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Thunderbird in Crisis?
Elektroschock writes "The two core developers of Thunderbird have left Mozilla. Scott McGregor made a brief statement: 'I wanted to let the Thunderbird community know that Friday October 12th will be my last day as an employee of the Mozilla Corporation.' Meanwhile, David Bienvenu blogged: 'Just wanted to let everyone know that my last day at The Mozilla Corporation will be Oct. 12. I intend to stay involved with Thunderbird... I've enjoyed working at Mozilla a lot, and I wish Mozilla Co and the new Mail Co all the best.' A few month ago Mozilla management considered abandoning their second product and setting up a special corporation just for the mail client. Scott was more or less supportive. David joined in. While Sunbird just released a new version no appropriate resources were dedicated to the missing component. And while Thunderbird became the most used Linux mail client it has been abandoned by Mozilla for 'popularity reasons'. Both messages from David and Scott do not sound as if the founders will play any role in the Thunderbird Mail Corporation. What happened to Mozilla? Is it a case of pauperization through donations?"
I will continue to use it even if it never changes again. I like it. Maybe it's just *that* stable?
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
I'm in the midst of attempting a conversion from my PC-based mail client (Eudora) to Thunderbird on a Mac. It's been a horror show from day one - the Thunderbird import function turns out to be more buggy than a
New York City apartment in the summer. If I didn't have lots of GNU command-line tools and a hex editor to fix the many things that choke Tbird, I'd have abandoned the effort and switched to some proprietary client a long time ago.
Let's hope as a separate entity they can do better.
I use thunderbird quite a bit but I wonder if heavy email clients have much future. Of all the applications where a web client can replace a heavy desktop side client email seems like one of the easiest and google has proven that you can make a webmail client that isn't painful to use.
And it'd be sad if it disappeared, but Apple Mail, Evolution and Gmail are better options on non-Windows platforms. That's probably why it's not as popular as it should be.
(also, if you're careful enough, Outlook and Outlook Express are perfectly usable on Windows, especially the newer versions)
US businesses that currently accept chip and PIN/signature
...When even International Rescue are in crisis!
Oh wait, what...?
Most Open Source supporters ARE normal corporations.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Read what you replied to again, note the word "supporter."
I would say that due to the fact that we're approaching the end of 2007 and Thunderbird still doesn't have integrated calendaring (not in beta, that's a copout), then yes, Thunderbird is in crisis.
Until feature-for-feature Thunderbird can equal or beat Outlook it will never have people flocking to it like Firefox did.
Look at Firefox versus IE 6 - heck, Firefox basically "inspired" IE 7 (tabs, search bar on the top right, extensions, etc. etc.) That's what led to the huge masses adopting it.
The fact that Zimbra has released a cross-platform offline client instead of extending Thunderbird to fit their needs speaks volumes.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/03/26/zimbra-to-lauch-desktop-application-with-full-offline-functionality/
Here's to the crazy ones
KMail is a good option too, or Kontact if you want integration with calendars and a newsreader (KNode), or just run them each separately. I use KMail for all my email, I prefer the interface to Thunderbird's.
I've been waiting five years for a decent e-mail application, which is a lot of time in the tech world. Maybe somebody will come out with something better, but it's irrelvant to me - I stopped waiting and moved everything to gmail.
I have used Thunderbird exclusively since v1.5 and I have never looked back! I need those new features.
I need security updates. I need a calendar. We all use Thunderbird. Just fork it damnit! We need it.
call it Inlook or something!
They're using their grammar skills there.
The reason Thunderbird won't gain the same traction as Firefox has is Exchange. The Thunderbird developers have made a great email client, but they've hit the wrong target. They, along with GMail et. al. have killed off Eudora and Pegasus, not Outlook. (aside - here's hoping IncrediMail is next)
Email has evolved into a collaboration tool, not just a way of sending words in ASCII. Plain and simple, until your contacts can email you a meeting request and TBird puts it in your calendar automagically - and that meeting goes in your BlackBerry/Treo/Gizmo-of-the-week - it won't gain near the same buzz. Outlook + Exchange adds far too much business value to simply abandon in the name of Open and Free.
If you just need email, Thunderbird is OK-fine - if you need collaboration, you need Outlook. It's a damn shame, too.
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
I use it for work email because I need to be able to tailor ways I write email according to folders (internal/external mail etc). That said, I do my personal mail on gmail because I need to read it on any machines and because I use it as a sort of knowledge database. Searching email in a real client always takes years where as in Gmail it keeps everything, ever, and takes a fraction of a second to search it. That's a killer feature right there.
