[csi95]

Hey folks -- I'm looking for some advice on which email client to on OSX. My main concerns are:

• Speed
• Ease of use
• Flexibility (able to edit HTML, filter spam, manage folders, etc.)
• Easy Integration with MS Exchange

So, the question is? Which email client should I use?

[cybergoober]

If you're concerned with Exchange I think Entourage would be the way to go.

[tomrock]

You can set Entourage or Mail to leave your mail on the server and try them both. You can see the same mail in either client that way.

[Nivag]

If you are using Public Folders on the Exchange Server i would go with Entourage, otherwise Mail works ok. Personally i prefer Entourage.

[lpkmckenna]

I switched from Entourage to Mail with Tiger so I could Spotlight all my mail, calendars, and addresses.

[besson3c]

Thunderbird is a damn good client, in many ways the best of the three as far as its core duties and email clientness. However, it doesn't have the Exchange support that Entourage does.

[JKT]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Thunderbird is a damn good client.

It's also a buggy piece of crap when it comes to HTML composition.

For csi95, unfortunately your only option is to use Entourage as Mail doesn't do HTML composition (it is only capable of Rich Text composition*) and Thunderbird is just really poor at it at the moment. I say unfortunately because the UI of Entourage is truly horrible... I don't know how they managed it, but it is even worse than Outlook on a PC.

You can use Mail for HTML messages via a workaround involving Safari (you would need to compose your HTML in a third party app, display it in Safari and use the Mail Contents of this page option under the File menu). If you install Safaristand and you don't mind doing plain text editing of HTML, you can compose your HTML directly in Safari and thus cut out one of the additional elements.

* Edit: and plain text, of course...

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by JKT 

It's also a buggy piece of crap when it comes to HTML composition.

For csi95, unfortunately your only option is to use Entourage as Mail doesn't do HTML composition (it is only capable of Rich Text composition) and Thunderbird is just really poor at it at the moment. I say unfortunately because the UI of Entourage is truly horrible... I don't know how they managed it, but it is even worse than Outlook on a PC.

You can use Mail for HTML messages via a workaround involving Safari (you would need to compose your HTML in a third party app, display it in Safari and use the Mail Contents of this page option under the File menu). If you install Safaristand and you don't mind doing plain text editing of HTML, you can compose your HTML directly in Safari and thus cut out one of the additional elements.

The Safari option is a great suggestion. I would suggest concocting a template you can recycle that would include references to your images hosted on your server, embed your CSS, use simple HTML and not XHTML, and create a script that will help you generate your mail in multipart HTML/text. This way, you'll be offering a plain text version of the same email for those without email clients that recognize HTML (there are several).

Does the Safari trick send the mail as straight HTML, or does it offer a plain text alternative?

[JKT]

It does offer a plain text alternative but, for some reason, not all the links are included as far as I can tell after a little bit of experimentation. I don't have time to investigate further, and I don't use this trick myself, but if you find it works for you or doesn't work, let us know.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by JKT 

It's also a buggy piece of crap when it comes to HTML composition.

Does HTML e-mail ever get used for anything other than spam?

[JKT]

Opt-in newsletters. Signatures. Other than that, though... spam!

[besson3c]

And really crappy/cutesy email with secretaries with a lavendar background set in Comic Sans and maybe a flower in the signature.

[Blasphemy]

I use entourage. Mail gives me no end of trouble to configure smtp settings with non-default ports over ssl and with authentication. Thunderbird's UI is ugly, and its mail windows for composing are horrible about not wrapping plain text.

I would prefer an entourage with Outlook 2003's interface and button styles.

[besson3c]

Thunderbird is the way to go when you want a powerful email client with all sorts of features and capabilities and you don't mind trading off a little Mac-like persona.

[tomrock]

Originally Posted by lpkmckenna 

I switched from Entourage to Mail with Tiger so I could Spotlight all my mail, calendars, and addresses.

One of the Entourage updates adds Spotlight support -- it's a choice in Entourage preferences.

[lpkmckenna]

Originally Posted by tomrock 

One of the Entourage updates adds Spotlight support -- it's a choice in Entourage preferences.

If you are using Office 2004. I have Office X, and I've never felt the need to update (i.e. spend more).

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

And really crappy/cutesy email with secretaries with a lavendar background set in Comic Sans and maybe a flower in the signature.

Oh, yes, I forgot about people who like to write e-mails in 36-point Comic Sans.

Frankly, I wish there were a way to tell Mail to ignore all HTML formatting. You can turn off the displaying of images, but I would like to make all e-mails plain text.

[JKT]

I forgot one other instance of where the ability to compose HTML e-mails is important... my workplace. Bleh.

(Note, probably teaching you to suck eggs Charles, but command-option-P when viewing a message... not precisely what you want as you have to do it manually, but at least you can turn the HTML off quickly).

[Hi I'm Ben]

It's too bad Thunderbird has no Exchange support, for you. I use Mail on OS X and Thunderbird on my PC. After sometime with Thunderbird I have found its Junk Mail learning system far superior to Apple's implementation of it. Aside from that there is nothing really great about Thunderbird over Mail.app. Mail has a nicer looking interface (although you can change Thunderbirds with the use of themes) and integrates with other applications well.

If and when hell freezes over and I stop getting spam, I'd choose mail over Thunderbird.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by JKT 

I forgot one other instance of where the ability to compose HTML e-mails is important... my workplace. Bleh.

(Note, probably teaching you to suck eggs Charles, but command-option-P when viewing a message... not precisely what you want as you have to do it manually, but at least you can turn the HTML off quickly).

Yeah, I know you can do it manually.

