6 ms·

Why Email Clients Need to Change

44 points by madh 17y ago

RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
My inbox is empty, everything filed into my GTD system. I have scripts that auto-compile the financial stuff into the right place, and other scripts that semi-automate (using a Bayesian classifier) stuff that needs an answer now, stuff that needs to be answered soon, stuff I need to think about, and archive. I hate repetition, and have scripted my most common actions. I guess I've hacked my email system.
- beza1e1 17y ago
  What software do you use? Python scripts and procmail? With what GTD stuff do you interact? What do you use for archiving (indexing, searching)?
  - RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
    I've hooked a Python Bayesian classifier into procmail and deliver things into folders. In essence it follows the GTD input process flow and delivers emails into project, answer required (AR), archive and delete folders. The AR emails I scan and reply to every day, refiling those that have been misclassified. My weekly GTD pass checks the other folders, allowing me to reclassify when they're wrong, and deal with appropriately otherwise. For archiving I just put it all in either a project specific repository or a single folder called "other". I can then search for keywords, but I usually pop out to a command line and grep for things if I need them. I'm sure there's more available in existing systems, but the Bayesian classifiers also work as spam filters. I wrote them years ago and they are a great tool to have to hand.
    - mcav 17y ago
      If you have the inclination, I'm sure many people (myself included) would be interested to see your code, even if it's raw and unsupported. Cool solution.
      - RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
        Hmm. I'll have to think about that. There's a lot I really wouldn't release, but I'll see what I can do. Too busy just now, but I'll put it on my list. Thanks for the interest. It never really occured to me that someone would be interested.
- pmjordan 17y ago
  While that sounds fantastic, I'd venture that your plain email client is inadequate to take care of most of this. Which I think was the point of the article.
zackattack 17y ago
Does anybody wish Gmail had an API? That would be oh-so-sweet.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- boundlessdreamz 17y ago
  It has. It is called IMAP. Joking aside, what would you want in API ? Search is something that gmail does better than most clients so that should be there
  - bonaldi 17y ago
    Conversations. You know, that threading-done-right they have that people love -- with a few holdouts -- but that no other email client has yet done correctly (and, no, an indented list of message titles isn't nearly the same thing, nor is IMAP THREAD's "same subject? Must be the same thread!"). There's a fair amount of deduction goes into Gmail's conversation ordering -- it's quite hard to fool -- and an API that allowed you to treat conversations as the primary unit instead of messages would be great. This article is right that the inbox needs to get smarter, and GMail is the closest to it yet. But while they're furiously adding frills around the outside, they've made very little changes of the sort suggested. Even easy things are missing: eg, why can't I click on a "from" header and automatically see all messages sent from that person? In fact, it's mostly small changes like this that could bring GMail much closer to what the author is looking for. Sure, being able to pull in Facebook interactions isn't going to happen, but a desktop client could certainly do that. Which brings us back to hoping for a GMail API.
    - briansmith 17y ago
      I've never seen Outlook's conversation view get things wrong.
    - moe 17y ago
      Conversations. You know, that threading-done-right they have that people love -- with a few holdouts -- Oh, you mean that useless representation that breaks down as soon as a third party gets involved and that google forces upon us even in their abysmal "groups" product that everyone insists on using nowadays? Referring to conversations as "threading done right" is the worst joke I've heard in a while. It's subset of what most e-mail clients already do with their collapsible threading based on message-id and subject and could be trivially added to same mail clients without loosing the advantages of real threading. The reason why that hasn't happened (except in niche products) is because most people just don't consider it a worthwhile feature. It has actually done more harm than good to the e-mail ecosystem because it encourages TOFU which annoys the hell out of people using regular mail clients and completely blows up on mailing lists. Edit: I just learned that outlook apparently has a conversation view. Well, why am I not surprised...
est 17y ago
One of my email accounts if full of activation/verification emails, forum notifications, auto reply notifications, etc.
duskwuff 17y ago
What the author's real issue appears to be here - which they don't quite articulate, but which is lurking in there - is really simple. We use email for two things nowadays: interpersonal communication and event notifications. The fact that they both end up in our inboxes is more by accident than by design, and a really good email client should probably separate the two to some degree.
- vorador 17y ago
  It is simpler to separate the inboxes than to separate the mails.
  - duskwuff 17y ago
    It's not just a matter of separating the messages, though. The workflow for a notification is completely different from the workflow for a personal email (which is also quite different from the workflow for a mailing-list message). As far as separating them, though, I suspect it really isn't that hard. Automated notifications tend to have some pretty distinctive phrases in them, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if you could get a Bayesian network to do an adequate job of separating them for you.
ori_b 17y ago
I have 29 of inboxes, and I have filters that categorize the mail automatically. The changes he wants are already here, and have been since the dawn of email. The author needs to learn how to use filters.
TweedHeads 17y ago
Gmail has filters. Use them. "if subject contains analytics apply label alert" "if subject contains facebook skip the inbox"
- braindead_in 17y ago
  Yeah. The authors best bet is to use filters for now. From the looks of it, he wants AI. Or an advanced Natural Language Processing. I mean going through the mails, checking them all to see if they are bills to be paid and then generate a report. Looks really cool. But too complex with what you can achieve with technology right now!
  - scorpion032 17y ago
    The emails from twitter, facebook and many mailing lists, have a specific format and some services(posterous) responds to a certain kinds of mails. Thus, first step toward what Alister says, could be done by defining patterns and associate gmail filters and searches to it. AI and NLP could have to be used sometime in the future. But for now import and export of filters should do quite a bit of it. Literally each gmail user has to set filters for himself. Rather if it could be configured via a workflow and associated with user inbox, it would be a long way for a better email client.
rabidsnail 17y ago
We need two-way RSS.

