Email account disappeared

[firefoxuse]

Hello,

A whole email account disappeared. What can I do?

Please DO NOT post links to webpages that have a TON of information about possible causes etc etc.

I need a solution with step 1, 2, 3.

thanks

UPDATE: It seems that the email account appears in the list when I start TB, but disappears after a couple of seconds :/

[malliz]

More information needed. Are you running multiple email accounts from Thunderbird and if so how many.
Is the Account that vanished web based or ISP based?
Did you try just adding it again using its settings?

[DanRaisch]

Please DO NOT post links to webpages that have a TON of information about possible causes etc etc.
I need a solution with step 1, 2, 3.

1) But that's how you would learn to resolve these issues on your own.
2) And just how are we supposed to provide that without knowing what's wrong on your system or how the account was set up? If you would just drop the demands for us to be psychics and provide you with instant solutions, you would get much more cooperation and support.

What version of Thunderbird?
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.
Does the same thing occur if you launch the application in Mozilla Safe Mode? http://kb.mozillazine.org/Safe_mode

[firefoxuse]

Latest version (duh, isn't it supposed to be always?)
IMAP

1) Is there a button to switch from IMAP to POP3? (is it better? more stable? more compact?)
2) Is there a button to download all messages from server including content?

[DanRaisch]

Latest version (duh, isn't it supposed to be always?)

No, many people choose not to update to the latest version if they are unhappy with changes to the user interface or fear they might lose support of legacy extensions.

1) Is there a button to switch from IMAP to POP3?

No, it's not as simple as clicking on a button. And with a POP account you would no longer have access to any server folder other than the inbox. That might be problematic if you have been used to seeing messages in other server folders.

(is it better? more stable? more compact?)

No, not really. Given your frequent problems you're better off staying with IMAP so the data may be on the server if you lose it on the Thunderbird side.

2) Is there a button to download all messages from server including content?

Click on the "down" arrow at the right side of the "Get Messages" button and click on "Get all new messages".

[firefoxuse]

(is it better? more stable? more compact?)

No, not really. Given your frequent problems you're better off staying with IMAP so the data may be on the server if you lose it on the Thunderbird side.

I thought POP3 would keep the emails in my laptop AND in the server? So if I lose them in my laptop, they won't get lost on the server?

[DanRaisch]

I thought POP3 would keep the emails in my laptop AND in the server?

You can set up the POP account to "Leave messages on server" but email provider's often set limits on how many messages can be stored or how much space can be used by the inbox. If those limits are exceeded, the account can be locked until the storage issue is addressed or they might delete the oldest stored messages to bring the numbers into compliance with their policies. Those limits might be fairly high on a provider like Gmail but some limit would still exist.

[firefoxuse]

I only use yahoo and gmail, which have 10TB of storage! I don't care about limits (for now)

[DanRaisch]

And which account stopped working/disappeared? It would better to recover that and get it working than to play around switching account types.