I just wish there were a setting in the Preferences to just say "Ignore all HTML formatting" and be done with it (perhaps with the option to click a button at the top of the message to display the HTML in the case that you actually want/need to see it for some reason). Like with inline images.

An additional benefit is the fact that this would protect you against any jerks who figured out a way to exploit some security hole in Mail's HTML renderer to take over your computer or some such thing.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Hi I'm Ben 

It's too bad Thunderbird has no Exchange support, for you. I use Mail on OS X and Thunderbird on my PC. After sometime with Thunderbird I have found its Junk Mail learning system far superior to Apple's implementation of it. Aside from that there is nothing really great about Thunderbird over Mail.app. Mail has a nicer looking interface (although you can change Thunderbirds with the use of themes) and integrates with other applications well.

If and when hell freezes over and I stop getting spam, I'd choose mail over Thunderbird.

There are all sorts of areas where Thunderbird outshines Mail, were you being literal?

[besson3c]

List of features Thunderbird has that Mail lacks (in no particular order):

- Support for Cyrus squatter, which is a server-side full-text index of your messages. This makes performing searches *much* faster than downloading and caching messages and then searching them.

- Support for multiple identities

- The ability to control which folders you are subscribed to

- The ability to set which folders you want to have checked when you check for new messages

- A pluggable architecture to allow for things such as adding PGP support without having to write hacks such as the GPGMail thing (Enigmail is far nicer than GPGMail)

- More robust rule/filter creation

[JKT]

Well, that last post isn't entirely accurate:

http://www.hawkwings.net/plugins.htm

There are well over 100 plug-ins etc to enhance Mail and Address Book, which probably rivals Thunderbird for the number of extensions. Arguably they aren't supported by Apple, but they do exist.

I have no idea what you mean by supporting multiple identities, subscribing to folders and picking which ones are downloaded to when checking as I don't see any options for any of these in Thunderbird. I assume you mean via extensions?

IMO, it is evident that both Mail and Thunderbird have features absent from the other and neither is "complete". Mail works for me, and the UI and very obvious lack of polish in Thunderbird annoys me, as well as the poor integration with the Mac OS, but I hope it continues to improve. It won't do any harm to have more than one decent Mail client for OS X.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by JKT 

Well, that last post isn't entirely accurate:

Hawk Wings - Plug-ins for Apple Mail

There are well over 100 plug-ins etc to enhance Mail and Address Book, which probably rivals Thunderbird for the number of extensions. Arguably they aren't supported by Apple, but they do exist.

I wasn't aware of that... I wish Apple would provide a legitimate way to do this so that developers wouldn't have to worry about stuff breaking between Apple releases.

I have no idea what you mean by supporting multiple identities, subscribing to folders and picking which ones are downloaded to when checking as I don't see any options for any of these in Thunderbird. I assume you mean via extensions?

Identity management is right in the Thunderbird prefs. Subscribing and including folders to be checked are options you can bring up within the Folder's contextual menu. No extensions required.

Multiple identities is a very big deal, I'm most surprised that Apple didn't think of adding this capability.

IMO, it is evident that both Mail and Thunderbird have features absent from the other and neither is "complete". Mail works for me, and the UI and very obvious lack of polish in Thunderbird annoys me, as well as the poor integration with the Mac OS, but I hope it continues to improve. It won't do any harm to have more than one decent Mail client for OS X.

Agreed... I guess my point was that for people who just want a lot of power and flexibility and don't care about the Mac OS X integration stuff (and there are probably a lot more of these types of people than we realize), Thunderbird is your game.

[csi95]

Everyone -- thanks for the responses.

Originally Posted by besson3c 

And really crappy/cutesy email with secretaries with a lavendar background set in Comic Sans and maybe a flower in the signature.

HTML email gets a bad wrap -- and deservedly so. Personally, I like it though. I like being able to emphasize things with bold text, italics and color.

So, it sounds like Entourage is really my only option, huh? I forgot to mention it, but multiple identities is a must as well. I run many different companies, and need to manage mail for each in one central location.

It's Entourage as much of a resource hog as Outlook?

[besson3c]

You manage all of your companies through your single email account? Multiple identities implies multiple personas within a single email account, obviously you can accomplish the same task with multiple email accounts regardless of whether or not your client supports this feature.

Mail also supports text formatting like you've described in the form of rich text rather than HTML. If text formatting this way is all you care about, you will be fine with Mail in this regard.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

I wasn't aware of that... I wish Apple would provide a legitimate way to do this so that developers wouldn't have to worry about stuff breaking between Apple releases.

Well, the method that those developers are using is a kind-of almost-supported mechanism, because Mail actually has a plug-in API just like Thunderbird, except that it uses Cocoa's built-in loadable bundle mechanism in order to work. It loads bundles from ~/Library/Mail/Bundles if EnableBundles is set to YES in the preferences. You don't have to use haxies, fake input managers, mach_inject, etc.

The only problem is that the API is undocumented (and the fact that this post on the cocoa-dev mailing list claimed that Apple might consider the plug-in feature as a security risk and thus might remove it at some point. However, that was in 2002, and it hasn't happened yet).

[csi95]

Originally Posted by besson3c

You manage all of your companies through your single email account?

No. What I mean is that I need to be able to receive and reply to multiple email accounts through the same mail client. I might receive some mail to bryan@thiscompany.com and some to bryan@thatcompany.com. I need to be able to respond to each, using the appropriate SMTP connection, with the appropriate signature, etc.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by csi95 

No. What I mean is that I need to be able to receive and reply to multiple email accounts through the same mail client. I might receive some mail to bryan@thiscompany.com and some to bryan@thatcompany.com. I need to be able to respond to each, using the appropriate SMTP connection, with the appropriate signature, etc.

All email clients in question here support that, this is quite common.