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Mozilla Thunderbird 0.1 Released

Posted by timothy on from the ground-up dept.

An anonymous reader submits: The Mozilla Thunderbird (stand-alone Mozilla based mail/news reader) developers have just released their first milestone: version 0.1, available for Mac Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. The v0.1 release notes highlight some of the bigger features like customizable toolbars, UI extensions, contact manager sidebar, simplified UI, 3-pane mail window option, and spell checker. Also of note, Mozilla's usage share has risen from 1.2% in February to 1.6% now, a 33% improvement!"

20 of 401 comments (clear)

  1. I have the pleasure to use this. by HyperColor+Underware · · Score: 5, Informative

    Yes, it is a 0.1 release for a reason. It crashed on my Windows system only once or twice, and that was probably due to some misconfiguring on my part. It was easy to configure, unfortunately it still reeks of "I-look-like-netscape"ocity (a problem plauging mozilla).

    Linux distribution is quite good, it won't take over from Evolution just yet.

    It's a good start. Remember, people, before you start posting whines about things not working, remember, this is a 0.1 release.

    1. Re:I have the pleasure to use this. by jilles · · Score: 4, Informative

      Thunderbird fullfills your requirements on my PC. It typically starts in about 3 to 4 seconds. This is something I don't have to do very often because I just keep it running all the time. Memory usage on windows currently is about 14 MB (It's been running all morning). I've observed that memory usage also depends on the size of the mailfolder you are currently looking at. If you open a large folder the associated index is loaded and that obviously takes some time. However, both loading and opening large folders is typically faster on my machine than similar actions in Outlook XP (which was my mail client until about 2 months ago).

      I've so far not experienced a thunderbird crash even though I've been using nightlies until I installed 0.1 this morning.

      XUL performs quite well on windows XP and it picks up system colors etc. The only annoying thing is that the Qute theme is a work in progress which means some of the icons are the ugly old netscape icons.

      --

      Jilles
  2. Extensions by Jedbro · · Score: 5, Informative

    Make sure you get your favorite features from the extensions ;)

    Extensions:
    http://extensionroom.mozdev.org/
    h ttp://texturizer.net/thunderbird/extensions.html

  3. Links by pen · · Score: 4, Informative

    MozillaZine Thunderbird Forums
    FAQ and tips at Texturizer

  4. Re:Stability? by Jedbro · · Score: 3, Informative

    Very stable, it is based off of the Mozilla Mail/News 1.5a which is a VERY stable mail client.
    Thunderbird is only 0.1 in terms of being a Stand-Alone App (with a load of new features).

  5. An Introduction to Thunderbird by Chuck+Bucket · · Score: 5, Informative

    Nidelven IT just put up a new article called An Introduction to Thunderbird. Looks pretty solid.

    CB

    --
    free ipod and free gmail!
  6. Re:Will it import my Mozilla Mail and settings? by CyberSlugGump · · Score: 5, Informative

    Look at How do I migrate my Mozilla mail and settings to Thunderbird

    FWIW, I've been runing Mozilla Mail 1.3 and Thunderbird side by side (using the same profile/email stores) and no problems.

  7. Also in the news by MicroBerto · · Score: 5, Informative
    Mozilla Firebird 0.6.1 has been released

    I don't think it's an official milestone, perhaps more of a release candidate, but test it out for the team anyway!

    --
    Berto
    1. Re:Also in the news by jesser · · Score: 4, Informative

      It is an official release -- it's even on the mozilla.org front page now. Here's the article I submitted to Slashdot (rejected):

      Mozilla Firebird 0.6.1 is available (download). Asa Dotzler explained the reason for this intermediate release: "Firebird 0.6 had two major flaws that have been fixed for a while now - the autocomplete crasher and the DOM security bug that broke most cool bookmarklets (and probably websites too). We _need_ to get these fixes into the hands of 0.6 users as soon as possible." Firebird 0.6.1 is based on the Mozilla 1.5 alpha branch, giving us time to avoid having major regressions in 0.6.1. If you're still using Internet Explorer, now is a great time to switch.

      --
      The shareholder is always right.
  8. Excellent! by mixy1plik · · Score: 3, Informative

    I've been using Thunderbird as my primary PC mail client at home since the first nightly build. Aside from a few small issues at first, I haven't had any problems for a while. It's the nicest looking alternative that I've found. Eudora has a nasty interface, and the MS stuff is well, just that. It's nice to have a decent alternative and I highly recommend it.

  9. Best IMAP support on windows bar none by batkiwi · · Score: 5, Informative

    This thing has the best IMAP support for windows of any mail client.

