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Why can't I see any emails from search results in offline folders?

  • 5 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 45 views
  • Last reply by Matt

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When performing a search in Thunderbird, if a result resides in an offline folder, clicking on that result to view the entire email will show nothing at all. This "bug" has been present for as many years as I've been using Thunderbird (a very long time).

1. Create an offline folder. 2. Drag a bunch of emails from a live IMAP folder to your offline folder. 3. Perform a search that will give you results from that offline folder.

You'll be presented with a list of email excerpts but any result which resides in an offline folder will be completely empty when you click on it. The conversation list and contents of the email will be blank.

When performing a search in Thunderbird, if a result resides in an offline folder, clicking on that result to view the entire email will show nothing at all. This "bug" has been present for as many years as I've been using Thunderbird (a very long time). 1. Create an offline folder. 2. Drag a bunch of emails from a live IMAP folder to your offline folder. 3. Perform a search that will give you results from that offline folder. You'll be presented with a list of email excerpts but any result which resides in an offline folder will be completely empty when you click on it. The conversation list and contents of the email will be blank.

Chosen solution

Help menu (Alt+H) > troubleshooting information Click on the show folder button Close Thunderbird. delete the file global-messages-db.sqlite Restart Thunderbird.

Let me say again: Thunderbird successfully searches and shows me message body results from my search - even from Local folders. It even shows me partial email bodies. It's when I click on a result that nothing happens.

Probably because the index did not get the move message and is looking in the old location.

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All Replies (5)

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What do you mean by 'offline folder'? Do you mean Local Folders? These are nothing to do with offline. they are just folders on your computer.

Do you synchronize folders? This will create a copy of the folder on your computer, which is ten readible in online or offline mode.

With non-synchronized messages, only the message "headers" are downloaded. The message body is not downloaded until you click on the message in the message list (which means that if you are not online, you can't read the message).

Full-text search of a message body is only possible on messages that have been downloaded.

it sounds like you are copying a load of message headers into a Local Folder and then wondering why you cannot see the body content.

Suggest you read some info on synchronizing:

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Yes - I mistakenly called "Local" folders "Offline" folders. Sorry.

No, I dragged the emails to the Local folder and the complete emails reside in those "folders" (those folders are actually just a single file). I can see all emails that are contained in this "folder" with a text editor (Profiles/MyProfileFolder/Mail/Local Folders/NameOfMyLocalFolder).

The problem is not my expectation - the problem is that Thunderbird has a bug.

Let me say again: Thunderbird successfully searches and shows me message body results from my search - even from Local folders. It even shows me partial email bodies. It's when I click on a result that nothing happens.

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Chosen Solution

Help menu (Alt+H) > troubleshooting information Click on the show folder button Close Thunderbird. delete the file global-messages-db.sqlite Restart Thunderbird.

Let me say again: Thunderbird successfully searches and shows me message body results from my search - even from Local folders. It even shows me partial email bodies. It's when I click on a result that nothing happens.

Probably because the index did not get the move message and is looking in the old location.

Modified by Matt

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That was it. You have no idea how happy this makes me. Thank you so much!

So if dragging to the Local folder causes the problem, what's the "proper" way to move it there?

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try and see if it does cause an issue.... as indexing is a low priority background task, I am guessing that when you did your last batch it was large and the index just missed the boat.