Thunderbird and where are my emails going

[Donald]

I get an email in GMAIL. I see it on the GMAIL app on my phone. Look over to my laptop running Thunderbird and its not in my INBOX. Wait a few min its still not there. Look in ALLMAIL rather than INBOX and its there. Not sure what folder its really in nor how it got there. Unlike my business email on Outlook, I do not have any rules setup to move things. Not that I remember setting up that is. Not even sure you can in Thunderbird.

 

[Hall]

Very good chance this is a setting in Thunderbird under your Gmail account's "folder" settings. Have you ever modified them ?

Easiest thing to do is simply delete the account in Thunderbird and re-add it. The default settings should work just fine. No need to change anything. Go through New account, pick Google or Gmail from the pre-defined choices, then enter your email address and password. It will do the rest.

 

[Quattro Pete]

Originally Posted by Donald
I do not have any rules setup to move things. Not that I remember setting up that is. Not even sure you can in Thunderbird.

You certainly can set up such rules in Thunderbird, so I would first check that.

Also, Thunderbird can be configured to automatically classify certain mail as junk, so make sure that's not happening if the email is not junk.

 

[Dave9]

"ALLMAIL"? I've been using TB portable for many years and have never had an allmail folder. Everything goes to my inbox, unless a rule sends it to junk. Well, maybe when I first began using it so long ago I had one, but not any time recently.

I would make a backup of your TB folder (or wherever else the settings are stored if it's not the portable version which I highly recommend) then delete the allmail folder if you want nothing going into it, then see what happens.

 

[Hall]

When it's a Gmail IMAP setup, this is normal, I believe. In Gmail, every single email is stored in one giant folder called "All Mail" or similar. It's Gmail's system of labels that makes them visible in Inbox, Sent Items, and other default folders along with ones you create yourself like Receipts, Family, etc.

 

[JohnG]

There is no "All Mail" folder in Thunderbird. There is in Gmail. Gmail screws it all up with promotions and crap like that.

 

[Hall]

If you configure a Gmail IMAP account, yes there is an "All Mail" folder. Thunderbird simply replicates the structure from Gmail.

 

[uc50ic4more]

I wonder if viewing it first in Gmail for a short period of time marks the message as "read" and Thunderbird's inbox is only showing you what Gmail reports as "Priority Inbox" stuff.

 

[Hall]

Originally Posted by uc50ic4more
I wonder if viewing it first in Gmail for a short period of time marks the message as "read" and Thunderbird's inbox is only showing you what Gmail reports as "Priority Inbox" stuff.

Good idea/point. I always turn that crap off myself so I wouldn't have remembered this at all.

 

[Dave9]

I think hallstevenson is onto something, then the next question is, how do you feel about using pop instead of imap? Gmail can do both, just weigh the pros and cons of each.

 

[Hall]

Originally Posted by Dave9
I think hallstevenson is onto something, then the next question is, how do you feel about using pop instead of imap? Gmail can do both, just weigh the pros and cons of each.

Up until a few weeks ago, I used Thunderbird with my Google Apps email. I used the Gmail app on my phone and often accessed my email through a browser (primarily for "filing" messages after I've dealt with them). I've never seen the behavior that Donald is seeing. I have adjusted the folders and in most cases, it messed things up. I vaguely recall one issue - no longer the case, by the way - where Thunderbird had a folder called "Sent messages" while Gmail called it "Sent mail" (currently it's just "Sent") and while messages didn't get lost, this "Sent messages" folder only existed inside T-Bird so at home, using my web browser, I couldn't see messages that I sent. IMO, that was a T-Bird misconfiguration that's since been fixed.

 

[Hall]

Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Easiest thing to do is simply delete the account in Thunderbird and re-add it. The default settings should work just fine. No need to change anything. Go through New account, pick Google or Gmail from the pre-defined choices, then enter your email address and password. It will do the rest.

Yes, quoting my own post....

Remember, with IMAP, the messages aren't actually "in" Thunderbird so by removing the account, your messages won't be deleted (from Gmail).

 

[Donald]

So I looked at the settings for the gmail account in Thunderbird and saw some options that were not setup where I could train Thunderbird to move JUNK emails to a JUNK folder. It was not setup but is now. I will give it a try.

On my phone with the GMAIL app I can click "report spam" and I think that moves things into the SPAM folder.

I have the activity manager running on Thunderbird. I want to see if that can help me figure it out.

So what is the interaction between the "report SPAM" on GMAIL and "mark as JUNK" on Thunderbird. Will I get stuff split between SPAM folder and JUNK folder depending upon which reads new emails first?

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted by Donald
So what is the interaction between the "report SPAM" on GMAIL and "mark as JUNK" on Thunderbird. Will I get stuff split between SPAM folder and JUNK folder depending upon which reads new emails first?


