My online inbox was full so I deleted all mail from the server online and all mail on my computer disappeared. Why isn’t it saved locally? Months of email has vanished. In my experience with Outlook, once mail was on my computer it was stored locally. Why isn’t eM Client this way?? How can I prevent this from every happening again?
Hello,
it is because you use IMAP protocol. When you use IMAP you are accessing your inbox on the mail server. IMAP does not actually move messages onto your computer. Although the messages appear on your computer while you work with them, they remain on the central mail server. Once you delete them from the server, they are lost.
It is possible, that you used POP protocol when you worked with Outlook so now you are confused, but it is not our fault. POP does the opposite. Instead of just showing you what is in your inbox on the mail server, it checks the server for new messages, downloads all the new messages in your inbox onto your computer, and then deletes them from the server. This means that every time you use POP to view your new messages, they are no longer on the central mail server.
Thanks for your quick reply. I guess I’ve just learned the difference between IMAP and POP the hard way! I am working with my hosting company to try to restore a backup. Hopefully that will work. In the future, if I drag the contents of my inbox to the inbox under the “local folders” heading, will that copy the emails to my computer? It sounds like it will, but I’ve already been burned by making an assumption so I would like confirmation.
Do I have a choice to make my account a POP? Or is that determined by my hosting company?
Thank you!
Yes, items in the Local folders are saved on the computer and yes, if your hosting company allows it, you can configure your account to use POP. When creating new account click Mail - Other - configure it manually.
Thanks, George. I appreciate your helping me prevent this from ever happening again 