246222 - nothing happens when clicking thunderbird icon - program won't open

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: General, defect)

Description

[Misty]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)
Build Identifier: thunderbird 0.5b

We have many people at work using Thunderbird and I work on the e-mail help 
desk.  We get several calls where a user clicks on the icon, but nothing 
happens.  The way we've found to fix this is to go into task manager, and 
usually we'll find thunderbird.exe in the programs list (even though the user 
can't see Thunderbird running, it must be running in the background).  Ending 
thunderbird.exe in task manager usually fixes the problem.


Reproducible: Sometimes
Steps to Reproduce:
We haven't been able to see a trend with this, but have noticed it happens 
multiple times to some of our users.


Expected Results:  
Thunderbird should open when the icon is clicked.

We were using Netscape 7.0 before we switched to Thunderbird and people had 
the same problem (where we'd have to end netscape.exe in task manager in order 
to get the email icon to work)
Most of our users have Windows XP, but some have 2000 and some have 98.

Comment 1

[Adam Becevello]

Misty,

This bug was filed almost 6 months ago.  Since a lot of work has gone into
Thunderbird in that time, a newer version may fix this problem.  I was wondering
if you are still experiencing this problem?

Please report back.

Comment 2

[Misty]

We haven't upgraded people to .9 yet (so they're using .8) but we're still 
getting calls on this problem occasionally.  Like I mentioned before, Netscape 
7.0 (& I believe 7.1) did the same thing.

Comment 3

[Misty]

We're on 1.0 now & I think we've had a few calls on this problem since 
upgrading.  We also get calls sometimes where the profile manager or account 
setup wizard comes up, even though a profile already exists and we have to go 
in & edit their profile.ini file to fix it.  That's probably a different bug 
though.

Comment 4

[Misty]

As another side note.....sometimes this bug occurs when thunderbird encounters 
some type of error & shuts itself down - the user will click the email icon to 
re-open the program & nothing happens.  Then we'll have to end thunderbird.exe 
in task manager & try opening it again.

Comment 5

[Misty]

We are still having this problem occasionally in version 1.0.2 (20050317).  I 
reported this a year ago.

Comment 6

[Misty]

I got another call from one of our users on 6/28, who had this problem.

Comment 7

[Michael Robinson]

I'm using Thunderbird 1.0.6 and have been having exactly the same problem since
the pre 1.0 releases.  About one in every five times I open Thunderbird it won't
launch and I'll have to end its process in task manager and then relaunch it. 
Thunderbird has never crashed on me and it always appears to exit successfully.

Comment 8

[Michael Robinson]

(In reply to comment #7)
> I'm using Thunderbird 1.0.6 and have been having exactly the same problem since
> the pre 1.0 releases.  About one in every five times I open Thunderbird it won't
> launch and I'll have to end its process in task manager and then relaunch it. 
> Thunderbird has never crashed on me and it always appears to exit successfully.

Forgot to mention I'm running Windows XP Pro x64, but still have the same
problem in Windows XP Pro.

Comment 9

[kns]

I have had the same problem as listed most recently in this list. Though, I
occasionally get through with 'safe mode', though it doesn't last long.

Comment 10

[woodie]

i,m hAVING THE SAME PROBLEM.IT HAS HAPPENED SEVERAL{3} TIMES.USUALLY
RE-INSTALLING THE PROGRAM FIXES IT BUT NOT THIS TIME,{TRIED EARLIER VERSIONS AS
WELL=NADA}
PLEASE GIVE SOME COMMENT/ADVICE I WOULD HATE TO HAVE TO GO BACK TO OUTLOOK

Comment 11

[David :Bienvenu]

If thunderbird won't come up, try bringing up windows task manager (cntrl - alt
- del), click on the processes tab, and look for thunderbird.exe - select that
line or lines, and click end process. Then try launching thunderbird. The
problem is that thunderbird is not shutting down cleanly, and the process is
left in memory, but won't allow new instances of thunderbird to run.

Comment 12

[Michael Robinson]

(In reply to comment #11)
> If thunderbird won't come up, try bringing up windows task manager (cntrl - alt
> - del), click on the processes tab, and look for thunderbird.exe - select that
> line or lines, and click end process. Then try launching thunderbird. The
> problem is that thunderbird is not shutting down cleanly, and the process is
> left in memory, but won't allow new instances of thunderbird to run.

In the latest version of Thunderbird (1.5) the problem is fixed.

Comment 13

[Gary]

(In reply to comment #12)
> (In reply to comment #11)
> > If thunderbird won't come up, try bringing up windows task manager (cntrl - alt
> > - del), click on the processes tab, and look for thunderbird.exe - select that
> > line or lines, and click end process. Then try launching thunderbird. The
> > problem is that thunderbird is not shutting down cleanly, and the process is
> > left in memory, but won't allow new instances of thunderbird to run.
> 
> In the latest version of Thunderbird (1.5) the problem is fixed.
> 
I have the same problem using 1.0.7. Where does one find 1.5 at - the latest download on the TB web site is 1.0.7.

Comment 14

[Michael Robinson]

You can grab the Beta (1.5) here: http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird/releases/1.5.html

Comment 15

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

closing WFM per comment 12.  If anyone other than bug author still sees this problem, please open a new bug.