Configuring Thunderbird

(Last tested on Version 17.0.3)

Prerequisites

• A supported version of Windows? or Mac OS (may also work with recent versions of Ubuntu)
• A CSAIL IMAP account
  • Many CSAIL accounts have mail forwarding instead: see Email Account Creation and Management
• Thunderbird installed
  • If needed, download from https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/

Instructions

• If prompted with the "Would you like a new email address" wizard, choose Skip this and use my existing email
• At "Mail Account Setup":
  • Your name: Your full name as you want it to appear on your outgoing messages
  • Email address: $YOU@csail.mit.edu
  • Password: Your CSAIL IMAP password
• Click "Continue", then "Done."
• If prompted to "set defaults", we recommend making Thunderbird the default client for email.

Manual Configuration Settings

• Incoming
  • Server Name: imap.csail.mit.edu
  • Port: 143
  • Connection Security: STARTTLS
  • Authentication Method: Encrypted Password
• Outgoing
  • Server Name: outgoing.csail.mit.edu
  • Port: 587
  • Connection Security: STARTTLS
  • Authentication Method: Encrypted Password

Checking and sending mail

• Thunderbird will check automatically.
• We suggest sending a test message to yourself as well.

Optional steps

Folder view: If the ordering of folders in the left panel seems odd, try clicking the > arrow next to "Smart Folders" until it reads "All Folders". Then expand "$YOU@csail.mit.edu" and "Inbox".

User database auto-completion: See LDAP Directory Lookup

-- ArthurProkosch - 17 May 2010