Windows 7 and Thunderbird

[Arneb]

Having read that Microsoft is going to dicontinue support for Windows XP in a year, I bought 2 OEM copies of Win7 Ultimate to install on a new desktop computer and on an Acer TravelMate 5730.

I like Win7's operations (U use it at work, too), but it has created a problem for me - migrating my old e-mails.

My way of migrating e-Mails collected in Thunderbird from one computer to the next was rather kludgy, but it worked and was relatively straightforward:
Old computer: download all e-Mails from provider via POP3
Old computer: Open application data folder under c:\users and settings, select Thunderbird and its Profiles folder, copy my entire profile folder on an external drive.
New computer: Install Thunderbird, create POP3 connection to e-mail provider.
Close Thunderbird
Open Thunderbird's profiles folder, look up my new profile, open the folderr containing the profile, and insert everything that was in the old profile folder from the external drive.
Open Thunderbird, and voila, everything is as it was on the old computer.

Now with Win7, I get the problem that I can't ope the application data folders because Win7, the bitch, won't allow me to, even if I am logged onto the coputer as an administrator.

Any way to heal that?
Alternatively, any way to export all my old e-Mails (HUGE amounts of files) to the new computer via legal routes?

[Мастер]

Can you indicate what the diagnostic is? Are you finding no permission if you browse (through whatever the Windows file browser thingy is) into the folder? Or is this a message that Thunderbird is producing? If the latter, I'm not so sure I would put too much stock into whatever it says.

I guess LLance is our Windows guy, the thing which occurs to me is, try to set up your email accounts from scratch in your new setup (create a new profile, configure everything), then copy the old emails in from the old profile into the new one. However, if you don't choose the "leave servers on email" option or whatever it is, this (if it doesn't work) could leave you with all of your old email in the old profile, then whatever new emails have come in recently in your new profile.

[Arneb]

My problem is - or rather, I hope, was - that I didn'T get access to the folder where you would save such a profile because, in spite of admin rights, Windows would shut me out of certain folders by unalterable default - among those folders, Application data where the profile belongs. My approach was to subvert the actual Thunderbird software and meddle directly with the stored profile files. Then, Win7 seemed to shut off my subversion channel.

I've since read up on it. Apparently, these paths aren't paths at all, but links ("junction points" pointing to the places where the real information is stored. This charade seems to be necessary to make older 98/ME/2000/XP software backward compatible because it simulates the old folder structure that applications had under these Windows incarnation but do not have any more in Win 7. By fiddling with the command prompt, you can find out what the real location of the program folders is. I even saw a side-by-side comparison for the most-missed folders. The real folders are accessible to anyone with admin rights. Only you don't get the idea to look for them, bacause the applications will still show you the "old" preVista/7 tree structure because, well, that is where Vista/7 wants them to believe the folders are. See here. Intricate.

[Arneb]

Hours later...

It worked!

I found out where the profile data would be stored in reality, opened that folder and copied my entire old Thunderbird profile containing every damn e-mail I haven't deleted since 2001, plus every damn e-mail I didn't delete during my entire time at Erlangen University.

It was fun, actually.

[Мастер]

Good work!

I should add, at various times, I have complained about the "shred emails at random" feature in Thunderbird. To the best of my knowledge, this only occurs when using IMAP, and you are using POP. Also, it seems there is a setting which disables this feature, and I haven't had this problem since disabling the feature on all my computers.

[Arneb]

Good to know I should never go near IMAP with my Thunderbird.

My primary email account is with a crappy priovider known to be a spam engine. I am not sure Darth Google is any better morally, but only out of interest: Can you do POP3 collecting with gmail, too?

In other news, I tried to install the newly bought Win7 on my Acer notebook (which is equipped to carry Win 7 64-bit incarnations). When looking for a driver for the wireless module, everything crashed, and now the hard drive isn'T responding any more AT ALL.

I love you, Bill Gates.

[Мастер]

I'm using IMAP with gmail, but I think you can use POP3 also. Somewhere in the configuration page when you log into gmail through the web interface there should be an option to enable it. If you can't find it, let me know and I'll look for it.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend against IMAP with Thunderbird now that I know how to fix the problem. I haven't had a single message corrupted (that I have noticed) since I implemented this option. And I'm doing things I wouldn't have dared to do before, like move 25 emails at once from my inbox (on the server) to a local folder. I would like a little more time before I'm sure, but so far, it is looking good.

I don't think I've ever found an email client I liked feature-wise as much as Thunderbird, it was just this incredibly aggravating unwanted "feature" which made me want to scream :(

[Enzo]

Thunderbird? Nah, MD20/20 is more my style.

http://www.bumwine.com/tbird.html

http://www.bumwine.com/md2020.html