Sounds like your settings are not being saved when Thunderbird closes. This a relatively common bug in some antivirus products. The are so slow in what they do that things like saving file on exist simply fail because they are still boiling the kettle to make a cup of coffee when Thunderbird exists and give up on it's request to save the file.

Generally placing an exception in the antivirus product for Thunderbird or it's profile folders will get you off that merry-go-round.

My settings are definitely not being saved, so the problem is more general than the title. My anti-virus is McAfee. Not knowing how to place an exception in McAfee, I temporarily removed it, disabled Microsoft Defender, rebooted, and tried various things to force a save, but none of them worked. So I have re-enabled Defender, reinstalled McAfee, and am hoping for another possible solution.

Help/Troubleshooting Info, Profile Folder, Open Folder, close TB, delete or rename session.json, restart TB a few times and see if the layout is preserved.

As far as I can tell, nothing I do causes changes to my settings to be saved. Siince currently the only setting I really want to change is Table view, and it is easily set when logging in for the session, I am going to abandon trips down this rabbit hole until I need to really change something else. I do appreciate the suggestions.

If no other ideas come forward, please tell us how things are when 140.2.0esr comes out in a couple weeks. Thanks.

I look forward top trying 140.2.0esr. I have been using thunderbird nearly since Eudora died, so I owe it some testing when I uncover something.

If no other ideas come forward, please tell us how things are when 140.2.0esr comes out in a couple weeks. Thanks.

I am at release 140.2.1esr (32-bit) and this behavior just started for me. Not sure if it was on the last update but very recently (2 weeks). No anti-virus changes and this never happened before.

I have 140.2.1 esr 64bit on Windows 11 with Antivirus running and I don't have this issue.

Maybe this is a 32bit edition issue. You may want to try Thunderbird 64 bit to see if this help. Please backup your profiles before make any attempt to change your edition from 32 to 64 bit. The 64 bit edition can be downloaded https://archive.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/releases/140.2.1esr/win64/

I have just upgraded to 140.2.1esr (64bit) and the problem is still there. For some reason 140.2.0esr did not get installed.

0) Exit Thunderbird

1) Please locate file prefs.js in %appdata%\Thunderbird\profiles\<Your Profile Directory> and verify the date the file was last modified.

It should be very closed to the date and time you close Thunderbird.

I have 140.2.1 esr 64bit on Windows 11 with Antivirus running and I don't have this issue. Maybe this is a 32bit edition issue. You may want to try Thunderbird 64 bit to see if this help. Please backup your profiles before make any attempt to change your edition from 32 to 64 bit. The 64 bit edition can be downloaded https://archive.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/releases/140.2.1esr/win64/

I just upgraded to 64bit and same problem.

0) Exit Thunderbird 1) Please locate file prefs.js in %appdata%\Thunderbird\profiles\<Your Profile Directory> and verify the date the file was last modified. It should be very closed to the date and time you close Thunderbird.

the date does not change on the pref.js even after I change various settings but all the .json files do get a new date/time (like session.json) which means I have the right profile directory.

So is there a user_pref() setting for card vs table view? maybe I can just add it in the pref.js?

Thanks

Sounds like your settings are not being saved when Thunderbird closes. This a relatively common bug in some antivirus products. The are so slow in what they do that things like saving file on exist simply fail because they are still boiling the kettle to make a cup of coffee when Thunderbird exists and give up on it's request to save the file. Generally placing an exception in the antivirus product for Thunderbird or it's profile folders will get you off that merry-go-round.

Almost. I added the prefs.js file as an exception and still had the problem.

THEN, I looked a the properties of the file and it was READ-ONLY. WTH? I have no idea how that happened but it must been since that date in 2024. Now my prefs are being saved!

Thanks for the assist in getting my problem resolved.

Michel T said

0) Exit Thunderbird 1) Please locate file prefs.js in %appdata%\Thunderbird\profiles\<Your Profile Directory> and verify the date the file was last modified. It should be very closed to the date and time you close Thunderbird.

the date does not change on the pref.js even after I change various settings but all the .json files do get a new date/time (like session.json) which means I have the right profile directory.

So is there a user_pref() setting for card vs table view? maybe I can just add it in the pref.js?

Thanks

Just found that the user_pref() for list view is : user_pref("mail.threadpane.listview", 1)

if one switches to card view in the app, this user_pref is removed.