Addon to delete messages from the server?

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i_am_jim
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by i_am_jim »

tanstaafl wrote:Sending your password in the clear is a poor idea, but not relevant to this problem.
I mentioned in my last post I now use SSL/TLS to check mail
If you delete a message in the POP accounts inbox that should delete the original message in the inbox folder on the server (based on your settings).
I don't "delete messages." I put them in the trash and the trash is emptied when I close TB.
Who is your email provider?
I have three. Comcast and Gmail are two of them and I have several accounts on a web host named WestHost. I have never checked this on Gmail because she doesn't use the account.
Do you get a error message when you delete the local copy of the message? If so, what is it?
No, I don't get an error message.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by tanstaafl »

"I mentioned in my last post I now use SSL/TLS to check mail"
That is inconsistent with the screen image you posted. Why do you believe "I now use SSL/TLS to check mail."?

"I don't "delete messages." I put them in the trash and the trash is emptied when I close TB."
Moving a message normally copies the message and then deletes the original. See if the problem occurs if you explicitly delete the message instead. Perhaps for some unknown reason the "until I delete a message" setting only reacts to an explicit delete, rather than a implicit delete as a side effect of moving a message.

"I have three. Comcast and Gmail are two of them and I have several accounts on a web host named WestHost. I have never checked this on Gmail because she doesn't use the account."
So this problem only occurs with Westhost accounts?

Westhost appears to be a web hosting company, which means you're the admin for your mail server. Sigh.
https://www.westhost.com/knowledgebase/ ... hunderbird describes how to add a IMAP account using a SSL/TLS connection. Have you considered using a IMAP account?
i_am_jim
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Joined: June 15th, 2006, 9:19 am

Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by i_am_jim »

tanstaafl wrote:"I mentioned in my last post I now use SSL/TLS to check mail"
That is inconsistent with the screen image you posted. Why do you believe "I now use SSL/TLS to check mail."?
That image is a copy of the 5th post in this thread. It was made and posted last year. Based on your concern I changed my setting.
"I don't "delete messages." I put them in the trash and the trash is emptied when I close TB."
Moving a message normally copies the message and then deletes the original. See if the problem occurs if you explicitly delete the message instead. Perhaps for some unknown reason the "until I delete a message" setting only reacts to an explicit delete, rather than a implicit delete as a side effect of moving a message.
I think I spoke incorrectly. I do delete messages from mailboxes but that simply moves them to Trash. And the Trash is emptied when I exit TB.
"I have three. Comcast and Gmail are two of them and I have several accounts on a web host named WestHost. I have never checked this on Gmail because she doesn't use the account."
So this problem only occurs with Westhost accounts?
No. It happens with Comcast and I think Westhost accounts but it's been several months since I checked that.
https://www.westhost.com/knowledgebase/ ... hunderbird describes how to add a IMAP account using a SSL/TLS connection. Have you considered using a IMAP account?
I don't use IMAP for technical reasons. It's been too long since I set these accounts up, but I think it's because two people cannot use the same IMAP based account. After one of them downloads message it doesn't download again, so the other person cannot check the same mailbox.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by tanstaafl »

"I don't use IMAP for technical reasons. It's been too long since I set these accounts up, but I think it's because two people cannot use the same IMAP based account. After one of them downloads the message it doesn't download again, so the other person cannot check the same mailbox."

You are actually describing the failings of a POP account which email clients try to work around by hacks such as "leave message on server". IMAP accounts (unlike POP accounts) are designed to let multiple users use the same mailbox at the same time. They can also use ALL of the webmail folders, while POP accounts literally only know about the existence of the inbox on the mail server.

IMAP accounts work quite differently from POP accounts. They are designed to store the messages on the server, and transparently fetch it as needed into memory when opening a message. There is an option set by default to download messages to "offline folders" but that folder is not viewed/used by Thunderbird when you are working online. I normally have that optional feature and global search/indexing (another background process that would download messages) disabled. In that case all that is downloaded to the hard disk is the headers needed for the *.msf file.

Thunderbird fully supports POP accounts but they are essentially legacy accounts given the direction of the industry and email clients such as Thunderbird.
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makaiguy
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by makaiguy »

[Edited to add: At least this is how it used to work. It's been a couple of years since I changed all my accounts over to IMAP so I have no current experience with the following...]

For POP3 accounts, you can set TBird to delete messages from the server when you move them from your Inbox after downloading. There used to be an option for this in the user interface, but they removed it years ago. Now you can only set this option via the configuration editor.

