GMail: POP'ing ALL of your old e-mails?

March 19, 2006 9:11 PM

With GMail via POP, is it possible to send ALL past email to an e-mail client?

I just noticed, to my great dismay, that while one can set up a GMail a GMail account to send copies of previously-sent e-mails and attachments to a POP e-mail client (Outlook, Apple Mail, etc), Gmail will only do so for a limited period of time; as I write this, Feb 27, 2006 on my account.

Is it possible to have copies of ALL prior e-mails (and attachments sent to a POP e-mail client?

posted by ParisParamus to Computers & Internet (11 answers total)

Yes, there's an option in the Gmail POP3 options, but it will re-send everything already sent.

I moved off all the previously fetched emails, then I set Gmail to delete everything that had been downloaded. It only goes into the Trash if you want to bring it back. It meant that I knew exactly what had and hadn't been transferred.

I did this to leave Gmail, so I didn't both fetching stuff back out of the trash.
posted by krisjohn at 11:40 PM on March 19, 2006

What KJ said. I added gmail accounts to Outlook many times and it takes ALL the old stuff.

The directions are in the help section of your gmail account. They're pretty clear. Just choose to enable pop for ALL mail.
posted by bim at 3:11 AM on March 20, 2006

And then there's this too.

Why wasn't all my email downloaded?
posted by bim at 4:54 AM on March 20, 2006

Response by poster: I did enable the pop for all mail, but the GMail settings page still references February 27--that's what prompted me to askmefi in the first place.
posted by ParisParamus at 9:05 AM on March 20, 2006

I just did this with Thunderbird, and ran into the same problem. But then found thay every time I closed thunderbird, then re-opened it, it grabbed a whole new batch of mails. I had to do that about 6-8 times total, then I got everything. There may have been a manual way to force it inside the client, but I could not find it.
posted by kokogiak at 9:40 AM on March 20, 2006

I did enable the pop for all mail, but the GMail settings page still references February 27--that's what prompted me to askmefi in the first place.

Well then I guess you broke gmail. That'll teach you to monkey with things, sonny.
posted by bim at 10:19 AM on March 20, 2006

Response by poster: Is it possible that Gmail only allows you to POP mail once? By the way, this is what I see in the POP settings:

1. Status: POP is enabled for all mail that has arrived since Feb 27
Enable POP for all mail (even mail that's already been downloaded)
Enable POP only for mail that arrives from now on
Disable POP
posted by ParisParamus at 12:11 PM on March 20, 2006

Best answer: Oh! GMail doesn't enable POP for archived mail; once I put it all back in the In Box, it all showed up!

Thanks for the sounding board!
posted by ParisParamus at 2:35 PM on March 20, 2006

And he designates himself "best post" after all this! You have got to be kidding. Jeezus.
posted by bim at 2:42 PM on March 20, 2006

Response by poster: Huh? It's for posterity; its in case someone has the same question.
posted by ParisParamus at 3:40 PM on March 20, 2006

Shame it's wrong.
posted by krisjohn at 2:40 AM on March 21, 2006