Working offline: dragging mails from Inbox to Local Folders not working
Dear All,
I am often unable to drag mails from the Inbox to the Local Folders when offline, for example when travelling on a train. Whilst still being online, e.g. at home, I do File – Offline – and I tick ‘Work Offline’. I press ‘Download now’ when prompted ‘Do you want to download message for offline use before going offline?’. The bar at the bottom moves until this download has been completed.
Once on the train I start Thunderbird automatically in offline mode. Initially the Inbox seems to be genuinely offline as shown by the ‘Inbox’ icon with the green arrow in the tab at the top. I am also able to drag mails from the Inbox to the Local Folders.
This then seems to change and the Inbox icon disappears from the tab and just displays ‘Inbox’ and the green circle spinning. Also the two little monitors in the lh bottom corner are present and when hovering over them say ‘You are currently on line’ with the message in the bottom bar ‘[my email address]: is currently looking for imap …’ or similar At some time then it switched to ‘off line’ again and the Inbox icon was properly displayed in the tab at the top. Interestingly, other folders that are also part of my online mailbox, like the default folders ‘Sent’ and ‘Junk’ work well in offline mode and so do some folders I created as part of my online mailbox, e.g. ‘ebay’ and ‘facebook’.
How can I get more reliability into working offline?
For info – here are some settings that I use. Account Settings – Synchronisation & Storage – Items for Offline Use – Choose mail folders and newsgroups for offline use: ‘Inbox’ is ticked, along with other folders that I’m using when on-line, e.g. ‘ebay’ and ‘facebook’. Account Settings – Server Settings: ‘Check for new messages at startup’ ‘Check for new messages every 10 minutes’ ‘Allow immediate server notification when new messages arrive’ They are all ticked but I also tried working offline with all those unticked. Synchronisation & Storage: Keep messages for this account on this computer’ is ticked. Windows 10 Thunderbird 45.2
Any advice welcome. Blackredgold1964
All Replies (3)
Hello All, Just being more patient seems to help, waiting for Thunderbird to start, clicking 'later' when prompted ‘Do you want to download messages for offline use before going offline?’
Thunderbird seems to be quite stable offline now and problem might be solved.
I think Thunderbird is simply trying to synchronise and, being offline, obviously cannot. A move to Local Folders implies a deletion from the IMAP-connected account and ideally this would be done immediately.
Rationally you would expect Thunderbird to just queue these deletion messages, but I suspect that the assumption of an always-on connection is hardwired into the IMAP function.
You'd hope it would recognise the difference between being offline by necessity and being offline by choice.
Hi Zenos, Thanks for the reply. It's still shaky but some folders are better than the Inbox so whilst on-line at home I go to one of those folders, close Thunderbird and when opening it on the train, i.e. when off-line, it opens showing that last folder. then do File - Offline - work offline and the Inbox seems to accept this genuine offline status.