Please update for Thunderbird 115

[gjf]

Today Thunderbird 115 was released and the addon was disabled as outdated.

Please update it.

In fact I just changed the manifest in latest release - and it seems working - but who knows...
manually_sort_folders-2.3.0-tb.zip

[schneeschmelze]

I second this request.

[wiltet]

ditto...

Yes, it would be very nice to use this addon in future.

[Wildvirus]

I support this requirement as well

[itagagaki]

I read an online article that said that folders can be reordered in Supernova, is that misinformation?

[Wildvirus]

You're right. I tested it on the mac- and windows-client. If you are in the account settings you can use drag & drop

[tidebre67]

as far as i can see only partly correct. you can sort the accounts but not folders.

[tidebre67]

Today Thunderbird 115 was released and the addon was disabled as outdated.

Please update it.

In fact I just changed the manifest in latest release - and it seems working - but who knows... manually_sort_folders-2.3.0-tb.zip

---

@gjf
your manifest change accepted by TB115, accounts can be sorted but not closed and folders can not be changed.

[gjf]

@tidebre67 As I told - it's just a quick trick to make it working.
Of course the job should be done by author, not me.

[schneeschmelze]

as far as i can see only partly correct. you can sort the accounts but not folders.

That's right. I tested TB115 last night, and then downgraded to version 102 again.

[tidebre67]

@gjf
you are right. my idea was only to mention status.
@itagagaki-san , guess all would be glad if you can make it work again.

[itagagaki]

I had assumed that Thunderbird's redesigned user interface would allow folder reordering as a matter of course. I don't understand why they don't allow it forever.

Aside from that, the UI code has been rewritten in 115, so I'll have to investigate whether this traditional add-on mechanism can be applied in the same way. It will take some time to analyze.

[Wildvirus]

as far as i can see only partly correct. you can sort the accounts but not folders.

You're right, sorry. I only used the sorting of the accounts, not the sorting of the folders. Therefore I did not notice it

[v3DJG6GL]

I had assumed that Thunderbird's redesigned user interface would allow folder reordering as a matter of course. I don't understand why they don't allow it forever.

I just saw that there was a blog post last summer explaining how to sort folders manually.
At first I thought, "wow, they finally managed to support this basic feature natively!"
But no, they only explained how to do it with this plugin.
https://blog.thunderbird.net/2022/08/video-tip-how-to-manually-sort-all-your-thunderbird-folders/#c

They are probably thinking, "Well, there is a plugin for that, so we don't need to implement that feature".

Anyway, thanks for your continuous support!

[itagagaki]

I did a little analysis and found out that Supernova always sorts folders alphabetically. All efforts of the add-ons will be flushed down.

Thunderbird is an open source project, so there may be a way to submit improvements that would prevent this and allow to replace the folder reordering method. But I think I would rather submit a modification that allows Thunderbird to sort folders itself than do that.

But it's not easy either way...

[protz]

Thanks Itagaki for chiming in. I agree that adding addon support in Thunderbird SuperNova for this functionality would probably take as much effort as submitting a patch to fix the issue in Thunderbird proper.

For the record, there was a plan that I outlined here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1606664, with some thoughts about how to implement it "properly" in Thunderbird. But I don't know whether it's worth investing time and effort when the UI is being significantly overhauled.

One question that I have is: is SuperNova still using the XUL tree widget? https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=193314 was closed years ago on the basis that the XUL tree is going to be phased away anyhow, meaning the bug should be fixed as part of a potential folder pane rewrite. I don't know if that rewrite is on the horizon, has been done already, and/or whether sorting folders is part of the plan there.

I also don't know how to convey the importance of sorting folders to the Thunderbird team. My previous attempt at improving things year ago for addons was here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1359410 and then someone decided that sorting accounts was important enough to become a built-in functionality. But I don't know why the same decision was not made for folders. I'll send out a couple emails to find out. Thanks!

[Wisewiz001]

Please do that. Maybe a couple of emails will make them pay attention to the significant interest among new users of 115 in getting back the freedom to set the folder order the way we want it (and that's almost always NOT alphabetically).

[gpz1100]

Re: thunderbolt 115

I'm not a user of this plugin from before, but do like my folders in a certain order. It appears this can be done from the accounts setting screen by just dragging/dropping the accounts in the order desired.

This still doesn't resolve the issue of ordering folders, especially if you have many of them, so hopefully this plugin will get updated for 115.

