When trying to migrate, I look in the Thunderbird profile folder there are no emails in inbox
I had done the migration process before, but for some reason, when I go to the Thunderbird folder, both on the main folder and the copied foldeer, there are no emails in the inbox for any profile. And yet, when I open Thunderbird, it has all the emails. Where are they?
All Replies (6)
If you have set IMAP accounts to not synchronize messages for offline use, there are no Inbox mbox files in the profile - only the .msf index files. In this case, when you run TB, only the message headers are downloaded (synced), and the message bodies are downloaded only when a message is opened, and they are stored in the cache.
I have pop and download the messages. In my original message I said I had done this before and it worked. I wasn't clear enough. Every time I have done this before, and copied the Thunderbird folder, when you look into it, in the profile, the inbox is huge and has lots of messages. I can't figure this out. It makes no sense. How can it be that I have tons of messages in my inbox, but when I look at the folder, there are now none?
Just to clarify, the Inbox mbox file in the source computer is large, as expected, but on the target computer, the Inbox mbox file is missing or has zero size? If only the Inbox.msf exists on the target, only the headers would appear in the Inbox in TB. There have been cases where an mbox file wasn't copied because the transfer medium was FAT32 formatted drive, limited to 4GB files, which is below the size of a 'large' Inbox.
In Thunderbifd, there's lots of emails. . . in the T-bird, inbox folder there is nothing on the main computer. There used to be, but there isn't any more. I have no idea. I first noticed when I copied the folder to the new computer when I looked and there was nothing in the folder or on the new T-bird application on the new computer. So I started looking and found them all gone on the main computer too, but they're still there in the app on the main computer. It makes no sense.
Hey, is there any way to get T-bird to backup all those inbox emails on the drive again? If I look in the "archives" folder, all the archive files are there. Can't I force T-bird to re-write all the inbox messages onto the hard drive again?
I can't find where to ask another question. I thought it was obvious but I can't find it anywhere. I wonder how how asked the questions before. I don't see any links.