Thunderbird
I am requesting some help regarding Thunderbird and using POP vs. IMAP in order to download my Gmail emails from online to my local computer. What I had been doing up until recently was using POP. I would sign on to my local computer and have Thunderbird check with Gmail on the web and download all my messages to my local computer. Gmail automatically moved those downloaded messages into the Trash and after 30 days time there, automatically deleted the messages. The only time I left them on the web and used them there was when I was away from my local computer. I would then access messages online, delete those I didn’t want to keep, and leave the rest in my inbox on Gmail. When I returned to my local computer and had Thunderbird access Gmail, the messages would all be downloaded from the web to my local computer. As stated above, Gmail then moved those downloaded messages into the Trash and after 30 days time there, automatically deleted the messages. As I processed those messages from my local computer, deleting those I no longer wanted and moving the others into local folders, Gmail was no longer involved except to process new emails and then download them as described above. Fortunately or unfortunately, I returned from a month and a half away from my computer only to find that I could not sign on to Thunderbird. In researching the problem, it appeared that there was no way to still use my POP account for processing. I researched (remember, I’m a novice and only tried my best to research and solve my problem) and then created IMAP for my email. I have managed to make those changes and now access my Gmail account through IMAP. BUT… 1. I want the master copy--in fact, the only up-to-date copy--on my local computer. I do not want those emails that I’ve moved to local folders to sync with the web and keep them online. If for no other reason than that I am currently using 2.58 GB (17%) of my 15 GB of free storage. It certainly won’t be long before that’s exceeded if Gmail is going to keep copies of all emails that I don’t delete directly. 2. And now, having kept track of these things for a while, after I delete hundreds of emails from the inbox, either by actually deleting them or by simply moving them to a local folder, I’m finding that they’re coming back into the inbox again! 3. And why do I need two copies of these emails coming to me, one for the All Mail box and one for the Inbox? 4. Should I just go back to using a POP account to receive my email into Thunderbird? But then that leads back to how I got to this dilemma--how do I get Thunderbird to let me sign into my account?
Sorry for the length of this plea for help, but I don’t know what more I can do on my own. Thanks so much for any advice you can give me.
Solution choisie
A couple (maybe a few) of points.
- Make sure you have cookies enabled in Thunderbird (It is default but some security or privacy software protects us from defaults.)
- When you add the POP account again ensure the oAuth authentication methods is selected. (googles preferred authentication)
- Go to this link and make sure POP is enabled. https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/fwdandpop
- Go to this link and make click on the manage third part apps and make sure Thunderbird is not on the blocked list due to some accident. https://myaccount.google.com/security It should be Ok, but there is no harm in checking it out.
If you still have issues, please post back.
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1. IMAP is synchronized, it is not in the slightest useful for what you want to do. So forget using IMAP. All the other numbered parts will then not be an issue.
Note that I use POP with Gmail without problems, so perhaps whatever the issue you are having needs addressing. But not the ability to use POP on GMail as I am doing it. That part does unequivocally work when correctly configured and without help from Third part products.
Thanks so much for your help, Matt. You've emboldened me to realize I'm on the wrong track. I loved using POP with GMail, and I'm now going back to it, knowing it really does still work.
Solution choisie
A couple (maybe a few) of points.
- Make sure you have cookies enabled in Thunderbird (It is default but some security or privacy software protects us from defaults.)
- When you add the POP account again ensure the oAuth authentication methods is selected. (googles preferred authentication)
- Go to this link and make sure POP is enabled. https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/fwdandpop
- Go to this link and make click on the manage third part apps and make sure Thunderbird is not on the blocked list due to some accident. https://myaccount.google.com/security It should be Ok, but there is no harm in checking it out.
If you still have issues, please post back.
I finally got your four tips checked out. I really appreciated the direct links where you gave them to me. I had to do a little research to find where Thunderbird enables its cookies. Once I got everything working--I thought--I deleted my IMAP checking. And it deleted its inbox, where I'd accumulated 20,000 or so messages. So I quickly went to GMail. In my wanderings, I'd learned that after emails had been downloaded, the copy was in the Trash, saved for 30 days. So I went through my 20,000 emails in Trash and moved them all to the Inbox. Since they downloaded to my current mailbox, I now am working my way through 40,000 or so emails, but at least it doesn't appear that I lost anything. In fact, I even found some interesting emails way back to 2010 and have been reading through them for fun.
Again, thanks so much for your help! It's greatly appreciated.