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Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

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Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#201

Post by hackuser »

Silhouette wrote: post #83
Certhas wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe not, but from the sound of it, a rewrite is necessary just to keep the lights on and to keep Thunderbird compiling in the long run.

What I don't immediately understand is why they can't just fork Gecko and continue using it for their own purposes. Apparently the needs of Firefox and Thunderbird have diverged, and Mozilla seem to have little interest in supporting Thunderbird any more, so is it a crazy idea to just separate the projects completely and avoid the whole issue indefinitely? Changing the UIs within this particular family of software pr…

Not only are security bugs an issue, as mentioned, but what about maintaining compatibility with changing platforms? Who will fix the bugs when future versions of Windows, MacOS, and Linux introduce growing numbers of 'minor' incompatibilities, and maybe major ones? What about changes in protocols, such as IPv6 (though mail protocols are mostly mature)?

If Thunderbird isn't updated, it will slowly die of bit rot.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#202

Post by edko »

ausjke wrote: post #199

I am a bit extreme here as I think Mozilla shall reduce efforts on firefox and make thunderbird a great product instead, one reason is that chrome is too powerful to beat already, and thunderbird could become the universal email client for all, not much contender there yet. after using slack for a while i feel we can use one slack-channel for each email contact, a bit like google wave probably, and thunderbird can me…

If Mozilla manages to build a product based on Servo that kicks Electron's ass (safer, faster, cheaper to distribute, etc.), then I am not sure that Chrome cannot be beat (or be seriously challenged).

This Electron competitor would become very popular, and it could become the "entry drug" into Rust development (you would be able to do everything in HTML/CSS/JS but you would also have the option to code some parts in Rust, for more power), which would also grow the number of Servo contributors. With a large enough community, Servo-based Firefox could fight for a place at being the best browser (safest, fastest, full-featured).

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#203

Post by Silhouette »

flukus wrote: post #194
Silhouette wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An IMAP server alone typically doesn't include the equivalents of fetchmail and the like. It just provides a protocol for remotely accessing the mail store. However, I don't see why you think it would be impossible for most users to set up what I'm describing. If they can install Thunderbird and configure it to retrieve mail from their ISP or GMail or whatever, they could install a two-part system and configure the s…

> However, I don't see why you think it would be impossible for most users to set up what I'm describing. If they can install Thunderbird and configure it to retrieve mail from their ISP or GMail or whatever, they could install a two-part system and configure the store part to do the same using exactly the same information. Then to connect from their mobile they have to open ports on their home networks, get a static…

Many ISPs offer a static IP. This is applicable for small businesses as well, and they almost certainly have one. Anyone with VPN on their router to access anything remotely has a way in.

There are difficulties in running a full mail server far beyond this. For example, many ISPs won't let you run one on anything below a high-level business plan without just blocking port 25 and friends at a firewall. Even if you can, many other mail servers will flag anything you send as likely junk mail if you're not running a well-known mail server yourself. For incoming mail, you need something that's going to be up 24/7/365 if you're going to give it as the MX for your domain, and you need to be constantly monitoring for security issues in real time, because if you're even a few hours late with the patch then you're probably running an open relay already and you just made every blacklist on the Internet.

Basically, if you're not big enough to have your own full time IT department, there are huge practical advantages to sending and receiving your mail via a dedicated SMTP server run by someone who does. These are completely unrelated to the usefulness of having a centralised mail store that can be used from anywhere on your network, or beyond if you provide a way in for remote access.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#204

Post by interfixus »

JadeNB wrote: post #121
interfixus wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a one. Have run it for years and years and years, overloaded with extensions. It has never failed me. But this! The post outlines a three year timeframe. I do not believe it. I believe Mozilla will be gone before three years, and Thunderbird with it, one way or the other.

> I believe Mozilla will be gone before three years, and Thunderbird with it, one way or the other. That's a dramatic prediction! Why do you believe it?

They are rewriting Firefox out of any relevance. They had a distinct product with unique features. It has been loosing uniqueness, usability and mindshare ever since they began shadowing everything the Google guys did. Now they're going all in, turning the thing into a functional Chrome clone. Once the user base drops below a certain percentage, there will be no point for anyone in sponsoring the show any longer.

