TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

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Rocketman
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Joined: January 3rd, 2004, 1:51 pm
Location: New York

TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by Rocketman »

I've had several SMTP servers configured in TB that I use for different addresses/services & I've had them for years. Lately, I'm finding all but 1 or 2 deleted. The last time this happened, a couple of weeks ago, I restored Win 11 back to a previous restore point & TB version. SMTPs were restored. Tonight I found the SMTP configurations gone again. Most, but not all, were gmail configurations using OAuth2. Any Idea what's deleting the SMTP configurations?
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -- Ben Franklin
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tanstaafl
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Re: TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by tanstaafl »

Its rare, but automated updates have been known to change settings with unusual values to a default value. I haven't heard of that deleting smtp entries though.

Are you using something like CCleaner to clean up the profile? That frequently has bad side effects and is not recommended.

Did your system hang or crash shortly before this happened? Next time this happens I suggest you check whether any non-account settings were changed/deleted, and whether you suddenly got some backups of the prefs.js file (with some numbers appended to the name).

If this keeps happening with the same version you could try copying the smtp settings from prefs.js to the optional user.js file. That file overrides the settings in prefs.js.
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Rocketman
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Joined: January 3rd, 2004, 1:51 pm
Location: New York

Re: TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by Rocketman »

Thanks for the reply, tanstaafl. I don't use CCleaner on my profiles. The troubleshooting info shows no crashes. What I also find odd is that the last time this happened (a couple of weeks ago), the only accts that would send email were the accts whose SMTP settings hadn't been deleted. This time they all continued sending so I did a test. I emailed all the accts from the acct that still had its SMTP server configuration & after replying, all the SMTP configurations suddenly reappeared. WTF! The only change I've made to the configurations is the changeover to Gmail's app passwords instead of my normal passwords because of Google's wanting to disallow (what they call insecure) 3rd party access. Could this be causing the issue?
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -- Ben Franklin
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tanstaafl
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Re: TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by tanstaafl »

If you had been using "normal password" as the authentication method for a Gmail account you should change it to "OAuth2" before the end of May. That requires cookies be enabled in Thunderbird (they are by default). You'll get a popup window asking you several questions in order to create the token (which will be stored by the password wizard). That popup window might look like its done by a browser but its created by Thunderbird.

Google is dropping support for "normal password" for 3rd party email clients such as Thunderbird at the end of this month. Enabling support for insecure apps was needed for "normal passwords" but doesn't do anything after they drop support for "normal passwords". You need to make the change to OAuth2 for both the account and the associated smtp server.

AFAIK an application password for Gmail is only needed if you enabled two step verification so that you have 2FA for your smartphone etc. Since Thunderbird can't enter the security code you use a application specific password (gaining no advantage from doing that) so that it can co-exist with your smartphone using the same account.
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Rocketman
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Joined: January 3rd, 2004, 1:51 pm
Location: New York

Re: TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by Rocketman »

All my gmail accts use OAuth2 & at google's "insistence" I did enable 2FA, but that really only applies to accessing gmail with a browser, which I rarely do. However, after enabling 2FA, TB couldn't send email until I replaced the normal PW in TB with the application password. https://ibb.co/9GsNty2
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -- Ben Franklin
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tanstaafl
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Re: TB 91.9 deleting SMTP servers

Post by tanstaafl »

Google automatically enabled 2FA recently (without any notification that they were doing that) for anybody who has a phone number in their google account. However, you can disable it. If you decide to do that you need to replace the application password in Thunderbird with the normal password.
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