Which mail client?

Which mail client?

[exits funnel]

Hello,

I'd like to start using EMACS as my email client. 
I've been researching the topic on the web and it
seems there are many choices: gnus, rmail, vm.  Are
they all three still actively maintained?  I don't
want to spend time trying to learn something only to
find out that it's no longer maintained/updated. I
guess I'm really just wondering what other people use
and/or suggest.  Thanks in advance for any replies!

-exits


	
		
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Re: Which mail client?

[Miles Bader]

exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:
> seems there are many choices: gnus, rmail, vm.  Are
> they all three still actively maintained?

Yes (well actually I'm not entirely sure about vm, but the likelihood
is high).

rmail is the simplest, but the least powerful; it operates on
single-file mailboxes.  I think in released versions of emacs, rmail
stores mail in the non-standard `babyl' format, which might occasionally
be annoying; plans are to change to using the more standard unix mbox
format instead (with appropriate conversion function in place of
course).

Gnus is utterly, insanely powerful, and is probably the most well
supported of any of them (there's a large and very active Gnus community
too).  It supports mail very well, but is a news-reader at heart and
treats mail as simply a special sort of newsgroup, which turns some
people off.  The last time I checked, setting up Gnus to read mail was
slightly fiddly.  This is what I use.

VM is sort of in-between -- it's only a mail reader, and while it's a
lot more featureful than rmail, it doesn't really approach the giddy
heights of Gnus.  Unlike the others, VM is not included in the GNU Emacs
distribution, and so may have a few issues because of that (it's been a
while since I kept up with VM, but when I did, the maintainer seemed
quite responsive and helpful).

-Miles
-- 
Somebody has to do something, and it's just incredibly pathetic that it
has to be us.  -- Jerry Garcia

Re: Which mail client?

[Stefan Monnier]

>> seems there are many choices: gnus, rmail, vm.  Are
>> they all three still actively maintained?

Yes, and there's more.  Emacs comes also with MH-E which is a very good
system as well.  If you look at non-bundled packages, there's also Mew
and I'm sure I'm forgetting a couple more.

Tho in practice if you want to directly access an IMAP mailbox (seems to be
the standard nowadays), I think Gnus is your only real choice.  he upside
of that is that it's a pretty damn good choice.  The only problem I have
with it is that its IMAP support is slow if you have many folders.


        Stefan

Re: Which mail client?

[Björn Lindström]

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

> Tho in practice if you want to directly access an IMAP mailbox (seems
> to be the standard nowadays), I think Gnus is your only real choice.
> he upside of that is that it's a pretty damn good choice.  The only
> problem I have with it is that its IMAP support is slow if you have
> many folders.

Another upside to Gnus is that it not only handles mail, but also news
(and a few other things). Even if you're not interested in Usenet,
you'll probably find that gmane.org is a great resource if you read a
lot of mailing lists.

-- 
Björn Lindström <bkhl@elektrubadur.se>
http://bkhl.elektrubadur.se/

Re: Which mail client?

[Markus Knittig]

Quote [ Stefan Monnier * 3914. September 1993 ]

> Tho in practice if you want to directly access an IMAP mailbox (seems to be
> the standard nowadays), I think Gnus is your only real choice.  he upside
> of that is that it's a pretty damn good choice.  The only problem I have
> with it is that its IMAP support is slow if you have many folders.

And you can store drafts on the imap server.
If you don't need all Gnus features Wanderlust[1] will be also a good choice.

MfG
 Markus

Footnotes: 
[1] http://www.gohome.org/wl/

Re: Which mail client?

[Xavier Maillard]

On 20 May 2004, Markus Knittig wrote:

> Quote [ Stefan Monnier * 3914. September 1993 ]
> 
> > Tho  in practice  if you  want to  directly access  an  IMAP mailbox
> > (seems to be the standard nowadays),  I think Gnus is your only real
> > choice. he  upside of that is  that it's a pretty  damn good choice.
> > The only problem I have with it  is that its IMAP support is slow if
> > you have many folders.
> 
> And you can store drafts on the imap server. If you don't need all

Huh ? Really ? How do you tell it so ?

-- 
.o.  | Hacker wonderland
..o  |
ooo  |

Re: Which mail client?

