Thunderbird Saves Personal Information Such As Messages, Passwords and User Preferences in a Set of Files Called a "Profile", Which is Stored In a Separate Location from The Thunderbird Program Files. While It Is Possible to Have Multiple Profiles, Most Users Just Use the Single Default (See Using Multiple Profiles for more information).

Table Of Contents.

What is a Profile?

In Thunderbird, The Profile Stores Two Main Sets of Items. First, IT Stores Your Local Mail, And Possibly Copies of Messages That Reside On The Mail Server (Depending On Your Account Configuration). Second, It Stores Any Changes You Make While Using Thunderbird (For example, Changes to Account settings and. Changes to the toolbar).

When you install Thunderbird It Creates a Profile Called "Default". This Profile Will Be Used Automatically Unless You Invoke A NEW PROFILE.

Where is My Profile Stored?

Profile Files Are Stored Separately From The Thunderbird Program Files. The Program Files Are Static And Do Not Change (Except When You Upgrade The Thunderbird Application Version). Because We Store Profile and Program Files Separately, You Can Uninstall Thunderbird Without Losing Your Messages and Settings, and If Something Goes Wrong Wrong With a Thunderbird Update Your Information Will Still Be Available. IT ALSO Means That You don "T Have to Reinstall Thunderbird in Order to Delete Your Information or Troubleshoot a Problem.

Each Profile Is Stored On Your Hard Drive in a Profile Folder. The FOLDER IS NAMED USING THE FOLLOWING CONVENTION:

.

WHERE " "IS EIGHT DIGITS RANDOMLY GENERATED by Thunderbird and" "Is The Name You Assigned to the Profile. The location of the folder Will Vary According to the Operating System (And Whether or Not You Specified a Non-Default Location WHEN YOU CREATED THE PROFILE):

Profile Location Summary

% APPDATA% \\ Thunderbird \\ Profiles \\ xxxxxxxx.default \\

• % APPDATA% IS Shorthand for the C: \\ Users \\ \\ Appdata \\ roaming \\C: \\ Documents and Settings \\ \\ Application Data \\ Folder, Which Depends ON Your Windows user Account Name.

~ / Library / Thunderbird / Profiles / XXXXXXXXX.DEFAULT /

• The Tilde Character (~) Refers to the Current User "S Home Folder, So ~ / Library IS The / Macintosh HD / Users / / Library Folder.

~ / .thunderbird / xxxxxxxx.default /

How to Find Your Profile

1. Click on the Menu Button or Menu Bar.
2. From the Help Menu, Click Troubleshooting Information.
3. In The Application Basics Section, Profile Folder Profile Directory, Click ON Show Folder Open FolderShow in FinderOpen Directory..
4. Their Windows Explorer. Mac Finder Files Window Will Show The Name of the Profile AS Well As The Path to IT.

Finding Your Profile Worth Opening Thunderbird

1. Click The. Finder icon in the dock. On the Menu Bar, Click The Go Menu, Hold Down The Option or Alt Key and Select Library.
2. Open The Thunderbird Folder, And The Profiles Folder.
3. Your Profile Folder Is Within This Folder. If You Only Have One Profile, ITS Folder Would Have "Default" in The Name.

1. (Ubuntu) Click The Paces Menu On The Top Right Of The Screen and Select Home Folder. A File Browser Window Will Appear.
2. Click The View Menu and Select Show Hidden Files If It ISN "T ALREADY CHECKED.
3. Double Click The Folder Marked .thunderbird. Your Profile Folder Is Within This Folder. If You Only Have One Profile, ITS Folder Would Have "Default" in The Name.

Backing Up a Profile

To Back Up Your Profile, First Close Thunderbird If It Is Open And Then Copy The Profile Folder to Another Location.

