thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

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cranleighboy
Posts: 8
Joined: July 10th, 2020, 3:25 pm

thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by cranleighboy »

I foolishly thought that moving Thunderbird from one Windows 7 machine to another Windows 7 would be easy. How mistaken I was!!

I followed the recommended paths, identified the profile in use, moved up a couple of levels, copied the files to a remote disk, then did the reverse on the new machine. Didn't work!! After several tries, I did a sideways move, allowed Thunderbird to create a 'new user' profile, then removed all the files from that profile and copied across the contents of the profile from the source machine. In passing I noted a strange thing -- which may be part of the cause -- on the source machine the active profile is located in AppData/Local/Thunderbird whereas on the destination machine Thunderbird was expecting it in AppData/Roaming/Thunderbird. Strange.

What I now have is an email system that will work with Thunderbird in Safe mode, but if one tries to use Thunderbird in normal mode it briefly loads as a small window in the top left, then exits with no messages or error reports.

While I can work in Thunderbird Safe mode it is somewhat annoying to be missing the spell checker!!

Suggestions welcome
cranleighboy
Posts: 8
Joined: July 10th, 2020, 3:25 pm

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by cranleighboy »

I have just had the small window that appears on entering TB directly not vanish, on enlarging it contains the text (in red):
'<window id = "messageerWindow"
^"
This means nothing to me but may help others who know more of the internals of TB!

Regards
cranleighboy
Posts: 8
Joined: July 10th, 2020, 3:25 pm

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by cranleighboy »

sorry for misspelling text is:
'<window id = "messengerWindow"
^'
phkhgh
Posts: 845
Joined: January 25th, 2007, 2:49 pm
Location: So. U.S.A.

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by phkhgh »

It's probably worth while to create a new profile & start from that, to see if it solves problems. They often get corrupted & creating a new one is faster than most troubleshooting. See below how to create & then use the new one.

I haven't seen that message before. But moving from one Win PC to another (same OS vers??) shouldn't be too bad.
A couple of files I've found lately that gave probs (under Linux) was "compatibility.ini" in the root profile folder. I read from good authority it won't hurt to delete it. (I did, in Linux, but...)

Another is profiles.ini. which in Linux is in the Thunderbird folder. You can easily look up where their default location is in Win.
Profiles.ini often gets in a state where it shows one or more profiles "locked," even when they aren't. It's usually a separate set of lines, apart from ones describing each profile you have.


As for
I followed the recommended paths, identified the profile in use, moved up a couple of levels, copied the files to a remote disk,
In each OS, Tb or Fx expect the profile to be in an exact path, UNLESS you move them to a non-default location. Just read the KB for the correct profile path in Windows.
Then put the profile's name folder like (xxxxxxxx.tbird-2020-07-21) - that you can create a name by executing "thunderbird -P" from Windows Run box, or from a command line / prompt [no quotes] to open the profile manager. When you create a profile, it will put it in the right (default) path. The profile's name folder is what it's looking for. All other subfolders & files come under it.

In the profile mgr, you can pick which profile you want it to use. Until things get straightened out, leave the line in profile mgr UNchecked, "use the selected profile w/o asking at startup.

I seem to remember there were 2 instances of Tb / Fx profiles in Windows, but only one is used to fire up the app. I'm not sure if the other is some type of backup. That may be the one you mentioned in "Roaming." You need to worry about the one in the specified path, in "where to find thunderbird profile in Windows.
cranleighboy
Posts: 8
Joined: July 10th, 2020, 3:25 pm

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by cranleighboy »

Thanks phkhgh -- most of that I have already tried. I am reluctant to create a new profile as I don't want to mess up my present emails, address book and who knows what!!

However I have moved three steps forward and two back. As many of the recommendations involved faulty extensions -- advice that I had ignored as I had never put any in and Thunderbird was reporting (in safe mode) that there were none, I decided to delete (actually rename) .../profilename/extensions to see what happened. Thunderbird then loaded correctly in normal mode (yippee -- solved!!) and had dutifully created a new .../profilename/extensions (empty). I then moved back the previous items into .../profilename/extensions loading thunderbird each time to locate the offending item. It was still loading OK when all the contents had been added back in!!! -- three steps forward!!

However what was now not working -- two steps back -- was the spell checker (which was not working in safe mode, but I assumed that was a side effect of safe mode). I have tried various ways to restore spell checker, but it does not want to locate dictionaries. I can download dictionaries and language packs as add-ins, and they arrive & install -- but don't appear in the spell checker.

Ideas on restoring dictionaries/language packs please!!

Regards Chris
cranleighboy
Posts: 8
Joined: July 10th, 2020, 3:25 pm

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by cranleighboy »

Finally resolved after a lot of digging. Clearly the automativ system for loading disctionaries/extensions did not work and I eventually forund buried very deeply the command 'Install Add-on From File…' which did the trick!
comhon
Posts: 1
Joined: February 20th, 2021, 8:34 am

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by comhon »

I had the same problem today when migrating my e-mails. On the first startup, the profile was loaded, but on the next, the said error window was shown. I tried removing languages, extensions on multiple attempts, but with no result. Fortunatelly, I did not need the local store of messages, but I was doing the transfer to prevent setting up multiple accounts. After a few attempts, I found out there are just four required files, that can be used to recreate the profile from scratch: perfs.js, cert9.db, key4.db and logins.json. I put these in empty profile directory and Thunderbird did the rest.
EastbourneOldie
Posts: 5
Joined: August 8th, 2014, 12:04 am

Re: thunderbird failing to load after move to new machine

Post by EastbourneOldie »

Just want to say a huge thanks to comhon - just save me hours of work with that information. I copied those files to a new profile and TB78 then opened Ok with all my settings and mails showing, Also the address book folders but not the actual addresses in them. However I was then able to also copy the various abook.sqlite files to the new profile (didn't need the old abook.mab fiiles from TB68) and hey presto all my addresses appeared in the correct folders. I did look at doing something similar with my extensions but wasn't sure which files to copy or whether this might upset things, so as there weren't that many I just re downloaded and installed then afresh. Now I have a completely working TB78 on my new Windows 10PC - many thanks again
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