Update: Fixing Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite Notes Crashes And Exchange Syncing Bugs
In this post I show you how to fix Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks Notes crashes and Notes syncing bugs with an exchange server. The fix should work on previous Mac OS X versions like 10.7 Lion and 10.8 Mountain Lion, too. Upgrading to Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks lead to several bugs concerning Gmail and exchange syncing. Further more, it could lead to Notes crashes and syncing bugs with exchange server. I on my own faced these two major bugs on my MacBook Pro (mid 2012).
First, I got Gmail and Exchange mail syncing problems. I could not move mails from the inboxes to a folder. All moved mails appeared again in the inbox after a few seconds when I went back to the inbox. I posted a fix to overcome the Gmail bug which perfectly works for me. In the meantime, Apple released an update for the mail.app to resolve the Gmail bug.
Second, the Notes app did not sync my Microsoft Exchange account, nor from my Mac to the exchange server, neither from the exchange server to my Mac. I fixed it following this work around:
Caution: If you got, in addition to IMAP and/or Exchange notes, sole-locally stored notes or POP3 notes, you have to take care on your own to save them separately! If you do not save them, they will be gone / deleted following this instruction! Following these steps is at your own risk!
- Go to ‘System Preferences…‘, ‘Internet accounts‘ and deactivate all ‘Notes‘.
- Close Notes app.
- Go to finder and click on ‘Macintosh HD/library/caches‘. Drag all the contents of the folder to the trash.
- Click on the finder, click ‘Go‘, hold the option key and click on ‘libraries‘ (will not appear if you don’t hold the option key). Go to the folder ‘Cashes‘ again and drag everything in the folder to the trash again.
- Click on the finder, click ‘Go‘, hold the option key and click on ‘Library‘ and then on the folder ‘Containers‘. Drag com.apple.notes to the trash.
- Restart your computer.
- Empty trash.
- Open notes again and wait for a while till updating of Notes app is finished.
Cleaning caches and notes app container resolves Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks Notes crashes and exchange syncing issues on Mac OS X. Could you fix it, too? Let us know and post your experience!
Stay tuned! 😉
52 Comments
All this succeeded in doing was permanently deleting all my notes.
Hi Propertius,
have you already checked your notes in your IMAP or exchange account online or on another device? If you got an IMAP or Exchange account as I stated in this posts, your notes couldn’t be deleted completely.
Cheers,
Gee Are
This did not work for me either. In fact, I followed everything step by step, but it does not load ANY of my notes on the desktop now, not just the exchange notes.
All of my notes are still visible on my phone and by signing directly into my exchange account on the web, but that doesn’t make what happened here okay. I had 2 perfectly fine accounts that are gone, even when I check the accounts back on in Internet Accounts. Not sure what is causing this issue, but let the record show that results in messing with these settings are going to be mixed at best.
It’s a good thing I did a Time Machine backup before I started messing with this stuff. I’m not going to go through the process of signing out/deleting accounts just to try and set them up to hopefully, maybe work again, and then lose everything. I would rather have 2 accounts that work than none at all.
Hi Jack,
I see. Is your Mac still on Mavericks? Have you already upgraded to El Captian? Does the problem persists in El Capitan?
Cheers,
Gee Are
Sorry, but how do I click on “Go”???
Hi Vincent,
you’ll find it in the finder app menu bar between ‘View’ and ‘Windows’. 😉
Cheers,
Gee Are
Hi Gee Are,
I’ve done what you write but I cannot enable Note on the Exchange Internet Account setting. It start doing something but the rolling wheel does not stop.
On iCloud Internet everything is ok.
Thanks
Hi Enrico,
if everything is backed up, delete the Exchange account, restart your Mac and add the exchange account again.
Cheers,
Gee Are
Thanks Gee Are, now it’s everything ok. Great job!
You’re welcome! Glad to could help you!
After reboot it doesn’t let me enable notes in icloud anymore, is this normal?
Hi Paco,
that’s not normal. First, try to reboot again. Second, sign out of iCloud, reboot and sign in again.
Cheers,
Gee Are
It was a great relief to find this fix. Thank you!
Given that I’m extremely lazy, on my second mac I followed the exact same procedure but skipped steps 3 and 4 (the deletion of the caches) and was pleased to find that your fix still worked perfectly well.
Thanks again!
Hi Sergio,
you’re welcome! And many thanks for your feedback regarding the ‘lazy’ fix! 🙂
Cheers,
Gee Are
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Very Good!!! It Worked!!!
Now my notes on my MacBook Air are blank…and I’ve waited 15 minutes since doing the steps above. My notes on my iPhone and at iCloud.com match, however.
How do I sync on my MacBook?
Hi Vincent,
First, heck your notes on your exchange server. They should be still there. If not, your notes have not been synced with your Mac before.
If the notes are still there, repeat the entire process. If you still did bot succeeded, I recommend to completely re-set up your Exchange Account on your Mac because in this case there must be something wrong with your Exchange Account on your Mac (meaning that it is not a Mavericks issue).
Cheers,
Gee Are
I went to System Preferences>Internet Accounts>iCloud>Notes>uncheck Notes>Delete from Mac>Checked Notes again….and it repopulated.
Thank you for your help!
Hi Vincent,
You’re welcome! I’m glad that I could assist you. And thanks for posting your solution!
Cheers,
Gee Are
Thanks man! Worked like a charm!
This fix worked for me. Now getting my Exchange Notes on my iMac (Mavericks OS X)