449714 - Retention policy "use server defaults" doesn't use original server in deferred accounts (Global Inbox)

Status: NEW

(MailNews Core :: Backend, defect)

Description

[Mike Badger]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.1.14) Gecko/20080418 Ubuntu/7.10 (gutsy) Firefox/2.0.0.14
Build Identifier: 2008072418

Changing retention policies may cause you to unexpectedly lose email.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Modify the retention policy on the global inbox to delete all but the last X number of messages.
2. Click to a different folder and back to the inbox to verify the retention policy. 
3. Modify the retention policy on the global inbox to use server defaults. 
4. Send a new message to the account. 

Actual Results:  
The new message will display in the global inbox along with the previous X messages. However, when you click on another folder and then back to the inbox, the old retention policy is applied and only the last x number of message displays. 

Expected Results:  
If I click on the User server defaults option, all other settings should be greyed out and overridden. 

In the retention policy, you can word around this by 
1. unselecting the Use server defaults option
2. Select Don't delete any messages
3. Click on User server defaults

Comment 3

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Mike, please only submit ONE bug report for the same bug. Not 3.

Comment 4

[Phil Ringnalda (:philor)]

Tyler, please don't lecture people about what was clearly a Bugzilla issue, in this case the load from the scheduled maintenance giving timeouts that made it look like things weren't submitting.

Comment 5

[Joshua Cranmer [:jcranmer]]

Pray tell... You said you're using global inbox. What are the settings on your POP servers and Local Folders accounts?

Comment 6

[Mike Badger]

(In reply to comment #5)
> Pray tell... You said you're using global inbox. What are the settings on your
> POP servers and Local Folders accounts?
> 

Joshua, that's a good question. Turns out that I did have the Disk Space option set to remove all but the last 5 messages for Local Folders. This complicates my original test results. 

So, after I set Disk Space option on Local Folders and all the configured POP accounts to never delete mail, I restarted Thunderbird. I ran the test described in the original report, and I'm able to duplicate the results. 

However, if I restart Thunderbird, then the new retention policy sticks and no mail is deleted. 

I suspect there's no problem here, but the only thing I'm not sure about is whether or not a restart is required to make the new retention policy effective. 

As an aside, additional testing shows me that the retention policy on the inbox takes precedence over the Disk Space options, which is what I expect.

Comment 7

[Joshua Cranmer [:jcranmer]]

I'm pretty sure that the Inbox is getting its "Server Settings" from the Local Folders accounts as opposed to the POP server from which it came. That fact is probably a bug; at the very least, it is not immediately obvious that this would be the case. CC'ing UX expert for his opinion.

I think there's enough here to confirm this bug, and I'll change the summary to indicate the core issue here. I also don't think the issue is critical, but it's certainly a major one at least. Drivers, feel free to override my opinions here.

Comment 8

[Bryan Clark (DevTools PM) [:clarkbw]]

This is a really confusing intersection of preferences, I'm not sure how many times I just read this bug to understand what was going on.  We can't have both settings for message deletion.

If I were designing the new local folders disk space UI right now I would probably just use it as a place to show how much disk space is being used, how much disk space remains, which accounts are feeding into the local folders, how much space each account is taking, and links to jump to the other accounts disk space prefs.  Essentially using the local folders for a dashboard view of disk space but leaving the policy up to the individual accounts.

Something to keep in mind is that in bug 446306 we're changing the folder pane and it will essentially remove the local folders.  Likely there will need to be some kind of disk space view, however there hasn't been any thought into that area yet.