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Synchronizing with GMAIL "All Mail" folder

  • 6 replies
  • 4 have this problem
  • 23 views
  • Last reply by Bryan

Bryan
Bryan
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I do almost all of my email through Thunderbird or K9 (Android).. only log into GMAIL once every month or two. Today I just discovered that my Gmail "All Mail" folder had > 12,000 emails. According to GMAIL help, this folder is a collection of everything sent and received that hasn't been deleted. In my case, most of the emails in this folder were emails received and deleted while in TB. I know this as I tested both TB & K9. K9 worked as expected. Whereas deleting an email in TB did remove the email from the GMAIL inbox but it didn't "delete" it from the All Mail folder.

I have TB (v24.6.0 on Win7) set as follows: 

   Server type is IMAP
   "When I delete a message" is set to "remove it immediately"
   "Clean up ("Expunge") Inbox on Exit" is checked
   Messaging Archives is not checked

Any ideas on what I need to do to get TB to clean Gmail's "All Mail" folder?

Thanks, Bryan

I do almost all of my email through Thunderbird or K9 (Android).. only log into GMAIL once every month or two. Today I just discovered that my Gmail "All Mail" folder had > 12,000 emails. According to GMAIL help, this folder is a collection of everything sent and received that hasn't been deleted. In my case, most of the emails in this folder were emails received and deleted while in TB. I know this as I tested both TB & K9. K9 worked as expected. Whereas deleting an email in TB did remove the email from the GMAIL inbox but it didn't "delete" it from the All Mail folder. I have TB (v24.6.0 on Win7) set as follows: Server type is IMAP "When I delete a message" is set to "remove it immediately" "Clean up ("Expunge") Inbox on Exit" is checked Messaging Archives is not checked Any ideas on what I need to do to get TB to clean Gmail's "All Mail" folder? Thanks, Bryan

Chosen solution

Perhaps this will help.

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/78755 https://support.google.com/mail/answer/77657?hl=en

Gmail behaves odd sometimes. To my surprise I found all the messages I ever moved off of the server still in 'All Mail'.

I don't care for 'All Mail' in Thunderbird, and I'm not subscribed to this folder.

I do regularly empty trash, and I believe this is needed to finally also empty 'All Mail'.

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All Replies (6)

christ1
christ1
  • Top 25 Contributor
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I'd unsubscribe from the 'All Mail' folder, so that it isn't even visible in Thunderbird.

Bryan
Bryan Question owner
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I don't bring the All Mail folder down to TB. The issue is not what I see on TB. The problem is that there are 12000 emails on Gmail's servers that should have been deleted when I deleted them in TB.

Matt
Matt
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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It is your android device that is the issue, it is not behavingh correctly, even though it is behaving as you would want it to.

Gmail is a collection of mail with labels. ALL folders in Gmail are not folders at all, but a label. Mail with no label is in ALL MAIL Deleted label is in the "folder" deleted and "all mail". You will also note advice to point Thunderbirds archive folder to the all mail folder as well as that is how Google describe all mail. An archive.

Try holding the shift key while you delete. I do not have a google IMAP accout to test, but it might work.

Bryan
Bryan Question owner
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Matt, thanks for idea but I really don't think there is anything wrong with my Android mail program. I only included it in the original post as an indication of how TB should work.

Google help says "All Mail is your archive, a storage place for all the mail you've ever sent or received, but have not deleted." So deleted mail is not in the All Mail view. When you delete an email in GMAIL the email is gone -- it's not in the inbox and it's not in the All mail view. This is what happens when I delete emails through the K9 android app. And this is the behavior that I expect when I delete emails through TB.

Unfortunately, it appears that TB doesn't really delete the email, it's only removing it from the GMAIL inbox view (removing the inbox label)... That's why the email continues to exist and is visible through the All Mail view.

I find it hard to believe that this is a TB bug, so I'm assuming that I have something setup incorrectly.

christ1
christ1
  • Top 25 Contributor
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Chosen Solution

Perhaps this will help.

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/78755 https://support.google.com/mail/answer/77657?hl=en

Gmail behaves odd sometimes. To my surprise I found all the messages I ever moved off of the server still in 'All Mail'.

I don't care for 'All Mail' in Thunderbird, and I'm not subscribed to this folder.

I do regularly empty trash, and I believe this is needed to finally also empty 'All Mail'.

Modified by christ1

Bryan
Bryan Question owner
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Christ1 - thanks for the suggestions. I checked out the links and with a little trial and error I now have TB deletions working. To be honest, I'm not 100% sure which change made the difference. In case others encounter the same problem here are the settings that work for me:

  • Server type is IMAP
  • "When I delete a message" is set to "Move it to this Folder" and [Gmail]->Trach is selected
  • "Clean up ("Expunge") Inbox on Exit" is checked
  • Messaging Archives is not checked
  • "To recover disk space...." is set to delete messages more than 120 days old

Thanks again for everyone's help.

Modified by Bryan