launcher icon shows wrong number of new messages

[Steve Magoun]

The thunderbird launcher icon shows a seemingly-arbitrary number of unread messages. My inbox currently has 7 unread messages, and I have at least 500 unread messages in other folders according to the thunderbird UI. However the launcher icon currently shows there are 42 unread messages. The number in the launcher icon does fluctuate, and it usually decrements when I read a message. It's never been correct about the number of unread messages, though.

The Mail indicator in the panel also has a list of folders with unread messages, and a count of the number of unread messages in each of those folders. The unread counts in the indicator's listing are also inaccurate, and the sum of the unread messages in the indicator does not match the number of unread messages in the launcher icon.

Thunderbird is configured for a pair of IMAP accounts. Each account has a number of folders and subfolders.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
Package: thunderbird-globalmenu 7.0~b3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-11.18-generic 3.0.4
Uname: Linux 3.0.0-11-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
Date: Thu Sep 22 13:49:06 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" - Beta amd64 (20100901.1)
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: thunderbird
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to oneiric on 2011-09-02 (20 days ago)

[Chris Coulson (chrisccoulson)]

It's not meant to show unread messages - but new messages - as per the spec: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MessagingMenu#Recommended_behavior_for_e-mail_clients

"For the purpose of the messaging menu, a new message is an unread message that the program discovered since the last time you (a) performed any action in that mailbox or (b) selected the corresponding item in the messaging menu."

So, navigating to a folder will mean that folder has no new messages anymore, and this is independent of unread messages.

[yannack (yannack)]

I think I have a way of reproducing in some cases. Connect thunderbird to an IMAP account, send an email to the IMAP account, watch the indicator count increase. Read the email from some other source than thunderbird (webmail or what have you): the count does not decrease (at least it did not for me) (i have a count indicator saying "1 unread message", but all my messages are read.

[yannack (yannack)]

This is maybe a duplicate of #850229

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Lars Noodén (larsnooden)]

Still present in the release version of Ubuntu:

$ apt-cache policy thunderbird
thunderbird:
  Installed: 7.0.1+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 7.0.1+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 7.0.1+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://fi.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ oneiric/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[William Ranvaud (wiranvaud)]

For me, messages marked as important are counted twice and I have to read both, the mail in inbox and the mail in the "important" folder in order to have the correct number in thunderbird launcher icon.

[gabriel smith (gabriel-smith01)]

Also, for me. I have automated message filters that move an email from inbox to another folder and marks it as read. However the launcher will still include this count.

[Coeur Noir (coeur-noir)]

Almost the same here : I have many pop accounts in TB. They all end into the tocal folders. Then I use filters to triage messages between personnal / professionnal and other subfolders in each.

TB icon in unity launcher never shows number of new unread message if they are in any subfolders. It only shows a number of new unread message if those are not "filtered" though kept in the incoming local folder.

(Other side effect : pop up notification only display alert about "local folder" instead of mail account being used since all my mail accounts end in local folders (one global account), instead of each having its own incoming/sent/trash folders (many accounts) - in other word, when I had many separated accounts in TB, pop up alert displayed the name of the one account concerned by new unread message. Errrr not sure if I'm clear, my poor english sorry)

coeur-noir@CompaQ:~$ lsb_release -a
LSB Version: core-2.0-amd64:core-2.0-noarch:core-3.0-amd64:core-3.0-noarch:core-3.1-amd64:core-3.1-noarch:core-3.2-amd64:core-3.2-noarch:core-4.0-amd64:core-4.0-noarch:cxx-3.0-amd64:cxx-3.0-noarch:cxx-3.1-amd64:cxx-3.1-noarch:cxx-3.2-amd64:cxx-3.2-noarch:cxx-4.0-amd64:cxx-4.0-noarch:desktop-3.1-amd64:desktop-3.1-noarch:desktop-3.2-amd64:desktop-3.2-noarch:desktop-4.0-amd64:desktop-4.0-noarch:graphics-2.0-amd64:graphics-2.0-noarch:graphics-3.0-amd64:graphics-3.0-noarch:graphics-3.1-amd64:graphics-3.1-noarch:graphics-3.2-amd64:graphics-3.2-noarch:graphics-4.0-amd64:graphics-4.0-noarch:printing-3.2-amd64:printing-3.2-noarch:printing-4.0-amd64:printing-4.0-noarch:qt4-3.1-amd64:qt4-3.1-noarch
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS
Release: 12.04
Codename: precise
coeur-noir@CompaQ:~$ uname -a
Linux CompaQ 3.2.0-27-generic #43-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jul 6 14:25:57 UTC 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
coeur-noir@CompaQ:~$ apt-cache policy thunderbird
thunderbird:
  Installé : 14.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
  Candidat : 14.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
 Table de version :
 *** 14.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1 0
        500 http://fr.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mozilla-security/ppa/ubuntu/ precise/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     11.0.1+build1-0ubuntu2 0
        500 http://fr.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/main amd64 Packages

[Yanpas (yanpaso)]

I've found one of such a bug reports on thenderbird bugtacker. Vote on bugzilla too https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=776218

[tlc (tlc)]

> It's not meant to show unread messages - but new messages - as per the spec: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MessagingMenu#Recommended_behavior_for_e-mail_clients

> "For the purpose of the messaging menu, a new message is an unread message that the program discovered since the last time you (a) performed any action in that mailbox or (b) selected the corresponding item in the messaging menu."

> So, navigating to a folder will mean that folder has no new messages anymore, and this is independent of unread messages.

Is there a way to change this? This is not desirable at all. I don't need a count that includes the stuff I've filtered into other IMAP folders to read "someday". Also, I run spam filtering on another machine. My icon count goes up for every spam.

[tlc (tlc)]

We need a way to say which folders should be counted. And we need an UNREAD count not an new-since-I've-been-in-that-folder count.

[tlc (tlc)]

Right now I have 227 unread/unscanned messages in SPAM folders
128 in Deleted Items
3 in Drafts
68 in a folder I filter a mailing list to.
10 in my Inbox

Displaying the sum of those counts in my launcher icon is not useful.
Being told there is 10 in my Inbox would be useful.

[tlc (tlc)]

The quote in #2 stops one sentence short:

" Whether a new message concerns you may be configurable within the program, perhaps by sender, by folder, or by mail filters."

[Alex (adlinds3)]

tlc, did you find a way to configure thunderbird to only show unread messages in the docker?