Download and Install

Thunderbird 2.0 is available here. It will automatically present the download for the OS and language you’re using at the time. There’s also a link to download the install for other OS’s and languages.

For the Mac the download is a 19.2MB disk image (.dmg) file. The Windows download is 6.4MB.

The official instructions say that Thunderbird just be installed over the previous version. Mail will be saved. Some extensions may not work until they are updated to be compatible with version 2. I don’t have any extensions. But earlier issues with Thunderbird have taught me to do a clean install so I’ll be uninstalling the old and installing the new.

On a Mac

1. Make sure Thunderbird is not running. Also make sure Thunderbird related processes are stopped.
2. Make a copy of the profile located in [Home]/Library/Thunderbird. Just make a copy someplace else. Don’t move the files.
3. Uninstall Thunderbird (drag the Application icon to the trash)
4. Open/Mount the downloaded DMG file and drag the Thunderbird icon to your Applications folder
5. Unmount the DMG file
6. Start Thunderbird. All your mail and mailboxes should be there. Send some test e-mails, look around. You’re done.
7. Delete the copy you made in step 2 once your confident the install worked. (Ok, now you are really done.)

After installation, Thunderbird uses 52.9MB (not including the profile and actual mail) of disk space and it’s a Universal App.

On Windows

1. Make sure Thunderbird is not running. Also make sure Thunderbird related processes are stopped.
2. Make a copy of the profile located in [Drive]\Documents and Settings\<ProfileName>\Application Data\Thunderbird. Just make a copy someplace else. Don’t move the files.
3. Uninstall Thunderbird through Add/Remove programs
4. Run the Thunderbird installer EXE. The install is straightforward so no screen shots needed. You can simply click through all the screens to get the recommended install.
5. After the Welcome screen you’ll accept the license.
6. You’ll be asked if you want a standard or custom install. Standard is recommended. Use custom if you want to change the install location, not install the icons (desktop, start menu or quick launch), or change the start menu group name.
7. After installation Thunderbird will startup (by default). Your mail should be there. Send some test e-mails and look around. You’re done.
8. Delete the copy you made in step 2 once your confident the install worked. (Ok, now you are really done.)

If you have problems with extensions and need to start Thunderbird in safe mode do so by…

• Windows: Start using the “Safe Mode” item on the start menu or run thunderbird.exe -safe-mode
• Linux: start with ./thunderbird -safe-mode
• OS X: cd /Applications/Thunderbird.app/Contents/MacOS/
./thunderbird-bin -safe-mode

Once in safe mode you can remove the problem extensions (or all of them and add one at a time to find the problem).

These are some of the known issues listed in the release notes, here are the ones most likely to be encountered (but looking over all the release notes would be a good idea)

• Some firewalls may block Thunderbird. They have configuration instructions for common firewalls here.
• The default dictionary is english. Other languages can be installed through add-ons and through the preferences screens.
• The mail views toolbar button is no longer a default button
• There is no Talkback on Intel-based Macs when running natively or under Rosetta. The Apple Crash report program should launch in the event of application crashes.
• On Linux/Unix if Thunderbird is installed to a location with spaces listed in the path it may not be able to be used as the default email program.
• If you use Fedore Core 3 and Gnome refer to the release notes for additional instructions.

New Features

Message Tagging: There was some rudimentary tagging in version 1.5 but now it’s been brought to the forefront and enhanced. I’m hoping this will cut down on the ever growing number of folders I have.

Message History: the ability to scroll backward and forward through message history.

Search improvements: find-as-you-type (a la Spotlight) searches and specific searches can be stored in folders.

UI improvements and customizations

Easy access to web accounts such as .Mac and GMail.

A complete list of updates are in the release notes.

Quick First Impressions

There wasn’t even a speed bump getting into version 2 after using 1.5. While there’s a new “Tag” button among other minor interface changes they aren’t significant enough to require relearning anything.

The account setup screen has new options for GMail and .Mac mail. I selected GMail and the setup couldn’t be easy. I enter my name (how I want it to appear on my emails) along with my GMail address (no need to type @gmail.com). The option to “download now” is checked by default. There’s a prompt for the password at the first connection.

