evolution email

[Patrick O'Callaghan]

On 02/01/2009 11:47 AM, Craig White wrote:
> On Sun, 2009-02-01 at 16:29 +0100, Harry R. wrote:
>> Oh well,
>>
>> After trying for a couple of days to get Evolution NOT to return those infamous sync errors
>> that it has been doing for years, after reading a LOT on the Net about this and other evolution
>> problems, after trying to import my old mailboxes (does not work always, or actually, it almost
>> never works), after trying to get it to understand an Mbox layout, and doing evrything again
>> and again, it now freezes at random and even crashed at typing email number 2.
>>
>> Evolution is I am sorry to say probably the most disappointing email client I have ever worked
>> with. Back to the basics.
> ----
> Evolution is a knock off of Microsoft Outlook.

If "knock off" means "competes in the same space as", then yes. At least 
it tries to be. AFAIK there is no other free mail client compatible with 
MS Exchange (other than via the IMAP interface of course). That may 
change now that MS has released its MAPI specs under a usable license.

> Evolution also suffers from the GNOME concept of hard coding features
> and limiting many user options.

Many of these are actually configurable through Gnome-conf, but I agree 
it can be annoying. Maximum length of a text line comes to mind (it's 
hard-wired to 72).

> That said, I've been using it for many, many years and it works fine for
> me.

Ditto, but with persistent frustrations. I'm fed up to the back teeth 
with it hanging forever trying to sync an IMAP mailbox, something that 
happens to me several times a day.

> mbox files are not always perfect and I have seen instances where the
> mbox files themselves can be the problem.
>
> Thankfully, there are a lot of e-mail client choices on Linux so you
> should be able to find one that makes you happy.

Not so much as you'd think. If you want mail to be functional, reliable 
and actively maintained, there are only Kmail (but it's borked on me 
more than once), Claws (but it doesn't support the IMAP model of message 
deletion), Mutt, Elm etc. (if you don't mind not having a GUI) and 
Thunderbird.

I'm currently using Tbird 3beta. Looks promising.

poc