SOLVED Google Mail Comes Up Offline When Mail App Started

[37Shannon]

I have a Mac Mini running Big Sur at 11.6.8. There is a user defined called "User" which has two email addresses set up:

- (e-mail address removed)
- (e-mail address removed)

When Mail is opened, the PTD account is online and usable, but the GMAIL account is offline. Attempts to take it online appear to work, in that the status changes from offline to online, but no emails from GMAIL appear. I tried clicking on the envelop icon to get new messages in all accounts, but nothing happens. If, after taking the GMAIL account online, I quit Mail, and then come back in, usually then there are emails for the GMAIL account. Not always, but if no GMAIL mails are present, quitting Mail and restarting it over and over eventually brings up the emails from GMAIL.

Is there any reason for this behavior? Is there a workaround? When I set up this PC, I defined the PTD account first, then the GMAIL account. This is not an issue with any other macOS machine.

Regards,
Bill S.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello,

• Have you tried Mail > View > Connection Doctor?
• Did you set these accounts up directly in the Mail application, or in System Preferences... > Internet Accounts?
• Do you have an extremely large number of emails in your Inbox - i.e. 1,000s or more?
• Can you login to the Gmail account in a web browser?

C

 

[37Shannon]

• Have you tried Mail > View > Connection Doctor? No - didn't know there was such a thing. Will try it.
• Did you set these accounts up directly in the Mail application, or in System Preferences... > Internet Accounts? The latter.
• Do you have an extremely large number of emails in your Inbox - i.e. 1,000s or more? No.
• Can you login to the Gmail account in a web browser? Yes.

 

[37Shannon]

Mail > View > Connection Doctor? No such option appears in the View menu under Mail.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hi...

My bad - Mail > Window > Connection Doctor

C

 

[37Shannon]

Connection Doctor says the userid or password is incorrect. Since my wife is the primary user of this system, I asked her if she had changed her Google password from what it was when I set up Mail, and she had. I logged onto GMail using her changed password and was able to connect, which explains why she could get on Gmail through the web. But, this should have triggered a password change request for the GMail account when Mail was opened, and that apparently did not occur, plus I don't see any means anywhere of manually changing the password that Mail uses to connect to Gmail, either in Mail Preferences or Internet Accounts. My thinking at this point is to delete the account and redefine it.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hi...sorry for the late reply.

Yes, it is easiest to simply delete the Google account and set it up again if it doesn't prompt you when you go to  > System Preferences... > Internet Accounts > and click on the Gmail account.

C

 

[37Shannon]

That seems to have taken care of it. But, I did nothing different than the first time I set it up. (I hate problem resolutions that don't expose a root cause.)

 

[Cory Cooper]

Excellent! Glad it's resolved.

Yes, sometimes it is just computer voodoo.

Be well,

C