this post was submitted on 21 Dec 2024
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Betterbird: A Thunderbird Fork That Promises Better Features (news.itsfoss.com)
submitted 1 day ago by petsoi@discuss.tchncs.de to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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[–] BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works 8 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Disclaimer: I haven't read the article, my rant is entirely based on the title.

[a] Fork That Promises Better Features

Have they released anything yet? Or are we at the project stage, where they're yelling at their CLI confused about git?

Promises are cheap, releases matter. I mean I could announce a project called Betterfox, promising to bring better features to a well-known browser. But in reality I'm by myself, overly ambitious, and going to leave the github page abandoned after the initial commit.

[–] weststadtgesicht@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago) (1 children)

Disclaimer: I haven't read the article

A wise choice in this case. It's 23 paragraphs that mostly describe standard Thunderbird features (as the author usually does not use email clients) and only one list with three (!) bullet points of new features in Betterbird.

Edit: to save you a click, here's the list from the article (the actual feature list on the project page is longer):

Some notable features include:

  • System Tray Icon (Linux)
  • Accent Colors (for folders)
  • Multi-line Inbox View (disabled by default)
[–] BigDanishGuy@sh.itjust.works 1 points 7 hours ago

System Tray Icon?!? What is this sourcery?

Sounds so futuristic. I mean I may be stuck in the 70s reading my electronic mail in pine on a pdp11, so that may influence my judgment.

[–] Sunny@slrpnk.net 1 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Does it have the new UI update that came with Thunderbird recently? Didn't see any screenshots of the UI on their website.

[–] Nilz@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

It does

[–] BaumGeist@lemmy.ml 19 points 12 hours ago

I came here because of the clickbait title, ready to lambast thunderbird for the empty promises... But it turns out that they're pretty clear on the specifics of what separates them from Thunderbird.

But I'm not gonna let that righteous indignation go to waste, so instead I'm gonma rip Sourav Rudra('s writing skill) a new one. Prepare your (writing skill's) ass for a kicking Sourav.

Betterbird: A Thunderbird Fork That Promises Better Features

Better features?! Can I also have updated elements and improved aspects? Maybe superior components too??? Ah. A girl can dream.

Vague buzzwords and nothing more. "Better features" is not only subjective, but also vague enough to be almost entirely meaningless. Let's hope the rest of the article does better.

Thankfully, the author included a shortlist of "Must-Know Bits." I'm sure that's a good summary of what's to follow.

— Features many long-requested features.

I'm glad they're finally listening to my request of compatibility with the Lovense remote control vibrator app's API. Now I can feel good about receiving emails instead of stressed! They sure took their sweet time, it's been long [time units] since I requested it!

How long and who requested? Or better yet, what features????? Why should I care???????? Please, give me somethinbg concrete to grip onto!

— A more streamlined alternative to Thunderbird.

Streamlined! Wow! Is it also more efficient, and higher quality? Will they make it sustainable? Maybe it can also be more ethically sourved.

Could you be more vague please? This almost accidentally told me something about the changes they've made.

— Highly customizable, thanks to Add-ons and Themes.

Like Thunderbird? Like the addons you can find at the official Thunderbird site at addons.thunderbird.net?

Do they also plan to send and receive email in betterbird? Will it work with a graphical desktop environment? Will it be computer software? Or does the failure to mention these assumed "features" imply that it will diverge from Thunderbird in these key aspects?

Deeply shit lead-in. The rest of the article stands in stark contrast, being actually specific and informative. It's like ol Sourav wrote an actually good article, then some idiot editor slapped it in ChatGPT and told it to fart out a title, subtitle, and highlights list. And then ChatGPT ignored all that and made the most generic tech article heading of all time.

FWIW, itsfoss.com: you should fire that editor for being a completely incompetent moron.

[–] solrize@lemmy.world 7 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

This doesn't really seem like something that needed to be done. Thunderbird already has too many features. It needs less, not more. A bunch of stuff in the email client part is also badly designed. That needs fixing, preferably upstream, but I wouldn't think of that as feature enhancement.

[–] fushuan@lemm.ee 2 points 10 hours ago (2 children)

In linux it doesnt have a tray with mail count that sends a notification when new mail arrives. It's a pretty basic feature nowadays to be honest. It didn't even have the auto fetch every 30 minutes when I switched!?!! Like Thunderbird expected me to click on the sync button every 30 minutes. That's not how people use email I'm sorry.

I agree that all those calendar and contacts features are completely unnecessary and that it could integrate with other tools instead, but the main use is lacking.

[–] lukewarm_ozone@lemmy.today 1 points 6 hours ago

Thunderbird definitely does have autosync nowadays. No tray icon, true, but it can send native notifications which isn't much worse.