When Gmail filters spam out you should not receive it - either at the Gmail web site or through your email application. If you ask Thunderbird to filter out spam it will be doing so independently of - and after - Gmail; and whatever rules or heuristics that Thunderbird develops will not be used by Gmail, and vice-versa.

Is short, there isn't really any interaction between the two; only Thunderbird looking for spam that Google missed.

 

[Donald]

Originally Posted by uc50ic4more
Originally Posted by Donald
So what is the interaction between the "report SPAM" on GMAIL and "mark as JUNK" on Thunderbird. Will I get stuff split between SPAM folder and JUNK folder depending upon which reads new emails first?


When Gmail filters spam out you should not receive it - either at the Gmail web site or through your email application. If you ask Thunderbird to filter out spam it will be doing so independently of - and after - Gmail; and whatever rules or heuristics that Thunderbird develops will not be used by Gmail, and vice-versa.

Is short, there isn't really any interaction between the two; only Thunderbird looking for spam that Google missed.


So in the GMAIL app on my phone when I am in a msg and click "report spam" that reports it back to the GMAIL server, rather than just keep aware of it on my phone app,

If a msg is picked up by this "report spam" does it go to the SPAM folder I assume?

 

[Donald]

So with the activity manager running, I see a msg like "1 email deleted from JUNK" or "1 email deleted from ALLMAIL". I am not doing these deletes. The JUNK folder only has email a few days old and should not delete until 60 days old.

So who/what is deleting these emails?

 

[Hall]

Originally Posted by Donald
So in the GMAIL app on my phone when I am in a msg and click "report spam" that reports it back to the GMAIL server, rather than just keep aware of it on my phone app,

If a msg is picked up by this "report spam" does it go to the SPAM folder I assume?

Gmail guesses if a message is spam and assigns values for different conditions. If it exceeds some secret threshold, it MOVES it to the SPAM folder. You can also "Report spam" on a message and it a) learns that you consider it spam and b) moves it to your SPAM folder. None of this has anything to do with Thunderbird.

As uc50ic4more said, the "junk" settings in Thunderbird are a secondary process. It might catch something that Gmail missed.

Originally Posted by Donald
So with the activity manager running, I see a msg like "1 email deleted from JUNK" or "1 email deleted from ALLMAIL". I am not doing these deletes. The JUNK folder only has email a few days old and should not delete until 60 days old.

So who/what is deleting these emails?
Do you have a folder named "Junk" in Gmail ? This will be in addition to "Spam". It sounds like you do. Maybe Thunderbird created this folder (label) in your Gmail account (you can probably do this in Account Settings in Thunderbird). If so, the following applies:

It deleted (1) message, not (2). See my post above about Gmail's "All Mail" folder. I can repeat.... Every single email message you have is dumped into a gigantic "All Mail" folder. Gmail assigns a label to that message and in this case, the label is "Junk". When you delete a message from various folders (technically, with a label), it also gets deleted from the main location (All Mail).

 

[Donald]

Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Originally Posted by Donald
So in the GMAIL app on my phone when I am in a msg and click "report spam" that reports it back to the GMAIL server, rather than just keep aware of it on my phone app,

If a msg is picked up by this "report spam" does it go to the SPAM folder I assume?

Gmail guesses if a message is spam and assigns values for different conditions. If it exceeds some secret threshold, it MOVES it to the SPAM folder. You can also "Report spam" on a message and it a) learns that you consider it spam and b) moves it to your SPAM folder. None of this has anything to do with Thunderbird.

As uc50ic4more said, the "junk" settings in Thunderbird are a secondary process. It might catch something that Gmail missed.

Originally Posted by Donald
So with the activity manager running, I see a msg like "1 email deleted from JUNK" or "1 email deleted from ALLMAIL". I am not doing these deletes. The JUNK folder only has email a few days old and should not delete until 60 days old.

So who/what is deleting these emails?
Do you have a folder named "Junk" in Gmail ? This will be in addition to "Spam". It sounds like you do. Maybe Thunderbird created this folder (label) in your Gmail account (you can probably do this in Account Settings in Thunderbird). If so, the following applies:

It deleted (1) message, not (2). See my post above about Gmail's "All Mail" folder. I can repeat.... Every single email message you have is dumped into a gigantic "All Mail" folder. Gmail assigns a label to that message and in this case, the label is "Junk". When you delete a message from various folders (technically, with a label), it also gets deleted from the main location (All Mail).


I understand that ALLMAIL is just a collection of mail from all folders. My point was I see "1 msg deleted from ALLMAIL" when I have not deleted any email from any folder.

 

[Donald]

I have found much of my missing email in the "Important" folder. I have not moved anything there. How does it get there?