Me, I was a loyal user since the Phoenix days. I have recently Firefox. It is not unusable yet, but it will be in about half a year.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#205

Post by ksk »

ams6110 wrote: post #181
hilbert42 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hum, it would be interesting to know how you use it (with respect, I'd suggest you have very basic email needs). For me Thunderbird is badly broken. This is not the place to list bugs, issues, limitations etc. in any detail but there are very many indeed (so I'll only provide a skeletal outline of them here). Frankly, on occasions, I find Thunderbird is unusable for some jobs and I end up using either an ancient copy…

I guess we all have our opinions but if you are composing long emails with intricate formatting I'd suggest you're doing it wrong. Email messages should be short, and preferably plain text. You have a little more leeway than in a tweet, but more than a paragraph or so and you lose the reader. I see this so often -- people will send me a treatise in email and I simply cannot comprehend that much text on a computer scr…

Could you explain how using the features of a product is "doing it wrong"? The only thing wrong would be the bugs in the features themselves.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#206

Post by xupybd »

"JavaScript, if used diligently and with good design, is a very efficient language. Both in execution time, but more importantly for developers. Personally, I wrote apps in many languages, including C++, Java and JavaScript. Of those, JavaScript is by far the most productive - I am personally 4-10 times as productive as with C++."

Not trying to start a this language is better flame war, but is this true? I still find JS to be a strange and incomplete feeling language, but I've not really done much outside of front end work with it. Is it really that productive?

Also I've disliked every interaction with NPM. You end up with a huge chain of decencies for even simple applications. Is this something that's workable with production software?

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#207

Post by wise0wl »

xupybd wrote: post #206

"JavaScript, if used diligently and with good design, is a very efficient language. Both in execution time, but more importantly for developers. Personally, I wrote apps in many languages, including C++, Java and JavaScript. Of those, JavaScript is by far the most productive - I am personally 4-10 times as productive as with C++." Not trying to start a this language is better flame war, but is this true? I still find…

I work for a company that uses mostly Node.js for their production microservices. It works very well. Joyent wrote their entire private / public cloud in Node.js. https://github.com/joyent/

It is definitely production workable. It's "LTS" cycle is insane, but it's workable.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#208

Post by beagle3 »

bane wrote: post #160
cakeface wrote: post #11

Does anyone actually have any problems with Thunderbird? I feel like it is "done" software. It works, perfectly, for all my needs. It's fast. It has great UI. It lets me read and write email.

I do. I'm only using it with about 7 mailboxes, none of which are terribly huge. It frequently stalls for an entire minute or two, has bizarre behavior and interactions with gmail when I'm writing long emails which gunk up conversations, configuration of mailboxes and SMTP servers are fractured all over the place, and search is only slightly more useless than reddit's search. Based on some chatter here recently, I ju…

delete panacea.dat (google before hand; I'm evil as far as you know). I had the same experience as you, eventually traced it down to a borked panacea file, deleted it, and everything is perfect again.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#209

Post by beagle3 »

xupybd wrote: post #206

"JavaScript, if used diligently and with good design, is a very efficient language. Both in execution time, but more importantly for developers. Personally, I wrote apps in many languages, including C++, Java and JavaScript. Of those, JavaScript is by far the most productive - I am personally 4-10 times as productive as with C++." Not trying to start a this language is better flame war, but is this true? I still find…

I suspect it is true that among Java, C++ and JavaScript, disciplined well designed JavaScript is easier for developers, and reasonably efficient in execution (given e.g. v8). Especially compared to C++, the memory safety and speed of the compile->run->debug cycle tend to give JavaScript an edge for more programmers (x4 to x10 is of course subjective).

But that doesn't mean JavaScript is a good language. e.g., you have to be extremely careful to not get bitten by the floating point-only math. It was the source of catastrophic bugs for many Twitter clients (in the sense that they stopped working) -- I would hate to find such a bug ate my local mail store.

Not sure what I'd recommend, though - JavaScript is technically bad, but socially excellent for such a project. Python is not fast enough for it (PyPy not withstanding), D/Rust/Nim/Ocaml/Scala are not mainstream enough.

Re: Proposal to start a new implementation of Thunderbird based on web technologies

#210

Post by bzbarsky »

orthecreedence wrote: post #134
nkkollaw wrote: post #60

They've already neglected Thunderbird for years, and now they want to start from scratch? Doesn't sound like a good idea. Sounds more like another project they will shut down after a while. I used to use both Thunderbird and Firefox a few years ago as my main mail client and browser. Since then, Mozilla started spreading between too many projects, chasing the failed phone thing, and both Firefox and even worse Thunde…

I think Thunderbird is fine how it is. I think a lot of the projects Mozilla takes on are stupid (Rust being a giant exception, I love Rust). You know what I want? NWJS/Electron but using Firefox/Spidermonkey. I want to package desktop apps with Firefox. They almost had this with xulrunner but killed it for some reason. And I want them to build crosswalk ( https://crosswalk-project.org/ ) for mobile, but with Firefox…

https://github.com/mozilla/positron is a thing, though not under active development right now.
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