[X-Newbies] Mail defaults [u]

[David Flory [c]]

Tony, let me start by saying that if you just like the feel of  
Entourage better than the feel of Mail that is a good and sufficient  
reason. Everyone has their likes and dislikes. On the other hand over  
50 years of playing with computers has told me that many of the  
problems people blame on the computer or software are based on user  
error/ignorance. That holds true for me too, I'm not picking on you.  
That said I'll try to answer your specific problems. Mail isn't  
perfect, but I've used almost all of the clients and I use Apple Mail  
as my client.

On Dec 18, 2005, at 1:24 AM, Tony Johansen wrote:

> How about the annoying habit of going 'off-line' after a very short  
> time.
>
> Then it seems to enjoy not wanting to use 'the specified server'  
> and wanting
> me to select another to send an e-mail.

In my experience this has been due to a problem with my ISP, not my  
computer. (In one case it was "my" fault due to a magical change of  
my network configuration page which I didn't do with "my fingers",  
don't know how it happened.)
>
> Or, periodically, pop-up windows requiring the password for various  
> accounts
> inexplicably

I've seen reports of this but never experienced it myself.
> The inbox window seems to be made of several tiles which tend to  
> overlap
> here and there when there are more than 250 messages in there

I generally delete messages after I've read them. Those I want to  
keep I put into FileMaker Pro. I just went and looked at my wife's  
inbox and she has 2046 messages there with 1022 unread. No sign of  
this particular problem, for whatever that is worth.
>
> Most recent messages are not located together.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean here. I filter route my messages  
into a separate mailbox for each e-mail list I read. Within that they  
are sorted by topic, and they end up sorted within identical topics  
by date sent. Do you have all messages go into your in Box? In any  
inbox clicking onto the date sent/received column header will sort by  
date/time.
>
> Full e-mail addresses are not immediately visible.

My first thought was why would you need that? But that's not really a  
valid thought, if you want it that's enough. How immediate do you  
need, click on the little arrow on the right end of the name and you  
get a display of the e-mail address and a menu that includes the  
choice to copy the address, add it to the address book, etc.
>
> Can't easily categorise mail within a mailbox.

I'm not really clear on exactly what your mean by this, but filters  
will let you sort incoming mail into sub-boxes within any "parent"  
mailbox. Clicking on the header of a column will sort displayed  
messages by that parameter.
>
> I have no problems remotely like any of these in Entourage, which  
> indicates
> it is the program at fault. I have 1500 messages in Entourage  
> currently.
> Mail seems to be fine for one or two e-mail addresses and small  
> numbers of
> messages, but deficient for heavy usage.

The lack of problems may be because you are more familiar with  
Entourage, than Mail. The problems you see not _necessarily_ the  
fault of Mail. My wife has to use Entourage at work and she hates it  
and love's Mail. That doesn't make Entourage a bad program or Mail a  
good one, but neither of us have any of these problems so may be it's  
possible for you to not have them either. If you want to try that,  
just give a little more detail on your problems and I'm sure there  
are several people here that will try to help you solve them.

Fair winds and happy bytes, Dave Flory, San Jose, CA.
--
Speak softly, study Aikido, & you won't need to carry a big stick!
See my photos @ <http://homepage.mac.com/dflory>