Hi alanrf! Thanks for the response. I'm running on Windows XP. I followed the most common suggestion and installed OpenSSL and stunnel and performed the following configurations:
1. Added the following services to stunnel.conf
; Gmail POP3 service, listens on localhost:11110
[gmail-pop3s]
accept=localhost:11110
connect=pop.gmail.com:995
; Gmail SMTP service, listens on localhost:11025
[gmail-smtps]
protocol=smtp
accept=localhost:11025
connect=smtp.gmail.com:587
2. Updated avast! so that the [MailScanner] section in the avast4.ini file looks like this
[MailScanner]
PopRedirectPort=110,11110
SmtpRedirectPort=25,11025
ImapRedirectPort=143
NntpRedirectPort=119
IgnoreAddress=
IgnoreLocalhost=1
AutoRedirect=1
StartPop=1
StartSmtp=1
StartImap=1
StartNntp=1
ShowTrayIcon=1
3. Updated Thunderbird so that my Gmail POP server is 127.0.0.1:11110 and my Gmail SMTP server is 127.0.0.1:11025.
With this configuration, the only way that I'm able to send email is if I have the Ignore local communication checkbox checked. With it unchecked, all my outgoing emails only reach the Sent folder of my Gmail account. I even took a look at the email headers between emails sent with the checkbox checked and emails sent with the checkbox unchecked, and the only significant differences were the lack of a couple of virus scan lines in the latter.
Having said that, I'm interested in this Thunderbird Gmail extension that you are referring to. However, I would like to get this current configuration working first before giving that a try.