what a nice mail.app!

endian

Dis Member
with the mailboxes drawer open, drag a message across mail.app's window - the drawer switches sides!
 
Originally posted by endian
with the mailboxes drawer open, drag a message across mail.app's window - the drawer switches sides!

It'd be a perfect mail application if it the replies came from the email account it checks - I have several email accounts that I have to check individually (I'm using a pre-commercial version of Eudora Lite) and Mail.app can check different accounts but as far as I can tell replies to emails all appear to come from one main account, instead of from the email account they were sent to.
 
I can't agree that mail is so good.. the Interface is very confusing and breaks a great number of user expectations. Here's a few major problems:

- No option to turn off panes and see messages in separate windows
- double-clicking message brings up reply (usual is to open in separate window)
- single account sending (as noted)
- saving as draft and making occasional saves creates multiple copies of messages!
- Saving in to be delivered doesn't send on connection
- No simple option to queue mail until connection
- No apparent way of adding addresses from received mail to address book (though they seem to add themselves..)
- No proper mail forwarding

I can't understand how Apple got this app so wrong in fact. I was really hoping this'd be the simple elegant app I've been waiting for so long. Still struggling to find a replacement for Emailer 2.0...

 
Mail totally sucks.

*can't recover from being disconnected

*no threading

*intolerant of slow connections

*can't delete items without receiving them

*no multiple personalities

Needless to say it's absolutely useless for modem users.
 
The real irony is that Emailer 2.0 and the mail function of Cyberdog were such great apps. How can Apple just throw away two great products and then just dump this make-do mailer on us?
 
I never really used Cyberdog, but Emailer 2.0 was my mail client until I started with OS X PB. Emailer really is a fantastic application, which behaves exactly as one expects. Does anyone know what happened to the code? I believe Apple own it - is that the case?

I'm hoping that BareBones will port Mailsmith. PowerMail is now in beta for OS X an dmight be worth checking out. Anyone have any recommendations?

There really is a need for a simple elegant mail app that integrates with OS X. Mail.app isn't it. Apple should look at how they integrated message transport on Newton. With UNIX underneath they really could do this. Mail (at least the transport protocols) should be part of the OS. Any app should be able to mail.
 
I used Cyberdog for about a year and a half, and only gave it up once it was clear the web browser was never going to evolve any further. I loved the mailer, too, although its best feature did make it into Mail.app -- V-Twin searches of indexed mailboxes.
 
Why is mail.app useless for modem users? I works fine with our crappy dial-up connections. It certainly crashes less than iCab or OmniWeb.
 
Originally posted by sharl
I can't agree that mail is so good.. the Interface is very confusing and breaks a great number of user expectations. Here's a few major problems:

- No option to turn off panes and see messages in separate windows
- double-clicking message brings up reply (usual is to open in separate window)
- single account sending (as noted)
- saving as draft and making occasional saves creates multiple copies of messages!
- Saving in to be delivered doesn't send on connection
- No simple option to queue mail until connection
- No apparent way of adding addresses from received mail to address book (though they seem to add themselves..)
- No proper mail forwarding

I can't understand how Apple got this app so wrong in fact. I was really hoping this'd be the simple elegant app I've been waiting for so long. Still struggling to find a replacement for Emailer 2.0...


I have to say I agree with you on some of your statements, but it IS still a beta and Apple is more than happy to hear what the users think. I hope you've posted your thoughts to Apple using their feedback site.
Dystopia!
 
Originally posted by sharl
I can't agree that mail is so good.. the Interface is very confusing and breaks a great number of user expectations. Here's a few major problems:

- No option to turn off panes and see messages in separate windows
- double-clicking message brings up reply (usual is to open in separate window)
- single account sending (as noted)
- saving as draft and making occasional saves creates multiple copies of messages!
- Saving in to be delivered doesn't send on connection
- No simple option to queue mail until connection
- No apparent way of adding addresses from received mail to address book (though they seem to add themselves..)
- No proper mail forwarding

I can't understand how Apple got this app so wrong in fact. I was really hoping this'd be the simple elegant app I've been waiting for so long. Still struggling to find a replacement for Emailer 2.0...


I have to say I agree with you on some of your statements, but it IS still a beta and Apple is more than happy to hear what the users think. I hope you've posted your thoughts to Apple using their feedback site.
Dystopia!
 