[Steinar Børmer]

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

| Tho in practice if you want to directly access an IMAP mailbox
| (seems to be the standard nowadays), I think Gnus is your only real
| choice.  he upside of that is that it's a pretty damn good choice.
| The only problem I have with it is that its IMAP support is slow if
| you have many folders.

I haven't tried Gnus 5.9.0 with IMAP, but I've been told that the more
recent versions (especially No Gnus, which I'm using) have notably
better IMAP speed and general functionality improvements.

-- 
SB

I am so smart, so smart - s-m-r-t!  I mean, s-m-A-r-t!
	         			- Homer Simpson

Re: Which mail client?

[Miles Bader]

s1726@ii.uib.no (Steinar Børmer) writes:
> I haven't tried Gnus 5.9.0 with IMAP, but I've been told that the more
> recent versions (especially No Gnus, which I'm using) have notably
> better IMAP speed and general functionality improvements.

How's No Gnus generally for stability?

I tried it out on a lark today (while setting up the gnus arch archive),
and it flaked out pretty badly, undefined variable errors, couldn't read
mail (got it from the server, but failed to store it in my mail
folders!).  I even thought it trashed my .newsrc.eld file for a while --
it asked if I wanted to "upgrade" that file (irreversibly), recommended
I make a backup, and when I realized I'd better go back to 5.9, the
backup had been deleted!  Luckily it turned out that the "upgrade" had
failed too... :-)

However, I presume it may have simply been a bad time.

Thanks,

-Miles
-- 
Saa, shall we dance?  (from a dance-class advertisement)

Re: Which mail client?

[Reiner Steib]

On Thu, May 20 2004, Miles Bader wrote:

> s1726@ii.uib.no (Steinar Børmer) writes:
>> I haven't tried Gnus 5.9.0 with IMAP, but I've been told that the more
>> recent versions (especially No Gnus, which I'm using) have notably
>> better IMAP speed and general functionality improvements.

I don't recall any major changes related to IMAP from Gnus 5.10 to No
Gnus.

> How's No Gnus generally for stability?
[...]
> I tried it out on a lark today (while setting up the gnus arch archive),
> and it flaked out pretty badly, undefined variable errors, couldn't read
> mail (got it from the server, but failed to store it in my mail
> folders!).  [...]
> However, I presume it may have simply been a bad time.

Probably.  Compare the activity in the ChangeLog within the last week
to the previous months.  No Gnus is a developer version after all.
But apart from yesterday, I didn't have serious problems.

If you see problems when upgrading from 5.9 to 5.10.6, please report
them on ding.

Is your arch archive (for Gnus) already set up?

Bye, Reiner.
-- 
       ,,,
      (o o)
---ooO-(_)-Ooo--- PGP key available via WWW   http://rsteib.home.pages.de/

Re: Which mail client?

[Miles Bader]

Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:
> Is your arch archive (for Gnus) already set up?

Yes, the branch for the Gnus CVS trunk is:

   miles@gnu.org--gnu-2004/gnus--devo--0

The usual mirror for miles@gnu.org--gnu-2004 is:

    http://sourcecontrol.net/~miles/miles@gnu.org--gnu-2004

I still haven't merged in changes from Emacs though; unless I'm missing
something, it's all a huge mess -- it looks like both branches (Emacs
and Gnus V5-8 [nevermind v5-10!]) were changed independently after the
point where emacs was forked, and the Emacs copy includes all sorts of
random junk like whitespace and spelling corrections (but also real bug
fixes).  It's going to take more thought and consultation to do things
well, I think.

But if you just want to track the Gnus CVS trunk using arch, the above
should work great.

-Miles
-- 
(\(\
(^.^)
(")")
*This is the cute bunny virus, please copy this into your sig so it can spread.

Re: Which mail client?

[Miles Bader]

Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:
> But apart from yesterday, I didn't have serious problems.

BTW, about the .newsrc "upgrade" -- as I mentioned, it asked me, and
then failed to actually change anything.

One thing that's funny about my Gnus setup is that I don't use a
.newsrc file -- I only have have a .newsrc.eld file.  Should the
upgrade process cope with that situation?

-Miles
-- 
97% of everything is grunge

Re: Which mail client?

[exits funnel]

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I just wanted to take a second to thank everyone for
their input; it was exactly what I was looking for. 
I'm going to take a crack at using gnus and see how it
goes.  Thanks again.

