I have used Evolution for years, but something very strange suddenly happened recently. Specifically, the Inboxes to all my IMAP email accounts suddenly disappeared. I looked at each of their "Properties" and found that all of their RECEIVING EMAIL configurations were all set to Port 993, but instead of saying "993 IMAP over SSL" they said "993 IMAP over TLS" (I would have expected this for SENDING EMAIL but not for RECEIVING EMAIL). Also, the Encryption Method for RECEIVING EMAIL had also changed from "SSL on a dedicated port" to "TLS on a dedicated port". I looked through all the drop-down menus for configuring RECEIVING MAIL and all options regarding SSL are missing. This leaves me with the ability to send email but not receive it, so I need a solution. Any help will be most appreciated.

Which crypto library is Evolution built against? Most crypto libraries, (like openssl, nss or gnutls), are dropping the long-deprecated SSL in favor of a minimum TLS 1.1 or 1.2. To restore operation, you may need an updated Evolution, or to revert to an older crypto library (which would be insecure).

I would not know, as I didn't build it. I can only tell you that its "About Evolution" pop-up menu identifies it as "3.28.5-0ubuntu0.18.04.1" (excluding the quotation marks). I can also tell you that it worked just fine until ~3 days ago.

Here's another piece of the puzzle. I installed this software using Synaptic Package Manager [SPM] a few weeks ago as part of a HDD rebuild (from scratch). It worked just fine the whole time throughout the entire rebuild. However, when I rebuild a HDD, the last thing I do is uninstall the software packages that come pre-installed with the distro I am using (in this case, it was Ubuntu 18.04.1). The day that it crashed, I had did "Complete Removal" (using SPM) of the following software packages:
- "deja-dup" (its launcher was named "Backups", and its full name was "Deja Dup Backup Tool").
- "evince" (its launcher was named "Document Viewer").
- "eog" (its launcher was named "Image Viewer", and its full name was "GNOME Image Viewer").
- "rhythmbox" (its launcher was named "RhythmBox Music Player").
- "seahorse" (its launcher was named "Passwords and Keys").
- "shotwell" (its launcher was named "Shotwell Photo Manager").
- "totem" (its launcher was named "Videos", and its full name was "Totem Movie Player").
I noticed the missing Inboxes (i.e. SSL options) almost as soon as I finished removing the last of these programs. I have since, however, reinstalled all of them, and have also reinstalled Evolution multiple times, but the SSL functions are still missing.

I have since reinstalled the "openssl" software package, but that didn't help either (I didn't bother with nss or gnutls packages since these are not installed on a laptop that I have whose Evolution is still working).

I hope this helps.

Pretty sure the problem is with Ubuntu 18.04.1, because I tried to set up the same mail accounts in Mozilla Thunderbird afterwards and they wouldn't work there either. FYI, the problem seemed to happen shortly after I uninstalled some of the pre-installed applications (that I never use) that came with Ubuntu, including "Backups", "Passwords & Keys", and "RhythmBox". None of them, however, were related to e-mail.

P.S. I reinstalled openssl but that didn't help. Note also that Evolution is not generating any error messages, such as "missing SSL access" - it is simply pretending SSL doesn't exist and is substituting TLS in all of its previous SSL options.

Looks related to this Evo bug:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...r/+bug/1382133

I will never know, as it never generated an error message. All options associated with SSL just magically disappeared in the RECEIVING MAIL options (i.e. pulldown menus). I am rebuilding this SSD from scratch as a result, making ISO backups periodically so I can figure out what triggered this issue.

I finally figured it out. The problem was (and still is) Comcast. Per the blogs I've looked at, they don't know what they are doing with IPv6. I disabled Ubuntu 18.04's IPv6, causing it to default back to IPv4, and all of the missing options in Evolution magically reappeared. You would think that a company as big as Comcast would have their act together by now. Anyway, thank you smallpond for the encouraging responses.