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From / To / CC are missing from the header display

  • 35 replies
  • 5 have this problem
  • 71 views
  • Last reply by shamit

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Using Thunderbird 102.4.1 - have not upgraded for a few days and program was working fine. Switched on today and inbox was rebuilt - and then all the messages are there but the From / To / CC fields are all blank on the message pane. When I reply to a message all the information is available. The From/To/CC is also visible on the summary pane. Same issue on all messages in every folder. Tried to restart in troubleshooting mode with addons disabled but made no difference. I have Header Tools Lite addon - disabled that but does not fix the issue. On Windows 11 and everything was working fine until this morning.

Using Thunderbird 102.4.1 - have not upgraded for a few days and program was working fine. Switched on today and inbox was rebuilt - and then all the messages are there but the From / To / CC fields are all blank on the message pane. When I reply to a message all the information is available. The From/To/CC is also visible on the summary pane. Same issue on all messages in every folder. Tried to restart in troubleshooting mode with addons disabled but made no difference. I have Header Tools Lite addon - disabled that but does not fix the issue. On Windows 11 and everything was working fine until this morning.
Attached screenshots

All Replies (15)

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@shamit

to create a new profile, exit Thunderbird, open a terminal window, then

cd c:\program files\mozilla thunderbird thunderbird -profilemanager

you should obtain a dialog to create a new profile. Be careful that by default the new profile becomes the current profile. You can use this dialog at any time to connect to a given profile. When on the new profile, you can cancel the new account tab and use Thunderbird without creating an account, then import only the mail files from the current profile (so that it don't try to get messages from your current accounts).

I think that at this point you may need to exit Thunderbird, edit the pref.js file in the new created profile to remove the line about the 'use_without_mail_account', save and restart Thunderbird.

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I've had the same problem on one computer, but not another. Both are now running TB 102.6.1 (64-bit) under MacOS 13.1 Ventura (but the problem has existed since 2-3 updates ago). The "missing" data is clearly there, since opening the raw source of a message on the offending copy of TB shows it.

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A few people have the same issue. The information is there because you can reply to the message and the missing headers are all there. It's interesting that the problem appears on one computer but not the other - that implies it is not related to the profile data. However I have tried on multiple laptops and they all have the same issue. My profile is on a external hard drive. Let's see what the experts say.

Modified by shamit

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Good morning Upgraded to 102.7.2 but same issue persists and had to go back to 102.4.0 Any further solutions proposed?

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Hello @shamit

Long time I could connect to this forum after a few weeks of error 500 each time I tried to login... Reading back this thread, I think that not a single person of the 5 complaining about this has actually tried to create a new profile and see if the new profile exhibits the same behaviour... And no, thinking that the profile 'should not be the problem' is not the same as *knowing for sure* that it is not the problem.

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Hi gp You are correct - it seems nobody has managed to set up a new profile to conclusively establish or rule out the issue with the profile. I did try and set up a new profile but unfortunately my (lack of) skills at importing the right emails and files meant I couldn't get anything to work, and I have almost 20 years of emails in the folders. Is there a simple step by step process to try and achieve this? Thanks in advance

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same problem here since this "bugged" update... I still with blank from,to,cc fields... in the message panel.

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@shamit

at the moment the most important thing (I think) is establishing if a new profile could fix it.

So enter the new profile, and create a new account with one of your existing mail addresses; if it's an Imap account, just use it; if it's a Pop account, just before validating click on 'advanced settings', it will create it and drop you into the tab for the settings; uncheck in Server Settings the 'For at most (14) days', so that you don't risk to download mails in both profiles. After that, if it's an Imap account it will immediately connect, if it's a pop account wait until a new mail incomes (or use your normal profile to send from another account)

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Setting up a new profile is a lot of work.

Here are some facts:

I run the same version of Thunderbird (several previous versions, currently 102.8.0 [64-bit]) on a MacBook Pro and an iMac, both running MacOS 13.2.1 (and both running previous versions of 13.2 in lockstep). The MacBook has had the problem for several Thunderbird and MacOS versions; the iMac has never had the problem.

  • viewing raw source shows correctly formatted From: and To: headers;
  • the problem applies to all accounts (5, all IMAP);
  • the problem applies to all email, including that dated before the problem appeared;
  • starting with option key (troubleshooting mode) doesn’t fix the problem;
  • compacting folders doesn’t fix the problem;
  • Repair Text Encoding doesn’t fix the problem;
  • changing any/all of the View options doesn’t fix the problem;
  • changing any/all of the More/Customize/Message Header Options doesn’t fix the problem;
  • rebooting doesn't fix the problem.

From all of this, I conclude:

  • it’s not the fault of MacOS 13.2;
  • it’s not the fault of a particular version of Thunderbird.

So what caused it and what IS the source of the problem? Beats me.

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Good afternoon, I updated the version to 102.7.1 and set up a brand new profile and it worked fine. Therefore this implies there is some conflict within the 20 year old profile that is causing this issue - but no idea what it could be. Had to go back to 102.4.0..... Does this help at all?

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shamit said

Good afternoon, I updated the version to 102.7.1 and set up a brand new profile and it worked fine. Therefore this implies there is some conflict within the 20 year old profile that is causing this issue - but no idea what it could be. Had to go back to 102.4.0..... Does this help at all?

this does not help me in any way since I don't have the problem, but it could help you and other having this problem. Instead of trying to fiddle with the old profile, I think that the simplest thing to try is to import the old profile into the new. This is a no risk thing to try in my opinion, since the old profile is not written to, only read, so if the transfer fails you are no worse than before. It should be something like Tools / Import then 'Import from another Thunderbird installation', then pick the directory holding the old profile. You would need some spare disk space of course

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I finally forced myself to try to investigate the issue again. So far - nothing. Among others, I've just tried "Import from another Thunderbird installation", which looked very promising, but unfortunately it doesn't make any difference.


[EDIT] What eventually seems to work for me was creating a new profile from scratch, setting up the incoming and outgoing servers and then replacing Mail\server-name\ folder with the one from the old profile and adding abook.sqlite for address book. Getting the Calendar data to work required a bit of fiddling with Prefs file, but is also doable.

Modified by em.en

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em.en said

What eventually seems to work for me was creating a new profile from scratch, setting up the incoming and outgoing servers and then replacing Mail\server-name\ folder with the one from the old profile and adding abook.sqlite for address book. Getting the Calendar data to work required a bit of fiddling with Prefs file, but is also doable.

Bummer. This means that something in the old profile indeed is indeed triggering the problem , but that importing the old profile is actually copying what is causing the problem. Unfortunately I don't know a thing about the profile import process, so can't have any insight here.

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the solution for me was: - backup manually the "data" folder under profile folders of my thunderbird installation. - delete thunderbird portable step 1 ) install new "portable thunderbird" step 2) configurate the mail accounts step 3) close thunderbird step 4) copy mail backup folder over the new folders (with the same name) step 5) start thunderbird the from , to, headers now appears.

Modified by mcgpessoal

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Good morning Mcpessoal Still having the same issue with Thunderbird 102.10 so will try and use your solution. However could you advise what is the mail folder? Is it the Mail Folder in the the profile folder? What about all the addons? Do they need to be reinstalled afresh?

This is now logged as a bug - so hopefully someone more qualified than me is working on the solution.

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1807702

Thanks Shamit

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