Menu Path:
  • [If running on Windows]: Tools | Options, or
    [If running on OSX]: Thunderbird | Preferences, or
    [If running on Linux]: Edit | Options

    .. then Advanced | General | Config Editor
If you've never done this before, promise to be careful and continue.

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

Note that when you locally delete a message (or in this case, move it from your POP inbox), it will not be deleted from the POP server until the next time your TBird checks the server for new mail.
Doug Wilson
Win10 64bit: FF 115.0.02 64bit, TB 102.12.0 32-bit ║ Android 13/10: FF 115.2.0/115.0.1 ║ No TB for Android available, dammit!
What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away - Doobie Brothers
i_am_jim
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by i_am_jim »

I don't think I've seen this message before. When I left this thread I thought we were at the end of the trail and I don't seem to get notices of new posts to my threads.
makaiguy wrote: For POP3 accounts, you can set TBird to delete messages from the server when you move them from your Inbox after downloading.
I need clarification on this. Are you saying just moving a message to any other mailbox/folder will cause it to be deleted from the server on next startup? I have filters that move incoming messages from their default inbox to all kinds of other mailboxes/folders. Occasionally I move a message to Trash (delete the message from inbox) accidentally. When that happens I move it back to where it came from. So, if simply having moved a message out of the inbox dooms it to be deleted from the server, I can't use this feature. I want it to be deleted from the server when I empty the Trash and only when I empty the Trash, which I have set to happen when I exit the program.
Double-click on the mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove entry to toggle this option between true and false -- set the value to TRUE.
My mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove is currently set to False so this may be the heart of the problem, but as stated above, I can't change this if just moving a message from its incoming mailbox/folder will cause it to be deleted from the server.
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makaiguy
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by makaiguy »

i_am_jim wrote:
makaiguy wrote: For POP3 accounts, you can set TBird to delete messages from the server when you move them from your Inbox after downloading.
I need clarification on this. Are you saying just moving a message to any other mailbox/folder will cause it to be deleted from the server on next startup? I have filters that move incoming messages from their default inbox to all kinds of other mailboxes/folders. Occasionally I move a message to Trash (delete the message from inbox) accidentally. When that happens I move it back to where it came from. So, if simply having moved a message out of the inbox dooms it to be deleted from the server, I can't use this feature. I want it to be deleted from the server when I empty the Trash and only when I empty the Trash, which I have set to happen when I exit the program.
Double-click on the mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove entry to toggle this option between true and false -- set the value to TRUE.
My mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove is currently set to False so this may be the heart of the problem, but as stated above, I can't change this if just moving a message from its incoming mailbox/folder will cause it to be deleted from the server.
Yes, with mail.pop3.deleteFromServerOnMove set to TRUE, moving a message out of the Inbox (which is the ONLY "folder" the POP3 protocol knows anything about) is supposed to cause TBird to tell the server to delete that message from the server's Inbox the next time TBird connects with the server.

With your settings, if you DELETE a message, that message should be deleted from the server the next time you connect. I don't know if it waits til the Trash is emptied or not before adding a message to the to-be-removed-from-server list.

Frankly I don't know if TBird considers moving a message to the Trash folder instead of deleting it the same thing, although they are operationally equivalent (copies message to Trash and marks copy in Inbox as inactive so it doesn't get displayed). From your description, it sounds like TBird doesn't consider moving a message to be a deletion. So if you want to get rid of a message from the server so your wife can't subsequently download it, DELETE it.

Again, that is the way it USED to work several years ago, and as I said I no longer have any POP accounts on which to experiment to see if anything has changed. You're the one with the POP account handy, set up an experiment or two and see what it does and doesn't do. You'll probably have your answers in less time than it took to write that reply.

{edited to fix typo}
Last edited by makaiguy on June 13th, 2017, 12:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Doug Wilson
Win10 64bit: FF 115.0.02 64bit, TB 102.12.0 32-bit ║ Android 13/10: FF 115.2.0/115.0.1 ║ No TB for Android available, dammit!
What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away - Doobie Brothers
i_am_jim
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by i_am_jim »

So, now the $64 question:

Since "Deleting" a message by using the mouse or pressing the Del key doesn't really delete it, rather this just moves it to Trash, how does one really delete a message?
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makaiguy
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Re: Addon to delete messages from the server?

Post by makaiguy »

Delete then compact.
Doug Wilson
Win10 64bit: FF 115.0.02 64bit, TB 102.12.0 32-bit ║ Android 13/10: FF 115.2.0/115.0.1 ║ No TB for Android available, dammit!
What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away - Doobie Brothers
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