1. Locate Your Profile Folder, AS Explained Above.
2. Shut Down Thunderbird.
3. Go to One Level Above Your Profile "S Folder, I.E. To % APPDATA% \\ Thunderbird \\ Profiles \\~ / Library / Thunderbird / Profiles /~ / .mozilla / Thunderbird /
4. Right-Click HOLD DOWN THE Ctrl Key While You Click On Your Profile Folder (E.G. xxxxxxxx.default), and Select Copy.
5. Right-Click HOLD DOWN THE Ctrl Key While You Click The Backup Location (E.G. A USB-Stick or a Blank CD-RW Disc), and Select Paste Item..

Restoring a Profile Backup

1. Shut Down Thunderbird.
2. IF Your EXISTING PROFILE FOLDER AND PROFILE BACKUP FOLDER HAVE THE SAME NAME, SIMPLY REPLACE THE EXISTING PROFILE FOLDER WITH THE PROFILE BACKUP, THEN START THUNDERBIRD.

   Important: The Profile Folder Names Must Match Exactly For This To Work, Including The Random String of 8 Characters. If The Names Do Not Match or If You Are Are Restoring a Backup to A Different Location, Follow the Steps Below.

Restoring to a Different Location

If The Profile Folder Names Do Not Match or If You Want To Move or Restore A Profile to A Different Location, Do The Following:

1. Completely Close Thunderbird, AS Explained Above.
2. Use the Thunderbird Profile Manager to Create a New Profile in Your Desired Location, Then Exit The Profile Manager.

   Note: If You Just Installed Thunderbird On a New Compuler, You Can Use The Default Profile That Is Automatically Created When You First Run Thunderbird, Instead Of Creating A New Profile.

3. Locate The Backup Up Profile Folder ON Your Hard Drive or Backup Medium (E.G., Your USB-Stick).
4. Open The Profile Folder Backup (E.G., The XXXXXXXX.Default Backup).
5. Copy The Entire. contents. Of the Profile Folder Backup, such as the mimetypes.rdf file, prefs.js file, etc.
6. Locate and Open The New Profile Folder AS Explained Above And Then Close Thunderbird (If Open).
7. Paste The Contents of the New Profile Folder Into The New Profile Folder, Overwriting Existing Files of the Same Name.
8. Start Thunderbird.

Moving a Profile

Occasionally, You Might Want To Move A Profile or Tell Thunderbird to Use a Profile Stored in Another Location.

Today, raking your current tasks, stumbled upon the following: transfer the Thunderbird mail client profile to the disk with RAID1, configure the backup for the profile. Well, what we went ..

Let's start with the question that should ask yourself everyone before you begin to do something: why is it generally necessary? In my case, the system, like user folders, i.e. / Home / * The default is on the SSD disk system. The reason for this is historical, at the time of the transition to Linux, other discs were in the raid from Windows, which required additional work With them to transfer data and create a raid in Linux. In general, it was decided to transfer the profile (and the corresponding and all data) of the postal client with SSD Disc on mirror. Firstly, it is at least a bit, but unloading the system disk, secondly, the mirror will save the data in the case of departure disks. Following important momentThe data saves again is a backup. Based on your experience, I believe that the backup should always be all. Even better if you even have a backup, backups. Let it be better not useful, but will be.

Now that it is clear that why I wanted to do, let's understand how to do it. Let's start with the profile transfer:

1. Stop Thunderbird (exit from the program)
2. Create a folder where we will carry the profile, in my case it is:
   / Store / Software / Thunderbird /
3. Next, open the folder with Thunderbird data, the default folder is in the User Profile folder (please note that the file manager settings, it can be hidden).
   The path is: /home/username/.thunderbird/
4. In this folder we are looking for a folder which is called:
   /home/username/.thunderbird/something123.default/
   We move it to a new location, i.e. here:
   /Store/Software/thunderbird/something123.default/
5. Open the file in the editor: /home/username/.thunderbird/profiles.ini. , there will be about the following:
   

   Name \u003d Default IsRelative \u003d 1 Path \u003d Something123.Default Default \u003d 1

   [PROFILE0] Name \u003d Default. Isrelative \u003d 1. Path \u003d Something123. Default. DEFAULT \u003d 1.

   
   Change on:
   

   Name \u003d default isrelative \u003d 0 path \u003d / store / software / thunderbird / something1.default default \u003d 1

   [PROFILE0] Name \u003d Default. Isrelative \u003d 0. Path \u003d / store / Software / / Something123. Default. DEFAULT \u003d 1.

