TBird hangs sending mail to IMAP sent-mail

[jhurliman]

I had this problem after switching from DreamHost's IMAP to my own VPS. I'm running the latest stable Postfix for Gentoo as well as Courier-IMAP, using SSL for SMTP and IMAP both. Clicking around to different folders would give me errors trying to access them seemingly randomly, and any time I tried to send an e-mail it would send but would sit indefinitely trying to copy to the Sent folder. I changed /etc/courier-imap/imapd MAXPERIP from 4 to 25 (it's a private server so I'm not too concerned about too many concurrent connections) and everything worked perfectly.

I still think this is a bug in Thunderbird though, can't it realize that it's probably using too many concurrent connections or that the copy action isn't going to work if it hasn't done anything for the last 10 minutes? If you are having this problem and don't have access to the mail server try turning down the number of concurrent connections in Thunderbird.

[pscandrett]

I still think this is a bug in Thunderbird though, can't it realize that it's probably using too many concurrent connections or that the copy action isn't going to work if it hasn't done anything for the last 10 minutes? If you are having this problem and don't have access to the mail server try turning down the number of concurrent connections in Thunderbird.

I don't particularly want to add a meaningless 'me too' to this thread but, well, 'me too'. Ever since I've moved to TB I've been using it with (various) IMAP servers; I've had my email provider looking into the problem, I've investigated it myself, but the whole copy-to-self issue is just really as irritating as it is frustrating - and yes, I'm convinced it's a TB thing. I'm using the latest TB on Win XP (I've always updated eagerly, hoping the thing might have been fixed); I've voted for the bug on bugzilla; I'm not totally sure what else I can do, not being a coder myself.

I'm seriously considering moving away from TB - and tbh I don't want to; I like the ethos of Mozilla stuff, and in general I like the way TB works. I can live with other issues like the crossposting stuff not being marked as read, or - well, any of the other things that come up from time to time, but this bug does seem to be a bit of a show stopper. I was so relieved when I found that others had the same problem.

I don't want to be discouraging to the developers, all of whom are great to have even got TB this far. I'm just a frustrated supporter of the thing, that's all...

[chasingclouds]

I go along with everything so far about the problems with IMAP and irregular failures in sending copy to sent folder. Most times it is when attachment involved but occasionally happens with longer email (400 words plus..?)
Very tempted to go back to OE which is reliable (and you could very easily relocate the storage without editing a preference file...) but like the ethos of open source.
Again, have followed this fault through several versions thinking it will have been solved and been consistently disappointed.
The bottom line seems to be that there is no value in this forum because no-one involved with Thunderbird development or programming seems to read any of this or if they do, they just can't be bothered to post a 'look folks, we are trying but it is a real problem, please bear with us.'
Er, before anyone starts on about bug reporting, I have looked at the bug screens and frankly, they remind me of the officialese in complaint forms where you start reading, get lost several times in wording and jargon and decide it isn't worth wasting that much time.
If there are that many folk bothering to complain about a feature (or failure of it) then someone ought to be doing something because I reckon these 5 pages of complaints on a single issue over two years are a tip of an iceberg.
Looking at the failure to address this issue makes me question just how useful an open source community is - it sure ain't helping me or the rest of these 5 pages...

[cwellard]

I am also having the same problem consistently will hang will trying to save an email sent to IMAP server. I am using recent version 1.5.0.5 (20060719)

Is anyone looking at this ?

[chasingclouds]

Is anybody looking into this imap email hanging problem? Depends what you mean by 'looking' and 'anybody'.....
More interesting question is, CAN it be solved? Like the infinite number of monkeys with typewriters producing works of Shakespeare, I suspect that there must have been enough bug reports on this problem. People with the ability to solve this problem are either working on something else 'more important' or the problem cannot be solved with current design of Thunderbird. Am no techie but there sems to be something about email client programs that were designed for POP3 trying to deal with IMAP which may not be implemented uniformly on assortedm servers. When I was on AOL, who seem to be entirely IMAP based but never said as much, I never had any hanging or problems with copy to sent folder. It does seem that the problem is not unique to Thunderbird and equally, no-one else seems to be bothered in solving it. Preswumably everyone assumes it will be sorted in the next build...
Maybe we ought to be pestering someone on a different forum page?

[bkwok]

It seems the problem is gone after I changed the setup to the following:

1. In "Copies & Folders", Check "Place a copy in:"
2. Select "Other" and then pick your "Sent" IMAP folder manually

That is, don't use the default "Sent" folder which provided by TB, but pick it up manually as it is a normal IMAP folder.