FWIW, one can set the order by prefixing a letter(number?) in front of the folder name. It sorts it alphabetically.

[schneeschmelze]

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but if I understood @itagagaki and @protz correctly, there is no way so as to make the add-on work again in TB 115 because the new Supernova user interface as we know it just does not allow for the reordering of folders. This is why @itagagaki said the only way to achieve this would be to modify TB proper.

After almost a week with six e-mail accounts, three news servers, 18 local e-mail folders and 15 rss folders and some reflection on the topic I think I do not need the add-on any more. I certainly would prefer to have everything as it used to be, but I can also live with that, too.

So I suggest you only try to fix this in TB proper if it does not take too much effort and if resistance in the TB team is low enough to get it into core easily.

[jobisoft]

I worked on the update a bit, it is too early to make a PR to this repo, but feedback would be nice:
Manually-Sort-Folders.zip

The "option" for sorting dialog are now under add-on:

I only updated the folder sort options, (the first and the last tab in the manual sort folder options do not do anything)

Sorting works here. Does it work for you?

[tidebre67]

@jobisoft
Edition Windows 10 Home
Version 22H2
TB 115.0 (64-Bit)

John, reordering of folders works perfect.

[jobisoft]

@itagagaki : My version is based on the POC I provided in topicbox. It moves away from the WindowListener API and follows the update guides:

• locale conversion
• XUL option page conversion
• remove WindowListener API in favour of dedicated Experiments

Will you be interested in accepting these changes in a PR?

I convert the XUL options page to HTML as best as I could. I tried something new regarding the icons, but I am not impressed with the performance, so I will change that again. The issue is that TB core uses context-fill in its SVGs, but support is still not enabled by default for WebExtensions (see svg.context-properties.content.enabled pref), because the standard has not yet been officially accepted. The OBJECT approach I tried still requires to pack clones of the SVG (because WebExtensions cannot access these chrome:// resources), but I do not have to modify them. But since the performance is so poor, I will resort back to modifed SVGs.

Since the chances are high, that this will get integrated in core, I would like to minimize the work on the update and therefore propose to remove the functionality to sort accounts, beacause that is already supported by core. We could either drop the first tab in the Manual-Sort-Folder Options page or make it print an information about how accounts can be sorted in Thunderbird (drag'n'drop in accounts setting). What do you think about this?

The version 3.1 fixes a few minor issues (new tabs did not always get patched) and brings back the "Open Folder at startup" feature (pure WebExt).

I currently have no idea how to implement the other extra feature "Hide Folder Icons".

Manually-Sort-Folders-v3.1.zip

John

[jobisoft]

Fix sorting glitch by making sure sortKeys are unique.
Manually-Sort-Folders-v3.2.zip

[mhdry]

Sorting works here. Does it work for you?

I have tried installing Manually-Sort-Folders-v3.2.zip.

Sorting works fine, but only on the top level. Subfolders aren't shown and therefore can't be sorted.

[jobisoft]

Subfolders aren't shown and therefore can't be sorted.

Seems doable, the logic is already there. The UI needs to be able to properly display subfolders in the tree view in the options page. That will be the main work. I currently pause my work until I have feedback from @protz or @itagagaki about whether they are interested in accepting a PR.

[itagagaki]

@jobisoft Sorry, I haven't had time to look at your POC yet.
You have already tried so many things. I appreciate it.
I would like @protz to decide if he wants to incorporate your concept into this add-on.

The first tab -- Sort Accounts -- I think this is no longer needed and can be removed, and I don't think it's necessary to show instructions on how to do this in Thunderbird.

The ideal I had in mind was that where we could intuitively move (drag and drop) accounts and folders around the folder pane to do whatever we wanted, but I wonder if that was ever considered for Supernova. That is unfortunate.

[protz]

Sorry, in a total rush but

• yes of course to accepting PRs, this is great and will 100% merge and test
• yes to ditching account sorting -- less code to maintain, happier life

Thanks SO MUCH John! what a relief

[gabri25ele]

tried [Manually-Sort-Folders-v3.2.zip]
The great feature of opening thunderbird to the last selected folder also seems to work fine! 👍

[kiki-ja]

@protz
@itagagaki
@jobisoft

About "Manually-Sort-Folders-v3.2.zip"

I hope open and start Thunderbird 115 with the last selected parent folder.

I hope to be able to choose a parent folder in "Use a custom folder" with the ability to start Thunderbird 115 with the last parent folder selected.
e.g "Blog & News", "Local Folder"

This is a feature that works in Manually sort folders 2.3.0 / Thunderbird 102.13.0.