I thought that was the point.
[insert witty quote here]
I don't know why this e-mail client doesn't get more attention. I find it similar to Thunderbird but much faster. Also, as far as I remember, included some tools to import from Eudora, which worked very well for me (while Thunderbird didn't).
The Mozilla Corporation has become something steeped more in PR and spin than actual technical innovation. We are partly to blame - we allowed ourselves to get caught up in it while a faceless organization silently emerged, focused on shipping more and more units of today's flavor... while beating the drum: there must be only one flavor of innovation... doesn't matter what it is as long as we are in control of the ideology and the message... keeps things simple for the marketdroids and the consumers. Actually maintaining choice and innovation on the internet is hard. Why bother when you can cut corners and say you didn't? Everyone will believe you anyway, so what's the point? That's the way things are done in America today. Why should Open Source be any different? Mozilla is a Public Asset after all. An open, egalitarian society where everyone can make a difference as long as you kiss the right ass and don't ask too many challenging questions of those in charge. Mozilla is a public asset. Just keep saying it over and over.
In this matter, everyone is being too cordial to be believed at face value. Doubtless there's a rich subtext. Such is life.
Yes,
But I believe the issue here is a resource issue. TB is a stable mail client software but it sits within its own world.
What it needs is more integration to third parties. I would suggest:
- compatibility with system address book (e.g. on Mac OS X)
- ability to natively synchronize with mobiles phones in regards with contacts and appointment
- ability to send / receive SMS and MMS from TB
- compatibility with calandar, task back end from major CRM softwares (SugarOS).
I would aso suggest the partnership with an open source calendaring and task management server to propose a complete package. Finally, Exchange compatibilty could be addressed by building an extension based OpenChange http://www.openchange.org/
So again, the same question arises : who will have time, dedidication and money to do all this.
Emmanuel
Their first day at the newly founded Thunderbird Mail Corporation? After all they, Scott and David, would have to leave the Mozilla Corporation, if they play to continue with Thunderbird, because TMC and MC are two *different* corporations....
The advantage of Thunderbird over Evolution is that it runs on all major platforms. Evolution does have a port for Windows, but it's pretty poor. I expect that a lot of companies would be interested in a Thunderbird client (and paying support for it) if it would support the mail server they use.
Perhaps Thunderbird / Sunbird should even move to the OpenOffice project. After all, an Outlook app must be the major the missing component in the OpenOffice suite, and here is one ready for adoption.
Try mutt. It still beats the pants off of everything in the known world when it comes to properly formatting and replying to emails (since it allows you to use your favourite editor). It's the only way to properly trim quotes, still reply with 2 words and sending the mail, in under 8 seconds.
Most people don't spend $87 on Outlook but some $250 on Office 2007 Standard. Many will also get it (almost) free by BitTorrent, KaZaA, some neighbourhood geek or their workplace. In that case "it" will probably be the Enterprise or Professional Edition, not Standard.
Thank you. I knew there was a good reason I subscribe to Slashdot. I just thought I was sending 10 bucks to the only place in the Universe that my Karma is "Excellent".
Seriously. Since I started using AdBlock, I do try to donate to the well-designed community websites that I use.
Sort of like the way I try to buy music directly from the artists I like best, since I refuse to deal with any of the largest music retail channels.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Would be my next Linux choice. http://kontact.kde.org/kmail/
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Open Letter to the Thunderbird Community
Also note that both Scott and David say they'll still be working on TB. Scott's post:
David's:
Given the timing and very similar wording of their posts, I'm guessing that Ascher's right - they're going off to work on something together.
It does suck; those two know more about TB than anyone, and even when they were full-time employees, TB development was fairly glacial - it's just too big and monolithic for that size development team. But I don't know that this necessarily means the end of TB. I certainly hope not.
My newest machine is about 7 years old; I'm in a pinch that thousands of hours of intense concentration can show no way out. I play UT, surf, do all the things everyone else does, I even have an icon that'll bring up random episodes of Firefly, since there's plenty of power for media.
But I load OpenOffice and the world stops.
I fear that Thunderbird, under the direction of OO will become bloated and laggy as well! I had a friend who didn't know any better; her P2/300 was on loan to show her how to use Linux. She waited over 2H for it to load. It was insane. These guys really need to profile their code.
--- For a good time mail uce@ftc.gov
Once you've imported it to an imap folder, why wouldn't you leave it there?
don't use Thunderbird simply because it doesn't have a Received Date option? I'm not kidding you. Every person I've EVER talked to about Thunderbird and why they don't use it brought this up. Its all these stupid little issues that they just ignore that got them where they are today.
