Disappearing Email in IMP

Introduction

If you use IMP and exceed your mail quota, one of the symptoms you will experience is that IMP not display your INBOX. Instead IMP indicates that "There are no messages in this INBOX." In the upper left, the Mail icon may indicate that there are new messages (in Image A below, the Mail icon indicates that there are 5 new messages). While this is occurring, you may be unable to send, receive, or delete messages.

Image A

This is a "glitch" in IMP (not intentional) that occurs because IMP does not have enough space to load the INBOX or perform routine operations. You have not lost any mail as a result of this glitch, but you will need to take a few steps to correct the problem.

Step 1: Temporarily increase your quota:

1. To bump your quota go to http://www.lehigh.edu/account. You'll be prompted for your username and password.
2. Select Bump Quota. The next page will summarize your disk quota. The asterisks indicate that the account is over quota in several areas (circled in red in Image B).
   
   
   Image B
3. At the bottom of the same screen click the button Increase my disk quota. Note that this is a temporary increase which lasts four hours.
4. Wait ten minutes for the quota bump to take effect.
5. Log into IMP again. You should now be able to see your INBOX and can begin to delete messages.

Step 2: Mark mail for deletion (identify messages to delete)

In most cases, you are over your quota because you have sent, received, or stored (in mail folders) some messages with large attachments. Below are some hints for identifying messages taking up the most space.

• Sort your INBOX by size of message. At the top of your INBOX list are headers Date, From, Subject, Size (see Image D below, circled in red). Click on the Size column once to sort mail by size, with the largest attachments appearing first. Delete and purge the largest attachments. In the example in Image C (below), the message shown is over 15 megabytes! Since the quota for the INBOX is 20 megabytes, the this message and its attachment(s) need to be deleted.
  
  
  
  Image C
• Check your Sent mail, sorting it by size if necessary. Delete and purge the largest attachments.
• Check any other folders where you routinely store mail.
• If you use the network server to store other kinds of files, such as programs or class projects, move these to another location or delete them.
• You may have more than one Sent folder. Check for any folders that might be storing sent mail.

Step 3: IMPORTANT! Purge your email

In step 2, you marked messages for deletion but even if they have disappeared from your mail, they are not yet "purged" and are still taking up disk space. Make sure that you Purge Deleted mail after you delete it. The Purge Deleted link is on the upper right portion of the screen (circled in red in Image D below).

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  Image D

Step 4: If the problem recurs after the temporary quota bump "expires"...

1. Go to http://www.lehigh.edu/account and select Disk Quotas (this link opens a new window).
2. You will probably see asterisks in the first column of numbers, indicating that you are still over quota. This indicates that you have not yet deleted enough mail to go under your quota limit.
3. The text below your quota summary will provide details about your mail and file storage, which can be useful in determining where you need to reduce your space usage (e.g., the INBOX versus mail folders or space outside your mail directory).
4. Confused about what the various quotas mean, and how to reduce your quota? You're not alone! It can be tricky to interpret. You can check out a Web page for details on the mail disk quotas (this link opens a new window), or contact the Help Desk if you have problems or questions.

sek2@lehigh.edu
November 2005
Library and Technology Services
Lehigh University