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Inbox mails from 2014 not showing or deleted
Hi: on 13/11 around 5 o'clock after electricity cut out all Inbox mails from 2014 disappeared. Only a few mails downloaded after cutout +all 2013 mails are showing. When i search from Global search i cannot find none the mails that came before 5 o'clock. Other 2014 mails put in subfolders are available but the ones that were in the INBOX all gone, i don't know where.
Actually immediately after cutout when i did a global search i could see some of them as a Ghost Files but when i click on it they were just showing as a blank screens so i tried to solve the problem by deleting popstate.dat file. After deleting popstate.dat that gost files also get lost.
Now i don't know whether it's possible to find the mails from 2014!! How could such a thing possibly happen, can some body tell me ? It just deleted or hid ALL the mails from 2014!! All 2012 and 2013 mails are showing. Would somebody please help if knows an answer ?
All Replies (6)
not anybody got a solution ? I don't believe it.
Do you have a Pop mail account?
I presume Thunderbird was closed when you deleted the popstate.dat file.
When you restarted Thunderbird, a new popstate.dat file would have been created and TB would then re downloaded everything that was available in the server Inbox.
It sounds like your TB mail account Inbox was open, being accessed to eg: read emails or downloading to Inbox at the time of the electrical failure.
Move all good emails out of the Inbox into suitable folders.
Access your profile folder to check for lost emails: You might need to make hidden folders visible; The AppData folder is folder is a hidden folder; to show hidden folders, open a Windows Explorer window and choose "Organize → Folder and Search Options → Folder Options → View (tab) → Show hidden files and folders".
In Thunderbird Help > Troubleshooting Information click on 'Show folder'
Close Thunderbird now - this is important click on 'Mail' folder click on mail account name
Do you have an 'Inbox.bak' file ? If yes, rename to 'OldInbox' - no extension You can open this file using 'Notepad', does it show emails? If yes, close file, close window and restart Thunderbird.
If no 'Inbox.bak' file Look for 'Inbox' file - no extension. open using Notepad can you see any emails that you recognise as being lost?
Also, look at these lines in the header info - it will be at the start of each email. eg: From - Wed Nov 21 12:21:56 2012 X-Account-Key: account1 X-UIDL: UID2168-1224250522 X-Mozilla-Status: 0001
If this line 'X-Mozilla-Status:' has a value '0009' check content to see if it is an email you want to rescue. To rescue the email change the 0009 to 0001
You could use the 'Edit' > 'Find' to search for X-Mozilla-Status: 0009
Then Delete the 'Inbox.msf' indexing file - TB will generate a new one.
close window.
Restart Thunderbird.
Thank you so,so much for the detailed answer!
I use IMAP, Does your advice applicable to IMAP ? if yes i'll try it immediately.
I've 2 accounts in TB but one of them has this issue. the other is standing safely. And it lost all 2014 files in INBOX. But its subfolders keep their 2014 messages.
With IMAP mail accounts, the Inbox file = what is in the Inbox server.
So, if you logon to webmail using a browser and they are not on the server, then the Inbox in Thunderbird only copies what is on the server.
However, it would still be worth checking the Profile Folder as you ned to rule it out, but as you use Imap, the mail account will be in the 'ImapMail' folder instead of 'Mail' folder.
If there is an Inbox.bak file, copy it to your desktop and then rename it 'OldInbox'.
Then download ImportExporttools addon. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/importexporttools/
how to install addon: In thunderbird Tools > Addons Click on gear wheel icon and select 'Install addon from file' locate file and click 'Open'
Right click on Local Folders > ImportExporttools > import mbox file Import directly one or more mbox files click on OK then locate the 'OldInbox' file on desktop. Use it import that 'OldInbox' file into Local Folders.
You can still check to see if the 'Inbox' has emails or has X-Mozilla-Status = 0009 and that email needs to be recovered.
Remember, Thunderbird must be closed. Do not compact any folders before checking. This attempt to recover emails may not be successful, but it is always worth checking.
Dear Toad; thank you so much for your suggestion!!
I tried your solution with Inbox.bak but couldn't find any string starting with 0009. I' was so hopeless that I purchased "Email Recovery for Mozilla Thunderbird" right away that evening and it searched my computer and found all the mails in the pc since the first installation of TB account and i recovered lost mails with that tool.
This mail is my work mailbox so i have to solve the problem fastly and accurately as possible, either it would cost me!:( I will keep your solution and will use it next time, i searched the web crazily that day and did not come up any solutions like you suggest. Thank you again.
I'll keep your advise in mind for the next problem. It's my mistake to keep all the incoming mails in the INBOX, i should have distribute them to subfolders earlier. I found in the web a solution for INBOX: somebody advise that no read mail should not be kept in INBOX. Read mails should be sent to subfolders.
Now i try to arrange my way in TB. Any read mail should go to a "READBOX" so they'll be safe. I moved all 2012-2013 mails to their corresponding archive folder.
I wish there would be an aoutomatic feature in TB that moves any read mail from INBOX to a kind of a temporary READBOX . I found "Awesome Auto Archive" addon yesterday but not sure how to use it at the moment.
Do you know whether there is an internal feature in TB that moves read mails to a subfolder automatically?
Ilungisiwe
If you found a folder called 'Inbox.bak' with content, then that was great news because it means those emails are recoverable.
If there were no 0009 then you do not have any 'marked as deleted' emails, but that file should have the emails. The reason for checking that was to ensure they had not been accidentally marked as deleted at time of crash, because if they had then been compacted those emails would be gone, so I wanted you to check for them before doing anything. This you did and finding none was good.
Then you would have needed to follow the methods as a dvised depending upon whether you had Pop or IMAP mailaccount.
However, it is good to hear that you successfully recovered those emails.
Additional info: All the folders you see in your Folder Pane are really mbox files. It is not wise to keep too many emails in a single file. So putting them all into an 'ReadBox' folder is still keeping a lot of emails in one file. Recommend you create several folders to organise them eg: Bills, Family, Friends,etc
Archiveing: You can set up 'Archive Options' to store anything older than eg: two months. It is recommended that you archive by month and year and keep folder structure. This will help to reduce the number of emails stored in files. Tools > Account Settings > Copies & Folders of mail account Select: Keep message archives in: Select: Archives folder on mail account
click on 'Archives options' button. See more help here:
Click on all the OK to save.
How to auto move emails: You can create Message Filters which auto run on the Inbox. for example: If you get Electric, Gas or Phone bills by email, you could have TB search for those email addresses as they come into the Inbox and auto move them to a 'Bills' folder. They would still need to be read but as they are already in the correct folder for storeage you will not need to move them. You could do the same for all your family emails.
Tools > Message Filters. Check the 'filters for' is for the correct mail account click on 'New' give filter a name eg: 'Bills' Apply filter when: select: 'Manually Run' Select: Getting new mail' select 'Filter before Junk classification'
If you set only one condition: Select: 'Match all of the following' If two or more select: 'Match any of the following'
FROM and IS and email address to add another click on the small '+' Perform these actions: 'Move Message to' and 'Bills on mail account' (The 'Bills' folder must have been already created by you) click on OK
Then make sure it is enabled.
If you currently have some emails that match one of those 'Bills' email addresses in your Inbox or ReadBox folder; you could select that folder to see emails, then manually run the filters on that folder.
Tools > Run filters on Folder'
or
Menu Icon > Message Filters > run filters on folder
Any email addresses matching the filter will be moved to the Bills folder.
Message Filters will run automatically upon new incoming mail to the Inbox folder. You can also run filters on any selected folder manually to help organise older mail.