Mozilla To Shaft Thunderbird Next Week

[schmidtbag]

The thing is that Mozilla products (with a few exceptions) are aimed at large masses. Thunderbird sat at the border of "masses" and "business". The masses has long ago migrated to webmail. Business is over half using MS products, which doesn't integrate well (if at all) with Thunderbird.

As much as I thought Thunderbird was better than Evolution, I think this makes sense for Mozilla.

I myself haven't used anything but webmail for 2 years, and for another 3 or 4, I was only on-and-off on a client (which was indeed Thunderbird).

I think you make an excellent point.


Aside from bandwidth reduction, uniformity, and archiving, what exactly is the point of email client programs? I personally find them a little annoying to deal with, especially if you use the same email address on more than one computer.

[RonJohn]

This seams like sad news, Tunderbird is one of the few email client (on any platform) that i am happy with, but even so it is still lacking a lot of features and many of it's plugins are shoddy.

A senior member at a Linux-dedicated sight that doesn't know that OSS never really dies? Especially mature s/w like Tbird, which they haven't actually had to change since the 1.5 series, except to fix bugs and keep up with Gecko.

And what features is it lacking?

[deanjo]

I don't think I'll ever use webmail. Not until I'm provided a way to backup my email onto hard drive and restore whenever I want.

I'm with ya on that one. Webmail is just so clumsy and is dog slow at finding results in large archives. Plus offline reading is non existent.

[Awesomeness]

The masses has long ago migrated to webmail.

Last I checked, mail clients had a major resurrection with smartphones coming to the mass market.
In the light of Firefox OS the announcement makes even less sense. I would've expected the opposite news: Increased focus on TB development for a kick-ass mail client as part of FF OS.

[madjr]

Last I checked, mail clients had a major resurrection with smartphones coming to the mass market.
In the light of Firefox OS the announcement makes even less sense. I would've expected the opposite news: Increased focus on TB development for a kick-ass mail client as part of FF OS.

I don't think you get what ffOS / B2G is...

FF OS is pure HTML5 and web stuff.

http://www.knowyourmobile.com/featur...the_world.html

Maybe an HTML5 email reader with offline capabilities should be in the works.

[0xCAFE]

Doesn't affect me. I've always been an Evolution user.

[MonkeyPaw]

It's not just that many have migrated to webmail, it's that social media (for better or worse) has taken over for email in a more general sense. I am not a Facebook user, and I can't think of the last time I got a real email from anyone. If you send someone an email asking them what's up, you might get a couple sentences in response. People's lives are shared in public now, and email is really going the way of business and eBills. Sadly, it seems like it's about maximum attention with as little effort and interaction as possible now.

[deanjo]

I personally find them a little annoying to deal with, especially if you use the same email address on more than one computer.

Internet message access protocol (IMAP).

[GreatEmerald]

I'm glad to hear that. I haven't used an e-mail program for at least five years now, and I don't see that changing any time soon. There was only one reason to install Thunderbird on another machine I maintain, so that it could integrate into the Gwenview image export options to make it easier to send them instantly. So yes, Thunderbird is simply staying as it is, but the developers are going to work on something more important, which is always a good thing to hear.

[89c51]

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I didn't expect that to be honest.

I was expecting it to be ported to iOS and to be the mail and maybe chat client of their OS but no.