The distribution lists do show up for me.

Can you see the distribution list in KAddressbook (use View->Distribution List Editor)?

Are you using a file resource or a directory resource for your contacts? In the later case, this is a known problem, see 166475.

Are you using a LDAP address book?

> see 166475.
Bug 166475 I mean

In kaddressbook they work fine: I can see all distribution lists and can send emails to them. 
My contact list was imported from an .ldif file, and the distribution lists were created from that imported lists.

The problem persists in version Version 1.10.0

I can confirm this bug with the kubuntu packages of Kde 4.1. Lists created in kaddressbook don't show up in the address selection dialog of kmail. They are available by auto-completion in the address fields, but if you select e.g. a list called "test" and try to send the message, there's an error about test@<hostname> being a non-existend address.

Secondly, distribution lists created from within kmail by the Save list... button don't show up in kaddressbook, so there is no way to rename/delete/alter them.

My contacts list from kaddressbook is a file (not a directory). I never changed the default configuration.

Yep, I can confirm all this behaviour. It makes distribution lists completely unusable in KMail in 4.1.2... :-(

I confirm this bug (using kmail in debian Lenny) v 1.10.1

*** Bug 170020 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

*** Bug 173356 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Confirming the problem with Mandriva KDE-4.1.2 packages

The problem is still there with Kmail-1.10.90 (KDE 4.1.71), Mandriva-Cooker packages

Yes, it is known to be broken, distribution lists are a total mess in KDEPIM :(

I confirm this bug on kubuntu 8.10, KDE4.1.3, KMail 1.10.3

*** Bug 175698 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

here is a bug I turned in to openSUSE (Novell Bugzilla)originally on 11-25. See the 12-06 entry below for specific versions of kde, kmail and Contact. Kmail and Contact are running under Kontact 1.3

11-25-2008
After update of KDE4.1.3 yesterday I went to use my kmail distribution lists
today and they are all gone. I looked in .kde4/share/apps/kabc and the
distribution list file is there. When I go to select a distribution list in
kmail it only allows add new list. Looking at the list of contacts there are no
distribution lists in kmail or contacts. the vcards are there but also contain
no distr lists.

12-6-2008
more info: 
Kde4.1.3 release release 63.3, 
Kmail 1.10.3
Contacts 4.1
kernel-default-2.6.25.18-0.2
kernel-source-2.6.25.18-0.2
linux-kernel-headers-2.6.25-8.1
kernel-syms-2.6.25.18-0.2

I recreated two distribution lists yesterday. when I look in ~/.kde4
/share/apps/kabc I see the following:std.vcf and several std.vcf_x. When I
display std.vcf I see both my distribution lists listed as v-cards.
 BEGIN:VCARD
FN:Moses Lake Lions
N:Moses Lake Lions;;;;
REV:2008-12-04T20:19:21Z
UID:7Jo9sJMVIX
VERSION:3.0
X-KADDRESSBOOK-DistributionList:;NEm9RVz1zq\,;cr2E9pssek\,;owalBoR2D8\,;Dtl
 ig4yMDP\,;gwr0W81zvs\,;Y8O1lGnOqW\,;8V1suowTk7\,;2NGmSWhsu2\,;8VAcwBCnhG\,;
 9akq7DhKUM\,;K7bn3Lc6Ki\,;BC6rw9VcZX\,;PfyQwNVCDa\,;5hyv5RLwRa\,;9guWqqIvR0
 \,;8q5np2jKcs\,;aSiLRZbr9t\,;BZc9C5Lxq0\,;q1HUUQ6TxN\,;lptsEqmtyn\,;lNKKGVM
 9OU\,;nLj8IpIx9U\,;WhgRmsqbU8\,;MJph49o8mN\,;1JMFxOBRdL\,;jGMW3oBbN0\,;V1iB
 ljayF2\,;46zPAUaAul\,;YSn3iE0ZIy\,;96KmJhVUyQ\,;H4aw0HLebd\,;ZIZ2OfAtvT\,;5
 cbLTwcyIB\,;ky8kvj5tOf\,;juuvBI7hv2\,;pw9E81kuaN\,;0yQNHqRnUO\,;ayEfVguny8\
 ,;pZsT1z5HdM\,;IR0CoF3TpX\,;Ydpgaa4CcW\,;8FscnjHhSn\,;jkDxlAsySE\,;Ui7zC9SY
 zl\,;xhhCRgzmgb\,;lj4nCuy7H9\,;qPu55f7XMB\,;nb5U6wCIZl\,;8WvS7Qpe8j\,;pQZLJ
 YFkft\,;uijNkdq5QP\,;3T4HVcvJe0\,;i61WiIqcDq\,;g1grMPYl0A\,
END:VCARD