-exits

ps - Speaking of gnus, I'm having trouble subscribing
to their mail list.  My email to
'ding-request@gnus.org' keeps getting bounced back to
me.  Is that the correct address?  Is their a more
appropriate list for a user rather than a developer?




	
		
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Re: Which mail client?

[Kevin Greiner]

Miles Bader <miles@gnu.org> writes:

> Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:
>> But apart from yesterday, I didn't have serious problems.
>
> BTW, about the .newsrc "upgrade" -- as I mentioned, it asked me, and
> then failed to actually change anything.
>
> One thing that's funny about my Gnus setup is that I don't use a
> .newsrc file -- I only have have a .newsrc.eld file.  Should the
> upgrade process cope with that situation?

The upgrade message is rather misleading in this case (It is, after
all, fairly new code).  I can see two issues that would contribute to
the confusion.  First, the message appears based upon the change in
version number.  No analysis is made to determine whether the upgrade
code actually needs to change your configuration.  Secondly, gnus
keeps its state scattered across a number of files that are normally
hidden from the casual user, it is quite possible that the "upgrade"
would be to one of those files.

I'll see what I can do to make the messages clearer.

Kevin

Re: Which mail client?

[Miles Bader]

Kevin Greiner <kgreiner@xpediantsolutions.com> writes:
> Secondly, gnus keeps its state scattered across a number of files that
> are normally hidden from the casual user, it is quite possible that
> the "upgrade" would be to one of those files.
>
> I'll see what I can do to make the messages clearer.

Are any of those "scattered files" used by older versions of Gnus?
Would that mean you really need to backup the other files besides
.newsrc{.eld,} too?

-Miles
-- 
Run away!  Run away!

Re: Which mail client?

[Steinar Børmer]

Miles Bader <miles@gnu.org> writes:

| s1726@ii.uib.no (Steinar Børmer) writes:
| > I haven't tried Gnus 5.9.0 with IMAP, but I've been told that the
| > more recent versions (especially No Gnus, which I'm using) have
| > notably better IMAP speed and general functionality improvements.
| 
| How's No Gnus generally for stability?

I haven't had any problems, as far as I can remember.  I haven't used
the 5.9 series for a long time, though, so maybe my files were more
"recent" and didn't need the upgrades you're talking about.  No
quirks, it just works.  =)

-- 
SB

I am so smart, so smart - s-m-r-t!  I mean, s-m-A-r-t!
	         			- Homer Simpson

Re: Which mail client?

[Tassilo Horn]

exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:

> Hello,

Hi,

> I'd like to start using EMACS as my email client. 
> I've been researching the topic on the web and it
> seems there are many choices: gnus, rmail, vm.  Are
> they all three still actively maintained?  I don't
> want to spend time trying to learn something only to
> find out that it's no longer maintained/updated. I
> guess I'm really just wondering what other people use
> and/or suggest.  Thanks in advance for any replies!

I use Gnus for my news and mail and I'm really happy with it. Today I
don't know how I could read my mail without it. Gnus is actively
maintained. For more information visit [1] and [2].
Beside the mail clients you mentioned there's another one which seems
to be quite good - Wanderlust [3]. I never used it, so look for more
information on its homepage (if you're able to read japanese ;-) ).

HTH,
        Tassilo

[1] http://www.gnus.org
[2] http://my.gnus.org
[3] http://www.gohome.org/wl/index.ja.html 
-- 
"It may just be paranoia, but I think Gnus reads my mail."
			Bruce Stephens <bruce@cenderis.demon.co.uk>

Re: Which mail client?

[Tim X]

>>>>> "exits" == exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:

 exits> Hello, I'd like to start using EMACS as my email client.  I've
 exits> been researching the topic on the web and it seems there are
 exits> many choices: gnus, rmail, vm.  Are they all three still
 exits> actively maintained?  I don't want to spend time trying to
 exits> learn something only to find out that it's no longer
 exits> maintained/updated. I guess I'm really just wondering what
 exits> other people use and/or suggest.  Thanks in advance for any
 exits> replies!

I've been using VM for e-mail for about 7 years and find it works
really well. The package is being actively maintained and has a active
user group. It supports most options you would probably be looking for
- imap, pop, maylcrypt, etc can easily be configured to handle
different attachments and mime types - for example, I've got mine
setup so that if someone sends me a word file, it is automatically
translated into text and displayed in the buffer. You can also
configure it to fire up an external program if you prefer (e.g. xpdf
for pdf attachments or a graphic viewer for many forms of graphics
which are or may not be supported natively by emacs etc. It also has
some nice features, like virtual folders and contributers have made
extensions avilable to make it easy to incorporate various anti-spamm
solutions etc.