In addition to the obvious server settings, the following defaults are used:

- Check for messages at startup and every 10 minutes

- Automatically download new messages

- Leave messages on server is enabled. GMail automatically moves them to the all mail folder.

- Junk mail controls are enabled.

The mail is delivered to a set of folders unique to the account. You’ll need to change the settings if you want mail to go to the common local folders

Setting up a .Mac mailbox is just as simple. Enter a name and email address and the rest is done for you. The mailbox is set up to use IMAP (yea!). None of the folders are enabled for offline use. Unlike GMail there wasn’t any initial connection to the server. In another quirk when I did a “Get Mail” for All it didn’t check the .Mac server. I had to do a “Get Mail” (or click on the inbox) to be prompted for the password to get the initial connection and the waiting mail.

The .Mac option isn’t availble on Windows. While it’s true there’s no point having a .Mac account unless you have a Mac, there’s no reason not to access .Mac mail from a Windows PC. I can manually configure Thunderbird to access .Mac mail. .Mac is just like any other IMAP mail service. From a cross-platform consistency standpoint I’d like to have seen it available.

On of the user interface tweaks is noticeable on the main screen. There’s a couple of arrows in the folders window. Clicking the cycles left or right through “All Folder” <-> “Unread Folders” <-> “Favorite Folders” <-> “Recent Folders”

There’s a new popup preview where holding the mouse over a folder shows the subject headings along with the first line for new mail in the folder. (New is not equal to unread)

One enhancement I wanted seems to be missing. I wanted to be able to share the same filter (called rules in other programs) among all incoming mail connections. As in previous versions it apears they have to be assigned to a specific connection. They can be assigned to “Local Folders” but it still only runs against mail being delivered to that location.

Thunderbird 2 still doesn’t have the concept of an outbox to send mail in the background. When sending mail Thunderbird still does it in the forground, displaying the status on the screen with the e-mail message still open.

On the Windows side of things, there’s a pop-up notification above the system tray for new mail and an icon is placed in the system tray that opens the inbox when it’s double-clicked. This is similar to what Outlook 2003 and above does.

I’m happy to see no big changes in the UI so there’s no need to re-learn anything. I can take the enhancments one at a time to improve my mail handling without having to take a step back first. I look forward to exploring the new features.

Visit my Thunderbird page here.

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Make sure you can access the account through the web before you configure it in Thunderbird.

Open Account Settings in Thunderbird (from the Tools menu) and click the “Add Account” button and select “EMail Account from the New Account Setup dialog.

Select “IMAP” as the server type. Enter “imap.aol.com” as the incoming server and “smtp.aol.com” as the outgoing server.

Enter in your full e-mail address (your AOL My eAddress) as both the incoming and outgoing user name.

Enter in a name for the account.

You’ll receive a “congratulations” screen,

But don’t start celebrating yet, your not done. When you click “Done” you’ll see the Accounts screen. Click on the outgoing server and locate the one you just created. (You may need to click another selection then click on “Outgoing Server (SMTP)” again before your new server appears in the list.

Select your new server and click the “Edit” button to get the settings screen. Change “Security and Authentication” to “SSL“, this will automatically change the port to 465which is what we want. Put in a description if you want. Verify that your full e-mail address is used for the user name.

Click OK and then close completely out of the account settings screens. We’re almost done. We’ll send and receive some e-mail so we can enter in the password information.

Compose an e-mail in Thunderbird to be sent from your new address and send it. When you send it you’ll be prompted to enter a password for the outgoing mail server. Enter your password and (optionally) check the option to remember the password.

If you selected the option to save the password you’ll see this message.

Then you’ll be prompted to enter and (optionally) save the password for the incoming mail server.

Send an e-mail to the new account and verify both the sent and received e-mails arrive OK and you’re all set.

External Links:
AOL My eAddress Information: http://free.aol.com/thenewaol/domain_email.adp

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Be sure you can access the account through the web before you configure it in Mail.

Open the accounts configuration page in Mail. Click the ‘+’ to add an account and start the process. Select “IMAP” as the account type, enter an account description and name then type in the AOL My eAddress that you’ve already set up.

Click “Continue” and configure the incoming server on the next screen, Use “imap.aol.com” as the server. Use your full e-mail address as the user name and type in your password.

