Problems with New IMAP Account in Thunderbird

[billwilson]

I have an existing POP3 account in thunderbird that has been working fine but now I want to switch to IMAP instead of POP3. I opened thunderbird and went through the steps to create a new account. I also set the POP3 account to stop deleting messages on the server. That seems to have worked fine and it pulled in the only new message that has arrived since then. However, a Trash folder as a subfolder under Inbox in the new account was apparently created automatically. That folder does not exist in that position on the FastMail account. Here is some data and some questions:

Thunderbird: version 24.2.0

There are 6-8 folders in addition to Inbox in the FastMail account.

1. I got the impression from something I read that folders added to the FastMail account would be automatically added to the IMAP client (thunderbird). Apparently that is not true. When I need to add a new folder do I have to add it both places?

2. Thunderbird lets me go through the steps of adding a new folder to the IMAP account but it never shows up in the display so I assume it has not actually been added.

3. Any idea why that Trash folder was automatically added as a sub under Inbox? It does not exist in that position on FastMail.

Thanks,
Bill

[Adrian Bell]

1. Right-click on the Inbox, then click "Subscribe...", you should then be able to tick the folders on the server that you want to see in Thunderbird.

2. Not sure about this one, check answer 1.?

3. "Tools > Account Settings... > Server Settings > When I delete a message", you should be able to pick the actual Trash folder from the list, and then delete the one you don't want. Also go to "Tools > Account Settings... > Copies & Folders", and "Tools > Account Settings... > Junk Settings", and set all of those. NB - It is best to pick "Other" and chose the folders from the list available.

[billwilson]

Thanks Adrian. Item #1 worked fine and I think that indicates why #2 didn't work. It is a puzzle why all the other folders are shown as subfolders under Inbox instead of being out at the same level as Inbox like they are on the FastMail server? I have done the things you suggested in #3.

In the FastMail account there are folders named "FileMsgs", "PossibleJunk", & "forwebmaster". Are those standard in all accounts? What are they used for?

I'm not sure who is doing the spam or junk filtering in this IMAP environment? Up to this point I really haven't used spam filtering in FastMail because I wanted to be able to see all the messages and POP3 only brought down the messages in Inbox. Thunderbird did a pretty good job of filtering out the spam. How should these two areas be set up now?

Thanks,
Bill

[Adrian Bell]

They are shown as subfolders of the Inbox because that's how they actually are on the server. It's a feature of the Cyrus IMAP implementation. The webmail hides this. It is also possible to achieve the same effect in Thunderbird though. Go to "Tools > Account Settings... > Server Settings > Advanced" and enter "INBOX." in the "IMAP server directory:" (include the full stop but not the quotes). It may take a while to kick in, try opening and closing the folder list and exiting and restarting Thunderbird a few times. The folders will then appear in a line as they do in webmail. You will then need to resubscribe to the folders and go though my previous directions (3.) again. I know it's fiddly but once it's set up it should be fine.

My Fastmail account doesn't have folders called "FileMsgs", "PossibleJunk", & "forwebmaster" so I don't think they are standard. However I only have a free account with basic junk filtering, so they could be something to do with the advanced junk filtering. Maybe someone with a paid account could confirm.

Using Thunderbird's junk mail filtering on an IMAP account should present no problems. You could also use Fastmail's junk mail filters. I personally would stick to one or the other, but's that's just personal preference. I don't know which are the most effective.

Note that some of the folder names in webmail differ from the ones in IMAP: Sent (Sent Items), Spam (Junk Mail). This is just to confuse you. If you go to webmail "Settings > Folders" the IMAP names are shown in brackets.

[EricG]

Most IMAP clients require you to refresh folders from the server to pick up changes.

[n5bb]

Originally Posted by Adrian Bell

... My Fastmail account doesn't have folders called "FileMsgs", "PossibleJunk", & "forwebmaster" so I don't think they are standard. However I only have a free account with basic junk filtering, so they could be something to do with the advanced junk filtering. Maybe someone with a paid account could confirm..

I agree with all of Adrian's comments. The standard folders in all current Fastmail accounts should be shown as follows in the current normal web interface. If your Theme is set to Standard, these folders (and only these folders) will be shown with darker unique icons, different from the folder icon used for other folders:

• Inbox (new incoming messages are delivered to this folder)
• Archive (messages are moved to this folder by the Archive button)
• Drafts (messages you are composing which haven't yet been sent are automatically saved in this folder)
• Sent (IMAP folder Sent Items)
• Trash
• Spam (IMAP folder Junk Mail)

You should also see a regular folder named Chats (used for storing chat logs from Fastmail XMPP/Jabber sessions).

In addition to these standard folders (which can't be deleted, and whose names can't be changed), you may find an optional Templates folder (used for storing draft messages which don't get deleted when they are sent). You can change your folders by clicking the Create or edit folders link at the bottom of the folder tree. You initially get the basic Folders setting screen, but you can click the Advanced link in the upper right to see additional choices.

