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Global Inbox - I Did It, Thought it Worked, but my Test Emails to 2 Email Addresses Show the Same Recipient

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  • Last reply by Matt

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Well, I THOUGHT my Global Inbox Unify task had gone smoothly today. In short, in Server Settings in the left-hand pane I had a pop.earthlink.net account, pop.earthlink.net(1) account (beats me why) and my new NON-earthlink (yes, still pop) email account. I will be cancelling earthlink any minute now, so maybe all this will be solved by that event, but I'm still concerned.

I did the Global Unify instructions from Mozilla Support. The result was a thing of beauty... a single Inbox, Sent "special folders" I think they're called, all under "Local Folders" ... no longer the two separate Inboxes and such.

BUT... right after doing the Global Inbox task, I ran a test, sending a single test email inside Thunderbird from my earthlink email address, with "TO" being my non-earthlink email address, and a CC to my earthlink email address.

This is hard to describe without telling/showing what my email addresses are!

The result in that inside-TBird test is that I receive both copies of that single email... yay ... BUT the "Recipient" column in TBird shows my Non-earthlink email address for BOTH emails. I expected to see the Recipient column say my Non-earthlink email address for one copy and my earthlink email address for the other. This shouldn't be this way, right? I tend to notice problems when they're not problems, so hopefully this is one of those cases?

In ANOTHER test, I emailed from out on the web...on icloud.com. In that test, I sent a single test email from my icloud email address, with "TO" being my Non-earthlink email address, and a CC to my earthlink email address.

THAT result was slightly different in look: I received two emails...yay ... BUT both those emails show the Non-earthlink email address *twice* in the Recipient column in TBird, separated by a comma.

Should I be worried? I will be stopping my earthlink email service, but I'm concerned that this is a sign of trouble to come even once I cancel earthlink. Maybe at some point I can delete my pop.earthlink.net accounts listed in that left hand pane in TBird, or maybe could have already. I'm always afraid to delete things!

One bit of good news, perhaps: When I do a test to just *one* of my two email addresses -- either my earthlink email address or my Non-earthlink one, the resulting Recipient display in the TBird's Recipient column seems to always be fine...always the right recipient email address. In other words, the problem behavior seems to only be when I do a test to *both email addresses in a single email*, with a "TO" and a "CC."

Is there a different simple test with simple results I should be doing to test if I've got a Global Inbox Unify side effect problem? I suppose in real life no one would ever be sending to both my earthlink and non-earthlink email addresses simultaneously, but I'm still concerned by what I'm seeing.

Thanks for any insights.

Well, I THOUGHT my Global Inbox Unify task had gone smoothly today. In short, in Server Settings in the left-hand pane I had a pop.earthlink.net account, pop.earthlink.net(1) account (beats me why) and my new NON-earthlink (yes, still pop) email account. I will be cancelling earthlink any minute now, so maybe all this will be solved by that event, but I'm still concerned. I did the Global Unify instructions from Mozilla Support. The result was a thing of beauty... a single Inbox, Sent "special folders" I think they're called, all under "Local Folders" ... no longer the two separate Inboxes and such. BUT... right after doing the Global Inbox task, I ran a test, sending a single test email inside Thunderbird from my earthlink email address, with "TO" being my non-earthlink email address, and a CC to my earthlink email address. This is hard to describe without telling/showing what my email addresses are! The result in that inside-TBird test is that I receive both copies of that single email... yay ... BUT the "Recipient" column in TBird shows my Non-earthlink email address for BOTH emails. I expected to see the Recipient column say my Non-earthlink email address for one copy and my earthlink email address for the other. This shouldn't be this way, right? I tend to notice problems when they're not problems, so hopefully this is one of those cases? In ANOTHER test, I emailed from out on the web...on icloud.com. In that test, I sent a single test email from my icloud email address, with "TO" being my Non-earthlink email address, and a CC to my earthlink email address. THAT result was slightly different in look: I received two emails...yay ... BUT both those emails show the Non-earthlink email address *twice* in the Recipient column in TBird, separated by a comma. Should I be worried? I will be stopping my earthlink email service, but I'm concerned that this is a sign of trouble to come even once I cancel earthlink. Maybe at some point I can delete my pop.earthlink.net accounts listed in that left hand pane in TBird, or maybe could have already. I'm always afraid to delete things! One bit of good news, perhaps: When I do a test to just *one* of my two email addresses -- either my earthlink email address or my Non-earthlink one, the resulting Recipient display in the TBird's Recipient column seems to always be fine...always the right recipient email address. In other words, the problem behavior seems to only be when I do a test to *both email addresses in a single email*, with a "TO" and a "CC." Is there a different simple test with simple results I should be doing to test if I've got a Global Inbox Unify side effect problem? I suppose in real life no one would ever be sending to both my earthlink and non-earthlink email addresses simultaneously, but I'm still concerned by what I'm seeing. Thanks for any insights.

