Features, usability, etc.

[Johan Brannlund <johan_brn yahoo com>]

H and thanks for a great e-mail client. I've used balsa for about two  
years now and it's really come a long way. It has most of what I'd  
like, without being bloated (*cough* like that Charles Darwin program  
from Novell *cough*). In the interest of stimulating a discussion, I  
thought I'd post a few comments and questions about some of the things  
I miss in balsa.

1. Why is it only possible to choose the "From" line from a number of  
pre-defined identities? In my opinion, it would be very convenient to  
be able to edit that header just like any other. Actually, if memory  
serves me right this used to be possible in earlier versions of balsa.

2. After Peter fixed "pipe through", I've started using that quite a  
lot. In fact, so much that it would be useful for me to have a key  
binding that pipes the current message to a given command. Any thoughts  
on this?

3. Would it be possible to add an option not to scan a mailbox for new  
mail? For instance, I'd prefer if the new mail notification didn't pop  
up whenever my spam folder changes.

4. Speaking of the mail notification: after metacity was changed not to  
allow programs to steal focus, that popup has not been very useful for  
me. Since I mostly use a laptop with fairly low resolution I tend to  
maximize my windows, which means that I never see the popup (now really  
popunder) window.

I'm aware that libwnck was recently changed to allow such formerly  
focus-stealing windows to pulsate in the window list but also for  
reasons of screen real estate, I have that panel set to auto-hide.  
Would the developers be interested in implementing libnotify support  
(http://blogs.gnome.org/view/rodrigo/2005/07/04/0), or be likely to  
accept a patch?

5. What is the developers' view of the gnome hig? I'm not sure how  
hig-compliant balsa is, since I've never read the guidelines. Have any  
of the hig people commented on balsa?

6. This may just be me being stupid, but I haven't been able to forward  
a message inline with full headers. Is that easily doable with balsa?

Regards,

Johan