Thunderbird 2 Released! Why are you still using Outlook Express?
Mozilla has released Mozilla Thunderbird 2, the newest version of its free and open source email, RSS, and NNTP client. Thunderbird 2 supports both POP and IMAP email servers and Google Gmail, and is an RSS News and Blog feed reader and a USENET Newsgroup reader. The new features of Thunderbird 2 include advanced folder viewing options, faster email folder searching and browsing, saving email searches for later use, creating customizable email templates, and the organization of email using text-based tags, the same tagging feature found on blogs, photo, and link-sharing Web sites. And like the Mozilla Web browser FireFox, Thunderbird supports hundreds of add-ons (plug-ins) to add many useful features.
Thunderbird is a very popular email program commonly used in place of Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express. Thunderbird installs and starts up quickly and has a well-organized and intuitive user interface. It includes an excellent junkmail (spam) filter and a spelling checker, both features which are sorely lacking in the aging Microsoft Outlook Express. Thunderbird also supports the ability to access Web-based email services, such as Google Gmail, without using a Web browser.
Why use Thunderbird instead of Outlook Express, you ask?
Aside from the occasional Microsoft security update, Outlook Express is largely an unsupported program. It does not enjoy the open source community support for providing testing, security, and new features that Thunderbird does. Since its introduction in Windows 95, Outlook Express has experienced a long history of security vulnerabilities by its ability to receive and execute malicious email attachments and its ability to run browser-based ActiveX controls and scripts because it uses Internet Explorer to display email. In addition, according to Secunia, there are some Outlook Express security vulnerabilities that have never been fixed by Microsoft.
If you don’t get your email directly from a corporate Microsoft network, Thunderbird is also an excellent replacement for the sluggish memory hog Microsoft Outlook. If you do not want to give up using Microsoft Outlook because of its calendar feature, download, install, and give the free and open source Mozilla Sunbird calendar program a try.
Using your ISP’s Email versus a Web-hosted Email Service
One of the most important rules to follow when signing up with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) is do not use the email service provided by the ISP, but not for reasons of cost or security. The ISP owns your email address. If you switch to another ISP, you will loose your email address. There are probably millions of Internet users who stay with their ISP simply because they do not want to change the email address that they’ve been using for so many years (and AOL and Earthlink thank you for that).
The alternative to ISP-supplied email service is using a Web-based email service, like Yahoo! Mail, MSN Hotmail, or Google Gmail. You use a Web browser rather than an email program to access your email, and your email address always stays the same because your ISP does not own it. There are even secure Web-based email services, such as Hushmail, if email privacy is real concern to you. (By the way, the email you send across the public Internet is not private. There is a good chance that every email you’ve sent in the last five years or longer has been archived by one or more network service provider organizations.)
If you already use an ISP-provided email address, you should strongly consider getting one or more Web-based email accounts and begin the long, tedious task of informing your contacts of your new email address, and changing your email address on every Web site that you use. Once you have signed up for a new Web email account, only send email from your new account, and occasionally check your old ISP email account just in case someone who you’ve forgotten about emails you.
One day, when you decide to switch to another ISP–or your ISP goes bankrupt and stops its service (as Flashcom did on April 15, 2001)–you will not hardly remember or miss your old email address.
April 25th, 2007 at 8:13 am
It looks like that Microsoft is loosing a lot of market share to Google and Open Source.
I have never tried using Thunderbird but I am not really using any Desktop email client like Outlook or Outlook Express.
I have to say that since I have been invited to use gmail I have stopped using any other web-based email and I am not afraid that Google will go away anytime soon…
But if I will need to combine some email accounts I might try to use Thunderbird…
Mozilla Sunbird is not working for me at all….I tried it and just didn’t like it.
April 25th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
I think Thunderbird 2 is a good alternative to Outlook Express for home users (and as you mentioned “If you don’t get your email directly from a corporate Microsoft network”), being a lightweight email client, but I’m not ready to trade in my Outlook (the real thing from MS Office) yet. And with Microsoft’s popular and downright best ever email server (Exchange Server) Outlook will remain to be popular and therefore Outlook Express as well. Shakespeare was wrong, there much more in a name than he thought.
Outlook is much more than an email client though, and if you actually use those additional features, Thunderbird is not a real alternative. But this is also partly why organizations like Mozilla can exists I guess. Microsoft adds more bells and whistles every version. Lot’s of them usually (Office being a good example). And most users don’t use many of the features, perhaps 5-10% of everything. Why pay for a Microsoft product (Outlook) that does 10 times more than you actually need, while you can get something free that does pretty much everything that’s essential.
It seems like Outlook and Outlook Express are actually competing in a way. The spelling checker in Outlook is Word’s spelling checker, which is rather good. I know many tech writers prefer it over anything else. If Microsoft would add such a good spelling checker to Outlook Express, the difference with Outlook would become smaller, which is exactly what they do not want, at least that’s my perception. A dangerous strategy because it will allow Thunderbird to get a larger market share, allowing Mozilla to get a larger piece of the browser market with FF as well.
Anyway, I’m not getting on the Mozilla train yet. I’m looking too much forward to upgrading to Outlook 2007 on Vista. It’s the eye-candy I always wanted, … I know, I should have bought a Mac. ;)
Anyone tried the Enigmail OpenPGP add-on for Thunderbird yet?
April 26th, 2007 at 9:31 am
I agree that Sunbird needs some more polish before it can really compete with Outlook’s calendar feature, but I’ve found it serviceable for appointments and schoolwork reminders. I wouldn’t throw away my Daytimer just yet.
And speaking of eye candy, have you checked out the new beta of Yahoo! Mail? It’s as pretty as Gmail is ugly, and it has a calendar, contacts, and notepad feature too. Still, I can’t see people dumping Gmail just for Yahoo! Mail’s new GUI and the “forever unlimited” storage space.
Yahoo! Mail is also sprinkled with ads and connected to the Spyware sites atdmt.com and ad.doubleclick.net. I need to blog about the HOSTS file to help prevent this kind of invasion of net privacy.
April 28th, 2007 at 8:52 am
If I may ask, how does Thunderbird2 compare to Ximian’s Evolution?