Modified by alysenet

Chosen solution

I expect the resulting Inbox's Recipient column to then show *those two *different email address;

Not going to ever happen. The to: address is the recipient. The CC recipient is getting a carbon copy of the base communication, between the recipient (To:) and the sender (From:)

I initially misunderstood you. Because I have no interest in who the email is addressed to, I do not show recipient in the list because it is not relevant to me. I do show from: because the order I read mail is influenced by who is mailing me. I got the email so it was sent to one of my email addresses. It matter little to me which one. Perhaps it is even as a BCC and may there for not have my email address anywhere in it to be found, but it was ultimately sent to me.

My interest in the receiving account may arise when I am actually reading the email, when full FROM: TO: and CC: information is shown in the email header part of the display anyway.

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Hoping to hear if this is truly a faulty behavior; seems it might be a Thunderbird glitch, but not sure.

Modified by alysenet

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just turn off the option to "show only display name for people in my address book in preferences. The list always defaults to the first entry found in the address book.

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Thanks for your reply. I went into Thunderbird's preferences and uncheckmarked "Show only display name for people in my address book," as you suggested. That did make a change, but not the change I wanted. All it did was remove the bracket <> portion of the Inbox's Recipient column's display; that's not what I need to happen. I need/expect *two different Recipient addresses* to happen. In other words, when I send a test email simultaneously to *two* email recipients -- Recipient "A" who I type into the "TO" line and Recipient "B" who I type into the CC line -- I expect the resulting Inbox's Recipient column to then show *those two *different email address; after all, they're different recipients, different email addresses. But instead of one email address showing for Recipient A and the other showing for Recipient B in the Inbox listing, I see that they show the *same* recipient email address for both emails.

I figured out the pattern of which of the two destination email addresses have ended up displayed in the Inbox's Recipient column when I do the test to myself at both my earthlink and other email address!!!: The email address I had placed in the "TO" line (never the CC line) is the email address that ends up showing as the Recipient for both emails. Is this a clue to what's going on and why?

We've probably beaten the above horse enough. I'll try to "let it go," I'm thinking maybe it's some glitch that just has to do with the very odd use case scenario I'm attempting -- sending an email TO/CCing two addresses that come into Thunderbird.

I'll likely go ahead next by doing my planned *delete* of the 2 earthlink accounts listed inside Thunderbird, keeping just my newly added non-earthlink account. I have a question about that at: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1360865

Continuing thanks.

Modified by alysenet

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Chosen Solution

I expect the resulting Inbox's Recipient column to then show *those two *different email address;

Not going to ever happen. The to: address is the recipient. The CC recipient is getting a carbon copy of the base communication, between the recipient (To:) and the sender (From:)

I initially misunderstood you. Because I have no interest in who the email is addressed to, I do not show recipient in the list because it is not relevant to me. I do show from: because the order I read mail is influenced by who is mailing me. I got the email so it was sent to one of my email addresses. It matter little to me which one. Perhaps it is even as a BCC and may there for not have my email address anywhere in it to be found, but it was ultimately sent to me.

My interest in the receiving account may arise when I am actually reading the email, when full FROM: TO: and CC: information is shown in the email header part of the display anyway.