Finding add ons that have not been reviewed

Thunderbird Add-ons
#1

I have been using TBird for a couple of years now and did not want to
updgrade to v68 because one of my must-use Add Ons, HeaderTools Lite was
no longer supported and I could not find a replacement. I emailed TBird
support about this and got a reply about a new version, found here

updated by someone other than the original author. It replicates all
the old add-on features in a version compatible with v68. However it
says “not reviewed by Mozilla.”

I have installed it and it seems to work fine. I have 2 questions.

  1. How long does it take for Mozilla to review and presumably approve a
    new add on?
  2. When I tried searching for Headertools Lite in the add-ons search,
    all I get are the older versions that no longer work. I can’t seem to
    find it with a search and if not for my posting a question, would still
    be out of luck. Is the reason I can’t find it with search because it
    has not been reviewed? If so, it seems like I should be able to search
    for non-reviewed items.

Thank you.

#2

I’m not certain about this but…
If you look at the page for Header Tools Lite you’ll see that there is a stripey background to the download button and it says “This add-on has been marked as experimental by its developers”. If, when uploading an addon, the developer specify it is experimental, it will be subject to automated checking (for disallowed code) but will not be reviewed at all by Mozilla. It is also not displayed if you search for it - you have to know it exists and know the URL. The advantage for the developer is that it’s signed and available immediately on addons.thunderbird.net (or addons.mozilla.org if it’s a firefox addon) and the devloper can give the URL to other people to test.

#3

Thank you for the explanation. Well it seems to be working fine for me. I hope it gets beyond experimental status and is approved so others can use it. The workarounds that have been suggested, namely dragging the message into the drafts folder to edit the subject, create a problem. When you drag the message back, with the new subject, the FROM line has been changed from the original sender to your own name. I find FROM as important as the subject.

#4

Well, my explanation (which was based on what used to happen in Firefox) seems to be wrong - or incomplete. I just submitted an new TB addon - it uses the Mail Extension Experiment API - which might make a difference. I marked it ‘experimental’, and it went onto the review queue. Maybe new addons are reviewed while updates are not. I found another option to make it invisible, so experimental addons must be visible in some circumstances.
I notice that all versions of Header Tools Lite were experimental, BTW: https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/addon/header-tools-lite/versions/
And, despite the comment in the review, none of them claim to work with 68.

#5

That is my point. When you search for Header Tools Lite all you get is the link you report, and none of those versions work with v68. However in a later response to my initial question sfhowes posted the following link
<https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/addon/headertools-lite/>

It takes you to the new version that DOES work in 68, but no amount of searching I do can find it. That is my concern. And ever worse, when I pasted the URL into this message without the double less than/greater than symbols surrounding it, the Mozilla system automatically converted it to a link, as you see in my first message above, and that converted link was INCORRECT. It is the link to the older versions that don’t work

Very confusing

#6

Oh, I see. Dillinger has produced a new addon - based on the same code - with a similar name. I thought you got it from the link you posted. And I was right that it’s marked as experimental - though whether that’s why you can’t search for it I don’t know.

#7

But the prior version Download buttons were also striped and are marked as experimental and you can find them. Odd, eh?