Click continue and configure the outgoing server. The outgoing server is “smtp.aol.com“. Check the “Use authentication” box. Use your full e-mail address as the user name. Type in your password. Unlike some e-mail services where an SMTP connection can be shared among accounts, I’ve found AOL My eAddress requires the account name to match the sending address so a outgoing connection must be configured for each account. If you’ve already got an outgoing server configured in Mail.app they will be available in a drop down. Simply type smtp.aol.com in the box and ignore the drop down. If you’re configuring multiple My eAddress addresses you must do this for each address.

When you click continue the connection will be verified which may take a minute or so then you’ll see a summary screen.

You should be all set. As a test, use another e-mail account to send to/from the account you just set up.

If you need to configure the outgoing mail server at a later time the screen will look slightly different:

External Links:
AOL My eAddress Information: http://free.aol.com/thenewaol/domain_email.adp

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So it’s back to the old style with the close button and the end of the tab strip. This has the added bonus of giving more space for the tab titles.

To do this simply go to the url about:config and filter for browser.tabs.closeButtons and change it’s value to 3. Other options are 0 - display on active tab only, 1 - default behavior, 2 - no close buttons.

Here’s the MozillaZine article on the setting.

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One of the things I like about the e-mail provided by .Mac is that it supports IMAP (Internet Mail Access Protocol). This keeps my local mailbox synchronized with the server. By using Apple Mail as the mail client for all my mailboxes I can save important e-mails to folders which are kept synchronized to my .Mac mailbox on a server. This gives me instant backup, and web access from any browser, should I have PC problems.

I also configure Apple Mail to leave the messages on the server for each pop account. I then manually save or delete mail from the server every once in a while. This is probably a waste of time but I started doing it when I didn’t want to be locked into .Mac. Apple Mail has the ability to delete messages from the server after certain lengths of time (week, month, etc…) - as do most e-mail clients. If I stay with Apple Mail I’d probably look into those options and look for similar features in a new client,

So my requirements are:

1. One e-mail client - multiple OS’s
2. Aggregate all my e-mails into one e-mail interface
3. Allow managing e-mail across PCs (first client to grab an e-mail can’t delete it from the server)
4. Support identities (allow me to send from any e-mail address or alias)
5. Good spam filtering
6. I have to like it

Thunderbird runs on OS X, Windows and Linux so it meets my first requirements. Time to see how well it does the rest.

The online FAQ includes instructions for importing messages from Apple Mail which would be a bonus.

Installation

The download is a single install executable. I start with my Mac and download the install to it. The download is a 17.7MB disk image (dmg) file. I’ll be installing version 1.5.0.8. After double-clicking the dmg file it displays the typical “Drag to Install” screen. So I do.
(Side note: all screenshots in this posting are hosted on Picasa. I’m trying it out and will write up my experience and thoughts later. Click a picture to see it full size.)

From Thunderbird I…

So it’s time to fire up Thunderbird.

Configuration

I start Thunderbird and the first screen I see is the import screen.

From Thunderbird I…

I have nothing to import (that it found) so I click “Continue”. The next screen asks me what I want to set up.

From Thunderbird I…

I select “Email account”, For testing purposes I’m going to start with my Google Mail account. The next screen asks me what name and e-mail address I want to use. These will be used on outgoing e-mail.

From Thunderbird I…

The next screen asks for the mail server information.

From Thunderbird I…

I enter the server information for Google mail. The “Use Global Inbox” is checked by default. Since I want to aggregate all my e-mail accounts I leave this checked.

The next screen asks for my user name (ID) for accessing my e-mail. It was pre-filled with the name portion of my e-mail from the first screen.

From Thunderbird I…

I enter the information and click “Continue”. Then I’m asked to name the account. It was pre-filled with my e-mail address but I change it.

From Thunderbird I…

I’m then shown a screen that asks me to verify my settings. There’s an option to “Download messages now” which I leave selected. I click “Done”. I’m then asked if I want Thunderbird to be my default e-mail application. I say “No” but leave it enabled to ask me again. I also assume this can be easily set in preferences. For now, we’ll keep it on demand only.

The main Thunderbird screen appears and it appears to be trying to download mail. I eventually get a timed out message. I’m not surprised since I’ve never been asked to enter a password.

