Disable automatic e-mail checking in Thunderbird 3

Have you guys ever done the math on that? You asked or allowed for 24000 interruptions from literally every human being in the world who could fall onto a keyboard and make an e-mail go to you. ( Merlin Mann Show archive.org snapshot )

So you decided to put a price on your attention Show archive.org snapshot and not check your e-mail 24000 times a year. A first step is to disable automatic e-mail checks in Thunderbird.

1. Open Edit -> Account settings and select your incoming mail account.
2. Under Server settings uncheck "Check for new messages on startup" and "Check for new messages every X minutes".
3. Under Advanced, uncheck "Use IDLE command if the server supports it".