this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2024
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K9 and Thunderbird beta for testers (lemmy.ml)
submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) by kixik@lemmy.ml to c/fdroid@lemmy.ml
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I'm long K9 user, and I was aware of it becoming Thunderbird, but I need to clarify what should I do to easy eventual transition, hopefully without having the deal with all my K9 settings...

Today K9 turned into Thunderbird Beta for Testers, however there's already an app called that way Thunderbird Beta for Testers showing up on f-droid. Thoug the actual ID of each differ (com.fsck.k9 vs. net.thunderbird.android.beta).

What should K9 users do, to avoid losing its current settings (accounts, folder settings, encryption and so on)? Should we remain using the K9 app, and hope that when it goes away then the thunderbird app replaces it somehow automatically and pick all accounts and settings? Should this period when the two apps with the same name coexist be used to install thunderbird beta for testers, hope that it pick all settings from K9 up, and then remove K9?

It's somehow confusing, I was originally hoping at some point K9 just turned into thunderbird, but at once, automatically, without still having two apps, so I'm wondering what's next. For now I'm just still using the K9 app with thunderbird name...

Thanks !

Edit 1: Many thanks for those who replied, at least I don't have a google account, and no need to inherit the OAuth to google, or any other of such account for that matter, although I could remain to K9 I migrated to Thunderbird official release (no beta) without issues. It sounds like a good opportunity to migrate to Thunderbird.

Edit 2: It's sad that the OAuth can not be inherited, though understandable. For those who were just using TB or K9 for a long time with gmail, and the account gets into the infinite dependency loop of requiring a device already logged in, given the stupid security question has no answer, then perhaps it's time to ditch google and look for an alternative, I haven't found anything useful to help around there. Google actually sent a message indicated it has protected the user from herself, and inhibited her attempt to reach her own account. Meanwhile, just staying with K9 seems OK, since it's still there (just a metadata name corrupted but the app ID remained K9 still).

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[–] Monstanner@lemmy.ml 15 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

You don't have to do anything. K-9 Mail remains K-9 Mail. A mistake was made in the naming process. This will be fixed soon. So in F-Droid the following will be present: K-9 Mail Thunderbird Thunderbird Beta

Thunderbird for Android is based on K-9 Mail, but has received a few changes here and there (e.g. the accent color is blue instead of pink). As mentioned above, K-9 Mail will remain and will probably continue to get the Beta & Stable versions in the version selector. Thunderbird has been split into two apps for this purpose. The settings should usually be able to be adopted from K-9 Mail and vise versa, because of the same codebase (but I haven't tested it). In the end, it's up to you whether you prefer the dog or the bird. :)

Edit: Added more info.

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

OK, many thanks !

I'll just do nothing for now then. I hope if at some point a migration is required, it's sort of automatic, f-droid just starts using the Thunderbird app rather than the K9, without user intervention other than performing the f-droid upgrade, one and that would be it. But we'll see.

If you ask, knowing it's the same thing, I would have gone with just one app, replacing the other one, and that would be easier and clearer, :)

Thanks a lot again !

[–] _ed@sopuli.xyz 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I updated to thunderbird from k9 on fdroid- accounts etc imported ok.

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Thunderbird beta for testers?

[–] _ed@sopuli.xyz 1 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

No that’s a different one. There’s also Thunderbird: Free your inbox (Vers 8.0) which I assume is the release.

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 weeks ago

correct, that's the official release, the other is beta for testers...

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Ohh, it needs to import though. I was afraid in case there would be sort of two different directories over the same data, or that on TB dir it would be to start fetching stuff. But it seems it literally copies over the directory contents, which is fine, since the then the other app could easily been removed.

And it works with TB non beta, I guess it works with beta for testers a well (though I like the release, and see how it goes). I'll be using non beta for now, a bit behind, I prefer to use releases rather than beta releases, and on f-droid I enabled unstable upgrades...

