4 ms·

I don't remember things being so bad back when IMAP was more popular. That and back when threaded messages were a thing. Nowadays, the way gmail shows threads

by taeric 4y ago

I don't remember things being so bad back when IMAP was more popular. That and back when threaded messages were a thing. Nowadays, the way gmail shows threads is about the best I can expect. What happened? I don't know any reason that programs such as Mutt should have gotten bad.

vxNsr 4y ago
Can you explain the difference between threaded messages and what gmail does?
- WesolyKubeczek 4y ago
  Gmail displays you a "conversation" where there's only one parent messages and threading is lost inside. It's bearable when conversation is more or less under control. But inside it, you lose, UI-wise, the information on who actually replied to whom. The only way you can infer that is if all participants have good quoting discipline.
WesolyKubeczek 4y ago
> What happened? I don't know any reason that programs such as Mutt should have gotten bad. If you have a mailbox with tens of thousands of messages and you also use mutt's IMAP capabilities, mutt's UI is going to freeze on you for prolonged periods of time. It also is trying very hard to be efficient and only download relevant stuff, but somehow it translates to "is downloading stuff all the time" (and freezes its UI while doing so). Basically you reproduce this by subscribing to a high-traffic mailing list, letting it send you stuff for a month, then trying to use Mutt on that. It also turns out that a maildir with all that stuff is also a stress test for your filesystem, so you add all deficiencies of email client to all deficiencies of your filesystem. Meh.
- taeric 4y ago
  Crap... Late to getting back to this. Newsgroups used to churn through a ton of messages. I don't remember them bogging down this badly. ;(
  - WesolyKubeczek 4y ago
    Maybe it boils down to async being hard and Mutt actually using synchronous network transfers, obliviously assuming they would be zero-cost which they are obviously not. There's also this work in configuration that you have to do to shoehorn Gmail's labels into Mutt's mailboxes. Oh, have I mentioned already that your 100K+ messages in one maildir will be really, really taxing on your filesystem? I don't know, maybe someone should come and try and reinvent this whole crap around more modern workflows.
    - taeric 4y ago
      I'm tempted to get gnus running again. :) Love to see how things compare to my memory.

by taeric 4y ago

vxNsr 4y ago

Can you explain the difference between threaded messages and what gmail does?

WesolyKubeczek 4y ago
Gmail displays you a "conversation" where there's only one parent messages and threading is lost inside. It's bearable when conversation is more or less under control. But inside it, you lose, UI-wise, the information on who actually replied to whom. The only way you can infer that is if all participants have good quoting discipline.

WesolyKubeczek 4y ago

> What happened? I don't know any reason that programs such as Mutt should have gotten bad. If you have a mailbox with tens of thousands of messages and you also use mutt's IMAP capabilities, mutt's UI is going to freeze on you for prolonged periods of time. It also is trying very hard to be efficient and only download relevant stuff, but somehow it translates to "is downloading stuff all the time" (and freezes its UI while doing so). Basically you reproduce this by subscribing to a high-traffic mailing list, letting it send you stuff for a month, then trying to use Mutt on that. It also turns out that a maildir with all that stuff is also a stress test for your filesystem, so you add all deficiencies of email client to all deficiencies of your filesystem. Meh.

taeric 4y ago
Crap... Late to getting back to this. Newsgroups used to churn through a ton of messages. I don't remember them bogging down this badly. ;(
- WesolyKubeczek 4y ago
  Maybe it boils down to async being hard and Mutt actually using synchronous network transfers, obliviously assuming they would be zero-cost which they are obviously not. There's also this work in configuration that you have to do to shoehorn Gmail's labels into Mutt's mailboxes. Oh, have I mentioned already that your 100K+ messages in one maildir will be really, really taxing on your filesystem? I don't know, maybe someone should come and try and reinvent this whole crap around more modern workflows.
  - taeric 4y ago
    I'm tempted to get gnus running again. :) Love to see how things compare to my memory.