BTW, I am using version 1.5.0.5, I don't know if it works for any other version.

Good Luck!

[chasingclouds]

Thanks for suggestion - have implemented as per guide notes (I had meant to sound less stilted ...!)

Will give it a try and will post back in about two weeks, sooner if it doesn't work - am also using Thunderbird 1.505. (Looked at Opera 9 email client, shivered and came home...)

[chasingclouds]

As promised, feedback on bkwok's suggestion - answer is that it does seem to work on my copy of 1.5.0.5 and the only time it didn't was when I had to reinstall Thunderbird - as I also did a reinstall of XP I couldn't expect it to remember - I hadn't used the Mozbackup (browse Mozilla - its there somewhere..) to backup the emails and forgot it would do the settings. I find Mozbackup very useful for both Firefox and Thunderbird and it allows me to get back up and running for both if a reinstall of OS is needed.

Yep, verdict so far is 'thank you bkwok - you may well have saved Thunderbird for me' !!!

[harrismk]

The fact of the matter is that this has been a long-standing problem, years, with no resolution. It sounds as though the option to send to the sent folder should be removed and an automatic "place Copy in Other/Sent" should be set as the installation default to prevent problems for the rest of us that are testing ThunderBird to see if it is truly functional and will meet our needs where other products will not. Don't get me wrong, I am appreciative of the Mozilla Community and everything they have done, but it would seem that this is basic email client functionality and the workaround is how the program should be set up. Actually, I just implemented this workaround and will see whether it is highly effective.

Thank you.

[Peter P. Schifferli]

I'm another "me too" on this issue, I'd tried bkwok's suggestion to no avail, now getting these dialog boxes:

The current command did not succeed. The mail server responded: Mailbox Sent Items cannot be appended to.

The message was sent successfully, but could not be copied to your Sent folder. Would you like to return to the compose window?

So...I guess its back to putting sent copies in the local file!

Pete

[chasingclouds]

Sorry to hear solution didn't work for you Peter - have to say that it is still okay for me.
I had wondered whether the zone labs and avg free versions where in any way responsible but since trying the solution have installed f-secure 2006 and despite the number of times that phones home still finding sent mail getting sent to local sent mail folder as per earlier instructions. Am not a programmer but wonder if it is worth creating another sent folder (called 'outgone' or whatever and see if T can send it to that folder via the 'other location' facility?
As said before, I think one needs to make noises about this on the bug site - I can't see that anyone from Mozilla programming community reads these pages...... unless the problem is more deepseated than we think!
Have you tried contacting bkwok?
Good luck, hope someone comes up with a solution for you.

[chasingclouds]

Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.... the bkwok work around currently doesn't. Am back to frozen sending screen with error in sending copy to sent folder...
Have been in touch with someone involved with working on Thunderbird and they comment it is a problem they are aware of and that it can have 5-10 different causes. They commented that the alpha 1 release of beta 2 Thunderbird is stable and seems to be working okay, have just emailed them to say that it still shows the same problem with the added extra that on cancelling the frozen authenticating screen that the copy to sent folder doesn't happen. It seems that causes include bugs in Thunderbird, virus checkers, bad server.
Currently I have saved the pref.js file from the alpha1 installation which I am about to remove via control add/remove, which will hopefully see me back to 1.5.05.
Installing alpha1 does not seem to allow me to run it and 1.5.05 version as an alternative, it seems to have overwritten the 1.5.05 version so anyone experimenting, myself included later, will need to engage brain and install to a different folder...
Anyone got any spare brain cells going cheap....?

[chasingclouds]

Latest suggestion received was to reduce cache (tools/accountsettings/server settings/advanced ..) currently at 5. Reduced it to 4 and resent problem email that had stuck but still sent copy to sent folder - result was that sending copy to sent folder error message came up saying copying to sent folder had failed - and it was right! No trace of copy in sent folder.

So, tried upping cache to 6 - result was that problem email zipped through like on something highly illegal but effective. Never seen Thunderbird sending and copy to sent folder process so fast.

Suspect this is not the real answer but it looks interesting.

Hope it helps someone.

[Peter P. Schifferli]

Thanks for the suggestion chasingclouds, tried setting cache at 6, unfortunately didn't work for me! Any and all suggestions welcome however.

Pete

[chasingclouds]

Peter, sorry cache=6 didn't work for you.
Did you try droppingndown to 4? I gather one can experiment with cache numbers but there is the caveat that there seem to be 5-10 assorted problems/causes for this one bug so for me the cache change may cure it but for you it may be anything from an anti virus to one of the bugs in Thunderbird.
At least they aren't calling it 'a feature'.....