   
   Here we changed the parameters isrelative. and Path.
   
6. That's all, the profile is transferred, run Thunderbird, everything should work

The next step, you need to set up a backup. In this case, the backup is simply copying the profile folder to another place. It seems to be simple, but there are many pitfalls, let's go in order:

1. Copying, according to "Profiles in Thunderbird. Backup profile", you need to do with thunderbird stopped. And then it lies quite a big problem: it always has always run, i.e. I started it after loading the system. And the system is practically not rebooted, because I use hibernation. Those. It is necessary for something that can ask me if it is possible to stop the thunderbird for a backup, make a backup and run it again.
2. The next thing we need is to run someone backup script script. The complexity is that we do not need to do it often (for example, not every day, but on Sat), but at the same time, if the day of the backup was missing, for example, we need to do it in Mon
3. It is necessary to monitor the number of backups, for example, to store only the last 34 copies, the rest is deleted.

Because I am a little programmer, I did not spend time on finding ready-made solutions, I decided to write everything quickly.

To write, our wonder-backup system, we use the usual Bash script.

Let's start to deal with the end:

1. Monitor the number of backups will be as follows: we sort all the archives by the time label, and delete older
2. Launch the script, it will be every 4 hours, while in the case of an archive for the desired date (for example, in the interval from last Sat before today), we will end the script.
3. The most difficult thing is to stop the Thunderbird. The following plan, install Zenity (which I already stood by default), in case of running Thunderbird, please close it to make a backup. If allowed, make a backup, if not, complete the script.
4. For the last, we show the Notify Messages in case of success / failure. To do this will be using: notify-send, which is also a lot where already installed "out of the box" (for example, I have in Linux Mint)

Now Magic: Pshpshpshspshshshshsh. Everything is ready, here it is script: open the latest version on GitHub

If you have already changed the paths in the script to yours, it remains to add this script in cron, for this we open it

# crontab -e.

And add the following, to start every 4 hours:

0 * / 4 * * * bash /path/to/script/thunderbirdbackup.sh\u003e / dev / null 2\u003e & 1

When using the Thunderbird Post Client sooner or later, you will have a question on exports (transfer) mail accounts. Such a question may occur when reinstalling the operating system or to configure mail access on the second computer. It works very well when there are several accounts, mail accounts from various services that you need to configure once. If you use the following way export and import mail accounts for thunderbird.You do not have to undergo a tedious configuration of all available mail accounts in this postal client.
The most important rule in export Email accounts thunderbird. This is what needs to have a configured client. In other words, to reinstall the operating system, you need to prepare the mail account database for Thunderbird. If the operating system is not loaded, you can use LiveCD Linux and copy all the necessary data.

In this article I will be touched export Email accounts thunderbird. both in Windows and Linux.

Export of Thunderbird Pavage Accounts in Windows:

For all available accounts, you can copy the appropriate files in your profile folders. And even for the convenience of moving them or archive.
To find out in Windows where information is stored for posting the message repository and there all all account settings, you need to go through the postcard interface as follows:
Open the ThunderBird menu (which is left at the top)\u003e Settings \u003e\u003e Parameters account And here will open a dialog box where you need to select "Local folders", in which the path to the local directory is registered. If you cannot see this path, then click the Browse button, which will show you the path to the folder.

The local catalog "Thunderbird" is a directory that contains all the settings of this email client. The content of this Thunderbird directory you can copy and transfer to another computer, and it is possible to simply copy it entirely to another device for backups. Someone will want to postpone the Thunderbird catalog in " cloud storage"Then the most convenient for all it will be archived accessible to you.

We will summarize: All contained files and folders in the Thunderbird directory are configuration files of configured mail accounts and the letters themselves.

Export of Thunderbird Mail In Linux

Just as described above, you can enroll in Linux. Having fully configured mail client Thunderbird, to export accounts, you open the file manager at the home directory root, pointing to it in the settings "Show hidden files", Find the folder. Thunderbird (starting from the point) copy, archive or carry it where it is convenient for you and need.

