[mdlug] Missing account in Thunderbird

[Ron / BCLUG]

Carl T. Miller wrote on 2024-08-16 03:51:

> In ~/.thunderbird/ each profile is stored in a subfolder
> with a random name, usually ending with ".default"
> (e.g., "abcd1234.default").
> 
> If you're having trouble locating the profile folder, you
> can open Thunderbird and go to Help > Troubleshooting
> Information. On that page, there's a section called
> "Profile Folder" with a button to open the current
> profile directory.

That's good info. Maybe I can expand on it.

First, back up ~/.thunderbird.



Assuming you're using IMAP...


Probably the best way to recover your Gmail is to go to Account Settings 
(right-click account name and select Settings), rename your current 
Account Name to something like you at gmail.com.OLD

Next, create a new account in Thunderbird for you at gmail.com, and let 
IMAP re-sync all the messages.

Eventually, remove the old account and its data via Account Settings > 
Remove Account. There's an option to remove the files from disk for a 
full cleanup.



For further digging:

I have customized my setup at some point in the distant past, so the 
folder names may not match up exactly in the middle of the path, but in 
~/.thunderbird/email/tbird_prof/ImapMail is where one finds all their 
email account data.

Look for ImapMail somewhere in ~/.thunderbird, that's where the data is.


There's one folder and one file per account, awkwardly named something 
like gmail.com/ and gmail.com.msf.  This gets to be awkward when there 
are multiple accounts per provider.


This part is not necessary, but...

I dislike this naming scheme, so on the Account Settings for each 
account, I go to Server Settings and at the bottom is Local Directory.

In bash I rename gmail.com/ to me at gmail.com/ and gmail.com.msf to 
me at gmail.com.msf, THEN change the TB Local Directory.  This causes 
Thunderbird to restart.  Now I can easily match storage locations to 
accounts.

rb