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Snow Leopard: Date detection in Mail working properly?

Users are experiencing issues regarding Snow Leopard's Mail program no longer recognizing data in messages.

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Joe Aimonetti MacFixIt Editor
Joe is a seasoned Mac veteran with years of experience on the platform. He reports on Macs, iPods, iPhones and anything else Apple sells. He even has worked in Apple retail stores. He's also a creative professional who knows how to use a Mac to get the job done.
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Joe Aimonetti
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Users are experiencing issues regarding Snow Leopard's Mail program no longer recognizing data in messages. Typically, common information relating to dates or contacts is recognized by Mail as such and users are able to create iCal events or Address Book contacts from messages they receive in Mail. This function, however, seems to be not working properly for some users.

In a thread on the Apple Support Discussions forums, user "Jaymz" reports:

I receive emails for events all the time and they have the following date format (example shown)

2009-09-19 19:30:00

Apple Mail used to recognize this as a date and time in the email so I could make a quick iCal addition. This seems to have ceased with the SL upgrade. It still detects more obvious dates and other data but I need it to detect this type as before.

Other users corroborate this information stating that multiple forms of typical date formats are not being recognized by Mail. One Terminal command is suggested in the thread, but does not work properly. Users can attempt to rebuild their Mailboxes (Select the Mailbox and from the Mail menu bar > Mailbox > Rebuild). If the issue persists, drag the "com.apple.mail.plist" file from (username > Library > Preferences) to your Desktop. Reopen Mail and test your messages.

Note: This will delete your Mail settings. If the issue persists and you would like your preferences restored, put the file back into the Preferences folder. If moving the file restores the data detection function, delete the old preferences file from the Desktop (a new one will be created).

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