Release Notes - Thunderbird 0.9
Thunderbird is a full-featured e-mail, RSS and newsgroup client that makes e-mailing safer, faster and easier than ever before. More information about Thunderbird is available.
Given the maturity of the underlying Mozilla code, Thunderbird is very usable as your primary e-mail client. However, it is considered a Technology Preview, and as such is assumed to have defects. See the License Agreement for more information.
These release notes cover what's new, download and installation instructions, known issues and end user support / feedback for the Thunderbird 0.9 release.
Please read these notes and the bug filing instructions before reporting any bugs to Bugzilla. We want to hear your feedback about Thunderbird. Please join us in the Mozilla Thunderbird Support forum, kindly hosted by MozillaZine.
What's New
Here are the highlights for this Thunderbird release:- Saved Search Folders
Saved Search Folders display messages based on previously set search criteria. For example, instead of filtering messages into a new folder, you could create a Saved Search Folder that lists all the messages received from a certain person over the past 30 days, even if those messages are stored in different folders and subfolders.
- Message Grouping
You can now group messages in a folder by attributes such as date, sender, priority or a custom label. For instance, a folder grouped by date will group messages from today, yesterday, last week, etc. into self-contained groups in the message list pane. (View > Sort By > Grouped By Sort)
- Other New Features
Messages with attachments now get marked as such in the message list pane immediately and not when the message is displayed.
Improvements to Thunderbird's Global Inbox support for POP3 users.
The new quick search bar introduced in 0.8 now features a clear button when search text is present inside the quick search box.
Fixed a regression introduced in 0.8 where a user could not change the local folder path in the Account Manager.
Improved offline support including fixes for common offline-related problems.
Improved privacy controls block remote content in e-mail messages from senders not in your address book.
Long file attachment names are no longer truncated in the message pane.
Bug fixes too numerous to mention!
System Requirements
Before installing, make sure your computer meets the system requirements.
Downloading Thunderbird
The Mozilla Foundation provides Thunderbird for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X.
Windows: Installer
Linux: GTK2 + XFT (no installer)
Mac OS X: Compressed Disk Image
Contributed builds (These are unofficial builds and may be configured differently than the mozilla.org builds. They may also be optimized and-or tested on specific platforms. Please see below.)
- None Yet
Localized builds (contributed by volunteers of the MLP):
- None Yet
Installing Thunderbird
Once you have downloaded a Thunderbird installer or compressed archive, follow these instructions to install:
Note: Mozilla Thunderbird will create its own user profile information if it does not exist. If you have previously installed the Mozilla Suite, Thunderbird will not interfere with your Mozilla Suite profiles.Windows
Double click the ThunderbirdSetup-0.9.exe installer to start the install.
Mac OS X
Double click the Thunderbird Compressed Disk Image to mount. Your browser may have already uncompressed the image and mounted it for you. Double click the Thunderbird 0.9 Disk Image and drag the Thunderbird application onto your hard disk. Drag the icon to your Dock if you want it to appear there.
Other Platforms
Extract the compressed archive and run thunderbird
Uninstalling Thunderbird
To uninstall Thunderbird, follow these instructions:
Windows
From the Start menu, choose Control Panel and double click Add or Remove Programs. Find "Mozilla Thunderbird (0.9.)" in the list and click Remove to uninstall.
Mac OS X
Drag the Thunderbird application to the Trash.
Others
Remove the thunderbird folder.
Known Issues
The following is a list of the more visible known issues in Thunderbird 0.9. Please do not file bugs in Bugzilla for these issues. Also, please refer to this list before reporting bugs on new issues (this list will be updated).
- If Thunderbird 0.9 is placed in a location with limited access privileges, it should be run by a user with access to that location first, so that all initial startup files are generated. There may be issues still where if a restricted-access user is the first to run the application, these files may not be generated properly and Thunderbird may enter an infinite restart loop. This will be fixed in a future release.
- The RSS reader does not work if the RSS feed requires a user name and password.
- You cannot create more than one RSS account via the Account Manager.
- Linux: Thunderbird does not properly dispatch browser URLs to the default browser out of the box. Read about about how to make this work here.
- The default dictionary is English-only. To add a non-English dictionary, read the installation instructions.
- Windows users can synch their address book with a Palm device by installing the Palm Sync extension for Thunderbird. Save the file locally and install it from the extensions dialog in Thunderbird. The extension will not show up in the list of extensions.
- The enable/disable option for adaptive junk mail detection appears to apply to all accounts (Tools > Junk Mail Controls > Adaptive Filters). It is, however, a per account option. To set the option for a specific account, choose the account in the 'Account:' dropdown on the 'Settings' panel, then switch to the 'Adaptive Filters' panel and set the option. Repeat per account as needed.
- The default theme is almost finished. There are still some Classic theme icons in the UI. Please do not file bugs about icons not being converted to the new theme.
User Support and Feedback
There are several excellent resources contributed by members of the Mozilla
Thunderbird community to help support users and gather feedback:
- Introduction
to Mozilla Thunderbird (getting started quickly)
- Mozilla Thunderbird Help (FAQs, Tips & Tricks, and other customization)
- MozillaZine Knowledge Base (FAQs, Tips & Tricks, and other useful information)
- Mozilla Thunderbird forums (general discussion, feedback, and peer user support) hosted by MozillaZine
- Mozilla Thunderbird Help (FAQs, Tips & Tricks, and other customization)