[Request] [Jolla Tablet] Please port Thunderbird
asked 2014-11-28 20:54:09 +0300
As many user seem unhappy with Sailfish email, to match the requests for native Firefox I would like to add a request for native Thunderbird.
8 Answers
answered 2015-01-16 13:06:27 +0300
Similiar request: Port kmail. It's Qt, so port should be easier, and imo it's a better Client :) Plus it's still under active development.
answered 2015-01-15 13:58:31 +0300
Sorry, we are not considering doing this. As midnightoil very well explains, this is a huge project and requires a lot of effort to port it to SailfishOS. Instead, we will continue to improve our Mail app.
answered 2014-12-14 23:15:32 +0300
I know K-9 Mail from an Android tablet and a phone. And I like it better than Thunderbird on my desktop. Is K-9 Mail (as Android app) not fully working on a Jolla device? Would it be easier to port to SailfishOS than Thunderbird would be?
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answered 2014-11-28 22:42:18 +0300
I can understand the effort that may be required, I am just worried that we just seem to be losing functionality all the time. I don't know what the answer is because it sounds like it would be too much effort to upgrade all the existing Sailfish apps. I was hoping that being open source meant sharing development across platforms like Firefox OS, Ubuntu, etc but perhaps I can now see why Samsung have given up with Tizen. Maybe Google is the only one that can afford the development costs.
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When google started other than openmoko there was no competition from the "free " side , now we have android apps which sadly/luckily run here stopping the native development. Then you can add all the "free" people divided between Firefoxos,ubuntu,tizen etc. I would like Jolla to organise sailfish developer events , more developing videos etc and also increase presence at tech events like FOSDEM ,linuxtag etc.
pavi ( 2014-12-21 19:32:51 +0300 )editanswered 2014-11-28 22:28:32 +0300
If the community really wants Thunderbird and Firefox ported, then it should band together and put together a bounty for developers on Indiegogo. This is a BIG project and expecting developers to complete it without incurring significant costs is unrealistic.
However, even if this was done, given the size of the current community / number of developers, I still don't think it's do-able. Far better would be to cooperate with developers active with Ubuntu Touch, since I'm certain that some of the Ubuntu community will be looking to port both. As a cooperative effort it would be much more feasible.
With regard to browsers, Opera are still listed as a founding member of the Sailfish Foundation ... but I assume they checked out long ago and cancelled any plans for porting their browser.
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Yes, about Opera... I had hoped that they would port their excellent mobile browser and that it would be offered as standard browser. It would have saved Jolla a lot of time, Opera would benefit from being the standard provided browser, and the Sailfish project would be stronger for having visibly active members.
bilgy_no1 ( 2014-12-15 09:07:19 +0300 )editanswered 2014-11-28 22:01:34 +0300
Even if Mozilla consider Thunderbird is ending its development cycle there is no comparable open source software able to replace it so it should be considered. I am worried that Sailfish is spending a lot of effort to provide half working simplified core apps when the standard open source equivalents provide much better functionality and the development effort could have been spent on porting. eg. Firefox, Thunderbird, VLC, ete etc. The whole affair makes me lose confidence in open source and think its easier to stick to Microsoft?
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answered 2014-11-28 21:49:35 +0300
Thunderbird's UI would be fantastically unusable on a device such as Jolla, so that makes little sense imho.
Writing your own UI on top of thunderbird's backend (even if there's a clear separation) would take so much effort that you may as well write the entire email client yourself.
answered 2014-11-28 21:12:16 +0300
Mozilla now stopped actively developing it, so it's kind of not moving forward much. Missing support for CardDAV at this stage indicates the condition of the project. So I don't think Jolla should do it.
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Asked: 2014-11-28 20:54:09 +0300
Seen: 1,085 times
Last updated: Jan 16 '15
That'd be very useful. However I am not sure that the TB UI is easy to scale down to such small screens.
juiceme ( 2014-11-28 21:06:34 +0300 )editYou may be correct about the small screen of a phone, but I was thinking of the tablet.
mariner ( 2014-11-28 22:04:20 +0300 )editAh, yes of course. Good point.
For the tablet that would be ideal indeed.
juiceme ( 2014-11-28 23:03:30 +0300 )edit