Best Pop Email Program, Now That Eudora Is Almost Gone

[A_Traveller]

^^ These days I'm doing different things, however, if memory serves Eudora to The Bat is doable, I seem to recall there's even a 'wizard'. On the save extension point, yes one can right click and save wherever.

Regards

Edited July 3, 2008 by A_Traveller

[A_Traveller]

^^ Percy, try looking up 'Saved Search' for Thunderbird aka Smart Folders {Mac & *nix}. That might do what you want to do.

Regards

Edited July 3, 2008 by A_Traveller

[JSixpack]

Does The Bat handle attachments like this.. Or is this only a Dream???

Yes it does.

Incredimail is so vile that it ought to be illegal. I've had to scrape it off a number of systems.

[JetsetBkk]

...And I DON'T Like FireFox.... Or Mozilla Based solutions...

Intriguing. Any particular reason why?

[klikster]

PMMail2000 .. old but solid .. excellent for multi-user or multi-account. Although SPAM filters are difficult to configure,

Has message filters > actions, canned replies on the right mouse button menu .. etc, etc ..

[nikster]

I'll add a few to the list. I have to say I looked at "the bat" years ago, and that was also because of my dissatisfaction with the state of Eudora development and I found it horrible. An email program is a pretty personal choice so I can understand people like it, but I doubt it's right when coming from Eudora.

The main thing about Eudora was that it followed Apple Human Interface guidelines - everything made sense, there was a certain concept behind it. It was very easy to use, yet if you wanted to, you could do even the most complex things. It was great. Unfortunately, it's not being developed anymore.

Coming from Eudora, Outlook is unbearable. I don't know how people can put up with this piece of c***. But a lot of ppl do so it seems to work for them. Outlook does everything wrong. It makes easy things complicated, yet doesn't allow you to set more complicated options. And it's dead slow.

On to the options:

- Thunderbird. It's not _that_ bad. It's certainly better than Outlook and it's getting better all the time. Try it - while it's not a Eudora replacement, it's as good as it gets on Windows. I am pretty sure you'll like it better than the bat unless the bat has seen significant improvements over the years. Least-worst on Windows, IMHO.

- Gmail web mail. I know you don't like webmail - I can see why. But the Gmail webmail interface is excellent - it has its own metaphor which really works very well. Search is, as you would expect, genius. It will also protect you from viruses. When I was on the PC I used to use Gmail when online and Thunderbird when disconnected. Thunderbird was set to sync with the gmail account via iMap so I'd have all mail locally.

- Mail.app - unfortunately, it's OS X only. But it's the closest you will find to Eudora. Not so much in looks, but in usability. It's very easy to use, and all the default settings are sensible. Eudora was the client of choice for most people inside Apple before Mail.app so it's a sibling in spirit. Mail.app is much more refined of course and it has lots of useful features that are not found in other clients. The search function is as good as or better than Gmail, search results appear as you type even with several GB of email. I am not going to go into more details because most of it is in the User interface and there's always a way to "also do that" in other clients - it's just not as nice, and not as accessible, which is the whole point. Suffice to say: Just like Eudora, it's subtle and refined.

I do get annoyed at Mail sometimes but it's by now certainly the best of the iApps.

Whether it's better than Eudora depends on why you liked Eudora so much in the first place. Ease of use or ability to tweak anything and everything? If the former, Mail.app is probably even better. If the latter, Thunderbird is your best option.

Whichever way you import your Eudora folders, make sure to create a few backups first

Edit: I didn't know about penelope, thanks for the tip! I will certainly check it out if I ever have to go back to the cold, harsh world of Windows

Edited July 4, 2008 by nikster

[Laawman]

I moved from Eudora Pro to Thunderbird - quite easy but you must remember to compress the mailboxes in Eudora before importation into Thunderbird. As for back-up there is a free program called MozBackup which will do that if you want.

In general I find TB faster than Eudora, especially for checking POP accounts with Gmail. If you're really missing the Eudora interface, then one can be added for TB through their site - apparently the old Eudora team now work for Mozilla on Penelope.

