Enlarging certain defaults in Tbird

[funkynassau1]

I have Thunderbird mail for Mac. I'd like to know how to enlarge the words that are part of the program, such as

Inbox
Drafts
Sent
Junk etc.

All of the default categories that are part of the program. Sorry I dont know how to say this any better way. I can enlarge the font for what I am typing in an email, but it's the words that come as part of the program I'd like to be bigger, they are too tiny for me. The version is 45.8.0.

Thanks
Funkynassau1

[DanRaisch]

See this article -- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bad_Eyesight_-_Thunderbird

No, it is not PC specific. Please identify what, specifically, did not work on your Mac.

[funkynassau1]

Thanks for your reply. I read that article earlier tonite and it does not help with Mac issues, it's for PCs.

My Mac itself is fine, it's the Thunderbird mail program I have an issue with, I'd like to enlarge the actual category words, as I described in my first post, as they are too tiny and hard for me to read. Hitting Command and + doesnt do it, I cant drag them down to make them larger. I've done a lot of googling today about this and found nothing so I suspect what I want to do cant be done. About 10 mins after my first post, Tbird updated itself to version 52.2..1 and I see nothing there to help me enlarge the fonts.

[funkynassau1]

I'd like to add an attachment showing what I am talking about, but dont see a way to do that. Are attachments not allowed?

Thanks

[DanRaisch]

Once again, that article is NOT PC specific. The same config values should work on a Mac or Linux system. What did you try that did not work?

See if you find this article any clearer -- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Pane_and_menu_fonts
I don't see how a screen shot will clarify anything here but see this article -- http://kb.mozillazine.org/Posting_a_scr ... _the_forum

[funkynassau1]

Thank you for the links, it seems it's Panes I want to enlarge. I have no idea how to do that type of editing. I have Safari, not Chrome, on a Mac with 10.9.5. It is the panes on the left side of the screen I'd like to enlarge the font in as well in the emails list in the In Box..

In other email programs I've had in the past you could click on those items and drag it downwards to enlarge it for easier viewing. You cant seem to do this in Tbird. I have tried Command and + which doesnt do it either.

Ataching a screen shot would hopefully explain the areas I want to enlarge.

[DanRaisch]

I have Safari, not Chrome, on a Mac with 10.9.5.

No need for a screen shot as I am quite clear on what you would like to do.
However, from that comment it is clear that you are misunderstanding the reference to Chrome. It does not refer to Chrome, the Google browser. It's referring to files such as userChrome.css, which can be added to the Thunderbird profile to cause it to enlarge the fonts displayed in the main Thunderbird window. The link I've included here gives instructions for what that file should contain, how to create it and where it should be placed to get the desired result.

[Eckard]

@ funkynaussau1,
I'm a Mac user, so I would like to give you some more details how to realize Dan's proceedings on a Mac.
The aim is to enlarge fonts in the Thunderbird's UI.

• First open the TextEdit.app (> "Applications" folder) and copy/paste the following css code in the TextEdit window:

Code: Select all

@namespace url("http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul");

/* Global UI font */
* { font-size: 13px !important; }

• Save the file as "userChrome.css" (without quotation marks and without the usual *.txt suffix, respect the capital "C" in the middle) to your Desktop
• create a new folder on the Desktop (Finder menu File > New > Folder), name it "chrome" (without quotation marks and with a lower-case "c") and move the userChrome.css file in the "chrome" folder.

• Start Thunderbird, go to menu Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Folder > Show in Finder.
• When the profile folder "xxxxxxxx.default" is displayed in the Finder, quit Thunderbird (menu "Thunderbird" > Quit or keyboard shortcut Cmd + Q).
• Move the "chrome" folder in the profile folder "xxxxxxxx.default".
• Restart Thunderbird and verify the font size, especially in the folder pane on the left and the thread pane on the upper right.

If it suits your needs everything is OK.
If the font size is too big or too small, return to the userChrome.css file in the "chrome" folder in the profile folder and change the 10pt size; you can also use decimals such as 12.5px or 13.5px. Then restart Thunderbird (each modification in this file needs a restart of Thunderbird to see the effect in the user interface).

Bigger font-sizes will make line spaces smaller, maybe too small. If this happens, you can add the following code to your userChrome.css file :

Code: Select all

/* Set Line Spacing */
#folderTree > treechildren::-moz-tree-row { 
height:  18px !important; }

#threadTree > treechildren::-moz-tree-row {
height: 18px !important; } 

If you prefer different font sizes for the folder pane and for the thread pane, we can propose different codes.

[funkynassau1]

Thank you very much Eckard! I will give this a try

[funkynassau1]

Eckard, I carefully did what you said and got as far as Restart Thunderbird, and verify the font size especially in the folder pane on the left and the thread pane on the upper right.

It doesnt look any different, so I am not sure where I went wrong...looks like I need some more help if you can!

Thanks,
Funkynassau1

[Eckard]

It doesnt look any different, so I am not sure where I went wrong...looks like I need some more help if you can!

I just re-tested the code, it works for me.
There are several frequent errors:
when copying and pasting the code
when saving and naming the file (since macOS would automatically add the .txt extension to your userChrome.css file, so it will be userChrome.css.txt !!)
when moving the chrome folder in the profile folder

When you open the profile folder in the Finder via the Help menu you should see your userChrome.css file at the following place (note that I'm using several profiles but the position of my userChrome.css file in its profile folder is clear in the following screen shot) :

[funkynassau1]

When I save userChrome it appears as userChrome.css.rtf. I tried it with .rtf and then without .rtf an neither worked. I'll keep working on this, and thanks for your help and patience.

Is there anything in the initial code you provided that needs to be deleted? Such as there,is.only.xul" which I did delete
and !important; which I also deleted. I've tried various things. It's probably something stupid I am doing or not doing.

[Eckard]

When I save userChrome it appears as userChrome.css.rtf. I tried it with .rtf and then without .rtf an neither worked.

You need to suppress the .rtf extension so that the file name will be userChrome.css and nothing else.

Is there anything in the initial code you provided that needs to be deleted? Such as there,is.only.xul" which I did delete
and !important; which I also deleted.

You may delete the first line @namespace url ..... , the css code will still work.
But you can't delete anything in the css code itself.

[funkynassau1]

Here's what I get when I save your two lines as userChrome.css
{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\cocoartf1265\cocoasubrtf210
{\fonttbl\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Monaco;}
{\colortbl;\red255\green255\blue255;\red39\green123\blue69;}
\margl1440\margr1440\vieww20820\viewh9340\viewkind0
\deftab720
\pard\pardeftab720

\f0\fs36 \cf2 \expnd0\expndtw0\kerning0
/* Global UI font */\
* \{ font-size: 13px !important; \}}

I cannot remove all but the last 3 lines...where am I going wrong?

[Eckard]

Here's what I get when I save your two lines as userChrome.css

Sorry, now I see your error.
With TextEdit.app you created a file in the "rich text format" (RTF) and that doesn't work!
The userChrome.css file must be in plain (simple) text.

Open TextEdit, go to menu TextEdit > Preferences and choose "Text Format" instead of "RTF Format", .
Then create your userChrome.css file with the code I gave you and it will work