401879 - Offline INBOX contents deleted when IMAP server times out

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 213827

(Thunderbird :: General, defect)

Description

[Steve Jameson]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.8) Gecko/20071008 Firefox/2.0.0.8
Build Identifier: version 2.0.0.6 (20070728)

I have my INBOX marked for offline use from our IMAP server, using the "Make the messages in my Inbox available when I am working offline" setting in the Account Options->Offline and Disk Space pane.  If I try to connect to the IMAP server and it times out for any reason, which often happens when I am connecting from outside and there is a VPN problem or I have neglected to initiate the VPN session, it wipes out my stored INBOX and all stored folder information, so that when I finally reconnect there is a very lengthly re-sync process.  What this means is that I cannot access my stored Inbox if I am connected to the internet but not to our company's VPN.  I do not see any functional reason for the reset of sync'ed information on timeout.

While I am not connected to the Internet at all, or if I have selected Work Offline, I am able to access the stored Inbox.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.  Configure an IMAP account for a server which requires VPN access from the internet, i.e. can't be accessed from the open internet.
2.  Select Inbox for offline use as noted above and synchronize Inbox and folder list while connected to the server.
3.  While connected to the internet but not connected to the server (i.e. without the VPN connection open), select the Inbox.
Actual Results:  
It tries to connect to the IMAP server, and when this fails, all of the folders under the IMAP server disappear from the folder pane, I can no longer access my offline stored Inbox, and when I next connect to the server it has to re-download the entire contents of my Inbox.

Expected Results:  
When the server timed out, it should let me access my stored Inbox contents as though I were offline.