Evolution hangs with "Formatting Message" after several hours

[sciencewhiz]

Binary package hint: evolution

I am using evolution with 8 imap accounts (on two different servers). After running evolution for several hours, it will "hang". The UI will still be responsive, but it won't show any new messages, displays "formatting message". It also won't close, I have to kill it from the command line. I have only seen this on gusty, not any earlier versions (I've been using ubuntu since 6.06), with the same setup. Sometimes, an error window pops up that says "async error"

I will attach a backtrace that I created with libglib2.0-0-dbg evolution-data-server-dbg evolution-dbg installed. I'm not sure if it will be usefull, since it didn't really crash.

[sciencewhiz (christmasboy-81)]

When this happens, I am still able to access the accounts in other mail clients, so I know it isn't a server problem. Here is the backtrace

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thanks for your report, the trace matches http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=459001 and the symptoms are the same, thanks.

[sciencewhiz (christmasboy-81)]

I have not seen this since upgrading to hardy.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

Thanks I've commented upstream also marking this as fixed since you don' have the problem with latest version, thanks you and feel free to re open the bug if you experience the same problem in the future.

[Steven Willis (onlynone)]

I'm seeing this problem all the time with Hardy.

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://ubuntu.media.mit.edu hardy-updates/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.22.2-0ubuntu1.2 0
        500 http://ubuntu.media.mit.edu hardy-security/main Packages
     2.22.1-0ubuntu3 0
        500 http://ubuntu.media.mit.edu hardy/main Packages

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 8.04.1
Release: 8.04
Codename: hardy

Usually Evolution hangs on "Formatting Message..." several times a day, it never recovers but I can read emails by double clicking on them. The type of email doesn't seem to be a trigger, sometimes it's on HTML emails, sometimes on plaintext. It's not reproducible, if evolution hangs on a message, and I kill it with "/usr/bin/evolution --force-shutdown", and restart, I'll be able to display the problem message just fine. I'm using Evolution to connect to my company's Exchange server.

Anyway, I finally got annoyed enough to run it under gdb. Strangely, it didn't hang for an entire day when I did this, and actually seemed much more responsive. After about 24 hours it hung and I ctrl-c'd it from gdb and got a backtrace with "thread apply all bt". The issue appears to be in thread 1273.

[Steven Willis (onlynone)]

Also, I don't believe the bugzilla.gnome.org bug: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=459001 is related to the issue we're seeing here. The bug at gnome referenced function: e_cal_get_object_list at e-cal.c:3147 which doesn't appear in either of the two backtraces posted here. This bug is about Evolution hanging with "Formatting Message..." displayed in the preview pane, the gnome bug doesn't seem to mention that behavior at all.

This bug seems like a better fit: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=361145 . Is there someone who could hook this issue up with that bug (I don't know exactly how to do that).

[sciencewhiz (christmasboy-81)]

This problem did stop for me for a while, after upgrading to hardy, but I have started seeing it again. I've been busy, and don't really remember when, but it was probably a few months ago.

The gnome bug that Steven linked to does sound like my symptoms.

[Harald Höller (harald-hoeller)]

this bug gets worse! it seems, the bigger the mail accounts, the more often the problem occurs. i have ubuntu 8.04 installed on 4 machines (one is ubuntu eee 8.04, two are amd64 machines) and i get the problem on all of them. the problem occurs with pop3 and imap accounts.

[AquaQuieta (aqua-quieta)]

It is definitely not fixed in Hardy...when I originally set this up it was working fine, but increasingly it is hanging on "Formatting Message"....I agree with Steven, http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=361145 is definitely the better description of the bug. "Formatting Message" never goes away, and the preview pane stops responding. You can still open messages in their own window, and everything else is otherwise responsive...but if you try to close evolution it just hangs and you have to kill it from the command line.

My installed packages:
evolution 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1
evolution-common 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1
evolution-data-server 2.22.3-0ubuntu2
evolution-data-server-common 2.22.3-0ubuntu2
evolution-exchange 2.22.3-0ubuntu2
evolution-plugins 2.22.3.1-0ubuntu1
evolution-webcal 2.21.92-0ubuntu1

[Harald Höller (harald-hoeller)]

persits in ubuntu 8.10 and evolution 2.24.1.

[Harald Höller (harald-hoeller)]

the problem inevitybly appears when changing IP adresses during evolution open. whenever i start vpnc, i get "formatting message ..." even if i wait fo hours. evolution can't be closed regularly but has to be killed.

i really wonder, why this is not bugging more people?!

[Daevid Vincent (dae51d)]

I too am experiencing this. It's quite annoying. I'm using Ubuntu 8.10 with all current updates. I have one 'exchange' email account and one 'imaps'. I've tried to kill "evolution" and restart, but it never restarts. The only way I've figured out how to get evolution working again is to logout completely and then re-login. I'm not changing IPs or anything. I am using Compiz if that matters, but switching to "No effects" doesn't seem to make a difference.

