Zimbra Solution to WLM?

My email provider has outsourced it's e-mail service to Windows Live, and I am in process of setting up my account. I had been using Thunderbird without issues, I am now thinking I'd like to keep my mail web based. At the same time, I have a lot of history within Thunderbird (local emails) that I'd like to have access to with a single e-mail application.

I've been told that Thunderbird is completely unsupported by my e-mail provider, and that there is no way of keeping my local email history with the new service.

A quick look at WLM doesn't inspire me either.

In summary, here's my objective:
- ability to keep all relevant e-mail on the server and access via web based mail app
- transfer my history (local saved emails) from Thunderbird for access within the same mail app

Is Zimbra Desktop a possible solution? Are there any other recommendations?

Please include any links that will help me out.

rumblecat said:

...In summary, here's my objective:
- ability to keep all relevant e-mail on the server and access via web based mail app
- transfer my history (local saved emails) from Thunderbird for access within the same mail app...

"web based mail app" is confusing. We usually think in terms of a "mail app" like "Windows Live Mail" or "Outlook" or "Outlook Express" or "Windows Mail" or "Thunderbird". Or we talk about a web-based mail service that you access through your browser like Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail.

It sounds like you want to keep your ISP's mail service, so if they switch to Windows Live (and require http acccess) then WLM will do that. It will also import your history from a Thunderbird export. I'm afraid I'm not familiar with Zimbra but whatever you use you want http access for new mail and the ability to import from a Thunderbird export.

If your willing to give up your ISP's mail service, you could get a traditional service that includes IMAP for new mail and continue to use Thunderbird.

It will also import your history from a Thunderbird export

How do I accomplish this? I've attempted using a few methods ... I can seem to find a version of importexporttools that works with the latest version of Thunderbird, and using the mail redirect also fails.

Maybe I'm making a mistake migrating away from Thunderbird as it would appear there's a lot more information available from users using TBird to access Hotmail / etc. Starting to think my best approach (keeping my current service) is to keep using TBird but leave messages on the server.

What do you mean when you refer to traditional service?

rumblecat said:

1) It will also import your history from a Thunderbird export
2) What do you mean when you refer to traditional service?

1) Regarding your question about my statement...I have never used Thunderbird but it's so well known and popular I assumed it would be capable of exporting messages to a format that can be imported by Windows Live Mail. However, WLM only imports from the free mail programs from Microsoft (OE, WM, WLM) so if Thunderbird can't export to one of those, perhaps there is no easy way to get your old mail into WLM.

2) By "Traditional Service" I mean the very common pop3 and imap mail server access protocols. Most ISPs that offer mail service as well as most dedicated mail service providers usually provide instructions for setting up your mail program to access their service via pop3 or imap or both. (I believe Yahoo charges a small fee for pop3 access, but I think Gmail includes it. I have a very old msn.com email address that pre-dates Hotmail and also allows pop3 access, but not imap, so I accomplish imap access by forwarding all its mail to my ISP's service which includes both pop3 and imap.)