However, it’s not pretty and it is clunky in many areas. Lightning is also clunky, but it’s great with Google Calendar, so I like it. I don’t currently use it, however. This is because of the sloppy look and the complete inability to use a normal, 12 hour calendar to input events, that is, I want to input events the way I do in Outlook where I can type in the date, and then set AM/PM.  Thunderbird makes you use a clunky, ugly 24 hour interface.

None of these problems are present in the latest release of Thunderbird. That’s because they chose to not even include Lightning, or any calendar application. Lightening isn’t even compatible with Thunderbird 3. Disappointing.

Picky? You bet. But when comparing Thunderbird to Outlook, one of the best schedule and email programs available, this program really needs to shape up. I’m absolutely perplexed that Mozilla would release Thunderbird when it’s not really finished. I’ll try this again when Lightening is updated to work with Thunderbird 3 – until then it’s recycle bin time.