On 05/27/2015 09:06 PM, Frank wrote:
This is long so I hope all can read till the end..... I access all my mail through Thunderbird using IMAP. It has always been flawless until yesterday. When I went into Thunderbird at mid-day one of my accounts with my ISP Videotron.ca registered a logon failure..despite the fact nothing had changed. They keep changing my password through their facilities...and when I run Thunderbird with the new password it connects fine. But if I close Thunderbird and go back in, the old "cannot logon to IMAP" is back. Three separate calls to support at Videotron resulted in them eventually claiming (on the third call) that my system had been compromised. I told them that was unlikely as I am not running Windows. He then spoke with their "security" department who said it was possible the system had been compromised...that Linux and Mac are subject to root-kits and "other" viruses. I have checked (with chkrootkit) and as far as it is concerned, there is nothing wrong. The strange thing is this: I have 3 separate mail accounts with Videotron...but only the main one (which is under my name) is giving this trouble. This one which I use for this list is fine as is a second less important account. It seems I can't convince them the problem is at their end....or perhaps something else is going on here ?
First, I wouldn't believe at all what they say about your system having been compromised. They don't know anything at all about linux and somehow they diagnosed over the phone that you have a virus??? Well, level one tech support often operates on magical thinking... that's just my experience over a lot of years.
Someone already mentioned the problem could be with the number of attempted IMAP connections might exceed what you've configured. I had this problem once and fixed it somewhere in my thunderbird configuration. (It was a long time and many versions ago, so even if I could remember where that configuration item was, it's probably not in the same place anymore anyway. Poke around for it. The language for that setting is unambiguous.)
This would be a good moment to have a dual-boot machine, or a VM, with Windows running on it. Failing those, if you have a smart phone, there are IMAP-based email apps. It would literally take ten minutes to download and set up. I run K-9 on mine and it works well; I use it routinely every day to check email. Even though, generally speaking, most android smart phones are *far*, *far*, *far*, *far* less secure than linux systems, in my experience level one tech support is much more easily persuaded they have a problem if you call them and tell them you're running android. Again, magical thinking.
If your problem still persists, check your network connection. Try pinging their mail server(s) and a few DNSs. Also the first hop after your modem. Not very often, but still occasionally, I get a problem which is resolved by rebooting mine. I'll reboot my switch and my bridge at the same time just to be thorough and because it takes no extra time to do so.
Then check your log files. If I'm on the clock, I do this first (even before going to a list for an answer). But a lot of people are put off, and often rightly so, by the obtuse language found there. But give it a try anyway. You might need to up the verbosity levels, then try again.
There are a few other things which can be done (and I'm probably forgetting a couple others), but the above stuff should do the trick on a fully upgraded system.