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Profile folder - Thunderbird

From MozillaZine Knowledge Base

This article is about Thunderbird's profile folder. See also Profile folder - Firefox and Profile folder - SeaMonkey.

Thunderbird stores all of your personal information such as messages, address books and settings in a folder called the profile. Its stored outside of your program directory to make it easier to upgrade without risking losing your data. Your profiles are not deleted if you uninstall Thunderbird.

The first time you start Thunderbird it will automatically create a default profile in a default location if you don't already have one. You can create additional profiles (in whatever location you want) , delete or rename them, or specify a different default profile using the Profile Manager.

Each profile can have one or more accounts. Thunderbird doesn't let you switch profiles without exiting, unlike Outlook Expresses identities. However, the profile switcher extension will let you do that.

Contents

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Finding your profile

Profile folders are placed in the same area by default but are named randomly for additional security. If you chose a custom location, see Other methods of finding a profile below.

The installation directory includes a folder named "profile" (for example, C:\Program Files\Mozilla Thunderbird\defaults\profile on Windows), but this folder contains program defaults, not your user profile data. On Windows 2000/XP/Vista and on Linux, the folder containing your user profile data is hidden by default and you will need to show hidden files and folders to navigate to the profile folder.

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Windows 95, 98, and ME

Profile folders are in one of these locations:

  • C:\Windows\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>\
  • C:\Windows\Profiles\<Windows user name>\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>\ .
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Windows 2000 and XP

Image:Appdata.png
  1. Choose Start → Run
  2. Type in %APPDATA%
  3. Press OK. A Windows Explorer window will appear.
  4. In the Windows Explorer window, choose Thunderbird → Profiles. Each folder in this folder is a profile on your computer.

You can also navigate directly to your profile folder at the following path:

  • C:\Documents and Settings\<Windows user name>\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>

The Application Data folder is a hidden folder; to show hidden folders, open Windows Explorer and choose "Tools → Folder Options → View (tab) → Show hidden files and folders".

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Windows Vista

Image:VistaStartMenu.png

  1. Open the Windows Start menu
  2. In the the "Start Search" box, type in %APPDATA% [1]
  3. Click the "Roaming" item that appears on the menu.
  4. In the Windows Explorer window that opens, choose Thunderbird → Profiles. Each folder in this folder is a profile on your computer.

You can also navigate directly to your profile folder at the following path:

  • C:\Users\<Windows user name>\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>\

The AppData folder is folder is a hidden folder; to show hidden folders, open a Windows Explorer window and choose "Organize → Folder and Search Options → Folder Options → View (tab) → Show hidden files and folders".

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Linux and Unix

Profile folders are located here:

  • ~/.thunderbird/<Profile name>/

However, if you're using a third party build from Debian or Ubuntu, those builds store your profile folder here:

  • ~/.mozilla-thunderbird<Profile name>.

Both are hidden folders. See this article for more information. To show hidden files in Nautilus (Gnome desktop's default file browser), choose "View -> Show Hidden Files".

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Mac OS X

Profile folders are in one of these locations:

  • ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles/<Profile name>/
  • ~/Library/Application Support/Thunderbird/Profiles/<Profile name>/

The tilde character (~) refers to the current user's Home folder, so ~/Library is the /Macintosh HD/Users/<username>/Library folder.

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Other methods of finding a profile

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Searching for a file

Every Thunderbird (or SeaMonkey) profile will have an "abook.mab" file, even if you've configured it to store messages outside of the profile. You could find a profile by doing a file search for that file. However, you need to include hidden files and folders in the search:

  • Windows 2000: In Windows Explorer (or My Computer) choose Tools → Folder Options → View (tab) → Show hidden files and folders
  • Windows XP: Click "Start → Search". In the Search Results window, scroll down and click "More advanced options". Check the boxes, "Search system folders", "Search hidden files and folders" and "Search subfolders"
  • Windows Vista: From the Windows Start menu, click "Search". In the "Advanced Search" area, select "Include non-indexed, hidden, and system files (might be slow)"
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Using the Error Console

You can also use Thunderbird to find the location of whatever profile it is using. In Thunderbird, go to "Tools -> Error Console" and then copy and paste the following code in the field near the top of the Error Console and click on the Evaluate button. It is one very long line ending in path — make sure that you get all of it:

Components.classes["@mozilla.org/file/directory_service;1"].getService( Components.interfaces.nsIProperties).get("ProfD", Components.interfaces.nsIFile).path

The console should display the location of the profile that is currently in use. If you don't see it, select "All" in the toolbar.

