Would greatly appreciate if someone can please help me figure out a) how to switch profiles (just selecting a folder does nothing... what do I choose within that profile folder? see attached) b) which profile to try (I think mb...? but I'm not sure... currently seem to be using gq...) c) whether the new mail I have downloaded (inbox) and responded to (sent) over the past 2 weeks will vanish or remain once I switch profiles, and if the former, how I can preserve it

I am completely immobilized until I have that information. Thanks very much for your help!

First, each profile is its own little universe. That is, accounts and messages and local folders will remain in that profile if you switch to another. Nothing is lost by a switch. To switch profiles, click help>troubleshootinginformation, scroll down to 'profiles' and click 'about:profiles' and the next pane you see will list them with a button to use the selected profile.

I've tried that a few times, but what you describe isn't what I get on the About Profiles page, see attached. It lists just one profile with an "open folder" option. And when I click "open folder" I can't tell which file is being used within that folder, so I don't know how to switch to another profile/folder. Sorry that wasn't clear.

Ok, since you have the names of the profiles, as shown in one of your screenshots, try this: - click help>troubleshootinginformation - scroll down to 'profiles', click 'about:profiles' - next, click 'create profile' - in that pane, enter a name, e.g., porrfolio1, and then click the browse button to locate and select one of the known profiles and activate it. - since you have four profiles, you could repeat this for each one

Thank you for the suggestion, but the part I'm stuck on is what file/item within each folder officially constitutes the profile for this purpose. Selecting a profile folder just takes me to all the subfolders and other files within it. I need to know which specific item to select in order to activate the profile. Sorry to take more of your time. Really appreciate your help!

And a new question... will upgrading make things better or worse? For now I said No, but it won't allow me to open TB without doing the upgrade, so for the moment I'm frozen.

The profile folder ends in either default or default-release. Generally, the newer one is default-release. On your question, I would say YES because there is an update pending.

I don't think I'm being clear, sorry. Let me try again.

• I click on "create profile" and choose a profile folder.
• This action opens that folder and leads to the subfolders, see attached screenshots.
• Clicking on a subfolder in turn leads to more folders and/or to files.

Which file am I ultimately looking for? What is the actual core of the profile? Choosing a top-level folder only leads to more folders.

I really hope this makes sense. Thanks so much for your help!

p.s. I updated TB, didn't seem to change anything substantive.

a folder ending in either default or default-release would be a complete proflle. You would select one of those.

OK, I went through all the profiles: - gqyio3qz.default is the one currently in use, with 6 months' worth of mail missing - 7ekmxwrr.default has no subfolders, contains only a "times.json" file - kut3ke1i.default has no subfolders, contains only a "times.json" file

I created new profiles for: - 03wpi96a.default-release - this one was completely empty - mbqhdt9e.New Profile - this one has all my missing mail! Yaaaaaaaaaaay!

Next question: Is there any way to move the past two weeks' worth of new mail from gqyio3qz to mbqhdt9e so everything is in one place? (Hoping this can be achieved, in which case I will immediately run a full backup!)

Thank you SO MUCH for all of your help!

Also how can I switch the default profile from gqyio3qz to mbqhdt9e?

In windows file explorer, you could locate the message folders in the old profile (each one has two names, such as inbox and inbox.msf) and copy the Mail\Local folders folder in the desired profile and then restart Thunderbird. It appears that he ...t9e profile is already the default. You can verify that by clicking help>troubleshootinginformation, scroll down to 'profiles' and click 'open folder.'

That worked! All my mail is finally in one profile! Yaaaaaaaaaaay! I am so relieved, and extremely grateful to you for all your help!

Was about to count this as solved, but then realized I still have a problem, which I was trying to resolve when I created a new profile and got into this huge mess...

I had been using POP for years, but recently was having trouble connecting / getting mail, so I wanted to switch to IMAP. I couldn't figure out how to switch over so I created a new account, using the same e-mail address with IMAP. That allowed me to connect successfully, but now all my mail went to a new inbox (see photos attached). And within that inbox was a phantom "#news" folder containing literally hundreds of subfolders which were not mine*, and I couldn't figure out how to get rid of it.

