This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Mailmerge in Thunderbird 78.2.2

  • 12 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by philip32

more options

This seems to be an old problem but nobody else has reported this in Thunderbird 78.2.2 as far as I can see. Trying to do MailMerge, which I have used literally hundreds of times in earlier versions, I put {{Email}} (or whatever) in the To: field, and it says:

No recipients were specified. Please enter a recipient or newsgroup in the addressing area.

This is obviously nonsense - the whole point is that MailMerge INSERTS the email addresses. If this can't be fixed, Thunderbird will be useless to me.

This seems to be an old problem but nobody else has reported this in Thunderbird 78.2.2 as far as I can see. Trying to do MailMerge, which I have used literally hundreds of times in earlier versions, I put {{Email}} (or whatever) in the To: field, and it says: No recipients were specified. Please enter a recipient or newsgroup in the addressing area. This is obviously nonsense - the whole point is that MailMerge INSERTS the email addresses. If this can't be fixed, Thunderbird will be useless to me.

Chosen solution

From the Add-On details web page, which you can see from Tools -> Add-ons-> Extensions then click on MailMerge in "Manage Extensions"

It says: "Thunderbird 78: Mail Merge 7.2.1 is fully compatible with Thunderbird 78!

Variable(s) in the To field in Thunderbird 78: You must hit "Enter" or "Tab" once you have added the variable(s) in the To field. This change is caused by the new "pills" in Thunderbird 78."

So that's the answer - RTFM (although admittedly this is quite obscure in this case).

I've tried this - it works, thank you! Apart from this, this is a fantastic and very useful add-on.

(Although now I see that the Subject is not appearing for some reason?)

Read this answer in context 👍 1

All Replies (12)

more options

Maybe you can try to update that add-on? If automatic update doesn't show anything search it and install it manually

more options

Thanks, I tried that. I have checked for updates. This is MailMerge 7.2.1 which says it is fully compatible with Thunderbird 78. Obviously not, unless something very odd is with my profiles.

more options

Yep, profile files might have been corrupted. You might try these steps: Click the Application menu button, then go to the Help menu and choose Troubleshooting Information. A new tab will open with information about your setup. Click on Open Folder -close TB -copy (do not move nor delete) prefs.js file(s) (might be multiple pref-nnnn.js files) on desktop or any other place -then open TB, open your profile again and now delete (same file(s)) prefs.js now. Restart TB.

Do you see any difference?

Modified by svlad2009

more options

I'm not sure that I quite understand the instructions, because if I delete prefs.js then I lose all of my email accounts and have to reset up again. However, I have just tried with a completely new profile, and set up just one email account in it, added MailMerge to my new profile, and get exactly the same problem.

more options

I have downloaded and re-installed Thunderbird 68. Of course, I can't use this with my existing profiles because they have been updated to TB 78. However, created a new profile, installed MailMerge, works as normal. (It also has MailMerge as an option under Send, which I much prefer and seems to have gone from TB78)

more options

The copy action mentioned above was for "back-up". Also, if you delete those files while TB is on (active/working) then when you'll close TB that file will be created automatically again... It was safe...

Anyway, now, for downgrade you can still use your old profile if you want... First start with command -p to select from profile manager that "not working anymore" profile and start it. It will show an error - click exit. Now start again with a command: --allow-downgrade

Modified by svlad2009

more options

Thanks again for your help. I tried your suggestion of deleting prefs.js (I made a copy first, of course), while TB is running, and next time I started it did indeed create (or re-create) prefs.js. However, this didn't solve the problem. I don't want to downgrade the profiles because I want to remain on the release update channel, but I have two email accounts that I regularly use for MailMerge, so I will make two profiles that I only use when I need MailMerge and run these from TB 68 if necessary. By this I mean that I have renamed TB 78 to Thunderbird78.app in Applications (this is MacOS), downloaded TB 68 from https://download.mozilla.org/?product=thunderbird-68.1.1-SSL&os=osx&lang=en-US (yes, I know this is an old version - I allowed it to update to 6812.0 but NOT to 78.2.2.), installed it in Applications, and then renamed this downloaded/updated version to "Thunderbird68.app". I've tried completely new Profiles, even a clean profiles.ini file, nothing seems to make MailMerge work with TB 78. I also usually put profiles in a non-standard folder so that I can keep them separated for each project I work on. However, it might be a permissions problem since I never run with Admin privileges maybe? I'm surprised, if there is a bug with MailMerge on TB78, if nobody else has this problem?

Modified by philip32

more options

However, downgrading to TB 68 is only part of the answer (and it's not a satisfactory solution, but it's a work-around), because you have to stop it automatically updating to TB 78! I had to disconnect from the Internet, turn off WiFi, and then to Preferences -> Advanced -> Update to turn off automatic updates.

more options

As MailMerge is an add-on you might try contacting the authors and report them this issue. They might have also a solution as, indeed, downgrading TB should not be considered as a permanent solution...

Modified by svlad2009

more options

How do I find the Author(s) to contact them?

more options

Chosen Solution

From the Add-On details web page, which you can see from Tools -> Add-ons-> Extensions then click on MailMerge in "Manage Extensions"

It says: "Thunderbird 78: Mail Merge 7.2.1 is fully compatible with Thunderbird 78!

Variable(s) in the To field in Thunderbird 78: You must hit "Enter" or "Tab" once you have added the variable(s) in the To field. This change is caused by the new "pills" in Thunderbird 78."

So that's the answer - RTFM (although admittedly this is quite obscure in this case).

I've tried this - it works, thank you! Apart from this, this is a fantastic and very useful add-on.

(Although now I see that the Subject is not appearing for some reason?)

more options

"Enter" or "Tab" (but not simply moving the cursor to the next field) solved my problem with entries in the "To" field in the header.

I noticed that for sending email from some accounts (but not others - I have lots of email accounts), the Subject line was removed at the moment of saving the message to the Templates folder.

It turned out that this is something to do with end-to-end encryption. It only happens for email addresses which have a personal OpenPGP key (and maybe S/MIME, but I haven't tried). I found that I can "fix" this by selecting not to use OpenPGP for this identity: Tools -> Accounts -> account -> End-To-End Encryption -> "Thunderbird found 1 personal OpenPGP key associated with xxx" -> click "None" Do not use OpenPGP for this identity.

For me, this is a very minor problem, but there could be others, and maybe myself in other circumstances, who would like to digitally sign Mail Merge emails.