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Backing up a single profile email account and exclude other profiles.

Thunderbird Import and export email
david replied 1 hour ago
JJM
JJM

Current official docs explains how to backup and move your profile, it assumes you only have one. I have multiple profiles which means about a 20GB backup but I only want to backup one specific profile (<2GB).

The backup is not for recovery but I need to keep a history records for a specific account which can be accessed through Thunderbird even if the original email account no longer exists.

To backup/copy its recommended to do it for this folder %APPDATA%\Thunderbird\Profiles\ (about 20 GB)

While all I need is %APPDATA\Thunderbird\Profiles\xxxxx.default-release\ImapMail\Important_stuff* (2 GB folder and .msf file)

Any better solutions than these?

  1. Use a backup method that excludes specific folder and files in backup/copy of
  2. Have a completely different installation of Thunderbird that only does the Important_stuff account (Thunderbird portable looks like it might do the job).

I suspect the first version will pick up a lot of unnecessary configuration and other stuff.

Current official docs explains how to backup and move your profile, it assumes you only have one. I have multiple profiles which means about a 20GB backup but I only want to backup one specific profile (<2GB). The backup is not for recovery but I need to keep a history records for a specific account which can be accessed through Thunderbird even if the original email account no longer exists. To backup/copy its recommended to do it for this folder %APPDATA%\Thunderbird\Profiles\ (about 20 GB) While all I need is %APPDATA\Thunderbird\Profiles\xxxxx.default-release\ImapMail\Important_stuff* (2 GB folder and .msf file) Any better solutions than these? # Use a backup method that excludes specific folder and files in backup/copy of # Have a completely different installation of Thunderbird that only does the Important_stuff account (Thunderbird portable looks like it might do the job). I suspect the first version will pick up a lot of unnecessary configuration and other stuff.

All Replies (1)

david
david
  • Top 10 Contributor

If all you need are the data folders, then exit thunderbird first and copy them. If you want to have account info so you can quickly restore and activate the account then exit thunderbird and copy the profile itself to ensure all elements are saved. Understand that, when you do not copy the full appdata\roaming\thunderbird folder, the restore is simple but different.

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