After looking at Kmail for a while, I decided to move some of my mailaccounts over to it to give it a serious test. And I thought I would share a few things here that could help others in the same situation as I could not find any guides that were up to date on the net.
Why would I do this at all? I am already using a "portable" version of Thunderbird on MSWin to avoid getting too much into the registry and to easily be able to back things up. I have set up Thunderbird in Kubuntu to use the same profile folder, so when I am downloading mail in Kubuntu, it will show in Thunderbird for Windows.
Still, there are things in Thunderbird that I do not like. And the biggest one is the addressbook. This is an area where KDE really shines. The addressbook here is shared between many applications, and is definitely one of the best I have seen. I am just missing a couple of things - sync with Plaxo and sync with my Windows Mobile 6 based phone.
The Kmail application has another very important feature for me that it share with Thunderbird. There is a list for outgoing mailservers (SMTP). I use a laptop and I move around a lot. In many of the networks that I connect to, the standard port for outgoing mail (port 25) is blocked, so I am forced to use the ISP's server or find another way around it. If I used Outlook, I would have to enter into the setup for 20+ accounts and modify the outgoing server for each of them. In both Thunderbird and Kmail, you simply add the new server to the list and set it as default. VERY elegant and efficient. Without this function, I would not move anything to Kmail. There are ways around it - here is one: http://www.wisnaes.com/2007/09/15/is...erver-blocked/
POP3 in Kmail
Unfortunately, migrating to Kmail is not very straightforward. There is an import function, but at best it does a poor job. You are better off doing it "manually".
The first thing you should do is to set up the folder structure. You could import the folders from Thunderbird and then rename them, or you can import and then move the mail over.
Kmail organizes everything under a "root" folder called "Local folders" except for IMAP accounts. They get their own root folders, but I will get back to that later. I go for POP3 in this description.
This is how I have set up my folder structure:
When this is done, you can set up identities and accounts.
Identities contains name, e-mail address, encryption information, templates for mail, folders, signature etc. Make sure you point the different functions to the folders you just created.
The account information is what you in other mailapplications would label as server information. It is tied to the physical mail server account you have. There is one important setting under Advanced - Destination Folder. Make sure you choose the Inbox that you created for this account. The rest should be fairly easy to understand.
Now you can go back to the mailfolders you created. Rightclick on them and choose Properties. Here you can change the icon that represents the folder. I found that all folders, except for the Inbox actually picked up the right icon by itself. But what is more important is the Sender Identity for the folder. It is normally set to the default identity, but as I want each account to behave as they were totally different persons, I want them to use their own identities. So I change this. You can also choose wether you want the folder to act on new/unread mail in this folder. For templates and sent mail, that should probably not be necessary.
You should now be ready to receive mail in an orderly fashion. But how do you get the mail from Thunderbird over to Kmail? I solved this by using the script for importing mbox files - Files>Import messages>Import mbox files (UNIX, Evolution).
You will then be prompted to choose the file that contains the mail. Thunderbird in Windows saves it's mail in the Documents and settings folder of the user in a hidden folder called Application Data. But as I was using the portable version, I had already moved this into a folder under the program directory. In there is a folder - Thunderbird>Data>Profile>Mail. It contains one folder for each account you have in Thunderbird plus the Local folder. Double click on the account you want to move.
Inside that folder you find several files. Some with a three letter extension and some without. You have Inbox and Inbox.msf and the file you want to import to Kmail is the one wihtout an extension. Depending on how much mail there is in the folder, it will take longer or shorter time to import.
After the import is finished, you have a folder in Kmail name MBOX-Inbox or something like that. You can now move the mail from this folder over to the Inbox that you created earlier. Repeat for the other folders.
This is a bit of work, but it gives you total control over what ends up where.
IMAP in Kmail - and GMail
My main reason for using IMAP is GMail. And I had some trouble finding a way to do it that did not crash Kmail. But I think I finally found a way that works by combining a lot of tips on the internet into this setup:
First of all, the main source for how things should be is this page -
http://mail.google.com/support/bin/a...y?answer=78799
Settings>Configure Kmail
As in the example above, you might want to add an identity. And then you need to add the account information.
Got to Accounts and click on Add... Choose IMAP
The account name can be anything you want it to be. Host is imap.gmail.com and port has to be 993. Login is your full e-mail address at GMail and you can choose to store your IMAP password so that you do not have to enter it every time to check mail.
On the advanced tab, I selected "Automatically compact folders" and "Show only locally subscribed folders". I deselected "Load attachments on demand" as this seems to make Kmail download all attachments no matter if I am viewing the mail or not.
As I have a separate identity for my GMail account, I deselected the "Use default identity" and chose the correct identity there.
