Thunderbird for Android Beta

[s|b]

<https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/09/help-us-test-the-thunderbird-for-android-beta/>

Thunderbird Beta for Testers
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.thunderbird.android.beta>

If you're already using K-9 Mail: apparently everything (settings,
mails, ...) can be exported to Thunderbird. This is in fact the main
thing they are testing.

(Haven't tried it myself.)

[Andy Burns]

Post by s|b
<https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/09/help-us-test-the-thunderbird-for-android-beta/>
Thunderbird Beta for Testers
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.thunderbird.android.beta>
If you're already using K-9 Mail: apparently everything (settings,
mails, ...) can be exported to Thunderbird. This is in fact the main
thing they are testing.
(Haven't tried it myself.)

I'll give it a go on my backup phone ...

[Andrew]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by s|b
<https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/09/help-us-test-the-thunderbird-for-android-beta/>
Thunderbird Beta for Testers
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.thunderbird.android.beta>
If you're already using K-9 Mail: apparently everything (settings,
mails, ...) can be exported to Thunderbird. This is in fact the main
thing they are testing.
(Haven't tried it myself.)

I'll give it a go on my backup phone ...

Thanks SorB and Andy for the information on K-9 mail which morphed to
Thunderbird when Google forced 2FA (and then backed off a bit).

During that horrific 3-month period before Google backed off on the
mandatory 2FA for all non-Google MUAs, I moved from K-9mail to FairEmail
and have been happy ever since (although the developer was frustrated by
Google and the K-9 developers helped him get past the hurdle).

*FairEmail*, privacy aware email by Marcel Bokhorst, FairCode BV, FOSS
Free, ad free, gsf free, 4.6 star, 24.3K reviews, 500K+ Downloads
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.faircode.email>
<https://email.faircode.eu/>
<https://github.com/M66B/FairEmail/releases>
<https://f-droid.org/en/packages/eu.faircode.email/>
<https://www.xda-developers.com/fairemail-email-app-privacy-conscious-android/>
<https://www.xda-developers.com/fairemail-open-source-privacy-friendly-email/>

Bear in mind that FairEmail (and I presume Thunderbird for Android)
accesses a Google mail account just fine - without 2FA (we hope).

As a side note to those who don't understand privacy, if you're using the
GMail app on your phone, then you have no right to complain about privacy
because you can't use GMail on a phone without it creating an account on
the phone (the account that GMail creates is the privacy hole).

Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

[Andy Burns]

Post by Andrew
Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

[Andrew]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by Andrew
Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

Yup. Thunderbird in name only. Most likely.

Whether it is, or not, you guys will find out for the team!

Particularly since the PC Thunderbird has a newsreader built in.

Thanks!

[Jeff Layman]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by Andrew
Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

Well, it won't include the news client for a start. Called it
"Thunderbird for Android" is rather misleading.

[Theo]

Post by Andy Burns

Post by Andrew
Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

There's a bunch of stuff they've done with making it easier to set up new
accounts, OAuth, etc. But that doesn't seem to be so useful if you've
already managed to set up K9.

Various enhancements (like configurable options for swiping messages
left/right) have been added to K9 by the TB team, so it's probably more that
they've decided K9 is now up to scratch to bear the TB name, rather than a
big functional difference between the current K9 and the new TB.
(although TB may have a slightly different look, that's a skin-deep change)

Theo

[Arno Welzel]

Post by Theo

Post by Andy Burns

Post by Andrew
Back to Thunderbird, I do use BetterBird on Windows but I doubt there is
any semblance of that Thunderbird on the Android Thunderbird, is there?

I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

There's a bunch of stuff they've done with making it easier to set up new
accounts, OAuth, etc. But that doesn't seem to be so useful if you've
already managed to set up K9.

OAuth is also supported in K9 Mail - I am using it this way right now.
There is no need to switch to the "Thunderbird" named version of K9 just
for that.

[Theo]

Post by Arno Welzel

Post by Theo
There's a bunch of stuff they've done with making it easier to set up new
accounts, OAuth, etc. But that doesn't seem to be so useful if you've
already managed to set up K9.

OAuth is also supported in K9 Mail - I am using it this way right now.
There is no need to switch to the "Thunderbird" named version of K9 just
for that.

It is because Mozilla added it - they've been developing K-9 for 2 years.
It's to the point of being good enough for the TB branding, but most of the
changes to get there were released in K-9. To switch branding they have to
make a separate app, but the codebase is the same.

I expect at some point TB will become the main product and K-9 will stop
being developed. I couldn't say when that will happen.

Theo

[s|b]

Post by Andy Burns
I'm expecting Thunderbird android to be 90% K-9, a thunderbird icon, and
I don't know what else from the existing thunderbird ...

Some guy (on the dev team?) told me on Reddit the main reason for this
beta is to test how well the transfer between K-9 and TB is going. But
I'm guessing it will be mainly the GUI and maybe some menus? Using
different identities in K-9 was a bit confusing to me at first for
example.

I still have to install and test myself, but I'm not sure on how to
'freeze K-9, so my mails won't be spread between K-9 and TB (and TB on
my PC).

[Arno Welzel]

Post by Andrew

Post by Andy Burns

Post by s|b
<https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/09/help-us-test-the-thunderbird-for-android-beta/>
Thunderbird Beta for Testers
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.thunderbird.android.beta>
If you're already using K-9 Mail: apparently everything (settings,
mails, ...) can be exported to Thunderbird. This is in fact the main
thing they are testing.
(Haven't tried it myself.)

I'll give it a go on my backup phone ...

Thanks SorB and Andy for the information on K-9 mail which morphed to
Thunderbird when Google forced 2FA (and then backed off a bit).

The requirement is OAuth2 and not 2FA. And OAuth2 is also supported in
K-9 Mail and still works fine with GMail accounts.

[Arno Welzel]

Post by s|b
<https://blog.thunderbird.net/2024/09/help-us-test-the-thunderbird-for-android-beta/>
Thunderbird Beta for Testers
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.thunderbird.android.beta>
If you're already using K-9 Mail: apparently everything (settings,
mails, ...) can be exported to Thunderbird. This is in fact the main
thing they are testing.

Well - in fact, this *is* K-9 Mail with some changes in the UI.

[s|b]

Post by Arno Welzel
Well - in fact, this *is* K-9 Mail with some changes in the UI.

I thought they were going to simply rename the app from K-9 Mail to
Android, but they made a "new" app instead. Maybe because this way K-9
can still go its own way?

[Theo]

Post by s|b

Post by Arno Welzel
Well - in fact, this *is* K-9 Mail with some changes in the UI.

I thought they were going to simply rename the app from K-9 Mail to
Android, but they made a "new" app instead. Maybe because this way K-9
can still go its own way?

They can't change the app ID - it would still be com.fsck.k9 while the new
TB app is net.thunderbird.android.beta. They also can't change the signing
key, and they probably want to sign it with Mozilla or TB's key rather than
the prior K-9 developer's.

Theo

[s|b]

Post by Theo
They can't change the app ID - it would still be com.fsck.k9 while the new
TB app is net.thunderbird.android.beta. They also can't change the signing
key, and they probably want to sign it with Mozilla or TB's key rather than
the prior K-9 developer's.

Ah, yes of course. Tnx for explaining.