@kiki-ja

[kiki-ja]

Link [Feature Request] Add Manually-Sort-Folders icon to toolbar #200

@kiki-ja

[LaFargeotte]

Hi Guys,

Like all of you I would like the add-on updated for v115 please.

I would also like to try add-on v3.20, I have downloaded the zip file, opened it, but cannot seem to install it. Help gratefully addpreciated.

[LinuxOpa]

Let him work in peace, he will continue the project when he has the time and energy.

[Firescribe2]

I downloaded 3.2 on mac today after upgrading to TB 115, not knowing this extension would break. Unfortunately, most of my imap is configured so all my folders are inside "Inbox." With the inability to sort subfolders, this means only "Inbox" shows up in the folder sort list.

The gmail account where I had folders outside my inbox didn't sort correctly. What I set to sort was all out of order in my TB folder pane and nothing I did could get it to sort the way I told it to.

Sadly, I've had to disable the extension. Hopefully the dev will have time and ability to resolve the problems for a workable solution, because like everyone else I'm feeling crippled without it.

[siffegh]

Sadly, I've had to disable the extension. Hopefully the dev will have time and ability to resolve the problems for a workable solution, because like everyone else I'm feeling crippled without it.

It will eventually become built-in.

[TBrianB]

It does seem as if this will never get sorted out. (Pun intended). it's always in the future
It sort of feels as if there is a reluctance within the core TB dev team to have folder sorting, As if for some kind of personal antipathy to it- and the fact that it wasn't included as part of TB natively in the first place is suggestive of that also. It wouldn't be the first time that software development has favoured some personal preference, whim or internal politics within the team rather than providing(optional) functionality that the users want, after all. And FOSS is, I'd suggest, particularly prone to this since it's mostly developed by volunteers. It's arguably a weakness within the FOSS system. Ultimately FOSS is largely hobbyist work with mostly hobbyist users. (Ironically that first part still holds even when the software application is taken up and used by mainstream developers).

[Boersenfeger]

@siffegh

It will eventually become built-in.<

The developer doesn't seem to be in such a hurry :-((
Perhaps read my comment there

[gabri25ele]

With the new Thunderbird 125 (https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/releases/125.0/) the extension is just disabled. 😒

[LaFargeotte]

Yes, we need an update for TB125 please.

[LaFargeotte]

For now I have renamed my folders with a number at the start of the folder name e.g.
1Steve
2Mike
3David
That will sort your own folders.
However, it would still be nice to sort the inbuilt TB folders, which cannot be renamed.

[hfm158]

@siffegh

It will eventually become built-in.<

The developer doesn't seem to be in such a hurry :-(( Perhaps read my comment there

Is it not built-in already? When I switch to All folders view and drag the folders around in the tree view, they will stay in that customized order.

[siffegh]

@siffegh

It will eventually become built-in.<

The developer doesn't seem to be in such a hurry :-(( Perhaps read my comment there

Is it not built-in already? When I switch to All folders view and drag the folders around in the tree view, they will stay in that customized order.

I don't know how you're doing that, because the only built-in feature as of now is the ability to reorder accounts by drag and drop on the Account Settings page. Besides, Manually Sort Folders doesn't work by drag and drop; you have to use MSF's options to move folders.

[itagagaki]

As far as I know, it is possible to do so only with the Thunderbird Daily version (Nightly build version) of a certain period of time, e.g.
https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/nightly/2023/11/2023-11-11-10-51-40-comm-central-l10n/

Or Betterbird. it ported the patch I provided in the above version.

[hfm158]

Oh yes, my fault. I'm using Betterbird, not native Thunderbird. I was not aware that this customized re-ordering is a Betterbird-only feature.

[itagagaki]

My patch was once merged into a branch, but was later backed out, so neither the current official release nor the beta has this functionality. The reason for the backout is that my patch revealed an issue with Thunderbird's own folder caching mechanism, which the Thunderbird team is trying to fix, but the right person is too busy to do so. Betterbird, on the other hand, has put a band-aid on the problem and released it.

[TBrianB]

Unfortunately, switching to Betterbird would be more of a burden than putting up with the annoyance. At least in the short to medium term. It's not so much setting the accounts up, as moving the existing calendar and message store.
If it were to prove that TB will never restore this common-sense functionality that would be a different matter. Though, does Betterbird work with TBSync? That's a key priority

Edit. A month later and I'm on Betterbird. TBSync works- and the profile came into BetterBird perfectly.