    -no "phantom" messages like OE (my previous favourite) gets
    -ssl support
    -automagic configuration of namespaces (something most imap clients don't do even though it's in the RFC)
    -conditional subfolder checking for "new" in case you have server side filtering
    -"delete", "mark deleted", and "move to trash" support, instead of the simple "mark deleted" most imap clients have
    -50% more pie

    1. Re:Best IMAP support on windows bar none by hysterion · · Score: 4, Informative
      his thing has the best IMAP support for windows of any mail client.
      Amen, and I would guess it's due in no small part to the presence of (IMAP4 designer) jgmyers among the developers. (I should know, he personally fixed a bug I filed. Thanks John. And THANKS to all the Netscape folks who -- from where I sit -- generally did a huge part of the work.)

      Howawah, IMAP still has a problem I find galling. The whole point is that you can check it from anywhere using all kinds of clients, right? The problem is with those (unspec-ed?) areas that each client finds fit to implement differently. So where Mozilla makes me a Trash folder, Mail.app makes Deleted Messages, SquirrelMail makes an INBOX.Trash, etc., ad nauseam. All on first connection before you even get a chance to configure them. And so the family complains about "all that junk in my profile".

      (BTW I could swear I once saw a pref to change that Trash name in either Mozilla or Mail.app, which I can't find anymore. Anyone remember if/where that exists?)

      --
      Timeo idiotikOS et dona ferentes
    2. Re:Best IMAP support on windows bar none by mrpuffypants · · Score: 4, Informative

      If you're talking about changing the exact IMAP folder that Mail.app uses for its trash/sent/etc. All you have to do is open up the drawer with all the boxes on the side, find the remote folder (let's just say 'trash'), ctrl or right-click it, choose "Account settings" and then "User this folder for Trash" or whatever applies.

      After you set that then Mail.app will shoot all of your trash for that account over to that remote folder.

  10. Pretty solid already by s0meguy · · Score: 5, Informative

    I've been using Thunderbird on Windows now for about 3 weeks and I haven't had a single problem. I much prefer it to Eudora, my previous email client.

    By the way, something useful for non-US English users that took me a while to figure out: Thunderbird uses MySpell dictionaries which can be downloaded here.

    And lots more tips for Thunderbird here.

  11. Re:Will it import my Mozilla Mail and settings? by andyed · · Score: 5, Informative

    It is possible to hack your profile directories and use your Mozilla Mail data. I just recreated the accounts and pointed Mozilla Mail to the t-bird profile folders in mail prefs. That way, I can use MozMail or T-bird -- primarily using T-bird when I'm hacking Mozilla and need to restart often.

    On other imports, I successfully imported 500mb of Outlook data with no problem. Easy to share the data between t-bird and mozmail too.

    As to the .1 issue, the core code here is based upon Mozilla 1.5-ish, so the datasource functions for mail are well tested, the UI not so much.

  12. Re:Check out Outlook 2003 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    1. Three vertical panes. 1 thin pane for folders. 1 pane for folder contents and 1 pane for displaying the selected mail. It is a MUCH more efficient use of space.

    Thunderbird already has it. Even mentioned in the summary. I don't like it myself, but whatever...

  13. Yes it does. by Jedbro · · Score: 5, Informative

    "In addition to automatically detecting junk mail using the same method as Mozilla Mail, Thunderbird also sanitizes HTML in mail marked as junk in order to better protect your privacy and give peace of mind when viewing a message identified as junk.".

    In other words YES, it does. As long as the message is marked as JUNK MAIL, it will stripp it of anything that could be dangerous for viewing, if it is not dangerous, just mark as "not junk" ;)

  14. Re:IE Too tough? Bullshit. by gantrep · · Score: 3, Informative

    Firebird on my 866mhz Pentium III machine was almost faster than IE on my Athlon XP 1400, and then I did this and there was no contest. Speeds up page rendering quite a lot.

  15. Opera's M2 Does It Too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Opera's M2 Email Client http://www.opera.com/products/user/m2/ Also has a filtering agent that does not contact outside servers so your privacy remains intact. It should also be mentioned that M2 is not an ordinary email client, it uses access-points instead of folders. Takes some getting used to but it is really useful and cool once you know how to use it.

  16. Re:Will it import my Mozilla Mail and settings? by Planesdragon · · Score: 3, Informative

    But will I be able too painlessly move my email from Moz over? I've got two years of mail in my .mozilla folder and I don't intend to hack together some sick bastardized transfer.

    can we have a resounding "Hell yeah?"

    To test out Thunderbird, I moved my mail foders to a FAT32 data drive a few days ago, and told Thunderbird and Mozilla to both look at the same place. The auto-filters I use were just a bit off, but the folders themselves were all there.

    You don't need to hack anything--it's a preference in the standard GUI layout for "mail folder location."

    'course, I don't see T-bird as worth it at home--the integration of Moz just works so well for me at the moment.