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Thunderbird Backups

  • 3 replies
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  • 2 views
  • Last reply by Matt

MeTheMan
MeTheMan
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Hi there Help people.

I have noted in what I think is the latest version of Thunderbird that the Profile can now be exported to a ZIP file, using the simple Tools / Export action.

However, an associated Help topic advises that if your Profile is over 2 GB, it is best to be backed up manually - by a different procedure.

My Thunderbird profile (as viewed under C:\...\Appdata\Roaming\ Thunderbird is 4.01GB. Despite the alert about being over 2GB, I tried it anyway using Tools / Export and it seemed to work, as the zipped file it generated is about 4.2GB.

Has the backup feature been improved since the Help data was written I wonder, thus enabling backups of over 2GB to now work correctly ?.

Also, being rather a newbie to the Thunderbird community scene, I do wonder why the Help articles have (apparently) no date / time stamp visible. Makes it hard to know when they were written, and if they might be obviously out of date. I couldn't find any date / time stamp anywhere.

Any advice to clarify these two issues much appreciated

Cheers

Hi there Help people. I have noted in what I think is the latest version of Thunderbird that the Profile can now be exported to a ZIP file, using the simple Tools / Export action. However, an associated Help topic advises that if your Profile is over 2 GB, it is best to be backed up manually - by a different procedure. My Thunderbird profile (as viewed under C:\...\Appdata\Roaming\ Thunderbird is 4.01GB. Despite the alert about being over 2GB, I tried it anyway using Tools / Export and it seemed to work, as the zipped file it generated is about 4.2GB. Has the backup feature been improved since the Help data was written I wonder, thus enabling backups of over 2GB to now work correctly ?. Also, being rather a newbie to the Thunderbird community scene, I do wonder why the Help articles have (apparently) no date / time stamp visible. Makes it hard to know when they were written, and if they might be obviously out of date. I couldn't find any date / time stamp anywhere. Any advice to clarify these two issues much appreciated Cheers

All Replies (3)

david
david
  • Top 10 Contributor
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The zip process is handled by the Operating System, not Thunderbird, and large zip files may be problematic. The warning is just something to be aware of. The other approach of locating the profile and copying it also works, but for most users, the zip process is more reliable and easier to do.

MeTheMan
MeTheMan Question owner
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Thank you David for your helpful explanation re ZIP process. I will continue to use it then, but will keep an eye on it. Appreciate your feedback

Do you have any thoughts on the lack of date / time stamp on the Help posts ? Possibly older posts are removed if they applied to out of date versions of Thunderbird, thus helping to avoid confusion in the user community .. not sure ?

Cheers

PS I really love Thunderbird, and find it incredibly useful and easy to use (compared to the Gmail web interface for sure !).

Matt
Matt
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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Did you try to actually use the ZIP? My understanding of the original issues was in the import process, and related to ZIP library used by Thunderbird. (last years release saw it pulled because the library made files only to about 200mb before having problems.

My personal feeling is use the manual method of just copy the data to a large USB drive with Thunderbird not running. A simple batch file/ Power shell script can be used to do this triggered from the windows task scheduler for automated backups.