[Daevid Vincent (dae51d)]

In case this is useful to you [there's no way to edit a comment -- even one you submitted :( ]:

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.24.1-0ubuntu2
  Candidate: 2.24.1-0ubuntu2
  Version table:
 *** 2.24.1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 8.10
Release: 8.10
Codename: intrepid

[Tremaine Lea (tremaine)]

I'm also seeing this problem

Linux quad 2.6.27-9-generic #1 SMP Thu Nov 20 22:15:32 UTC 2008 x86_64 GNU/Linux

evolution:
  Installed: 2.24.1-0ubuntu2
  Candidate: 2.24.1-0ubuntu2
  Version table:
 *** 2.24.1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 8.10
Release: 8.10
Codename: intrepid

I have to do an evolution --force-shutdown to get the application back.

[Tremaine Lea (tremaine)]

Just for some evolution usage details, I'm running with 4 pop accounts, one spool account, and 4 'blank' accounts that allow me to use a different sending address (domain alias).

Load images is set to 'Load images in messages from contacts'.

In the category of slightly disturbing, ~/evolution is 3.3G according to a du -h

[Harald Höller (harald-hoeller)]

Evolution hangs ~ every 30min with me now; I get "formatting message" and nothing happens, as described by other users. Evolution must be killed (try killing evolution data server, if restart does no work either).

I've been using Evolution for five years now but I'll need to switch to the ugly cousin called Thunderbird which is really bad, since I also use the Calendar ... ;(

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installiert: 2.24.2-0ubuntu1
  Kandidat: 2.24.2-0ubuntu1
  Versions-Tabelle:
 *** 2.24.2-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com intrepid-updates/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.24.1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/main Packages
$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 8.10
Release: 8.10
Codename: intrepid

[Dragan Tomas (croatian-earthlink)]

Same thing here, although I'm using the latest Intrepid version of Evolution 2.24.3. I have to kill it at least 10 times a day to get it to work again.

I can add to that, although probably less important in this thread, the fact that the unread message count is also not working properly, especially when the Evolution is first started or when deleting messages. The "Refresh" option when you right click an email folder doesn't seem to work at all. There are times when Outlook shows that I have emails in my Inbox, but the Evolution selectively choses to not even show them. They miraculously appear in the Evolution Inbox without me doing anything different (aside from first opening them in Outlook so I can read them). My mail is on an Exchange 2003 server and besides that I have one POP3 account configured as well.

I've been using Evolution for more than a year now, ever since Gutsy, and it has never been perfect, but at least it wasn't as buggy as it is today. I can go on and on like this about many annoyances that it affords me on daily basis, but it's better I leave that for some other threads.

[Ulf Rompe (rompe)]

I'm experiencing this bug since I added an Exchange account to the two existing IMAP accounts.

Just upgraded to Evolution 2.25.90-0ubuntu1 and all related packages from Jaunty and the bug is still there. Last log output is always the same:

(evolution:1082): libecal-WARNING **: e-cal.c:320: Unexpected response

The update just changed the line number.

[Daevid Vincent (dae51d)]

This "hang" happens so frequently, I've literally got an alias and keep a terminal window open behind it at all times:

alias kev='killall -vrI evolution'

In a given work day, I'll typically have to run 'kev' upwards of 6-8 times or more. I used to get all pissed off, but now I've just come to accept this is what it is and you get what you pay for...

Next I think I'll just map that command to a key combination. *sigh*

[Ulf Rompe (rompe)]

I just changed the command line of the starter in my panel:

sh -c 'evolution --force-shutdown; evolution 2>&1 | ts >/tmp/evolution.debug'

(ts adds timestamps to the output and is found in package moreutils)

I have to click that one about 8-10 times a day.

[Harald Höller (harald-hoeller)]

i just realized, that it is not necessary to kill evolution but the messages get formatted after killing the evolution-data-server(-2.24).

by the way this bug still persists in ubuntu 9.04 alpha 5.

[buster (ses-snoke)]

can confirm. Bug still exists and is really annoying during work.

[Christian Theune (ctheune)]

I've been seeing this bug since I updated to Jaunty.

hh is right with his notice that killing the evolution-data-server (2.26.1) causes evolution to continue (it restarts the data server itself then).

[Jeff Sereno (jsereno)]

Just upgraded (well, fresh install - not upgrade from Intrepid) to Jaunty RC a week ago myself (and updated to Final today) and I'm experiencing this issue as well with my POP3 mailbox. When Evolution has been running for at least an hour, when I click on any new message, it comes up with "Formatting message..." and just hangs. You can see other tasks periodically try to start such as polling for new mail etc. You can't close Evolution either.