Those other folder names you listed must have been created by you in either the Fastmail web interface or an IMAP email client. The name "for webmaster" (spelled in various ways) is how you name a folder when you need to share certain messages for use by Fastmail support, so they aren't reading all of your messages when trying to assist you.

Bill

[billwilson]

Thanks guys for the good info. I have finally remembered creating the PossibleSpam folder a long time ago! I must have created the others too. I have deleted them.

I'm puzzled by your messages about "Sent" vs "Sent Items" and "Spam" vs "Junk Mail". Are the name pairs equated automatically or do I need to do something? I don't really care which name is used in each case.

I think I am in pretty good shape now. I still need to copy some messages from existing folders in the POP3 client into the IMAP client and I don't expect to run into any problems there as long as I go slow enough so that I do not violate any of the volume rules at FastMail.

Thanks for your help.
Bill

[n5bb]

Originally Posted by billwilson

... I'm puzzled by your messages about "Sent" vs "Sent Items" and "Spam" vs "Junk Mail". Are the name pairs equated automatically or do I need to do something? I don't really care which name is used in each case...

Bill, the IMAP standard (which is now over ten years old) only specifies one folder name: INBOX (case insensitive) for the default delivery folder. So after Fastmail started up in 2001, they used folder names which were popular back then (Sent Items and Junk Mail). Those are still the actual IMAP folder names, so they are what an email client connects to. Unfortunately, there is still no standard for these folder names, and different email systems use different IMAP system folder names.

The Fastmail web interface can use any name or icon the developers desire for the system folders. They decided last year to change the web interface to show Sent and Spam, probably because these were one word shorter forms of the older terms and there was interest in simplifying the interface, especially for smaller mobile screens.

So you don't have to do anything special except make sure that the IMAP email client uses the actual IMAP folder names. If the email client tried to connect to the Sent folder to save sent messages it would cause difficulty, since the actual name is Sent Items. Most email clients figure this out the first time you set them up, and they nearly always have a setup screen which allows you to make any needed system folder name changes. If you don't check this you might end up with sent messages from the web interface (which appear to the web user interface as in the Sent folder, but are actually in the Sent Items IMAP folder) being stored in a different folder than the one created by the IMAP email client (which might save into the Sent Messages folder it creates, for example).

This is confusing for new users when the email client doesn't find the proper folder names for the system folders, but it's only an initial setup issue.

Bill

[billwilson]

Bill, I'm still confused as to what I should do. Right now my thunderbird IMAP client has a Sent folder and a Sent Items folder. I've sent out 3 emails this evening and copies of two are in the Sent Items folder and the other one is in Sent! On the FastMail server there are two Sent folders and one contains those two messages and the other one contains the 3rd message. So, I think I need to do something but I'm not certain what that is.

Thanks,
Bill

[n5bb]

I don't have Thunderbird installed on this PC I'm using right now, so I can't look at the setup menu. Did you follow the Fastmail Thunderbird setup directions for changing the Sent and Junk folders?
https://www.fastmail.fm/docs/imap/thunderbird3.html

[billwilson]

I read those setup directions several days ago but forgot about them when I was doing the setup yesterday! I've gone back through them and I think I have the Sent Items and Junk Mail folders set correctly now.

There is still one puzzle. The instructions referenced above say that the incoming port should be 993 but I had left it set to the default 995. That seems to have worked OK! I just changed it to 993 and did a sync as noted in the instructions and I got an error message. I changed it back to 995 and did the sync and it seemed to work although there was nothing new to see in any of the folders.

I have had a Blogs & News Feeds section in the left window in Thunderbird where I have been getting any new FastMail Status information that is issued. Will that continue to work just like it is or do I need to make changes there too?

Thanks,
Bill

[n5bb]

Originally Posted by billwilson

...The instructions referenced above say that the incoming port should be 993 but I had left it set to the default 995. That seems to have worked OK! I just changed it to 993 and did a sync as noted in the instructions and I got an error message. I changed it back to 995 and did the sync and it seemed to work although there was nothing new to see in any of the folders.

Port 993 is the standard port for secure IMAP access, while port 995 is the standard port for secure POP access. If you saw a default port set to 995 it was because you had it set to use SSL or TLS security for POP access. I thought you were changing to IMAP.

Bill

[billwilson]

Originally Posted by n5bb

Port 993 is the standard port for secure IMAP access, while port 995 is the standard port for secure POP access. If you saw a default port set to 995 it was because you had it set to use SSL or TLS security for POP access. I thought you were changing to IMAP.
Bill

Well, I am changing from POP to IMAP, but I'm doing it by adding a 2nd account to my Thunderbird and the 2nd account is my new IMAP account. The POP account still exists but my objective is to set it to not get any more messages from the server. I may not have done that thoroughly or correctly. My intention is to leave many of my existing messages in that old POP account for a while before deleting them completely.

Should this approach work if I fix it up correctly?

Thanks,
Bill

[n5bb]

I think that should work, as long as the accounts are named differently so Thunderbird treats them as separate services.