On the security tab, you have to select "Use SSL..." under Encryption and "Clear text" should already be selected under Authentication. Click OK to accept the settings and get back to the normal view.
Here, you should now do one thing. Right click on the GMail folder that you just created in the folder list and select "Local Subscription..."
Here I deselected "All mail", "Spam", and "Trash" according to a tip on this webpage:
http://qaywsxedcrfv.blogspot.com/200...opper-for.html
These things combined look like they did the trick and I am now able to connect to GMail with IMAP.
Misc.
Also, here are a couple of tips about some things that had me going crazy in Kmail.
I usually like tooltips on some things, but in Kmail, they totally get in the way and most of the time, they are totally useless. So I wanted to turn them off. For the message list, you go to Settings>Configure Kmail>Appearance>Message list and remove the check mark for displaying tooltips. But how do you turn off the tooltips for the folder pane? Right-click at the top of the folder pane where it says Folder and you get a menu where you can change some things including the tooltip. So now that annoyance is gone too. I have also increased the size of the icons in the folder pane a little bit as well as changed ordering from automatic to Manually - drag and drop. The folders have a tendency to jump up and down a bit if you do any changes to the properties for a folder, but I just drag them back into place and hope those bugs will be fixed soon :-)
Addressbook
Moving the addressbook from Thunderbird to Kmail - This is something I have not tried yet, but LDIF is supported as export in Thunderbird and import in Kmail. Be aware of one bug in the addressbook if you have contacts with multiple e-mail addresses in KDE 4.2.2. When you click on a contact like that, you will have to click OK in a number of dialogue boxes. This has been fixed in KDE 4.2.3 and you can get it by following the details in this thread:
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3103637.0
I did an import of all of my addresses from Plaxo. I searched all over their site to find how to export my addresses and finally got a tip from one of the people working there:
http://www.plaxo.com/export
I exported first as vCard, but got problems with the coding of Norwegian special characters. Looks like the export from Plaxo is not correct, the other options there however, seems to be ok. So I imported an .LDIF file and sp far everything looks ok.
I must say I really like the way Kmail matches addresses. When you create a new mail and start typing a To: address, Kmail will immediately show you matches for the letters you have typed so far. I have had this way of searching in some other programs and really love it as you usually have your match after 2-4 letters.
If you would like to see full Plaxo sync in a future version of the PIM, please add your vote to
http://forum.kde.org/sync-contacts-w...o-t-45328.html
I have been in contact with the people at Plaxo, and they told me that they have a SyncML server and a RESTful API. It is free and they seem very interested in connecting, so the only thing missing is a couple of programmers to do it.
Calendar
There are many things I love about it, and I will be using it a lot in the future. The first thing I did was to add Norwegian holidays to it. I found some iCal files on the internet that had the holidays and then imported them into the calendar. You can also use the Import>Get Hot New Stuff function if the calendar you need is in the official list.
If you want to import other calendars, like the schedule for the Formula-1 season or the English football season, you can also do this as iCal imports. Find your desired calendar, download it to your PC, got to File>Import>Import calendar and choose your calendar file.
In Lightning you can export your calendar as iCal. I have not tried it, so I do not know how much data that comes over or how well some events translate (recurring events especially), but it is absolutely worth trying it out. In Lightning: File>Export Calendar if my info is correct. In the dialog that follows, remember to choose the right format.
I have done some checking, and especially looking for Google Calendar integration. At the moment it can be done via some hacks, but I found this comment from a Norwegian that is working on getting this into the Akonadi backend:
http://romn.es/
Getting a connection to Google Calendar into the Akonadi backend sounds to me as the correct way to go. I am also hoping for some more there, specifically sync the addressbook with Plaxo.
Akregator - feed/RSS reader
It works ok, but there are problems connecting to it from Firefox. You know, when you click on the orange icon in the addressbar, you can usually pick a standard program to add the feed to. But it appears to be difficult to do with Akregator, and some say impossible if you are running Akregator as part of the PIM solution in KDE. But if you want to have a go at some scripting, here is a link for it:
http://porpoisehead.net/hi/?q=node/25
I have been in contact with some developers regarding a problem with Akregator. If you want to import an OPML from Thunderbird, RSSOwl or other RSS readers, you might get a crash. There seem to be problems with some favicons and big number of feeds. It has been registered as a bug, confirmed and hopefully someone will take a look at it soon.
Today I got news about one of my favourite feature requests: Akregator sync with NewsGator. Looks like there has been made a resource that sync Akonadi, the backend for the PIM, with NewsGator and that it should be available in KDE 4.4 . It is a two-way sync that updates read/unread status so you can switch between reading online or offline. That is really great news!
Let me know if something in this little guide/tip needs to be changed. Good luck with your migration!
