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> ...Gmail does many things well, except for being a good email service. Gmail/Gsuite seem to be good email services from my perspective as lay user and occasi

by abtinf 8y ago

> ...Gmail does many things well, except for being a good email service. Gmail/Gsuite seem to be good email services from my perspective as lay user and occasional admin. Can you expand on why you think they are not good email services?

jxdxbx 8y ago
I’m not a fan of Gmail either, mostly because it lacks push vis iOS Mail (which Fastmail supports, so it is possible), and its non-standard tagging system doesn’t not play well with any third-party client that does not take extraordinary steps to accommodate it. Folders are better. Its proprietary apps are terrible and its web interface is weird, unintuitive, ugly, and slow.
- rjmunro 8y ago
  I find it's "non standard" tagging system is a massively superior model for managing email. I really wish there were alternatives that did similar, and a protocol like IMAP or JMAP that assumed the tagging based model underneath.
josteink 8y ago
Here's a few things: - constantly changing things around. UI gets less intuitive for every release. - slower for every release - violates IMAP standard by re-using IDs across tags/IMAP folders, risking actual data loss. Example: if you in a real email-client try to delete a email from a single folder, you will also delete this email from all other folders it has been "tagged" in. - similar IMAP issues with sent emails. Hard to track sent emails from email-client, unless you allow the email-client to explicitly save a copy to sent-emails folder. But then you suddenly have duplicate emails in the web-UI. - Makes an open standard (internet email) proprietary. - Hell to integrate with: See above. I'm sure I could go on, but really. If you still consider GMail best in class, the only possible explanation is that you haven't seen anything else.
- chrisfinazzo 8y ago
  The messed up deletion behavior baffles me to this day. The stock mail app on iOS will behave correctly if you muck with the Gmail POP/IMAP settings and turn off 'Archive' in MobileMail, but I have zero confidence that this will work on macOS because Apple pays less attention to the desktop and Gmail don't give a crap if actual client applications work correctly. They just assume everyone uses the web interface.
  - jrnichols 8y ago
    > They just assume everyone uses the web interface. More likely, they want you using their app and their web interface, and merely tolerate third party apps. For now. Google wants you in the Googleverse forever.

by abtinf 8y ago

jxdxbx 8y ago

I’m not a fan of Gmail either, mostly because it lacks push vis iOS Mail (which Fastmail supports, so it is possible), and its non-standard tagging system doesn’t not play well with any third-party client that does not take extraordinary steps to accommodate it. Folders are better. Its proprietary apps are terrible and its web interface is weird, unintuitive, ugly, and slow.

rjmunro 8y ago
I find it's "non standard" tagging system is a massively superior model for managing email. I really wish there were alternatives that did similar, and a protocol like IMAP or JMAP that assumed the tagging based model underneath.

josteink 8y ago

Here's a few things: - constantly changing things around. UI gets less intuitive for every release. - slower for every release - violates IMAP standard by re-using IDs across tags/IMAP folders, risking actual data loss. Example: if you in a real email-client try to delete a email from a single folder, you will also delete this email from all other folders it has been "tagged" in. - similar IMAP issues with sent emails. Hard to track sent emails from email-client, unless you allow the email-client to explicitly save a copy to sent-emails folder. But then you suddenly have duplicate emails in the web-UI. - Makes an open standard (internet email) proprietary. - Hell to integrate with: See above. I'm sure I could go on, but really. If you still consider GMail best in class, the only possible explanation is that you haven't seen anything else.

chrisfinazzo 8y ago
The messed up deletion behavior baffles me to this day. The stock mail app on iOS will behave correctly if you muck with the Gmail POP/IMAP settings and turn off 'Archive' in MobileMail, but I have zero confidence that this will work on macOS because Apple pays less attention to the desktop and Gmail don't give a crap if actual client applications work correctly. They just assume everyone uses the web interface.
- jrnichols 8y ago
  > They just assume everyone uses the web interface. More likely, they want you using their app and their web interface, and merely tolerate third party apps. For now. Google wants you in the Googleverse forever.