Searching "Body" searches more than body
Dudley Brooks
message. I search on the name using Edit/Find/Search in Messages,
followed by "Match all of the following" (or "Match any of the
following, it doesn't matter which), then "Body contains" the name
Several messages will be returned. I'll open one that I suspect should
*not* have the name. While in the message I'll use "Find" (Ctrl-F),
and, sure enough, the name will *not* be found. But if I then use
View/Message Source and again do Ctrl-F, I discover that the name is in
the header, for example in To: or BCC:.
If Ctrl-F find looks only in the Body (and apparently there's no way to
get it to look anywhere else), why does "Search in Messages, Body
contains" also look in the header?
I guess I could get around this by using "Match *all* of the following",
"Body contains" name and "From doesn't contain" name and "To doesn't
contain" name and "CC doesn't contain" name, or something like that.
But say I want to find the name in From, Subject, or Body, but not in
To, CC, or BCC. I *ought* to be able to do that by using "Find *any* of
the following" with "From contains" name, "Subject contains" name, and
"Body contains" name. However, if I do that, "Body contains" also
apparently finds the name in To, CC, or BCC.
This is a bug, right?
-- Dudley
Nir
Are you sure that search word isn't present in the message body when you
viewed the message source? Does the message have any attachment attached?
Tb has a bug to search in attachments (base64 encoded) when full body
search is performed. But similar thing is not followed when you perform
a quick search on same message.
"https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=37031"
Keith Nuttle
First make sure you are showing the search window in the main TB window.
It should be an box with a magnifying glass on the left side.
click the Magnifying glass, and select the option you wish. You can
search sender and four other options including search entire message.
Dudley Brooks
Yes, 100% sure, not only because of thoroughly examining it by eye, but
also because of using the Quick Search you describe below: Quick Search
on the "rendered" message (i.e. the normal view of the message) returns
"not found", and then on the message source finds it in the header.
> Does the message have any attachment attached?
No.
> Tb has a bug to search in attachments (base64 encoded) when full body
> search is performed. But similar thing is not followed when you perform
> a quick search on same message.
Well, apparently full body search has another bug, namely, searching the
header as well as the body.
> "https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=37031"
-- Dudley
Dudley Brooks
Sorry, I see that I didn't make clear that I'm talking about the search
necessary to create a Saved Search. The only thing I can find that has
a box with a magnifying glass is what I describe above, Ctrl-F
(actually, I should have said "Apple-F", since I'm on a Mac) or
Edit/Find/Find in this Message, and which only searches individual
messages. And, in fact, it's that find-box, which works correctly,
which is showing by comparison that "Edit/Find/Search Messages/Body
Contains" is *not* working properly, i.e. is finding messages which have
the search word not in their body but in their header.
If there's a similar box for searching entire mailboxes, please tell me
where to find it.
> click the Magnifying glass, and select the option you wish. You can
> search sender and four other options including search entire message.
Yes, this is for searching individual messages, not for *finding*
messages. Or if there *is* one for finding messages, please tell me how
to find *it*! ;^)
And the magnifying glass is not clickable, at least not the one which
searches individual messages in my TB 2.0 for Mac.
Nir
Well, it sounds like a bug.
Can you check the following and reply back with your findings?
Create a folder under Local Folders.
Copy particular message to that folder.
Select that folder and perform 'search in message body' (Edit > Find )
and see whether or not Tb still looks into header.
Dudley Brooks
It works properly on the newly created folder. And thanks, you made me
realize the one crucial fact I forgot to mention, which may be the
source of the problem: I'm trying this on an IMAP account from gmail.
Is it possible that gmail is taking the request to search the body and
is applying it to the header as well?
I thought that if I synched the account the search would be on the
downloaded messages. Perhaps because I have so many messages in my
account, synching hasn't finished downloading? Or do I misunderstand
synching and/or searching?
Andrew Sutherland
> This is a bug, right?
There was a bug in Thunderbird where body search would, in some cases,
search into the headers and possibly body of the message stored
sequentially next on disk. This is fixed in Thunderbird 3.0. Please
try the release candidate.
Andrew
David Pyles
thread intrigued me so I did a search with an email address that is
unique (rnrcurmudgeon) on the body of the message. It found numerous
messages with "rnrcurmudgeon" on only the from line. Additionally, it
found some messaged that do not contain "rnrcurmudgeon" at all. I'm
using the Ver. 3.0 release candidate, so I don't think the bug mentioned
above is fixed.
Dave Pyles
Dudley Brooks
> On 11/27/2009 08:41 PM, Dudley Brooks wrote:
>> This is a bug, right?
>
> There was a bug in Thunderbird where body search would, in some cases,
> search into the headers and possibly body of the message stored
> sequentially next on disk.
Aha! I thought, but didn't check out in detail, that I was even getting
some results that didn't seem to have *anything* to do with the search
word. That would certainly explain it. (So in the case I was
describing -- search word in the header but not the body -- maybe it was
just coincidence that the returned message did in fact also have the
search word in *its* header?)
> This is fixed in Thunderbird 3.0. Please
> try the release candidate.
Can I use it without causing any changes which would make 2.0 no longer
work correctly if I decide to revert to it?