BEGIN:VCARD
FN:MD19 Lions
N:MD19 Lions;;;;
UID:NjxOXKzmRh
VERSION:3.0
X-KADDRESSBOOK-DistributionList:;RpvhwmmqRO\,;SBjaKrPjNA\,;r8TYAJuRXz\,;rvs
 1OtixA7\,;Ao5JK2uFIS\,;2xBRgs1InN\,;7j9p1kpQv6\,
END:VCARD

~/.kde4 /share/apps/.kaddressbook there is only a folder contacteditorpages and
its empty.

under 3.59 there used to be a distlists file. located under .kabc

When I go into contacts I can see three distribution list: All, MD19 Lions and
Moses Lake Lions. When I go into K mail and new message and select there are no
distribution lists shown when I select Messages--> new messages-->Addressbook:
distribution list or under all contacts. 

I search bugzilla to no avail

ref #15 The distribution lists have disappeared again after an export as vcard for backup purposes. The contacts list shows the list name but all entries are gone. Just installed latest updates to KDE4 and will test again tomorrow.

I have the same problem on OpenSuse 11.1, KDE 4.1.3. Specifically, I can see all distribution lists that I generated under KDE 3, and none that I generated since installing KDE 4. It seems that kmail reads the distribution lists from a file called .kde4/share/apps/kabc/distlists whereas kaddressbook stores distribution lists in .kde4/share/apps/kabc/std.vcf.

Yes I just looked at .kde4/share/apps/kabc/ on my new 11.1(KDE 4.1.3) system and there is no distlists file. On my 11.0 (KDE 4.1.3) I copied the 3.5.9 distlists file into the above directory but kmail(4.1.3) still did not see the the lists. See comment #15.

Yesterday while sreach on this I did find a work around:
   I will post this when I log back onto my 11.0 system as thats where I book marked it. 

Ref #15 and 18: went to write up work around today and my distribution lists are gone again. I did some rpm KDE4 updates yesterday. My addressbook is still in tack and looking in ~/.kde4/share/apps/kabc the last for vcards show an entry for the 2 distribution lists I created, and a UID for each. But going into Kontact/Contacts the distribution lists are gone. 

Where are these UIDs and the data actually stored? 

What is causing this as distributions lists are critical.

This is on KDE 4.1.3 release 69.2
kde4-kontact-4.1.3-84.7 (1.3)
kde4-kmail-4.1.3-84.7 (1.10.3)
kde4-kaddressbook-4.1.3-84.7

This has been caused by a mistake made during KDE3 -> KDE4 porting.

I just committed a kind of automatic "importing", i.e. reading the 4.1 era lists and saving them in their current form.

In other words this should be fixed from 4.2 on.

Sorry for breaking your PIM experience and thank you for reporting your findings.

thanks Kevin. Good to hear the problem will be fixed. I was going to install the prerelease of kde for openSUSE but I'll wait a week or so to give them time to hopefully put the fix in.

Thanks for the continuing support.

openSUSE 11.1
Just installed KDE4.2 with kmail 1.11.0 and Kaddressbook  4.1. The Problem appears to be fixed.
I appreciate all the work you have done.

Indeed it appears that now everything runs smoothly. Kudos for the developers!

I am using kde 4.2.0 and distribution lists are working fine. Thanks!

Closing since 4.2 is out and reports confirm that it's fixed there.

I have had the distribution lists working since upgrading to KDE4.2 release 88.2 and later, now on release 93.