Is Panther's Mail better than Entourage?

I

Imagine

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I've been using Entourage for a couple of years, and was wondering if Apple's Mail is a better program.

Any opinions?

Thanks
Dean
 
Imagine said:
I've been using Entourage for a couple of years, and was wondering if Apple's Mail is a better program.

Any opinions?

Thanks
Dean
Click to expand...


I too use MS Entourage, and have done since it's initial release. I've never like Apple Mail. At the end of the day, I think that it's all about personal preference.

Dean, what are you looking for from Apple Mail that MS Entourage cannot provide? Are you using MS Entourage with Exchange? IF you are (like myself), stick with Entourage.

All I can suggest is that you give Apple Mail a "30-day" trail to see if you like it, meets your needs etc... If it does, move on over, if not, go back to Entourage.

I also recommend that you keep you mail on your server for the 30 day trail. Then you won't have a headache of import it in to Entourage from Mail later on.

Hope it helps...
 
If I wouldn't be running Apple mail, I'd probably be using Mutt or something completely different and simplier. I've tried them all, qmail, gyazmail ...

And some of the features I would love to have i my mail, are not available in any of the mail programs (Spam filter where you can give each spam word/feature a value that you can change for example).
 
I use Entourage too...

One of the things I use most is the "categories" option.

I am involved with several businesses and being able to categorise each contact in the address section(company 1, company 2, friends, family etc.), and then have mail come in to me automatically colour-coded and categorised makes searching for messages very simple...

The same categories apply to the calendar section...

I can get round the hassle of having to switch between apps (mail to address book to iCal etc.) if I can get this level of customisation - but I can't find a way to do it...

Either it's not there, or Apple doesn't speak the same language as me on this one...?

Anyone have any thoughts / information? I'd prefer to keep everything Apple orientated if possible... but M$ does seem to have the lead on this one for now (ooops, I said it!)

Thanks

ed
 
I'm a strong supporter of Entourage, I tried others and none compare, one of the best multipurpose apps, even if I only use the calendar and mail. I have it customized over years of use, so i worked out what at this time is the best configuration and created a number of custom applescripts to do this and that at given times or periods.

Does it work fine under Panther? Doesn't matter, i don't plan on upgrading for a while, my system works well, i'll wait till i free up some time on a snowed in day and redo the entire system.
 
I would say that pound for pound, Entourage is the better program, no doubt. However, I have pretty modest email needs, so Mail is just fine.

I like be as Microsoft-free as possible.

Also, a big plus not so much for Mail over Entourage, but for iCal, Address Book and Mail as a group over Entourage is being able to use iSync and/or .Mac or other free services for calendar posting, etc. Add an iPod to the mix and, for me, that little group crushes Entourage. Perhaps Entourage does that stuff as well somehow, but it may not be as easy and fluid as Apple has it with iSync.

I really do miss the color-coded "labels" from Entourage, Apple really needs to add that.
 
mindbend said:
I really do miss the color-coded "labels" from Entourage, Apple really needs to add that.
Click to expand...

so I'm not losing my mind? This option doesn't exist in Mail?

Thanks for confirming...

Shame, though... I'd like to use Mail for all the same reasons you state - iSync, iPod, t610, iCal, .Mac - all seamless... (Playing with Entourage's export feature to Address Book is a nightmare before you even start with the others!)

c'mon Apple - give us another update!!! It's been 2 days already!
 
applewhore-

I haven't delved deep into Address Book or Mail, so I could definitely be missing something, but the only way I know of to categorize contacts is to apply the "This is a company" option in Address Book or to make a Group in Address Book and manually add the contacts to the group. This isn't bad, but what happens if you add ten new contacts and forget to add them to a specific group. How do you easily go back and find those ten new contacts? You can't. Also, you can't color code contacts and then sort by the color code.