Thanks.
-- Dudley
Andrew Sutherland
> I think there actually may be a problem with the "Search Feature." This
> thread intrigued me so I did a search with an email address that is
> unique (rnrcurmudgeon) on the body of the message. It found numerous
> messages with "rnrcurmudgeon" on only the from line. Additionally, it
> found some messaged that do not contain "rnrcurmudgeon" at all. I'm
> using the Ver. 3.0 release candidate, so I don't think the bug mentioned
> above is fixed.
It's conceivable an off-by-one error remains or something like that.
The fix went in without a unit test because of testing framework
limitations at the time (since rectified).
The bug I'm talking about is:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=249841
It would make sense to log a new bug and reference the old bug rather
than reopening the old bug.
Note that the global search functionality in Thunderbird 3 is not
subject to this problem, and is a much better way to search. (Of
course, global search does not help with message filtering problems.)
Andrew
Andrew Sutherland
> Can I use it without causing any changes which would make 2.0 no longer
> work correctly if I decide to revert to it?
You should be able to go back to to 2.0 after having used 3.0, just
avoid creating any new filters using 3.0-specific functionality while
using 3.0. (Which is to say, don't create/modify any mail filters in
3.0 until you decided what to do.)
However, you'll probably want to delete global-messages-db.sqlite from
your profile directory if you go back to Thunderbird 3.0 again; it will
get out of date from your Thunderbird 2.0 usage and become confused.
Andrew
David Pyles
newsgroups and IMAP accounts" but I was getting the problem searching
the Inbox of downloaded message in a POP account.
Dave Pyles
Dudley Brooks
Thanks.
So far, 3.0 seems great (despite the still-remaining search bug which
David Pyles mentioed -- which I haven't had happen yet). I would still
love to have full Boolean search (there are some criteria which can only
be described by a combination of and's, or's, and not's), not to mention
regular expressions (to exclude all the "aaargghh!"'s and "size-aaa"'s
and only find my actual AAA insurance notices!), but the flexibility of
the new system is quite good.
-- Dudley
Andrew Sutherland
> That bug is entitled "False positives from message bodies search in
> newsgroups and IMAP accounts" but I was getting the problem searching
> the Inbox of downloaded message in a POP account.
Ah, it must be a different bug then. If you could try and see if there
is an existing bug filed, and if so note that it still happens in 3.0
RC1, and if not open a new bug, that would be great.
Andrew
Ken Whiton
*-* In Article <L5CdneqYH75p0ozW...@mozilla.org>,
*-* Dudley Brooks wrote
*-* About Re: Searching "Body" searches more than body
> Keith Nuttle wrote:
[ ... ]
>> First make sure you are showing the search window in the main TB
>> window. It should be an box with a magnifying glass on the left
>> side.
>
> Sorry, I see that I didn't make clear that I'm talking about the
> search necessary to create a Saved Search. The only thing I can
> find that has a box with a magnifying glass is what I describe
> above, Ctrl-F (actually, I should have said "Apple-F", since I'm on
> a Mac) or Edit/Find/Find in this Message, and which only searches
> individual messages. And, in fact, it's that find-box, which works
> correctly, which is showing by comparison that "Edit/Find/Search
> Messages/Body Contains" is *not* working properly, i.e. is finding
> messages which have the search word not in their body but in their
> header.
>
> If there's a similar box for searching entire mailboxes, please tell
> me where to find it.
What Keith described is known as the "Quick Search" box. It was
removed from the UI in TB2, but it's still available. Right-click on
a toolbar, select "Customize...", and drag the box from the
"Customize" palette to a toolbar.
>> click the Magnifying glass, and select the option you wish. You
>> can search sender and four other options including search entire
>> message.
>
> Yes, this is for searching individual messages, not for *finding*
> messages. Or if there *is* one for finding messages, please tell me
> how to find *it*! ;^)
One of the search options in the "Quick Search" box is "Entire
Message". Selecting that searches the bodies of all the messages in
the folder and returns a list of all the messages containing your
search term.
Ken Whiton
--
FIDO: 1:132/152
InterNet: kenw...@surfglobal.net.INVAL (remove the obvious to reply)
Keith Nuttle
Sorry about that I have been using the Quick Search since I changed from
Netscape to Thunderbird, and had forgotten that it was an option.
I hope it is still there in Thunderbird 3.0 since I use it frequently,
which I am looking forward to.
Dudley Brooks
Thanks, I didn't know that. But I'm now trying 3.0 anyway.
>>> click the Magnifying glass, and select the option you wish. You
>>> can search sender and four other options including search entire
>>> message.
>>
>> Yes, this is for searching individual messages, not for *finding*
>> messages. Or if there *is* one for finding messages, please tell me
>> how to find *it*! ;^)
>
> One of the search options in the "Quick Search" box is "Entire
> Message". Selecting that searches the bodies of all the messages in
> the folder and returns a list of all the messages containing your
> search term.
In 3.0 this search box seems to be on the toolbar by default -- and it
works very nicely!
-- Dudley
Dudley Brooks
It *is* there, and you were right to recommend it -- it's quite good.
-- Dudley