Re: [Evolution-hackers] Mail interface question

[Robert Wittams <robert wittams ic ac uk>]

Dan Winship wrote:
> 
> > One feature that seems to be lacking in every gui based mail client that
> > I have looked at is the inability to easily change the "From:" or
> > "Reply-to:" field of an email.  This is a definite must for many people
> > who need to specify an alternate email address to reply to.
> 
> Yes, we're planning to do this. Multiple sig files too.
> 
> The way I was thinking about was to have a "From" in the header part
> of the composer, with a pop-up menu that you could select an identity
> from. (Although that won't work with the current way signatures are
> implemented...)

The way this works in "The Bat", a shareware email client for windows
that a few of my 'doze loving colleagues swear by, is that the default
settings for an email depend on the folder you are in. So a folder has
properties like Reply-To, sig, CC, etc, and these are inserted into any
new message composer window. If the folder doesn't set a property, it is
"aquired" (in the zope sense) from the parent folder. This seems a good
way to do it.


On a kinda unrelated note, another thing that might be good would be to
have some kind of mailing list management. I've not used an email client
with this, though I believe mutt does something. The way I was thinking
of doing this would be to define some kind of metafile (maybe in rdf, or
some other xml) which contains information about a mailing list. Then in
whatever browser people are using (mozilla in nautilus? ), make sure
some evolution component is set up to handle that mime type. The info
stored in the rdf could include: 

list name
list address
subscribe address & type (for common types of mailing list manager)
web archive location
imap archive location 
mbox archive location

etc. 

When evolution (or a specific component of evolution) gets this file, it
could ask if you want to subscribe, and make a folder+filter or vfolder
with this information attached, and remember any passwords associated
with the list ( maybe encrypted? I dunno ).

Then a right click option on that folder could be to unsubscribe or
visit the archives. 
This might make for some nice integration with mailing lists, and if the
gnome lists supported it, it might catch on with other lists. Maybe some
files could be made up for popular mailing lists. It would certainly be
nicer than having to go through lots of annoyingly different web page
interfaces for mailing lists, and setting up filters manually. 


Rob