Why does Thunderbird keep receiving my email when converted my email server from pop to smtp but not changed my Thunderbird server settings?
I've been using Thunderbird to mange email for a couple of pop email accounts of mine. With time I realized the differences between pop and smtp email accounts and moved these accounts to smtp servers. Some of the messages were important to me so I did not change the server configurations for these accounts in Thunderbird. My intention was to keep thunderbird unchanged so I would always have access to old pop email messages that had been deleted from the pop servers. I was going to use a new email client to manage mail from the smtp servers.
To my surprise, Thunderbird has continued to receive email for these accounts from the smtp servers, even though the server configuration in Thunderbird has not been changed from the pop email server names. This is actually great, but I don't understand why it is happening and I don't trust that it will continue to happen indefinitely. And I am worried that if I change the server names to their new smtp values (if I am allowed to do that) or delete the pop accounts and recreate them as smtp accounts, my old emails from the pop servers will disappear or something else bad or confusing will happen.
I would like to understand why I am seeing what I am seeing and whether it is wise, possible or necessary to change my server names to their new smtp values.
Thanks
Chosen solution
Your e-mails exist on one e-mail server that your e-mail provider has. They offer the ability to access those e-mail through POP and IMAP, but no matter which way you have set up to receive them, the e-mails come from the same place.
You can set up two "accounts" in Thunderbird, one to access an e-mail address via POP and via IMAP. This sounds like what you have done.
The POP account will download the e-mails and eventually tell the server to delete them from the server (depending on your settings in Thunderbird for the account).
The IMAP account will mirror what is on the server.
See below the difference between POP and IMAP.
The old e-mails you have in your Thunderbird POP account probably do not exist on the server anymore, but just on your computer, saved in the Thunderbird POP account.
To simplify things, you should choose whether you want to use POP or IMAP in the future, not both.
If you choose IMAP, then move all the e-mails that are under your POP account in Thunderbird, to under Thunderbird's "Local Folders". Then remove the POP account from Thunderbird. Leave the IMAP account.
Then in the future, if you want to save an e-mail permanently from your e-mail account in Thunderbird to your computer, copy or move it to under "Local Folders"
Personally, I do not keep e-mails on the server, but move them from the IMAP account to folders under "Local Folders".
The difference between POP and IMAP
With POP, all the e-mails from the server get sent to Thunderbird, Thunderbird saves those e-mails on your computer, then tells the server to delete those mails from the server. Unless you set an option in Thunderbird to not tell the server to delete the e-mails.
With IMAP, the e-mails are kept on the e-mail server. Thunderbird continually communicates with the server to show the e-mails on the server, but doesn't necessarily save them on your computer. You can tell Thunderbird to also save the e-mails on your computer.
When using multiple devices to access the same e-mail, the only way to keep the e-mails synchronized between the devices is to use IMAP.
Another thing to remember, is that anything in the "Local Folders" in Thunderbird are only on your computer.
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Your e-mails exist on one e-mail server that your e-mail provider has. They offer the ability to access those e-mail through POP and IMAP, but no matter which way you have set up to receive them, the e-mails come from the same place.
You can set up two "accounts" in Thunderbird, one to access an e-mail address via POP and via IMAP. This sounds like what you have done.
The POP account will download the e-mails and eventually tell the server to delete them from the server (depending on your settings in Thunderbird for the account).
The IMAP account will mirror what is on the server.
See below the difference between POP and IMAP.
The old e-mails you have in your Thunderbird POP account probably do not exist on the server anymore, but just on your computer, saved in the Thunderbird POP account.
To simplify things, you should choose whether you want to use POP or IMAP in the future, not both.
If you choose IMAP, then move all the e-mails that are under your POP account in Thunderbird, to under Thunderbird's "Local Folders". Then remove the POP account from Thunderbird. Leave the IMAP account.
Then in the future, if you want to save an e-mail permanently from your e-mail account in Thunderbird to your computer, copy or move it to under "Local Folders"
Personally, I do not keep e-mails on the server, but move them from the IMAP account to folders under "Local Folders".
The difference between POP and IMAP
With POP, all the e-mails from the server get sent to Thunderbird, Thunderbird saves those e-mails on your computer, then tells the server to delete those mails from the server. Unless you set an option in Thunderbird to not tell the server to delete the e-mails.
With IMAP, the e-mails are kept on the e-mail server. Thunderbird continually communicates with the server to show the e-mails on the server, but doesn't necessarily save them on your computer. You can tell Thunderbird to also save the e-mails on your computer.
When using multiple devices to access the same e-mail, the only way to keep the e-mails synchronized between the devices is to use IMAP.
Another thing to remember, is that anything in the "Local Folders" in Thunderbird are only on your computer.