I am usually not that big a fan of add-ons, plugins etc., for the simple reason that I really hate having to collect them from different websites only to get the program I want running and having to repeat all that every time i switch to another computer. But for some plugins the gain in productivity outweighs the extra effort downloading them. For Thunderbird the add-ons I can recommend are:

  • Enigmail, which gives you gnupg integration for Thunderbird
  • External Editor, which allows you to compose mails with your favorite editor (think (g)vim).
  • Colored Diffs, which is a must-have if you read mailinglists where patches are posted.

Colored Diffs

The last plugin is especially cool, since it allows you to read patches much easier than in the raw format.