I’ve been working together with Richard Marti of late on bug 569400 to implement Aero glass for the Windows version of Thunderbird, similar to what the Firefox devs are doing for their 4.0 release. This makes things look a lot sweeter, and blend in better with Windows 7.
Since there are several parts and widgets getting touched and that it therefore needs a lot of testing and feedback before we unleash it to the majority of our users, we decided to implement it as a theme before doing any patches for core.
Here is where I need your help. If you’re a Thunderbird user on Windows, download the xpi and take it for a test spin. You’ll need version 3.2 of Thunderbird on order for things to work correctly. Get a nightly build here.
Leave feedback here or on the bug!
How do I install the XPI in Shredder, there’s no “install from a file”? I even could not download it with FF, did it with Chrome.
Ezh: Ah yes, the new addons manager don’t have that implemented yet. Just drag and drop the xpi on the addons window.
Tnx, it worked.
My biggest problem is that things like the textual menus at the top of the window are totally and utterly unusable with this kind of glass effect with many combinations of window colour/desktop background.
You’ll notice that pretty much no application that has menus has an all-glass interface, and this is why. Perhaps you should make a Thunderbird menu like the one Firefox 4?
Way too much glass. Glass is fine, but it doesn’t work with a menu bar. I definitely think Thunderbird’s UI could do with a lot of polish, but it takes more than slapping on some glass.
Nice! TB really needs a visual refresh. In fact, it could use a Thunderbird menu. The simpler and more minimalist the better.
I’m really looking forward to seeing what exciting changes will come.
Nice idea, but:
- The Menu Bar items are too hard to read on Glass
- The button icons really should stay color for much better recognizability (black icons are ugly)
- Mail Toolbar buttons on Glass are bad for the text-readability and for the much better colored icons. Please don’t sacrifice so much for relatively little gain.
BTW: The “Filter These messages” (which for me is the primary/only search method) is harder to access than the full/slow/cumbersome “Search all messages” (because it’s under a toggle-button). This seems ass-backwards. The quicky-search should be in primary UI, and the full/rare search should be under a drop-down button.
It would be great to see Thunderbird pick up a blue Thunderbird button. In addition to matching the interactive design of Windows Vista and 7, it would help to unify the appearance of the two applications.
Well, nice. But…
1. I agree with @Stephen Gentle, as it is, it doesn’t help the menu, maybe a non-glass background on mouse-over, or a button-style for each head menu item?
2. Otoh, something like the Firefox-Button on FX4 may be THE thing needed here in TB too. (as fixed 1. Button in in Button/Toolbar ?)
Thanks for the work, but as it is I can’t win over my parents and friends with it. The look of the menu is the point of decision.
Everyone: Thanks for the great feedback!
Peter: In what way is the filter bar within the scope of this bug?
I agree with Faaborg, but I guess a couple of things need to happen first — a Test Pilot study so that we can empirically choose what to keep, for instance.
Nilsson: Didn’t you notice the “BTW”?
Peter: I did, but I still don’t understand how it has anything with this to do. It’s a totally different issue.
Andreas: The “anything” was: Making Thunderbird better. Sorry if that was too far OT (even for a “BTW”).