TB method of POP3 "leave message on server" changed (?) - broken now on AOL servers
Greetings.
I'm trying to work out using email clients on multiple computers, including a new one. I've been having various issues; one of the things that I started trying to do was to change our "legacy" email from POP to IMAP, using the suggested steps here:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/switch-pop-imap-account
That hasn't worked however. I opened a separate query for that here:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1330505
So now I'm trying to re-enable my legacy POP settings - but it's not working! Now when I re-check "leave messages on the server" - I get this error message back:
The POP3 mail server (pop.aol.com) does not support UIDL or XTND XLST, which are required to implement the ``Leave on Server, ``Maximum Message Size or ``Fetch Headers Only options. To download your mail, turn off these options in the Server Settings for your mail server in the Account Settings window.
So it appears that something has changed in the way that TB sends this setting to the AOL POP3 server. The old method worked - the new method does not. And unfortunately unchecking and then re-checking the setting within TB caused it to now start using the new not-compatible method!
Help please!
Is there any way I can revert to using the old method? E.g. perhaps is there a way I can restore my old server settings profile?
Thanks.
(P.S. the more I read about it - the more I prefer POP over IMAP. I want to be able to use email across multiple devices while leaving emails on the server - but only leaving them for a limited period of time, for security and space reasons. This appears to only be supported in POP not IMAP (?), which seems bizarre if true.)
Chosen solution
If using IMAP on all computers this means all computer will only display what is on server. So if you start deleting emails off server then you also find them deleted from the imap folders. So
However, if you download full copies and get 'copies' of them into the 'Local Folders' mail account, then you can delete them off the server and still see those emails in Thunderbird - in 'Local Folders' mail account. Obviously if you want identical copies of emails in 'Local Folders' then either you need to repeat the action of copying to 'Local Folders' on all computers before deleting off server OR perform on one computer and then copy paste the profile 'Local Folder' folders between each computer profile.
The message you are getting from the server typically occurs only on yahoo servers for eg: verizon, aol etc.
It is random and if this was a setting wrong in Thunderbird then all hell would have occurred with thousands of compaints. Yahoo has loads of server clusters to store accounts and it has been thought that one of them may have an issue, but it's not exactly something you can prove. But, it seems to occur when yahoo servers would like you to delete emails off server, hence the message which would force this. Even I got one of those messages some time back for one of my accounts. I logged on to server/webmail account and deleted a large batch of old emails and low and behold it started working again. So worth trying :)
re :So now I'm trying to re-enable my legacy POP settings When you removed the old pop accounts from Thunderbird,did you then access the profile name folders and also delete the pop account? Thunderbird does not auto delete the pop account files from the profile, so it is likely they are still there. This means you can point the 'new' pop account to look at the old pop account and get a view of all your emails again. How to point new pop account to old pop account:
- Right click on new pop account name in Folder Pane and select 'Settings'
- Select 'Server Settings'
bottom right you will see 'Local directory:'
- make the window wider to see all the info.
It will say some thing like this: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername-1.com Notice it will have a number added to the pop account.
- Click on 'Browse'
It will open showing contents of that mail.servername-1.com folder
- go up directory to the 'Mail' folder to see other pop accounts.
and locate the original pop account which may not have a number eg: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername.com
- select the pop account name folder
- click on 'Select Folder'
Now restart Thunderbird.
Read this answer in context 👍 0All Replies (3)
Chosen Solution
If using IMAP on all computers this means all computer will only display what is on server. So if you start deleting emails off server then you also find them deleted from the imap folders. So
However, if you download full copies and get 'copies' of them into the 'Local Folders' mail account, then you can delete them off the server and still see those emails in Thunderbird - in 'Local Folders' mail account. Obviously if you want identical copies of emails in 'Local Folders' then either you need to repeat the action of copying to 'Local Folders' on all computers before deleting off server OR perform on one computer and then copy paste the profile 'Local Folder' folders between each computer profile.
The message you are getting from the server typically occurs only on yahoo servers for eg: verizon, aol etc.
It is random and if this was a setting wrong in Thunderbird then all hell would have occurred with thousands of compaints. Yahoo has loads of server clusters to store accounts and it has been thought that one of them may have an issue, but it's not exactly something you can prove. But, it seems to occur when yahoo servers would like you to delete emails off server, hence the message which would force this. Even I got one of those messages some time back for one of my accounts. I logged on to server/webmail account and deleted a large batch of old emails and low and behold it started working again. So worth trying :)
re :So now I'm trying to re-enable my legacy POP settings When you removed the old pop accounts from Thunderbird,did you then access the profile name folders and also delete the pop account? Thunderbird does not auto delete the pop account files from the profile, so it is likely they are still there. This means you can point the 'new' pop account to look at the old pop account and get a view of all your emails again. How to point new pop account to old pop account:
- Right click on new pop account name in Folder Pane and select 'Settings'
- Select 'Server Settings'
bottom right you will see 'Local directory:'
- make the window wider to see all the info.
It will say some thing like this: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername-1.com Notice it will have a number added to the pop account.
- Click on 'Browse'
It will open showing contents of that mail.servername-1.com folder
- go up directory to the 'Mail' folder to see other pop accounts.
and locate the original pop account which may not have a number eg: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername.com
- select the pop account name folder
- click on 'Select Folder'
Now restart Thunderbird.
Thanks much for the response. Very helpful. Breaking down the bits...
