"CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

"CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Ken Raeburn]

http://home.cnet.com/software/0-8888-8-9161160-1.html

Actually, it's a combination of email client and IM client and
personal information manager, but existing Emacs packages should
provide most of the functionality, even if it's not the easiest to
configure.

Anyone want to try to get Emacs and Gnus in the (ahem) news?
Give them what they want, and make it easy enough for Mom to use...

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Sean Neakums]

commence  Ken Raeburn quotation:

> Anyone want to try to get Emacs and Gnus in the (ahem) news?

No.

-- 
 /////////////////  |                  | The spark of a pin
<sneakums@zork.net> |  (require 'gnu)  | dropping, falling feather-like.
 \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  |                  | There is too much noise.

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Sean Neakums]

commence  Sean Neakums quotation:

> commence  Ken Raeburn quotation:
>
>> Anyone want to try to get Emacs and Gnus in the (ahem) news?
>
> No.

Please ignore this; I thought I was reading another (less mannerly)
mailing list at the time.

-- 
 /////////////////  |                  | The spark of a pin
<sneakums@zork.net> |  (require 'gnu)  | dropping, falling feather-like.
 \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  |                  | There is too much noise.

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Per Abrahamsen]

Ken Raeburn <raeburn@raeburn.org> writes:

> http://home.cnet.com/software/0-8888-8-9161160-1.html

I did read it.  I do not think that what they want would make sense to
implement in Emacs, they are clearly targetting a completely different
market. 

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Simon Josefsson]

On Mon, 8 Apr 2002, Per Abrahamsen wrote:

> Ken Raeburn <raeburn@raeburn.org> writes:
> 
> > http://home.cnet.com/software/0-8888-8-9161160-1.html
> 
> I did read it.  I do not think that what they want would make sense to
> implement in Emacs, they are clearly targetting a completely different
> market. 

I didn't read it, but in theory I don't see a conflict between eye candy
and user friendlyness and the amount of customizations possible in Gnus.  
In essence, I don't see why Gnus can't fit everyone.  Emacsen seem to have
GTK soon, and then Gnus could use all those colors and bitmaps and
multimedia wizards and transperancy and themes and ripple effects and
sound effects that everyone absolutely needs.

The problem with user friendlyness in applications generally is that they 
are implemented poorly.  Gnus can do better.  It can be user friendly AND 
expert friendly.

In practice there is the problem of finding someone who wants to implement
though..

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Wes Hardaker]

>>>>> On Mon, 08 Apr 2002 12:58:54 +0200, Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> said:

Per> I do not think that what they want would make sense to implement
Per> in Emacs

Oh, yeah, like *that's* every stopped anyone before.
-- 
"The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will
 insist on coming along and trying to put things in it."   -- Terry Pratchett

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Per Abrahamsen]

Wes Hardaker <wes@hardakers.net> writes:

>>>>>> On Mon, 08 Apr 2002 12:58:54 +0200, Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> said:
>
> Per> I do not think that what they want would make sense to implement
> Per> in Emacs
>
> Oh, yeah, like *that's* every stopped anyone before.

You should read the article, it is very much about GUI details, like
"this icon should be placed below that divider line".

Emacs already has most (all?) of the functionality mentioned.  While
these features could be presented better, they should be presented in
a way that make sense within an Emacs framework.  Not in a way that
would make sense within Outlook, as the article want.

While there have been some attempt to copy user interface from MS
Windows applications, they all suck.  We should copy the features from
MS Windows, and reinvent the UI in a way that make them integrate
nicely within the rest of Emacs.

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Ken Raeburn]

Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> writes:
> I did read it.  I do not think that what they want would make sense to
> implement in Emacs, they are clearly targetting a completely different
> market. 

Well, they certainly aren't targeting UNIX computer geeks who enjoy
spending hours fiddling with their tools to get them to do exactly
what they want (or anything remotely close to it), who don't mind huge
sets of key bindings that take forever to learn, and who like figuring
out for themselves how to get different tools to work together, no.
But I don't think Emacs should target them exclusively, either.

