[SOLVED] Thunderbird won't start anymore

[Quaxo76]

My Thunderbird suddenly stopped working. I shut it down regularly last time, and now when I try to start it, a window appears saying that "Thunderbird is already running but not responding, close the other existing Thunderbird process or restart the system".
I tried rebooting, but the problem wasn't solved. How can I kill a process I can't see? And why did this happen in the first place?

Thanks,
Cristian

[Rog131]

Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

Killing processes:
Ksysguard
Press: Ctrl+Esc -> choose prosess -> press kill
or
K>System>ksysguard
or
Press Alt+F2 -> type ksysguard

More:
Controlling runaway processes on Linux
http://rudd-o.com/archives/2007/08/0...sses-on-linux/


KDE can start programs automatically (restore session - default):

K > System Settings >| Advanced - tab |> Session Manager

There are three options On Login:

Restore previous session
Will save all applications running on exit and restore them when they next start up.

Restore manually saved session
Allows the session to be saved at any time via "Save Session" in the K-Menu. This means the currently started application will reappear when they next start up.

Start with an empty session
Do not save anything. Will come up with an empty desktop on next start.

From Kudos (Kubuntu is a User-friendly Desktop OS)
http://kudos.berlios.de/

Note: The default Kubuntu behavior of automatically restoring previous session status may also restore residual "run away" processes from the previous session. Moreover, some of these run away processes may never die off, so they may continually inherit from one session to the next, creating an unnecessary burden on system resources, without you being aware of it. For this reason, I would suggest either using [Start KDE always with a definite set of applications] or adding the "Runaway Process Catcher" applet to the panel (right click on panel -> Add to Panel -> Applet -> Runaway Process Catcher)

[Quaxo76]

Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

Hello,
In Ksysguard I couldn't find any process related to Thunderbird, so I didn't know what to kill.
I tried restarting KDE with a clean session (so I lost all the apps I keep always running in the panel) but I still get the same error.
Should I reinstall Thunderbird to see if it helps?

Thanks
Cristian

[Quaxo76]

Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

Update: reinstalling won't help.
I found some info on the web saying to delete the "lock" file in my profile folder; I can see the file, but I can't delete it. If I type "ls" in the console, I can see the file "lock"; but if I type "sudo rm lock" it says "No such file or directory". How is it possible? The file is there, I can see it, I can also open and read it... Why can't I delete it?

Thanks
Cristian

[Rog131]

Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

I found some info on the web saying to delete the "lock" file in my profile folde

Hmm - Profile in use
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_in_use
and
Profile folder
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_fo...file_folder.3F

=>

For other applications, see the information below. Some of these folders may be hidden.

Unix ~/.mozilla/

Are you in the /home/USER/.mozilla/ ?

I don't have Thunderbird, but my Firefox lock-file is in the /home/USER/.mozilla/firefox/nxwc6a3l.default/

I can see the file "lock"; but if I type "sudo rm lock" it says "No such file or directory". How is it possible?

Where are you ? There are other lock -files
Is your konsole in the right place ?
If you start konsole from K > System > konsole -> konsole starts in the user home folder (= /home/USER/)
If your lock-file is in the /home/USER/.mozilla/... then you don't need sudo.

My Firefox lock:

/home/USER/.mozilla/firefox/nxwc6a3l.default/$ ls -l lock
lrwxrwxrwx 1 USER USER 15 2007-10-31 10:48 lock -> 127.0.1.1:+7510

Note
USER is log in name.

[Fintan]

Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

How about doing a backup of your "mail" folder to a different folder like "TBBackup" and just deleting the contents /home/username/./mozilla-thunderbird/xyz_Default. Uninstall TB completely. Logout /reboot (without the restore seesion function), reinstall TB using this tool:
http://ubuntuzilla.wiki.sourceforge.net/
Reboot and restart TB, go through the setup of new account stage without loading any mail (uncheck the "download mail now" box at the end of the setup process). Now copy and paste your old "mail" folder into your new ./mozilla-thunderbird/xyz_Default folder replacing the "new" one.

I hope this helps

[Quaxo76]

[SOLVED] Re: Thunderbird won't start anymore

Problem solved.
Turns out I couldn't delete the "lock" file (by the way, it's in a separate partition made just for my mail, so that I can access it both from Linux and from Windows) because the file system was corrupt. I had to reboot windows (after months that I didn't need it), have the filesystem fixed, delete the lock file, and reboot into linux.
Now I have to find out why mi filesystem got corrupted...

Thanks everyone for your suggestions!

Cristian