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Account keeps prompting re IMAP auth failure, but all server settings are set to NOT poll

sparrowtwo
sparrowtwo
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A google workspace account I used to use has been deleted on google. I want to keep my repository of emails for that account. I have tried to tell tbird NOT to poll any servers re this account, but I think it still does.

For that account in server settings: - check for new messages at startup is off - check for new messages every x minutes is off - allow immediate server notifications when new messages arrive is off

I remove the SMTP setting for that account entirely.

The error message mostly shows up when I've switched from say Sent to Inbox. At those times I am not even looking at that accounts messages, there are other active accounts. The exact message is: Authentication failure when connecting to server imap.gmail.com I can't be positive that it is related to this now gone account that I still keep in thunderbird, but the issue did start when the account went inactive.

A google workspace account I used to use has been deleted on google. I want to keep my repository of emails for that account. I have tried to tell tbird NOT to poll any servers re this account, but I think it still does. For that account in server settings: - check for new messages at startup is off - check for new messages every x minutes is off - allow immediate server notifications when new messages arrive is off I remove the SMTP setting for that account entirely. The error message mostly shows up when I've switched from say Sent to Inbox. At those times I am not even looking at that accounts messages, there are other active accounts. The exact message is: Authentication failure when connecting to server imap.gmail.com I can't be positive that it is related to this now gone account that I still keep in thunderbird, but the issue did start when the account went inactive.

sparrowtwo modificouno o

All Replies (2)

Matt
Matt
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  • Top 10 Contributor
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There is no option to disable polling of an IMAP or POP mail account. So you can not use downladed IMAP mails as a archive for an account you no longer have as they will be deleted at some point when Thunderbird tries to poll the account, like when you select a folder in the IMAP account to view mail in the folder.

The part about synchronized appears to cause people difficulty understanding it. To archive mails for an imap account they have to be moved from the imap account. Preferably before the account is access is lost as after you have to manually go into the profile folder and copy the files with mail in them out of the profile. Then there is the task of importing them back to local folders using the import export tools. https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/addon/importexporttools-ng/?src=ss

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sparrowtwo
sparrowtwo Question owner
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Hi Mat Thanks a lot for this answer! Not what I was hoping to hear, of course. I think this has never happened to me before because for all other cases where I wanted to keep an archive of an account that was going away, I first copied all of the emails to a different gmail account, usually one I created for the purpose of storing archival messages. I think I can upload what I have in tbird for this account to a gmail account? Normally there is more than a tbird store in place, ie the account is still hot. But I can try.

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