253184 - Files "Sent" and "Trash" never empty, but no contents show in folders

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(MailNews Core :: Backend, defect)

Description

[Bill Strohm]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC; en-US; rv:1.3.1) Gecko/20030723 wamcom.org
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC; en-US; rv:1.3.1) Gecko/20030723 wamcom.org

In Mail & Newsgroups mode, the "Sent" and "Trash" folders appear to be empty,
but if I navigate to
Documents/Mozilla/Profiles/wstrohm/91cxa757.slt/Mail/pop-server.socal.rr.com and
look at the files "Sent" and "Trash," they have many megabytes of data in them.
I can manually trash them and get back the disk space, but why doesn't Mozilla
delete the data when commanded to from within the Mail & Newsgroups page?

Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
1.Place data in Sent and Trash folders in Mail & Newsgroups.
2."Select All" in Sent folder and click "Delete." (Files move to Trash folder
correctly.)
3."Select All" in Trash folder and click "Delete." Files disappear.
4. Navigate as shown in "Details" above to view "Sent" and "Trash" files.

Actual Results:  
There is lots of data in both the "Sent" and "Trash" files. I have noted
hundreds of MBytes of data in both files after long periods of time even though
both the "Sent" folder and the "Trash" folder in Mail and Newsgroups appear empty.

Expected Results:  
The "Sent" and "Trash" files should NOT accumulate data when they are manually
emptied regularly in Mail and Newsgroups.

Mac OS 9.2.2, using WaMCom 7-23-03 version of Mozilla 1.3.1. Hardware is a
Macintosh Power PC PM8500/120 upgraded with a Newer Technology 500 MHz G3 CPU.
If you need more info I am at [e-mail] and will await your message.
Thanks for your support!

Bill Strohm
Fountain Valley, CA

Comment 1

[OstGote!]

Wrong Product/Component, it's MailNews/Mail Back End.

WFM ... that's by design (messages are only marked as "deleted" in the mail file
for performance reasons), you have to do it manually by "Compact Folder(s)" or
set the pref "Automatically compact folders if i waste more than xxx MB". This
will rebuild the mail file without the "deleted" messages.

Open Mail&News, select your account and choose File -> Compact Folders.
The Pref is found under Edit -> Preferences -> Mail & Newsgr. -> Offline & Disk
Space: right side bottom ... [x] Compact folders ...

Comment 2

[Bill Strohm]

Thanks, "osgote."

Don't know what "WFM" means.

Don't understand why Mozilla doesn't actually delete items in Trash when you
select items in Trash and click "Delete." If this is by design, I would liken it
 to design of a solar-powered flashlight.

Don't know how I would be expected to know that the proper component is
"MailNews/Mail Back End." I can't tell which end is front & which is back, or
even if there are "ends."

The phrase "compact folders" means to me that Mozilla will "zip" or compress
files within folders. If that is true, it's not the same as Deleting them.

I did check the box for "compacting" when over 1 MByte, and thanks for the
advice, but now I don't know what is going to happen because I am no longer sure
what "compacting" means. Can you explain, please?

Thanks for your help!

    ----    Bill

Comment 3

[Bill Strohm]

Incidentally, the "Offline and Disk Space" menu item is NOT under "Mail and
Newsgroups;" it is a top-level Menu item in Edit/Preferences (in the Mac version
of Moz 1.3.1).

    ----    Bill

Comment 4

[Bill Strohm]

So how do I know it applies only to folders in Mail and Newsgroups?

    ----    Bill

Comment 5

[OstGote!]

(In reply to comment #2)
> Don't know what "WFM" means.
WORKSFORME, see http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/bug_status.html.

> Don't understand why Mozilla doesn't actually delete items in Trash when you
> select items in Trash and click "Delete." 
See bug 247444 comment 5 for other bugs.

> Don't know how I would be expected to know that the proper component is
> "MailNews/Mail Back End." 
But you could know that your problem belongs to MailNews and not the browser
itself. :-) Please change the Product/Component as I stated, I can't do it. Thanks.

> The phrase "compact folders" means to me that Mozilla will "zip" or compress
> files within folders. If that is true, it's not the same as Deleting them.
No, it recreates the mail database (the mail files) and omit all as deleted
marked messages, so you save the wasted disk space.

> I did check the box for "compacting" when over 1 MByte, and thanks for the
> advice, but now I don't know what is going to happen because I am no longer sure
> what "compacting" means. Can you explain, please?
Every time Mozilla detects that you waste more than 1 MB disk space you will be
prompted if you want to compact the folders. It takes some time on large mailboxes.


(In reply to comment #3)
> Incidentally, the "Offline and Disk Space" menu item is NOT under "Mail and
> Newsgroups;" it is a top-level Menu item in Edit/Preferences (in the Mac version
> of Moz 1.3.1).
I don't know the Mac, but I strongly recommend you to upgrade to Mozilla 1.7.1
for performance, stability, and security reasons. Simply uninstall 1.3.1 and
install 1.7.1 (don't delete your program folder for the plugins), your profile
will be kept.


(In reply to comment #4)
> So how do I know it applies only to folders in Mail and Newsgroups?
Compact folders is only for the mail database files in your profile.

Comment 6

[Bill Strohm]

Thanks, "ostgote," for the education. I will visit that bug report you referenced.

"I strongly recommend you to upgrade to Mozilla 1.7.1
for performance, stability, and security reasons."

I would really like to do that, but unfortunately for all Mac Classic OS (v
9.2.2 and below) users, it is only because of Kai Engert's outstanding work on
Mozilla v 1.3.1 in creating WaMCom that it can be used on our operating systems.
Mozilla ceased supporting the Classic Mac OS with version 1.2.1.

Mac OS X (which I suppose Mozilla does currently support) is not supported by
Apple on my computer. It is possible to run OS X, but problems abound with
peripherals such as printers, scanners, external hard drives, etc.

I attempted to comply with your request for reclassifying this "bug" (see
above). Let me know if it was correct.

    ----    Bill