1424518 - Add-on ImportExportTools: Importing messages or mbox files doesn't work in 58.0b1 (32-bit)

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Thunderbird :: Untriaged, defect)

Description

[Robert Miles]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:57.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/57.0
Build ID: 20171206182557

Steps to reproduce:

Tried to import an mbox file from Thunderbird on my other computer. Then tried to import the individual .eml files which I had exported on my other computer.


Actual results:

When I told it to import either an mbox file or an individual message, either after clicking on Tools or after clicking on the folder I wanted to import into, then clicking on ImportExportTools, the box for selecting what file to import did not appear, leaving no way to do the import.


Expected results:

The box for selecting the file to import should have appeared, and after selecting a file, the import should have been done.

Note above also tried under Earlybird 54.0a2 (2017-06-20) (32-bit).  Box to select file to import did appear any of the ways tried.

Comment 1

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

We don't track add-on problems here, please contact the author.

Due to may interface changes in TB 58, all add-ons need to be carefully reviewed by their authors. I believe that the author of ImportExportTools, https://freeshell.de/~kaosmos/index-en.html, hasn't update any of his add-ons for TB 58. I in fact updated "Profile Switcher" myself since I use it.

Comment 2

[Robert Miles]

The author announced on his web site that he would not support ImportExportTools any longer, so I see no point in contacting him.

I found that 58.0b1 (which calls itself 57.0 in some places) has a few other ways to export messages and mbox files, but apparently no other way to import messages no longer on the server, or import mbox files.  Should I prepare to abandon use of Thunderbird and switch to some other email/news program that can import messages and mbox files?

What computer language is Profile Switcher written in?  There's a small chance that I could update ImportExportTools myself if it's in a computer language I've already used.  Where can I get the source code of ImportExportTools if it's in a computer language I've already used?

Is any other add-on able to import messages and mbox files, while running under 58.0b1?

Comment 3

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

I can't see the announcement you mentioned in a hurry.

Add-on XPI files are just ZIP files, you can unpack with 7Zip or WinZip. The code is written in JavaScript. A list of changes you need to make is here: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/Add-ons_Guide_57

I've looked at the add-on and sadly it uses the JAR format internally, so you need to use a Java Decompiler to extract the sources. After modifying the files, I suggest not to pack it as JAR any more and to modify the chrome.manifest accordingly.

For someone who knows what they are doing, it's possibly an exercise of 30 minutes to get the add-on running again (as I said, I fixed Profile Switcher by the same author), but the Thunderbird team can't really take over thousands of add-ons that authors have abandoned.

See recent discussing on the Maildev mailing list at:
http://lists.thunderbird.net/pipermail/maildev_lists.thunderbird.net/2017-December/date.html
[Maildev] Integrating popular and useful extensions into TB

BTW, nothing stops you from installing two TB versions in parallel. You could then do import/export in TB 52.

Comment 4

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

(In reply to Jorg K (GMT+1) from comment #3)
> For someone who knows what they are doing, it's possibly an exercise of 30
> minutes to get the add-on running again ...
I have to eat my words here :-(
Since it's a grey and cold Sunday afternoon, I thought I take a look (after fixing HeaderToolsLight by the same author in five minutes).

So following the "add-ons guide" I went to work replacing nsILocalFile with nsIFile, and {get,set}ComplexValue() with {get,set}StringPref(). I also did the de-JAR'ing, but then I got stuck on the replacement of nsIFilePicker.show(). That's tricky since sync code needs to become async :-(. And that's not a mechanical replacement, but at worst a restructuring for the code. And since there are 17 such calls, that would take time.

Comment 5

[Robert Miles]

Firefox will no longer allow me to access the author's site, so I can no longer find the announcement either.

XPI - I was able to extract the .jar file. However, none of the Java decompilers I found will let me see the decompiled source code.

I do not follow the chrome.manifest format well enough to think I can modify it in a useful way.

I've never used JavaScript before, but the size of the .jar file was small enough that I decided to see if I could at least understand it if I could decode it.

Maildev - looks useful for the future, but not yet.

Two TB versions - looks best for now if I can still find TB 52 already compiled for Windows.

Comment 6

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

I use "Java Decompiler" do convert the JAR file into a ZIP. I can give you my WIP (work in progress), but without JS skills, you won't be able to do the nsIFilePicker.show() replacement.

TB 52 ESR is the official version, so you can get it easily, for example here:
https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/all/

Comment 7

[Robert Miles]

Two TB versions - also installing TB 52 allowed me to resume moving messages and mbox files form one profile or computer to another.

Which Java Decompiler?  I found 8.  Six of them give error messages and no output file.  One gives a ZIP file, but it only contains a text file saying that the decompile was successful.

Comment 8

[Robert Miles]

The last one gives no error messages, but no decompiled output either.

Comment 9

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

Attachment: importexporttools.zip - WIP, NOT working

I used JD-GUI 1.4 from http://jd.benow.ca/.

Attached my WIP:
- de-JAR'ed
- nsILocalFile -> nsIFile done
- {get,set}ComplexValue() -> {get,set}StringPref() done
- nsIFilePicker.show() (sync) -> nsIFilePicker.open() (async)
  NOT done.

All this version does is show Options in the Add-ons Manager, I didn't see a menu item yet to do something useful.

Comment 10

[Jorg K (CEST = GMT+2)]

Comment on attachment 8936216 [details]
importexporttools.zip - WIP, NOT working

This should be working: http://www.jorgk.com/misc/addons58