[LivinLOS]

I too have used many over the years.. Bat didnt grab me.. Outlook keeps coming back around.. Thunderbird is my current POP3 reader but...

A couple of years ago I realized the really handy feature of redirecting a copy of all my emails to my own managed domain, into gmail for archival... It means all those years worth of archives, converting from one application to another application, backups and storing, organizing and searching are all done.. Then the unintended bonus of being able to get to any of those from any connected machine.. and well I have evolved into a gmail apostle..

Then you start to learn some trick, like I have 10's of daily financial newsletter subscriptions to a different pop on my domain.. Well by using gmails labels and autoarchive settings these can be stripped out from my inbox but there ready to read at my leisure under the labels section.. The SPAM protection.. Etc etc etc.

The beauty of this system is its parallel and independent of my mailservers or offline mail reader and my POP3 use should I want.. It started as just an automated email archival but now I have to admit its my primary email interface. I also hop between machines a lot and have multiple operating systems so am really enjoying web interfaces for my documents, email, etc etc.. More and more of my personal stuff is moving online, gmail, google docs, flicker, etc etc etc.

[JSixpack]

Though The Bat! is the best there is, if you don't like Thunderbird you can try Foxmail (which may be Eudora-like), Koma-Mail (haven't tried it much, but looks promising--is portable, too), and Pegasus (lots of features but with unintuitive interface). I once tried the Becky email client but liked The Bat! much better.

Then you start to learn some trick, like I have 10's of daily financial newsletter subscriptions to a different pop on my domain.. Well by using gmails labels and autoarchive settings these can be stripped out from my inbox but there ready to read at my leisure under the labels section.. The SPAM protection.. Etc etc etc.

The beauty of this system is its parallel and independent of my mailservers or offline mail reader and my POP3 use should I want..

Oh, you can do the same w/ any good email client, just create different folders for the newsletters and then filter them by sender address into the folders. And in The Bat! you can have the filter active only on READ messages, so you can, if you wish, see all the unreads in the inbox without having to go to each "label" or folder, and after reading they are automatically filed. This way you've got them on your machine for reading at your leisure EVEN WHEN OFFLINE, which reveals a certain ugliness of your system. You still have the spam protection of Google or you can add Mailwasher or Spampal. However, no need to delude yourself that your system is independent of your mailservers because, after all, without the mailservers you get no mail nor would you get the same filing capability in Gmail that depends on the servers. BTW, using the archival in Gmail adds another layer of complexity in Gmail, and you can't download until you move the email in question out of the archive.

I like Gmail, but mainly because of its speed, reliablity, spam filtering, and storage space.

Edited July 4, 2008 by JSixpack

[CosmicSurfer]

The Bat! looks promising, but I'm disappointed that the Free Trial is only 30 Days.

Eudora started out as a totally free program and then allowed an Ad-Supported Free Version for Newbies. Of course by the time they came out with the Free and Paid Pro versions, I was married to it.

30 Days just doesn't seem like a long enough period to fully test out a program and decide if you want to commit to it.

This is a negative to me.

Edited July 4, 2008 by CosmicSurfer

[A_Traveller]

Given your initial post I'm loathe to say this, but given that The Bat is about 30 odd EUR {Pro}, if that is an issue, then why not look at Thunderbird + Penelope which is both free and provides Eudora like functionality, but falls into the Mozilla 'issue' you have. Roundabout, lose, swings, rearrange into a meaningful well know phrase

Regards

[JSixpack]

The Bat! looks promising, but I'm disappointed that the Free Trial is only 30 Days.

Eudora started out as a totally free program and then allowed an Ad-Supported Free Version for Newbies. Of course by the time they came out with the Free and Paid Pro versions, I was married to it.

30 Days just doesn't seem like a long enough period to fully test out a program and decide if you want to commit to it.

This is a negative to me.

But it shouldn't be. Two weeks would be plenty of time and 30 days is incredibly generous and ample, esp. given your very elementary needs. After all, how much time do you need to create an account & some folders, a filtering rule or two, go thru the options menu, save an attachment, create a signature template, and create a few messages and replies? And read the documentation of course. I think an hour or two is about all I'd need.

