Strange message in Thunderbird

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The above shows the contents of one of my folders in Thunderbird.  The content of this folder is behaving in a way I’ve never seen before.

When I double click the first entry dated 2023-02-27, I immediately get seven messages opened.  I have no idea how.why this thing that, on the surface, looks like a message actually contains seven messages.

I expect the greater than sign (>) and bent arrow in the Subject column, but I have no idea how this strange entity got created.

Ideally. I’d like to get the seven messages out of this odd thing and have them as seven separate messages, but my first step would be to just understand what I’ve got here.

[Moderator edit] removed attachment because it contained your email address.
Use Snip n Sketch to take screenshots. Then you can collect just a small section and blank out undesirable information.

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Thunderbird has a folder repair tool.
Right click on the folder containing the troublesome message and select Properties > Repair Folder.
As always, make a backup first.

cheers, Paul

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Hopefully this abbreviated screenshot will show the greater than sign and “bent arrow” to which I previously referred in an acceptable manner.

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Look at this thread and see if it is the same issue you are experiencing.

Thunderbird Nesting Issue

The bent arrow sounds line threaded emails.

 

1 user thanked author for this post.

Bob Coleman

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It’s the same issue or at least a related issue in that both involve threaded emails which I never heard of before.

Via View -> Threads -> Expand All Threads on the folder in question, I’ve at least been able to get a somewhat, to me, logical view.  I don’t know how the folder got threaded emails,  but I suspect it’s something I did accidentally without knowing it.

I now at least know that I need to investigate the topic of threaded emails if I want to understand this any better.

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I just moved a bunch of emails into their own folder in Thunderbird and encountered the threading issue for the first time. I did not ask for it to happen, none of my other folders are threaded, it pulled a Microsoft and did what it wanted. I did find a way to turn the threading/greater than marks off and go back to a flat list. See the image for the little highlighted control I clicked to make the threading go away.

Also, the little purple bent arrow is an indicator that a message has been replied to. I didn’t see any obvious way to turn that off in Settings or anywhere in a quick look but I didn’t try very hard as I like having those there.

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Bob Coleman

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Thanks for the hint about the “little highlighted control I clicked to make the threading go away”.  I see now that hovering on that icon causes it to display its function as “Display message threads” and that it can also be used to create threads in a folder that doesn’t have any.

I don’t yet completely understand what a thread is.  A chain of related messages similar to a Gmail conversation, I guess.

Apparently it will remain a mystery how your and my single folder got threads in the first place, but now I know how to get rid of (and create)  them.

You’re right about the purple bent arrow indicating a message that has been replied to and it doesn’t seem to be related to threads.  It exists in other folders that don’t have threads.  I just never noticed it before perhaps because I have a Status column indicating, among other things, “Replied”.

 

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I’ve just encountered another variation of this issue and have discovered that another way to control the behavior is go to the folder in question, click View in the menu bar, then Sort by, then either Threaded or Unthreaded.

Note that this is View in the traditional Menu Bar.  The “hamburger” or three-line menu also contains a View section, but not the choices described here.

It’s speculation, but I think I now know why the folder discussed at the beginning of this topic was threaded.  It was probably an at the time newly created folder.

My most recent encounter with this behavior also involved a folder that I just created.

I certainly don’t think it’s always been this way, but I now believe that at some point Thunderbird started creating new folders with threading on.

At least now I know how to turn it off.

 

 

 

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