Re: Gnus vs Wanderlust

[colin.rafferty@morganstanley.com]

Miguel wrote:

> I been using Gnus for email only since a while. I think it is a very
> nice client but I would like to compare it with other Gnu/Emacs
> email clients. 

I used VM as a mail reader for about 7 years.  I then used Gnus for
about two years.  I switched back to VM for three more years.  I have
been using WL for about two months now.

I stopped using Gnus for mail because, to paraphrase Kyle Jones, I
prefer a mail reader for mail, and a news reader for news.  Note that
this is a personal decision.

When I enter a mail folder, I expect to see all the messages, rather
than just the ones for that are new.  I prefer to delete messages
myself, rather than have them expire.  I prefer to have my messages
ordered by date rather than by perceived importance.

I realize that I have all those options in Gnus.  However, those are
all working against how Gnus works.  I prefer swimming downstream.

I switched to WL because at my company, we use imap, and have for a
while.  Until two months ago, I would use fetchmail+procmail to
download, fold, spindle, and mutilate my mail.  I would then use VM to
read it.

I switched to WL because it works with imap, as opposed to VM, which
works in spite of imap.  I can now keep my mail on the server, and
read the 1% of windows-only messages I care about in Thunderbird.

I also use nnimap on an experimental basis.  However, it is painfully
slow to enter a group.  For example, right now, my primary inbox shows
15382 messages total.  It's sparse -- there are only 707 actual
messages.

Every time I enter it, it takes between 25 and 30 seconds to generate
the threaded summary.  That's a long time.  I'm running on a 4-way
2.8GHz 6GB unloaded linux box.

This makes it effective unusable, since I want to see all my mail, and
not just the new mail.

VM and WL optimize summary creation by caching the summary.  If I get
new mail, either one places it in the proper position, so the time
spent is proportional to the amount of new mail, rather than the total
amount of mail.

I love Gnus as a news reader.  I use it actively, and think it is the
best news reader ever.  However, the needs of a mail reader are
different from a news reader.

-- 
Colin