I go to “Tools” -> “Account Settings” and look at the server settings for Google mail. I change the “Security Settings” from “Never” to “SSL” (which I know Google mail uses). Since I’m here I also check the box “Leave messages on server” so nothing gets deleted. The screen shot below shows the configuration after my changes.

From Thunderbird I…

I figure my outgoing smtp server is also wrong so go to the “Outgoing Server (SMTP)” configuration. Several changes are needed here. I fill in the optional description. I also have to change the port from 25 to 587 (GMail uses 587). user name and password is checked by default but I change “Use Secure Connection” from “No” to “TLS”. See the screen below for my settings.

From Thunderbird I…

I’m now ready for another test. I click the “Get Mail” button and sure enough, I’m prompted for a POP password. I enter it and select the option to “Use password Manager to remember this password” The following alert is displayed about saving passwords.

From Thunderbird I…

There weren’t any errors. But since I didn’t have any waiting e-mail I didn’t receive anything. So I’ll send an e-mail from Thunderbird to my regular e-mail and then I’ll reply to it. This will also prompt for my smtp password and test outgoing mail. I click the “Write” button and get the default compose screen.

From Thunderbird I…

I address and compose the e-mail and click “Send”. I’m prompted for the SMTP password which I enter, selecting to save it in the password manager. The e-mail seems to go out just fine. I fire up Apple Mail and find the e-mail waiting. I send off a reply which arrives in Thunderbird just fine. So I’m good to go with G-Mail

A Diversion to Webmail

When checking out Thunderbird I saw reference to the Webmail project. This integrates various Web based e-mails into Thunderbird. I’m curious and now is the time to play, before I commit anything important to Thunderbird.

I download the Webmail 1.0.14 extension to my desktop along with the GMail 0.5.4 extension. The Webmail extension is required, and then there are various extensions for various Web E-mail platforms and I’ll need the Google extension for my testing.

I go to the “Tools” -> “Extensions” menu in Thunderbird which brings up the extensions manager.

From Thunderbird I…

I click the install button and browse to my downloaded Webmail extension to install it, then I do the same for the GMail extension. I need to shutdown and restart Thunderbird which I do.

I go through Webmail quickly, configuring the GMail account again. While an interesting concept, it’s not for me. I’d lose much of the integration between e-mail addresses that I’m looking for. It looks like it would work similar to Apple Mail in that there’s a folder structure for each mailbox and any movement between them or common folders must be done manually or via rules.

I delete the test mailbox, uninstall the extensions and restart Thunderbird.

Back on Track

So far it’s obvious that Thunderbird meets my first three requirements (multi-OS, aggregate mail addresses, and allow managing e-mails on the server).

The next step is to see how it handles identities. I don’t see any obvious way to set them up so I go to the help and search for “how do i set up an identity”. (The help is web based.) The third item is “Multiple Identities Per E-mail Address” and the blurb mentions Thunderbird so I select it. Sure enough, I just missed it. But they mention that there’s an exception for Google in that “The Gmail SMTP server will ignore whatever From: address you supply unless you add it in the Gmail web page at Setting -> Accounts -> “Add another email address”. I do already have some alternates set up but they were pre-fiasco so I’ll need to change them.

To manage identities go to “Tools” -> “Account Settings” and click on the account to get the identities. Click on the “Manage Identities…” button in the lower right. See screen shot below.

From Thunderbird I…

This looks like exactly what I want (which Apple Mail can’t do beyond the 5 aliases allowed for the account.) I register one of my aliases in GMail and set up an identity for it. After clicking “Manage Identities…” and “Add” I get the main identity screen shown below.

From Thunderbird I…

I fill in a name, e-mail address, and reply to address.
The “Copies and Folders” tab gives me the following options and I just keep the defaults.

From Thunderbird I…

The “Composition and Addressing” tab has the following options and I just keep the defaults.

From Thunderbird I…

I save the settings and have a new identity.

I send an e-mail using the new identity. The identity is now listed in the “From” drop down list on the compose screen. When I select the alternate identity the reply-to address is added to the address list and displayed as the “From”. I send the e-mail.

