399716 - Subscribed IMAP folders unsubscribe themselves after a few seconds

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Thunderbird :: Mail Window Front End, defect)

Description

[Michael]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.7) Gecko/20070914 Firefox/2.0.0.7
Build Identifier: version 2.0.0.6 (20070728)

I have roughly 100-150 IMAP folders under my Inbox.  When I first connected to my IMAP account, only a subset of these folders were shown.  I explicitly subscribed to *all* of the folders, and they all showed up in my folder pane.  A few seconds later, most of them vanished, and running the subscribe function showed that most of them were now unsubscribed again.  The set of subscribed folders does not seem to remain consistent, nor does there seem to be a real pattern as to which folders are subscribed to.  Some have recently been updated.  Most have not.  Some are small.  Some are not.  None of my other IMAP clients have this problem.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.  Open Thunderbird.  Not all IMAP folders will be displayed.
2.  Go to subscribe, highlight all folders, select subscribe.  All folders appear in the folder pane.  (Well, actually sometimes the folders in the folder pane don't update at all, and a restart is required to show the other folders._
3.  Wait a few seconds.
4.  Most folders vanish!
5. Go to subscribe again.  Only a small subset of folders are checked for subscription.
Actual Results:  
A subset of folders vanish.

Expected Results:  
Folders should all be visible unless explicitly unsubscribed.  All the time.  Even when they have been displayed for more than a few minutes.

Comment 1

[David :Bienvenu]

we may have failed to actually subscribe to them - an imap protocol log of a session where you try to subscribe to the folders, and this happens, might help.

http://www.mozilla.org/quality/mailnews/mail-troubleshoot.html#imap

it might also be the case that the server is forgetting the subscriptions. Again, the log will help.

Comment 2

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Michael, are you able to supply such a log?  Or, is the problem gone?

Comment 3

[Michael]

The last time I tried using Thunderbird,the problem was still there.  However, I haven't tried it in a while for fear of corrupting my mail data, and I've recently switched to a completely different platform, which does not have any similar problems.

Michael

Comment 4

[Steve Simms]

Without an IMAP log, I don't think there's much we can do for this bug.  Any chance we can get one?  Otherwise, this should get resolved as incomplete.

Comment 5

[WADA:World Anti-bad-Duping Agency]

Reported situation is easily reproduced, by access from 2 clients.
 (1) Client-1(in my test, Tb): Subscribe IMAP folder-1, and open folder-1.
                               IDLE support is enabled.
 (2) Client-2(in my test, Sm on same PC): Unsubscribe folder-1
 (3) Client-1(Tb): Sooner or later, folder-1 is unsubscribed without no operation.
This is IMAP's spec. (Subscribe status is kept at IMAP server)

To Michael(bug opener):
Do you access same account's mail box from multiple clients at same time?
Same IMAP account is shared with other people?

Comment 6

[Michael]

Yes, I do sometimes access my IMAP accounts from multiple clients simultaneously (although I may only be using one system actively at any given time).  Actually, this is now becoming the norm.  For example, if you have multiple PCs that are on and are running a mail client, or a PC and an iPhone, you may have multiple clients checking the same account simultaneously without the user explicitly running two clients simultaneously.  So any modern IMAP client needs to handle that situation.

My IMAP accounts are not shared with anyone.

Michael

Comment 7

[WADA:World Anti-bad-Duping Agency]

Oh, access from PC & iPhone simultaneously.
Sharing of IMAP folder among multiple clients is implemented by "multiple IMAP accounts & shared folder". In this case, subscription staus is kept for each IMAP account by IMAP server. So, I think WONTFIX is adequate for this bug for Tb.
But, your request sounds for me reasonable, because PC + iPhone case. "Multiple accounts" is over spec for it. "Hiding of non-needed IMAP folders at iPhone instead of Unsubscribe" is sufficient for your use of IMAP by iPhone. How about to ask Apple to enhance?   
 

Comment 8

[Michael]

That was just an example - as I recall, it was happening regardless.  On Apple's side, I do currently run IMAP clients on both the iPhone and with Apple Mail.  Folders never disappear from either one.  Actually, it doesn't happen with Pine either.

I'm not sure how the IMAP spec is worded, but as a user, I generally expect my choices of folders to remain constant from one minute to the next.  If I choose to unsubscribe from a folder, then obviously it shouldn't appear (or perhaps should appear greyed out so that I have an easy way to find it again).  But folders should never disappear without an apparent reason.  It's quite disconcerting.

Michael

Comment 9

[David :Bienvenu]

No one is saying that you can't access an imap account from multiple machines. I'm just trying to figure out why subscription is getting lost, and an other client unsubscribing could explain it. But, again, a protocol log would help.

Comment 10

[David :Bienvenu]

Again, I suspect subscribe isn't working for some reason, and a protocol log would tell if its because of the server or TB. Or, you can tell Thunderbird not to use subscription at all in the advanced imap server settings.

Comment 11

[Joshua Cranmer [:jcranmer]]

Michael, could you give us a log of what's going on?
<http://wiki.mozilla.org/MailNews:Logging>

Comment 12

[Joshua Cranmer [:jcranmer]]

RESO INCO per lack of response to last comment. If you feel this change was made in error, please respond to this bug with your reasons why.