I can confirm that as noted, you have to kill the /usr/lib/evolution-data-server-2.26 task and then Evolution bounces right back into action without the need to quit and restart Evolution completely.

jsereno@lamaar:~$ ps aux | grep evolution
jsereno 8480 0.0 0.1 528344 13976 ? Sl 01:29 0:00 /usr/lib/evolution/evolution-data-server-2.26 --oaf-activate-iid=OAFIID:GNOME_Evolution_DataServer_InterfaceCheck --oaf-ior-fd=29
jsereno 8507 0.0 0.1 426132 14964 ? Sl 01:29 0:00 /usr/lib/evolution/2.26/evolution-alarm-notify --oaf-activate-iid=OAFIID:GNOME_Evolution_Calendar_AlarmNotify_Factory:2.26 --oaf-ior-fd=35
jsereno 11269 0.0 0.1 414976 14488 ? Sl 01:34 0:00 /usr/lib/evolution/2.26/evolution-exchange-storage --oaf-activate-iid=OAFIID:GNOME_Evolution_Exchange_Connector_BookFactory:1.2 --oaf-ior-fd=26
jsereno 31430 1.3 0.2 402412 19796 ? S 12:22 0:00 evolution --component=mail
jsereno 31503 0.0 0.0 7528 912 pts/2 S+ 12:22 0:00 grep evolution
jsereno@lamaar:~$ kill -9 8480

Sometimes Evolution can run happily all day without a hang. I have not noticed any consistency with the messages that Evolution fails on. By and large the majority of my emails are plain text notifications with no HTML embedded.

[Vivek Kapoor (marquivon)]

Confirmed as above, on a Fresh Jaunty 9.04 64 Bit Desktop. I have 3 imaps accounts and have enabled 'Load images in messages from contacts' option. It gets stuck, and works if I do 'killall evolution-data-server-2.26'

[Christian Theune (ctheune)]

I'm seeing this behavior although my setting is set on 'Never load images from the web'.

[Guilherme Gondim (semente) (semente)]

I have the same problem with the Evolution on Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty and my setting 'Never load images from the web' is set on.

[Ms_Angel_D (mrsangeld)]

I have this issue as well, Ubuntu 9.04 32 bit. My Mail account is a Gmail imap account. I have evolution set to Never load images from the web also, yet I still have this issue.

[Dave Mays (dave-emays)]

I can also confirm, this is a problem in Jaunty. Is there a way to "packet sniff" or log the imap conversation without using a packet sniffer? I would like to know which message it is hanging on.

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.26.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 9.04
Release: 9.04
Codename: jaunty

[kylea (kylea)]

I can also confirm this behaviour in 64bit Jaunty, I have turned off the loading of images and the Exchange connector.

I'll try a few combinations and see what (if anything) causes a repeat of the problem)

Not sure if its related - but when I have a message open and select "Load Images" - the display window does not visibly render anything - although the mouse-over events fire as the status line changes as the mouse is moved around the window.

 2.6.28-11-generic #42-Ubuntu SMP Fri Apr 17 01:58:03 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.26.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.26.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com jaunty/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[VladNistor (vladnistor)]

This is also affecting me in Karmic 64 bit. It affects me after less then an hour. It's really annoying, why hasn't this been fixed in the last two years?

Linux unknown-device 2.6.31-3-generic #19-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 14 16:07:02 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux

apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.27.4.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.27.4.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.27.4.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[Antono Vasiljev (antono)]

Same bug on 32 bit Karmic.

Linux ubook 2.6.31-3-generic #19-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jul 14 16:04:41 UTC 2009 i686 GNU/Linux

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.27.4.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.27.5-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
     2.27.5-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://by.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages
 *** 2.27.4.1-0ubuntu1 0
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[kylea (kylea)]

This behaviour for me was totally related to an MS Exchange mail account being active, Once disabled never happened again.

[mac.ryan (macryan)]

Ubuntu Jaunty 64 bit, updated to present date.

A couple of additional info:

1. The problem also presents itself with two POP accounts (gmail). So, it does not seem necessarily related to exchange, IMAP or similar.

2. For me the culprit does not seem to be "evolution" but "evolution-data-server-2.26". In fact even killing the evolution client, won't restore my system normal behaviour. I have first to issue "sudo killall evolution-data-server-2.26" and then I can open evolution again and work normally.

Annoying, indeed... :(

[TraceyC (grrlgeek)]

The behavior Steven Willis described happens to me on 32 bit Jaunty, fully updated. The preview pane is turned on. The hang on "formatting message" happens on an IMAP account every time I try to load a message with external images where the sender is in my address book. I had Evolution set to load external images for addresses stored in my address book. Turning off the preview pane doesn't make "formatting message" go away after it hangs.

If I kill the evolution-data-server the problem goes away until I try to load a message with external graphics. If I turn off the preview pane & open the same message after restarting evolution-data-server, the "formatting message" notification doesn't hang. The external graphics are still not loaded automatically as expected. I have to go to View - Load Images to get the images to load.

The hang seems to only be caused for me when the preview pane is open and Evolution is set to "Load images in messages from Contacts". It doesn't hang if I set it to always load images from the Internet, with or without preview pane. It doesn't hang if I manually load images while the preview pane is open.
To prevent the hang, I set Evolution to "Never Load Images from the Internet"
(Preferences - Mail Preferences - HTML Mail). I see this didn't prevent the hang for others.

