[Continuing to split my big post up into separate ones! Apologies if anything seems disjointed as a result.]
4> Saved emails - Thunderbird
This is similar to the one above. I try to not keep many emails in Thunderbird, only what is currently ongoing. For long term archiving I would drag them out of Thunderbird and into a folder. E.g. I might have a folder on my D: about some teaching I’d done; I might drag out the email with the invoice, and the course description, and save them in the D: folder they relate to along with the teaching materials, so it is all in one place. If I opened the .eml file it would automatically open and display it in Thunderbird, as I’d hope.
But in Zorin there seems to be no way to drag an email from Thunderbird into a folder. It just shows it pinging back. The only option is to open a menu and choose “Save as” and save an .eml file that way. It is doable, but more clunky, since it uses extra clicks; and whereas in Windows I might already have the folder open and could drag straight into it, a Save as dialogue means browsing through the whole nested structure all over again. So, why doesn’t Zorin let me just drag the emails to a location? Is it a hidden setting I can change?
Then in Zorin, I also can’t open them. Even if I set it so an eml file opens with Thunderbird, when I then double click an eml file nothing happens. No error message. So Zorin knows to open the file in Thunderbird, but doesn’t do so. Again, any idea why, or how to get round this?
In Windows How copy emails from Thunderbird? In Win just drag one to desktop, saves eml file. Can save, but then won't open even when set to open with Thunderbird. Can if set to Evolution. [Also if change location of profile of TB to anywhere apart from default, won't open second time.] Also, have existing .eml files on hdd - when I set them to open with Thunderbird, nothing happens when I click on them.
Thanks - I know how to save them, but it is obviously a few more clicks each time than just a quick drag. And I normally want to save to, or open from, a deeply nested folder, so using a dialogue that requires browsing through that folder structure every time takes a lot longer than just double clicking. But maybe I'll just have to adapt it - save to desktop, cut paste to location; to open, cut paste from location to desktop, open, cut paste back to where it was. Probably quite a few extra clicks/options on a daily basis though.
Perhaps you could think about saving long-term items in Thunderbird. I keep a sidebar open always in TB, and have about 15 sub-folders in 'Inbox' ( right-click on Inbox and set up new folder). I can then drag any incoming email that I want to save to a subfolder, where it will remain. If I want to refer to it, I can open the folder, click on the relevant email and read it. My main Inbox never has more than about 10 items. If not saved, deleted.
Yes, I used to do it like that (and still do have subfolders for ongoing projects). However, I'm thinking of basically my long term archiving. It probably makes more sense if I explain what I mean!
One of the reasons I never use existing OS folders like "pictures", "videos" etc is because I file things in a hierarchy of meaning, rather than content type. So One set of folders might cover editing clients, subfolders for project - they might have documents, invoices, emails etc related to that project. The novels I write have subfolders which contain the books, notes, promotional images, book cover files and so on, so a range of file types. My hard drive is organised in this way because it matches how I file stuff, and means I can easily find anything, and all relevant content will be in the same folder (or subfolders).
A long way to say: if I kept those emails long term in Thunderbird, I'd end up replicating that structure in the email. And I'd never have related content in one place: to know if there was something I'd have to look in the nested structures in Thunderbird as well as my Data drive, so everything would take twice as long, with content that should be together split between two places. It's why, to me, filetype is irrelevant: only what the file concerns is of use. Whether a table in in docx, odf, xls, jpeg or whatever makes no difference, it just goes in the folder it is relevant to. Hope that explains why I raised this - I'm not just dismissing good suggestions for no reason, they just don't match how I do my PC. Cheers!
I wonder if an import/export Add-On to Thunderbird may be effective under Linux as Windows. I know some that use ImportExportTools NG
but not tried that Add-On yet myself.