[Solved]How to import multiple LDIF (Thunderbird) address books into Opera Mail 1.0?

[luctur]

luctur last edited by

I've just rediscovered Opera Mail 1.0 and I still find it a good mail client.

However I should import 4 LDIF address books (including several distribution lists) from Thunderbird and I haven't found an effective way to do so. They are thousands of addresses and their manual importation is simply not viable.

What I've tried so far:

1. old software utility called Dawn: it doesn't detect standalone version of Opera mail;
2. exported from Thunderbird to .csv and then converted to adr here: http://hallvord.com/opera/conversion1.htm The result is really messed up, with several entries missing names or email address;
3. created "fake" Thunderbird outgoing mails with the addresses I want to import into Opera Mail. When imported into OM 1.0, the addresses are collected, but duplications are deleted so many distribution lists with the overlapping recipients lost a lot of entries and I should manually add hundreds of email addressed...

I have nearly given up. Has anyone further suggestions?

[sgunhouse]

sgunhouse Moderator Volunteer last edited by

If Hallvord's conversion tool doesn't help there is nothing I can suggest. Never tried Dawn, if you want you could download Opera 12.18 and install that, configure mail there, and see if that will work. The files are identical between old Opera and Opera Mail, so if Dawn does work you can just copy it over.

(Opera won't create the mail directory unless you create at least one mail account, so I presume Dawn won't work until you do.)

[burnout426]

burnout426 Volunteer last edited by

As far as importing goes, Opera adr format looks like the following. Thunderbird's contact fields need to be converted correctly for Opera to import them correctly. Opera doesn't support all the fields Thunderbird does (and vice versa).

The way Opera does distribution lists is with contact folders. You basically choose to send to all contacts in a folder. You can have multiple copies of a single contact, but only one per folder (or top folder, aka "in no folder") will count when importing. So, the copies of a contact must be separated into each folder nesting (or the top folder) in the adr file for Opera to import them correctly.

Via the UI, you can create as many copies of a contact as you want in any level. This is because Opera goes by ID= for the contact in the adr file. If you want to do this for importing, the adr file must use an ID= for each contact.

Here's the key for what each field is for:

NAME=Display Name for contact (or name for folder)
URL=Contact's Homepage
DESCRIPTION=Notes. Each line is separated by two STX control characters
MAIL=List of email addresses for the contact. First one being primary. They're all separated by two STX control characters
PHONE=Phone number
FAX=FAX number
POSTALADDRESS=Contact's address. Each line is separated by two STX control characters
PICTUREURL=URL that references a picture for the contact
ICON=See the "Icon" setting under the "Images" tab in a contact's properties

ADR File Template

Opera Hotlist version 2.0
Options: encoding = utf8, version=3

#CONTACT
    NAME=Contact 1
    URL=
    DESCRIPTION=
    MAIL=
    PHONE=
    FAX=
    POSTALADDRESS=
    PICTUREURL=
    ICON=

#CONTACT
    NAME=Contact 2
    URL=
    DESCRIPTION=
    MAIL=
    PHONE=
    FAX=
    POSTALADDRESS=
    PICTUREURL=
    ICON=
    
#FOLDER
    NAME=Folder 1
#CONTACT
    NAME= Nested Contact 1
    URL=
    DESCRIPTION=
    MAIL=
    PHONE=
    FAX=
    POSTALADDRESS=
    PICTUREURL=
    ICON=
-

#FOLDER
    NAME=Folder 2
#CONTACT
    NAME= Nested Contact 1
    URL=
    DESCRIPTION=
    MAIL=
    PHONE=
    FAX=
    POSTALADDRESS=
    PICTUREURL=
    ICON=
-

See contacts.adr in the preferences folder for more info.

With that said, you'd have to find a program that can do the above properly when converting Thunderbird's LDIF or CSV to adr. Hallvord's converter isn't that advanced.

[luctur]

luctur last edited by

I solved the issue in a very empiric way, a variation of point 3) described in my first message.

Here the procedure:

1. I created some fake messages in Thunderbird with the distributions lists that have less addresses among all and I queued them. I imported those mbox files as "Sent" into OM 1.0 and copied & pasted those addresses into new OM folders;

2. I created more fake messages with the larger distribution lists. When imported, new addresses were added to the previous ones at OM top level ("no folder level"). Then, I've cut and pasted them into other new folders so that I've replicated the structure of TB distribution lists;

3. finally, I've compared the OM addresses in each folder to Thunderbird distribution lists content. The check is very fast because you can put those windows side by side. When I found an address that didn't belong to a specific folder, I simply deleted it in Opera Mail.

So, after all, I had manually to delete few tens of addresses.

[burnout426]

burnout426 Volunteer last edited by

Glad you got it!