2.6.28-15-generic #49-Ubuntu SMP Tue Aug 18 18:40:08 UTC 2009 i686 GNU/Linux

hstxc0@lpadc72dmj1:~$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.26.1-0ubuntu2
  Candidate: 2.26.1-0ubuntu2
  Version table:
 *** 2.26.1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty-updates/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 9.04
Release: 9.04
Codename: jaunty

[Jeff Sereno (jsereno)]

This problem seems to be getting worse for me. Sometimes it will hang within minutes of launching Evolution or may last several hours without a problem, but I'm now guaranteed a minimum of four lockups a day, requiring me to kill the evolution-data-server task each time.

I now have a cron job setup to kill the evolution-data-server task every minute. This has worked around the hanging problem for me, but of course it prevents certain functions working properly if that function relies on the data server task just as cron kills it (such as email address suggestions as you type).

As a side point, I notice the evolution-data-server seems to interfere with other elements of the system when it hangs. Most notably MPlayer's framerate dropped to half a frame per second at the times evolution-data-server would hang. Killing the evolution-data-server instantly restored full speed in MPlayer. What on earth has Evolution got to do with MPlayer? And no, the CPU was not 100% either (I use NVidia VDPAU). It's part of the reason why I set my cron job to run every minute rather than every 30.

[cyberwiz (dimitar)]

Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 9.04
Release: 9.04
Codename: jaunty

evolution:
  Installed: 2.26.1-0ubuntu2
  Candidate: 2.26.1-0ubuntu2
  Version table:
 *** 2.26.1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://nl.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty-updates/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.26.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://nl.archive.ubuntu.com jaunty/main Packages

I use the exchange plugin
evolution-exchange:
  Installed: 2.26.0-0ubuntu3
  Candidate: 2.26.0-0ubuntu3

[TraceyC (grrlgeek)]

This is still affecting me in Evolution 2.28.1.
The same system I mentioned before has been updated to Karmic Kuala 9.10.

I tried to go through Help - Report a problem to attach a debug log. The website, however, loses the debug log when you choose an existing bug.

[mac.ryan (macryan)]

@TraceyC - I had a clean install of Karmic on a new partition and then ported the data from the old installation of evolution. I have to say that so far so good... the problem seems to have disappeared for me (I upgraded last week-end, so I tested it only for the past 7 days, but before the problem was occurring several times per day).

[buster (ses-snoke)]

I have this same problem since jaunty, not on karmic.
Is there no workaround? It's really, really annoying.. :

[mac.ryan (macryan)]

@buster - If you find annoying manually killing your evolution data server, let a cronjob do it for you. From your console type "crontab -e" and assign say every 15 minutes a "killall -9 evolution-data-server" command. Check the exact command to kill, as I am not on Jounty and therefore I can't check myself if it's only "evolution-data-server" or if there is a version number after it.

[Gary Alexander (alexanderg)]

Can confirm this on Karmic 32bit with latest updates.

Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 9.10
Release: 9.10
Codename: karmic

evolution:
  Installed: 2.28.1-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2.28.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2.28.1-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://za.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[maheshjagadeesan (maheshj)]

I force-shutdown evolution and noticed something else that was strange: when I restarted evolution through Empathy, nothing would happen for about five to ten minutes, and then my inbox would open up. Has anybody else noticed this odd behaviour?

Regards.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

I'm getting the same behavior of Evolution getting stuck on "formatting message" with Karmic fully updated. Its has been happening for as long as I remember using Evolution, but in the last year it became problematic to the point that I have to deal with this multiple times each day.

I found that if I open a new window (by launching evolution again or using File->New Window), then the new window can show messages (including the original one that got the old window stuck) but the "formatting message" progress is still shown on all windows.

The funny thing is this use case:
1. Browse to a message that gets Evo stuck in "formatting message"
2. Open a new window and browse to any message and wait for Evo to format it properly
3. Try to cancel the "formatting message" progress in either window - nothing happens
3. Close the original window that is stuck
4. The new window still shows the "formatting message" progress. Try to cancel it - immediate crash.

Unfortunately apport doesn't detect this crash for some reason, so I can't submit a stack trace.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

Architecture: amd64
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
Package: evolution 2.28.1-0ubuntu2
PackageArchitecture: amd64
ProcEnviron:
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-11.38-generic
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-11-generic x86_64
UserGroups: adm admin audio cdrom dialout dip fuse lpadmin netdev plugdev sambashare vboxusers video

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

Attached is the core that I generated for the use case in my previous comment. Please let me know if you need any more information.

Sorry about the bug spam a minute ago - I tried to use apport-collect to submit the core dump.

[Thibault (thibault.dalban)]

@Oded Arbel, I have exactly the same problem (on Karmic too), if I open a new window, close the original and then try to cancel the "formatting message" progress, evolution crashes !

[Matthias Grüter (mgrueter)]

I propose bumping up the severity to a higher importance. This bug renders evolution basically useless for productive use.

(Evolution 2.28.1, Ubuntu 9.10, only 1 IMAP account)

[maheshjagadeesan (maheshj)]

I have this problem too (I can confirm that the problem only seems to appear when you use an Exchange account), and agree with Matthias. Having to force-close the exchange plugin several times a day is simply not a good way to work, though it's an effective way to work *around*

[maheshjagadeesan (maheshj)]

My Evolution version is 2.28.1, running on 2.6.31-17-generic #54-Ubuntu SMP x86_64.

