What's happened to my Thunderbird?

There are two possibilities.

With no Master Password set, the passwords are "trivially encrypted". There is a python script, which works for Firefox or Thunderbird, that can remove the encryption (outside of Thunderbird operation).

If the Master Password is set, something else happens.

Mine, with no Master Password set, stores a USER:PASS for a USENET server, in the "logons.json" file.

There are more files than this involved, and some of the files are "versioned" and have a number on the end.

During migration, this is a high-churn part of the fileset, and a lot of busted-ness is involved with the damn passwords. I have now memorized the details of my high security USER:PASS from typing it so many times. Thanks, Mozilla.

Paul

september.org","httpRealm":

september.org","formSubmitURL":null,"usernameField":"","passwordField":"",

"encryptedUsername":"MDaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa/",

"encryptedPassword":"MDbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb",

"timePasswordChanged":1758302427245,"timesUsed":1,"syncCounter":1,"everSynced":false,

"encryptedUnknownFields":"MDcccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc

"timeCreated":1632977510045,"timeLastUsed":1632977510045,"timePasswordChanged":1632977510045,"timesUsed":1},

"timeCreated":1632977510045,"timeLastUsed":1632977510045,"timePasswordChanged":1632977510045,"timesUsed":1}],"disabledHosts": [],"version":2}

Dunno....I have always used Pan.

Plusnet have been dicking about with email very recently...

Yes you're right*. What I had to change was the user name. Which for the last 14 years, for some reason, had been different to my Plusnet user name. But had still worked perfectly.

Then all of a sudden didn';t,

It was only after logging on to Plusnet Webmail, which I've never used using my Plusnet user name and password to check my latest emails, that I thought I'd give those a try. And the original user name did work.

bb

• Although when you get the error message box the password was shown in asterisks ?

What he said.

I don't use Plusnet so I can't comment on that.

I do use Eternal-September for Usenet (for text newsgroups) via Thunderbird and now and again E-S seems to sulk. I have headers downloaded on a timer basis, and sometimes clicking on a header results in nothing happening, and then I know it has also stopped adding new headers. Eventually it comes back to normal working, and the new headers for the last couple of days get added and then I know that I can read the bodies as well as seeing the headers.

So for Usenet I recommend doing nothing because the problem is at the server end and it gets fixed after a while.

That is how I see it, but I opted for the esr version of Thunderbird a while ago because they don't try to do anything troublesome in that range of updates. Your experience with the standard version might be different.

If you're impatient, then toggling TB offline and back online with the ((o)) icon in the status bar can hurry it along ...

I haven't changed anything, and I can't see where TB stores the passwords for email or Usenet.

That doesn't always work, and neither does closing/opening TB. I now simply reboot when it occurs. It always works if TB's the problem, and with modern systems using SSDs rebooting takes only a few seconds.

Right. I checked the Saved Passwords dialogue and there weren't any. Having entered the Usenet (Eternal September) username and password umpteen times it is now stored, and I don't need to enter it every time. (I don't know why.)

But it still asks for the Plusnet (email) username and password every time and it isn't in Stored Passwords. It also says "Unable to write the email to the mailbox. Make sure the file system allows you write privileges, and you have enough disk space to copy the mailbox." and no email is collected. AFAIK neither of these restrictions is true.

So what do I do now?

Maybe you hadn't ticked the "remember thiss" box before?

There never was a "remember this" box. Only a "password manager" one. Which I don't use.

You are confusing Thunderbird with Firefox.

When you first log in to a mail server, you are asked for the name and password, and in that popup is a little unobtrusive tick box that says 'remember password?'

If you don't tick the box, it's only remembered until you exit TB

I thought that the password manager is a program that stores all your passwords for different applications so you just have to remember one master password.

I got it to remember the Eternal September (Usenet) password (somehow) without checking that box.

And, as well as not remembering the email password, it still says "Unable to write the email to the mailbox. Make sure the file system allows you write privileges, and you have enough disk space to copy the mailbox." and no email is collected. (I can still read email from PlusNet webmail.)

You can have a standalone password manager like that (e.g EnPass, LastPass, KeePass) but TB, FF, Chrome, etc have one built in. Web browsers tend to have add-ons which recognise the 3rd party manager instead of the built-in manager.

There must be a way, but I don't know it.

After restarting TB, I sometimes get that message, which I believe is TB misreporting the status that's reported to it by Windows, if I ignore the message, and leave it alone for a couple of minutes, it miraculously stops reporting lack of disk space and lack of permissions and carries on properly.

I've tried monitoring and logging with the SysInternals tools, but there's no obvious cause.

Well, check that your email file system is writeable and not full. And is where you specified it to be

logins.json ? [Open with Notepad]

You can check the permissions on the Profile. My profile, the permissions are fine, and I checked and see that the folder is grayed because it inherits permissions all the way from my home directory at the top.

Paul

OK. I've got the email to log in without asking for a password every time (by checking the Use Password Manager), but it still won't write to the mailbox. I tried to uncheck the Read Only box for the Profiles folder, and it says it will do it all the way down, but then it resets it. I would have thought that the program wouldn't work at all as all the folders are read only. In fact, all my folders anywhere say they are read only but I can write to them. I don't understand.