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Extraneous gmail folders in Thunderbird

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  • Last reply by Matt

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I have been having difficulties with Thunderbird account definitions for 6 months. I didn't recognize it as a definitions problem because I hadn't made any Thunderbird changes. I finally have all but 1 of my 5 email accounts working... but, my now-working Gmail account has a lot of extraneous folders (like multiple trash bins, etc; see attached).

Gmail shows 2 lists of incoming email: "Inbox" and "All mail". The "Inbox" folder is incomplete, most recent email shown is from last August; the "All Mail" folder appears to contain a complete list of emails for the Gmail account.

Can I get rid of all the extraneous folders? How?

I have been having difficulties with Thunderbird account definitions for 6 months. I didn't recognize it as a definitions problem because I hadn't made any Thunderbird changes. I finally have all but 1 of my 5 email accounts working... but, my now-working Gmail account has a lot of extraneous folders (like multiple trash bins, etc; see attached). Gmail shows 2 lists of incoming email: "Inbox" and "All mail". The "Inbox" folder is ''incomplete'', most recent email shown is from last August; the "All Mail" folder appears to contain a complete list of emails for the Gmail account. Can I get rid of all the extraneous folders? How?
Attached screenshots

Chosen solution

Thanks for the quick reply. two-factor authentication may indeed be an issue, although it didn't seem to be an issue in the case of the other 3 Zoho accounts that are working under Thunderbird. But I'm not certain just when Zoho initiated two-factor login, and its possible I changed those accounts back to password-only.

Two-factor is in effect when I log into any of my 4 Zoho email accounts from a browser, doesn't seem to affect the other 3 Zoho accounts that are currently working in Thunderbird. But I didn't need to use a Thunderbird login to (re)create those 3 accounts, I just altered their server parameters. That didn't work for the waynec entry, so I tried allowing Thunderbird to build the waynec entry.

It will take me awhile to check that out (I'm old & slow), and I have some appointments today, so I won't have the time until possibly tonight.

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car-nuts said

But, of course, I had to sacrifice the extra security of a 2-factor login. Is there a plan for accommodating two-factor login via Thunderbird, or must we forego that extra security?

Two factor authentication really will never be something that can be implemented in mail apps like Thunderbird. Thunderbird connects to the server on a timed basis every X minutes. Do you really want a pop up every 10 minutes telling you to input some new password that will soon be arriving on another thing like your phone. Times however many accounts you have?

That is why providers when they came up with this really silly idea of sending a secondary message every few minutes invented app passwords. This allows a password for use by a specific application to be used without the need to reenter the password every X minutes. Google went one further and uses oAuth which send a token when you authorize that will remain current for a long time. I have in fact never had to renew mine in years through entering a password. But I am on a fixed IP address, nothing ever changes from connection to connection or year to year until I get a new PC. See https://help.zoho.com/portal/en/kb/bigin/channels/email/articles/generate-an-app-specific-password

Regarding oAUth2.0, I see Zoho offers it as an option, https://www.zoho.com/crm/developer/docs/api/v2/oauth-overview.html so I will file a bug requesting it be offered as an authentication method. Could you please create a bug account in Bugzilla and follow the bug. If developers start asking specifics I will not be able to answer as I do not have an account and my involvement is really tangential.

Bug https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1751600

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