[alexolog]

I thought Betterbird can work with existing TB profiles.

[gabri25ele]

I thought Betterbird can work with existing TB profiles.

it worked with mine, but putting the language on betterbird is a mess

[big-bay]

How can I arrange the email addresses alphabetically in Betterbird? Just like it works with "Manually sort folders".

[alexolog]

putting the language on betterbird is a mess

Please explain

[datenheim]

@gpz1100

I'm not a user of this plugin from before, but do like my folders in a certain order. It appears this can be done from the accounts setting screen by just dragging/dropping the accounts in the order desired.

That acutally helps a lot already, as accounts can now be sorted in TB115 (tested with TB115.10.1)
Thanks a lot for that comment 🥇

Besides that sorting also folders inside accounts would be great, so waiting for the plugin to come back :-)

[TBrianB]

Please can we keep separate the issues of sorting accounts with sorting folders.
The query was always specifically about sorting folders.
Yes you have a list of accounts, that apparently can be sorted, if you actually do have more than one email account set up in TB. That the inbox of each given account is contained within it, you have sorted inbox folders. Yes. One for each account Though you'd need quite a few different email accounts for that to be significantly useful. But that's not sorted folders.
Sorted folders means that in any given account, or the global inbox, you have actual folders for specific subject types and that these can be placed in a chosen order. The different folders may be associated with specific email accounts, or they may not. What's relevant here is that an email about "widgets" goes in the "widgets" folder, one about "snowboarding " goes in a "snowboarding" folder and so on, irrespective of which email address it came to. It is much more likely that you'd have a whole bunch of different folders, rather than of accounts if you use folders to keep your emails sorted. Because there are so many possible subject types. And having these in alphabetical order may be less useful than priority order, say. i.e. you may want to have "Family" for the highest folder, below that "holidays" then "bills" then ""Purchases" then "car" etc etc. and "work" rather lower.

[datenheim]

@TBrianB
Did not intend to down-value "sorting folders", I'd love to have that back again.
Just wanted to point out that the "sort accounts" feature is maybe no longer required in the plugin to probably make it simpler to focus on the folder sorting... ;-)

[TBrianB]

I understand. But there's enough confusion over this already.
Sorting accounts has no real relevance unless users have one dedicated account and inbox for each and every subject. In the real world it is not a substitute for sorting folders and inserting it into this thread is a blind alley. Unless you have more than, say, three or four email accounts it wouldn't make the slightest difference what order they came in.
However, having a very long list of folders is far more likely ( which is why there are add-ons like Quick Filters to sort emails into folders automatically). At which point sorting by priority, or significance, or whatever, becomes rather useful.

[Jaylo70]

When will the update to be able to sort the sub-folders be applied?

[dimitris64bit]

After a long time I decided to finally apply the best solution:
Revert to version 102.15.1 which is very fast as used to be.
Version 115 is too slow to work with. The performance is awful.
In version 102.15.1 the addon works perfectly so stick with this if you want to be productive.

[gabri25ele]

When will the update to be able to sort the sub-folders be applied?

no one talks about the folder to open at startup, a feature no less important than others.

[Jaylo70]

When will the update to be able to sort the sub-folders be applied?

no one talks about the folder to open at startup, a feature no less important than others.

That's actually the main feature I used this extension for. I was able to find another extension that does this and it works with the current version of Thunderbird. It's called Start with Inbox.

This addon has nothing to do with this conversation. The title for this one is "Manually sort subfolders" You should add this remark in a conversation that is related you your subject

[TBrianB]

Which is why I did ask that we keep on topic. i.e. The broken/defunct (possibly) app that allowed us to "Manually Sort Folders" and/or the functionality it provided to do that thing. Any other functionality that add-on provided is either a) dependent on the add-on being updated or b) if folder sorting is to be part of TB's core functionality (as it is with Betterbird) then the additional function needs to be addressed separately- as a new add-on or new TB core functionality.

[itagagaki]

Here are my thoughts on the startup folder.
https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/thunderbird-specify-startup-folder/idi-p/47957

It is said that BetterBird already has that functionality. I don't know how it is implemented.

[gabri25ele]

This addon has nothing to do with this conversation. The title for this one is "Manually sort subfolders" You should add this remark in a conversation that is related you your subject

what are you saying?
it's an option of MANUALLY SORT FOLDER.
It' my favourite option, I installed it only for that.