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Profiles.ini

Thunderbird uses the profiles.ini file to find the location of your profiles, and to determine which profile is the default profile. If you're using Windows the file is located in the parent of the "Profiles" folder. It can be edited to move your profile. If it's deleted, a new profiles.ini file will be created and a new default profile folder created when Thunderbird starts.

This file is the reason why you can't just copy a profile into the "profiles" folder and have Thunderbird discover it.

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Files and folders in the profile

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Folders

Name Description
Attachments Used when attachments aren't stored in the folder or the desktop.
chrome Its mainly used for the optional userChrome.css and userContent.css files.
extensions Installed extensions and themes.
ImapMail Mail from IMAP accounts.
Mail Mail from POP accounts and Local Folders (Global Inbox)
News News from newsgroups

All of the messages for an account are stored in a subdirectory named after the mail server. For example if you have a Gmail POP account it would create a pop.gmail.com subdirectory in Mail. Your messages would be stored in text files with the folders name and no file extension called mbox files. For example, the inbox folder would be called "Inbox.". There would also be a inbox.msf file (a index file, it doesn't have any messages) and there might be a inbox.sbd subdirectory. The .sbd subdirectories are used to store the folders in a hierarchy, there is no master list describing how the folders should be organized.

If you use a add-on to make a webmail account emulate a POP account the mail server is typically 127.0.0.1 (or localhost). If you have more than one account with the same mail server Thunderbird adds a suffix. So your second yahoo webmail account might be stored in 127.0.0.1-1. The same thing occurs if you have multiple accounts with the same POP or IMAP servers, though thats less common.

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Files

None of these files should be read-only. If they are that might be a side effect of dragging and dropping or backing up files to removable media, and then using them to restore your profile.

See Files and folders in the profile - Thunderbird for a more complete list.

Name Description
abook.mab Personal Address Book
cert8.db Security certificates
cookies.txt Cookies RSS_cookies_(Thunderbird)
downloads.rdf Download history. Can be deleted to resolve slow downloads or program hangs (Bug 159107)
extensions.rdf Installed extension information. It can be deleted to remove "ghost" entries from the extension list [2] and to resolve various other issues.
history.mab Collected addresses
key3.db Key database
localstore.rdf Toolbar and window layout size/position settings. It can be deleted to resolve various issues.
mailviews.dat Defines your current message view (you can customize it)
mimeTypes.rdf Action to perform when downloading certain types of files. Can be deleted to reset download actions.
msgFilterRules.dat in ImapMail, Mail, News Message filters
panacea.dat Mail folder cache. Deleting it sometimes helps get rid of Phantom folders
popstate.dat in Mail Keeps track of which messages have been downloaded and left on the POP3 server
prefs.js All preferences. See: Modify Thunderbird settings
secmod.db Security module database
signons.txt Encrypted saved passwords, requires key3.db to work . The signon.SignonFileName setting specifies this file.
training.dat Custom training for Junk Mail Controls
user.js
(does not exist by default) 		User-set overriding preferences
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Files without specific names

Name Description
*. in ImapMail, Mail, and News Mbox files. They are text files that contain all of the messages for that folder.
*.mab other than abook.mab and history.mab User-created or imported address books.
*.msf in ImapMail, Mail, and News Index files for mail messages.
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Portable Thunderbird

Portable Thunderbird is a popular third party build of Thunderbird that is installed on a USB drive along with the profile. Its designed for roaming users. The profile is not specified by a profiles.ini file on the boot disk, its always in a Data\profile directory within the programs directory. It can have only one profile and doesn't support the profile manager.

The profile has the same layout and files as Thunderbird.

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Miscellaneous information

The channel-prefs.js file in the defaults\pref directory in the Thunderbird program directory specifies what update channel you are using. That determines what type of builds auto-update looks for. app.update.channel is normally set to "release". If you installed a beta that would set it to "beta". If you want to stop getting beta and release candidate updates change it to "release".

The application.ini file was added to the Thunderbird program directory with Thunderbird 3.0. Its mainly used to control whether the migration assistant , crash reporter and extension manager are enabled.

The mailviews.dat file in the defaults\messenger directory in the Thunderbird program directory specifies the default custom views. Views are selected using the View list box in the toolbar. You can add it to the toolbar by right clicking on the toolbar, selecting customize, dragging and dropping the View control to the toolbar and pressing the Done button.

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See also

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External links

Retrieved from "http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Thunderbird"