New user, very confused about email and firefox

[sue]

Hi, I have just set up my sys as a Vista/Linux dual boot, I need to access my email from both. Also my firefox bookmarks and sign ons.
I have looked all over the internet for how to do this, and have found many different methods and instructions, most of which say the other way is wrong!
The only thing they seem to agree on is not to share themes and extensions.
What is the simplest, correct way to do this? (Keep in mind, I am an absolute Linux beginner)

Thank you for any help

Susan.

[Jook_roberts]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

I can't help with email, but bookmarks is easy enough.

You can export your bookmarks from your Vista Firefox.
In your Linux Firefox Look under bookmarks, organize bookmarks, import and backup, export to HTML to see what I am talking about (vista should be similar)

Now go to Vista and do the above and select export to HTML. This will create a text style file, I guess it is HTML.
Save this file some place you can get it over to Linux, eg a shared directory, thumb drive, a CD, or whatever.

Reboot into Linux

Open firefox and select bookmarks, organize bookmarks, import and backup, import HTML

Find your file and import it.

Your bookmarks will be imported. Some manual organization will likely be needed after. Beats remaking the all again.

Remember Vista and Linux Firefox are completely separate and do not share bookmarks, that I know of.

[Jook_roberts]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Help us out. What type of e-mail are you using eg Gmail, hotmail, something from work your ISP's pop3?
I don't even know what POP3 means.

I think we may need a little more info.

Hey BTW, welcome to Linux

[vinnywright]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Kmail would be your e-mail clyent or you can DL thunderbird these ar your outlook counerparts hear.

the bookmarks you can export to file and then import to your linux's firefox.

VINNY

[kjjjjshab]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

You should consider IMAP instead of POP for email... it keeps the email on the server instead of downloading to an application... but you can still use Thunderbird, Outlook, KMail, etc. And once you view/delete an email those changes get remembered.

The only downside would be that your email is on the server so if you provider goes bust you would lose your email (of course there are ways to back it up and work offline, etc.). It can be slower to use as well.

IMAP is especially great for if you want to try out different email apps without needed to export/import email along the way.

For firefox, use an extension called Xmarks. It stores your bookmarks and logins on a server so they are accessible by both installs of firefox without the need to be exporting/importing. Again, you should be making your own backups though.

So once again, to summarize, the methods above don't share anything with the actual application installations... no need to worry about all those pitfalls...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interne...ccess_Protocol
http://www.xmarks.com/

[sue]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Sadly I cannot find any way to get IMAP with a yahoo account
As for firefox, is Xmars trustworthy? Do they access the stored passwords?

[dtr]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

I haven't had any problem with Xmarks at all. I don't use them for passwords - just my bookmarks. I use sxipper add-on for my password storage, but that's just because I started using the sxipper add-on first.

[Fintan]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Sadly I cannot find any way to get IMAP with a yahoo account

If you are using yahoo all you need is a browser

If you are using a e-mail client then I would suggest using thunderbird on both machines / os's.
Then you can point both thunderbirds to the same e-mail folder.

x-marks is very good and reliable. Of course I wouldn't trust anyone with my passwords.

There is also this:
http://cybernetnews.com/2007/10/24/c...u-and-windows/

Hope this helps

[sue]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Thank you all for helping
I have decided not to sync firefox, but am sharing thunderbird profile, so far so good

[doctordruidphd]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

I have decided not to sync firefox

Probably a good thing. Many firefox extensions are OS-dependent, so if you try to share the same profile between Win and Linux, it may choke. Mine sure did...

[Fintan]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Probably a good thing. Many firefox extensions are OS-dependent, so if you try to share the same profile between Win and Linux, it may choke.

x-marks works fine between win and linux.

http://www.xmarks.com/

[Pillage Idiot]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

You could change your bookmarks to symbolically link to the windows bookmarks.
Open your home folder and press alt+. to show the hidden folders.
Navigate into the .mozilla/firefox/randomnumbers.default folder and rename the bookmarks.html file.

Next go to split view mode (handy little button on the tool bar) and navigate into your profile folder in your documents and settings.
It should be in application data from memory.
Find the bookmarks.html file here and drag it into the linux profile folder in the other pane.
When it prompts move/copy/link choose link.

Firefox in linux won't know that it is looking at a link, and will read the file from your windows profile.
Any changes made in any session will be stored in the same file in your windows profile.

You can create symbolic links this way for other folders and files too, for example to get to your my documents folder easily from your home folder.

[Detonate]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

I use an extension named "Password Exporter" to save my passwords in xml format, then they can easily be imported to the other system. Then I immediately delete the file for security reasons. Works for me.

[olejnikster]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Sadly I cannot find any way to get IMAP with a yahoo account
As for firefox, is Xmars trustworthy? Do they access the stored passwords?

I've been using xmarks(foxmarks until the name change recently to xmarks), for years to keep my bookmarks, and recently passwords safe and easily accesible for me(system reinstalls and other public computer access through xmarks website as well). Safe and you can sync your bookmarks with ie7 as well,to linux firefox or windows firefox. But you could try to forward your yahoo emails automatically to another email such as the one google has(Gmail). By that you could access it by IMAP OR POP3 easily. So as when you get an email on yahoo it gets delivered to your Gmail and further retrieved by you on your PC. How about that?

[Detonate]

Re: New user, very confused about email and firefox

Yahoo mail. You can get mail forwarding and POP access only if you upgrade to Mail Plus. That's $20 a year. You get POP access with Gmail for now extra charge. I use POP access for both, with Thunderbird. Works great. Only thing is sometimes they both put messages in your spam folder that should not be there, so you have to check it once in a while to retrieve those messages. I am slowly moving totally to gmail and away from yahoo. Only reason I keep it that I've been using it for over ten years, and there are still a lot of people who have that address.