Closed Bug 543958 Opened 16 years ago Closed 16 years ago

New option to disable cache and only use offline store

Categories

(Thunderbird :: General, enhancement)

Product:
Thunderbird
Component:
General
Platform:
x86
All
Type:
enhancement
Priority:
Not set
Severity:
normal

Tracking

(Not tracked)

Status:
RESOLVED WORKSFORME

People

(Reporter: tanstaafl, Unassigned)

Details

User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2) Gecko/20100115 Firefox/3.6 Build Identifier: 3.0.1 final I'm not sure if the internals will allow this, but here's the thing... I only set a few select folders to full offline mode - usually just the Inboxes, sometimes the Sent folders. I want all of my IMAP activity for all other folders to be 'Download/Sync on Demand'. Meaning, when I click on a message, I want it downloaded fully to offline storage, not stored locally in the cache. So, I'd like to see an option to simply disable the cache, thus forcing all messages downloaded to be downloaded to the offline store. Reproducible: Always
Simply setting the disk-cache size to 0 in Tools > Options > Advanced will do. It may need tweaking a few preferences for exactly the behavior you describe above, bug I'd say that's WFM for disabling the cache...
Duh... I should have at least tried that... Thanks. Can you elaborate on what prefs I might need to tweak?
(Quoting bug 508276 comment #3) > Here we go, that's mail.server.default.autosync_offline_stores, thus should be > covered by any %serverkey% construct. This will switch off autosync and only synchronize on demand, per your remark > I want all of my IMAP activity for all other folders to be 'Download/Sync on > Demand'. Meaning, when I click on a message, I want it downloaded fully to > offline storage, not stored locally in the cache. That's all I had in mind (from the discussion in your other bug).
(In reply to comment #3) > (Quoting bug 508276 comment #3) >> Here we go, that's mail.server.default.autosync_offline_stores, thus >> should be covered by any %serverkey% construct. > This will switch off autosync and only synchronize on demand, per your remark Oh, right, I remember this now... so, just set this to false, and the cache to 0. Cool, many thanks... :)
I'll take your last comment as an ok to close this bug, so that's WFM.
Status: UNCONFIRMED → RESOLVED
Closed: 16 years ago
Resolution: --- → WORKSFORME
Yep - sorry, should have done that myself... Thanks...
Woops, one last question on this... I changed it, and went to see which one it is in about:config, and it was: browser.cache.disk.capacity But just below that is: browser.cache.disk.enable So, maybe I should just set this to false? Or set both (false and 0)? What about these: browser.cache.memory.enable/capacity browser.cache.offline.enable/capacity image.cache.size/timeweight media.cache_size and network.http.use-cache Disable and set all to zero?
If you set browser.cache.disk.enable and browser.cache.memory.enable both to false you won't have any caching at all (i.e., everything has to be reloaded from the offline storage or the server each time you open a message). You can use those to keep the capacity settings intact, but essentially it has the same effect as setting capacity to 0. The network.http.use-cache preference should only affect remote content (images) but not IMAP messages.
(In reply to comment #8) > If you set browser.cache.disk.enable and browser.cache.memory.enable both to > false you won't have any caching at all (i.e., everything has to be reloaded > from the offline storage or the server each time you open a message). Right, which is what I want... no caching, things just download to the offline store. > You can use those to keep the capacity settings intact, Sorry to be dense, but - what is meant by 'capacity' here, and how would setting both of those to false 'keep it intact'? I guess I don't understand what the 'cache.memory' does... > but essentially it has the same effect as setting capacity to 0. Is there a wiki page or something somewhere that describes all of these offline related settings and how they interrelate so I don't have to keep bugging you with mundane questions? ;) > The network.http.use-cache preference should only affect remote content > (images) but not IMAP messages. Ah, right, thanks...
> (In reply to comment #9) what is meant by 'capacity' here, and how would > setting both of those to false 'keep it intact'? The browser.cache.disk.capacity pref is tied to the Advanced Options UI, thus disabling there will set it to 0. If you want to keep the value of 50 without needing to reenter it, you can toggle browser.cache.disk.enable. In that case, the '50' capacity is still there, it's just not used as it is disabled. When you toggle the boolean pref to true, it starts using the 50MB cache again. > I guess I don't understand what the 'cache.memory' does... There is a disk cache and a memory cache. You can disable the disk cache, then the memory cache is used (but its contents lost once you close Thunderbird) for the message content and attachments. It's just a 2-level performance thing, the memory is closer than the disk cache, which in turn is closer than the network. > Is there a wiki page or something somewhere ... I'm not aware of a complete and up-to-date list of preferences related to cache and offline/autosync settings, but maybe someone else can provide a pointer.
Got it, ok, thanks for taking the time to explain it to a dummie... ;)
(In reply to comment #7) > Woops, one last question on this... > > I changed it, and went to see which one it is in about:config, and it was: > > browser.cache.disk.capacity I hate doing this in a closed bug, but... Why is this named 'browser.cache...'? That is confusing. I almost asked if this would affect Firefox, before realizing that the prefs are stored in the user profile for each app. Wouldn't "imap.cache..." be more appropriate?
Again, apologies for asking these questions in a closed bug, but it seems the most appropriate place. Ok... I'm looking at these settings more closely, trying to nail down a weird bug (before I open a new bug) where some of my users are having intermittent problems with random messages, where the size is incorrectly displayed as 1K, and when this happens, any attachments of these messages fail to open, even if saved to the desktop. There are 3 ways to 'fix' the message: 1. Move the message to a different folder, 2. Rebuild the folder index, or 3. Delete the local offline store for that folder The only one that seems to be a permanent fix (at least for that message) is method # 1 - if I do # 2 or #3, the same message will re-corrupt itself almost immediately after selecting a different message then the problem message again - which makes me suspect the problem might be in the local cache, as opposed to the offline store. So... > browser.cache.disk.enable/capacity > browser.cache.memory.enable/capacity > browser.cache.offline.enable/capacity What is the difference between these? As I said earlier in this bug, what I want to do is completely disable the 'cache', and only use the offline store. So, what is 'browser.cache.offline'? Having both 'cache' and 'offline' in that pref name is confusing. and What is 'browser.cache.memory' for?
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