need to move from POP to IMAP

[sheilach2]

I have been fighting this Email problem for DAYS, I cannot send Email, keep getting error messages -
"An error occurred while sending mail: The mail server sent an incorrect greeting: Cannot connect to SMTP server 68.114.188.100 (68.114.188.100:587), connect error 10060."

"Sending of the message failed.
The message could not be sent because the connection to Outgoing server (SMTP) mobile.charter.net timed out. Try again."

I cannot change from a POP to a IMAP on Thunderbird & charter/spectrum is of NO help, they say to come here.
They switched to a IMAP without telling us or providing information on how to switch the account, I am ROYALLY PISSED!
I'm ready to send the 'puter to the $HOP, perhaps someone there can fix this mess that spectrum left me with!
Too bad I can't send the BILL to Spectrum!

How do you post a image here? I clicked [img] on "Img" but just got two more "Img" on this page & I still cannot insert an image.

[tanstaafl]

See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Posting_a_scr ... _the_forum

If you need to switch from POP to IMAP create the IMAP account using tools -> account settings-> account actions, check it works, move any downloaded messages from the POP account that are only stored on your hard disk to the IMAP account, and after confirming everything is okay, delete the POP account. You can temporarily have both a POP and a IMAP account for the same mailbox. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Convert_a_POP ... AP_account for more details.

Are you sure that you want to keep using your ISP as your email provider? ISPs are usually poor email providers because they view email as just a cost center. You could use a free account with Outlook, Zoho, Yahoo, GMX or Gmail instead. I recommend Gmail as its the most reliable and has the best spam detection. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Gmail if you're interested.

https://mail2.charter.net/index.php/mobile says its Charter's mobile mail settings, but usually there is no reason why you can't use mobile mail settings with a desktop. That was done for years when yahoo wouldn't officially support IMAP for the desktop for example.

[sheilach2]

Thank you "tanstaafl" for your response, I am so angry that Spectrum did this without telling us.
It's a royal pain to have to use the internet for Email and I am very pissed off that Spectrum made this change without notifying us first.
I had no idea why I could no longer send Email from home, I've spent HOURS & DAYS trying to figure this out.
It was only after going to their site that I discovered that they had switched to a IMAP system, they left NO instructions on how to move to IMAP. They should have left the POP alone for those who don't want or need it.
I would LOVE to be able to dump Spectrum but they have a monopoly here, the other provider is much SLOWER.
I do have a G-mail account but I've never used it, I guess now I'll have to.

OK, I created a new IMAP account, very easy & it seems to be working, now to move the mail to another folder but I do not know where the Emails are being saved. (I discovered that I can't use "/" here.)
I just searched through Thunderbird folder, not there. I tried again & found the Email folder & the "Profile" folder but now where is the IMAP account so I can copy & move that copy to the IMAP account?
The IMAP settings seem to be working but will the address book also be transferred to IMAP? I do have it saved.
The IMAP account folder was in the "thunderbird,Profiles~l0fr545n.default folder. I put a copy of the incoming mail into the imap folder & it's in there. I still need to try "Mozbackup" for my profile.

I had to do a "search" to find the "local folders" even though I had selected "show hidden folders" it's STILL HIDDEN!

I really appreciate all the help you folks have been giving us, not always helpful but it usually is.

[tanstaafl]

Its not clear whether you are trying to move the mbox files used by the POP account/Local Folders to store mail for its folders to the IMAP account's "local directory", or created a new profile with a IMAP account and now want to merge the two profiles.

Moving the mbox files (for example "inbox.", "sent." etc.) used to store mail in a POP account to a IMAP account won't help. It will at best ignore them. It will not discover them and create a corresponding remote folder on the mail server when it syncs the remote and offline folders. Creating a new profile with a IMAP account is the hard way to do things as it makes it harder to import your other data.

I suggest you go back to the profile with the POP account and add the IMAP account to it. You can temporarily have both a POP and IMAP account for the same email address. "create the IMAP account using tools -> account settings-> account actions, check it works, move any downloaded messages from the POP account that are only stored on your hard disk to the IMAP account, and after confirming everything is okay, delete the POP account. " You can drag and drop folders if the destination doesn't have a folder with the same name. Otherwise select all of the messages in the source folder (Ctrl-A or edit -> select -> all) and move them to the target folder (message -> move to). You'll probably need to do the latter for the inbox and sent folders.

The reason for doing it this way is it makes it easier to migrate your mail and reuses the existing address books, add-ons, etc.

[tanstaafl]

Its tough for me to understand exactly what you're doing. But http://kb.mozillazine.org/Importing_folders , http://kb.mozillazine.org/Moving_addres ... n_profiles and http://kb.mozillazine.org/Show_hidden_files_and_folders might help if you deleted the profile with the POP account and are trying to move that data into a Gmail IMAP account in a new profile.

[allande]

You may already know more about it than I do, but things are really different between IMAP and POP. POP has as an basic concept and default behavior: A bunch of messages come into one box on the server, then you download them forever to your computer, that automatically removes them from the servers, and from then on they are only on your computer. After that, in your email client you can divide them into various folders or run filters to do so automatically.
IMAP's concept is: the server should always keep all the messages. The server can have multiple boxes. Whatever is on your computer is thought of only as a cache to speed up performance, it isn't meant to be the permanent storage. If you make folders or move messages, you sync those back to the server and make sure your email client is doing that properly.
Either can be customized to work more like the other, but they, especially by default, act really differently. So pay attention to what is going on and watch for things not working the way you want them to while you are shifting.

