Re: Balsa 2.2.0 end user impressions

[Craig Routledge <webstuff craigroutledge com>]

On 07/23/2004 02:20:48 AM, Steffen Klemer wrote:
> The question in general is why balsa has to use 587 an not 25 - Okay, the  
> rfc says it... Is there any other real-world reason? The HIG and many  
> other usability docs speak of "doing it right and easy for the user" -  
> Where is the problem if EVERYBODY else in this world use 25 as the  
> submission port, why don't we?

I'm not opposed to this as I mentioned earlier in the thread, but it isn't  
my call.  I was just trying out ideas within the current setup to see what  
people thought.

> Am 2004.07.22 17:56 schrieb(en) Craig Routledge:
> > I thought of this, however my ISP doesn't give a connection refused on  
> > port 587 -- it just sits there forever.  I confirmed this with telnet.   
> > So when Balsa tries to send a mail using the default port it just  
> > appears to hang.  There could be other cases where 587 may be  
> > temporarily down and setting the port to 25 may cause confusion and/or  
> > breakage.  Maybe we just have to add a separate port field in the  
> > settings and ...

  [some implementation ideas snipped]

> > "SMTP server refused connection.
> >  Message has been left in outbox.
> >
> >  Balsa by default uses submission service (587).
> >  You may try submitting mail using relay service (25),
> >  specify it in Settings->Preferences->MailServers->Port"

> I don't see the need for such a message - people will ask -> when this  
> damn program know what is wrong then why doesn't it fix itself?

Well, the rationale was that the program doesn't really know.  It's  
guessing and could be wrong -- leading to a completely broken configuration  
and a user who has no idea what's wrong.

Certainly a default of port 25 is by far the least troublesome for new  
users.  One would hope that any ISP that required port 587, would provide  
the necessary instructions since it is currently so uncommon.  So, if the  
developers think it's okay ....