Here’s how I moved all (?) my Thunderbird data from my Windows machine to my Mac, replacing the contents on my Mac.

First step: Make a back up of your Mac Thunderbird settings. You’ll find them in [yourname]/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles and then in a folder that’s a meaningless string of letters and numbers. Save all those contents to a new folder, just in case. And keep in mind the most important thing throughout this entire process: I am not responsible. In any sense of the word.

Now copy your Tbird settings from your Windows machine to your Mac, using whatever transfer mechanism you want. The Windows settings are in: Documents and Settings/[yourname]/Application Data/Thunderbird/Profiles and then some other folder with a different meaningless string of letters and numbers.

Delete the current contents of your meaninglessly-named Thunderbird folder on your Mac. (Remember, you’ve already backed it up. Right?) Copy in the contents from your Windows meaningless folder. Now the contents of your meaningless folder on the Mac are identical to the contents of that other meaningless folder on your Windows ,achine.

Start up Thunderbird. It should display the contents from your Windows machine.

If Thunderbird now refuses to download mail, check the account settings, of course. Mine still wouldn’t download. But then I looked in the pop.gmail.com folder in the Mail folder in the meaninglessly-named folder on the Mac and found a file called “popstate.dat”. I renamed it to “popstate.dat.bak” and restarted Thunderbird. It worked. Unless you use gmail as your pop server, however, the appropriate folder will have a different name. I have confidence you can figure it out. I believe in you.

Good luck. And remember: I am not responsible. [Tags: thunderbird macintosh gmail ]

Categories: Uncategorized dw