Dear Maintainer,

since the package tracks upstream's ESR release cycle, an appropriate description
should be provided to avoid confusion between other packages from other sources.

upstream currently provides its software on flathub as both Thunderbird and
Thunderbird ESR. while not the official way to install packages on Debian,
users who use a graphical software center with flathub's remote enabled see
the following packages:
 - Thunderbird (provided by Debian)
 - Thunderbird (provided by upstream)
 - Thunderbird ESR (provided by upstream)
these names come from the packages' short description.

this could lead to confusion as to which package tracks which release cycle.
while it's expected for Debian packages to not follow upstream's version, the
source of these packages is not shown upfront in GNOME Software for example,
thus potentially leading to further confusion. this might affect the 11770
current users having installed gnome-software-plugin-flatpak, and the 8662
current users having installed plasma-discover-backend-flatpak as well as
potentially other users

there is precedent for Mozilla packages to be clearly marked as ESR. Firefox
is provided as firefox-esr and firefox (the latter only available on the
unstable branch). the package name and description in this case does clearly
indicate if it is ESR or not.

additional considerations:

 - consider naming the package as thunderbird-esr. while no separate package
   exists on Debian for ESR and non-ESR versions, it would be consistent with
   the naming of firefox-esr

 - consider changing the name in the .desktop file to Thunderbird ESR. users
   having installed multiple versions of the software (although necessarly from
   different sources) could easier distinguish which version they wanna launch.

   counterpoint to this: upstream's flatpak version of Thunderbird ESR still
   calls itself only Thunderbird. consistency with upstream might be desired in
   this case

 - consider changing the packages long description too. on flathub the
   description upstream's two packages differ by the following line being
   inculded in the ESR version.
   "The official Extended Support Release channel is intended for users who
   want all available new features on an annual basis and stability/security
   fixes on a monthly basis."
   this might be a good basis for the change, but note that this is not the
   "official" Extended Support Release as it is a redistribution, so do not
   include it verbatim

 - same applications from different sources are grouped together in GNOME
   Software and Plasma Discover. if this is desired with Thunderbird, consider
   updating the descriptions to match upstream's so that they would be grouped
   together.

   counterpoint to this: upstream might change this description more frequently
   than Debian's stable release schedule would allow for, so a match might not
   last

from: jan kapoli
(i didn't use AI for any of this report. if it's sounds clunky, please consider
that English is not my first language)