Thunderbird search returns a list of emails but I can't open them
Hi, I'm looking for some old emails from 2018-19 for an important project and I can find them in search but when I click on each email I just get a blank page. I can see they exist somewhere, as they are indexed, and I can read the first few lines, date and address etc, but not open them fully. I found this earlier which mentions sqlite? I don't know what that is or whether it might be part of the solution. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1018203
If anyone knows how to retrieve the content of these emails I'd be very grateful. Many thanks.
All Replies (4)
In case you're talking about Global Search, see https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/global-search
It is more likely the index needs updating, because your messages somehow got lost.
If those messages are important to you, you probably did create a backup and can restore them from that.
Thanks Christ1.
Yes, I'm talking about Global Search I think. I've read that page earlier, and it does what it says it does, but when I get the list of results up, I can't open the emails individually.
I have an old profile from 2019 that seems to have a file called global-something-sqlite but I can't get it to open so I can read its contents.
I really don't want to rebuild the global whatever it's called as I think that will delete the emails that are still there. So I'm wondering whether to download an sqlite reader and see if that will show the content.
I'm not very techy so would be glad of any thoughts/instructions for how to restore.
I've read that page earlier, and it does what it says it does, but when I get the list of results up, I can't open the emails individually.
That tells us the index isn't up to date anymore, hence you need to rebuild the global database as described in the support article. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/rebuilding-global-database
I have an old profile from 2019 that seems to have a file called global-something-sqlite but I can't get it to open so I can read its contents.
I'd expect your problem is with a current profile you're actually using, not with an old one from four years ago. The global-messages-db.sqlite file is just the search index. It does not contain the actual messages. You can open it with a sqlite reader application, but I think you'd just be wasting your time.
I really don't want to rebuild the global whatever it's called as I think that will delete the emails that are still there.
No, it won't delete any messages, because it just rebuilds the search index. If you messages still exist they will be found by rebuilding the index. If they are gone, they will also be removed from the search index.
So I'm wondering whether to download an sqlite reader and see if that will show the content.
I'm not holding you off. But don't be disappointed if it doesn't produce the expected result. Good luck.
Many thanks for explaining that. I won't bother with the sqlite reader then.
The chap in the page I linked to had the same problem, or what sounded like the same problem, and when he rebuilt it the messages went completely. This is what I'm afraid of: I can currently see the first few lines of them, which is way better than nothing (this is to do with a fairly serious matter, so I need as much as I can get) so I'm afraid if they no longer exist I won't even have the email titles and start of the text.
Hope that makes sense. It's a bit of a risk. I know I wouldn't have deleted them but I did replace my computer at some point so they may have been got rid of during the transfer process. So I don't know if they still exist or not.
Thanks again for your help. I might take the risk or not, gotta think it over.