Suddenly, inbox is empty

[yky]

For some reason, I lost all the email in Inbox. Although I still see Subject, From, Date, Size, etc., when I click on any email, there is no content. I checked the Mail folder, the Inbox size was zero while Inbox.msf was quite big. This is true for two accounts. It affects only Inbox. Others such as Sent, or other folders I have created are not affected.

Anyway to re-download the email in Inbox? I use Windows 8.1 and Thunderbird 45.4.0.

[DanRaisch]

How is the account set up in Thunderbird, as POP or IMAP? Find out using menu path Tools->Account Settings->Server Settings->Server Type at the top right of the dialogue.

[yky]

Sorry. Forgot to mention that. It is POP.

[tanstaafl]

Check that the search field for the quick filter bar is empty. Its folder specific. It's possible that the "inbox.msf" file used for the folder listing is corrupted. To rebuild the index of a folder, right-click it, select Properties, and choose "Rebuild Folder" from the General Information tab. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Disappearing_mail for some other possibilities.

If none of that helps look at "Total:" in the bottom right corner of the main window to see how many messages are in the inbox. That normally works even when the folder listing is empty. The reason is to verify its a display problem (i.e. your messages aren't lost, and don't need to be downloaded again).

[yky]

Thank you for the reply.

The total shows a large number. In one account, it is 2222 and 1998 in another. But I believe these numbers are from Inbox.msf. Is that correct? My situation is that the Inbox.msf is fine. Its size is more than 1 Mb but the size of Inbox is zero (now, it is greater than zero because of the email I have received after the posting). When rebuilding Inbox.msf, I believe Thunderbird gathers info from the Inbox. Now that Inbox is zero byte, there is nothing for Thunderbird to rebuild from.

[tanstaafl]

Check the size of the "inbox." file (no file extension). You could even exit Thunderbird and open it with a text editor (NOT a word processor) from http://kb.mozillazine.org/Edit_large_mbox_files . Any HTML messages will be hard to read due to all of the HTML tags not being processed but you could get a good idea of how much of your mail is still there.

If you delete the popstate.dat file in the same directory (or move it outside of the profile) Thunderbird will forget what messages it has downloaded and try to download everything from the POP3 server. If you want to do that I suggest you login to webmail using a browser first and verify that there are a lot of messages to download.

[yky]

Thank you for the reply.

The size of Inbox was zero when I first posted the message while that of Inbox.msf was greater than 1 Mb. Inbox is not zero now because Thunderbird has downloaded some email since the original post.

Anyway to modify popstate.dat so only the email after certain date are downloaded? Under the Mail folder, besides Inbox, Sent, etc., I also have folders like 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 which stores email received in that year. The Inbox should only contain email received this year (2016) but now most of the email is gone. I only need those email received in 2016. If I delete popstate.dat, will all the email at Gmail be downloaded? That'll be six-year worth of email, more than 25 Gb. It'll take four to six days to download.

[tanstaafl]

If all mail from before 2016 is stored in child folders in webmail, then you don't need to move anything to prevent downloading lots of messages that you do not want. Thunderbird will only download messages from the inbox in a POP account, not from its child folders. It will re-download the messages from after your first posting two days ago if you delete the popstate.dat file, but its easier to delete that small number of duplicates than to try to prevent them from being downloaded again.

You didn't make a backup of your profile?

[yky]

Thank you for the reply.

I have backup but the backup is overwritten by the bad Inbox file before I have noticed the problem.

My gmail account doesn't have sub-folders. It is my Thunderbird that has sub-folders. According to what you said, maybe I should go to my Gmail account and put old email in sub-folders but I don't know whether Gmail really moves the email to sub-folders or just tags them. If Gmail just tags them instead of physically moves them, I suppose it won't work then.

By the way, I opened popstate.dat with Notepad and found nothing in it except a warning message saying this is an automatically generated file, don't edit it.

