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Thunderbird can reply but not send new mail!!!

  • 5 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 6 views
  • Last reply by Matt

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I'm experienced thunderbird and computer user, baffled by this.

I created a new account at my website host for email. It receives fine, it REPLIES fine, it hangs on send. 100% repeatable.

On send, it appears to send then hang on copy to sent folder step. My sent folder is a nested folder Inbox/sent, because my website hosts just thinks thats the way it should be. I have no reason to think that is related except its different than my other accounts. I can manually copy to sent folder fine. Have varied the setting for save files to in the account, with no effect.

I have settings to leave message in same folder on replies, so suspect it cant copy to sent, even though it has no other similar issues.

Once it hangs, the mail sub-window is dead. It wont send it again, closing it makes a warning dialog.

So, I assume this is some weird interaction with my mail host, but I have no way to diagnose further. It baffles me why it would make a difference if its a reply or a new email.

Webmail host is inmotionhosting.com

Thanks for any pointers.

I'm experienced thunderbird and computer user, baffled by this. I created a new account at my website host for email. It receives fine, it REPLIES fine, it hangs on send. 100% repeatable. On send, it appears to send then hang on copy to sent folder step. My sent folder is a nested folder Inbox/sent, because my website hosts just thinks thats the way it should be. I have no reason to think that is related except its different than my other accounts. I can manually copy to sent folder fine. Have varied the setting for save files to in the account, with no effect. I have settings to leave message in same folder on replies, so suspect it cant copy to sent, even though it has no other similar issues. Once it hangs, the mail sub-window is dead. It wont send it again, closing it makes a warning dialog. So, I assume this is some weird interaction with my mail host, but I have no way to diagnose further. It baffles me why it would make a difference if its a reply or a new email. Webmail host is inmotionhosting.com Thanks for any pointers.

Chosen solution

just something to try.

Tools > account settings >server settings > advanced and insert inbox. (including the . ) as the personal namespace and allow the server to override it. Restarting Thunderbird after the change.

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All Replies (5)

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I'm presuming this is an Imap mail account as the Sent folder is considered a sub folder to the inbox.

Try this: Tools > Account Settings > Copies & Folders for the mail account or menu icon > Options > Account Settings > Copies & Folders for the mail account

when sending messages, automatically Select: 'Place a copy in' select: 'Other' and choose the Sent folder for the imap mail account select: 'Place replies in the folder of the mesage being replied to' click on OK

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Thank you. Good suggestion but it had no effect on behavior.

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Chosen Solution

just something to try.

Tools > account settings >server settings > advanced and insert inbox. (including the . ) as the personal namespace and allow the server to override it. Restarting Thunderbird after the change.

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Thanks! I have no idea what those changes are supposed to do, but I have finally been able to send a message from that account.

Thunderbird could "see" the sent folder, but clearly not as the special folder it is supposed to be. Before this change, the sent folder had the normal folder icon, now it has the sent icon.

Ditto for the junk folder.

I suspect this is a bug/oversight as somewhere the special folders are not being given their full path. That and the failure does not result in an error message.

If any developers are reading this, perhaps have a look at the code which sets the special folder icons, and work back to why it isnt accepting "inbox/junk" as the junk folder and inbox/sent as the sent folder.

Modified by mrbi11

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That "change" tells Thunderbird that your imap server is strange in that the special folders hang off the inbox on the server. ie inbox\send, inbox\drafts etc. The root of the folder in "inbox." not the more common " " this is what you replaced with inbox.

What is generally simply not considered is that the mail server runs IMAP server software. This is not a single IMAP program. Like word processors there are multiple "brands" and each one has it's own setup and its own strengths. So when writing a program that connects to an imap server there needs to be setting to cope with all the possibilities. You have just changed your settings to cope with the possibility that the people setting up the server decided the personal namespace was inbox.

BTW I think you will find the messages were going out. The SMTP sending process is separate to the saving of the mail to the sent folder.