[Markus Birth (mbirth)]

I noticed that this mostly occurs after having sent a mail. It rarely happens when just browsing my mails but after sending one, it appears almost for sure.

I have 3 IMAP accounts in Evo: Kerio Mailserver, Courier IMAP and Google Mail.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

@maheshjagadeesan : I get this problem a lot on a workstation where I have the exchange account set up but I never use it to read e-mail. All the "formatting message" problems I get on IMAP account - does that make sense?

[Jon UK (jdoull)]

I experience the same hang on Karmic, using an IMAP account. It seems this bug has not been reviewed since 2007-12-10.

[Alex Rovner (alexrovner)]

How can we escalate this issue? This issue makes using Evolution 2.28 (Ubuntu 9.10) with Exchange 2003 unusable!

I get the formatting message all the time during the course of the day. What I did notice is that this is affecting the preview window only since I can double click on the message and a new window will pop up displaying the message contents!

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

Regarding my previous comment - here is an interesting behavior:
1. I have an OWA account configured and enabled.
2. I get the "formatting message" problem on an IMAP account: I select a message and the message preview stays blank with a "Formatting message" progress notification that can't be cancelled, but if I open a message viewer on that message it works fine - all as documented in this bug.
3. I open the preferences dialog and disable the OWA account.

After I do step 3, the "Formatting message" progress immediately completes and I get to view my message in the preview panel.

[maheshjagadeesan (maheshj)]

@Oded: Strange behaviour indeed! Your experience seems to suggest that the error occurs both when you have the OWA account enabled and also when it's not, which is different from what I'm seeing.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

Not really - what it suggests is that (a) the error cannot occur if the OWA account is disabled, and (b) if you are in an error state then disabling the OWA account fixes the error immediately without needing to restart.

[PEIGNOT Kévin (kpeignot)]

I have the same bug with Lucid, with pop3 messages. If I click to answer the message, it appears in the answer windows.

[PEIGNOT Kévin (kpeignot)]

I put it in bugzilla too:
https://bugzilla.gnome.org/attachment.cgi

[Hery Atmadja (heryatmadja)]

Any fix to this problem yet? This happens to frequently to me (running Jaunty) and it's kinda driving me nuts, and the irony is I have been trying to promote more use of Ubuntu and its apps to my clients and one of the most basic function/app is not working consistently. Anything that I can help by way of providing logs or additional info? Thanks.

[Raymond Hill (rhill)]

I get this problem a lot, so much that each time I launch Evolution I get anxious about whether it will hang with the "Formatting message (...)" or not. Currently running version 2.28.3. Contrary to what Markus Birth reported above, mine hang without a message being sent, often immediately after launching Evolution.

What's an "OWA" account btw?

[Jeremy Melanson (jmelanson)]

I've upgraded to Ubuntu Lucid (10.04) Beta. This problem no longer
occurs for me.

On Mon, 2010-03-29 at 12:17 +0000, Raymond Hill wrote:
> I get this problem a lot, so much that each time I launch Evolution I
> get anxious about whether it will hang with the "Formatting message
> (...)" or not. Currently running version 2.28.3. Contrary to what Markus
> Birth reported above, mine hang without a message being sent, often
> immediately after launching Evolution.
>
> What's an "OWA" account btw?
>

[Matthew Gregg (mcg)]

Fixed for me as well, current Lucid.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

It still happens to me with Lucid and Evolution 2.28.3

[Matt Pharoah (mpharoah)]

This happens whenever the IMAP server is down. If the server is responding, then Evolution will work properly, but if the server is down it will hang forever.

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

Same here -> It still happens to me with Lucid 64 bits and Evolution 2.28.3

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

It still happens to me with Lucid and Evolution 2.28.3 and I have not any IMAP account. Just 3 pop accounts

[Sam Liddicott (sam-liddicott)]

Happens to me on latest lucid.
To avoid the problem I have to click on the local in box "On This Computer" as soon as evolution starts, and let it render the default welcome message.

Then I wait until my mapi folders have been detected and listed and can then click on my MAPI inbox, and it will work fine.

[swests (simon-thewests)]

I'm seeing this now on latest Lucid. The 'work around' in #71 does work but really isn't ideal.

[Herbert V. Riedel (hvr)]

same here with 2.28.3-0ubuntu9 on lucid/x86_64

[Raymond Hill (rhill)]

Yep, exactly the same for me: happens to me with Lucid 64-bit and Evolution 2.28.3 and I have no any IMAP account, just 3 pop accounts. Now it has happened almost every time I launch Evolution lately. Need to "end process." I tried to change "preview" settings, and now I have *five* "Formatting message..." in the status bar. I can double-click on items in the preview area, and have a window with the message in it correctly open. I try #71 above, but too quick for me.

[swests (simon-thewests)]

Working round this with Lucid by using the Evolution 2.30 PPA at https://launchpad.net/~jacob/+archive/evo230 - Jacob has done a great job - it seems quite stable!

