Joe's Quest

Reason of Apple Mail starts automatically

Previously I met the problem that the Apple Mail application starts automatically. I tracked the history for a few days and now I find out the reason. Here under is my analyze:

  • There was no sign that the Apple Mail run in a fixed frequency.
  • The chance of virus is slim too. Because virus often hides itself when doing anything bad like sending email to all contacts. And in another hand, OS X is much safer than Windows at present and no too much virus is reported so far.
  • It could be triggered by some application that I had to find out.

So I check the system log in Console. I found out an error of iCal occurred at the same time that Mail run. When I look into the details, yes, it was there, iCal called a function to run Mail to send a email out. Since I have never set up an account in Mail, it pops up an notice to let me set one. The log also recorded what kind of mail iCal wanted to send. Then everything is clear: I sync the iCal to my google calendar, my google calendar has a series of email reminders to send to myself. While google has it’s own mechanism to send them out, iCal uses Apple Mail.

This is just a specific problem. But the way of wisely using the Console and tracking down the history is the key to find out the reason for most problems.

You see, there is only one constant, one universal, it is the only real truth: causality. Action. Reaction. Cause and effect.

The Matrix Reloaded

Discussion (17)

There are 17 responses to “Reason of Apple Mail starts automatically”.

  1. Jerry responded:

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    Thank you for investigating and posting this! It has been driving me crazy! 🙂

  2. AJ responded:

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    I really appreciate the info….but here’s the 64, 000 question, how can I stop this from happening?

    • Tkjune responded:

      @AJ you may have to setup an account in apple mail to let it send out email. Or remove the notify option in events. I prefer the former way. And don’t have other solution yet.

  3. Adrian responded:

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    thank you so much! I ended up removing the notify option since google calendar takes care of that just fine. Solving this is like taking a pebble out of my shoe.

  4. Ben responded:

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    Awesome. Thank you for sharing your findings!

  5. brilliant! thanks for that it’s been driving me crazy too!

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  7. OMG, this totally answers my question! it also explains why i’m getting duplicate email notifications. i’ll have to remember not to do the email reminders.

    thanks.

  8. Ross Heitkamp responded:

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    Thanks for posting this. I have been frustrated that my desktop Mac keeps opening Mail while I am away on vacation. So, despite dutifully getting and deleting my mail while I am away from my laptop or iPad, I return home to have to do it all again. Did it again this past week, so I found your post and knew right away that it was my backup routine that had been mailing about errors. That wasn’t too bad, only a week of extra email, but over the summer it cost me 6 weeks of email – over 1500 to deal with when I returned!

  9. David responded:

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    Thanks!! As I use Thunderbird I was crazy looking my Mail open when there was a calendar notfification…. Thanks!!

  10. Andrew M. responded:

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    Thanks so much. That was really bothering me and slowing down my computer at login. Great catch!

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