I'm not worried: I'm more of an olde english drinker.
echo $SIGNATURE
Yes, but what in the hell does Mozilla need $50m per year for? Do the top developers fly from the east coast to mountain view by private jet every morning to begin the work day or something?!
Being able to integrate with exchange would be MARVELOUS - if it were open. And by that i dont mean that Exchange should be open, but the communication with it. Take a look at things like:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/openchange/
There have been MANY projects to try and pull apart that communications channel into a library that could be implemented anywhere and no one has managed it (yet). The original work (above) was about trying to make an exchange (server) replacement, but now its extending into implementing client connectivity. Hell, evolution only manages to do it by going thru the OWA (which is a hack at best). So everyone sitting there going "oh it should have exchange connectivity" paleeease write to MS and tell them they should open the protocols (personally, i think they should be forced to do this).. It would be fair to say that it would be nice if it had a real calendar/colab tool for the corporate environment, but if your using this at home you really REALLY need to get a more spontaneous life, seriously!.
So that you can check your email while killing mercenaries and alien scum.
As I said, there may have been other steps in this process that I've forgotten.
My point isn't that these solutions, in my case, were that hard. But figuring out what was wrong, and implementing them, took huge amounts of time and patience. An ordinary user would never have these means (knowledge of command-line Unix utilities, and insight into what might be failing) at his/her disposal. And they surely wouldn't have gone to these lengths to diagnose and correct the problems. (Although, to be honest, an ordinary user wouldn't have 10-15 years of email saved up that they wanted to convert to a new platform).
And - more importantly, and some of the reason for this rant - I think that import/conversion function, especially in FOSS software, have a greater need to be as friendly and bulletproof as possible, because the user's still quite possibly in the "I'm going to try it out and see if I want to use it instead of my old [proprietary] application if it doesn't work'. But in Tbird, seemingly, Import's it's at most an afterthought, and extremely fragile even AFTER you've used third-party apps like Eudora Rescue or Eudora Mailbox Cleaner to try and get around the known issues, limitations, and deficiencies in the code. That isn't the way it should be in an app that's trying to compete for mind and market share with some pretty damn good commercial or closed-source apps.
As someone who is now collecting a fairly significant backlog of mail archives, I gotta ask: Is it worth it? How often do you actually need access to those archives and do they provide the resource you think they should? I know storage is cheap and I've got plenty of it, so I don't think I'll *stop* archiving, but sometimes I wonder. I've had to access them once in about 3 years. I was able to zgrep a big zip archive of emails to find a reference I needed, but it wasn't something I could live without. Convenient? yes. worth the time and effort to maintain those archives? probably not.
Part of my motivation for asking is because I've changed the way I file my paper files and suspect that I could treat my email the same way. I now file all my stuff, unsorted, in a box. The typical office depot collapsible box will hold about 3 months worth of records. 99% of the time, if I need something out of the "files" its in the current box in reverse chronological order and relatively easy to find. Boxes go in storage with the date range on them and after a few years, just get thrown out. I waste 0 time filing and since in reality almost never need access to the back files, there's no real penalty in the retrieval time either.
meh. must be a slow day.
man, I feel like mold.
Mozilla makes a fortune from Firefox thanks to their Google deal, so Firefox is self-funding where-as Thunderbird has no potential revenue stream so is just seen as a drain on resources. That's what happens when your corporatise an open source project, the money clouds your vision and detracts from your goals. The tin-foil hat brigade out there might even suggest that Thunderbird, as a competitor to Google, threatens Mozilla's main revenue stream and so may well be paying the price for Googles ongoing support...
Yeah! Mozilla should stop ignoring Thunderbird. They should create a company whose sole focus is on email and other messaging technology. They should fund the new company with several million dollars so they can get off the ground. Yeah, that's what they should do... then Thunderbird will get the attention it deserves. Oh wait, that's what they're doing already. Nevermind.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
maildir is not a good option if you want to search your e-mails. You'll get an open/close for each and every e-mail, and when there's tens of thousands of e-mail messages, this takes time and ties up IO on the box.
Too many files, and you'll even thwart normal shell expansions, like grepping for a string in * and getting "Arguments too long".
I much prefer standard mbox format, with external index files. Not only can the files be read by pretty much anything, but searches are also MUCH faster.
A lot of spam identifies itself with The Bat in the (optional) X-Mailer header. So few real people use The Bat, and so many spammers do, that I routinely add SpamAssassin points to any messages listing The Bat in X-Mailer.