Toad-Hall said
If using IMAP on all computers this means all computer will only display what is on server. So if you start deleting emails off server then you also find them deleted from the imap folders. So However, if you download full copies and get 'copies' of them into the 'Local Folders' mail account, then you can delete them off the server and still see those emails in Thunderbird - in 'Local Folders' mail account. Obviously if you want identical copies of emails in 'Local Folders' then either you need to repeat the action of copying to 'Local Folders' on all computers before deleting off server OR perform on one computer and then copy paste the profile 'Local Folder' folders between each computer profile.
Yep - that's what I was planning on doing if I couldn't get POP to work - just setting up all devices (two PCs and two phones) with IMAP, and then every now and then manually doing a move of older emails to an "archived inbox" folder in Local Folders.
Toad-Hall said
The message you are getting from the server typically occurs only on yahoo servers for eg: verizon, aol etc. It is random and if this was a setting wrong in Thunderbird then all hell would have occurred with thousands of compaints.
Well I'm guessing I'm one of only a few people who have tried to turn off that POP setting (e.g. in attempt to switch to IMAP), and the turned it back on again, and also using the not-as-often-used AOL servers. However....
Toad-Hall said
Yahoo has loads of server clusters to store accounts and it has been thought that one of them may have an issue, but it's not exactly something you can prove. But, it seems to occur when yahoo servers would like you to delete emails off server, hence the message which would force this. Even I got one of those messages some time back for one of my accounts. I logged on to server/webmail account and deleted a large batch of old emails and low and behold it started working again. So worth trying :)
I think that's it! Last night it started working again - my guess is it had switched to a different server from which to fetch the emails, and the other server doesn't have this issue. Seems really odd and coincidental that this would happen for me right when I was tweaking this setting (it was the first time I had ever done it), so I figured it was way too coincidental.
Toad-Hall said
re :So now I'm trying to re-enable my legacy POP settings When you removed the old pop accounts from Thunderbird,did you then access the profile name folders and also delete the pop account? Thunderbird does not auto delete the pop account files from the profile, so it is likely they are still there. This means you can point the 'new' pop account to look at the old pop account and get a view of all your emails again. How to point new pop account to old pop account:bottom right you will see 'Local directory:'
- Right click on new pop account name in Folder Pane and select 'Settings'
- Select 'Server Settings'
It will say some thing like this: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername-1.com Notice it will have a number added to the pop account.
- make the window wider to see all the info.
It will open showing contents of that mail.servername-1.com folder
- Click on 'Browse'
and locate the original pop account which may not have a number eg: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername.com
- go up directory to the 'Mail' folder to see other pop accounts.
Now restart Thunderbird.
- select the pop account name folder
- click on 'Select Folder'
Thanks - now that I see that it's OK I won't do this - however I have this information saved and will give it a shot if I have problems again.
I may still end up switching to all-IMAP at some point, if I can get *that* problem figured out.
Modified by jasgstock
Thanks much for the response. Very helpful. Breaking down the bits...
Toad-Hall said
If using IMAP on all computers this means all computer will only display what is on server. So if you start deleting emails off server then you also find them deleted from the imap folders. So However, if you download full copies and get 'copies' of them into the 'Local Folders' mail account, then you can delete them off the server and still see those emails in Thunderbird - in 'Local Folders' mail account. Obviously if you want identical copies of emails in 'Local Folders' then either you need to repeat the action of copying to 'Local Folders' on all computers before deleting off server OR perform on one computer and then copy paste the profile 'Local Folder' folders between each computer profile.
Yep - that's what I was planning on doing if I couldn't get POP to work - just setting up all devices (two PCs and two phones) with IMAP, and then every now and then manually doing a move of older emails to an "archived inbox" folder in Local Folders.
Toad-Hall said
The message you are getting from the server typically occurs only on yahoo servers for eg: verizon, aol etc. It is random and if this was a setting wrong in Thunderbird then all hell would have occurred with thousands of compaints.
Well I'm guessing I'm one of only a few people who have tried to turn off that POP (e.g. in attempt to switch to IMAP), and the turned it back on again, and also using the not-as-often-used AOL servers. However....
Toad-Hall said
Yahoo has loads of server clusters to store accounts and it has been thought that one of them may have an issue, but it's not exactly something you can prove. But, it seems to occur when yahoo servers would like you to delete emails off server, hence the message which would force this. Even I got one of those messages some time back for one of my accounts. I logged on to server/webmail account and deleted a large batch of old emails and low and behold it started working again. So worth trying :)
I think that's it! Last night it started working again - my guess is it had switched to a different server from which to fetch the emails, and the other server does not have this issue. Seems really odd and coincidental that this would happen for me right when I was tweaking this setting (it was the first time I had ever done it), so I figured it was way too coincidental.
Toad-Hall said
re :So now I'm trying to re-enable my legacy POP settings When you removed the old pop accounts from Thunderbird,did you then access the profile name folders and also delete the pop account? Thunderbird does not auto delete the pop account files from the profile, so it is likely they are still there. This means you can point the 'new' pop account to look at the old pop account and get a view of all your emails again. How to point new pop account to old pop account:bottom right you will see 'Local directory:'
- Right click on new pop account name in Folder Pane and select 'Settings'
- Select 'Server Settings'
It will say some thing like this: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername-1.com Notice it will have a number added to the pop account.
- make the window wider to see all the info.
It will open showing contents of that mail.servername-1.com folder
- Click on 'Browse'
and locate the original pop account which may not have a number eg: C:\Users\User Account \AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\6w5tt99a.default\Mail\mail.servername.com
- go up directory to the 'Mail' folder to see other pop accounts.
Now restart Thunderbird.
- select the pop account name folder
- click on 'Select Folder'
Thanks - now that I see that it's OK I won't do this - however I have this information saved and will give it a shot if I have problems again.
I may still end up switching to all-IMAP at some point, if I can get *that* problem figured out.