[–] solrize@lemmy.world 3 points 10 hours ago

I use TB under Debian and there is a tray icon and an arrival notification, poll time of maybe a few minutes, seems fine. Showing the # of messages in the tray icon could be sort of handy I guess, though I had never thought about it before and didn't miss it. Basic features = shut off the "email contains remote content" banner or "spam filter thinks this email is spam" (I can recognize spam for myself). I just want a preference that permanently disables remote content without throwing banners at me. And eliminate the client side spam filtering completely since I have that on the server side, and can manually flag any that gets through. Plus various other stuff like that. Yes, get rid of the calendar and contacts stuff. Biggest feature needing significant code changes: make message search not suck.

[–] VintageGenious@sh.itjust.works 9 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

All I want is Microsoft Exchange support (I didn't choose to need it...)

[–] unskilled5117 3 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

It‘s coming along in Thunderbird, they continuously mention it in their monthly development blog.

Exchange Web Services support in Rust

November saw an increase in the number of team members contributing to the project and to the number of features shipped! Users on our Daily release channel can help to test newly-released features such as copy and move messages from EWS to another protocol, marking a message as read/unread, and local storage functionality. Keep track of feature delivery here.

If you aren’t already using Daily or Beta, please consider downloading to get early access to new features and fixes, and to help us uncover issues early.

[–] savvywolf@pawb.social 39 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Direct link to said better features, for the lazy: https://www.betterbird.eu/#featuretable

[–] k_rol@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 day ago

Im lzy, ty

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 25 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Looking at the linked-from-the-“due to differences”-link emails… jesus christ… so that’s what people mean by Mozilla prioritizing greedy money…

[–] SineNomineAnonymous@lemmy.ml 44 points 23 hours ago (3 children)

If you read the developer's background and reasons for the fork, it's actually a lot more....... cringe.

Pretty much, the guy lost his shit because Mozilla is woke / SJW / DEI and all the lovely buzz words used by certain people.

[–] NotSteve_@lemmy.ca 5 points 13 hours ago

Got that vibe when he said he was ousted by weaponized cancel culture

[–] NiaKitty@beehaw.org 15 points 21 hours ago

Thanks for sharing this, looked into it myself and that's quite unfortunate.

Why does every piece of cool software end up having some reactionary midlife crisis behind them?

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 11 points 23 hours ago

That would make sense. I'd like some links.

[–] Sekoia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 32 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Ngl that link puts me slightly off. It reads exactly like what people booted for very good reasons say

The following paragraph shows how so-called cancel culture was used weaponising [...]

And in the email, Mozilla talks about him violating their "inclusivity" policy... we also don't know what was reported, only the reasons stated.

Not saying that it wasn't unjust, just that we only have 1 perspective and it's written in a way that raises some red flags.

[–] RiikkaTheIcePrincess@pawb.social 16 points 21 hours ago

Pretty bad when one side's perspective makes them look awful and the other side is the one accusing them of being awful 😬

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 5 points 23 hours ago

I agree that I'd be very curious as to what the violations actually are, but...

  1. No specific instances of violations are referenced in the CPG emails
  2. There's no language in the CPG emails regarding prior warnings
  3. Suspension from the council is clearly out-of-process
[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.ml 0 points 1 day ago

Mozilla doesn't do loose coupling of UI and core, huh?

[–] kittenroar@beehaw.org 1 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

Thunderbird, and probably betterbird, is too bloated for my taste.

[–] mactan@lemmy.ml 3 points 13 hours ago

all you really need is a steady hand and a magnetized needle. kernel is bloat

[–] Rade0nfighter@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I had no idea!

Wonder if any of that stuff will make it upstream and if not if there’s good reason?

[–] Nilz@sopuli.xyz 10 points 1 day ago

As per the FAQ:

We will submit all changes to upstream to eventually benefit Thunderbird.

[–] Aimeeloulm@feddit.uk 1 points 21 hours ago

One bug that irks me is deleting an email on a folder with sorting such as grouped sorting and Thunderbird loses the sorting settings, then I have to reapply the sorting settings again.....gah

[–] vort3@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Is there a way to use this as a drop in replacement easily? Like maybe move my Thunderbird profile folder into a Bettterbord folder, or maybe an automatic import option?

This looks promising but I don't really want to set up my email accounts and settings from scratch.

[–] Nilz@sopuli.xyz 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

As per the FAQ they seem to share the exact same profile so you can seamlessly switch between them (provided both are the same dot release).

Edit: in case that doesn't work, run betterbird -p and select the right profile. For me it chose the wrong one.

[–] MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 day ago (3 children)

I just gave it a try and it does not pick up my existing Thunderbird data automatically, or prompt to import it.

[–] Nilz@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 day ago

Same here :(

[–] Sturgist@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 day ago

Booooo

[–] mcmxci@mimiclem.me 1 points 1 day ago (2 children)

The instructions change if you're using flatpak. I was only able to get it to work with a manual import

[–] 7eter 3 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

for TB -> TB-flatpack simply pasting from ~/.thunderbird/ to ~/.var/app/org.mozilla.Thunderbird/.thunderbird/ did work for me. I might try betterbird sometime.

[–] MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I'm on Windows on this PC, so nothing being isolated here.

[–] diykeyboards@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

This is amazing. Thanks!