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xmacintosh · Dec 13, 2003, 01:07 PM

I installed Thunderbird and ... wow! It's great.

Fast, easy, beautiful and I can create HTML messages!!

Sorry, Apple...

Krypton · Dec 13, 2003, 01:29 PM

But it still has the Windows-esque theme? I was hoping it would get the same treatment as Firebird

Moonray · Dec 13, 2003, 01:51 PM

HTML email is already Windows-esque enough.

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wataru · Dec 13, 2003, 01:55 PM

Originally posted by xmacintosh:
I installed Thunderbird and ... wow! It's great.

Fast, easy, beautiful and I can create HTML messages!!

Sorry, Apple...

I'm sure your recipients are just dying to receive your HTML mail

I'll take plaintext, thanks.

Krypton · Dec 13, 2003, 02:34 PM

Originally posted by wataru:
I'm sure your recipients are just dying to receive your HTML mail

I'll take plaintext, thanks.

It's interesting how people are scathing of features that aren't in their chosen software. Personally I don't have a use for it, but it's better to have the choice than none at all.

IronPen · Dec 13, 2003, 02:46 PM

There are some nice features in Thunderbird, a FREE mail app from the Mozilla project. I am stilling using Mail.app myself, but I really like many things about Thunderbird, including:

- Minimum font size setting (NOT in Mail.app. I HATE getting mail in HTML format from other people b/c Mail.app displays the messages in really tiny font.)
- Header displaying.
- Attachment handling.
- Junk mail filtering (Mail.app has this too, of course)
- Threading (also in Mail.app)
- Usenet (MOT in Mail.app)
- And others...I'm on a PC right now, so don't have it here to compare.
- Spellchecker (also in Mail.app)

I don't like that Thuderbird:

- Does NOT work with my LDAP server.
- Does NOT integrate with the Apple Address Book.
- Doesn't ask me which SMTP server to use when I switch from home to work like Mail.app does.
- Needs improved keyboard shortcuts and navigation, just like other Mozilla apps. Although, Command+Enter to send a message makes more sense than Mail.app's weird three-key shortcut.
- Needs a more Mac-like theme. The guy that makes the Pinstripe theme for Mozilla was working on a Thuderbird theme, but I don't know if or when that will be ready. However, I don't think the interface is bad except that the fake aqua widgets are HUGE, which looks sloppy.

It is a good mail program. I can't get used to Eudora's fugly interface and the free version doesn't have junk mail filtering. Entourage is slow and has its own problems. As a free alternative to Mail.app, it's hard to beat Thuderbird IMO.

KevinG · Dec 13, 2003, 03:06 PM

Thunderbird will ship by with a new version of Pinstripe as the default theme for the 0.5 release. I hope to have a beta version of the theme available after the holidays.

Kevin

Moonray · Dec 13, 2003, 03:17 PM

Originally posted by Krypton:
It's interesting how people are scathing of features that aren't in their chosen software. Personally I don't have a use for it, but it's better to have the choice than none at all.

It's just that so called HTML email is nowhere properly defined (and most likely will never be).
Thoughtless use of HTML elements lets the interpretation of them to the mail clients creating a chaos about what elements are supported and how, and render mail unreadable by normal text mode clients.

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ryaxnb · Dec 13, 2003, 04:09 PM

HTML e-mail is good for some things. Don't be so annoyed. Many HTML e-mail messages shouldn't be HTML, but often times I pine for a () or () or maybe a (< Font Size = + 1.) When I think about it, maybe I could create that type of basic HTML e-mail right in Mail. But Thunderbird makes it easier. Thunderbird is neat, though I still use Apple Mail. I love the concept of having a separate address book for addresses collected from e-mail messages, since many of the messages are spam.

Krypton · Dec 13, 2003, 04:30 PM

Originally posted by KevinG:
Thunderbird will ship by with a new version of Pinstripe as the default theme for the 0.5 release. I hope to have a beta version of the theme available after the holidays.

Kevin

Yay!

philcozz · Dec 13, 2003, 07:17 PM

Originally posted by KevinG:
Thunderbird will ship by with a new version of Pinstripe as the default theme for the 0.5 release. I hope to have a beta version of the theme available after the holidays.

Kevin

That is going to be very cool... Pinstripe for Firebird is great.

Angus_D · Dec 14, 2003, 02:12 PM

Originally posted by Krypton:
It's interesting how people are scathing of features that aren't in their chosen software. Personally I don't have a use for it, but it's better to have the choice than none at all.

No, it isn't. HTML mail is an abomination.