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Access same Address Book(s) from two different non-simultaneous installations in different OS's.

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  • Last reply by ENAR

ENAR
ENAR
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Running Thunderbird on both Win 7 and Win 10 sharing the same hard drive. The mail and address book files are located in a common folder on a different internal drive. This way, I can access the same mail folders, etc. from either OS installation. (I've done this for years and it works fine.)

But, I have run into a problem. When resetting up Mozilla on a reinstalled Win10, I got the message that the address books were protected, and would not be loaded.

Where exactly are the address books, and how can I access them from the second installation?

I know that I can export and import the address book(s), but subsequent changes made in the Win 7 installation will not be reflected in the Win 10 installation.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Running Thunderbird on both Win 7 and Win 10 sharing the same hard drive. The mail and address book files are located in a common folder on a different internal drive. This way, I can access the same mail folders, etc. from either OS installation. (I've done this for years and it works fine.) But, I have run into a problem. When resetting up Mozilla on a reinstalled Win10, I got the message that the address books were protected, and would not be loaded. Where exactly are the address books, and how can I access them from the second installation? I know that I can export and import the address book(s), but subsequent changes made in the Win 7 installation will not be reflected in the Win 10 installation. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

All Replies (2)

Matt
Matt
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SO did you move your profile folder (the preferred method) or use the browse button to set a local directory for each account. (Easier and far more prone to long term failure)

ENAR
ENAR Question owner
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Neither. The two OS's, Win 7 and Win 10 share an SSD, and the Thunderbird Profile is located on a different HD. since the two OS's can't be run simultaneously, each of the Thunderbird programs on each OS looks at the Profile on the same hard drive (that is seen logically same either way).

Thus the Profile location is the same for each installation of Thunderbird, and can get mail and contains the same folders. Until relatively recently, both installations could also recognize the same Address Books.

However, when setting up the newer installation and setting the same Profile, there is a warning message that says that the Address Books (only) are in a restricted folder.

If they are, I'd like to move them to a similarly compatible location like the commonly used Profile. Or, are they already are, but that they have an attribute that makes them not accessible to the second installation.

As I mentioned, I've used this technique for years, and it has saved me from developing parallel mail folders with different messages, Somehow, that is not working for the Address Books.