Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

User Help for Mozilla Thunderbird
noneya
Guest

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by noneya »

Agreed. The lack of an unread mail folder in Thunderbird is kind of ridiculous considering its long established usefulness in Outlook.
milkyman
Guest

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by milkyman »

Try add-on AdditionalFolders, which adds a seconds folder pane. Then you can set one pane to "unread" and leave the other as default.
Every folder with new mails is automatically shown in the unread pane.

Just one quirk: if the mail in a folder are all read, it will not automatically disappear in the unread folder.
Opinion_Jockey
Guest

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Opinion_Jockey »

I think that it is a bit funny how the original question was clear but the discussion segued into unrelated subjects but many posts never addressed the question. I found how to get an Unread folder from an old blog on another site, http://wooga.drbacchus.com/thunderbird- ... nread-mail.

Run a search of messages (Edit > Find) for a status of "isn't" read. Save the search as a folder.

You can mark the folder as a favorite, as well for viewing in favorites. T-bird does have a view for unread folders, but that does not show unread messages only.

I installed Additional folders, like milkyman suggested, and now I have favorite folders in the top pane, like in Outlook.

I did have issues setting up the search, though because there was not an easy way to set the search for all accounts. I could have a search for each account or select the folders to search when I saved the search. New folders need to be added to the search through the properties option.

The unread folder does not group messages the way Outlook does, but the messages can be sorted by the location column. Perhaps there is a grouping option somewhere for this. The unread folder also does not update automatically. The count updates, but the message list does not update until you nav away and back. It also counted itself for a moment, so I had a double count, but then it went back to a normal count when I clicked a message. Odd.

It's really funny that T-bird can be made to look and function like Outlook, but Outlook will never have the flexibility to look like anything other than what it is.
Opinion_Jockey
Posts: 2
Joined: August 28th, 2009, 1:55 pm

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Opinion_Jockey »

I've been using my unread folder for a couple of days now and the count is accurate and refreshes when a message is read. I would still like to organize the unread messages by grouping by folder...
guest01
Guest

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by guest01 »

For anyone still looking for an answer:

http://email.about.com/cs/mozillatips/qt/et040402.htm
User avatar
DanRaisch
Moderator
Posts: 127187
Joined: September 23rd, 2004, 8:57 pm
Location: Somewhere on the right coast

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by DanRaisch »

Except that should not be an issue if you use the "Unread Folders" view. That causes Thunderbird to display (in the left hand folder pane) only those folder which currently have unread messages. Do you have so many folders with unread messages that they require scrolling in that pane to view them all?
Sharonie2
Posts: 13
Joined: November 6th, 2009, 4:58 am

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Sharonie2 »

Daifne - not everyone is as super dooper organised as you nor does eveyone want to be.

Personally, I would find an undread mail folder extremely useful as I have lots of read emails in my inbox (and I like it that way!!!) and one unread email which I cannot find.

I moved from Outlook where I had such a folder and I liked it. I would find it very useful in Thunderbird too. If anyone has an info on how to create such a folder, I would be grateful to learn about. it.

I do not need any lectures on how to organise my folder by moving things around....not helpful!
Sharonie2
Posts: 13
Joined: November 6th, 2009, 4:58 am

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Sharonie2 »

Guest 01 Thank you for this link - http://email.about.com/cs/mozillatips/qt/et040402.htm

Simple instructions which work and no lectures!!
User avatar
DanRaisch
Moderator
Posts: 127187
Joined: September 23rd, 2004, 8:57 pm
Location: Somewhere on the right coast

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by DanRaisch »

Sharonie2, it's not a matter of how you like to work. It's a matter of "do you want the program to work well or are you going to insist on working a particular way, even if it poses the risk of data loss?" Storing messages in the Inbox of any email account is a very bad practice. As the busiest area of the system, the Inbox is most at risk of data corruption and corresponding data loss. The more messages in the Inbox, the more messages at risk of loss. Creating an organization of folders, typically under Local Folders, and moving all but the most recent messages from the Inbox to that structure, will help to minimize risk of loss and improve performance.
User avatar
Daifne
Moderator
Posts: 123071
Joined: July 31st, 2005, 9:17 pm
Location: Where the Waters Meet, Wisconsin

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Daifne »

Sharonie2 wrote:Daifne - not everyone is as super dooper organised as you nor does eveyone want to be.


