For some unknown reason I have been unable to delete emails that have been downloaded from my POP account to my local inbox. Instead it acts in a manor that it just marks the messages as read, and the messages continues to stay in the inbox. This occurs with both POP email accounts, but my IMAP email account works just fine. Here's what does NOT work:

Selecting the message and pressing the delete key
Opening the message and hitting the delete button
Right-clicking the message and selecting delete

The only way I can get an email in the inbox to move to the Trash folder is by dragging and dropping it to the Trash folder.

I've tried:

Reinstalling Thunderbird
Compacting folders
Removing .msf files
Removing Inbox file
Running Thunderbird in safe mode
Disabling add-ons or uncommon extensions
Deleting unnessary emails to free up space
Updating software packages

I'm running Thunderbird 17.0.6 on Linux Mint. Any help will be greatly appreciated. I've been using Thunderbird for forever and this is the first time that I've seen anything like this. Googling answers comes up with nothing.

I don't know if this is related to your problem. I also use T-Bird 17.0.6 but I have no folder called "Trash". Are you talking about the list of folder that appear to the left of your Inbox contents (including Inbox, Junk, Sent, Archives, etc.)? On my system that's called "Deleted" and not "Trash".
jdk

Does the same thing occur if you launch the application in Mozilla Safe Mode?
http://email.about.com/od/mozillathu..._safe_mode.htm

Have you tried to press shift+del key?
Does it give same response?

I have a trash folder on the left, which I now have to drag the email messages to the trash folder on the left to delete them.

karim.ouda - The shift+del key works. I don't understand why the delete key doesn't work by itself, or any of the delete buttons, but this is a temporary work around, thanks. Safe mode produces the same results, in which trying to delete messages just marks it as read.

That's very strange. The folder appearing in the first tab on the left is called "Deleted". There is no "Trash Folder to be seen". Are you sure you're not just dragging them into the Trash folder on your Desktop?
jdk

@anccert
If shift+del works but del does not then...
Can you delete folders & files using del key?
Just check once, I think you have assigned your del key for another functionality.
Just check once keyboard shortcuts, if del key is assigned to some other function.

Problems associated with deleting or moving email usually stem from failure to compact mail folders, especially inboxes. This is because deleted email is not removed from the application until you compact (expunge is the technical term). This can be done automatically by a setting in your email account. Manually is simple enough. On any mail folder do this: right click/compact (or File/Compact Folders). This is especially important on inboxes but also, any folder from which you regularly delete/move email.

If you are experiencing problems you probably have a lot of uncompacted mail so be patient the first time and watch the activity bar for its status (at the bottom of the application).

Find more useful info here

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewto...f=39&t=2638361


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rais

Posts: 951
Joined: May 25th, 2011, 8:57 pm

Post Posted January 7th, 2013, 6:47 pm
two things just for starters:

Archive all the mail currently in the Inbox
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Archiving_your_e-mail

enable AutoCompact
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Compacting_fo ... omatically

Last edited by rais on January 8th, 2013, 3:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
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I've tried maually compacting messages a long time ago and it didn't work. It didn't take much time at all since thunderbird was already setup to automatically compact messages. At this point the only option is to reinstall thunderbird, setup my mail accounts from scratch, and not import any of the old messages.

Hi ANCCERT, sorry to hear the compacting folders didn't help. Email problems are seriously annoying. I posted with the fact in mind that may users search and find answers like these. It hasn't helped in your case but completely solved my problem of mail not deleting and not moving between folders. Completely and never recurred.

A couple of tips if I may to you readers out there:

• I don't rely on Auto compact, I compact inboxes often
• Restarts and reinstals are at best temporary fixes. They do not address the underlying problem
• Avoid tampering with '.msf' folders and similar nerdy advice. Unless you have advanced technical skills you will more likely cause corruption than solve the problem.

Good luck with it.

Same problem with Thunderbird 24.4.0
I deleted the account myaccountX whose InBox refused deletion - this did not delete the directory ~/../Mail/myaccountX
Then, I recreated an account myaccountX, it then used another directory ~/../Mail/myaccountX-1
Deletion is then possible on the InBox of this new account.

- - - - - a bit more investigations - - - - -

In the account Settings, I changed the directory of the new account to the old directory: ~/../Mail/myaccountX,
deletion was impossible again. I checked the access rights of the sub-directories and found no difference between the old and the new one.

Then, I deleted ~/../Mail/myaccountX, renamed ~/../Mail/myaccountX-1 into ~/../Mail/myaccountX,
Deletion worked normally - and the name of my directory is restored to the original name.