Thunderbird Community Forum

Would like to see these enhancements made to Thunderbird:

1. Add recipient email address to view. This could be added next to the sender email address, separated by something like a pipe character "|" and identified by "From: ", "F: ", "Sender: ", or "S: " in front of the sender address and "To: ", "T: ", "Recipient: ", or "R: " in front of the recipient address
2. Add search filter terms to search capability. Some example filter terms would be 1) "mailed-to:" or "recipient" to search for emails sent to a specific email address or domain (using wildcard), 2) "mailed-from" or "sender" to search for emails sent from a specific email address or domain (using wildcard).

Steps to reproduce the problems:

Perform a Global Search (ctrl + K). Search for any string. Just make sure there is at least one search result. > Click "Show results as list". > Right-click on the search result in the Message List Pane. (Please see the footnote.) > The pop-up context menu has two problems:

(1) There are redundant dividers. (Please see the first attached image.)

(2) Hover the mouse over "Tag". The pop-up submenu of "Tag" is incomplete. The menu includes "New Tag" and "Manage Tags". However, "Remove All Tags", "Important", "Work", "Personal", "To Do" and "Later" are missing. (Please see the second attached image.)

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These problems (redundant dividers and incomplete submenu) also occur in Troubleshoot Mode.

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These problems only occur after using Global Search and clicking "Show results as list".

If I right-click a message in the Message List Pane of a regular folder (such as the "Inbox" folder or "Templates" folder), the pop-up context menu displays correctly: There are no redundant dividers, and the submenu of "Tag" is complete. (Please see the third attached image.)

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Operating system: Windows 10.

Versions of Thunderbird: 140.3.1esr (32-bit) and 140.6.0esr (32-bit). Previously I was using 140.3.1esr (32-bit), and currently I am using 140.6.0esr (32-bit). Both versions have the same problems.

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Footnote: When I right-click on the search result in the Message List Pane, the following error messages display in the Error Console (please see the fourth attached image):

Uncaught NS_ERROR_FAILURE: Component returned failure code: 0x80004005 (NS_ERROR_FAILURE) [nsIMsgDBView.getThreadContainingIndex]        mailCommon.js:647
    isCommandEnabled chrome://messenger/content/mailCommon.js:647
    fillMailContextMenu chrome://messenger/content/mailContext.js:340
    onPopupShowing chrome://messenger/content/mailContext.js:146
    handleEvent chrome://messenger/content/mailContext.js:133
    _onContextMenu chrome://messenger/content/about3Pane.js:5235
    handleEvent chrome://messenger/content/about3Pane.js:4758
    init chrome://messenger/content/about3Pane.js:4712
    async* chrome://messenger/content/about3Pane.js:170
    async* chrome://messenger/content/about3Pane.js:139

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The fifth attached image shows mailCommon.js:647.

I have about 250 message filters that I have setup since 2006. The message filters take my POP mail and sort it into the inbox folders, delete the mail I don't want and even remove the entries from my POP server to keep things tidy. The filters work perfectly and some filters have more than 100 entries into a single filter! I have several hundred hours in this filtering and , as I said, the filtering is perfect. Now for my problem. I can go into "Message Filters" and use the search to locate the message filter I am attempting to edit. However, once inside the message filter, I cannot search for any entry that I have added to that filter. Sometimes, the filter may have 50-60 entries in it and it would be handy to be able to sort for the entry I need. Please understand that the message filter entries are applied in order (from top to bottom) and so, sorting the entries alphabetically would ruin the filter. I would like to know how to search ALL of the message filters for any entry inside the filter. It would be VERY HANDY if I could simply go to "Message Filters" and perform a search that would list not only the FILTER the entry was in but all occurrences of the search term as both a FILTER and an ENTRY TO THE FILTER. That is the way the email search works. If you search for any word in the search, it tells you every occurrence of the email and any occurrence of that search term inside any email. Can we make the search of message filters work the same way? Or, if it works this way, can you tell me how to use the search to find an entry WITHIN a message filter? Thank You.

Hey

Thunderbird has a well-functioning Search function that uses the cache (or rather, what the background search process/function "read" and saved in global-messages-db.sqlite).

With a newly configured account (IMAP), it works like this:

- establishes the directory tree - downloads message titles (including sender, date, etc.) - *.msf summary files - then a process that downloads the entire message for local storage - in the background, an indexing process (GLODA?) starts, which creates a search database (subject, from, to, keywords in the message body) using the global-messages-db.sqlite file.