When it arrives the reply-to address is in fact the alias. But in looking at the header I see that my GMail address is listed as the return path. So it would be visible by looking at the header. As a test, I use the GMail Web page to send an e-mail to the alias to unsubscribe from an e-mail list. Sure enough it’s rejected as not finding my GMail address (instead of the alias). Although the reject was sent to the reply-to address which was the alias the look up must have used the return path. [After I start setting up my accounts I set up an identity using an alias on The OS Quest domain. This does mask the real address which is what I'm really looking for. So this appears to be a GMail thing and not a Thunderbird issue. In this case the alias points directly to the e-mail address.]

Expansion

It’s time to add another e-mail account to Thunderbird so I can see how well they play together. I’ll use my .Mac account which I’ll configure for IMAP. The setup is similar to the GMail account except it will use the GMail SMTP server (this isn’t unexpected as most e-mail clients I’ve seen use a default smtp server). Apple Mail uses a default server for all servers although the other servers are configured and available.

I click on the newly created Mac Mail (the name I picked) inbox in the folder pane of Thunderbird. I enter my password (clicking the option to save it) and all my folders appear from the server.

I remember seeing setting about offline use so I go into the account settings and select all folders (except trash and junk) for offline use. I also select the setting to make offline use the default for new folders. The next screen shows the Offline settings screen.

From Thunderbird I…

Clicking the “Select Folders for offline use…” button displays a folder list. Clicking the check mark or dot toggle the offline use (check being available offline).

From Thunderbird I…

Looking Around

I look around Thunderbird. Filters seem as flexible as Apple Mail. There is a search feature although I don’t use that a lot in e-mail.

One thing I’d like to get away from is having two sets of folders. Filters (aka rules) seem to be attached to folders. By having all mail delivered to local folders I’d only need one set of rules. Because Mac Mail uses IMAP there’s a separate set of folders there. While I can save sent mail, drafts and templates to the Mac Mail folders automatically it doesn’t appear I can have incoming mail sent to it directly. While there is an option to redirect incoming GMail, Mac mail isn’t in the list. I’m not sure I’d want to because this would probably result in multiple copies of e-mails (and probably why it’s not available).

The option to save sent mail, drafts and templates to the server is a plus. While Apple Mail applies the rules to all incoming mail without regard to which mailbox is processing it, at least Thunderbird can deliver all the POP mail to one folder. So in my environment I can send all my e-mail to one set of local folders for rule processing. My Mac mail isn’t used for much of anything besides testing and saving e-mail. So this should work.

Because all my saved mail is in my .Mac mailbox there’s no need for me to try the import from Apple Mail. They got added when I configured .Mac mail and set the folders for offline use.

As for my final requirements, the quality of the Spam filter will remain to be seen and so far I like Thunderbird.

E-Mail Settings
Now it’s time to go through all the settings and customize it to my use. As I configure the additional e-mail accounts I’ll use the same settings.

I make the following changes from the defaults under “Tools” -> “Account Settings:

• Empty trash on Exit enabled
• On replies I change the setting to “start my reply above the quote”

I make the following changes in Preferences:

• I turn off sound and alert notifications for new mail arrival
• I change “forward messages as” from “attachments” to “inline”.
• I enable auto save and leave it set to every 5 minutes.
• I check the return receipts setting but leave it as “Ask me” for all options.
• I change automatic updates (of Thunderbird) to “Ask Me” from the default of auto install
• I disable the setting to load images images if the sender is in my personal address book.

I also disable the preview pane from the view menu and set up the Junk mail filter from the tools menu. I get a message saying the junk mail filter will need to be trained.

I configure my other e-mail accounts in Thunderbird and make it my default e-mail client.

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First I check my extensions:
Google Browser Sync 1.2.20060911.3: Google says it works with 1.5+. So a strict interpretation means it should work. Of course, experience says sometimes software vendors don’t mention an upper limit, especially for unreleased software.
Web Developer 1.0.2: The write-up on the Firefox add-ins page says it works with 2.
Yahoo! Photos Easy Upload Tool 2006.4.17: I couldn’t find any info on this. But it’s the least important add-in as I only downloaded it to evaluate Yahoo Photos and I haven’t started that yet.

