How to reset all Thunderbird UI / CSS / Theme settings to default?
Hi, some years ago I installed the Monterail theme manually. That means I've missed out on all the recent goodness of updated icons and UI with the default themes, and have a bunch of layout issues I'd like to fix.
However the old folder structure of userchrome etc seems to have been deprecated - I can't find a trace of the old css files that I manually installed for that old theme I used. Which means I can't find the backup default userchrome folder, or delete the old theme files I manually installed. In fact I can't find any .css files in my Tbird user profile directory, which is weird.
So how can I reset all the UI CSS to default so visually I'm using the current default Tbird theme? I can see that this works fine when I create a new profile and try that - it looks great! But I don't want to lose my 12 mail accounts and other config options by deleting my main profile completely and reconfiguring from scratch. Thanks!
All Replies (13)
userChrome.css still works. Locate it in chrome folder within profile folder.
@david Thanks - but I can't find userChrome.css or the proper chrome folder - there is one folder called `chrome` inside `permanent` but I presume that's not the one I'm looking for.
Here's the complete tree view of the profile directory (`/home/user/.thunderbird/75uuhod8.default`): https://pastebin.com/nKFpDjDf
The chrome folder in profile is not there by default; you have to create it. Then, you can create or copy a userChrome.css file there.
Thanks - within the profile directory I did the following:
mkdir chrome; cd chrome; touch userChrome.css;
And then restarted Thunderbird, but it doesn't seem to have had any effect. What did I do wrong?
Check the content you placed in userChrome.css. It's easy to make syntax errors, so that would be my suggestion.
I left it blank - where's the best place to get default content for the CSS file from? My other profiles also don't have that folder, so I can't copy it from there AFAICS.
There is no once place for that info, but if you are very explicit in your need, someone here may share what you want. That is, there is no default; everything in the file is a user customization.
But I don't need any customisation, just the default CSS / UI appearance. I don't know where the old custom CSS, which is still being applied, now resides, because the chrome directory didn't exist until I just created it. When I installed the old theme, it added a custom chrome folder and contents, but now there's no trace of it, but it's still apparently being applied :(
I/m not sure what you're seeking, as there has never been custom CSS in a chrome folder. It has always been a user customization. All I can figure is that a prior custom theme provided that. Otherwise, Thunderbird offers some basic themes, and there are some user-developed ones available.
The theme that I previously installed included a chrome directory and css files. The installation process of that theme states:
"Rename the extracted thunderbird-monterail folder to chrome, edit userChrome.css to choose your theme variant, and restart thunderbird." (from https://github.com/spymastermatt/thunderbird-monterail).
However years later (today), the chrome folder and CSS files are nowhere to be seen, but the theme files still seem to be hiding somewhere and taking effect on the user profile in question. I'm seeking to reset the Thunderbird UI to default, and undo that custom theme.
Just an FYI, restart Thunderbird in troubleshoot mode to be offered a reset menus and toolbars option.
Thanks @matt! Found the mode, and reset the menus and toolbars. That might have changed the icons, but not the background colours or fonts. Small progress though.
It doesn't seem to be working in the updated thunderbird 111.0b2, I have a chrome folder and userChrome.css inside that but it doesn't seem to be working. I hate the new layout and there are 3 things needed to change to make it readable again.
it's standard css so nothing there, the css works in the developer tools just fine but doesn't seem to work in the userChrome.css file.
it would be better to just edit the original CSS files but can't seem to locate them on my system. chrome://messenger/skin/shared/threadPane.css chrome://messenger/skin/about3Pane.css