kontact

[przxqgl]

If you've set up your mail accounts properly in thunderbird, maybe they're using POP? If your mail provider supports IMAP, I suggest moving to IMAP, but that can be tedious.

all of my email accounts except for one are POP3. i don't like using IMAP because it leaves my email on someone else's computer, which is, to me, a violation of my privacy. the one IMAP account i have is actually a honey pot, so i don't actually send email from it, and i report everything that comes into it.

If you have mail that's not on your mail provider's server, and so is only in kmail, you'll have export the mail from kmail, and import it into thunderbird.

that's what i'd like to do... do you have any clue how to export from kmail, and import to thunderbird?

[jlittle]

... i don't like using IMAP because it leaves my email on someone else's computer, which is, to me, a violation of my privacy.

Well, I'll just say that email lacks privacy anyway, unless you use end to end encryption, like Proton mail supposedly, IIUC.

do you have any clue how to export from kmail, and import to thunderbird?

No, sorry.

[WWDERW]

i can see all of the email that i have received when i can get Kmail to work, but i CANNOT see that same mail in Thunderbird.

what i want to do is connect Thunderbird to the same place that Kmail is connected to, so that i can see, and respond, to emails that i have already received.

The problem is using POP3 in this case. IMAP will allow you to do this and see both at the same time. Using POP3, once you download the email, it's on that local machine as far as your email goes (now, it may still be somewhere on that email server, but you won't have access to it).

If insisting on keeping things as POP3, then will always have to export and then import.

I'll do IMAP and then I'll archive things (which clears it from being seen on their server (like I said, there still may be another copy somewhere on their server)) when I don't need it right then and there, but I can refer back to it if need be.

all of my email accounts except for one are POP3. i don't like using IMAP because it leaves my email on someone else's computer, which is, to me, a violation of my privacy. the one IMAP account i have is actually a honey pot, so i don't actually send email from it, and i report everything that comes into it.

Unless you are self hosting your email, just using someone else's server, you run privacy risks (and you agree to some things within the EULA itself, otherwise those hosting companies can't (supposedly) do their job efficiently).

Only true way to get around that is to host yourself.

[przxqgl]

Unless you are self hosting your email, just using someone else's server, you run privacy risks (and you agree to some things within the EULA itself, otherwise those hosting companies can't (supposedly) do their job efficiently).

Only true way to get around that is to host yourself.

which is EXACTLY why i am hosting my own email...

i don't care about why i should, or should not use IMAP compared to POP3, and the discussion about such things is just a waste of time from my standpoint. what i am really interested in, is how to convert what i have, which is kmail/kontact, to a new Thunderbird installation.

as i have said before, i rely on email, and the longer i have to come up with funky work-arounds for an installation of kontact that DOESN'T WORK -- �� -- the more irritated i get.

seriously, at this point, kontact is RECEIVING email just fine, but, for some unknown reason (yes, i have checked my POP3 settings, and they are EXACTLY what they should be) kontact is unable to SEND mail... if i use webmail, it works. if i use my tablet, it works, but from kontact, all i see is error messages that say "Failed to transport message. Connection timed out."

please, does ANYBODY have a clue about how to do this? what i want to do is export the email that i have already received in kontact, and import it into thunderbird, where i can see, and interact with it...

[WWDERW]

which is EXACTLY why i am hosting my own email...

i don't care about why i should, or should not use IMAP compared to POP3, and the discussion about such things is just a waste of time from my standpoint. what i am really interested in, is how to convert what i have, which is kmail/kontact, to a new Thunderbird installation.

Since you are hosting your own email, I don't necessarily know why you would have the issue of not wanting to use IMAP (not trying to be argumentative, I actually want to know), because it would be on your own servers as far as it is on your end (people you are communicating with, that's another matter, but that's another matter regardless if you use POP3 or not).

please, does ANYBODY have a clue about how to do this? what i want to do is export the email that i have already received in kontact, and import it into thunderbird, where i can see, and interact with it...

