535139 - Message body search not available in advanced search

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: Search, defect)

Description

[Martin Jungowski]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686 (x86_64); de; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091102 Firefox/3.5.5
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686 (x86_64); de; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091204 Thunderbird/3.0

In previous verions of Thunderbird (e.g. 2.0.0.23) the advanced search dialog (edit - find - search messages) included "Message Body" as criteria, or as place to search. Thunderbird 3.0 lacks this feature, and adding it manually (I tried Body, messageBody, Content, Contents, etc.) doesn't do anything.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Go to Edit - Find - Search Messages
2. Select Search Criteria
3. Look for Body, Message Body, etc.
Actual Results:  
Message Body cannot be search

Expected Results:  
Just like in Thunderbird 2.x, message body should be in that list

Comment 1

[Kent James (:rkent)]

If you are using POP3 and local folders, 'body' is always there.

If you are using IMAP, 'body' will show up if the selected IMAP server is configured to "keep messages for this acount on this computer".

The IMAP body search is a new feature in TB3 that did not exist in TB2.

All of this works for me. So to see if you are seeing a real issue, I need to know exactly what you have selected as your server and folders in the advanced search dialog, and whether you have the "keep messages ..." enabled if this is IMAP.

Comment 2

[Martin Jungowski]

As a matter of fact it is an IMAP server, and "Keep messages for this account on this computer" is not enabled. The IMAP server is on the local company network, thus there really is no need fo every single of our users to keep a copy of their mails on another server or another computer. Keeping them all on our IMAP server has served us just fine for years, and so far we have been able to search body in TB2 even without using a local IMAP cache.

Comment 3

[Kent James (:rkent)]

(In reply to comment #2)
>  Keeping them all on
> our IMAP server has served us just fine for years, and so far we have been able
> to search body in TB2 even without using a local IMAP cache.

Then what you want is "run search on server" to be enabled.

I'm not sure what TB2 was doing here. I guess in theory it could download the message body and search that without saving it, but I am not aware that it had that capability. Is that what you think you were doing before?

Comment 4

[Martin Jungowski]

Yes, that's it. Thanks, I would have never thought about it. That and the fact that the English -> German Translation for "Body" went from "Nachrichtentext" (TB1, TB2) to "Inhalt" (TB3). It's an inconsistency though, because that's only true for the advanced search - the basic search still refers to it as "Nachrichtentext". But that's a different "bug" ;)

Thanks again, it works now even without having to keep a local copy of every message.

Comment 5

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

Martin do you have suggestions for a better german translation ?

Comment 6

[Martin Jungowski]

Both "Nachrichtentext" and "Inhalt" are fine. Consistency is key though. I really don't see why it should be referred to as the former in basic search (aka the search bar on the top right) and the latter in advanced search.

Might I also suggest a feature request? Body should always be available in the advanced search dialog, and automatically check "search on server" if necessary. While the current setup makes perfect sense to me after reading Kent's explanation it's pretty confusing without knowing all the technical details.

Comment 7

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

WFM per comment 4

Comment 8

[Ben Slade]

(In reply to comment #1)
...
> The IMAP body search is a new feature in TB3 that did not exist in TB2...

This is not true.  I've been using the Edit->Find->Search Messages search body option for years on IMAP email accounts.

I've noticed that *only* with IMAP used with SSL on Thunderbird 3.0, under server "View settings for this account", there's a new "Synchronization & Storage" option (only with SSL, non-SSL IMAP doesn't have this option).  If you go into that option, and enable "Keep messages for this account on this computer" *and* click on the "Advanced" button just below this option, and make sure the "Download" option is enabled for the folder(s) you want to body search, then the search body option *will* appear for that folder.

Additionally, if you enable the above option, you can include body searches in the filters (Tools->Message Filters).   I'm pretty sure this feature wasn't available before.

Comment 9

[Kent James (:rkent)]

Ben(In reply to comment #8)
> (In reply to comment #1)
> ...
> > The IMAP body search is a new feature in TB3 that did not exist in TB2...
> 
> This is not true.  I've been using the Edit->Find->Search Messages search body
> option for years on IMAP email accounts.
>

Ben, you are correct. The new feature that I was discussing was IMAP body search as part of incoming filters, which uses the same search code in a different context.