I know, I'm generalizing.  We've got some Windows and OS/2 geeks in
our midst, too. :-)

Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com> writes:
> I didn't read it, but in theory I don't see a conflict between eye candy
> and user friendlyness and the amount of customizations possible in Gnus.  
> In essence, I don't see why Gnus can't fit everyone.  Emacsen seem to have
> GTK soon, and then Gnus could use all those colors and bitmaps and
> multimedia wizards and transperancy and themes and ripple effects and
> sound effects that everyone absolutely needs.

I think a bunch of the specific visual details are beside the point,
and as Gnus developers we can ignore the standalone PIM stuff, but
some of the general ideas may be useful.  Template responses to email
(basically form letters) are a good idea (maybe not for me, but for
some people).  New email notification slightly more discriminating
than "you have mail".  A simple UI for "always file this email address
[or subject] in folder X" rather than pulling up an editor on a text
buffer in some obscure (to Mom) format.  Displaying contact info from
BBDB when the user moves the mouse over an email address.  Putting
"reply to message X" in your to-do list to come back to later.

> The problem with user friendlyness in applications generally is that they 
> are implemented poorly.  Gnus can do better.  It can be user friendly AND 
> expert friendly.
>
> In practice there is the problem of finding someone who wants to implement
> though..

Actually, I think an equally tough problem is finding someone with
half a clue *how* to do that.  Some random writers at CNET are
probably just as good at the "user friendly" side of it as many of us
are, if not better.

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[news]

Ken Raeburn <raeburn@raeburn.org> writes:

> Well, they certainly aren't targeting UNIX computer geeks who enjoy
> spending hours fiddling with their tools to get them to do exactly
> what they want (or anything remotely close to it), who don't mind huge
> sets of key bindings that take forever to learn, and who like figuring
> out for themselves how to get different tools to work together, no.
> But I don't think Emacs should target them exclusively, either.

I understand your point.

Don't underestimate, though,  the time and money corporations spend when
they adopt a new email or PIM client.  People will typically go
to a 4-8 hour training class in a short window before or after the
rollout.  The MS UI and feature sets cannot be understood by
*most* people without taking time to learn.  
 
I wouldn't be surprised if in the future insurance companies give
a discount on rates to companies that pull the mice off
the machines, and have *exclusively* keystroke controlled
software.  This would reduce RSI.

Sure, emacs without any training is impossible, but given its
feature set, maybe with color-themes, emacro and training it's
attractive.

I think what is outstanding is that emacs has many of the
features *today* that those authors would like to see *tomorrow*.

> I think a bunch of the specific visual details are beside the point,
> and as Gnus developers we can ignore the standalone PIM stuff, but

But PIM is rarely standalone in new email/notes/collaboration
systems now.  The target, as the article mentions, is to
integrate them.  Emacs has this capability, in the scenario
of emacs + gnus + bbdb with private newsgroups on a collaboration
server running inn.

> some of the general ideas may be useful.  Template responses to email
> (basically form letters) are a good idea (maybe not for me, but for
> some people).  New email notification slightly more discriminating

Many of us are using skeletons now, and maybe some have bbdb
hooked into that use, but I don't yet.

> than "you have mail".  A simple UI for "always file this email address
> [or subject] in folder X" rather than pulling up an editor on a text

emacs + Mew can do this without *any* UI right now.  I bet the
creation of splitting rules for gnus will improve with time, too.
Mew also automatically verifies pgp keys and snarfs new ones,
which is a feature on the CNET wishlist.  I think some folks are
using a bbdb field to set the email correspondence privacy level
on a person by person basis, too.

> buffer in some obscure (to Mom) format.  Displaying contact info from
> BBDB when the user moves the mouse over an email address.  Putting

Emacs + bbdb doesn't have mouseover, but maybe these CNET authors
need to see the behavior of (setq bbdb-view-pop-up t), which is
quite similar.

> "reply to message X" in your to-do list to come back to later.

