Omnia Mutantur

I’ve just received my copy of the Leopard upgrade, and while it has significant improvements (the storage format for FileVault is more compact and easier to backup, Time Machine), it’s given me significant grief. Here are some tips:

• Back up everything first. Use an external disk, DVD or something equally accessible.
• If you’re using FileVault, turn it off before the upgrade – it’ll save you at least a couple hours. You can turn it back on after the upgrade so that its format is updated.
• If you’re using PHP or MySQL, read this page. You’ll also need to execute the instructions I outlined some time back if you’re using FileVault.
• Get OpaqueMenuBar to remove the annoying menu transparency that makes it unreadable. Why did Apple decided people would just love it and did not include a configuration option is beyond me.
• Be prepared for random applications to stop working.

In my case Thunderbird died. These were the symptoms:

• An IMAP account wouldn’t list any folders but the inbox, and wouldn’t display its contents.
• Thunderbird was continually into “accessing messages” mode, and the Stop button did not work.
• The application had to be closed via Force Quit on the Activity Monitor.

I removed Thunderbird, reinstalled, opened the application. It worked. Restored the configuration and messages from backup, it died again. Tested several approaches. At first I thought the problem was IMAP, because usually the moment I added that account things froze. In the end, the approach that worked is akin to voodoo, so I’ll just list the explicit order in which I did things.

1. Remove the ~/Library/Thunderbird directory
2. Start Thunderbird
3. Restore the Local Folders to directory ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/xyz.default/Mail/Local Folders
4. Create your first account, in my case strangevistas.net
5. Close Thunderbird
6. Find the profile directory for the account, for example ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/xyz.default/Mail/strangevistas.net
7. Copy the files you had backed up for that specific directory
8. Start Thunderbird, test. If it works, backup your current ~/Library/Thunderbird and repeat for the next account.
9. For IMAP accounts you won’t need to copy the folders, only the file msgFilterRules.dat from the account’s directory
10. Install and configure enigmal.
11. Restore the ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/xyz.default/pgprules.xml file if you had any custom rules.

I don’t recommend upgrading to Leopard unless you have some time to kill, literally need one of its new features (like BootCamp), or really, truly hate yourself. I strongly advise against leaving your Random Inexperienced User alone with it. Apple came pretty close to pulling a Vista with this one.

Ricardo Science and Technology