EmailDiscussions.com - View Single Post - New Year Tip: CardBook extension for Thunderbird

InfamousGrouse · 8 Jan 2017, 11:29 PM

Thanks for the tip; CardBook seems both light and powerful and doesn't throw errors like SOGO used to so I've switched over to it, added my FastMail Address Book as a CardDAV account, and almost everything is perfect.

Almost.

The issue I'm having is with Groups. While Groups set up within FastMail do seem to work in Thunderbird (I have sent test e-mails and they go to the correct recipients) they are displayed within CardBook as if they were individual contacts, and do not appear in the tree structure in the way they did using SOGO.

The Family Name and Display Name are the same as the FastMail Group name but no other fields are populated and there is no indication as to which contacts are members of the Group, or ability to edit it.

If I right-click on the Group within CardBook there's an option to "convert list to category" which uses the Group name to create a Category with which the individual contacts are tagged. This does make the Group editable, and it show sup in the CardBook tree structure, but alas it destroys whatever voodoo FastMail uses to construct its Groups. When I next use the webmail interface after sycning, the FastMail Group is gone.

It's unclear whether this is a limitation of FastMail's Groups, or of CardBook's UI, or both.

Like I said, the system does work and in many ways it's actually better than SOGO (I also had to maintain both FastMail Groups and local Thunderbird groups when using SOGO due to similar syncing issues). But while Groups do seem to transparently work using CardBook, I would prefer to be able to see what was going on "under the hood" rather than just relying on something I can't see into. The ability to edit Groups from within CardBook would also be nice.

I would contact the CardBook author directly but he seems to be using Chrome Store feedback has his primary support platform and it's less than ideal for the job. At this point I'm really just looking for a) any pointers to things I might have missed, and b) a confidence boost that I haven't done anything wrong.

Thanks again for the recommendation. I was never fully happy with SOGO and this seems like a much better option.

8 Jan 2017, 11:29 PM	#2
InfamousGrouse Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Posts: 20	Thanks for the tip; CardBook seems both light and powerful and doesn't throw errors like SOGO used to so I've switched over to it, added my FastMail Address Book as a CardDAV account, and almost everything is perfect. Almost. The issue I'm having is with Groups. While Groups set up within FastMail do seem to work in Thunderbird (I have sent test e-mails and they go to the correct recipients) they are displayed within CardBook as if they were individual contacts, and do not appear in the tree structure in the way they did using SOGO. The Family Name and Display Name are the same as the FastMail Group name but no other fields are populated and there is no indication as to which contacts are members of the Group, or ability to edit it. If I right-click on the Group within CardBook there's an option to "convert list to category" which uses the Group name to create a Category with which the individual contacts are tagged. This does make the Group editable, and it show sup in the CardBook tree structure, but alas it destroys whatever voodoo FastMail uses to construct its Groups. When I next use the webmail interface after sycning, the FastMail Group is gone. It's unclear whether this is a limitation of FastMail's Groups, or of CardBook's UI, or both. Like I said, the system does work and in many ways it's actually better than SOGO (I also had to maintain both FastMail Groups and local Thunderbird groups when using SOGO due to similar syncing issues). But while Groups do seem to transparently work using CardBook, I would prefer to be able to see what was going on "under the hood" rather than just relying on something I can't see into. The ability to edit Groups from within CardBook would also be nice. I would contact the CardBook author directly but he seems to be using Chrome Store feedback has his primary support platform and it's less than ideal for the job. At this point I'm really just looking for a) any pointers to things I might have missed, and b) a confidence boost that I haven't done anything wrong. Thanks again for the recommendation. I was never fully happy with SOGO and this seems like a much better option.