Download All Hotmail Folders

User Help for Mozilla Thunderbird
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squeezin
Posts: 4
Joined: December 2nd, 2007, 3:01 pm

Download All Hotmail Folders

Post by squeezin »

Ive read a ton of conflicting topics on this so im posting my own to try and make sense of this. And get some info thats not 2 years old...

Simply this...trying to get thunderbird to download the rest of my hotmail folders. I have my hotmail setup and working perfectly with the webmail and the hotmail extension. Can send and receive fine. But i cant get TB to download/import the rest of my hotmail folders....sent items, junk, as well as a few personal others.

Ive tried putting the folder names in the hotmail extension for downloading...but it dont download them. All i have is the inbox, sent and trash folders, where inbox is the only folder that actually syncs with the hotmail server.

Any suggestions or guide that im missing?

Thanks in advance.
alanrf
Posts: 1492
Joined: October 14th, 2004, 1:02 pm
Location: Sacramento, CA. USA

Post by alanrf »

1) Junk is downloaded by selecting the "Download JunkMail" box in the POP tab for the Hotmail account in the Hotmail extension option.

2) Let's skip the sent folder for now ... I will come back to it.

3) Other custom folders need to have their names specified exactly as they are named on Hotmail.

Now the gotcha. You are running Hotmail as a POP account. Thunderbird is playing by the rules of POP and so must the Webmail extensions. POP is very old, very simply, caste in concrete and it is not going to change. POP rules say that the client (Thunderbird) can only download mail from the server's Inbox to the Inbox of the client. The Webmail developer can only bend the rules slightly. That means the developer can get the mail from the Junk folder and the other custom folders you specify but they all have to be delivered to the Inbox of the account on Thunderbird.

All is not lost. The Webmail developer puts in the header of each message as it is downlaoded a line that tells you which folder it came from on Hotmail. To see this select a message in the Hotmail Inbox and then Thunderbird > View > Message source and you will see a line like:

X-Folder: Inbox

in the headers.

You can set up filters for your Hotmail in Thunderbird to examine this header line as it arrives and move the message to the appropriate folder in Thunderbird. If you need any help with that just say.

Another gotcha. If you have selected "Download unread emails only" in the Hotmail extension then you probably will not download anything from the custom folders.

Back to the Sent Messages - can you please tell me what kinf of account type you have set for the Hotmail account in the Hotmail server?
Has this account ever worked with Outlook or Outlook Express?
squeezin
Posts: 4
Joined: December 2nd, 2007, 3:01 pm

Post by squeezin »

Thanks, i really appreciate your help. Ill have to tinker with it a bit.
As for the the sent messages, they have always worked in OE6.

"can you please tell me what kinf of account type you have set for the Hotmail account in the Hotmail server?"
I dont understand exactly what your asking me here, sorry.

I do pay for the hotmail account, think its called hotmail plus er whatever if that helps.

Thanks again
alanrf
Posts: 1492
Joined: October 14th, 2004, 1:02 pm
Location: Sacramento, CA. USA

Post by alanrf »

You have a "WebDav" enabled Hotmail account - it just means it can use the WebDav access method that works with Outlook or Outlook Express.

If you go to Thunderbird > Tools > Add-ons > Extensions tab > Hotmail extension > Options > Mode tab for your account you should select the "WebDav" account type. This will give you the most stable and most fully functional experience with the Hotmail extension.

When you have done this then in the POP tab you can get your Sent folder to download by adding to the list of custom folders "SentItems" (without the quotes). Please enter it exactly as given here.

Since you have Hotmail Plus you should now be able to use the POP and SMTP servers provided to paying Hotmail customers with the Thunderbird client. However, please be aware that using those servers will restrict you absolutely to accessing only the Inbox of the Hotmail server. (Those POP rules again).
RichA999
Guest

Re: Download All Hotmail Folders

Post by RichA999 »

I think this must apply to earlier versions of Thunderbird because I can't figure out where these settings are. i'm using Thunderbird 7.0.1.

For example "Junk is downloaded by selecting the "Download JunkMail" box in the POP tab for the Hotmail account in the Hotmail extension option." I'm assuming you mean in Thunderbird not Hotmail but I have searched everywhere through the properties and options and can't find anything with a POP tab or even a Hotmail extension.

Any help would be appreciated as I'm sure I'm not the only one who wants to get all their emails out of hotmail.

Thanks
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