For very large mailboxes (>100k msg, ~50GB), this means that the server's content is transferred to the local disk (and stored in ImapMail).

The question is: how do I configure TB to run in "thin" mode, meaning after connecting a new account: - establish a directory tree - download message titles (including sender, date, etc.) -> *.msf - DO NOT download messages for local storage - start the indexing process, which will download and index the subject, from, to, and keywords in the message body (it will download and "read" the message, but not save it locally) and save it to global-messages-db.sqlite

Setting "mail.server.default.offline_download" to "false" will cause this behavior, but the message body will not be indexed (only from, to, and subject).

I tried to work around this by: - configuring the mailbox with the download option for offline use - waiting for it to download - setting "mail.server.default.offline_download" to "false" - deleting all "cur" directories (I use maildir) or deleting all *.eml files from the ImapMail directory.

Content search works for messages that have been downloaded (and indexed) previously; it doesn't work for new messages.

Why am I trying this? Some people have "air" laptops (meaning - weaker processors, small SSDs) and need access to email (via IMAP), including full search, without having all their email downloaded locally.

In other words, how can I configure TB via IMAP to: - download the directory and subdirectory tree - download the headers of all messages - "read" and index all messages (including their content) and store them in "global-messages-db.sqlite," but not store all messages locally (online mode only)?

Regards Chris

Hello Thunderbird team,

We are an organisation that recently migrated from another email client to Thunderbird. Overall the client has been fast and easy to use, but we have identified a key functionality gap that impacts our day-to-day operations.

Previously we relied heavily on the ability to search not only in email body text but also inside PDF attachment contents (e.g., specific keywords within attached PDF files). In Thunderbird this capability is currently missing, existing search and add-ons (e.g., Expression Search – NG, etc.) do not index or find text inside PDFs.

This feature is critical for business users that need to locate emails based on text inside attachments. We would like to request that full-text search of common attachment types (PDF, Word documents, etc.) be considered for inclusion in a future Thunderbird release, ideally with options for indexing and performance controls.

If this is already on the roadmap, we would appreciate any guidance on how to enable it or track progress. If not, we would be grateful if the team could evaluate this enhancement.

Thanks for your work on Thunderbird and wishing you a happy new year!

We’re having a weird issue with Thunderbird that’s showing up on multiple computers using the same mailbox. When we search using the top search bar (Ctrl+K), it often doesn't find all emails that clearly match the search term For example, we have multiple sent emails with the searched phrase in the subject, but Ctrl+K only finds one of them, even though there are two (or more) that match. When we use Ctrl+Shift+F (advanced search) with the exact same keyword and folder, all the matching emails show up just fine.

So it's not like the emails are missing —they're just not being picked up by the Ctrl+K search.

The annoying part is that Ctrl+K lets us open the whole conversation thread, which is really useful, while Ctrl+Shift+F only shows single messages.

Ive tried to:

- repair folders

- delete .msf files

- rebuild global database

- reenable "Include messages in this folder in Global Search results" but it did not help

And this isn’t just one machine, it's happening on every PC where this mailbox is used

"Open message in conversation" is no longer listed when I right click on an e-mail.

So I started investigating. Rebuilding the Global Database was suggested as a solution. So I deleted the "global-messages-db.sqlite" file (66MB), and started TB again.

Now the database starts rebuilding. I follow the status in the Activity Manager. It's stuck at: "Indexing messages Determining which messages to index in Inbox/+ 2023/+ Pantoon/+ Algemeen - Yannig.eu"

So I backup this folder "Algemeen", delete it from TB, and restart TB. Now the Indexer is stuck at the next folder. I once again backup, delete and restart. Now the indexer is stuck at the next folder in the list, and so on.

Any advice on how to break this cycle and get TB do index succesfully?

Hi, I don't remember exactly from which release it started, but for a couple of months, quick filtering has not been working properly. For example, when typing the sender's name, the results show emails from other senders, and the sought name can be found in the 'Copy' field or in the message text. However, quick filtering works as before, fully correctly in Troubleshooting mode 😳 Attached screenshots with quick filtering results shown when opening TB in 'Normal' and in Troubleshooting mode.

I perform a search using the top search bar looking for a word i.e. 'Messages mentioning:' The search result shows it has found 30 emails. I click on 'Show results as list' and the new tab opens but the list only shows only 26 of the 30. When I compare the 30 with the list of 26, I see that the missing four are consecutive in the date sequence. Going back to the tab that displays the 30, and clicking on the individual messages, I find that the four troublesome messages result in 'No message found'. Going directly to the folder where I know the messages are stored, I can open the four troublesome messages OK.