Strobe: <i>I also hope the next version stores passwords securely using CDSA or keychain.<i><p>

Keychain is broken in PB. It seems to be half there, but the implementation is not done - iCab tries to use keychain if you want to store your passwords, and then crashes when you try to actually make a keychain.
 
Why is there no option to retrieve messages that have already been read?? This is a really useful feature that exists in every other mail app out there. I use different computers for checking my POP accounts. I need to see my old messages for this app to be of any use. I don't like that it's only limited to unread messages.

-Lex
 
Since writing I've experienced more problems with the mail.app. Mails I send seem to be showing up with weird line break characters. Nothing I switch in the prefs seems to affect it. And I'm getting lots of inconsistencies and apparent bugs in the prefs to switch between html/text mail. In fact these prefs are some of the worst-designed I've seen..
 
Originally posted by Tim Kelly

It'd be a perfect mail application .... [/B]

OK, so maybe it isn't the "perfect" mail application. I retract that statement. I did not experience the same problems everyone else is having, but I could not use Mail.app due to its inability handle multiple profiles simultaneously. I stuck with Eudora, but I had problems there I think because of the new way the file system handles modification dates. I kept getting messages indicating the In mailbox had been modified since the last time I used it, which meant rebuilding the TOC, which inevitably lead to emails missing or returning after being deleted. Because of this and a few other issues with OS X, I've gone back to OS 9 fulltime. My overall impression of OS X is that beta or not, this is not up to the usual standards we expect from MacOS. I would like to see an interim (second) beta release before this OS is declared GM, because as many problems as I have found with it I am not sure I would spend $100 on the final release just to find these issues have not been fixed.
 
I was expecting a very clean nice e-mail client, as many of you. But I found menu commands very confusing, misplaced, and a little old-fashioned.
The Send mail does not have any progress bar of its own, and there is no clear items similar to Outlook's "Send later" option!

Please tell me if I am wrong.
Arta
 
God, Claris Emailer kicked more ass than anything that ever kicked ass before? I love it. I LOVE EMAILER. I wish it would be carbonized, given IMAP and LDAP support and used to replace Mail.app, that's how much I love it.
/me cries woefully
 
the single most annoying thing i find in a lot of email apps is there in mail.app too.

I.E. the inability to automatically move an email to a different folder after ive read it. claris emailer had it as a standard option. outlook express allows you to do it in a roundabout way by setting it up as an action [as does mailsmith] but mail.app eudora and powermail still dont have this basic capability.


i find it incredible that this seems to be considered so unimportant a feature. i want my in tray to contain only the mail i havent read yet. after i read an email i want it to feck off to my read mail tray, not stay in my in tray. am i the only one?

i also find the interface in mail.app very ugly. the way the mailboxes drawer doesnt quite line up level with the top and bottom of the main window irritates the hell out of me.

i also agree about the address book. i can see the point of having it as a seperate app in that it can serve as a central repository accessible from various other apps but it seems to be completely non-functional.

i was gobsmacked after painstakingly typing in all my contact info into addressbook [no import options fer gawds sake!!!] to find that dragging a contact from the address book into a blank compose window in mail.app doesnt create an email addressed to that person. nor does dragging a contact to mail.apps icon in the dock or onto the compose button in mailer.app.

what then is the point of the addressbook? a glorified clipboard that we can copy and paste an email address from into mail.apps compose window? in fact it seems to be so functionless that im sure ive missed something obvious here. i look forward to being severely flamed as you all show me how addressbook integrates beautifully with mail.app [but i aint holdin my breath!]
 
2 things...

first, the address book does serve a purpose, you start typing someone's name in the TO: of CC: or BCC: field and mail.app searches the address book database and throws up a list of names...don't cut and paste, thats freakin retarded...the address book also stores a temporary file of people you have emailed recently or who have emailed you. This saves a lot of time so you don't have to go and type all that crap in...akhm akhmm :) the dragging and dropping would be nice, but personally i have no desire to leave my address book open, if you can use the keyboard to do something it is typically a lot faster...

second, I have a feeling there have been a lot of changes or will be a lot of changes to how the address book is integrated with the system as well as how the mail.app program functions. There have been some somewhat large changes to what is on apples page now about mail.app and how the public beta mail.app functions. Check out my thread in the General discussion for more info and links
 
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