OS X Mail

[Primo]

Apple's Mail application for OS X has a few shortcomings, in my view.
Some are minor, while others are serious enough to make me consider
abandoning it. I'll list my gripes below, in case anyone can suggest
ways to deal with them (or perhaps a developer monitoring the group will
consider changes in future releases). But I'd also like to know if
anyone has any recommendations for alternatives. Before upgrading to OS
X, I was using Outlook Express. I'm willing to pay a reasonable
shareware fee but not what M$ is charging for Entourage. I used Eudora
several years ago, tried the OS X release, and decided Mail was a better
option.

1) After hundreds of Viagra, organ enlargement and mortgage refinancing
messages, I would have expected Mail to "learn" that they're junk mail,
but it still misses about half of those, and many others. Being able to
write rules directly (as in OE) is a bit more work but was well worth
it. Furthermore, is there any reason Mail couldn't be designed to
continue its junk mail "training" after it's switched to Automatic mode?

2) everytime I send a message, Mail reports that it's adding the
(presumably recipient's) address to the Address Book. As I have one of
the early (350 MHz) G4s and my address book has over 1200 entries, this
step takes 5-10 seconds for a single address and longer, of course, when
there are multiple addresses. Many of the addresses are already in the
book, but regardless, I've yet to find that any address was actually
added. Any way to turn this off?!

3) doesn't seem to be any way to include a file in the body of a
message, other than to open it in another application, copy the contents
to the clipboard, etc.

4) OE allowed a message to be dragged directly into a folder or the
desktop (where a file was created) or onto an application, such as a
MacPerl droplet that would be launched and could read the message as
standard input. That's a nice little feature that Mail doesn't support.

- Chuck

[Primo]

In article <%nXUa.22822$BB6.714097@twister.tampabay.rr.com> ,
Enough <enough@idontcare.com> wrote:

> In article <noaddress-976EC6.12403127072003@central.isp.giganews.com>,
> Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:
>

> > Apple's Mail application for OS X has a few shortcomings, in my view.

>
> And WHY, pray tell, gentle retard, should I CARE what you think?
>
> Hint: those Viagra ads were right on target!

That has got to be one of the weakest trolls I've seen in 18 years on
Usenet. My inquiry was directed to the helpful people who participate
in this group, not some pre-teen who wouldn't be able to do anything
even with viagra.

[Ron Shepard]

In article
<noaddress-976EC6.12403127072003@central.isp.giganews.com>,
Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:

> 2) everytime I send a message, Mail reports that it's adding the
> (presumably recipient's) address to the Address Book.

Where do you activate this? I have to manually add the addresses to
my address book (from my address history list), and I would prefer
to do it the way you do.

$.02 -Ron Shepard

[Martin Nadeau]

In article <noaddress-976EC6.12403127072003@central.isp.giganews.com>,
Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:

> Apple's Mail application for OS X has a few shortcomings, in my view.
> Some are minor, while others are serious enough to make me consider
> abandoning it. I'll list my gripes below, in case anyone can suggest
> ways to deal with them (or perhaps a developer monitoring the group will
> consider changes in future releases). But I'd also like to know if
> anyone has any recommendations for alternatives. Before upgrading to OS
> X, I was using Outlook Express. I'm willing to pay a reasonable
> shareware fee but not what M$ is charging for Entourage. I used Eudora
> several years ago, tried the OS X release, and decided Mail was a better
> option.
>
> 1) After hundreds of Viagra, organ enlargement and mortgage refinancing
> messages, I would have expected Mail to "learn" that they're junk mail,
> but it still misses about half of those, and many others. Being able to
> write rules directly (as in OE) is a bit more work but was well worth
> it. Furthermore, is there any reason Mail couldn't be designed to
> continue its junk mail "training" after it's switched to Automatic mode?

I believe Mail does continue its training when in Automatic mode. From
the Help files:

"In automatic mode, Mail will move messages to the Junk mailbox so
they're out of your way and you can easily screen them. You should
periodically review the messages in the Junk mailbox to make sure
messages you care about aren't being identified as junk. If a message
is wrongly classified, click the Not Junk button. You should also
periodically delete junk messages. Correcting misidentified messages,
and deleting junk messages, improves Mail's ability to correctly detect
junk mail."

> 2) everytime I send a message, Mail reports that it's adding the
> (presumably recipient's) address to the Address Book. As I have one of
> the early (350 MHz) G4s and my address book has over 1200 entries, this
> step takes 5-10 seconds for a single address and longer, of course, when
> there are multiple addresses. Many of the addresses are already in the
> book, but regardless, I've yet to find that any address was actually
> added. Any way to turn this off?!

I didn't even know it could do that!

> 3) doesn't seem to be any way to include a file in the body of a
> message, other than to open it in another application, copy the contents
> to the clipboard, etc.

You can simply drag a file from the Finder into the body of a message
or select "Attach File..." from the "Edit" menu.

--
Martin Nadeau

[tony@aplawrence.com]

Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:

>Apple's Mail application for OS X has a few shortcomings, in my view.
>Some are minor, while others are serious enough to make me consider
>abandoning it. I'll list my gripes below, in case anyone can suggest

>1) After hundreds of Viagra, organ enlargement and mortgage refinancing
>messages, I would have expected Mail to "learn" that they're junk mail,
>but it still misses about half of those, and many others. Being able to
>write rules directly (as in OE) is a bit more work but was well worth
>it. Furthermore, is there any reason Mail couldn't be designed to
>continue its junk mail "training" after it's switched to Automatic mode?