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

#75: evolution installed 2.30 and the problem still persists. Also unlike others, happens to me when you start the program, not after several hours. It is a problem that I consider serious. Not everyone use webmail to manage our mail.

[Matt (matt-mattford)]

Also affects me on Lucid x64

[Andre (ajx)]

This bug is very serious. I cannot deploy Ubuntu to anyone else unless it is fixed. The usual user cannot be told to use xkill Evolution and give it a second try. Evolution runs into "formatting message" on every first start on my machines (3). It's impossible to close Evolution without killing it once it hangs.
Evolution is a great Email-Client with excellent integration into Gnome. I switched from Thunderbird several month ago.

[Leon Alvarez (locoxella)]

This very same bug its affecting me on two of my lucid systems. Only two. I still don't know whats might be related with this bug. Evolution version its 2.28.3. And hangs several times while formatting most messages.

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

I have traced the origin of the problem to an evolution plugin: "Fuentes predeterminadas".

I can tell you that if you disable the plugin "Fuentes predeterminadas", the problem disappears.

The name of the plugin I put it in Spanish, as well on my system and I can not find which is the correct translation of the English name of the plugin.

I presume that in English the plugin would be "Select One Source"

Please confirm this.

Regards

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

I think this plugin is the "Default Sources" plugin, which is supposed
to only affect calendar and address books. I don't see how that relates
to the "Formatting Message" bug.

Mariano - can you please check if the plugin that causes this problem
for you is the one written by Sivaiah Nallagatla From Novell ?

On Mon, 2010-05-31 at 14:14 +0000, Mariano wrote:

> I have traced the origin of the problem to an evolution plugin: "Fuentes
> predeterminadas".
>
> I can tell you that if you disable the plugin "Fuentes predeterminadas",
> the problem disappears.
>
> The name of the plugin I put it in Spanish, as well on my system and I
> can not find which is the correct translation of the English name of the
> plugin.
>
> I presume that in English the plugin would be "Select One Source"
>
> Please confirm this.

--
Oded Arbel <email address hidden>

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

Oded, in fact, the author of the plugin is Sivaiah Nallagatla From Novell. "Default Sources" is the literal English translation of "Fuentes predeterminadas", but could not confirm it, because I had no evolution in English to see.

I fully agree that it is curious that this happens, because the plugin does not apply to mail, apparently.

However, it was a matter of disabling it, and the problem ceased to occur.

[Leon Alvarez (locoxella)]

I cannot confirm that this bug its affecting lucid (I nominated this for lucid before), because its not happening anymore. I don't know why it started, neither why it stoped...

[Martin Svensson (stellarvortex)]

There is a plugin named "Select one source" by JP Rosevear <email address hidden>: "Select a single calendar or task source for viewing". Mariano, who is the author of your plugin? Is it the the plugin that you refer to?

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

Martin, that is not the plugin I refer. The author of which I refer is Sivaiah Nallagatla From Novell.

According to Oded, the correct name of the plugin is "Default Sources".

[Herbert V. Riedel (hvr)]

fyi, I had the same hanging-while-formatting issue with 2.30.1.2-2ubuntu1~ppa2 as well;
disabling all plugins didn't help, but curiously disabling 'Show the photograph of sender in the message preview' in MailPreferences->Headers did...

[Leon Alvarez (locoxella)]

Disabling Show photograph of the sender seems to work also for me.

Disabling the plugin of Sivaiah Nallagatla "Fuentes predeterminadas" did not solved the problem on lucid to me.

The problem its erratic, so I cannot confirm that a 100% sure that disabling the photograph of the sender (or choosing to look for photos only on local directories) do the trick. But I can confirm that the plugin of Sivaiah Nallagatla its not the problem because Evolution hungs again with that plugin disabled.

[Herbert V. Riedel (hvr)]

well in my case i reached a point where evolution 2.30 would hang in 'formatting message' as soon as I would select the first message after starting evolution... so for me disabling that feature allowed me to access my emails at all again... but of course (as it's often the case) I can't prove the negative... :-)

[Adam W (adamdblu)]

I confirm it is as Herbert says, in Lucid
The bug increased in frequency until it happened every time I started evolution and viewed the first message. I confirm that the work-around is to disable "Show the photograph" in Preferences... Mail Preference... Headers.

[Andre (ajx)]

I deactivated the photographs as well -> "formatting message" dissapeared so far.

[Mariano (mariano-gurrieri)]

I turned off the option "show the photographs of sender", but the error continues to appear, though less frequently.

[Sergiy Matrunchyk (sergiy.matrunchyk)]

this bugs affects me when I want to read message with photo. But sometimes it is crashes or hungs on messages without any photo but with attachment.

So I think bug activates while Evolution is processing attachments

[Aditya (adityapatadia)]

When I start evolution, it sometimes stops responding and the status bar shows the message "Formatting message" . I have to end evolution process from system monitor to get rid of this. It happens both with my POP Yahoo account and IMAP gmail account. Please note that this happens only once in 2-3 days. Please contact me if you need further info.

