277519 - Folder pane missing and cannot be restored - Lost all mail - cannot see anything

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Thunderbird :: Mail Window Front End, defect)

Description

[Brian]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0

Started using Thunderbird 0.8 then upgraded to 1.0 when it came avialable. Now a
few weeks later while reading my mail the Folder pane dissapeared from the
screen.  It makes no difference whether I select Classic, Vertical or Wide
layouts. Cannot find an option to restore the Folder pane. Have uninstalled and
reinstalled with no joy. 
Have previously lost mail when folder name contains a '#' and Thunderbird
created a duplicate folder with same name but empty.

The key question is how do I access my saved e-mails. They contain receipts,
serial numbers etc

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.No idea what originally created the problem
2.On my machine it is start Thunderbird
3.

Actual Results:  
The folder pane is missing and the e-mail listbox is empty. Just the column
headings are displayed.

Expected Results:  
Listed my folders so I can select InBox - sent e-mails etc

XP SP2 with no customisation of Thunderbird

Comment 1

[David :Bienvenu]

the folder pane disappeared? So you just have a thread pane and a message pane?
Has the folder pane just been minimized/hidden, so that dragging the left edge
of the window makes it reappear? A screen shot might be helpful.

Assuming the folder pane just has a zero width somehow, you could try deleting
localstore.rdf from your user profile dir, to restore the default pane sizes. If
that doesn't work, you could also try deleting the xul cache, XUL.mfl. Your user
profile dir is something like c:\documents and settings\<user name>\application
data\thunderbird\profiles\<profile name>

Comment 2

[Brian]

Thanks for the quick response.

The folder pane had been minimized/hidden, so that dragging the left edge
of the window made it reappear. 

You feel a real fool when there is such a simple solution to your problem. 

After spending hours searching Bugzilla, Google and the Mozilla / Thunderbird
documentation I could not solve my problem.  Bugzilla was not helpfull - search
either found 200 items or no items. Could not find any usefull help on using
Bugzilla on the Mozilla site.   

I suggest the real problem is the lack of: 
1. An indication that the folder pane had been minimized or  
2. A clear menu option to restore the folder pane.
3. Lack of good supporting documentation

Hopefully you will improve this situation in the next release. I would to love
to help. I would also love to help on Postgresql, Mono, Nant, Nunit, Cruise
Control...... As I am already working 7 days a week 12 hours a day on my own
product hopefully some one else will do it.

Finally I think it is important to record that this has been a very positive
experience for me. I appreciate the quick and accurate / perceptive response
both on Bugzilla and via e-mail from someone. It makes me much more confident to
use Thunderbird, Firefox etc and also confident to recommend the Mozilla
products to others.

Brian

Comment 3

[Scott MacGregor]

please uses the forums for help support and not bugzilla in the future. You'll
get help much faster.