So I download a 5.7MB file for the Windows install. (IE was 14.7MB)

I run the setup and it’s a very straightforward setup. I pick custom instead of standard. The only custom install options where the “Dom Inspector” and the “Quality Feedback Agent”. The default is to install them. I keep the defaults. The description of the DOM Inspector is “Inspects the structure and properties of a window and its contents.” The Quality Feedback Agent sends information about program crashes to Mozilla.

I’m asked where I want to install. The default is the same directory that Firefox 1.5 is in. I keep the default.

Next I’m asked where I want the icons created. All three locations are checked by default and I keep them selected. They are “On my desktop”, “In my start menu programs folder”, and “In my quick launch bar”.

The install runs. When it’s done I’m asked if I want to start Firefox. I do.

When starting Firefox checks the add-ins. The only one with a problem is Yahoo! Photos. I click a button to check for an update. There isn’t one. Firefox tells me it will disable the extension and periodically check for an update. No big deal, just means I can’t do bulk uploads to a photo site I’ve yet to use.

On the first start I notice two tabs open. The first tab is an intro page with links to release notes, the add-ins page and my home page. My previous home page is in the second tab.

A quick check shows the Browser Sync and Web Developer add-ins seem to be working fine. Things are going to well I decide to upgrade Firefox on my Mac.

Upgrading Firefox on OS X

I start up Firefox 1.5 on my Mac and make sure browser sync works by using the browser history that should have been synced. There it is. I download the Mac version. It’s a 17.6MB download that’s a DMG disk image file. I double-click the file. When it’s mounted the license screen is displayed. I accept and the typical “Drag this icon to Applications” screen is displayed as shown in this picture:

I drag the icon to my applications folder. After agreeing to let it replace my older version it’s copied. I unmount the disk and start Firefox. I’m again told that the Yahoo! Photos add-in is incompatible. I again check for a compatible version but, as expected, there isn’t one. Just as with the Windows version, two tabs open. The first has the intro page and the second my home page.

First impressions of Firefox 2 are good. There’s now an “X” on each tab to close that tab, rather than one “X” to close the active tab. Unlike IE it still looks a lot like the previous version so there isn’t a radical change to get used to.

Summary

Now, to compare the installation to IE. First, the IE installation wasn’t too bad. But there were certainly more questions, screens and decisions with IE 7. The IE installation took longer. It was excessive, and maybe if I simply clicked through the screens the time might have been closer to Firefox. In both cases (IE and Firefox) I was upgrading existing browsers and they took the settings. Since Firefox is my primary browser, and I sync it between PCs there was certainly more to maintain during the upgrade. The first start up for Firefox was straightforward. The first start up for IE was cluttered with a selection for a tour and to view add-ons (many add-ons were being sold, which was a turn-off for me). IE 7 has a drastic change to the UI of IE 6 (arguably a good thing) while Firefox is similar to the previous version so there’s no hunting for a feature (at least not yet). Bottom line, IE 7 wasn’t enough of an upgrade to make it my primary browser in Windows and now with Firefox 2 it’s less likely. The changes a user (me) sees in Firefox are incremental. Speaking for myself they fall in the category of things I’ve seen in other browsers and liked.

The real test will come as I visit sites with each browser.

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Google Docs and Spreadsheets (Visit Site)
I’ve been using Google Spreadsheets for awhile but nothing big. One sheet to track my fountain pens and another to track car expenses and gas mileage. I’d signed up for Writeley but never used it. I decided to use try using Writeley to write up my Windows XP Install. But behold, the Writely URL brought me to Google Docs and Spreadsheets.

So far it looks like “Docs and Spreadsheets” is nothing more than a new front end that manages both docs (Writeley) and spreadsheets. At this time there doesn’t appear to be any integration of the apps. For example, spreadsheets can’t be embedded into docs. At least not yet. Google avoids comparisons to MS Office.

I’m not heavy into Word Processing or Spreadsheets for home use, but both seem perfectly acceptable for what I need.This blog entry [link removed - blog gone] was done with Docs, which also allowed it to be published here. I could also publicly post the document as shown here.

Definitely worth pursing and I’ll keep using it, at least for now.

Well, well. Just did a spell check on this doc. Interesting that “Google” isn’t in the dictionary and is flagged as misspelled. “Blog” as also flagged as misspelled.