Anyone played with push vs. pull on TB? On K9, I ended up having both. With the last years changes, it removed the push option selecting from the fetching configs, but the push could be selected/deselected from each folder, and I keep them both. Pulling makes the requirement of not having restrictions on battery usage though.

Not sure if that's getting any better with TB (non beta or beta), and if push has gotten any better. In the end, imap push/idle pretty much depend on the server, and not so much on the client I'd guess...

Thanks !

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Sadly, when having a gmail account, the migration is not possible, if the user doesn't keep permanently logged in somewhere. TB is not taking the current K9 OATH, and tries to establish it's own authentication, which on a K9 + desktop TB user not logging often to google at all, it's really almost impossible to login to gmail, since it ask as security the user 1st phone number, which could have never been registered to google, and beyond that it requests to use a different device which is already logged in, but it you go to the desktop, and attempt to login, it does exactly the same thing, the same stupid question or requesting for another device. So it gets into a loop of devices which can't be resolved. And for this other user I tried to setup TB for, they don't authenticate near often to google, but they use both desktop TB and K9 quite well.

For now, for such users, until they figure out how the hell to login to their google account again, they better don't try migrating to Thunderbird, since the import functionality is not quite enough to get google mail working fine, again if the user doesn't login to google often. A bit sad, though it makes sort of sense, since the apps registered to google would be different. Sad in the sense that an already working setup for gmail on K9 can not just be imported as is to TB, and keep just working.

While K9 remains working, there's no issue for such users though. Hopefully that doesn't happen,

It works great when not having a google/gmail account, :)

[–] Eeyore_Syndrome@sh.itjust.works 4 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Just install thunderbird with K-9 still installed.

No beta......

Then just import settings from K-9.

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 weeks ago

Did that, thunderbird release no beta, and no issues since I don't have google account. For people with google account requiring to re-sign in, and who don't often do so, signing in is really hard if they don't registered their phone number to google. It's sad, I commented about it in some other post. Understandable in reality they are different apps, but in the end it should be the same user ID, but nevertheless it's a PITA if people don't have a device permanently logged in, :( For them it's better to stay on K9,and hope K9 doesn't go away, or else find out how the heck to login to google once again.

[–] communism@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 weeks ago

I exported my K-9 settings and imported them to Thunderbird and it works fine

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 3 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

I had net.thunderbird.android.beta already installed from the official github releases, so ig that's the official variant. I just wonder if it can automatically update from F-Droid (basic), considering it was technically installed by my browser.

[–] kixik@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 weeks ago

F-Droid produces its own builds, with its own signatures, so to get f-droid going, you'll need to install from F-Droid. However the import mechanism seems really nice. Perhaps you can install from F-Droid the official release, which can co-exist with your upstream installed beta release, import from it from the F-Droid app, then remove the upstream installed beta release, and if you wan to keep on beta, then install the beta release from F-DRoid (be careful right now, given a bug made K9 show up as beta release as well, but the app ID is clear, just being careful is enough), and then import from the official release, then remove the official release and you're all set. The idea is not to reconfigure a thing by doing those steps, and perhaps you wouldn't like to go to beta, and remain on the official release, which is not that behind, and perhaps better tested.

[–] Monstanner@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

It's easy to find out. Navigate to Thunderbird Beta in F-Droid Basic and look at Versions. If you only have a single version there, then you have to delete it. If it says that no version with a compatible signature was found, so too. If you have three versions to choose from and one of them is installed, then you don't need to do anything, because then you will get updates.

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

1000033548

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[–] Monstanner@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Looks right. Then you don't have to do anything. I mean, it's up to you, but do you really want to continue using the beta?

[–] 30p87@feddit.org 2 points 2 weeks ago

I use betas almost everywhere, and apart from firefox sometimes having minor bugs (expectable in nightly), I've never had any real issues. So yeah, until it breaks down completely I'll just use beta.