From MozillaZine Knowledge Base

This article was written for Thunderbird but also generally applies to current versions of SeaMonkey.

You can tell Thunderbird to use more than one identity per mail account. This is useful when you:

• Have a catch-all account for a domain
• Forward messages from another e-mail address (either an account or a forwarding service such as Bigfoot)
• Use plus addressing to create email addresses to help deal with spam
• Have multiple accounts and don't want to have to worry about what folder is currently selected in the folder pane
• Want to hide the fact that you're using something like Gmail's Mail Fetcher to centralize messages from multiple accounts
• or want to create a set of customized settings in order to switch which SMTP server you use, whether the message is encrypted, what reply-to address to use etc. when sending a message.

How to add another identity:

1. Go to your account settings.
2. Choose the account to which you wish to add additional identities.
3. Click the "Manage Identities..." button (on the lower right).
4. Click the "Add..." button and then add the necessary information for the additional identity for the account.
5. Repeat as necessary for additional identities.

When you write a new message, Thunderbird uses the default identity for the account you are working in. When you reply to a message, Thunderbird uses the identity that matches the address the message was originally sent to, if it can find a match in the account you are working in. Otherwise it uses the default identity. Set mailnews.reply_to_self_check_all_ident to true using the Config editor if you want it to check the identities for all accounts when replying.

You can select any identity from any of your accounts when replying, forwarding or composing a new message by selecting it in the From drop down list box. If desired, you can also create a unique signature, specify the draft folder, what folder your copy of the sent message should be stored in, and what reply-to address should be used for each identity.

Messages sent using mailing lists frequently don't specify what address the message was sent to in the To: or Cc: headers. It might be buried in one of the Received: headers, or in mailing list specific headers such Delivered-To: or Envelope-To: that Thunderbird has no knowledge of. In that case, Thunderbird doesn't know how to match the address the message was originally sent to and will typically select the default identity. If that happens you need to manually select the appropriate identity from the list box. If you use a separate folder for mail sent to each mailing list one workaround would be to use the Folder Account extension to specify what identity to use when a specific folder is selected.

Exceptions

The Gmail SMTP server will ignore whatever From: address you supply unless you add it in the Gmail web page at Setting -> Accounts -> "Add another email address". AOL's SMTP server won't accept a email address that doesn't match the the screen name used to authenticate when sending.

Thunderbird 2 changed the behavior when replying to a sender, where the sender is one of your multiple identities. It used to reply to that identity, now it uses the default identity. According to this bug report its by design.

Folder specific settings

The Folder Account extension lets you select what account or identity will be used when composing, replying, or forwarding mail based on what folder is currently selected. It also lets you specify the default To: address when composing a message based on the currently selected folder. Right click on the folder and select properties in order to configure the account/identity and/or To: address.

You can still select a different identity from the From: drop down list box if you use this extension.

S/MIME and Enigmail

The S/MIME certificate only applies to the accounts default identity. You need to copy the settings from the default identity to mail.identity.idN.encryption_cert_name , mail.identity.idN.encryptionpolicy, mail.identity.idN.sign_mail , and mail.identity.idN.signing_cert_name . [1]

There is an experimental S/MIME Security for Multiple Identities extension. You need to register at the Mozilla Addons web site to download it.

OpenPGP support is enabled by default for the accounts default identity in the Enigmail extension . It provides a GUI to manage secondary identities. See this article.

See also

• Installing an SMIME certificate
• Multiple SMTP servers - Thunderbird
• Mail concepts
• Modify Thunderbird settings
• Secondary accounts

External links

• The old way to add multiple identities by editing prefs.js

• The Correct identity extension may make it easier to choose an identity. It supports aliases.

• The Folder Account extension lets you associate user accounts and identities with specific folders.

• The Identity Reminder extension might be useful if you're worried that you will accidentally reply using the wrong email address. Another solution would be to use the BorderColors extension to color code the compose message window based on the current identity.

• The Identity Select extension lets you select your identity from the Write button.

• The EditSender extension lets you change both the name and email address of the sender to whatever you want (on the fly) when composing a message. Right click on the From: line and select "edit sender details for this message" to edit it.

• The Virtual identity extension is another extension to modify the From: address on the fly while composing a message. Left click on the From: line to directly edit it.

• The Freeform From and FCC on Compose extension is the most well known of the extensions to modify your email address on the fly when composing a message. Unfortunately the author is no longer reachable and their web site is gone. The Add-ons Mirror has a copy, and periodically bumps the version limit so that it still installs.

• Bug report about identity selection in mailing lists