[Richy (klemmster)]

Disabling HEader -- Show Photos worked well for me, too

[Daniel J. Franco (danieljfranco1)]

Hello All,

Does anyone experiencing the "Formatting Message" endless hang have the Plugins Bogofilter Junk Filter and/or SpamAssassin Junk Filter enabled?

Since having disabled both the Plugins Bogofilter Junk Filter and SpamAssassin Junk Filter, which are all my available junk filters, so far, I have yet to experience the "Formatting Message" hang or the need to kill Evolution.

What's your experience?

[Martin Svensson (stellarvortex)]

I have never enabled those anti-spam plugins, yet I have the bug.
I guess that it is possible that this bug occurs more often when certain plugins are enabled, though.

[randomas (randomas)]

I am also affected by this bug. I'm running ubuntu lucid lynx 32 bit. After I upgraded from karmic I started experiencing the bug. It seemed to happen while opening mail in local search folders, to fix it I found that switching to a regular account folder disabling my yahoo pop mail account and killing evolution from terminal would let me access my mail again at next startup. I hope the disable picture settings works cause it's a lot less painful.

I hope this is useful towards fixing the bug, I suggest bumping the severity of the bug up a notch, not being able to use your mail on a desktop system built for internet use, with the default application is bad. Considering that this is an LTS release and this is a severe regression from karmic it really does need fixing fast.

TIA

Matt

[Daniel J. Franco (danieljfranco1)]

I should have had included the following with my previous comment, #95:
I was able to eliminate my Evolution's "Formatting Message" hang and need to kill after having disabled all the Evolution Plugins. I then re-enabled each Plugin individually, i.e. one-by-one, and then a few at a time. My "Formatting Message" hang and need to kill seemed to reoccur when I enabled both the Bogofilter Junk Filter and/or SpamAssassin Junk Filter. It ceased again when I disabled both.

Has anyone else stopped the "Formatting Message" hang and need to kill after having disabled all their plug-ins?

Currently, my installed Evolution Plugins and their statuses are:
Attachment Reminder - Enabled
Audio Inline - Enabled
Automatic Contacts - Enabled
Backup and Restore - Enabled
Bogofilter Junk Filter - Disabled
Calendar Publishing - Disabled
Copy Tool - Enabled
Custom Header - Enabled
Default Sources - Enabled
Disable Account - Disabled
Evolution Indicator - Enabled
GroupWise Features - Disabled
IMAP Features - Enabled
Inline vCards - Disabled
Itip Formatter - Disabled
Mailing List Actions - Enabled
Mail Notification - Enabled
Mail-to-Task - Enabled
Mark All Read - Enabled
Outlook PST import - Disabled
Prefer Plain Text - Disabled
Python Loader - Enabled
Save Selected - Disabled
Select One Source - Disabled
Setup Assistant - Disabled
SpamAssassin Junk Filter - Disabled
Subject Treading - Disabled
Templates - Disabled
WebDAV contacts - Disabled

My system info:
Evolution 2.28.3
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Lucid Lynx)
Kernel Linux 2.6.32-24-generic
GNOME 2.30.2

Additionally, Evolution would quit/exit/close when I re-enabled the Evolution Indicator plug-in, but it did not occur when disabling it or enabling/disabling any other plug-ins.

[TheOctagon911 (theoctagon911)]

I too experienced this as in post #95, however the post above (#98) referencing disabling plugins one at a time, seems to have hit the nail right on the head. I narrowed that down to just disabling the two spamfilters, then re-enabling just spamassassin. It has since not hung once *Knock knock* -- if you think about it, it is having two spam filters running at same time. Don't work for antivirus too well, why should this be any different? ;-) Anyway, now only running spamassassin and it works without hanging at all. All other plugins seem to be working as expected.

my info below:

$ apt-cache policy evolution
evolution:
  Installed: 2.28.3-0ubuntu10
  Candidate: 2.28.3-0ubuntu10
  Version table:
 *** 2.28.3-0ubuntu10 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid-updates/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.28.3-0ubuntu9 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/main Packages
$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS
Release: 10.04
Codename: lucid

[TheOctagon911 (theoctagon911)]

Oops, forgot to mention it was bogofilter as the other spam filter I disabled. Sorry ....

[Gerard Dethier (g-dethier)]

I can confirm that disabling both spam filters solves the problem for me.

Same configuration as TheOctagon911 (see #99).

[Gerard Dethier (g-dethier)]

Finally, the problem still occurs when the spam filters are disabled (post #101 can be ignored). It seems that disabling plugins only decreases the occurence probability.

[Paul d'Aoust (paul)]

I had this problem, and, after a few suggestions from elsewhere, I turned off display of images (it was previously set to show images from people in my contacts). Perhaps it's an addressbook issue? I never had it before 10.04; I wonder if my issue had something to do with the sluggishness of CouchDB address books.

[Tomasz Chrzczonowicz (tch)]

I think the bug is related to the "Default Sources" plugin. I disabled
it and never experienced the bug afterwards.

