Bugzilla

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

### The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because things can't be easy and that would be too nice to have a reliable system underneath all of this.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) ``mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

#### The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Deprecate those 2 different `default_view_flags` prefs and have only one that actually works.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

### The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because things can't be easy and that would be too nice to have a reliable system underneath all of this.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) `mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

#### The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Deprecate those 2 different `default_view_flags` prefs and have only one that actually works.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

### The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because if the user opened one of those folders in the past, the old `flags` were already stored so changing the pref doesn't affect anything.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Use the thread pane header**
Click on the `Message list display options` button in the thread pane header and access the `Sort by >` menuitem to change things.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) `mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

#### The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Deprecate those 2 different `default_view_flags` prefs and have only one that actually works.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

### The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because if the user opened one of those folders in the past, the old `flags` were already stored so changing the pref doesn't affect anything.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Use the thread pane header**
Click on the `Message list display options` button in the thread pane header and access the `Sort by >` menuitem to change things.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) `mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

### The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Deprecate those 2 different `default_view_flags` prefs and have only one that actually works.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

## The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because if the user opened one of those folders in the past, the old `flags` were already stored so changing the pref doesn't affect anything.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Use the thread pane header**
Click on the `Message list display options` button in the thread pane header and access the `Sort by >` menuitem to change things.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) `mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

## The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Deprecate those 2 different `default_view_flags` prefs and have only one that actually works.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.

### Please be kind
I would kindly ask everyone to please be patient and supportive of the developers.
We're only 13 desktop developer maintaining an application used by 11+ million monthly users. We get hundreds of bug reports per day and there's only so much we can do, and unfortunately things slip through the cracks or get put in the backlog because of lack of resources.

## The problem
The core of the problem is, as usual, how this whole architecture was implemented on the first place.
- New folders are created with the default prefs of the application.
- Changing a folder config (thread, sorting, etc) only affects the single folder and nothing else.
- Because of this here's no easy way to apply the same config to every folder all at once.
- Furthermore, there's no easy or intuitive way to apply a configuration to only specific folders in batch.

Some of those operations can be done via the context menu of the table view header, but that's not very intuitive and it has been proven unreliable.

#### The new default
We changed the new default to always be threaded.
For those of you that saw their folders suddenly change, that's due to the fact that those folders didn't have any user-changed configuration, therefore they get what the pref is set to.
- **Disclaimer:** this is also sometime unreliable because if the user opened one of those folders in the past, the old `flags` were already stored so changing the pref doesn't affect anything.
- We changed this default because a threaded view is what the majority of the users expect. We have data confirming this with new user adoption and retention going up for the first time in 12 years. All other email applications have threaded emails by default and not having it was mostly alienating new users.
- We understand that this is super annoying and frustrating for existing users, we apologize and we will work on a solution.

#### Some workarounds

**Apply the current config to another folder or batch folders**
In table view, click on the column picker > `Apply current view to...` > `Folders and its children...`
And select the account, or a parent folder, you want to apply the same view to everything.

**Use the menuitem**
When you stumble upon a folder that you want to be unthreaded, use the menuitem `View` > `Sort by` > `Unthreaded`.
That will apply the new setting and maintain it for that folder.
Super annoying to do this if you have even a dozen of folders, so this is definitely for a one off.

**Use the thread pane header**
Click on the `Message list display options` button in the thread pane header and access the `Sort by >` menuitem to change things.

**Change the pref**
In the config editor you can change these 2 prefs to `0`:
- for Mail/RSS/... (nsMsgDatabase) `mailnews.default_view_flags`
- for News (nsNewsDatabase) `mailnews.default_news_view_flags`
Apparently this solution doesn't work reliably...fun...

## The real solution
As usual, the more permanent and reliable solution is to rebuild this thing and build it in a way that makes sense, so that's what we're gonna do.
This is a generic plan of action.

**A single place to change everything**
- Having a dedicated `Appearance` section in the settings to change the default threading, sorting, etc, of all the folders.
- Allowing to edit the configuration of a single folder without affecting the global settings.
- Implementing a more intuitive "Apply this configuration to other folders" with an easy batch selection of the folders to affect.

Most likely the first intervention will be to:
- Prevent flags from being stored when a folder is opened and only store them when the user actually changes them.
- Expose that pref to the UI.
- Implement tests so we don't break it anymore.

**Timeline**
As I wrote at the beginning, we're a few devs dealing with a lot of things, so we can't commit to a deadline for this yet because, even if it's annoying, there are workarounds to mitigate the issue and this problem is not causing dataloss or inability to use the application.

We apologize with the delay and we thank you for your patience.