Howto: Add thunderbird to Indicator Applet

[shortcut144]

This has worked for me to far on Karmic. I think it would be the same if any other versions use the indicator applet. If you would also like to have notification from libnotify, follow this <a href="http://www.theopensourcerer.com/2010/02/09/indicator-applet-libnotify-support-for-thunderbird/"]http://www.theopensourcerer.com/2010/02/09/indicator-applet-libnotify-support-for-thunderbird/">post</a>

1. Add a Desktop file for Indicator Applet

sudo touch /usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

2. Add new text to this file.

sudo nano /usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=Mozilla Thunderbird Mail/News
Comment=Read/Write Mail/News with Mozilla Thunderbird
GenericName=Mail Client
Exec=thunderbird-3.0 %u		#Change according to your Thunderbird command
Terminal=false
X-MultipleArgs=false
Type=Application
Icon=thunderbird
Categories=Application;Network;Email;
MimeType=text/html;text/xml;application/xhtml+xml;application/xml;application/vnd.mozilla.xul+xml;application/rss+xml;application/rdf+xml;
StartupWMClass=Thunderbird-bin
StartupNotify=true

3. Add another new file for indicator Applet.

sudo touch /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird

4. Add text to the file.

sudo nano /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird

/usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

Close and exit the Terminal.

Now Logout and Login and Thunderbird should be in your indicator applet.

[sambita]

Awesome thanks!

[Kaobear]

Worked awesome, thanks!

[OzzyFrank]

At step 3 after sudo touch /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird I get this error:

touch: cannot touch `/usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird': No such file or directory

Any ideas?

[stanna]

thank god for this little hack, cheers dude. worked like a charm. should be easier to add/remove things to the inficator.. for people like me who dont know all that much.

[albinootje]

At step 3 after sudo touch /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird I get this error:

touch: cannot touch `/usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird': No such file or directory

The touch command is not even needed here, just continue with :
sudo nano /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird

Perhaps the directory /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/ is not there on your computer for some reason ?

[sayantandas]

This has worked for me to far on Karmic. I think it would be the same if any other versions use the indicator applet. If you would also like to have notification from libnotify, follow this <a href="http://www.theopensourcerer.com/2010/02/09/indicator-applet-libnotify-support-for-thunderbird/"]http://www.theopensourcerer.com/2010/02/09/indicator-applet-libnotify-support-for-thunderbird/">post</a>

1. Add a Desktop file for Indicator Applet

sudo touch /usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

2. Add new text to this file.

sudo nano /usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Name=Mozilla Thunderbird Mail/News
Comment=Read/Write Mail/News with Mozilla Thunderbird
GenericName=Mail Client
Exec=thunderbird-3.0 %u		#Change according to your Thunderbird command
Terminal=false
X-MultipleArgs=false
Type=Application
Icon=thunderbird
Categories=Application;Network;Email;
MimeType=text/html;text/xml;application/xhtml+xml;application/xml;application/vnd.mozilla.xul+xml;application/rss+xml;application/rdf+xml;
StartupWMClass=Thunderbird-bin
StartupNotify=true

3. Add another new file for indicator Applet.

sudo touch /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird

4. Add text to the file.

sudo nano /usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird

/usr/share/applications/thunderbird.desktop

Close and exit the Terminal.

Now Logout and Login and Thunderbird should be in your indicator applet.

a fantastic post!! I am going to link this to my blog. thanks again.

[hellblazer]

yeah! thanks!

[OzzyFrank]

I can't do the 2nd part:

touch: cannot touch `/usr/share/indicators/messages/applications/thunderbird': No such file or directory


I don't even have /usr/share/indicators. I'm running Lucid 64-bit. Any ideas? Cheers.

[OzzyFrank]

Oh... OK, hehe... /usr/share/indicators was no longer on my system (and hence any subfolders) because while trying to get rid of the Evolution notifier and get my volume button back, I uninstalled indicator-messages. Actually, I think I did that after I realised I didn't have to put up with indicator-applet since all I needed was the old gnome-volume-control-applet. Anyway, just successfully added Thunderbird to the Indicator Applet... (now I just have to figure out what happened to my system tray, and why adding a new notification area gives me nothing but its drag bar thingy!).

So anyone else who had the same error:

sudo apt-get install indicator-messages

If your system tray is missing afterwards, as with me, just logout and back in, or reboot.

While I actually won't be displaying Indicator Applet all the time, not until they let me customise away that horrifically large spacing between icons, I'll leave it installed so I can play with cool tips like this. Hopefully one day we won't need hacks, but it will have a config GUI app. But I must say I'm both impressed and surprised that of the apps I have running, besides Rhythmbox the only other app using this notifier is KAlarm, a KDE app, hehe.