Maybe someone has done this with a mail client and the to-do
function in bbdb-records.  I do a similar contact management
function with mew + bbdb + records using a special field in
the bbdb record rather than the records-mode record.

I also use emacs to dial voice calls to respond to email I'm
reading.

> Some random writers at CNET are
> probably just as good at the "user friendly" side of it as many of us
> are, if not better.

I think it was a good article, and a kind of requirements
document for a mail client.  I didn't quite understand their
vision for document sharing though.  Did anyone else?

Some unanswered questions I have are about IM and emacs, and if
anyone is using it in emacs the way those authors have
described.  The article doesn't mention ldap, but that will be a
more common way to recognize people in the email client, and I
know we have eudc.  

Chris

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Kai Großjohann]

(Chris Beggy ) news@kippona.com writes:

> But PIM is rarely standalone in new email/notes/collaboration
> systems now.  The target, as the article mentions, is to
> integrate them.  Emacs has this capability, in the scenario
> of emacs + gnus + bbdb with private newsgroups on a collaboration
> server running inn.

We are using an IMAP server with shared folders.  Works very nicely.

If you agree on some protocol, you can even do todo lists in such
shared folders.  We put "[TODO]" in the subject line of todo items and
we tick the items that are not done.  When somebody signs up for an
item, he removes that tick and makes a followup with "[TODO Kai]" (or
similar) in the subject.  Tick marks on "[TODO Kai]" messages should
only be frobbed by Kai.

kai
-- 
Silence is foo!

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[news]

Kai.Grossjohann@CS.Uni-Dortmund.DE (Kai Großjohann) writes:

> We are using an IMAP server with shared folders.  Works very nicely.
>
> If you agree on some protocol, you can even do todo lists in such
> shared folders.  We put "[TODO]" in the subject line of todo items and
> we tick the items that are not done.  When somebody signs up for an
> item, he removes that tick and makes a followup with "[TODO Kai]" (or
> similar) in the subject.  Tick marks on "[TODO Kai]" messages should
> only be frobbed by Kai.

Thanks, I like hearing about how people are using these flexible tools.

So I think tick is ! (bang).  Then the item stays in the [TODO]
thread until it is completed, at which point the tick is removed,
and the item can expire.  Does the !(bang) mark all of the way
back to the IMAP server, not just in gnus?

Is that right?

Then do you expire(expunge) it from the IMAP server as well, or just from
everyone's gnus?  Do you preserve it on the server as a record of what
has been done?  I haven't shared IMAP folders before, but I use
IMAP/nnimap.

I guess I could experiment right now...

Well, I'll send this post first.

Chris

Re: "CNET imagines the perfect e-mail client" - can Emacs be it?

[Kai Großjohann]

(Chris Beggy ) news@kippona.com writes:

> So I think tick is ! (bang).  Then the item stays in the [TODO]
> thread until it is completed, at which point the tick is removed,
> and the item can expire.  Does the !(bang) mark all of the way
> back to the IMAP server, not just in gnus?
>
> Is that right?

Mostly.  See below.

> Then do you expire(expunge) it from the IMAP server as well, or just
> from everyone's gnus?  Do you preserve it on the server as a record
> of what has been done?  I haven't shared IMAP folders before, but I
> use IMAP/nnimap.

We mark the message as read, and since we are NOT using total-expire,
this means that it is kept on the server.

Also, we are using Cyrus (in an old version) where all marks (except
the read mark) are global across all users.  In particular, the tick
mark is across all users.

I am using the following kludge to make the dormant mark be local to
each user:

  (setq nnimap-importantize-dormant nil)
  (setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-flag-alist)
          (format "gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name)))
  (setcdr (assq 'dormant nnimap-mark-to-predicate-alist)
          (format "KEYWORD gnus-dormant-%s" (user-login-name)))

Whee.  I think that Cyrus 2.x allows me to specify which marks should
be per-user marks.  So I wonder how to migrate this hack to the new
version :-{  Any ideas?  Anyone?

kai
-- 
Silence is foo!