Why would I do this at all? I am already using a "portable" version of Thunderbird on MSWin to avoid getting too much into the registry and to easily be able to back things up. I have set up Thunderbird in Kubuntu to use the same profile folder, so when I am downloading mail in Kubuntu, it will show in Thunderbird for Windows.
Still, there are things in Thunderbird that I do not like. And the biggest one is the addressbook. This is an area where KDE really shines. The addressbook here is shared between many applications, and is definitely one of the best I have seen. I am just missing a couple of things - sync with Plaxo and sync with my Windows Mobile 6 based phone.
The Kmail application has another very important feature for me that it share with Thunderbird. There is a list for outgoing mailservers (SMTP). I use a laptop and I move around a lot. In many of the networks that I connect to, the standard port for outgoing mail (port 25) is blocked, so I am forced to use the ISP's server or find another way around it. If I used Outlook, I would have to enter into the setup for 20+ accounts and modify the outgoing server for each of them. In both Thunderbird and Kmail, you simply add the new server to the list and set it as default. VERY elegant and efficient. Without this function, I would not move anything to Kmail. There are ways around it - here is one: http://www.wisnaes.com/2007/09/15/is...erver-blocked/
POP3 in Kmail
Unfortunately, migrating to Kmail is not very straightforward. There is an import function, but at best it does a poor job. You are better off doing it "manually".
The first thing you should do is to set up the folder structure. You could import the folders from Thunderbird and then rename them, or you can import and then move the mail over.
Kmail organizes everything under a "root" folder called "Local folders" except for IMAP accounts. They get their own root folders, but I will get back to that later. I go for POP3 in this description.
This is how I have set up my folder structure:
Code:
Local Folders -
Account 1 -
Inbox
Sent Mail
Drafts
Templates
Account 2 -
Inbox
Sent Mail
Drafts
Templates
etc.
Identities contains name, e-mail address, encryption information, templates for mail, folders, signature etc. Make sure you point the different functions to the folders you just created.
The account information is what you in other mailapplications would label as server information. It is tied to the physical mail server account you have. There is one important setting under Advanced - Destination Folder. Make sure you choose the Inbox that you created for this account. The rest should be fairly easy to understand.
Now you can go back to the mailfolders you created. Rightclick on them and choose Properties. Here you can change the icon that represents the folder. I found that all folders, except for the Inbox actually picked up the right icon by itself. But what is more important is the Sender Identity for the folder. It is normally set to the default identity, but as I want each account to behave as they were totally different persons, I want them to use their own identities. So I change this. You can also choose wether you want the folder to act on new/unread mail in this folder. For templates and sent mail, that should probably not be necessary.
You should now be ready to receive mail in an orderly fashion. But how do you get the mail from Thunderbird over to Kmail? I solved this by using the script for importing mbox files - Files>Import messages>Import mbox files (UNIX, Evolution).
You will then be prompted to choose the file that contains the mail. Thunderbird in Windows saves it's mail in the Documents and settings folder of the user in a hidden folder called Application Data. But as I was using the portable version, I had already moved this into a folder under the program directory. In there is a folder - Thunderbird>Data>Profile>Mail. It contains one folder for each account you have in Thunderbird plus the Local folder. Double click on the account you want to move.
Inside that folder you find several files. Some with a three letter extension and some without. You have Inbox and Inbox.msf and the file you want to import to Kmail is the one wihtout an extension. Depending on how much mail there is in the folder, it will take longer or shorter time to import.
After the import is finished, you have a folder in Kmail name MBOX-Inbox or something like that. You can now move the mail from this folder over to the Inbox that you created earlier. Repeat for the other folders.
This is a bit of work, but it gives you total control over what ends up where.
IMAP in Kmail - and GMail
My main reason for using IMAP is GMail. And I had some trouble finding a way to do it that did not crash Kmail. But I think I finally found a way that works by combining a lot of tips on the internet into this setup:
First of all, the main source for how things should be is this page -
http://mail.google.com/support/bin/a...y?answer=78799
Settings>Configure Kmail
As in the example above, you might want to add an identity. And then you need to add the account information.
Got to Accounts and click on Add... Choose IMAP
The account name can be anything you want it to be. Host is imap.gmail.com and port has to be 993. Login is your full e-mail address at GMail and you can choose to store your IMAP password so that you do not have to enter it every time to check mail.
On the advanced tab, I selected "Automatically compact folders" and "Show only locally subscribed folders". I deselected "Load attachments on demand" as this seems to make Kmail download all attachments no matter if I am viewing the mail or not.
As I have a separate identity for my GMail account, I deselected the "Use default identity" and chose the correct identity there.
