Quick Filter suddenly seriously broken

[zoney70]

I use TBird as a desktop client to several IMAP accounts, which are also stored offline on my desktop. One of these accounts is subscribed to a mailing list. A regular TBird message filter applied to the inbox of that email account moves emails addressed to the mailing list to a list-dedicated IMAP folder.

For many TBird releases, I have used the Quick Search feature successfully on that folder to select specific threads by the content of the Subject header. Typically, a thread might contain anywhere from 2 or 3 to maybe a couple of dozen messages.

In the current version of TBird (I am running 45.6), this capability has gone totally bananas. Now, when I enter a phrase from the desired topic, and choose Subject, a list containing literally hundreds of randomly selected messages appears, containing virtually none of the desired few messages. Strangely, just before this berserk list appears, I will frequently see the desired list flash into the pane and then abruptly disappear.

I am not exactly sure on which date this was first broken, because it has been several weeks (perhaps a couple of months) since I last dealt with the mailing list before this week. This feature is a fantastic productivity aid that I sorely miss. Has anyone else noticed this drastic change, or did something else break on my machine? (I recently uninstalled a few programs I no longer use, but having no obvious connection to any Mozilla product. I doubt it had anything to do with the change to TBird.)

[DanRaisch]

I seriously doubt that's a program issue. That sort of thing is usually related to issues in the profile.

Do you regularly compact the message folders? Compacting is something that needs to be done regularly in any email programWhen done often enough, it can be an extremely fast process. Not doing so can lead to problems like those you are experiencing. See this about how to and why it's so important: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Compacting_folders

If you haven't been doing that before, first back up your Thunderbird Profile -- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_backup then compact all folders. If 'compacting' them (and leaving a long enough time for the process to complete) doesn't fully resolve the problem then do the following on each account:

Close Thunderbird. Find and delete all of the files with the .msf file extension in your profile folder/Mail http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_Folder#Thunderbird including your Local Folders, especially if you are using the global inbox. You must have "View hidden files and folders" on http://spywarewarrior.com/viewtopic.php?t=272 and you need to set "hide extensions for known file types" off (just below View Hidden) if you are using Windows. These are your mail summary files and do not hold any messages themselves. They will be rebuilt the next time you open each folder in Thunderbird. Compact all your folders when you have completed this.

To avoid this happening again, see the tips in these articles:
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Keep_it_worki ... derbird%29
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Performance_%28Thunderbird%29

[zoney70]

The issue definitely is not compaction related. I have run for years with automatic compact set for 20MB. Not to mention, the main folder of interest never has any messages deleted.

I now suspect the issue may be related to a recent server crash while ThunderBird was active.

I am backing up the profile. Once that completes (Nearly 8GB) I will try the *.msf solution. Thanks for the info.

[zoney70]

Rebuilding the .msf files appears to have solved that problem! At least, the Quick Filter now works correctly on the folder of interest.
Also, the profile now has nearly 500 fewer .msf files, which occupied about 300MB. All goodness.

While investigating the issue, I noticed that one of the inbox folders was not marked for offline use, so I marked that for offline use.

During the rebuild, I noted that all the inbox folders were reread. When the rebuild completed, I found that the aforementioned inbox now has a few dozen emails that have today's date in the Date column although these emails actually arrived over several months. Investigating this issue, I find that the originating email server (our fair city) failed to include a Date: header. However, the messages do have Delivery_date: headers with the correct dates of delivery.

Is there some way to configure TBird to use Delivery_date: in the Date column for sorting purposes? (Perhaps I should start a different topic for this.)

[DanRaisch]

(Perhaps I should start a different topic for this.)

I think that would be best.

Thanks for posting back with the results of your clean up work.

[zoney70]

Will do. Although, I now see that there is an outstanding Bugzilla report on the issue, started in early 2001, with no takers yet, 16 years and counting.

Sigh.