RSSMozilla Rolls Out Thunderbird 2.0 RC1
By Ed Oswald | Published April 6, 2007, 5:36 PM
Mozilla on Friday took the wraps off of the first release candidate of its upcoming Thunderbird 2.0 release, aimed at making organization of e-mail easier for its users.
The open-source e-mail client will be available across 35 languages on three platforms, including Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. In addition, full Vista support has been built into the client for the first time.
In an interview Friday afternoon with BetaNews, Mozilla's lead Thunderbird engineer Scott McGregor said that the latest release was aimed at those who seem to "live in their inbox."
"Our focus is on helping the user organize their inbox so they can get on with their lives," he said. Many of the features included in the 2.0 release come as a direct result of requests from users for various organizational features within the client.
Users would be able to use tags and saved folders, much like the labels feature within Gmail, and the saved folders feature within Mac OS X's Mail client. This would make pulling up information on a specific topic much faster than searching by keyword.
Searching has also been enhanced. With similar "find as you type" functionality as found in Firefox, and instant search results as a query is typed. McGregor noted that many of the features requested in Thunderbird have been brought over from the popular alternative browser easily because they share the same code base.
This would also be true for the new Message History Navigation feature that adds back and forward buttons to the client. "You can browse through messages just like in a Web browser," he said. The functionality would also be independent of data type, meaning a user could switch between a RSS feed and mail message, for example.
Mozilla is also experimenting with a new webmail integration feature, and ships Thunderbird 2.0 with connectors for Gmail and .Mac out of the box. This would allow a user to easily set up either service without having to enter the technical particulars.
"This is an experiment to see if it is useful," McGregor said. "People so far have liked it, and we'll see if we can add other providers in the future."
Of the development process, Mozilla claims about 2,500 users actively download its nightly builds, with about 55,000 using the beta regularly. Outside of Mozilla itself, McGrevor estimated it had about a dozen developers actively working on code, with about another 100 active technical contributors.
McGregor also said he believed that those working on the code were likely a bit more dedicated than those testing proprietary software. He stressed not to think of Mozilla as just the company itself when talking about development. "Mozilla is the community," he said. "There is no difference."
OK, so now we have labels. How long until Mozilla and Google reach and agreement for Gmail IMAP on Thunderbird? That will be the day...
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|I will certaily checkout the new features..The one "bug" in 1.5 that is annoying is that the tray notifier will alert you to messages that are considered junk or one that have been deleted. Not sure if there is fix for this in 2 but it would be nice.
***note**
if there is a setting that fixes this that I have overlooked..sorry in advance.
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|So, will this have connectors built in for Exchange? I have tried some add ons for the Exchange Calendar in recent Thunderbird releases and they flat out don't work.
I wish Mozilla would see there is a huge market for a lightweight, enterprise email client that works with Exchange. Evolution does it's job but it is clunky.
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|I know this isnt the proper place to ask, however, is there a way to move my mail files/folders to a usb drive and configure both my portable thunderbird and installed thunderbird to use the same profiles on the usb stick?
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|yes, see www.portableapps.com for a usb stick thunderbird client, with details on how to import your profile from other pcs
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|Ask here: http://forums.mozillazine.org
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|Anyone ever get this message???
XML Parsing Error: undefined entity
Location: chrome://messenger/content/messenger.xul
Line Number 139, Column 9:
--------^
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|Does TB2 has that "chat" like function like gmail where replies are grouped together (i am not talking about the real chat - gtalk)?
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|I've been using 2.0 RC1 for the past two days. I must say I like it. The tagging feature is awesome and I like the new skin. I have not experienced any problems with it yet.
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|Decided to download this and give it a try (I dropped using Thunderbird about 2 years ago, and switched to Opera), and many people have been saying good things about the tagging.
Unless I am missing something, tagging is nothing special at all, and something I have used in Opera since I moved to it. In addition, none of the irrating behaviour that Thunderbird has, has not been fixed.
It does look a little nicer than last time I looked, and the gmail downloading is nice, but again, nothing that Opera can't do...
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|And the "irrating behaviour" is?
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|I've just started using Thunderbird after 10 years on Pegasus (and a short spell of frustration with Outlook, which, while it does a lot, seems a bit like a Supertanker in its weight and the time it takes to turn things around). I like Thunderbird a lot. It seems similarly powerful to Pegasus. Its search capabilities (with a 10-year archive) are much faster; and its html rendering is much better for those messages which insist on html. It will, of course, turn off graphics and links if you wish. I'm sticking around for a bit longer. I like the plug-ins, too for the bits that aren't so good, like alternative signatures, and attachment handling.
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|Since the editors apparently don't deem it necessary to include a link to the Release Candidate, here y'all go.
http://ftp.mozilla.org/p...htly/2.0.0.0-candidates/
There's actually a RC2 directory, as well, with the program dated April 3rd. That's the one I downloaded and am using now.
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|Their file links are in the FileForum:
http://fileforum.betanew...ndows_Beta/1057948436/4
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|The proper link is
http://releases.mozilla....ird/releases/2.0.0.0rc1/
You're using a nightly build and not RC2 release.
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|Not true, RC 2 is listed here
http://ftp.mozilla.org/p.../2.0.0.0-candidates/rc2/
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|I would be curious to hear more comments regarding the pros and cons of Thunderbird in general and their other components such the one above - without the usual fanboy rants.
Any one care to comment on the pros and cons of the packages, as I would love to consider another local mail client aside from LookOut and using offsite non-archival sources such as Yahoo or GMail. And such info would be most welcomed.
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|Thunderbird is basically LookOut with enhancements and better security. Look at the extensions available and see if you need the extensibility.
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|Just your basic email client. I think the best thing it's got going for it is the fact that it is in active development with a lot of user input.
You see that in the Gmail and .Mac connectors and such.
Don't really use it, don't actually plan on installing this version, even. Been using the Gmail web-interface and it's grown on me, but I like what they're doing with this.
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|I use Thunderbird 1.5 (on Windows XP) as my main email client. I used to use Outlook Express. It's not bad but IMO it still needs a lot of work. There are a few annoying bugs and it uses tons of RAM compared to Outlook Express. There are lots of extensions which is good as it's easy to add new features such as a calender and pgp encryption.
I'm looking forward to v2.0 and hope it fixes the bugs and problems I've been facing with v1.5.
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