Everything that I'm seeing in the export option for KMail has to do with backing up for it to be used in another installation of KMail. It makes no mention of transferring it from KMail to Thunderbird. I don't know if KMail has a 1:1 parity export option to go to Thunderbird in that regard. I never could get KMail to work at all, so I never really bothered with it on the last couple of LTS releases and since I used the minimal install option on this one, it wasn't even installed from default. So I haven't played around with options to move email from one to the other and since I have used Thunderbird for over a decade, I would have had to make the merge, but it would have been easier in my case.

On Thunderbird's site, the mention going from Evolution to Thunderbird, but no mention of KMail or using Kontact. What might work is put all your emails from the POP3 account back on to the mail server and then setup Thunderbird and download those msgs again (I would back them up independently just to make sure that you still have them).

[woodsmoke]

Hi
This has been an interesting read of a thread, and I apologize for not checking in more often.

Two things. I always have just about ALL of the e-mail clients running on my machine because, mainly, I'm just interesting in "getting them to work" and "seeing how they work".
A:

i can see all of the email that i have received when i can get Kmail to work, but i CANNOT see that same mail in Thunderbird.

I have OFTEN seen that myself.

HOWEVER it only happens on the initial startup of the particular client.

My only real answer is to...wait, and wait, I really DO think that it is "possibly" a function of the hardware and Akonadai dealing with "lots of stuff". Since I built my "Blue on Blue - woodsmokes last build" I have not observed the problem.

My present machine is: 4 x Intel Cor i5-2320 CPU @ 3.00GHz
memory 7.7 GiB of Ram
Running Neon user edition 5.15

B)
As to your problem.
I am just a simple guy.
I have watched people in tears because they could not get a "system to backup" and all that stuff for oh... a decade... both Windblows and Linux.

I decided early on to just not do "backups". Simple as that.

I'm going to explain what i do instead to illustrate what i do with Kmail folders.

I tried backing up Kmail stuff several times over the years...and...LIKE YOU...I just have a massive amount of stuff from being a college teacher.
My Yahoo is a throwaway and so i do not worry about it.
My Gmail is my personal account for family and friends and it is large but not 'that" large.
However the college account is huge and even though the college stores EVERYthing I like to move stuff ultimately to a DVD and have had...three actual instances when i needed to find things like "recommndations" for students and they were on BOTH the school server and my DVD so I was lucky.

BUT as to your problem.

for my "data" I really just do physically drag my "data" like documents, presentations etc onto a USB stick and copy it there into a dated folder.
I know that this sounds paranoid, but after "a while" I then drag THAT to an external hard drive... which is only intermittently plugged into my machine.
And ultimately that is transferred to a DVD.

As to e-mail...yeah...Kmail has worked in fits and starts since I came to Kubuntu and I have MULTIPLE threads that are archived in the dungeons describing how I tried to get it to work with Gmail, Outlook yada yada...

But...back to your question...again...

Microsoft has actually STOPPED...'causing a problem" with exporting to an e-mail client and that is because it is now ALL on the cloud for the college. so the cloud is agnostic for Kmail or Thunderbird or whatever...

FINALLY...what I started doing with Kmail a few years ago is to... archive "the folder" to a zip file...simple as that.

I do that kind of regularly and yes I know, I am storing mutilple "copies" of everything, but I just delete the "extras" every once in a while.

So...when I install a NEW OS... before i quit the old OS I archive EACH FOLDER...that is Yahoo, Gmail and the college as seperate archives and put them on a USB stick.

I install the new OS
move the archive to the OS and extract it to a folder.
and then I go to "tools / import / export data" an import the data.

I can walk off and leave it to do it's thing.

BECAUSE the Kmail is not fiddling with going out checking mail etc. It can relax and just import the stuff.

Then... lol... I set up the accounts and TRY to get the stuff off the server(s) ...usually it does not take THAT longg!

It DOES take a while but it is "supposedly" checking what it has with what is out there, just like it does on a daily basis when one logs into the e-mail out there.

So...since you host your own e-mail, this now becomes dead simple, just archive each folder to a zip file, put it somewhere removeable, install the new OS, copy the archive over extract to a folder and then import that folder.

when you hook Kmail to your e-mail client it can calmly compare what it already has to any new stuff and you are set...hopefully!

Like I said, I'm just a simple guy and mostly a hardware kinda guy.

hope this helped a little but I really can feel your pain in this...

woodsmoke