IMAP syncing downstream only
Over the past few months, the default behavior of my Thunderbird client (11.5 on Win10) seems to have changed. In the past if I deleted an email or moved it to a local offline folder, the message would simply disappear from my Inbox - end of story. Lately when I do the same thing, the email removed from my Inbox gets pushed back down from the server. It behaves like IMAP is only syncing from server>client and not from client>server. I can delete email a second time and it will still sync down another copy the next time I launch Thunderbird. What am I missing here? I could change the 2nd & 3rd settings, but it's happening with messages that are only a few days old.
Sync & Storage
=
- [Y] Keep messages in all folders for this account on this computer - [Y] Synchronize all messages locally regardless of age - [Y] Don't delete any messages - [Y] Always keep starred messages
All Replies (5)
For us to better investigate this issue, we will need some more information.
Could you please do the following?
- Open the menu
> Help > Troubleshooting Information, then click Copy text to Clipboard.
- Go to https://pastebin.mozilla.org/, paste the clipboard by right clicking in the large text area, select paste from the menu, change the retention period to expire in 28 days, use the Paste Snippet button to create a page containing your info, then copy the resulting URL (address) of the page created.
- Open a reply to this post, and paste the URL to your troubleshooting information you just copied.
- Please also provide results for the following test on your system
- Does Thunderbird work as expected in Thunderbird troubleshooting mode?
- Does Thunderbird work as expected with your OS started in safe mode with Networking. Instructions for each operating system: Windows 10/11, Windows 8, Windows 7, OSX
https://pastebin.mozilla.org/ewH82CQL
I've noticed something since posting that may help. When I open my inbox, I often see these previously deleted message showing up in the "read" status. If I click the "Get Messages" icon next to my mailbox name, the Inbox will clean up these stale copies. However, if I close and reopen Thunderbird, the stale copies of the emails will be back again. Clicking "Get Messages" cleans them up and this persists until I close Thunderbird. The same issue occurs when running in troubleshooting mode.
Try right clicking the folder, selecting properties and then the repair button. Hopefully that will fix the issue.
Second, you have what appear to be lots of old printers in Thunderbird profile. go down to the printers section in the troubleshooting information and click clear saved print settings.
Mostly undocumented search in Troubleshooting Press Ctrl+F to open search on page. Type in search term print and press the down arrow on right of the term a couple of times to be navigated to the printer section.
I just wanted to note that the Repair folder option works, but is not persistent. It copies of previously synced messages from the Inbox and Junk folders that have been deleted or stored offline in Personal folders. However, after a few days, they start reappearing and I have to repair the folders again. I'm wondering if the issue lies in the IMAP implementation of the Charter/Spectrum/Roadrunner mail server rather than Thunderbird?
I'd like to add to this issue since I seem to be having a similar problem.
When I delete an email and it goes to the Trash folder it may or may not get deleted on the email server. I have the email accounts set up as IMAP, so everything should sync. I get a lot of spam so I stay on top of the trash folders, deleting them a couple of times a day. A week or so ago I noticed that the trash emails I was deleting had delivery dates up to 5 or 6 days ago; very odd. I am able to go to my account online, using my ISP's (Spectrum) online email access and see/delete the old emails and they don't return.
Today, in TB, I deleted 4 emails from one of my email accounts' Inbox. They went to the Trash folder in TB, Spectrum email access and visible in my Outlook 2013 email app. I deleted 1 email in TB and the email disappeared from the other 2 places; Spectrum and Outlook 2013. I waited about 5 minutes and deleted a second email from the TB Trash folder. It has been over an hour now and on both Spectrum and Outlook 2013 there are 3 files in the Trash folder but TB has only 2.
I deleted 2 more emails in the TB Trash that have stayed on the Spectrum email server and in my Outlook 2013 email app. But then I delete them on the Spectrum server and they stayed in the Outlook 2013. There should be only 1 email left in the Trash folder for all of the locations, but that's not how it is. (Note: A spam email arrived as I was deleting files, so the total was 5 emails.)
Now I'm confused because it seems like there is a disconnect somewhere but I can't point the finger at anyone, although I still think it's Spectrum. If I delete it from Spectrum and it doesn't delete anywhere else and I delete it from TB and it doesn't (always) delete it from Spectrum then I think that is where the problem is, especially since, for me, it all started about 2 weeks ago.
It appears to me that the IMAP sync is not always working properly.