iPad Email Crashing/Closing

[Moltuae]

I usually refuse to work on all things Apple, so please excuse my ignorance here ...


Got an iPad, belonging to a business customer. Said I'd make an exception to my no Apple rule, as a favour, and take a quick look at an email problem he's having.

On the back, says it's a 32GB A1396. Settings claims it's up-to-date, running iOS 8.4.

The iPad seems to work perfectly well, except the email app just closes (without any error message), intermittently, usually when attempting to open an email. Some emails open fine (doesn't seem to matter whether or not they have attachments, or whether the email is an old one or a new, unread email).

In the email settings there are 3 accounts: 2 POP/SMTP and one "iCloud".


I'm thinking, delete all the accounts and recreate them. Is that the best option?


Edit: Oh, and I have tried turning it off and on again (power off/on made no difference)

 

[dgiles79]

Yes, I would start with deleting the accounts and recreating them. I would also check how much storage space is available under the settings.

 

[Moltuae]

Thanks, I'll do that.

Storage states 15.5GB Available (out of a total capacity of 27.7GB)

 

[nlinecomputers]

Hold on that. Pop email? Is the email stored on the server or on the device? I wouldn't do that if this is the primary device for email.(Unlikely but not unheard of.)

 

[Moltuae]

Thanks nline. No, that's ok, his primary device is a desktop PC, so deleting the accounts is not a problem.



Assuming recreating the accounts fixes it, I suppose the cause is a corrupt email account. In my very limited dealings with Apple products, corrupt email accounts seem to be a reoccurring issue. Is there anything that can be done to prevent this happening again, or is there any kind of app that can be installed to repair the account or easily recover it from an earlier backup?

 

[Markverhyden]

Hold on that. Pop email? Is the email stored on the server or on the device? I wouldn't do that if this is the primary device for email.(Unlikely but not unheard of.)

Valid point. But the default setting in iOS for Mail accounts is to leave it on the server. But it is something I always check.

 

[ComputerProVA]

I know you mentioned power cycling the device, but a hard reset my be helpful also (Press and hold the Sleep/Wake + Home button) until the device reboots. If that doesn't work restoring from backup or full restore is the next option IMO.

 

[Moltuae]

I know you mentioned power cycling the device, but a hard reset my be helpful also (Press and hold the Sleep/Wake + Home button) until the device reboots. If that doesn't work restoring from backup or full restore is the next option IMO.

Thanks. I'll make a note to try that next time.

Deleting and re-adding one of the accounts seems to have fixed it.

So I assume there's no simple way to backup/restore or fix corrupt mail accounts then?

This is one of the reasons I avoid working with Apple devices. Maybe it's just my ignorance of their systems but, for all its weaknesses and flaws, Windows seems infinitely more configurable and hackable. Had this been a Windows device, in the absence of any OOTB feature or third party solution, I could've just written a script to automatically backup and replace the relevant files and folders. Instead I have to hand it back to the customer fixed but without any preventative solution, explaining "it's Apple, it happens ... and it may happen again".

 

[Markverhyden]

This is one of the reasons I avoid working with Apple devices. Maybe it's just my ignorance of their systems but, for all its weaknesses and flaws, Windows seems infinitely more configurable and hackable. Had this been a Windows device, in the absence of any OOTB feature or third party solution, I could've just written a script to automatically backup and replace the relevant files and folders. Instead I have to hand it back to the customer fixed but without any preventative solution, explaining "it's Apple, it happens ... and it may happen again".

You have to differentiate between OS X and iOS. OS X, just like M$'s regular computer OS's, has a world of hidden gems under the hood for the dedicated tech. The smart devices are a different matter from what I have read, being a non-smart device programmer. iOS is a real Walled Garden. With Android there is more flexibility but they have their own Walled Garden approach. No idea about Windoze for smart devices but I would guess it has a similar approach.

 

[Moltuae]

You have to differentiate between OS X and iOS. OS X, just like M$'s regular computer OS's, has a world of hidden gems under the hood for the dedicated tech. The smart devices are a different matter from what I have read, being a non-smart device programmer. iOS is a real Walled Garden. With Android there is more flexibility but they have their own Walled Garden approach. No idea about Windoze for smart devices but I would guess it has a similar approach.

Thanks Mark, yeah I hadn't thought of it like that. Although I've frequently encountered mail corruption issues with Apple OS X products too -- in fact, in my very limited dealings with Apple products that seems to be the one common and recurring issue I have encountered. I assume there would be ways to provide some sort of workaround/script for the OS X systems then?

One of these days I'm going to have to make an effort to get to grips with Apple OSes. I did have a play around with an Apple VM a few years ago, but I wasn't too impressed and quickly lost interest. I felt like I was working with a heavily modified, glorified and restricted Linux distro. And, to be fair, it's hard to find the motivation when you're dealing with business systems every day, encountering very few Apple products, but constantly having to learn more new server/networking stuff than you have time for.

As far as Windows-based mobile devices go, in my experience with them, they're pretty much as hackable as regular desktop installations of Windows. I'm yet to get my hands on a Windows phone, but I've worked with a few Windows tablets and, apart from some limited functionality, there seems to be no real difference as far as being able to run CL, scripts, schedules, etc goes. Of course the downside of that is that they're just as vulnerable to hacking and viruses as any other Windows machine but, as a techie earning money supporting Windows, you gotta love M$ for those imperfections.