On the security tab, you have to select "Use SSL..." under Encryption and "Clear text" should already be selected under Authentication. Click OK to accept the settings and get back to the normal view.
Here, you should now do one thing. Right click on the GMail folder that you just created in the folder list and select "Local Subscription..."
Here I deselected "All mail", "Spam", and "Trash" according to a tip on this webpage:
http://qaywsxedcrfv.blogspot.com/200...opper-for.html
These things combined look like they did the trick and I am now able to connect to GMail with IMAP.
Misc.
Also, here are a couple of tips about some things that had me going crazy in Kmail.
I usually like tooltips on some things, but in Kmail, they totally get in the way and most of the time, they are totally useless. So I wanted to turn them off. For the message list, you go to Settings>Configure Kmail>Appearance>Message list and remove the check mark for displaying tooltips. But how do you turn off the tooltips for the folder pane? Right-click at the top of the folder pane where it says Folder and you get a menu where you can change some things including the tooltip. So now that annoyance is gone too. I have also increased the size of the icons in the folder pane a little bit as well as changed ordering from automatic to Manually - drag and drop. The folders have a tendency to jump up and down a bit if you do any changes to the properties for a folder, but I just drag them back into place and hope those bugs will be fixed soon :-)
Addressbook
Moving the addressbook from Thunderbird to Kmail - This is something I have not tried yet, but LDIF is supported as export in Thunderbird and import in Kmail. Be aware of one bug in the addressbook if you have contacts with multiple e-mail addresses in KDE 4.2.2. When you click on a contact like that, you will have to click OK in a number of dialogue boxes. This has been fixed in KDE 4.2.3 and you can get it by following the details in this thread:
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3103637.0
I did an import of all of my addresses from Plaxo. I searched all over their site to find how to export my addresses and finally got a tip from one of the people working there:
http://www.plaxo.com/export
I exported first as vCard, but got problems with the coding of Norwegian special characters. Looks like the export from Plaxo is not correct, the other options there however, seems to be ok. So I imported an .LDIF file and sp far everything looks ok.
I must say I really like the way Kmail matches addresses. When you create a new mail and start typing a To: address, Kmail will immediately show you matches for the letters you have typed so far. I have had this way of searching in some other programs and really love it as you usually have your match after 2-4 letters.
If you would like to see full Plaxo sync in a future version of the PIM, please add your vote to
http://forum.kde.org/sync-contacts-w...o-t-45328.html
I have been in contact with the people at Plaxo, and they told me that they have a SyncML server and a RESTful API. It is free and they seem very interested in connecting, so the only thing missing is a couple of programmers to do it.
Calendar
There are many things I love about it, and I will be using it a lot in the future. The first thing I did was to add Norwegian holidays to it. I found some iCal files on the internet that had the holidays and then imported them into the calendar. You can also use the Import>Get Hot New Stuff function if the calendar you need is in the official list.
If you want to import other calendars, like the schedule for the Formula-1 season or the English football season, you can also do this as iCal imports. Find your desired calendar, download it to your PC, got to File>Import>Import calendar and choose your calendar file.
In Lightning you can export your calendar as iCal. I have not tried it, so I do not know how much data that comes over or how well some events translate (recurring events especially), but it is absolutely worth trying it out. In Lightning: File>Export Calendar if my info is correct. In the dialog that follows, remember to choose the right format.
I have done some checking, and especially looking for Google Calendar integration. At the moment it can be done via some hacks, but I found this comment from a Norwegian that is working on getting this into the Akonadi backend:
http://romn.es/
Getting a connection to Google Calendar into the Akonadi backend sounds to me as the correct way to go. I am also hoping for some more there, specifically sync the addressbook with Plaxo.
Akregator - feed/RSS reader
It works ok, but there are problems connecting to it from Firefox. You know, when you click on the orange icon in the addressbar, you can usually pick a standard program to add the feed to. But it appears to be difficult to do with Akregator, and some say impossible if you are running Akregator as part of the PIM solution in KDE. But if you want to have a go at some scripting, here is a link for it:
http://porpoisehead.net/hi/?q=node/25
I have been in contact with some developers regarding a problem with Akregator. If you want to import an OPML from Thunderbird, RSSOwl or other RSS readers, you might get a crash. There seem to be problems with some favicons and big number of feeds. It has been registered as a bug, confirmed and hopefully someone will take a look at it soon.
Today I got news about one of my favourite feature requests: Akregator sync with NewsGator. Looks like there has been made a resource that sync Akonadi, the backend for the PIM, with NewsGator and that it should be available in KDE 4.4 . It is a two-way sync that updates read/unread status so you can switch between reading online or offline. That is really great news!
Let me know if something in this little guide/tip needs to be changed. Good luck with your migration!
Comment