Tomasz Szumski
I did what you'd said and then sent message to myself. It was somehow downloaded but was not visible. When I closed Eudora and started it again the same thing happened... no 'in.mbx' :(

Do you backup your email data? Have you tried copying that both the in.mbx and in.toc?

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

On Tue, 14 Jan 2020 11:37:09 -0800 (PST), Tomasz Szumski

Post by Tomasz Szumski
Hello,
'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx

Your user data (mailboxes and INI) should NOT be in the program
installation directory. And that is not something new... While WinXP made
it easy to override, all versions (WinXP, Win7, Win8x, and Win10) natively
expect user data to be IN the user specific directory tree.

Those files should be in (Win10 and Win7)

C:\Users\Wulfraed\AppData\Roaming\Qualcomm\Eudora

(replace "Wulfraed" with your user account name; WinXP would replace
"Users" with something like "Documents and Settings")

Win7/10 implemented a shadow store, which holds files that programs
attempt to modify that are in the protected OS directories. This shadow
store may be subject to cleaning/deletes at any time. Mine is:

C:\Users\Wulfraed\AppData\Local\VirtualStore


If you have been using a custom shortcut to start Eudora, it would be
the first place to examine. My shortcut has

Target: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\Eudora.exe"
Start in: <blank>

[Tomasz Szumski]

No, not really. Would it help if I would reinstall Eudora, please? Shall I back up my 'in.mbx' and 'in.toc' or anything else too?

[Rick C]

Post by Tomasz Szumski
No, not really. Would it help if I would reinstall Eudora, please? Shall I back up my 'in.mbx' and 'in.toc' or anything else too?

You should always backup any important data. I don't see how reinstalling Eudora would help with lost data files.

I believe the .toc file is transient anyway. If you lose it a new copy can be made from the .mbx file. But if the .mbx file is lost or corrupted you can't recover that data unless you know how to manually edit it and can find the problem.

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

On Mon, 20 Jan 2020 13:11:49 -0800 (PST), Rick C

Post by Rick C
I believe the .toc file is transient anyway. If you lose it a new copy can be made from the .mbx file. But if the .mbx file is lost or corrupted you can't recover that data unless you know how to manually edit it and can find the problem.

The TOC should be recreated -- BUT... the message status
(read/unread/etc.) will be lost. I don't know what the default is for this
situation. It is also possible that information about attachments will be
lost, as Eudora doesn't save the full MIME content in the MBX file -- it
breaks the inbound spool file into separate attachments and saves the
"best" text format (messages can be sent with both plain text and HTML
representations, for example; Eudora tends to delete the plain text and
save only the HTML)

Each message in the MBX file is delimited by a line beginning with

FROM ***@domain
{though Eudora just uses ???@??? -- the full UNIX MBX format repeats the
user}

NOTE: this is NOT the
FROM: ***@domain
header line -- spot the : ?

Also, in formal UNIX MBX, any text line in the message that starts with
FROM<space>
is converted into

Post by Rick C
FROM<space>

so that it doesn't get mistaken for a new message start.

I don't recall if a blank line is required before the FROM start line.

[Tomasz Szumski]

Hi,
No data was lost. I can easily display my mail up to December 19th and I can send new mail. I can not download new mail only.

[Rick C]

Post by Tomasz Szumski
Hi,
No data was lost. I can easily display my mail up to December 19th and I can send new mail. I can not download new mail only.

Do you have an in.mbx and in.toc? I'm not understanding what you are saying. You say you have no in.mbx? If the file is missing, how do you "see" your messages? Have they all been moved to another folder that you can see?

Your initial post says, "I no longer can download / read my e-mails". You said it recovered the in.mbx and you can see the messages in it. What is not working exactly? Does it recover in.mbx every time you run Eudora?

Sorry, but I'm just not understanding what you are saying.

[Tomasz Szumski]

Hi,
Yes, when I check my program files I do have both an 'in.mbx' and 'in.toc'. When I start Eudora I see the message
'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx
Cause: No such file or directory exists. (2)'
and it starts
'building mailbox 'In' table of contents'
but the last messages I see after are December 17th old. I can easily access all my mail up to December 17th for both 'in' and 'out' mailboxes. I may write / send e-mails and see them in 'out' mailbox. I can not download my mail only and the procedure 'could not ready from file...' happens every time I start Eudora. I have absolutely no idea what's wrong, sorry :(

Kind regards

Tomasz

[Rick C]

Post by Tomasz Szumski
Hi,
Yes, when I check my program files I do have both an 'in.mbx' and 'in.toc'. When I start Eudora I see the message
'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx
Cause: No such file or directory exists. (2)'
and it starts
'building mailbox 'In' table of contents'
but the last messages I see after are December 17th old. I can easily access all my mail up to December 17th for both 'in' and 'out' mailboxes. I may write / send e-mails and see them in 'out' mailbox. I can not download my mail only and the procedure 'could not ready from file...' happens every time I start Eudora. I have absolutely no idea what's wrong, sorry :(

If you get this behavior every time you open Eudora, that means there is something wrong with the In mailbox. I would first copy the file to backup names so you don't lose them. Then open Eudora and once you can see all the files in the In mailbox, select them all and copy them to a new folder with a unique name. Close Eudora and make a backup copy of this unique file.

Hopefully on opening Eudora you won't get the same error about In.mbx not being read. Then you can either copy the files back to the In mailbox from the unique folder (after making a copy of that as well) or you could try changing the name of the unique mailbox files to In.

If you do get the same error on opening Eudora, delete the empty In.mbx and .toc files and open Eudora again. It should create new empty In mailbox files. Then proceed as above.

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

On Thu, 23 Jan 2020 11:58:14 -0800 (PST), Tomasz Szumski

Post by Tomasz Szumski
Hi,
Yes, when I check my program files I do have both an 'in.mbx' and 'in.toc'. When I start Eudora I see the message
'could not read from file C:\Program Files (x86)\Qualcomm\Eudora\In.mbx

Your user mailbox files should NOT BE IN the executable program path.
In modern Windows systems (actually, it started with WinXP, but WinXP made
it easy to override) the program files directories are READ ONLY. Any user
application trying to modify files in the protected location will create a
shadow ("virtualstore") file, which may or may not be available the next
time you run that application. In fact, what may be happening is that
Eudora is trying to create the backup mailbox files -- those end up in
virtualstore, and then finds it is unable to write to the mailbox in the
protected directory.

Post by Tomasz Szumski
but the last messages I see after are December 17th old. I can easily access all my mail up to December 17th for both 'in' and 'out' mailboxes. I may write / send e-mails and see them in 'out' mailbox. I can not download my mail only and the procedure 'could not ready from file...' happens every time I start Eudora. I have absolutely no idea what's wrong, sorry :(

Open
Help/About Eudora

and tell us what the last two lines show (the lines starting with Data: and
Application:). In a proper default configuration, Data: should look
something like:

C:\Users\Wulfraed\AppData\Roaming\Qualcomm\Eudora

(obviously, put in your user account name where it says Wulfraed)

If you are using a shortcut icon to start Eudora, open its properties
and show us the COMPLETE contents of

Target: ...
Start in: ...