Also I can't send from the new account, I get an error message saying "Sending of the message failed. An error occurred while sending mail. The mail server responded:... Relaying denied. Please check the message recipient and try again."

Now that I have finally reclaimed my missing mail (whew!), I am back to the previous problems. Are you able to tell me: - How can I switch back to my original account? - Is there a way to change my original account (Eudora Mail in the photos) from POP to IMAP? - If not, is there a way to direct the new account to send my new messages to the original inbox? - How can I get rid of the phantom folder, which is probably taking up a lot of space to no purpose?

Or am I better off trying to copy all my mail folders into the profile that had gotten messed up, and hope it'll work better from now on?

Thanks very much for all your time and patience!

• Best guess is these may have belonged to the friend (now sadly deceased) who originally gave me the program.

- If the messages retrieved on IMAP account are still on the server, you can retrieve them by retrieving with POP account. No need to manipulate them. - I presume you still have the POP account. A POP account and IMAP account can coexist. - In IMAP, you can highlight and delete unwanted folders. If denied, log onto the online account and delete it there. - you need to decide whether you plan to continue with POP or IMAP, as they are different.

I wasn't clear, sorry! I don't care at all which connection method I use. The problem is that since I tried using a different protocol when I was having connection problems, I now have two sets of inboxes in the default (mbqhdt9e) Thunderbird profile, one linked to an account using POP (see images attached, marked in green) and one linked to an account using IMAP (see images attached, marked in yellow), both for the same e-mail address. (There is no mail left on the server, I download and clear it every night. I am only asking questions about Thunderbird. I wouldn't presume to ask you non-TB questions on the TB forum.)

I hope that helps to frame my questions more clearly. Appending them here again with some added notes [in brackets]. If anything doesn't make sense, please let me know. Thanks for your patience! --- I had been using POP for years [account marked in green], but recently was having trouble connecting / getting mail, so I wanted to switch to IMAP. I couldn't figure out how to switch over so I created a new account, using the same e-mail address with IMAP [account marked in yellow]. That allowed me to connect successfully, but now all my mail went to a new inbox (see [new] photos attached [marked in yellow]). And within that inbox was a phantom "#news" folder [marked in yellow] containing literally hundreds of subfolders which were not mine*, and I couldn't figure out how to get rid of it.

Also I can't send from the new [marked in yellow] account [within Thunderbird], I get an error message saying "Sending of the message failed. An error occurred while sending mail. The mail server responded:... Relaying denied. Please check the message recipient and try again."

Now that I have finally reclaimed my missing mail (whew!), I am back to the previous problems. Are you able to tell me: - How can I switch back to my original account? [marked in green] - Is there a way to change my original account (Eudora Mail in the photos [marked in green]) from POP to IMAP? - If not, is there a way to direct the new account [marked in yellow] to send my new messages to the original inbox [marked in green]? - How can I get rid of the phantom folder [within the account marked in yellow], which is probably taking up a lot of space to no purpose? - Or am I better off trying to copy all my mail folders [with the recovered mail] into the profile that had gotten messed up [gqyio3qz], and hope it'll work better from now on?

Thanks very much for all your time and patience!

• Best guess is these may have belonged to the friend (now sadly deceased) who originally gave me the program.

I will attempt to answer: - if the account is already there, just use it as default - To switch to IMAP from POP, just create a new account alongside the POP account and then delete the POP account. BUT, before doing that, copy any desired messages to save to a new local folder. otherwise, you will lose them if you delete the POP account. - you can delete the phantom folder by logging in to your online account and deleting the profile there first. - be sure to do a full backup from c:\users\<yourid>\appdata\roaming\thunderbird while TB is NOT RUNNING. If you ever need to restore, you can copy the backed-up thunderbird folder to c:\users\<yourid>\appdata\roaming.

all the best. Please mark this thread solved. david

I was able to use all your advice to splice together a solution. Thanks so much for all your time and insights!