44 points by madh 17y ago

My inbox is empty, everything filed into my GTD system. I have scripts that auto-compile the financial stuff into the right place, and other scripts that semi-automate (using a Bayesian classifier) stuff that needs an answer now, stuff that needs to be answered soon, stuff I need to think about, and archive. I hate repetition, and have scripted my most common actions. I guess I've hacked my email system.

beza1e1 17y ago
What software do you use? Python scripts and procmail? With what GTD stuff do you interact? What do you use for archiving (indexing, searching)?
- RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
  I've hooked a Python Bayesian classifier into procmail and deliver things into folders. In essence it follows the GTD input process flow and delivers emails into project, answer required (AR), archive and delete folders. The AR emails I scan and reply to every day, refiling those that have been misclassified. My weekly GTD pass checks the other folders, allowing me to reclassify when they're wrong, and deal with appropriately otherwise. For archiving I just put it all in either a project specific repository or a single folder called "other". I can then search for keywords, but I usually pop out to a command line and grep for things if I need them. I'm sure there's more available in existing systems, but the Bayesian classifiers also work as spam filters. I wrote them years ago and they are a great tool to have to hand.
  - mcav 17y ago
    If you have the inclination, I'm sure many people (myself included) would be interested to see your code, even if it's raw and unsupported. Cool solution.
    - RiderOfGiraffes 17y ago
      Hmm. I'll have to think about that. There's a lot I really wouldn't release, but I'll see what I can do. Too busy just now, but I'll put it on my list. Thanks for the interest. It never really occured to me that someone would be interested.
pmjordan 17y ago
While that sounds fantastic, I'd venture that your plain email client is inadequate to take care of most of this. Which I think was the point of the article.

zackattack 17y ago

Does anybody wish Gmail had an API? That would be oh-so-sweet.

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
boundlessdreamz 17y ago
It has. It is called IMAP. Joking aside, what would you want in API ? Search is something that gmail does better than most clients so that should be there
- bonaldi 17y ago
  Conversations. You know, that threading-done-right they have that people love -- with a few holdouts -- but that no other email client has yet done correctly (and, no, an indented list of message titles isn't nearly the same thing, nor is IMAP THREAD's "same subject? Must be the same thread!"). There's a fair amount of deduction goes into Gmail's conversation ordering -- it's quite hard to fool -- and an API that allowed you to treat conversations as the primary unit instead of messages would be great. This article is right that the inbox needs to get smarter, and GMail is the closest to it yet. But while they're furiously adding frills around the outside, they've made very little changes of the sort suggested. Even easy things are missing: eg, why can't I click on a "from" header and automatically see all messages sent from that person? In fact, it's mostly small changes like this that could bring GMail much closer to what the author is looking for. Sure, being able to pull in Facebook interactions isn't going to happen, but a desktop client could certainly do that. Which brings us back to hoping for a GMail API.
  - briansmith 17y ago
    I've never seen Outlook's conversation view get things wrong.
  - moe 17y ago
    Conversations. You know, that threading-done-right they have that people love -- with a few holdouts -- Oh, you mean that useless representation that breaks down as soon as a third party gets involved and that google forces upon us even in their abysmal "groups" product that everyone insists on using nowadays? Referring to conversations as "threading done right" is the worst joke I've heard in a while. It's subset of what most e-mail clients already do with their collapsible threading based on message-id and subject and could be trivially added to same mail clients without loosing the advantages of real threading. The reason why that hasn't happened (except in niche products) is because most people just don't consider it a worthwhile feature. It has actually done more harm than good to the e-mail ecosystem because it encourages TOFU which annoys the hell out of people using regular mail clients and completely blows up on mailing lists. Edit: I just learned that outlook apparently has a conversation view. Well, why am I not surprised...

est 17y ago

One of my email accounts if full of activation/verification emails, forum notifications, auto reply notifications, etc.

duskwuff 17y ago

What the author's real issue appears to be here - which they don't quite articulate, but which is lurking in there - is really simple. We use email for two things nowadays: interpersonal communication and event notifications. The fact that they both end up in our inboxes is more by accident than by design, and a really good email client should probably separate the two to some degree.

vorador 17y ago
It is simpler to separate the inboxes than to separate the mails.
- duskwuff 17y ago
  It's not just a matter of separating the messages, though. The workflow for a notification is completely different from the workflow for a personal email (which is also quite different from the workflow for a mailing-list message). As far as separating them, though, I suspect it really isn't that hard. Automated notifications tend to have some pretty distinctive phrases in them, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if you could get a Bayesian network to do an adequate job of separating them for you.

ori_b 17y ago

I have 29 of inboxes, and I have filters that categorize the mail automatically. The changes he wants are already here, and have been since the dawn of email. The author needs to learn how to use filters.

TweedHeads 17y ago

Gmail has filters. Use them. "if subject contains analytics apply label alert" "if subject contains facebook skip the inbox"

braindead_in 17y ago
Yeah. The authors best bet is to use filters for now. From the looks of it, he wants AI. Or an advanced Natural Language Processing. I mean going through the mails, checking them all to see if they are bills to be paid and then generate a report. Looks really cool. But too complex with what you can achieve with technology right now!
- scorpion032 17y ago
  The emails from twitter, facebook and many mailing lists, have a specific format and some services(posterous) responds to a certain kinds of mails. Thus, first step toward what Alister says, could be done by defining patterns and associate gmail filters and searches to it. AI and NLP could have to be used sometime in the future. But for now import and export of filters should do quite a bit of it. Literally each gmail user has to set filters for himself. Rather if it could be configured via a workflow and associated with user inbox, it would be a long way for a better email client.

rabidsnail 17y ago

We need two-way RSS.