Before anyone can help, you need to tell whether your centurylink account is IMAP or POP and how you access the account (such as via an email client on online). Your statement implies you are creating a new account. That is, you state you want to keep emails in centurylink for now, so my inference is there is a new account. Please provide more detail on this.

thank you. I set up an account here for was told I could export my clink to here easily enough..not seeing how to do that. Thought after setting up an account here, ( which I sign in with my centurylink address), I could get my email exported from clink to here without much ado.

In looking back at a screen print I took while setting an account up here , looks like I " set up my existing email centurylink address" with all my info. from centurylink,( pw etc.) and under " configuration found in mozilla ISP database" I checked on the IMAP stuff vs. pop. ( was told that'd be the best way to get ALL folders from clink moved over )

I am on a desktop, get to my clink email via webmail and the info. at clink is as follows:

POP3 Server: pop.centurylink.net POP3 Port: 995 (SSL/TLS)

IMAP Server: mail.centurylink.net IMAP Port: 993 (SSL/TLS)

SMTP Server: smtp.centurylink.net SMTP Port: 587 (TLS) or 465 (SSL)

I think I may have royally screwed up but hope not. I am totally new to this concept , sorry. If I need to delete what I've done here and start over some guidance would be greatly appreciated. Did I mess up by putting all my centurylink email info. in here at this website? Should I go and change my pw at centurylink now and/or delete the account I set up here? Am going to dump clink soon but NEED those emails saved somewhere else.

not seeing my full reply so will add to it here, not sure what happened in my last reply.

looks like ..per a screen shot I did while setting up an account here... that I set up my existing centurylink email address here with all my centurylink email info, pw etc. and chose IMAP as my mozilla isp database configuration .

I am trying to figure out what your goal is. I now think your intent is to save messages from the centurylink account and then to close the account. True? If so, I suggest setting the account as IMAP so you can save all the messages in inbox and also all the messages in outbox. Please confirm and we can go from there on next steps.

Thanks David , yes...that is my goal. HOW do I get the messages to my thunderbird account without doing them ONE by ONE ? Am looking for a way to export all the centurylink emails to here for saving. I did set it up here as IMAP . Am not seeing how to do anything here really other than post to this forum.

I THINK I maybe need to delete my account here ( which has my centurylink address) and start all over. I have done something wrong it seems and need to start over. I will wait to hear from someone the best way how to proceed to achieve my goal here. I simply want an account here that I can move all my centurylink email to for safe keeping as a back up for when I get rid of that centurylink account. As of now I started this account here with ALL MY CENTURYLINK info, pw included. Do I need to go and change my pw at centurylink now, just to be safe ? All I want is my email from Centurylink backed up somewhere, somehow.

With the IMAP account set up, just do this:

1. - click the advanced button in 'synchronization&storage' for the account to verify that desired folders can be downloaded
2. - then, click file>offline>download to ensure that all messages are downloaded. browse a few here and there to verify that you have the contents, not just the headers
3. - then, if you're confortable with windows file explorer, do this:
   • - click help>troubleshootinginformation
   • - scroll down to 'profile folder' and click 'open folder'
   • - exit thunderbird
   • - click the imapmail folder and then the account folder
   • - copy the folders, such as inbox, sent' to Mail\Local Folders (but IGNORE all files ending in .msf)
   • - restart thunderbird and check that you have all the messages saved
   • - you may now delete the account if not further needed
4. if not comfortable with that, let me know

I DO NOT SEE HOW TO DO ANY OF THAT IN MY ACCOUNT. ALL is see when clickin on my username is view profile, settings and inbox which take me to extremely ltd choices to do anything....actually am seeing NOTHING that helps me out one bit. I have totally missed something here , only email options are exchange msgs. with other contributors. Settings are useless for what I want to do and is the view profile tab.

Please post a screenshot of what you do see and we'll go from there

can't get printscreen to work here, dunno why. I do screenshots on a regular basis...not working for me here. All I can tell you, again, is that when I hover over my user name at top right I see: view profile, settings, inbox...none of which have choices under them that are of any help to me. Thank you for your continued help but I really am getting nowhere with this.

birdlover said

can't get printscreen to work here, dunno why. I do screenshots on a regular basis...not working for me here.

You might find that the issue is the type of keyboard, especially if it is a laptop. Microsoft suggest Fn + Windows logo key + Space Bar to take a screenshot, is the print screen button does not work. https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/windows/keyboard-shortcut-for-print-screen-601210c0-b3a9-7b58-bc40-bae4dcf5f108

The following link is to an article on screenshots put together by the Firefox folk. It does provider relevant information once you get past the first Firefox specific instruction

How do I create a screenshot of my problem?

While David is a fan of manual copying for email folder contents. I prefer to use a more point and click method offered by the import export tools addon. https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/addon/importexporttools-ng/?src=ss

My preference is largely because IMAP mail is transitory in that is is synchronized. By exporting the mail from Thunderbird (exactly where David is going) the syncronised link to an account is broken. My preference for the addon is that as a part of it's export it checks that the latest copy of each mail in in the local store that is being exported. Thunderbird does not always have a full copy of an IMAP email stored locally or depending on account settings it may only be cached locally, so occasionally you can get a missing message body by relying on the original download only. The drawback is the export process using the addon is significantly slower.

THe addon offers the opportunity to export mail in a number of formats, EML and MBOX being perhaps the most useful. Windows likes EML and you can work with individual emails from the file manager. Thunderbird native storage format is MBOX so the files are very easy to import back into Thunderbird after the non-account linked archive has been created.

I will but out again now.

I am going to start over. Can someone please just tell me EXACTLY what to do to set up an acct. here where I can get this to automatically move my emails from Centurylink to here in a step one, step two, step three type scenario. I am seeing no options to do that with the mozilla acct I have here? I have little time to spare getting this done and no time to read through a gazillion instructions.

I saw this link someone left elsewhere...I followed the how to's but does NOTHING for me. I think I am in the wrong part of mozilla to do what I want to do !!!

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1356300

Well, I gave step-by-step instructions earlier and I don't have time to rewrite it all. The info is there, and it is a detailed process you are seeking to do, some some digging into the details is necessary for you. Matt gave advice on the same strategy, but will a different approach.

David and Matt, I do appreciate it David...problem is, I see NO WAY TO DO what you instructed me to do. If I go to my settings all I see is Watch forums, Watch KB discussions, watch questions, send emails for private discussions , that type of thing.

I do not see anything you are explaining to me...it just does not exist. my settings, view profile and inbox is all I see and are bare boned go nowhere do anything type things.

is it at all possible to save emails in bulk fashion to an external hard drive ? I have one but don't want to do ONE EMAIL AT A TIME since I have well over a thousand of them.

This shouldn't be complicated, if your current setup is fully described here - but I don't see that it is. There are two choices:

1. Are all your mail exists on the server at centurylink? Then add the centurylink email in Thunderbird as an imap account.

2. If some of your messages are not on the server and only on a PC, you need to tell us what application you are using on the PC to access these messages prior to Thunderbird.

I agree Wayne and best I can tell, my account here is set up just for community forum stuff. Inbox says exchange msgs. with other contributors, there are none. Settings is manage privacy and notifications preferences and has the several boxes to check off , all seemingly related to watch forum this, watch thread that. etc. that's it.

I cannot do any of what David says to do, the options simply aren't there. 

View Profile has manage your info. and see your contributions.

I access my centurylink via their webmail and have it in outlook interface on my computer but all my centurylink email never really makes it THERE, thanks to the "new" outlook debacle .