Thunderbird: address books and e-mail lists

An address book card contains the information about one e-mail contact address.
You can find on this page as an example of an address book card: Name: ann.sonders Email: ann.sonders@ictp.it
You can create easily a single address book card:

• in the main thunderbird window bar click on Address Book
• and then in the Address Book window click on New Card.

A list contains a list of your e-mail contacts.
You can find on this page as an example of a list name: colleagueslist.

An address book can contain: address book cards and lists.
You can find on this page as examples of two address books names: Personal Address Book and newcolleagues.

a) Create a file with the extension “ .txt ” (for example newcollegues.txt) writing in each line only one e-mail address. To avoid any problem due to different versions of Thunderbird, please insert an EMPTY LINE as first line of the file.



b) Run Thunderbird.

c) On main thunderbird bar:

• 1) Click on Tools;
• 2) then select Import …
  

d) In the Import window:

• 1) select Address Books box;
• 2) click on Next.
  

e) In next the Import window:

• 1) select Text file (LDIF, .tab, .csv, .txt);
• 2) and click on Next.
  

f) In the Select address book file window:

• 1) select as file types Tab Delimited;
• 2) select the filename.txt previously created (for example newcolleagues.txt);
• 3) then click on Open.
  

g) In the Import Address Book window, please check:
the Primary Email box have to be checked and pay attention it have to be on the first position of Address Book fields column. If it is not:

• 1) put a check into Primary Email box;
• 2) move Primary Email* line in the first position of the column, select Primary Email* line then move it up using the Move Up buttom;
• 3) all the other boxes in Address book fields column have to be unchecked (unselected);

• 4) after checking the Import Address Book window, click on OK.
  

h) In the Import window: click on Finish.



i) Select Address Book.



l) In the Address book window (on the left):

• 1) select the address book name just created (in our example newcolleagues);
  
• 2) then you will see its content.
  

a) In the main thunderbird window, click on Address Book.



b) In the address book window:

• 1) select the address book name where you wish to keep the list (for example Personal Address Book);
• 2) then click on New List.

c) In the Mailing List window:

• 1) write a list name in the List Name: field (for example colleagueslist) and
• 2) – optionally – you can write a a short description in the Description: field (for example colleagues list for June);
• 3) then OK.

d) In the address book window:
click on the Plus sign “ + ” on the left of the Personal Address Book (on the left sidebar).


e) In the same address book window:

• 1) now you can see the list (for example colleagueslist) just created;
• 2) and then select the address book name (for example newcolleagues) where the e-mail contacts you need are stored.

f) In the same address book window:
- f1) to select all the e-mail contacts of newcolleagues address book:

• 1) click on Edit and
• 2) on Select All to select all the e-mail address of newcolleagues address book.
  

OR
- f2) to select some e-mail contacts only:

• click on each e-mail contact you need, always pressing <CTRL> button.

All the e-mail contacts selected will have a blue line color as background.

g) Drag the selected e-mail contacts on the newcolleagues list name (previously created).



h) If you select the newcolleagues list, you will be able to see the e-mail contacts present in it.



If you now click on write (in the same Address Book window), a new Compose window will appear and all the e-mail contacts of the newcolleagues list will be inserted in different To: fields of the header.



But very often you could need to write an e-mail inserting an e-mail list in the Bcc: (blind carbon copy) field of the header. Please start from the main thunderbird window selecting write, then write the e-mail list name (for example newcolleagueslist) in a Bcc: field of the header.