In Linux, like any other things, copy the hidden folder. Thunderbird can be in several ways, that is why Linux is considered a very flexible operating system.
First way; The described above is simple, all manipulations are made in the graphics environment, file Manager Installed in the Linux distribution.



Second way; By moving the folder. Thunderbird, you can implement the command in the terminal:

CP -R ~ / .thunderbird ~ / Templates / Thunderbird

(Now all files can be found in the directory / templates / Thunderbird)

Export of Thunderbird Mail Accounts between Windows and Linux operating systems

Thunderbird postal client is cross-platform, it means that all configuration files To work with accounts and available posts are suitable for different systems. You can safely copy all files from the catalog. Thunderbird in Linux in the Thunderbird Windows directory and vice versa. All your account settings and the available mail will be easily transferred, exported and will work in the newly installed postal client.

Thank you for your attention, all successful work.

Backup Profile

To do backup Your profile is necessary to close the Thunderbird and copy the folder containing your profile to another place.

Close up thunderbird.
Determine the location of the folder with your profile, as shown above.
Go to the folder level above with the folders of your profile% AppData% \\ Mozilla \\ Thunderbird \\ Profiles \\
Right-click on the folder containing your profile (for example, XXXXXXXX.DEFAULT) and select Copy.
Right-click where you want to place a backup (for example, a USB drive or empty CD-RW disc), and select Paste.

Restore profile from backup

Close up thunderbird.
If the folder of your current profile and the backup folder of the profile are called the same, then simply replace it with a folder with a backup profile, then run Thunderbird.
IMPORTANT: Folder names containing profile must match, including a string of 8 random symbols. If the names do not match or if you restore a backup to another location, follow the instructions described below.

Restoring backup to another place

If the folder names with profiles do not match or you want to move or restore the profile to another location, just do the following:

Fully close the thunderbird.
Use Thunderbird Profile Manager to create a new profile in the desired location. To start the Thunderbird Profile Manager
C: \\ Program Files \\ Mozilla Thunderbird \\ Thunderbird.exe -p.

Note: If you just installed Thunderbird on new computer You can use a standard profile that is automatically created when you start Thunderbird for the first time.

Exit the Thunderbird Profile Manager.
Find a backup of the hard disk profile or on another backup media (for example, a USB drive).
Open the backup folder of the profile (for example, a backup of xxxxxxxx.default).
Copy the entire contents folder folder: MiMetyPes.RDF files, prefs.js, BookmarkBackups folder, and others.
Find and go to the new profile folder, as shown above, and close the thunderbird (if it is running).
Insert the contents of the profile backup folder new folder Profile, overwriting existing files with the same name.
Run Thunderbird.

Move profile

Sometimes you may want to transfer your profile or specify Thunderbird to use a profile stored elsewhere.

Close up thunderbird.
Move the profile folder to the desired place. For example, on Windows Xp, move the profile from C: \\ Documents and Settings \\\\ Application Data \\ Thunderbird \\ Profiles \\ xxxxxxxx.default in D: \\ Stuff \\ MyMailProfile. (If you restore a backup profile, then in this step there is no need. Just remember the current profile location you want to recover.)
Open the profiles.ini file in text editor. This file is located in the Thunderbird application data folder:
On windows 7 / vista / xp / 2000 path% appdata% \\ thunderbird \\
On Windows 95/98 / Me Path Usually C: \\ Windows \\ Application Data \\ Thunderbird \\
On the Linux Path ~ / .thunderbird /
On Mac OS X Path ~ / Library / Thunderbird /
In the profiles.ini file, locate the line with the profile that you just moved. Enter the PATH parameter \u003d new profile location.
If you switch to the relative path to the absolute, it may be necessary to change the slope of the layers. For example, in Windows, not relative paths (absolute) use the flashes with the left inclination, the relative paths use the lace with the right tilt. Change Isrelative \u003d 1 on Isrelative \u003d 0.
Save the profiles.ini and restart Thunderbird.