Using gvim as editor for Thunderbird

5,951

Solution 1

At this web site you can find a non official thunderbird extension to use an external editor of your choice:

http://globs.org/download.php?lng=en

Solution 2

As enzotib stated, you should use the external editor plugin.

The direct link to the plugin should be this: http://globs.org/file/exteditor_v090.xpi

You'll need to download the plugin, then go to Thunderbird and do: Tools -> Add-ons -> Install Add-on from file (from drop-down at top-right)

Then, you will need to set the preferences for the plugin so the external editor is gVim. On linux, that will probably just be 'gvim -f'.

Most importantly, you will then need to add the 'External Editor' button to your toolbar. Without adding the toolbar button the plugin would not work for me. Below I included a picture where you can see the 'External Editor' button that I'm referring to. After adding the toolbar button, you can launch the external editor with the toolbar button or CTRL-E

enter image description here

Solution 3

Try Teledactyl. You can do much more vim-oriented things with it but if you're only interested in editing files in vim, it also works, just disable all of it and keep the external editor feature on.

This is what I had (use GMail interface now) in my .teledactylrc file:

:set editor='gvim -S .vimrcforvimperator -f'
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somasekhar
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somasekhar

Hi, I am Martin Ueding, a physicist (Dr.), Machine Learning researcher and programmer. My areas of interest are natural language processing, theoretical physics, numerical methods and high performance programming. My strongest programming languages are C++, Python, R and Bash.

Updated on September 18, 2022

Comments

  • somasekhar
    somasekhar about 1 year

    Can I somehow use gvim to compose my email messages in Thunderbird?

  • Knowledge Cube
    Knowledge Cube over 12 years
    that tutorial assumes that vim is being used as the external editor, not gvim (which the asker wants to use). Would this still work fine, or what changes would be necessary?
  • vhbsouza
    vhbsouza over 12 years
    Here on my computer, no changes were necessary. :D
  • Nich Del
    Nich Del over 7 years
    Note from the future: This extension doesn't appear to work with newer versions.
  • Hi-Angel
    Hi-Angel over 6 years
    @NichDel it works, see the answer below (i.e. about adding the toolbar).