What should I try next to analyse the problem further?

140.1.1esr (64-bit)

After upgrading to the latest version of Thunderbird ( release 141.0), I noticed an issue in the message list window: the horizontal scrollbar at the bottom appears very close to the last visible email in the list (which is usually the most recent message, depending on the sort order). In some cases, the scrollbar even overlaps the subject line of that last email. This often makes it difficult or even impossible to click on the email, as the scrollbar covers a large portion of its title. This issue occurs when the "Quick Filter" feature is enabled. If I disable "Quick Filter," a proper space appears between the last email's title and the scrollbar, and the issue no longer occurs.

In classic search, "To, from, cc, bcc" and "reply-to" are two separate searches. Is there a way to combine these in a single item in the drop-down list? The reason is I need to do

("To, from, cc, bcc" = <something> OR "reply-to" = <something> ) AND ("age in days" < 30)

so

("To, from, cc, bcc, reply-to" = <something> ) AND ("age in days" < 30)

does the job. I'd greatly prefer this to be classic search, but all suggestions welcome.

Many thanks

When I search Messages (Ctrl+Shift+F) there used to be an option to select "Body" Contains [a text string]. But it's disappeared. The body of my emails IS downloaded and 'Keep messages in all folders for this account on this computer' IS checked in the Sync. and Storage section of Tools/Account Settings. So how can I get the ability to search the body back?

When I opened it today, the search function was no longer working. Specifically, it does not progress past “Searching.” I tried deleting “global-messages-db.sqlite” as suggested online, but it did not resolve the issue.

My Thunderbird was not finding messages that I could see were there.

I followed the advice here https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/rebuilding-global-database.

I deleted the (large) global-messages-db.sqlite (I have been using Thunderbird for a long time - and I am monthly contributor).

The rebuild gets to a certain point and then stops (as indicated by Tools Activity Manager). Always at the same point. I guess there is a bad message in there somewhere. But now I am worse off than before.

I tried rebuilding several times. I have also compacted the account folders of the account that stopped and then tried rebuilding.

I have many years of messages in there and I need a functioning search. What can I do?

The Thunderbird search feature use some kind of fuzzy search, but I would like to be able to search for the exact word I typed.

One example is if I look for "assurance", Thunderbird will show results for "assurer", "assurent" in addition to "assurance", but I would like only the email with the exact word "assurance" to be returned (sorry, my last search was using a French term, but you get the gist of my question even if you don't speak French). I tried putting the word between double quotes or adding a + sign in front of the word, it doesn't work.

Any option I didn't see that would let me do this or is it a feature request I'm asking here? I didn't find anything in the documentation, nor any add-on that would be helpful. Even when I’m sorting the results by relevance, with the number of emails I have, it's not as helpful than finding the exact word(s) I'm searching, which is what I want most of the time.

I use the Search Messages tool daily, and I have always used the keyboard shortcut Cmd-Shft-F. That shortcut seems to have been eliminated. Could it be restored?

Thanks, Ben

When I remove a Quick Filter, I'd like the list to move to the most recent message (my msg lists are sorted by date desc). Instead what happens is that after showing the full list, which includes redrawing the list so that it moves to the top, it forces the re-selection of the message that was selected when the Quick Filter was in place. What happens, a lot, is that after checking a message via filter from months ago, the filter is released, the full list appears briefly, I select the top message if I'm quick, and then it re-selects the message from months ago. I then have to scroll to the top or use ctrl home.

It's very stubborn about this behavior. Even if I

• select another email account which would not contain any hits for the filter
• wait for it to build that list
• select an email at the top of that list
• select the All Accounts top level Inbox folder

it will re-select the email that was selected when the filter was in place.

I filter a lot and each time I have to fiddle around with this to return to the top of the unfiltered list, which takes time.

It seems like a rather lame behavior, not sure if it acts like this by design or not. But it be better to at least have the option to have thunderbird go to the first message in the list. By the time the Quick Filter is released, doesn't it make sense to return to what would have to be the normal selection for most users, the top of the list?

When I have the quick filter row displayed I can type something to search for. There is a row of "filters", like "unread", "tag", etc. that I can select to narrow down the set of messages to search in. But there's no indication which filter is active. The row of filters looks exactly the same whether they are active or not. As a result, it's hard to know if I'm not getting results because there aren't any or because I've clicked a filter by accident or have forgotten I did.