The only other plugin that I disabled is "GroupWise Features".

[Michał Faflik (faflu)]

Always when I start evolution after I start the computer, it hangs with "formatting ...". Then after I kill and restart it - it never hangs again (until I restart my computer). I'm running Ubuntu 10.04.1, evolution 2.28.3

[mtweb (mtrainerjr)]

I have been having this issue for quite some time. Until now though, it has been random and somewhat tolerable. The last few days, however, it has become persistent to the point that no matter what I do (kill the program, restart, etc..) it will hang on the first or second message and make it nearly impossible for me to read emails.

[Paul L (pallo-ubuntu)]

It seems like this problem has become a lot more frequent (happens many times per day) with the upgrade to Ubuntu 10.10. On 10.04 the problem also existed, but only happened once every week or so. No changes have been made to the e-mail setup other than the Ubuntu upgrade.

[Oded Arbel (oded-geek)]

Regarding the evolution-exchange angle, I should say that ever since I've stopped using the Exchange connector(*) I've never had a single incident of hanging with "Formatting Message" problem, on either Lucid or Maverick.

(*) I've started using a personal Zimbra installation that is synced with the company's Exchange account. Also has great calendar and addressbook integration that doesn't suffer from other evolution-exchange issues.

[luca_ing (luca-ingianni)]

One more data point:
I've been using Evolution since Ubuntu 9.10 or 10.04, but I've only started to see this problem now, with 10.10. All distribution updates were actual updates, not reinstalls, so the configuration and data directories should have stayed unchanged.
Curious.

[Seb (sdechatre)]

Hi,
i've been experiencing the same issues this a week or two.
I'm using Ub 10.04 since May 2010.
Evolution 2.28.3
3 imap accounts, and 2 pop.
Disabling "default sources" didn't solved the problem.
I though about the large amount of emails i had, so did some clean up. Unsuccessful.
Then disabled the portrait thing in the header (Preferences -> Email preferences -> Headers -> disable portrait (or photograph, i don't know the english term as i use a french version)). This seem to do the trick, no more hangings for some times

[Jean-Peer Lorenz (peer.loz)]

I confirm the workaround presented by Seb: I disabled photographs in the message preview and had no more 'Formatting message' deadlocks (Edit -> Preferences -> Mail Preferences -> Headers -> Show the photograph of sender in the message preview).

There is a related bug filed in Bugzilla: Bug #578577 - deadlock in contact image lookup leading to evo hang formatting message (https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=578577).

[Paul Forgey (paulf-tessier-ashpool)]

Workaround of disabling photo doesn't work for me. Perhaps it is affecting the timing to where it isn't as likely? In my case, it seems certain HTML messages do this, and do them with 100% reproduction.

[Manolinux (mu)]

The bug started to show on my installation when I enabled the Photo, but it didn't disappear disabling that again. I can't find a configuration that would avoid this problem.

[Manolinux (mu)]

#113

Finally, the configuration that was giving me problems was not the Photo, but the synchronization with IM clients (I enabled the two simultaneously, but forgot to disable that one).

Disabling the IM sync made the problem dissappear.

[Craig Gowing (credativ) (craiggowing)]

On a whole bunch of identical Ubuntu desktops with identical configurations, this problem is only affecting one user. Even when this user logs into a different desktop, the problem seems to follow them.

The evolution process gets stuck in futex_wait and after killing evolution and restarting, it will freeze again immediately. The only way to unfreeze and restart evolution is to kill evolution-data-server as well. This occurs about 2 to 4 times a day.

The problem only started after the user first tried to use the calender, however even after clearing out all evolution data and configuration the problem remained. The only common factor to all of this is the addressbook.db file. We will remove this and start a new addressbook.db file from scratch... lets hope this fixes the problem.

[VSJ (vsj08)]

Evolution hangs immediately with status Formatting message, as soon as I click on an e-mail with an attachment, stored in my Sent items folder....
I use Ubuntu 10.10 64-bit

[WhyteHorse (whytehorse)]

Same problem on 11.04 32-bit. It only occurs when I receive a message with a meeting request and it must be checking my google calendar which hangs sometimes due to my connection. Is it possible to add asynchronicity to the display of messages and contact/calendar/etc lookups? Or possibly just display the message contents and "checking calendars" somewhere so that it doesn't completely hang the program?

[Arto-jarvinen (arto-jarvinen)]

Same here with Evolution 2.30.3 on Ubuntu 10.04. The offending message is a sent mail that was a forward of a received mail without any attachments. The forwarded mail ends up as an attachment in the sent mail. All other messages with attachments work fine.

[Asperatus Undulatus (miphonenosugref)]

Same problem with Evolution 2.30.3 and Ubuntu 10.10. I recently completed my first appointment send on evolution, and the problem started after that.

I disabled the Edit->Preferences->Headers and unselected the face option and it seems to be working again.

[Andre (ajx)]

@Asperatus: Please use the latest version of Ubuntu which is 11.10. And then report again if still existent.

[Andre (ajx)]

Can anybody please delete this SPAM in comment #121 ?