If KMail is launched at startup time then it will be stay Offline until you restart it, the Work Online menu option wont't do anything. I suspect there could be a race condition here because while NetworkManager is launched far earlier at boot time (thanks to systemd) the KDE environment may not be able to setup a working internet connection fast enough before Kontact/Kmail is invoked. I use a bash script as a work around that sleeps for ten seconds and then launch Kontact. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. System Settings -> Startup and Shutdown -> Add Program -> kontact --iconify 2. 3. Actual Results: Log out and in again: it should work - meaning KMail will be Online. Reboot: -- it shoudln't work now. Kmail will be launched Offline and the only way to change it back online is to restart the app (or the whole Kontact PIM Suite). Expected Results: When Kmail/Kontact is started it is already online.
This bug has only been reported for versions before 4.14, which have been unsupported for at least two years now. Can anyone tell if this bug still present? If noone confirms this bug for a Framework-based version of kmail2 (version 5.0 or later, as part of KDE Applications 15.12 or later), it gets closed in about three months.
Just as announced in my last comment, I close this bug. If you encounter it again in a recent version (at least 5.0 aka 15.08), please open a new one unless it already exists. Thank you for all your input.