[sheilach2]

I just found where the IMAP folder was & copied the incoming mail into the file for the IMAP & it is in there but I don't know if IMAP can access it & Mozbackup is beta & is no longer being worked on so they suggested not using it as it still has "bugs" so now how do I move my profile to the IMAP folder? Will drag & drop work or will I need another way to transfer that info? Or did the Thunderbird software do that when it set up the IMAP account?
I'm just a very old lady who fumbled about teaching herself how to use the 'puter. I do a lot on my computer from Email to photo editing.
I wish I knew more so I could help others.

[tanstaafl]

You seem to keep trying to treat a IMAP account like a POP account. It works quite differently. A IMAP account discovers new folders by explicitly asking the mail server what folders exist, NOT by looking on the hard disk. That's the fundamental reason why copying files from a POP account to a IMAP account won't do what you want. Everything else is a detail.

Details which may just confuse you:

The files you copied get ignored when working online. In fact I normally configure my IMAP accounts not to have any offline folders (uncheck "keep messages for this account on this computer" in synchronization & storage) , so the only files in its local directory are *.msf files (caches of the folder listings - they have NO messages). The wording of ""keep messages for this account on this computer" is very misleading because its easy to interpret that as meaning IMAP accounts can store mail folders like a POP account does. It doesn't. The sames files will exist but they will get used/interpreted very differently.

Asking "how do I move my profile to the IMAP folder?" makes me suspect that you misunderstand the difference between accounts and profiles. A profile is basically a container that holds one or more accounts plus non-account/global stuff such as settings, address books etc. An account has a top level directory (the "local directory") and then has a directory tree underneath it. Each of those child directories in a POP account stores messages in a file named after the folder but with no file extensions (a mbox file, such as "inbox."). There is also a file named after the folder with a .msf file extension that contains just a cache of the folder listing (such as "inbox.msf"). You can see the same files in a IMAP account but THEY ARE USED VERY DIFFERENTLY. The *.msf files are always created. The mbox files ("inbox.", "sent." etc.) are optional.

When you are working online (normal situation) the folder listing is displaying the contents of the remote folder on the mail server. If a offline folder exists its contents are only displayed if you configure Thunderbird to work offline (file -> offline -> work offline). Its never used as a cache. If you copy some mbox file from a POP account such as "xyz." its either going to get automatically deleted when the IMAP account syncs the remote and offline folders, or its going to get ignored. (Depends upon the version) That is because IMAP accounts work differently even though they have the same type of files. If had you copied that mbox file to a POP account it would have automatically discovered it, created a corresponding *.msf file for it and used it as a mail folder. The IMAP account won't because the mbox files are optional, and they're used only to create a offline folder (a copy of an existing remote folder, stored on your hard disk). The mbox files are never used as the primary storage. If the remote folder is deleted the corresponding mbox file (offline folder) is automatically deleted. The IMAP account discovers new folders by asking the mail server what folders exist, NOT by looking on the hard disk.

I repeat my prior suggestion:

I suggest you go back to the profile with the POP account and add the IMAP account to it. You can temporarily have both a POP and IMAP account for the same email address. "create the IMAP account using tools -> account settings-> account actions, check it works, move any downloaded messages from the POP account that are only stored on your hard disk to the IMAP account, and after confirming everything is okay, delete the POP account. " You can drag and drop folders if the destination doesn't have a folder with the same name. Otherwise select all of the messages in the source folder (Ctrl-A or edit -> select -> all) and move them to the target folder (message -> move to). You'll probably need to do the latter for the inbox and sent folders.

The reason for doing it this way is it makes it easier to migrate your mail and reuses the existing address books, add-ons, etc.

[sheilach2]

I created a IMAP account & inputted all their settings & made it "default", it still will not work, I cannot get either system to work anymore. I have had it with charter! To hell with them!

I am moving my emails to a online system (gmail) rather than continue to fight this IMAP system.
I am letting my inbox at spectrum/charter DIE, I will just let it fill up with JUNK & I'm doing a TWITTER STORM about their terrible customer "service" since they did this to us without telling us ANYTHING & their "help" is WORTHLESS!
They are not trained or educated to help customers with this IMAP move/ reconfiguration problem that THEY CREATED.
I will have to update my contact info here as well and many other sites I subscribe to.

[tanstaafl]

If you change your mind and decide you want to add a Gmail IMAP account to Thunderbird (rather than switching to Gmail webmail using a browser) see http://kb.mozillazine.org/Gmail . There are lots of people who can help you if you have problems doing that.

[sheilach2]

Thank you & thanks to to all the other people here who wrestled with my problem.
I am so ANGRY at Charter/Spectrum because they said NOTHING about them switching from POP to IMAP so I had no idea why I could no longer send Emails. I still cannot get it to work even after making a "new account" for IMAP & inputting all their settings & making it "default".
That didn't work either so now I can neither send or receive.

I made a copy of "tanstaafl" instructions to see if I can get that to work.
Thank you "tanstaafl"!

How do you add a "IMAP" account to the POP account, drag & drop or what?
Just trying to find all the many places Thunderbird is in the hard drive is like wandering a maze blind!

[tanstaafl]

"How do you add a "IMAP" account to the POP account, drag & drop or what? "

Add it using tools -> account settings -> account actions -> "add mail account". That runs the new account wizard. Be careful not to press the "get a new account" button, that's actually a way to buy a domain and a mail account from a commercial email provider. Instead fill in the details about an existing email provider and press next .....

I'm assuming you have the menu toolbar enabled and are not using the hamburger button in the upper right corner.