thunderbird - corrupt address book

krus · 09-15-2006, 06:36 PM

For the past few weeks, the strangest thing has been happening with my (generally well behaved) thunderbird client. Anytime I launch the program, (slightly less often than daily), I'm told that my history file can't be opened. It's backed up as history.mab.bak (then history.mab-1.bak, history.mab-2.bak, etc.) It's happened a few times with impab.mab. Those files being wiped clean didn't bother me, so when I couldn't find other people posting about the same symptoms, I put off solving the problem. Today, however, my personal address book got corrupted too. Unacceptable. I regularly backup, so nothing should be lost forever... but I need your help putting a stop to this craziness.

Some details:

thunderbird 1.5.0.5(20060728)
kubuntu 6.06
2.6.15-26-386 #1 PREEMPT Thu Aug 3 02:52:00 UTC 2006 i686

ls -lt of my thunderbird profile folder is below.

Thanks in advance for any insight.

Code:

karen@s2:33nhiij4.slt$ ls -lt .
total 8824
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   41059 2006-09-15 16:24 panacea.dat
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users 3479408 2006-09-15 16:24 XUL.mfasl
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   43586 2006-09-15 16:24 localstore.rdf
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    2512 2006-09-15 13:24 history.mab
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users  682269 2006-09-15 13:16 downloads.rdf
drwxr-xr-x 11 karen users    4096 2006-09-15 10:43 extensions
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    1415 2006-09-15 10:07 abook.mab
lrwxrwxrwx  1 karen users      15 2006-09-15 10:03 lock -> 127.0.0.1:+8532
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   65536 2006-09-14 20:46 cert8.db
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   16384 2006-09-14 20:46 key3.db
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   52876 2006-09-14 20:46 prefs.js
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users    3027 2006-09-14 20:46 virtualFolders.dat
drwxr-xr-x  4 karen users    4096 2006-09-14 12:57 ImapMail
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users  127909 2006-09-14 11:34 abook.mab.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   36624 2006-09-14 10:18 history.mab-11.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    1415 2006-09-14 09:33 impab.mab
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users  949597 2006-09-13 18:21 training.dat
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   26385 2006-09-13 12:36 impab.mab-5.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   26385 2006-09-12 11:29 impab.mab-4.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   31784 2006-09-11 13:31 history.mab-10.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users  144088 2006-09-08 15:17 compreg.dat
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    1274 2006-09-08 15:17 extensions.cache
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    1300 2006-09-08 15:17 extensions.ini
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   14379 2006-09-08 15:17 extensions.rdf
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users  101261 2006-09-08 15:17 xpti.dat
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   12884 2006-09-08 15:04 install.log
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    2448 2006-09-08 10:46 impab.mab-3.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   30128 2006-09-07 16:55 history.mab-9.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    3374 2006-09-07 12:11 impab.mab-2.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   26942 2006-09-07 10:06 history.mab-8.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   34978 2006-09-06 11:41 history.mab-7.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users    8328 2006-09-01 10:44 mimeTypes.rdf
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   28819 2006-08-30 10:36 history.mab-6.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   33395 2006-08-29 15:13 history.mab-5.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    2633 2006-08-28 14:49 impab.mab-1.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   27796 2006-08-28 11:53 history.mab-4.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   37389 2006-08-25 10:12 history.mab-3.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users     438 2006-08-25 09:36 3076152.s
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users   27373 2006-08-24 09:22 history.mab-2.bak
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users    7385 2006-08-23 12:10 history.mab-1.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users  479690 2006-08-20 17:25 history.mab.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   57457 2006-08-16 17:27 impab.mab.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users     311 2006-08-16 17:18 cookies.txt
drwxr-xr-x  3 karen users    4096 2006-08-16 12:51 chrome
drwxr-xr-x  7 karen users    4096 2006-08-16 12:46 Mail
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users    3672 2006-08-12 19:05 persdict.dat
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users     136 2006-08-03 09:26 compatibility.ini
-rw-------  1 karen users    1196 2006-05-26 11:41 mailViews.dat
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   16384 2006-04-04 12:42 secmod.db
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users      24 2006-04-04 11:19 components.ini
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users      24 2006-03-13 11:58 defaults.ini
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users     678 2005-09-30 14:49 user.js
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   13682 2005-09-30 14:42 prefs.js~
-rw-r--r--  1 karen users     679 2005-09-30 14:27 user.js~
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   33514 2005-09-07 12:40 #localstore.rdf#
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users 2100810 2005-09-07 11:12 XUL.mfl
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users   11088 2005-09-07 11:12 prefs.bak
-rwxr-xr-x  1 karen users      85 2005-09-07 11:07 82099029.s

rjwilmsi · 09-16-2006, 12:37 PM

Why are your history.mab and abook.mab file (and user.js) read only? Mine are all at least -rw-r-r- and none of my files are read only in the profile directory.

6r4 · 02-05-2009, 09:55 AM

Hi! I had the same problem, my abook.mab file got corrupted. I examined its contents, but this is not for human readers. I had to restore the last backup.