Hello Olaf, Unfortunately I know exactly what you are talking about. PM is not as robust as it should be in terms of dealing with errors. The program can not fix certain problems, even though it should be able to because this the location of the corrupt information, and how to handle it, is rather straight forward.
In fact, there is a product written by an independent programmer which fixes all sorts of problems with PM can not. This is a poor substitute since this sort of functionality should be built into PM (i.e. the ability to fix itself, within reason). CTM Dev should do whatever it takes to either put this functionality in itself, or to make this tool available to its paying customers free of charge. Unfortunately, this programmer has PM users over a barrel because it is a choice between losing all emails or or paying whatever the guy wants. And he wants as much for his utility as PM itself costs ($50). I feel this is extortion, though I direct my frustration at PM's developers for putting me into this position in the first place. As a software developer I would never put my paying customers in such a predicament. My solution? When PM finally failed to load my database no matter what, I used a backup (corrupt, but usable), lost 3 days worth of emails, exported to Apple's Mail program, and am now getting used to a more narrow feature set. I tried for several months to avoid migrating to Mail, including going without email for many days while PM attempted to fix things (and failed). In the end it came down to an issue of stability. Mail has it, PM doesn't. At least that is my experience, although Jerome of CTM Dev certainly tried to help. Steve On Jan 23, 2005, at 5:56 PM, Olaf Drümmer wrote: > Hi folks > > > I seem to be unable to recover from a database issue - no access > anymore > to my email database... > > Starting last Thursday I ran into database issues. After doing a > 'compact > database' (after PM 5.0 had warned me that I was coming close to the > 2GB > limit) the night before, when retrieving emails I got alerts saying: > > A database error occurred > Class = 'DB '; what=100; when=9; err=158 > > Initially it showed up once, then twice then more and more (now > seemingly > indefinite number of times). I had to quit PM 5.0 (though it told some > connection is still in progress? There wasn't any connection/process > displayed) and upon starting it again PM 5.0 starting rebuilding the > sort > index, and after a few minutes showed the error message > > A database error occurred > Class = 'DB '; what=100; when=100; err=493 > OR (in retrospect I am not sure anymore) > A database error occurred > Class = 'DB '; what=100; when=9; err=158 > > Then I tried to do a low level database rebuild and got the error > message: > > An error occurred while rebuilding the Message Database file. > > Clicking on More info I got: > > A database error occurred > Class = 'DB '; what=100; when=100; err=493 > > > As PM insists on doing a sort index build when launched - which fails > with a database error - I am not in a position anymore to even access > all > my emails. > > I had done a backup of my PM 5 files right after compacting the message > database, and made a copy of that and put that copy on my hard disk, > then > just started to retrieve all my messages again. Right away I got the > "Class = 'DB '; what=100; when=9; err=158" error again repeatedly. > > Next I made a copy of the PM 5 files folder, and trashed the Message > Database and the Message Database Index (so I could keep all my set up > but have no messages at all). Everything looked OK (except of course > there weren't any messages), and then upon retrieving messages from my > email account, right away I got the same "Class = 'DB '; what=100; > when=9; err=158" error again - which is weird... > > Next I made a fresh environment, and retrieved my emails - which now > went > OK. Problem is, I still neither have access to my emails from the last > years nor can I use the setup (hundreds of folders and filters) > anymore. > > Some info about my context: > - Mac OS X 10.3.4, 1GB RAM, 5 GB free disk space, 12" PowerBoook, > SpamSieve installed > - database has probably some 250.000 messages and a size of 1.2 GB > (after > compacting from nearly 2GB last Wednesday night) > - several hundred folders > - a few hundred filters > - on my most relevant POP account close to 4.000 messages are waiting > to > be retrieved (I leave them on the server for two weeks) > - the database (I assume that's the "server side database") is in a > state > where it says it needs to retrieve about 1.000 out of those 4.000 > emails > (as the other 3.000 had already been retrieved previously) > > BTW - I have also tried all of the above with most recent 5.1 version > of > PM as available today on the CMTdev website. Until today I had been > using > 5.0 though. > > Any advice more than appreciated - I am seriously stuck. > > Olaf Druemmer > > > >
