how much free dis space do you have on your computer?

I have over 200 GB left. I moved several folders to my "Local Folders" and was able to compact. There must be some sort of limit. Is there an explanation of all the folders and where the data is stored please? Thanks. tim

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-tb

Thanks Matt. I have been looking for documentation that describes folders, which are local, which are remote, how they relate, which are compacted, how to manage, size limits, how to delete (if possible), what "subscribe" does, what repair does to folders, etc. Just basic doc describing use and misuse of all the folders. Along with best practices. I looked extensively and could not find a single document. Is there a "User's Guide" perhaps that I am overlooking?

thanks, Tim

The sort of details your seeking really does not exist. Once upon a time I looked for something similar and on some of those topics I am still trying to learn more.

But I can offer some pointers.

IMAP. Terms like Subscribe expunge and, quota, are inherent to the IMAP protocol and are not terms you will find defined in Thunderbird, or it's documentation. They are defined terms in the IMAP protocol, See RFC 3501

Their is no such thing as a remote folder, but IMAP is synchronized. essentially the local copies of mail are a cache to speed performance, although there are options to not keep local copies. My experience is it is slow. I am assuming IMAP is that that which you refer to as remote folders.

Size limits at a technical level are difficult. Historically Thunderbird has a 4Gb limit per folder. This was removed way back for IMAP. local POP mail accounts and local folder still have the limit, or at least bug if you exceed the limit. Every time the developers think they have killed the bugs, a new one crops up.

What folders are compacted. Why all of them! Compaction has a dual purpose.. In IMAP account it expunges the deleted mail from the server (a final delete) locally folders which large amounts of wasted space are compacted to recover the space still used by mail marked as deleted. The physical removal of deleted mail only occurs during compact.

Deleting folder is as simple as right clicking them and selecting delete. Some special folders and the spacial Local folders account simply can not be deleted.

There is a manual here http://en.flossmanuals.net/Thunderbird/ but I do not think it covers the topics you raised.

Yes - I have this problem too and its ludicrous! The folder it hangs on is the newest and only 12 MB - (the largest 883). I am using IMAP mail and have like 12 GB of quota remaining there and 805 GB of free space on the hard drive - so WHERE am I low on disk space and how will deleting files - even a few gigs be of any help??

I had this problem too and was able to find a solution to it. The error messages about not enough disk space mentioned the name of a folder like Junk or Deleted Items. When I looked at the ImapMail folder of my Thunderbird profile, I noticed that these folders had only .msf files and did not have files with no extension. After I created these empty files with no extension, the problem disappeared.

WORKED!! Great find!! Incredible observation!! I wonder how/why tbird managed to screw that up in the first place. I found two such occurrences only one of which was reporting the "out of disk space". Its fixed now and I know what to look for in the future! Thanks!

tjohnson, I agree with the prior post about your incredible find! I have no idea how you sleuthed this one. Great job.

A fix is in the works at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1174485 It will likely be a few months until it becomes available in a public release