Why can't you make backup and restore part of thunderbird?
Whenever someone in the family gets a new computer, it is a real hassle trying to move thunderbird from one computer to another. I've tried mozbackup and it isn't working. Why can't the developers include backup and restore as a part of thunderbird. There must be a lot of people having this problem every day. To me, it would be a must have when writing the software, yet after all these years of Thunderbird it still doesn't exist. Why not?
Выбранное решение
Yes you get everything
The caveat is. if the user has changed the paths to account in the account settings then obviously you do not get the stuff they have squirreled away on the E: drive. But few users actually fiddle with those default, although I would dearly love to see the user interface simply removed entirely.
You will see most instructions tell you to move the "profile" folder. By going up the two levels in the folders to "Thunderbird" you get the profiles ini file. This is the file Thunderbird uses to locate your profile. Again with the defaults, this is stored relative to the location of the actual profile, so when you move the profiles.ini when Thunderbird starts it knows where to look. but it needs to be edited when moving from windows to linux/OSX and back. They use / instead or \ in path names
If you have moved the profile, obviously it has to be copied separately, but you moved it so you know where it is. These are instructions for moving profiles, not necessary, but you might find them useful. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Moving_your_profile_folder_-_Thunderbird
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I am with you, Mozilla just do not get it and never have. They point to the backup tools that come with Windows and online and suggest backup is an operating system issue, not an application one.
The Thunderbird Council might get there, but they are busy at the moment trying to extricate Thunderbird from the Firefox code base before the Firefox changes break Thunderbird beyond simple recovery.
Until then, I recommend the import export tools. It has a backup that can be scheduled.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/importexporttools/
Having said that, a manual backup of default locations is a fairly simple thing. When folk start trying to move account directories is when things get messy.
Close Thunderbird. (having it running is the most common cause of issues with backups and copies to move to a new device.)
Type %appdata% into the windows run dialog. (windows key +R) Copy the folder "Thunderbird" that appears in the windows file explorer and it's sub folders and their contents to a usb backup drive. (right click and select properties will show the number of files and folders. It is good practice to check the source and destination have the same counts so you are sure you have everything.)
Backup complete.
Restore is the reverse, being aware you will replace whatever is already there.
Thanks Matt. If I copy the folder "Thunderbird" from %appdata% in your reply and then copy it over the folder of the same name on the new computer, will I then have the old profile with server settings, folders, emails and calendar on the new computer?
Изменено FrustratedbyThunderbird
Выбранное решение
Yes you get everything
The caveat is. if the user has changed the paths to account in the account settings then obviously you do not get the stuff they have squirreled away on the E: drive. But few users actually fiddle with those default, although I would dearly love to see the user interface simply removed entirely.
You will see most instructions tell you to move the "profile" folder. By going up the two levels in the folders to "Thunderbird" you get the profiles ini file. This is the file Thunderbird uses to locate your profile. Again with the defaults, this is stored relative to the location of the actual profile, so when you move the profiles.ini when Thunderbird starts it knows where to look. but it needs to be edited when moving from windows to linux/OSX and back. They use / instead or \ in path names
If you have moved the profile, obviously it has to be copied separately, but you moved it so you know where it is. These are instructions for moving profiles, not necessary, but you might find them useful. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Moving_your_profile_folder_-_Thunderbird
Brilliant Matt. So much easier than fiddling with the profile folder (which is what I have done previously) .I think most users would be like me and just run the setup using defaults and don't change paths etc. Hopefully someone will see sense and make backup/restore part of Thunderbird in the near future.
FrustratedbyThunderbird said
Brilliant Matt. So much easier than fiddling with the profile folder (which is what I have done previously) .I think most users would be like me and just run the setup using defaults and don't change paths etc. Hopefully someone will see sense and make backup/restore part of Thunderbird in the near future.
I doubt it. I remain hopeful and push the barrow out every now and again. It got as far as a stand alone profile manager with build in backup restore back in January 2011 https://jagriffin.wordpress.com/2011/01/11/profilemanager-1-0_beta1/ but that dies a natural death as the ever whimsical Mozilla changed tack.