[DanRaisch]

1. Gmail does not actually use folders at all but only tags messages to indicate in which "Folder" you have filed them.

2. Moving messages on the Gmail server will not help in your situation because POP type mail account can only access the server inbox folder. Other folders (Sent, Trash, etc.) or sub-folders, even of the inbox folder, are not accessible under the POP3 email protocol.

3. See tanstaafl's last post. Because those other folders and sub-folders (real or tagged only by Gmail) are not accessible to Thunderbird under the POP3 protocol, only messages found specifically in the server inbox will be downloaded again if you move, rename, or delete the file popstate.dat.

[yky]

3. See tanstaafl's last post. Because those other folders and sub-folders (real or tagged only by Gmail) are not accessible to Thunderbird under the POP3 protocol, only messages found specifically in the server inbox will be downloaded again if you move, rename, or delete the file popstate.dat.

I'd like to clarify one thing. The sub-folders 2011, 2012, etc. I have mentioned earlier are on my computer. My Gmail account doesn't have any sub-folders except those built-in ones like Sent, Draft, etc. All incoming email is in Gmail's inbox. I don't even bother to tag them because I use Thunderbird to read email. So, I think doing anything on Gmail side is just a waste of time. I don't even log in Gmail directly through a browser. Well, maybe few times a year.

If I understand you folks correctly, in my case, if I remove popstate.dat, I'd be downloading the entire 25 Gb of email. Is that correct?

[DanRaisch]

You would download only those messages that appear in the Gmail's inbox. Those in the Sent, Trash, Spam, Drafts or other normal Gmail "folders" would not be downloaded unless they are duplicated in the inbox.

Inbox.msf does not contain the full content of messages as it is only a summary file used by Thunderbird as an index, of sorts.

[yky]

You would download only those messages that appear in the Gmail's inbox.

That would mean all the email from 2011 till now. That's what I have been trying to avoid but it seems there is no other way.

By the way, I found a backup dated Sep. 20. Any way to use it and download only the email since Sep. 20?

[tanstaafl]

That would mean all the email from 2011 till now. That's what I have been trying to avoid but it seems there is no other way.

You previously stated you "have folders like 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 which stores email received in that year." Why do you think the inbox has messages from 2011 till now? I'd have assumed you moved, not copied, the old messages to those child folders.

By the way, I found a backup dated Sep. 20. Any way to use it and download only the email since Sep. 20?

One way would be to copy your recently downloaded mail to the Local Folders inbox, exit Thunderbird, restore the other backup, and then copy the "inbox." and "inbox.msf" files in the ..\Mail\Local Folders directory from one profile to the other, over the existing files. Or install the ImportExportTools add-on in the current profile, use it to export the folder, install the add-on in the other profile, and then use it to import the exported folder. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Importing_folders

[yky]

That would mean all the email from 2011 till now. That's what I have been trying to avoid but it seems there is no other way.

You previously stated you "have folders like 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 which stores email received in that year." Why do you think the inbox has messages from 2011 till now? I'd have assumed you moved, not copied, the old messages to those child folders.

Those folders are on my computer, not at Gmail web site. I created Thunderbird filters to move the email from Thunderbird's Inbox to the sub-folders according to the year the email was sent. On Gmail side, I hardly do anything. The way I use Thunderbird is I do everything on Thunderbird side (i.e. my local computer) and leave Gmail alone. To login Gmail, I have to enter userid and password. That's a burden already. Thunderbird is so wonderful. It remembers the userid and password and automatically logs in Gmail and retrieves email, all without human interaction. Great!

By the way, I found a backup dated Sep. 20. Any way to use it and download only the email since Sep. 20?

One way would be to copy your recently downloaded mail to the Local Folders inbox, exit Thunderbird, restore the other backup, and then copy the "inbox." and "inbox.msf" files in the ..\Mail\Local Folders directory from one profile to the other, over the existing files. Or install the ImportExportTools add-on in the current profile, use it to export the folder, install the add-on in the other profile, and then use it to import the exported folder. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Importing_folders

How to restore the email received between Sep.20 and yesterday? I imagine they need be downloaded again from Gmail site.