Not really a solution, but why would you want to make ~/.thunderbird a symlink pointing to ~/thunderbird? Beats me.

Because when I do a disk-to-disk copy as my method of backing up, it means there are no problems with copying a hidden folder. But then, as you say, this is absolutely irrelevant to my question.

But then, as you say, this is absolutely irrelevant to my question.

Is it? I do not know, but the message is about file permissions perhaps your symlink is not working as it used to in the past. Perhaps try the expedient of a cold start of your system. I am frequently chastised for being condescending for offering fundamental basic in your face advice, but I find that folk appear to have forgotten the fundamentals of troubleshooting. Turn it off snd turn it on again is about as old as electricity powered devices and yet no one appears to be doing it these days.

The problem has persisted through multiple reboots.

brian@ryzen:~$ ls -ld .thunderbird lrwxrwxrwx 1 brian brian 23 May 13 2021 .thunderbird -> /home/brian/thunderbird brian@ryzen:~$ ls -ld thunderbird drwxrwxr-x 21 brian brian 4096 Dec 22 07:46 thunderbird brian@ryzen:~$

And I've checked the file permissions all the way down beneath ~/thunderbird - as you would expect, folders are 775, files are 664.

Brian.

Additional information. Every time I try to run Thunderbird, and come up against the error described above, Thunderbird creates a lock file in my profile directory. If I close Thunderbird, delete this file, and then run it again, the same error occurs and the lock file is created again.

brian@ryzen:~/.thunderbird/4w8dbbyv.default$ ls -ld lock* lrwxrwxrwx 1 brian brian 16 Dec 25 14:51 lock -> 127.0.1.1:+22229 brian@ryzen:~/.thunderbird/4w8dbbyv.default$

I don't know whether this has any bearing on the problem. Once again, any ideas would be welcome, I'm getting rather tired of having to use my mail host's webmail interface. :(

If you're using IMAP, ignore this.

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Next time it happens, see if anything relevant shows up in the Error Console:

- press Ctrl-Shift-J

- if there are errors, R. click > Copy Message or Copy all Messages > paste here

Especially looking for any mention of popstate.dat.

I'm using POP3. Here's the output from the error console. All I've done is to run up Thunderbird and dismiss the dialog telling me that it couldn't write to the mailbox.

1766856490294 addons.xpi WARN Checking /usr/lib/thunderbird/distribution/extensions for addons Registerd messageDisplayScript; unmangle safelinks ready. background.js:6:9 This page is in Quirks Mode. Page layout may be impacted. For Standards Mode use “”. background.html SimpleMailRedirection: 1.49 on Thunderbird 140.6.0 1766856493758 addons.webextension.{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b} WARN Loading extension '{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b}': Reading manifest: Warning processing locales: An unexpected property was found in the WebExtension manifest. 1766856493758 addons.webextension.{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b} WARN Loading extension '{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b}': Reading manifest: Warning processing chrome_injectors: An unexpected property was found in the WebExtension manifest. Calendar: Calendar moz-storage-calendar:// has a dangling E-Mail identity configured. calProviderUtils.sys.mjs:361:16 pop3.server5.1: Got an error name=pop3MessageWriteError, the server said: undefined Pop3Client.sys.mjs:1627:18

Yes, I still have the four addons that I use enabled. I have tried running Thunderbird in safe mode, it does not stop the error occurring.

I'm using POP3. Here's the output from the error console. All I've done is to run up Thunderbird and dismiss the dialog telling me that it couldn't write to the mailbox. 1766856490294 addons.xpi WARN Checking /usr/lib/thunderbird/distribution/extensions for addons Registerd messageDisplayScript; unmangle safelinks ready. background.js:6:9 This page is in Quirks Mode. Page layout may be impacted. For Standards Mode use “”. background.html SimpleMailRedirection: 1.49 on Thunderbird 140.6.0 1766856493758 addons.webextension.{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b} WARN Loading extension '{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b}': Reading manifest: Warning processing locales: An unexpected property was found in the WebExtension manifest. 1766856493758 addons.webextension.{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b} WARN Loading extension '{a300a000-5e21-4ee0-a115-9ec8f4eaa92b}': Reading manifest: Warning processing chrome_injectors: An unexpected property was found in the WebExtension manifest. Calendar: Calendar moz-storage-calendar:// has a dangling E-Mail identity configured. calProviderUtils.sys.mjs:361:16 pop3.server5.1: Got an error name=pop3MessageWriteError, the server said: undefined Pop3Client.sys.mjs:1627:18 Yes, I still have the four addons that I use enabled. I have tried running Thunderbird in safe mode, it does not stop the error occurring.

Try R. click Inbox > Properties > Repair folder button.

Well it fixed it to some extent, Ed. I was using my mailhost's webmail function to check mail while this problem was occurring, so I know that I had just under 600 e-mail messages on the server. I have a LARGE network of folders in Thunderbird, and 736 (yes, really) filter expressions sorting all my mail when it comes down.

Repairing the inbox got the mail flowing again, but I had to acknowledge a ridiculous number of messages now targeting a specific folder, certainly in excess of 100. Is there some way to 'bulk repair' all the folders, or do I really have to repair them individually?

All this seems to have happened at once, which seems a bit of a coincidence. Are you aware of any single file which could somehow have got corrupted and caused all this?

Thanks,

Brian.

Is there some way to 'bulk repair' all the folders, or do I really have to repair them individually? All this seems to have happened at once, which seems a bit of a coincidence. Are you aware of any single file which could somehow have got corrupted and caused all this?

I don't think you need to repair any other folders now that the email is coming in. It was probably corruption in the message index, which 'repair folder' fixed.