[ale] need some Evolution email magic

Ron Frazier atllinuxenthinfo at c3energy.com
Sat Jan 22 01:02:34 EST 2011


See comments in line.

On Fri, 2011-01-21 at 12:54 -0500, Michael B. Trausch wrote:
> On Fri, 2011-01-21 at 10:18 -0500, Ron Frazier wrote:
> > I have two scenarios that I need help with re evolution email, which I
> > just recently converted to.  The scenarios are listed below. 
> 
> I am going to give a more full reply on this one either later today or
> tomorrow, but something I noticed right from the start is that you're
> using multiple clients.
> 
> Use IMAP.  Seriously.  If you want your MUA to store messages locally as
> well, nearly every single one that I am aware of (including Evolution)
> supports the notion of "offline" folders, where all messages will be
> synchronized locally.  If you do that one single thing, your life in
> managing mail will become so much easier.  Guaranteed.  Shared state
> between multiple systems is so, so valuable.
> 

That's probably good advice.  Another learning curve I have to climb up.
I'll have to do some research to determine how IMAP could work in my
environment.

> Also, one other thing:  Evolution absolutely has its share of bugs.
> Thunderbird, IME, has even more of them (at least for my own personal
> usage patterns, which involve sometimes sending HTML mail, sometimes not
> sending HTML mail, several email accounts in several different places,
> etc.).  If you want something rock-solid that works and is (relatively)
> free of bugs, I'd recommend something like mutt or Alpine.
> 

I've got some on the list recommending Evolution and others recommending
Thunderbird.  I guess I've got more research to do.  Evolution is
working OK in Ubuntu, and I'm still using an old version of Eudora on
Windows.  I can run it in Wine too, but this is an old version that
doesn't do TLS properly.  So, I'm reluctant to use it outside my own
house.

I looked briefly at Mutt and Alpine.  Totally text based.  I built an
app like that for Delta Air Lines 20 years ago, because Windows didn't
exist on our network.  But now, hey, it's the 21st century and
everything, and we have things called GUI's and mice and touchpads.  At
this point, I have absolutely no interest in a text based program.  It's
time for programmers, myself included, to step up to the plate and give
users easy to use, intuitive programs, using GUI interfaces, and rich
media, without bugs.  I think I was ranting about that in another
thread.  However, I do thank you for the tip, and I saved the links just
in case I get desperate.

> Or, shoot, you can always hop in and try to fix Evolution's or
> Thunderbird's bugs.  Evolution's code base is far easier to read,
> navigate, and patch than Mozilla's, even though Evolution is in C; it's
> pretty well-written code and you can get in and out once you have a
> roadmap very easily.  I spent a year one week trying to fix a bug in
> Thunderbird, and that's why I wound up going to Evolution.  :-)
> 
> 	--- Mike

That's a nice thought, but I think I've got a lot of new learning to do
before I tackle that.

Sincerely,

Ron

-- 

(PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to
call on the phone.  I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy
mailing lists and such.  I don't always see new messages very quickly.)

Ron Frazier

770-205-9422 (O)   Leave a message.
linuxdude AT c3energy.com




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