Mail's spam filtering just isn't that good. Nothing is perfect, but
Spamassassin works well for me :

[url]http://aplawrence.com/MacOSX/macosxspamassassin.html[/url]

--
[email]tony@aplawrence.com[/email] Unix/Linux/Mac OS X resources: [url]http://aplawrence.com[/url]
Get paid for writing about tech: [url]http://aplawrence.com/publish.html[/url]

[Karel Koskuba]

Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:

> 1) After hundreds of Viagra, organ enlargement and mortgage refinancing
> messages, I would have expected Mail to "learn" that they're junk mail,
> but it still misses about half of those, and many others. Being able to
> write rules directly (as in OE) is a bit more work but was well worth
> it. Furthermore, is there any reason Mail couldn't be designed to
> continue its junk mail "training" after it's switched to Automatic mode?

I think you may have your Mail rules set up in a similar manner as I
used to have.

I have rules to separate mail to various folders and also a rule to move
junk mail to a Junk folder. I used to have the 'junk' rule as the last
rule and I used to find about half junk msgs in the Junk folder, the
other half was distributed in my normal folders - marked as junk but
still there. It took me some time to realize that when a rule is
actioned, the other rules are ignored! So I have moved the 'junk' rule
as the first rule and now ALL mail that is marked as 'junk' goes to the
Junk folder :^)

Few junk mails still get through without being marked as junk :^(

--
Regards,

Karel

[Primo]

Thanks to everyone who has commented on this topic. I'm going to try to
address all the responses in one followup to Heath's message.

In article <bg2i2a$ldl$1@seagoon.newcastle.edu.au>,
Heath Raftery <hraftery@myrealbox.com> wrote:

> Primo <noaddress@nodomain.none> wrote:

> > Apple's Mail application for OS X has a few shortcomings, in my view.
> > Some are minor, while others are serious enough to make me consider
> > abandoning it. I'll list my gripes below, in case anyone can suggest
> > ways to deal with them (or perhaps a developer monitoring the group will
> > consider changes in future releases). But I'd also like to know if
> > anyone has any recommendations for alternatives. Before upgrading to OS
> > X, I was using Outlook Express. I'm willing to pay a reasonable
> > shareware fee but not what M$ is charging for Entourage. I used Eudora
> > several years ago, tried the OS X release, and decided Mail was a better
> > option.

>

> > 1) After hundreds of Viagra, organ enlargement and mortgage refinancing
> > messages, I would have expected Mail to "learn" that they're junk mail,
> > but it still misses about half of those, and many others. Being able to
> > write rules directly (as in OE) is a bit more work but was well worth
> > it. Furthermore, is there any reason Mail couldn't be designed to
> > continue its junk mail "training" after it's switched to Automatic mode?

>
> You can still write rules in Mail (Preferences->Rules). I use to have a
> large collection of these before Junk handling came along. I've since
> turned all these rules off (updating them was a pain) and rely on the Junk
> filter. Seems pretty good to me. Are you 'teaching' Mail by hitting the
> Junk button on every piece of Junk, and the Not Junk button on every
> mistakenly junked mail?

Yes, I was "teaching" Mail that way. It didn't seem to be getting any
smarter in Automatic mode. I switched back to training mode a week or
two ago, and it's gotten somewhat better. But thanks for pointing out
that custom junk filtering rules can be written. That's what I was
looking for (and may be a better option for me than products like
spamassassin).

> > 2) everytime I send a message, Mail reports that it's adding the
> > (presumably recipient's) address to the Address Book. As I have one of
> > the early (350 MHz) G4s and my address book has over 1200 entries, this
> > step takes 5-10 seconds for a single address and longer, of course, when
> > there are multiple addresses. Many of the addresses are already in the
> > book, but regardless, I've yet to find that any address was actually
> > added. Any way to turn this off?!

>
> Sounds like your Address Book might be corrupted or something. Are you
> using OS 10.2 (Jaguar)? I thought Junk processing was added in Jaguar, but
> this discussion:
> <[url]http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&selm=dCednZv3ANjy[/url]
> BXKgXTWcow%40ctc.net>
> seems to suggest what you're seeing shouldn't happen in 10.2.

Yes, I'm running Jaguar. That thread suggests that what's really
happening is that Mail is adding the address to its history, not the
Address Book. I'd still like to turn it off.

>

> > 3) doesn't seem to be any way to include a file in the body of a
> > message, other than to open it in another application, copy the contents
> > to the clipboard, etc.

>
> What do you mean? Drag the file to the new mail window. Some file formats
> are included in place, others are attached. Is this what you want?

A couple quick tests show the file being attached, which is not what I
want. It's just a plain text file (or is it?) normally opened with
BBEdit Lite.

>

> > 4) OE allowed a message to be dragged directly into a folder or the
> > desktop (where a file was created) or onto an application, such as a
> > MacPerl droplet that would be launched and could read the message as
> > standard input. That's a nice little feature that Mail doesn't support.

>
> Yeah, I seem to recall being annoyed by this one as well. If you try to
> drag an email, you get a little email drag icon, which looks good enough
> right? But then the only thing which will accept the drop is a mailbox in
> Mail right?

Exactly.

> I think you have to File-Export and choose a format to get a
> file. You can then drag as you please, of course. Or, you could set up a
> folder action on the folder you save to, to automatically perform the
> processing you are after. Or, you could highlight the text you are
> interested in the email, and click, pause and drag somewhere.

I've been saving the file, then dragging it from the Finder, which isn't
the end of the world. Haven't had to choose a format (possibly because
the message is plain text?). Dragging the message is a nice little
feature that streamlined the process a bit. Got to migrate the perl
applet to OS X yet, which is another story.

- Chuck
(I'm leaving on a business trip Tuesday a.m. and won't read or respond
to news again until Sunday.)

[Dasha Samojlova]

thanks for information