Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

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zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

Good evening,
My PC is set up in double boot UBUNTU | Windows10.
My Thunderbird data are on a NTFS partition.
I use Thunderbird on both sides.

Several days ago, I tried to download my latest e-mails on Windows where Thunderbird was propably at an older update level.
It had lost the knowledge of the messages already downloaded and started to download thousands of e-mails. I cancelled it.
Same behavior on the Ubuntu side.

I tried to find some ways to fix the problem.
- "Repar" the folder
- Delete the files ".msf" in the Mail folder of the profile.
.... in vain.

Would somene know how to fix this?
Thank you!
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DanRaisch
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Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by DanRaisch »

Moving to Thunderbird Support.

What version of Thunderbird are you running?
How is the account set up in Thunderbird, as POP or IMAP? Find out using menu path Edit->Account Settings->Server Settings->Server Type at the top right of the dialogue.
zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

I am running
-102.2.2 on Ubuntu side
- 102.3.2 on Windows10 side (It was older when the problem was fired).

My account is set up as POP.
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tanstaafl
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Joined: July 30th, 2003, 5:06 pm

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by tanstaafl »

Sometimes the global search search index gets corrupted and it keeps downloading mail. Try temporarily disabling it and see if that has any effect. If its due to that the workaround is to delete global-messages-db.* and let it build it again.

Probably won't help but it wouldn't hurt to compact the inbox.

The popstate.dat file is used to record what messages have been downloaded. Look in the files properties in Windows to see when it was created. The normal time date stamp doesn't help as that shows when its contents were last changed. I'm wondering if there are problems with that file.
zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

Thank you for the advices :
"Try temporarily disabling it and see if that has any effect."
I did it. It didn't fix the problem.

"Probably won't help but it wouldn't hurt to compact the inbox."
I did it by the mean of Windows Explorer (right click on Inbox, and action on the Advanced Properties panel).
It didn't fix the problem.

"The popstate.dat file is used to record what messages have been downloaded. Look in the files properties in Windows to see when it was created."
In was created on Thurday the 13th,
and modified today (where I canceled the receive command process).

I didn't fix the problem.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by tanstaafl »

"I did it by the mean of Windows Explorer (right click on Inbox, and action on the Advanced Properties panel)."

compact != compress.

That's NTFS compression, it just reduces the amount of storage used, and is completely transparent to Thunderbird. I'm talking about "compacting", a feature of Thunderbird that understands what messages have been marked for deletion and knows how to physically remove them from the file. It has no effect on the rest of the file.

https://winbuzzer.com/2021/02/01/compre ... 10-xcxwbt/
zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

compact != compress.

Indeed!
I have always had the option checked to compact automatically. But as far as I understand, this is fired on some criteria with a popup asking for confirmation. But I am not able to fire it.
zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

I managed to force compacting by modifying the size limit that triggers the process in Thunderbird.
This didn't fix the problem.
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DanRaisch
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Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by DanRaisch »

First, backup your Profile ( http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_backup )

Create a new sub-folder under Local Folders. Move all of the messages currently in your Inbox to that new subfolder.

Confirm that you have made the recommended backup of your Profile.

Close Thunderbird and navigate to the \Mail sub-folder of your Profile folder. Delete both the file Inbox.msf and the file Inbox with no extension.

Restart Thunderbird and you should find a new, empty Inbox folder in place. Copy any messages you MUST have in your Inbox from the sub-folder created above to the Inbox. Compact the Inbox after those messages are copied in.

The "Real Fix" entry in this article -- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Compacting_folders#Real_fix also describes this process.
Johnny_Sun
Posts: 124
Joined: August 7th, 2003, 8:08 pm

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by Johnny_Sun »

I have the same issue on win10 recently. Thunderbird keeps retrieving old mails from pop3 mail server. I checked and found the popstate.dat file is empty. I copied a popstate.dat from backup and replaced the empty one. But the file just shrinks from 1.6MB to 975KB once Thunderbird checks mail and it still getting old mails.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by tanstaafl »

What email provider are you using for the POP account?

Try setting mailnews.pop3.jsmodule false using the config editor and restarting Thunderbird. Version 102 replaced the old C++ module for POP support with a new one written in Javascript. The new code doesn't work well with every email provider.

There is a button for the config editor at the bottom of tools -> settings -> general. Its essentially about:config for Thunderbird.

If that workaround works I suggest you file a bug report against Thunderbird at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/home where you tell them what the problem was, who your email provider was, and that reverting to the old implementation worked around the problem. If you don't tell them this they won't investigate what caused the problem in the rewritten code.

If you do that please post a link to the bug report.
Johnny_Sun
Posts: 124
Joined: August 7th, 2003, 8:08 pm

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by Johnny_Sun »

zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

Sorry, I was convinced I had replied.
I have been very busy and wasted a lot of time with the Thunderbird trouble.

My e-mail provider is pop.orange.fr

In Oktober, I followed the advice of Dan RAISH (October 16th, 2022, 4:55 pm)
This led me to download again all the messages from the server that had already been dowloaded, and I didn't want.
I have worked with this version (Ubuntu side) since then, beeing able then to download only the not yet downloaded messages.

Yesterday, I worked on the Windows side, and downloaded my messages.
The behavior was than again to download all messages from the server.
On Ubuntu side then also now.

I suspect that Thunderbird is no longer able to let us work with common data files from both sides Ubuntu and Windows as I have been used to do for 5 years.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by tanstaafl »

Just to be clear, are you using a common/shared profile or does each operating system have its own Thunderbird profile?
zoe1
Posts: 7
Joined: October 15th, 2022, 11:34 am

Re: Thunderbird downloads already downloaded e-mails

Post by zoe1 »

Thank you for your reply.
My profile is a folder on a NTFS partition.
It is common/shared by both operating sytems.
Regards
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