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I want to install Thunderbird 2 on my laptop, which now has Ubuntu 10.04 on it. I'd prefer to use the Ubuntu package system if that's possible, but with all the tools included in Ubuntu, only Thunderbird 3 is offered, and I don't like Thunderbird 3.

Is there an older package repository I can point to or something like that?

Step-by-step instructions would be appreciated; while I'm a relatively experienced Unix user, I'm fairly new to Ubuntu, apt, and desktop Linux in general.

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2 Answers

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The latest installation can be found in Download Thunderbird 2.

Download thunderbird-2.0.0.24.tar.gz and then follow the instructions in the article:
Manually Install Thunderbird 2
(read the comments as well.)

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I know how to build it from source, I was just hoping there was a way to do it using a package. – davidcl Sep 27 '10 at 13:03
It seems like TB3 has replaced TB2 as latest package. However, it might not be necessary to build it from source, if the downloaded package is compatible enough (see my second link). – harrymc Sep 27 '10 at 13:15
Okay, got it-- didn't realize the download provided by mozilla was a compiled package. Unfortunately, the downloaded version fails on a libc++.so.5 dependency, so it looks like I'm building from source. – davidcl Sep 27 '10 at 13:23
Yup, it does look like you do. – harrymc Sep 27 '10 at 14:01
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Going back to older software can be a big problem if the software uses shared library code as that shared lib code may not be available in the new OS release. Even if you found the old package it might not work without the effort of finding the old shared libs too. IF you wanted to rebuild from source that would be different - but also nontrivial.

It probably sounds like overkill but the only solution I can think of that will work is to find an older version of Ubuntu that came with Tbird 2.0 and run it in a VM. If you've got 4 GB RAM or more on the laptop it stands a pretty fair chance of working - with 2 GB or less and it starts to get iffy since a modern GUI (gnome/KDE) is going to need at least a 512MB RAM VM in my experience.

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Nah, not running it in a VM. I think you're saying that installing the old package may fail because of shared library incompatibilities; but I probably wouldn't have that problem if I built from source? Am I understanding that correctly? – davidcl Sep 27 '10 at 12:57
Yes. Most packages are not built with static linkage. I've run into it numerous times on several OS, not just Linux. – hotei Sep 27 '10 at 14:39

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