Photo Software
I’ve been looking at what’s out there for low cost digital photo organizing and editing software. I currently have iPhoto which came with the Mac and I have Adobe Photoshop Elements. Haven’t spent a lot of time with either editing photos. I’ve used iPhoto for organizing and Elements for any editing.

I have a Nikon D50 which can do RAW photos so I decided to see what other options are out there. Having seen a few apps for RAW workflow reviewed in the past I found a couple reasonably priced options. Nikon has also released their own photo editing software recently which has gotten good reviews, although it’s more expensive than the other.

I downloaded an eval of Bibble a month or so ago. If I was to buy it I’d be using the “Lite” version which goes for $70. I used it for a bit and liked the results. It’s not like I actually know what to look for in this software but it had options that seemed powerful Isince I had no clue) and options that I could use to improve the photo. It’s only for RAW photo processing. Had the ability to batch process but that’s not something I really need. It was a little slow on my Mac Mini (1GB) but not unbearable.

I recently downloaded an eval of DxO Optic Pro (version 3.5 for the Mac, version 4 is currently only available for Windows). When I installed it a second install kicked of that installed copy protection software which caused the software to lose points. More points were lost a day later when I was gold the eval expired. The download said it was 21 days. The start up expiration message said it was 21 days or 10 uses. I didn’t actually count used but find it hard to believe I started it 10 times (might have been ten photos with each photo being a use).

Anyway, DxO is based upon modules for camera bodies and lenses. These module contain a profile for the body or lens to automatically correct the photo. The eval on allows one lens and they didn’t have a module for the lens I used to take my test photos. But, the automatic updates were OK and there seemed to be plenty of manual controls. Again, it’s not like I know what to look for in this software. The “Starter” version doesn’t support SLR’s so I’d need the Standard version which lists for $150. I didn’t pursue the premature expiration. With my limited requirements I wouldn’t be shelling out $150. While I had only a short time to use it the software displayed previews quicker than Biddle on my Mac but the processing and output of jpg files was slower.

Nikon Capture NX software was recently released from Nikon. I downloaded a 30 day trial. It’s also $150 does. Unlike the DxO software, it’s something I might pay the $150 bucks for. It’s a full featured editor. I uses the concept of control points to make the edits. Another feature I like is it keeps a list of the changes which can be turned on and off as needed without losing the settings or having to go back multiple undoes. Probably not for people who are used to (and like) Photoshop (or similar apps) as the concepts are totally different.

Then there’s the free stuff. Google Picassa 2 has an iPhoto plug-in for uploading to web albums. The Windows version can import the Nikon NEF (RAW) files although not the EXIF camera data. As for the Web Albums there’s a 250MB limit (for free space). An additional 6B is available for $25/year. Interesting that the company that pioneered massive space for e-mail is offering less than others for photos. The Windows client includes some photo editing capabilities (which I haven’t looked at yet). Yahoo photos has unlimited storage for web albums but I didn’t see any photo editor. The upgrade they’re promoting will have the ability to edit photos.

So, bottom line is, I going to continue to look at Capture NX until the eval expires. I can’t justify the $150 price for what I need but it looks intriguing. I just have to look at the free stuff first and expand my skills.

And finally there’s Sharpcast which seems like a really cool concept. They’re currently offering a free (for the remainder of the year) 5GB account. There’s web based photo album piece. But the cool part (if it works) is the syncing between the web and all PCs that have the Sharpcast client. Even if you have only one PC the web storage serves as a seemless backup. They currently only have a Windows client. They promise Mac and iPhoto support. They’ll offer a free account after the beta although the storage amounts and upgrades aren’t announced. The real potential seems to be their planned support for other file types.Here’s some Google searches for information about the software mentioned:

Bibble Photo Software
DxO Optic Pro
Nikon Capture NX
Yahoo Photos
Picassa (Google Photos)
Sharpcast

Linux
Itching to fire up another old PC and do some Linux installs. I haven’t used the PC since moving into this place. Just haven’t had a place to put that big old 21″ CRT. I’ll have to fire up the PC to make sure it survived the move then start looking for some low cost LCD screen. Gotta fire up another OS.

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