ROFLMAO! Ask my fiancé how organized I am... I am anything but. I just don't want to have my inbox corrupted, so I do move stuff to other folders. Are those folders well organized? Not really, but I can find things.
Opinion_Jockey
Posts: 2
Joined: August 28th, 2009, 1:55 pm

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Opinion_Jockey »

guest01 wrote:For anyone still looking for an answer:

http://email.about.com/cs/mozillatips/qt/et040402.htm


This is fine for seeing just unread messages, but what I wanted and wound up using was a multi-pane display. The top-left pane is set to favorite folders and has a count of my main Inbox unread messages and and count of all Unread messages. Of course I can add more favorite folders. The bottom-left pane shows all accounts, all folders, and counts of unread messages. The top-right pane is my message list, and the bottom-right pane is the selected message or default web page when no message is selected. I can still cycle through the different displays (Favorites, Unread, Recent, and All) in the panes on the left. I can change my settings to show different displays and I am now considering creating a folder for all messages with certain tags. Like the To do list can be a Favorite Folder.
Guest
Guest

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by Guest »

Opinion_Jockey wrote:I think that it is a bit funny how the original question was clear but the discussion segued into unrelated subjects but many posts never addressed the question. I found how to get an Unread folder from an old blog on another site, http://wooga.drbacchus.com/thunderbird- ... nread-mail.

Run a search of messages (Edit > Find) for a status of "isn't" read. Save the search as a folder.

You can mark the folder as a favorite, as well for viewing in favorites. T-bird does have a view for unread folders, but that does not show unread messages only.

I installed Additional folders, like milkyman suggested, and now I have favorite folders in the top pane, like in Outlook.

I did have issues setting up the search, though because there was not an easy way to set the search for all accounts. I could have a search for each account or select the folders to search when I saved the search. New folders need to be added to the search through the properties option.

The unread folder does not group messages the way Outlook does, but the messages can be sorted by the location column. Perhaps there is a grouping option somewhere for this. The unread folder also does not update automatically. The count updates, but the message list does not update until you nav away and back. It also counted itself for a moment, so I had a double count, but then it went back to a normal count when I clicked a message. Odd.

It's really funny that T-bird can be made to look and function like Outlook, but Outlook will never have the flexibility to look like anything other than what it is.


Thank you! This solution is near perfect. I'm a Windows Live Mail user looking for other options now that hotmail has been freed once again to work with other clients (via pop/smtp). I did become spoiled by WLM's Unread folder feature which allowed me to see all unread mail headers across my half-dozen or so different accounts with their individual inboxes.

I've set it up as you describe and it works well. A very minor gripe is that my "Unread" search folder must reside under an account (I used Local Folder) where as it's found at the topmost "account" level in WLM's folder pane. I can live with that.

Another annoyance is having to manually specify in the unread folder's search settings any new accounts that I may add later, but I can live with that also.

Grouping of different account emails within the unread folder would be nice to have, but I find that I can enable the "account" column for the message headers in the unread folder and quickly discern which account a particular message belongs to. Since I'm only searching the inbox folder of each account, there's no need for the 'location' column.

All in all, Thunderbird's "search folder" concept appears very powerful and should be very useful.

Thanks again for the tips! =D>
imjohn
Posts: 12
Joined: February 13th, 2006, 6:21 pm
Location: Texas

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by imjohn »

Okay, I'm going to see if I can walk through this again.
I just created an UNREAD folder in Thunderbird 52.4.0 after trying a multitude of things.
1 - Right click on your email address at the top of your folder list.
2 - Select Search Messages
3 - When the Search Messages box opens click on Subject and select Status
4 - Click on the next box is and select isn't
5 - Click on the next box Replied and select Read
6 - Click on the Search box (top right corner) to make sure you have nothing but unread messages displayed
7 - Now down at the bottom, click on Save as Search Folder
8 - Now give the folder a unique name, such as UNREAD.
9 - Now click on the Create selection at the bottom right and you should have an UNREAD folder in your folder list.
10 - Your display will have the following columns:

This is not the default, but the way I reordered them:
1 - Subject
2 - Location
3 - Correspondents / Sender
4 - Date ( I set this as my default with latest date first.)

I have LOTS of folders (25+) and (70+) filters that I use to separate my incoming emails such as:
One for each of my regular email recipients (26) all the others end up in my Inbox
One for purchases, for each of my software vendors, for each of the companies that I regularly do business with, for each forum I precipitate in . . . well you get the idea.
I like to keep my actual Inbox as clear as possible and It is usually blank.

My emails had become a tremendous mess until I started using this system and many friends are wanting me to look up information in specific emails and that's where it really shines.
Hope this helps and there aren't any errors,
John
User avatar
DanRaisch
Moderator
Posts: 127187
Joined: September 23rd, 2004, 8:57 pm
Location: Somewhere on the right coast

Re: Mozilla Thunderbird unread folder

Post by DanRaisch »

I appreciate the time and effort involved in your post but please note that the last reply in this thread is dated July 18, 2012. It's very doubtful that anyone in the original discussion was still seeking input on the subject.

Locking this due to the age of the original posts -- 5 years. It will still be accessible for reading but no further posts will be accepted.
Locked