"Leave messages on server" and "Until I delete them"

[jm38712]

For my hotmail (POP), with the feature "Leave messages on server", how does it behave if I don't check the "Until I delete them" box?

What I am looking to have happen is that Thunderbird on my PC leaves the email on the server until I either delete it from my Inbox or move it to another local folder on my PC. That is, I want the POP server to reflect my Inbox so that my iPhone shows only my email in my Inbox. Currently with both boxes checked, when I delete from my Inbox it deletes from the server but when I move to another local folder on my PC, it stays on the server (and on my iPhone).

Is it as simple as just unchecking "Until I delete them"?

Thanks.

[makaiguy]

What you want is the way it used to work -- when you moved from your local Inbox to a different local folder it was removed from the server's inbox. This is no longer the default, but it can still be enabled.

Menu Path:

[If running on Windows or OSX]: Tools | Options, or
[If running on Linux]: Edit | Options
.. then Advanced | General | Config Editor

Enter delete in the Filter bar to limit display to just options containing delete.
Double-click on the mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove entry to toggle this option between TRUE / FALSE.
- set the value to true.

[jm38712]

Excellent. Thank you. Worked like a charm.

Not sure why you would not want this behaviour by default. It should definitely be something configurable in the Account Settings user interface.

I had not found the Config Editor before now, pretty cool but dangerous. Probably more than I want to know about the insides of Thunderbird (and I am a former sw developer now moved to the dark side in sw sales ).

Just for anyone else finding this thread, under OS X you need to go to Thunderbird -> Preferences -> Config Editor to make the change to this setting.

[makaiguy]

Not sure why you would not want this behaviour by default. It should definitely be something configurable in the Account Settings user interface.

With computers, never assume the way you want to use them is the way everyone, or even the majority, wants to use them.

For instance, my desktop is up and running 24/7 unless I shut down before going away for a few days. Filters move lots of my incoming messages into other folders automatically all the time on this main system. When I access from another computer (typically my much-less-capable netbook in the living room) I WANT to be able to still see those messages in the Inbox. It was no big deal for me, as I just turned delete-from-server-when-moved off, but I suspect enough people did complain that they changed the default.

As for whether this particular option should be configurable in the user interface, I tend to agree. But go back into the advanced configuration and see the hundreds of options that are listed there. For each one of them there is probably a bunch of folks that would like to see it in the user interface, but if they were all in there it would be completely unworkable.