I've got a saved profile from Thunderbird, with an IMAP account and lots of mail. I want to import that into Thunderbird Portable so I can read the mail and package it up for other reviewers (it's a forensics job, so the original profile is on a copy of a hard drive).
My procedure is to open a fresh Thunderbird, close it, then copy the contents of the originals's xxxxxx.default folder into the Data\Profile folder of TB (I find that if I don't open and close it first, I don't get the user addons and themes). When I open Thunderbird now I can see their account with all the mail, IMAP folders, themes, addons etc. The problem is that when I close and reopen it, the account settings are still there but all the mail is gone.
All the data from the mail is still there in the data\profile\ImapMail\$account\ folder. I've done comparisons of the before and after state of the folders with Winmerge and can't see anything glaringly obvious that'd make it not show. The original is from Linux and I'm working on Windows 10 but I've had the same problem in the past when both systems have been the same. Taking the account online isn't an option. I've tried choosing 'Work offline' and 'Download and Sync Now'.
Any ideas anyone?
Edit: just to clarify, when I open it after it's been closed, I can no longer see the email or list of IMAP folders. I can however search for mail successfully.
Try moving the IMAP files into an POP account. Thunderbird POP accounts don't re-download everything after a profile move.