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Storing and reading Thunderbird Emails

I have a batch of local folders in my Thunderbird email program that I'd like to save in a separate file outside of Thunderbird and read the contents at my leisure, hopefully in an HTML format that will allow me to see graphics etc.

I've downloaded the Thunderbird Add-on "Import/Export Tools" and installed it, and I've doped out the way you save a folder and each email to view it in Thunderbird BUT all I'm seeing where I should see graphics are the links spelled out.

Any way to see the WHOLE email that I'm missing?

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Dave Howe

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RadioGeorge

ASKER

David, Thanks for the detailed reply. I've done all that you suggested without trouble, except for the finishing touch.

You say: "moving those across to your portable Thunderbird folder will "Migrate" those emails for you to your offline, portable copy."

Inside the"Mail" folder that appears in my "real" Thunderbird account, I see the folder named "Mail" and another inside that one named "Local Folders." Inside that one are all the folders in my account. So I copied two, such as:

Conclave
Conclave.msf

But exactly what do I do to migrate them? I tried just copying and pasting, and nothing seems to take? What am I not seeing in this process?

Thanks,

George

Dave Howe

Just copying and pasting should work. Don't bother with the msf file, which Thunderbird will/prefers to rebuild. Copy "Conclave" to Mail>>Local Folders on the target (portable) copy, then when when you start up that instance, it should add a new (populated) folder under "Local Folders" there.

RadioGeorge

ASKER

Got it! For some reason I can't figure out, I simply did not open the subfolders all down the route you designated: data-profile-mail-local folders. Once I got down the line all the way and copied/pasted over an inbox category file to the local folder, Thunderbird Portable worked like a charm.

Thanks for a great solution!

RadioGeorge

ASKER

I've requested that this question be closed as follows:

Accepted answer: 0 points for RadioGeorge's comment #a40769542

for the following reason:

Wish all EE solutions were this easy! Direct, to the point, and gets the job donw. What more could you ask?

ElrondCT

The expert answered your question. Why aren't you accepting his answer???

RadioGeorge

ASKER

Excellent answer and followup that did the trick-very pleased with Dave's repsonse.

RadioGeorge

ASKER

THE LAST WORD, hopefully, regarding this nonsense about not awarding points....

Bottom line is hat I made a small mistake. I thought I had selected "accept this answer", awarding all 500 points to Dave Howe. I have used Experts Exchange for several years now, and I was surprised to find that I had apparently checked "accept all" to award the points.

At the risk of sounding a bit snippy, perhaps EE should have a mechanism that pops up and asks "Are you sure you want to award yourself points?" or whatever the appropriate wording would be when someone checks "accept all" when that person has indeed included awarding point to themselves. Come to think of it, why would that even be an option, since the act of posting a question means that you don't have an answer to your problem!

Anyway, over, done, mistake caught and fixed.