would like emails from a particular sender to automatically get exported to a text file or appended to an existing text file on my hard drive
Emails from a particular sender I would like to get appended to a single or to multiple csv or text files.
I think I've read that Mozilla can use filters to get all emails from a particular sender put in a particular folder.
That might be useful but does not get me all the way to goal.
I've also read about 3rd party plugins that give you export options through additional menu options
However, I need something that just automatically exports (without me having to be there and does not require any mouse commands) whenever an email from a particular sender shows up. And that exports to a csv or txt file.
thanks for any time you spend on this question.
Chris
All Replies (9)
You could create a filter that automatically Saves messages as (eml) files, if you installed the FiltaQuilla add-on, but each message would be saved to its own file.
The ImportExportTools add-on can export a folder of messages to a single text file, but I don't see any way to invoke it as a filter action.
this sounds very good. Would the messages be saved off as they came in?
Also since you said filter I'm assuming you could only save off the emails from a particular user. Is that correct?
thanks,
Chris
A filter can be set to run automatically when mail is downloaded, or you can run it manually.
There are several filter criteria such as From a particular sender, or domain, or a sender who is in a specified address book. Multiple criteria can be set up in a filter:
sounds good. you say when mail is downloaded. Can I assume downloading of mail happens automatically? Hopefully there is no manual intervention required.
The big picture of what I'm trying to do:
I have a program that will monitor for these exported emails from a particular sender. It will need to parse these for certain information that will be in emails from this sender.
This needs to happen without any manual intervention required.
Chris
POP accounts download automatically if you set them to do so, while IMAP accounts usually download when mail arrives at the mail server.
You might be able to achieve the parsing operation with the 'Body + contains' or 'Subject + contains' filter criteria. Actions could include replying with a template message, forwarding to another account etc.
I got filtaquilla and the import export tool add-ons installed, Althought am not sure what to do with them.
I've also created a filter in thunderbird to get emails from particular sender routed to a new local folder I created.
I'm just not sure how to use my add-ons to do the automatic export from the new local folder to a single or individual email files.
If I can get that solved I'm there!
Chris
Open Tools/Add-ons/Extensions and select Options for FiltaQuilla, and check "Save Messages as File" under Filter Actions. You can then select that action for your filter as shown in the picture attached to my 2nd reply (click the folder icon to specify the external location). This will automatically save the messages as eml files, which can be viewed in a text editor.
ImportExportTools can save messages to individual files or a single file, but it can't be invoked automatically through a filter action.
Thanks I'm very grateful for this sage advice. It is working! I am now getting .eml files from the sender that I filtered on; showing up in the folder I specified on my hard drive.
Is there a way to make it store the email files as text files rather than .eml?
Chris
ok I answered my own question on this one.
According to Filtaquilla online documentation:
(Beginning in Filtaquilla version 1.3.0): By default, the message is saved with the default Thunderbird extension .eml The filter will use a different extension if you append to the file spec a | followed by the extension. So for example if the filespec is C:\temp\saveas\ for the default extension type, change this to C:\temp\saveas\|txt and the extension will be “txt”.
I was able to verify this works in my test.