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Author Topic: Spicebird - an open source e-mail collaboration application for Linux or Windows  (Read 8341 times)

40hz

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I've been looking for a good Outlook-like replacement that supports IMAP under Linux for a while now. And although TBird can gain a lot of capabilities courtesy of plug-ins, it's still a little heavy on its feet for my tastes. Evolution seemed like the ideal candidate, until I discovered you can't automatically save a copy of a transmitted message in your Sent folder like you can in every other e-mail client I've ever used.

A recent issue of LinuxFormat ran a write-up of a new e-mail/collaboration client that looked very promising. It's called Spicebird.

Spicebird provides e-mail, calendaring, contact management, instant messaging, task lists, and a host of other features (current or planned).

I'm running it under Ubuntu 8.04LTS, and so far, it does everything they claim it can do.

Windows binaries are also available for those of you who haven't been "given the bird" yet.

spicebird.png


Spicebird Beta 0.7 Released!

Spicebird is a collaboration client that provides integrated access to email, contacts, calendaring and instant messaging in a single application. It provides easy access to various web services while retaining all the advantages of a desktop application. The application is based on projects like Thunderbird, Lightning and Telepathy and adds more functionality and integration among its components.

This release of Spicebird adds the following functionality:

    * Chat with friends on services like Yahoo, Google Talk, AIM, ICQ and Jabber
    * Add iGoogle Gadgets to Spicebird
    * Disable the applications that are unused
    * Access Google calendar
    * Experimental support for managing blogs
    * Available in more than 10 languages
    * Basic set of add-ons
    * Import data from Thunderbird, Outlook and Outlook Express

For a detailed description of this release, see the release notes.

Get Spicebird!

Now available in 27 languages with more planned. Why not give it a try?

Homepage: http://www.spicebird.com

Downloads: http://www.spicebird.com/download

« Last Edit: February 17, 2009, 12:57 PM by 40hz »

Shades

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The tool has a lot of promise, but the last time I checked the Windows binary out (some months ago) it was quite "painful" to use.

With "painful" I mean that the mail client looked like Thunderbird, but did not feel like Thunderbird. It was lacking in shortcut keys and because of that I could not get into the "flow" I was accustomed to.

On my system TB, together with Lightning are running happily together. Maybe I will check it out when version 1.0 arrives.


Anyway, that were my two Guaranies (local coin...or do you really want the equivalent in dollar cents? Have it your way...my 100 Guaranies then).

40hz

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Maybe I will check it out when version 1.0 arrives.

Probably a lot smarter to do it that way.  8)

(I'm running it in parallel with the same Thunderbird/Lightning combo. I don't completely trust it either. ;D But the 0.7 version has been very stable so far. fingers crossed...)


Dormouse

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I've used Spicebird for a long time now. It's not my primary email prog (that's The Bat!), but it has been very solid. Development and communication has seemed somewhat uncertain at times, but the prog has always worked as it should with me (they are fixing some bugs) and a new version (0.7.1) is coming out very soon. Certainly prefer it to TB.
« Last Edit: February 19, 2009, 07:48 AM by Dormouse »

TucknDar

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Looks very promising, indeed. Looked and worked beautifully out of the box. I'm certainly considering ditching TB for it.

Thanks for the link, 40hz!

tomos

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Looked and worked beautifully out of the box

on wondows?
Tom

TucknDar

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@tomos: Yes. Haven't tried on Linux yet.

40hz

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@tomos: Yes. Haven't tried on Linux yet.

It works very nicely under Linux.

I haven't tried it on Windows yet.  ;D