Thunderbird:Message Signatures

The current Thunderbird signature system is lacking some simple improvements that could make it useful to most people.

Goals

There are a set of goals we need to achieve here, a single primary goal of making things simpler and easier and some secondary goals to improve the system for extending beyond our primary goal.

Primary

Improve the Thunderbird signature editor enough that any person could create a single default signature per account and easily have that signature inserted into their compose window.

Secondary

Encourage signature extensions which create a greater signature editing and inserting experience for users.

Relevant Links

• Thunderbird:Collected_User_Requests#Better_signature_management
• Signature Block

Relevant Extensions

• QuickText
• Signature Switch
• Tagzilla

Relevant Bugs

These bugs are for creating, editing, and using signatures in Thunderbird and MailNews

Thunderbird

• bug 324495 — put signature editing in UI (rather than select a file)
  • contains patch waiting for review of reading sig from prefs
  • has a number of screenshot of other signature editors from other apps

MailNews

• bug 58406 — [RFE] let user choose signature separator
  • Lengthy bug, can people choose '--' to be at their signature heading
• bug 219197 — Put signature in UI textarea rather than selecting file
  • asking for a simple editing window for signature creation
• bug 73567 — Ability to select from multiple signatures (global / per account?)
  • Many mockups of signature managers and buttons for insertion
• bug 37644 — Show signature in collapsible pane for editing/switching
  • ASCII mockups of a bottom pane for signatures