However, this is what you can do to work around it. It's a pain at first, but not so bad once you get going. You can add a custom field or use the notes area in Address Book to make a note like "--Friend" or "--Competitor" or whatever. Then when you search in AB, it filters to those tags. It's actually more flexible than color-coding. Once you've filtered your search, you can then make a group for use in Mail.
 
mindbend said:
applewhore-

I haven't delved deep into Address Book or Mail, so I could definitely be missing something, but the only way I know of to categorize contacts is to apply the "This is a company" option in Address Book or to make a Group in Address Book and manually add the contacts to the group. This isn't bad, but what happens if you add ten new contacts and forget to add them to a specific group. How do you easily go back and find those ten new contacts? You can't. Also, you can't color code contacts and then sort by the color code.

However, this is what you can do to work around it. It's a pain at first, but not so bad once you get going. You can add a custom field or use the notes area in Address Book to make a note like "--Friend" or "--Competitor" or whatever. Then when you search in AB, it filters to those tags. It's actually more flexible than color-coding. Once you've filtered your search, you can then make a group for use in Mail.
Click to expand...

hey mindbend..

Thanks for your reply...

It certainly sounds like a possible way round, but surely you've also got to remember the names you're giving each category?

The easy bit about Entourage is the drop down list:

step 1 : you create the category - once (although editable)
step 2 : assign it a colour - once (although editable)

and then everything in mail, address book and calendar sections is categorised in exactly the same way, every time...

If you edit a category - it applies itself to everything that you've already worked on...

If I'm missing your point, my apologies - I just don't know if it's doing exactly the same thing?
 
Unfortunately, the Entourage way (of categorizing by using colors/labels) is definitely better, no question about it. It's ironic given that Apple has had its own labels infrastructure for years. My Mail approach was just a work around if you really want to dump Entourage. Based on your image attachment, looks like an approach beyond what Mail/Address Book can deliver.
 
yup - I kind of figured that might be the case...

Never mind - perhaps Apple will bring this functionality in one day? I think they'll need to if they want to appeal to professionals (as they appear to be doing with their talk of the multi-threading messaging thingy!)

Thanks anyway, mindbend...
 
Anyone with Entourage on Panther having any problems? I want to be sure it works without any problems before I jump to 10.3

Although I'm in no rush just yet, my system is running fine for the work I use it for.
 
I use both entourage and apple mail, I use apple mail for my personal emails that i shoot off to friends and family and entourage for my business emails. Hence....I use mail more often :( but eh...I like them both, but i do think that entourage does have it's advantages in more "complex" situations than apples mail does.....though apple mail is about as good and simple as it gets for the normal daily "shooting off an email" routine.
 
Urbansory said:
Anyone with Entourage on Panther having any problems? I want to be sure it works without any problems before I jump to 10.3

Although I'm in no rush just yet, my system is running fine for the work I use it for.
Click to expand...

I use Entourage with Panther. I haven't found any real problems, I have notice that Entourage takes longer to render HTML emails than previous. Also, when I access mt LDAP server I work now, Entourage crashes.

Apart from that, it's fine.
 
Instead of a smart playlist, Apple should incorporate a smart group feature in Address Book. Have a rule that all contacts with the same last name go into the Family group. Also, have those rules carry over into both Mail and iCal ... that way you could color code e-mails from people in certain groups or notify certain groups of people when your iCal changes.
 
Urbansory said:
Anyone with Entourage on Panther having any problems? I want to be sure it works without any problems before I jump to 10.3

Although I'm in no rush just yet, my system is running fine for the work I use it for.
Click to expand...

I've been running Panther since 24th November (of course!!!) and no problems with Entourage at all so far...

I did a clean install (copied and pasted "Microsoft User Data") and everything worked perfectly...

Perhaps I'm one of the lucky ones? No problems with Panther whatsoever...

(please, don't let that sound the death knell for my PowerBook!)

Hope your upgrade goes as well when you take the plunge!

:D
 
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