Re: Balsa as a newsreader?!

[Stewart Evans <stewart lutris com>]

Speaking as a new Balsa user, I agree with Matthew - one of the reasons I
started using Balsa was as an alternative to the all-in-oneness of
Netscape.  Now when my web browser hangs, I don't have to kill my mailer. 
(Admittedly this would be less of a problem if Netscape was less of a
fragile piece of cr^H^Hjunk.)

While they're technically very similar, the ways that I use email and news
are very different, so my needs in a reader are different.  For mail, I
generally read or at least skim every message - I want something
lightweight for going through a mailbox one at a time.  With news, a
message that I actually read is the exception, not the rule.  The ideal
newsreader for me would have more sophisticated searching and filtering
options, and easy ways to dispose of  large quantities of uninteresting
messages.

It seems like making balsa into a basic newsreader could be done by bolting
on the NNTP mailbox like Ian suggested - but to turn it into a *good*
newsreader would have more impact on the overall design to add things like
server/newsgroup management, marking read, followup vs. reply, compose
options.

-- Stewart