Thunderbird

From RHLUG

Thunderbird email setup in Linux.

[edit] Installation

Thunderbird is available from http://www.mozilla.org/. Installation methods vary depending on your Linux distribution.

Ubuntu users can install Thunderbird with the following command:

$ sudo apt-get install mozilla-thunderbird

For Gentoo users:

# emerge -av mozilla-thunderbird

[edit] Configuration

Configuring Mozilla Thunderbird to connect to the on-campus Exchange server is a fairly simply process. Once you have Thunderbird installed, run it. If this is the first time you have run Thunderbird, you will be presented with the option of creating an account. If you have run Thunderbird before, simply go to File > New > Account... in the Thunderbird menu to reach the new account dialog. From here, it is a simple matter of following these steps.

1. Choose "Email Account" and click Next.
2. Fill in your name and your Rose-Hulman email address and click Next.
3. Choose the IMAP radio button. Put exchange.rose-hulman.edu as the incoming and outgoing server and click Next. (If this isn't the first time you've run Thunderbird, it might only ask for an incoming server, which is okay.)
4. For your incoming username, put your normal Rose-Hulman username and click Next.
5. Give the account a name of your choosing and click Next.
6. Look over your settings and click Finish.
7. Click Edit -> Account Settings... from the menu.
8. On the left side of the screen, under the heading of the account name you just created, click Server Settings.
9. In the box on the right, change the port to 993.
10. In the Security Setting section, check the SSL radio button. Make sure "use secure authentication" is not checked.
11. Click Outgoing Server in the list on the left.
12. Click the Rose mail server then click Edit. Make sure TLS is chosen under "Use secure connection" and the port is 25.
13. Click OK to apply your new settings.

You should now be able to connect to Exchange in Thunderbird. When you connect, it will ask you if you are sure you want to trust the certificate provided, and then ask you for your password. If you aren't asked for your password, check your settings and try again. These settings work to the best of my knowledge as of 13 September 2007.

[edit] LDAP Setup

LDAP, the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, can be used to provide e-mail address autocompletion based on the official list of Rose students, faculty and staff.

See IAIT's HOWTO to set this up.

[edit] Sharing a profile with Windows

If your machine is a dual-boot, it is possible to share Thunderbird's profile between operating systems, allowing you to share extensions, backed up emails, folders, and anything else that you like between Windows and Linux completely seamlessly. It should also be noted that by using a similar procedure, the same may be done with Firefox.

The method described below requires NTFS read/write support. If, for some reason, you do not feel comfortable doing this, you may also create a small FAT32 partition that is visible to both operating systems (note that FAT32 is much more susceptible to corruption than newer file systems and that the mbox file format used by Thunderbird to store your e-mail is itself vulnerable should Thunderbird be shut down improperly).

1. Choose which operating system's profile you would like to use. For Linux, this is located under /home/username/.mozilla-thunderbird/Profiles/ (Note that the dot in this location indicates that the folder is hidden). In Windows, this folder can be found under C:/Documents and Settings/user/Application Data/Thunderbird/Profiles/.
2. Copy the data contained within the profile of your choice. Usually, this is contained in a folder called xxxxxxxx.default where the xs are a string of random numbers and letters.
3. You will want to paste the data somewhere in your Windows partition. Although it is possible to leave it right where it is, I would highly recommend against it to avoid the profile from being overwritten or removed by mistake. I simply put mine in C: /Linux Sync/Thunderbird/.
4. Now that the profile has been moved, you need to tell Thunderbird where it is. For Linux, type mozilla-thunderbird -profilemanager (or thunderbird -profilemanager, depending upon your installation) into the terminal. This brings up a profile selection window.
5. Click create profile.
6. Click next.
7. Click choose a folder.
8. Navigate to the folder to which you copied the profile.
9. Once you are done, delete the old profile.
10. Now boot into Windows and execute thunderbird.exe -profilemanager via Run on the Start Menu.
11. Repeat the same steps as before. Once this is complete, any changes you make in one operating system should be reflected in another.

[edit] Truncated Attachment Problem

You may run into a problem where attachments on received e-mails are corrupted, and images in e-mails only load partially. This is caused by Exchange reporting attachment sizes incorrectly, so when Thunderbird breaks the message into chunks it doesn't download all of them. Fixing this is simple.

1. From the Edit menu, select Preferences
2. Select the Advanced' tab
3. Click the Config Editor button
4. Set the filter to mail.server.default.fetch_by_chunks. The default value should be true
5. Double click the mail.server.default.fetch_by_chunks preference. It should turn bold, and the value should now read false

Now Thunderbird will download attachments as one block, avoiding the bad attachment size problem.