Where's my mail?

March 18, 2006 1:06 PM

Why has Thunderbird stopped saving my "Sent" emails, and how can I make it start saving them again?

Suddenly, my "Sent" folder in Thunderbird is empty, and when I send email through the Thunderbird client, nothing shows up in the "Sent" folder.

I'm not aware that I've done anything to cause this. It was working as expected up until yesterday. Now everything I've sent is gone. I have it set up via POP to my sbc/yahoo email account. (I'm still getting email just fine.)

What's going on? Help! I need to know what I've said to people!

posted by trip and a half to Computers & Internet (4 answers total)

Have you checked all of your sent folders? You need to check Local Folders > Sent as well as your Yahoo account's sent folder. Go to Tools > Account Settings, click on Copies and Folders and make sure you've ticked the checkbox that places a copy of your sent messages in your sent folder. All this won't necessarily solve your problem, but it'll give you a start.
posted by matthewr at 1:34 PM on March 18, 2006

Best answer: Have you checked the "View" menu under the submenu "messages"? If you have it checked to show unread messages only, it will make your Sent mailbox appear empty(TB apparently treats all sent mail as "read"). Maybe you changed it by accident (I've done it myself). If so, change it back to "All," and your messages will be visible again.
posted by words1 at 2:02 PM on March 18, 2006

ps -- that's a per mailbox setting.
posted by words1 at 2:18 PM on March 18, 2006

Response by poster: Thanks to you both! Somehow I must have inadvertently set the "Sent" folder to show only unread messages.

(matthewr thanks for your helpful answer, as well, but words1 nailed it!)
posted by trip and a half at 2:28 PM on March 18, 2006