User Interface V.8.0

A more general note – I think this thread is getting very long and some information is getting lost. It might be a good idea to pause here. Please feel reassured that we don’t consider the drawer done and there is more work to be done in 2025. We know it is inconvenient for certain groups of users and would like to find solutions that are versatile enough to work for many of those groups.

To whomever is reading my message and considering to reply, please take a look if the feedback has been brought up above, and if responding will constructively help find a better solution.

6 Likes

I can well understand that the level of criticism is uncomfortable for developers but the answer is not to stifle that criticism but rather to fix the shortcomings. That is relatively simple.

2 Likes

Perhaps there’s been a misunderstanding about what I’m suggesting. It seems that some of the questions and concerns being raised are ones we’ve already acknowledged in this thread and are actively addressing. Repeating the same points might unintentionally overshadow previous responses and make it harder to track the progress being made.

2 Likes

Nope. There is no misunderstanding. You are trying to stifle criticism, more particularly the volume of that criticism. Thus far we have seen no will or attempt to address the issues raised.

3 Likes

There’s been a small attempt, I would suggest, with the recent ability to now choose the two letters shown in the icon (via account name), and its colour. More adjustments are promised.

I suspect that people feel that something that worked reasonably well (account switching) has been replaced by something that didn’t work at all, and small adjustments to that don’t really explain why the switch was made, nor do they make things as good as they used to be.

I don’t know the thinking behind the switch, although I’ve seen comments that suggest that the old method didn’t suit everyone. Clearly the new method currently suits even less.

For me, I much preferred the old method, but I was living with the newer, fixed character, method, with 5 accounts, 4 of them on the same domain (so same chars). The recent ability to adjust makes that a bit nicer, and I can live more easily with that, but it’s still far from as simple as the old method.

But I don’t see it as something worth screaming about; it’s usable. life’s too short.

3 Likes

Finishing the image loader work and other improvements will be a little more involved.

Simply go back to the portion of the pre-v8 code that displayed images for each account.

There is no need to reinvent a wheel. This could be fixed quickly and easily.

3 Likes

Going back would be a disaster. The code of the navigation drawer was quite a mess. In order to not eat up a significant part of the development time just to work around issues caused by the old navigation drawer, the drawer had to be rewritten from scratch. “just go back” is not an option. The only option is to go forward to improve the current implementation, like to re-add support for account pictures. (Note that the old way to set account pictures through your contacts list is not really a good option because it regularly confused users. It needs to be redesigned to something that users understand)

3 Likes

It appears that the major focus at the moment is making the donation page more attractive. UI deficiencies have a lesser priority.

1 Like

That’s wrong. You can look at the git history to see that most time is currently spent on bug fixing and general things like store metadata, translations, etc: Commits · thunderbird/thunderbird-android · GitHub

1 Like

Unfortunately that is not born out in the beta releases, but hey money is the key.

Even if it was about money, what are you trying to achieve here by claiming this again and again? If you don’t like the app, just go and look for another one.

3 Likes

I don’t use the app. I went to Fairemail long ago. I find the forum entertaining due to its lack of honesty in dealing with users that have been duped. I’ve hoped also that there might be a reversal at some point and commonsense might prevail. But alas no.

1 Like

Since this thread no longer seems to be about the original issue, but whatever bothers people right then, I feel it’s okay to add a completely off-topic and non-constructive comment of my own.

Sometimes I’m annoyed by people who think it’s okay to insult the creator(s) of a thing they are using. Doubly so, if they actually get the thing for free without doing anything in return.

You don’t like the thing? Fine, use another thing. You used to like it, but after the thing was updated/changed you don’t anymore? You could just move on to another thing. But the creator(s) are probably interested in making the thing work for you. So you could describe why you liked the thing better before and what makes the thing harder or less pleasant to use now. You could also make a suggestion on what you believe would improve your use of the thing. All of that can be done without insulting the creator(s). After all, it’s very unlikely they made the change to specifically make your life harder. You’re probably not mortal enemies. The creator(s) likely know nothing about you personally. But on the other hand, maybe you are their enemy. Surely they made the change because they wanted to make your life as miserable as possible. Probably best to work under that assumption. Write one or several dozen nasty comments in the creator(s) public forum. Surely that will make them take you seriously and meet your demands immediately. Not yet? Well, I guess just one more comment will do the trick.

It’s really not that hard to express dissatisfaction and disappointment without being obnoxious. Most people manage to do this just fine. If you’re not one of those people, maybe it’s time to explore why not (in your mind, not in a comment to a public forum).

Another, totally unrelated thought: I wonder why the people involved in the development of K-9 Mail and Thunderbird rarely participate in forum discussions. Must be an odd bunch of people.

6 Likes

Greetings from the Thunderbird Community Manager. I would rather be here under different circumstances. The reason I am posting is well stated by the OP [quote=“C-h, post:25, topic:11044”]
I do not at all understand the angry and even insulting messages. Therefore, even if I am not happy at all with the latest user interface change and it might make me stop using the software completely I do not support bashing contributors
[/quote]

There have been many posts which
a) have strayed from the original purpose of the OP’s helpful feedback
b) by this point monopolized the majority of activity, which is at best impolite to C-h,
c) repeat what has already been stated, which amounts to badgering

I could go on, but the point is this isn’t healthy or productive for the k-9 community, and must not continue. Please take responsibility such that posts are thoughtful and help move the product forward. And if you have an issue that is unrelated to the original post, please do make a new topic.

Best to all.

5 Likes

Hello Mira. This is Wayne.

Are you aware several of your posts were flagged for content? This did not come from any admins, but users active in the forum.

I’m on android and v8.1 and no I do not.

I’m not Mira.

···

On December 4, 2024 6:47:23 PM PST, Wayne Mery via K-9 Mail Forum noreply@forum.k9mail.app wrote:

| wsmwk Thunderbird team member
December 5 |

  • | - |

Hello Mira. This is Wayne.

Are you aware several of your posts were flagged for content? This did not come from any admins, but users active in the forum.


Visit Message or reply to this email to respond to wsmwk, cketti, Mira, Figgerty, ByteHamster, Jeff-741852, cdmackay, kewisch, Pitt, Nimueh and 10 others.

To unsubscribe from these emails, click here.

Sorry about that. Thanks for letting me know

Strange the way this works.

Sorry, I thought I mentioned in the earlier post that you get that control with 9.0b1