582587 - Update in Thunderbird version 3 changed Pop3 mail settings to IMAP and mail would not download.

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Thunderbird :: Account Manager, defect)

Description

[troryp]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.8) Gecko/20100722 Firefox/3.6.8
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.4) Gecko/20100608 Thunderbird/3.1

Sometime following one of the recent updates to T'bird version 3, all the POP3 account settings were changed to IMAP. I don't know exactly when this happened because it hasn't happened on the PC I use every day, but did happen on 2 other PCs (my wife's desktop and my work laptop), where I don't download mail regularly.

I think the reason it happened on 2 PCs, but not the other is this: I recently changed ISP and created new email accounts for myself, my wife and my daughter, who uses my wife's PC. On my laptop I had already upgraded from V2 to V3 when I created the new account, but on the other PCs I created the new accounts first, then upgraded.

This wouldn't be such a problem if it were possible to change it back, but in each case I have had to create new accounts to get the POP settings back, and that is tricky as the "Wizard" (more like an evil goblin) defaults to IMAP and only very reluctantly gives you the option to select POP3. I've now had to create new accounts in 4 profiles and it took a long time. So I'm not happy.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Create new account in V2
2. Upgrade to V3 and apply updates.
3. Try to get your POP3 settings back (good luck with that).
Actual Results:  
Because there is no option to change an account from IMAP to POP3, I had to create new accounts. Because the wizard doesn't work, this was difficult and frustrating.

Expected Results:  
I would have preferred the POP3 settings I had to be left alone. The change having happened, I would have liked to make a simple configuration change to the existing accounts. If that isn't possible, I would like to be able to get a POP3 account set up without having to hack the account setup wizard. 

The account setup wizard seemed to work ok when I originally set up the accounts, it detected POP3. Now it defaults to IMAP.

Comment 1

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

So changing type from pop to imap is not possible and never has been.

The new dialog in 3.1.1 fixes that.