firefox/thunderbird

[Tommy Trussell]

On 4/7/06, DavidFourer <ulist at gs1.ubuntuforums.org> wrote:
>
> It should be a simple matter to import addresses into thundirbird.  I'm
> using the build of Thunderbird that came on the ubuntu 5.10 install CD.
> The import menu doesn't help (though it does import my address book).
>
> The thunderbird help files say the mail files are located somewhere
> like: ..../defaults/profiles/mail_file_name.
>
> I found: /usr/lib/mozilla-thunderbird/defaults/profile/ but can't find
> "defaults"
>
> I found the firefox profile, containing my bookmarks, at:
>
> /etc/mozilla-firefox/profile/
>
> What is the source of this confusion?  Is this because I'm using the
> ubuntu build of thunderbird?  Should I uninstall this and try manually
> installing from the Mozilla site?

I believe the items in the /etc/mozilla-firefox/ directory are
referenced when a user starts Firefox for the first time or otherwise
needs the default settings.

> By the way, what is meant by the expression "~/.folder_name"  I would
> really appreciate someone explaining that to me.

The tilde "~" in Unix / linux represents your home directory. So no
matter where you are, you can use the tilde to point back to your home
directory. And directories beginning with a dot (period) are "hidden"
so they aren't visible in most file listings by default.

So here are some examples:

If you open a terminal and type
  cd /etc
you will be in the /etc/ directory. If you then type
  cd ~/.mozilla
you will move to the "hidden" mozilla directory in your home directory
(created the first time you ran Firefox). If you actively use Firefox
you will see that the firefox subdirectories contain the bookmarks and
settings you actually use.

SO all the  information specific to you for Thunderbird will be stored
in your home directory under the hidden .mozilla-thunderbird directory
-- /home/username/.mozilla-thunderbird/ OR equivalently
~/.mozilla-thunderbird/



At a terminal, type

ls -a

to see all the directories, even the hidden ones