Mail.app trouble opening new followup message window from secondary display

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Level 1

6 points

Mail.app trouble opening new followup message window from secondary display

I am using the second display on my MacBook Pro. Ever since upgrade on OS X Catalina the Mail.app isn't able to open new (eg reply/forward) message while the main window I operate on is on secondary display.

When I click reply, forward, reply all while having some message selected, new window doesn't appear. Sometime the primary display shows focus at the time of the click, suggesting that the mail attempts to open the window on the primary display, but no window opens.

Occasionally the window comes at second click attempt, sometimes when I try really hard and keep clicking crazy (even double clinking) the button, the message eventually opens..

Later I find my drafts folder filled with messages resulted from all the failed clicks.

When I use Mail.app on primary screen everything is fine.

the console shows: error	09:25:09.318727+0100	Mail	kill() returned unexpected error 1

Probably a reason for bug report, but perhaps somebody has a clue what can be a workaround

MacBook Pro 15", macOS 10.15

Posted on Mar 3, 2020 12:26 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Luis Sequeira1

Level 9

67,606 points

Mar 3, 2020 1:06 AM in response to vasek-b

It seems clear that the reply message is created, since it shows in the Drafts. Maybe the window just fails to open (in which case a temporary workaround is to open it from the Drafts folder); but

I am thinking that one of two things is probably happening: either a) the window is somehow open but behind other windows, or b) it opens on the same display but on a different “desktop”.

You can check if a window is created by clicking the Window menu to see it exists, and even select it from there.

You can use F3 to open Mission Control to see which desktops exist for each display. If you have extra desktops you don’t need you can close them in MC.

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Answer 2

vasek-b Author

Level 1

6 points

Mar 3, 2020 1:13 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

Hi Luis, thanks.

You can check if a window is created by clicking the Window menu to see it exists, and even select it from there.

No, it is not open. There is clearly some failure happening in mail.app on the attempt to open a window.

b) it opens on the same display but on a different “desktop”.

not the case, but it would also be a bug having mail.app opening the message on hidden screen.

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Answer 3

Mar 3, 2020 1:25 AM in response to vasek-b

I agree that it is not working correctly, I was just speculating as to what was actually happening.

Please run Etrecheck and post its full report here. Maybe we can spot something. Weird behavior which others cannot reproduce often is the result of software conflicts that are peculiar to one system. No two macs have exactly the same software and hardware.

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Answer 4

vasek-b Author

Level 1

6 points

Mar 12, 2020 2:34 AM in response to vasek-b

I have made an interesting discovery - the problem manifests itself only when Mail.app is assigned to particular display (eg. #1) via Dock options and then manually moved to the other display (eg. #2). Attempts to open window on the dedicated display #1 then fail.

When I disable the desktop assignment, the windows open on the same display as the main window and everything works normally.

The aim is that I want Mail.app to stick on the particular display (mb pro display) if the other is not available, but when working with secondary display I keep moving it to the secondary.

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Answer 5

Mar 12, 2020 3:51 AM in response to vasek-b

Instead of assigning a particular display to an application (say, Mail), this is what I do to have it start in one particular display. HTH.

1) Click the Menu Bar on the desired display (notice it is highlighted whereas in the other display(s) it is dimmed)

2) Press command-space to launch Spotlight

3) Type Mail (or just enough of the word so that it displays) and press Enter

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