In 'Address Book' Are you selecting 'All Address Books' ? This is a virtual address book and will not export.

Select a specific address book eg: 'Personal Address Book' Tools > Export

I have only one address book. In my Tbird profile it is called abook.mab. If I was moving it to a new installation of T'bird I would just copy that file to my new profile. I want it in a different application so I need to do the export-import thing. Is there any other way to do this? Thanks, JRS

re :I have only one address book By default, Thunderbird has two: 'Personal Address Book' which is called 'abook.mab' in profile folders. 'Collected Addresses' which is called 'history.mab' in profile folders. There is also a virtual address book seen when you click on 'Address Book' and it is called 'All Address Books'. It does not exist in the profile folders and you cannot sucessfully export if you select that address book.

re :In my Tbird profile it is called abook.mab. If I was moving it to a new installation of T'bird I would just copy that file to my new profile.

Yes - abook.mab is the address book called 'Personal Address Book' as seen in Thunderbird application when you click on 'Address Book'.

re : I want it in a different application so I need to do the export-import thing. Is there any other way to do this? Yes. You run Thunderbird.

• Click on 'Address Book'
• Select 'Personal Address Book'
• Click on 'Tools' and click on 'Export'
• A window opens allowing you to choose where you want to save the exported file.
• Save as type: Comma Separated csv

I opened my exported PAB file using Open Office Calc when opening make sure to use 'separated by' : comma

Thanks Toad -- another Wind in the Willows fan I assume.

I was unaware of history.mab; I found it in my profile folder but it is an empty file. I do not know how to access it other than in my profile.

I have never seen "Personal Address Book" referred to by that name. When I click on 'Address Book' in Tbird, my address book (abook.mab) opens and the title bar says "Address Book" with no 'Personal' descriptor.

I have also never seen "All Address Books" anywhere. When I click on "Address Book" my address book opens and no options are offered.

When I click on Tools / Export in Address Book and select csv, an empty file is created -- nothing is exported. Looking at your bullet list above, I cannot do #2 as it is never offered. I do #1 then #3, 4, 5 -- but to no effect.

What is your version of TB? It must be very old if it doesn't show All Addresses. I can't say why the export doesn't work, but it suggests there's some kind of corruption in the mab file.

Try this: in Address Book, File/New/Address Book..., name it and OK. Then, select all the contacts in your current address book (Ctrl+A) and drag and drop them, while holding the Ctrl key, onto the icon for the new address book. If the contacts appear in the new address book, select it and then Tools/Export, and see if the csv or LDIF is empty.

TB version 38.5.0, probably a couple years old. I don't update very often because I usually do not like the changes that are made but I guess I am going to have to do it this time.

I created a new AB named JRS and it opened with no entries and replaced my previous AB. It appears in my profile as abook-1.mab. Fortunately my old one is still there. When I closed abook-1 and clicked on AB again, my old one opened. Whew!

I do not see how to have both ABs open and I don't know what "the icon for the new address book" means. Neither AB has an "icon" that I am aware of. When I click on Address Book on the TB tool bar, no options are offered; abook.mab opens.

I guess I will have to update TB to make this work but it offers an excellent example of why I do not like to update. I do not want multiple address books. It just complicates things and I'm too old for all of this change. The KISS principle rules.

Thanks for trying. JRS

If you can't see the icons for the address books, you probably have the Directory Pane hidden. Enable it under View/Layout, although I can't recall if that option was in 38.5.

Aha!! I never heard of the Directory Pane and never needed it since I had only one address book. I found it, copied all data to the new AB and exported it successfully as both .csv and .ldif files. Both files appear to be correct. Success!

Then, since I have no need for two address books, I moved all of the data back where it came from, deleted the empty, unneeded AB and closed the Directory Pane. It now looks the way I want it and works correctly when I open and close it.

One lingering concern is that abook.mab appears in my profile with file size 0 bytes. The only other .mab file listed is history.mab, which remains an empty file as it always has been. I would be happier if abook.mab showed the correct file size but as long as it works I guess I do not care. Weird.

Thanks very much for your help! JRS

I'm glad you managed to export the new address book, but I wouldn't have recommended moving the contacts back to the original one, as it is probably corrupted. The typical sign of this is that a corrupted book doesn't accept new contacts or changes to existing ones.

Hmmm, I've been adding and editing entries most every day and it all has worked fine. If I create another new AB and move my data into it may I then delete the corrupted one? I was nervous about deleting the default AB, thinking that might be a problem. Even after making some changes it is still listed in my profile folder as zero bytes. It used to be about 400.

I want to be sure I have only one AB going forward but i do not care what its name is.

Thanks again!! JRS

A better method is to copy the contacts to a new address book, then close TB and delete abook.mab, the corrupted original address book, from the profile folder. When you restart TB, an empty Personal Address Book should be created (and a corresponding uncorrupted abook.mab). You can then move the contacts from the new one to the new Personal Address Book, by drag and drop, and finally delete the new one.

Thanks very much!!! I will do that. JRS

Later: I did it and it worked fine but the new abook.mab is still shown at zero bytes. I opened and closed it several times to see if that would change. My AB works and looks as it should so I guess I don't care how many bytes it has.  ;o)