Romain Vuillemot bio photo

Romain Vuillemot

Assistant Professor
École Centrale de Lyon
LIRIS Laboratory

Email Twitter Facebook Google+ LinkedIn Github Youtube Google Scholar ResearchGate Zotero

My Top 5 Thunderbird Add-ons


I am a big fan of Thunderbird (current version when I’m writing this post is 3.0.1 - ThB3). It is a great piece of open-source software; and as every Mozilla project it has a very active community contributing to add-ons. Take a look at the official add-on list. This list is quite exhaustive. So here is my pick for the Top 5 Thunderbird Add-ons:

#1 Nostalgy

Nostalgy 0.2.23 by Alain Frisch. It adds keyboard shortcuts Thunderbird, for moving emails or jumping to a folder. The interface is activated with hot-keys and suggestions help you to auto-complete the folder you are interested in.

  • It makes non-repetitive task (such as sorting emails to different folders) quicker.
  • It allows to reach folders you don't even know where they are because you have too many of them.
  • You can easily jump to folders even if they are collapsed (i.e. not visible).

#2 Quote Colors

Quote Colors 0.3 by Malte Ruecker. It displays message thread into colors. In other words, replace the >>> with a color regarding the conversation depth.

  • At a glance it displays how many replies there are in the conversation thread without visual overload.
  • You can focus on the content without looking to the >>> on the left side to get the conversation depth.

#3 ImportExportTools

ImportExportTools 2.3.2 by Wind Li. It exports/imports emails from files or other mailbox systems.

  • Perfect if you have email quotas and want to free some space.
  • You can easily re-import mails if you get quota extensions ;)

#4 Display Mail Route

Display Mail Route 0.3.1 by Jürgen Ernst. It adds a symbol (such as a country flag) regarding the route that took the email.

  • Very intuitive  and compact way to  detect spam/scams without visual overload.
  • Of course not enough to detect frauds, but one more indicator that does an IP lookup for you..

#5 AttachmentExtractor

AttachmentExtractor 1.3.5 by eviljeff. It makes email attachment extraction easier.

  • Provides a download shortcut to your favorite download folders.
  • Automatically renaming files to avoid replacing existing files.

← Back to posts