Tim




-- 
Tim Cross
The e-mail address on this message is FALSE (obviously!). My real e-mail is
to a company in Australia called rapttech and my login is tcross - if you 
really need to send mail, you should be able to work it out!

Re: Which mail client?

[Jesper Harder]

exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:

> ps - Speaking of gnus, I'm having trouble subscribing to their mail
> list.  My email to 'ding-request@gnus.org' keeps getting bounced
> back to me.  Is that the correct address?  Is their a more
> appropriate list for a user rather than a developer?

The most appropriate place to ask questions is the newsgroup
gnu.emacs.gnus.

It's available from the newsserver news.gnus.org if you don't have
access to another server.

-- 
Jesper Harder                                <http://purl.org/harder/>

Re: Which mail client?

[Jesper Harder]

Jesper Harder <harder@myrealbox.com> writes:

> The most appropriate place to ask questions is the newsgroup
> gnu.emacs.gnus.

Apparently it's also gatewayed to a mailing list now [1] -- this seems
to be very recent, only within the last 1-2 months.

Sigh, this probably means that gnu.emacs.gnus will begin receive just
as much gatewayed spam as gnu.emacs.help.  The GNU mailing lists
*really* need much better spam-filtering.


[1] <http://mail.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/info-gnus-english>
-- 
Jesper Harder                                <http://purl.org/harder/>

Re: Which mail client?

[Tassilo Horn]

exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:

> ps - Speaking of gnus, I'm having trouble subscribing
> to their mail list.  My email to
> 'ding-request@gnus.org' keeps getting bounced back to
> me.  Is that the correct address?  Is their a more
> appropriate list for a user rather than a developer?

You also can read Ding via Gmane. There it's called

    gmane.emacs.gnus.general

Other newsgroups where you can get a lot of help are
      
      gnu.emacs.gnus

and, if you can read/write german

     de.comm.software.gnus

HTH,
        Tassilo
-- 
main(){printf(&unix["\021%six\012\0"],(unix)["have"]+"fun"-0x60);}

Re: Which mail client?

[exits funnel]

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Okay,

I've got gnus up and running (hobbling, really) but I
need a jumpstart.  After much tinkering, my .gnus
looks very similar to this:

//BEGIN .gnus 	
(setq gnus-select-method '(nntp "news.gnus.org"))
(setq user-mail-address "my_anme@mycompany.com")
(setq user-full-name "My Name")

;;Incoming
(add-to-list 'gnus-secondary-select-methods '(nnml
""))

(eval-after-load "mail-source"
  '(add-to-list 'mail-sources '(pop :server
"mypopserver-mail1"
                                    :user "My Name")))

;;Outgoing
(setq send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it)
(setq message-send-mail-function 'smtpmail-send-it)
(setq smtpmail-default-smtp-server
"mail.mycompany.com")
//END .gnus

when I start gnus it asks me for my password and I
briefly see a subsequent message informing me that
it's downloaded some emails from my pop server.  This
is all good, but unfortunately after spending an hour
and a half reading the info pages I still can't figure
out how to see my messages!  I'm afraid one of them
may have been something important so I'd really
appreciate a jumpstart to set me in the right
direction.  So, basically, how can I find and read the
emails I downloaded?  Thanks in advance.

-exits



	
		
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Re: Which mail client?

[Xavier Maillard]

On 21 May 2004, Tassilo Horn wrote:

> exits funnel <exitsfunnel@yahoo.com> writes:
> 
> > ps - Speaking of gnus, I'm having trouble subscribing
> > to their mail list.  My email to
> > 'ding-request@gnus.org' keeps getting bounced back to
> > me.  Is that the correct address?  Is their a more
> > appropriate list for a user rather than a developer?
> 
> You also can read Ding via Gmane. There it's called
> 
> gmane.emacs.gnus.general
> 
> Other newsgroups where you can get a lot of help are
> 
> gnu.emacs.gnus
> 
> and, if you can read/write german
> 
> de.comm.software.gnus

and if you can read/write french

  fr.comp.applications.emacs

-- 
 In Gruuik we trust