TB 24: What new features are coming?

[mad.engineer]

Anyone know what "new features" are going to make it into the upcoming TB24 release?. Pointers to any wiki/links in this regard would be helpful.

[rsx11m]

Not much shown in the release notes:

Release notes for betas to date (since TB17):
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/18.0beta/releasenotes/
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/19.0beta/releasenotes/
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/20.0beta/releasenotes/
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/21.0beta/releasenotes/
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/22.0beta/releasenotes/

What isn't stated there is bug 845807 introducing a Firefox-like dialog in the Display preferences to set font, background, and link colors (the latter thus far not available). Also the signature color handling is changed, I've updated the Signature display color KB article already.

There is also bug 437139 which changes the default reply position for new mail (but not news) accounts from "below the quote" to "above the quote" to follow what other e-mail programs and webmail services do, and has ui-review approval but isn't finalized and checked in yet. This won't affect existing accounts in any way, and if a default account exists already, its setting will be chosen by default for subsequent accounts created (so that should be a good compromise between the conflicting interests).

Other than that, nothing on my list that I know of. Lots of bug fixes though, and I'm not watching Chat or Filelink development. A lot of stuff should also come from the Core side, such as partial support of TLS 1.1 for encrypted connections.

The cut-off date for new features (especially with string additions or changes) is in 10 days from now (June 24, next merge day), after that only small fixes should go into the aurora and beta channels.

[mad.engineer]

Thanks rsx11m, I am aware of these Release Notes, which are labelled as "Various fixes and performance improvements" aka bug fixes only. If this what's going to make into TB24 which is being advertised as "Next Thunderbird Major Release". then I, speaking for myself only, think it is disappointing for the user community . There are feature requests which are close to 10 years since opened and have stalled with no chance of making it into any future TB release as they sit currently. Anyway, thanks again for your contributions to the TB community.

[rsx11m]

I forgot to mention bug 425451 to make the number of address lines in the composition window configurable, provided that ThomasD can come up with a working patch and can get it reviewed by next weekend. Let's see if there are any other last-minute surprises.

And yes, while there has been a period where new features were pushed aggressively, currently there doesn't seem to be much going on in terms of new feature development (though kudos to aceman who has been fixing a lot of things in both backend and UI - getting those things fixed is equally important to maintain a stable application).

[mad.engineer]

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=107884 is one such that I'm interested in, if this ever gets implemented. Thanks

[rsx11m]

Yeah, the templated reply headers are unfortunately stuck in a deadlock. Comments there range from "everything is fine as it is right now" to "only a fully-fledged template system makes sense" thus apparently the assignee has given up on that.

[K4RBQT99]

Restartless language packs applies here too, I think. It see it since Firefox 21 or 22.

[rsx11m]

There is also bug 437139 which changes the default reply position for new mail (but not news) accounts from "below the quote" to "above the quote"

Switching the default in the auto-configuration Account Wizard has checked in already,

This won't affect existing accounts in any way, and if a default account exists already, its setting will be chosen by default for subsequent accounts created

the last part is still pending Blake's review, though. This can be added in the aurora phase if it doesn't make today's merge deadline, thus hopefully shouldn't be a problem (it only means that you won't see the full feature yet in the upcoming Earlybird builds).

A lot of stuff should also come from the Core side, such as partial support of TLS 1.1 for encrypted connections.

The backend supports TLS 1.2 now, it's not clear to me what is still missing (the fallback from TLS 1.2 and 1.1 to 1.0 for sure, bug 839310), and the default maximum encryption version remains TLS 1.0 with fallback to SSL 3.0 (bug 733647), at least for now, but may be switched soon and possibly within the 24.0 timeframe).

I forgot to mention bug 425451 to make the number of address lines in the composition window configurable,

Checked in this morning. The default is 3 rows rather than the current 4 and can be changed with mail.compose.addresswidget.numRowsShownDefault.

[WaltS48]

If you use Thunderbird for reading newsgroups.

883485 – Allow deletion of news posts by default (with a prompt!)

You can even disable the prompt.

[foobar12345]

I'm having the same question. But even after reading this thread I'm not sure what will await me when TB24 is finally here.

I try to rephrase the original question:
When upgrading from TB17.0.8 ("23") to TB24 will there be a bunch of big new features that are not just small improvements?
So, does TB17.0.7 differ from TB 22? Does TB17.0.8 differ from TB 23 (Beta)?

Or another rephrase:
Let's assume a user updates directly from TB17.0.0 (original "17") to TB24, will he have more than just all these "small improvments, fixes and bugfixes"?

For example, is there a chance for the long awaited address book overhaul? Or a chance for a majour GUI update (like "Thunderbird button", similar to the Firefox button)? Or a big surprise feature?

[Lee_Dailey]

howdy foobar12345,

i can tell you that there will NOT be ...
- tbird button
that is being removed from firefox and replaced with the app button [or whatever it's called] over on the far right. the three-horizontal-line mystery totally non-obvious thingy. [*grin*]
- address book overhaul
it's at least a year away, from what i can tell. certainly not in the tb24 release.

take care,
lee

[rsx11m]

So, does TB17.0.7 differ from TB 22? Does TB17.0.8 differ from TB 23 (Beta)?

Yes - all 17.0.x releases have the same features, dialogs, functionality, etc., as the first 17.0 release. The updates only include security and stability fixes along with small bugs being resolved. Development is done in the 18.0-23.0 versions, only 24.0 will replace the 17.0 releases, then the game starts again until 31.0 is reached.

Thus, while the 18.0-23.0 betas are released around the same time as the 17.0.x release versions, only they include any new features and changes that will be seen with the upcoming 24.0.x release branch.

[foobar12345]

Thanks for the info.

But the release notes for the 18-23 Beta versions mentioned in the beginning of the thread are identical to the 17.0.x release notes ("small fixes" all the time), or not? How/where can I find out, what exact new features will wait for me in TB24?

Are there some more indepth development analysations/blogs since Mozilla dropped gave TB "to the community"?

[rsx11m]

The release notes should state any major changes or additions, but sometimes they don't. There is always a link to the complete list of bugs fixed which you can look at, but it's a bit tedious to find anything major in the mix of minor bugs resolved and even fixes in tests that are listed there.

[foobar12345]

Thanks. Than I just wait and hope there's at least some surprise.