Perhaps you need a time and motion study to discover how you might read, click, and type at your computer more efficiently.

[Guest Reimar]

The Bat! looks promising, but I'm disappointed that the Free Trial is only 30 Days.

Eudora started out as a totally free program and then allowed an Ad-Supported Free Version for Newbies. Of course by the time they came out with the Free and Paid Pro versions, I was married to it.

30 Days just doesn't seem like a long enough period to fully test out a program and decide if you want to commit to it.

This is a negative to me.

But it shouldn't be. Two weeks would be plenty of time and 30 days is incredibly generous and ample, esp. given your very elementary needs. After all, how much time do you need to create an account & some folders, a filtering rule or two, go thru the options menu, save an attachment, create a signature template, and create a few messages and replies? And read the documentation of course. I think an hour or two is about all I'd need.

Perhaps you need a time and motion study to discover how you might read, click, and type at your computer more efficiently.

I second that! 30 days is a real long time. Most of the so named Shareware just giving 15 days which is even long enough!

Cheers.

[sabaijai]

I'm in a similar position, Eudora user ever since it was introduced, now ready to switch to something else but only if it can import my Eudora mail archives. Thunderbird can do that but the files must be compressed first? Sounds tricky .... I've already had a look at T-bird and it looks very good at first glance.

[Gary A]

I use Hotmail (Livemail) as my junk email catcher. My main email is Gmail and I am quite impressed with their spam filters. Privacy is not a huge issue to me but spam is irritating. I also still have Yahoo mail but I think it really stinks. I have limited Yahoo incoming mail to the addresses in my address book. If I were using email for a business, I'd have to take another look.

[percy2]

^^ Percy, try looking up 'Saved Search' for Thunderbird aka Smart Folders {Mac & *nix}. That might do what you want to do.

Regards

Thanks.

I've managed to set-up a saved search folder containing all my in boxes, so now I have one place to look for all my mails.

Unfortunately the search bar doesn't seem to work with it.

Any ideas?

Cheers

[LivinLOS]

Though The Bat! is the best there is, if you don't like Thunderbird you can try Foxmail (which may be Eudora-like), Koma-Mail (haven't tried it much, but looks promising--is portable, too), and Pegasus (lots of features but with unintuitive interface). I once tried the Becky email client but liked The Bat! much better.

Then you start to learn some trick, like I have 10's of daily financial newsletter subscriptions to a different pop on my domain.. Well by using gmails labels and autoarchive settings these can be stripped out from my inbox but there ready to read at my leisure under the labels section.. The SPAM protection.. Etc etc etc.

The beauty of this system is its parallel and independent of my mailservers or offline mail reader and my POP3 use should I want..

Oh, you can do the same w/ any good email client, just create different folders for the newsletters and then filter them by sender address into the folders. And in The Bat! you can have the filter active only on READ messages, so you can, if you wish, see all the unreads in the inbox without having to go to each "label" or folder, and after reading they are automatically filed. This way you've got them on your machine for reading at your leisure EVEN WHEN OFFLINE, which reveals a certain ugliness of your system. You still have the spam protection of Google or you can add Mailwasher or Spampal. However, no need to delude yourself that your system is independent of your mailservers because, after all, without the mailservers you get no mail nor would you get the same filing capability in Gmail that depends on the servers. BTW, using the archival in Gmail adds another layer of complexity in Gmail, and you can't download until you move the email in question out of the archive.

I like Gmail, but mainly because of its speed, reliablity, spam filtering, and storage space.

You dont seem to understand what I was explaining.. Why would I have to worry about downloading from gmail ??

I have my own domain and mailservers.. From this I pull my multiple email boxes into a POP3 reader for offline use.. Its totally independant of gmail and set up with forwarding (to gmail) so that gmail is just an 'archiver'.. My email is available offline, my email is purely POP3 and gmail is just an online backup. I never have to think about backing up my files, changing email reader, converting PST's to thunderbird or anything like that.

However I actually end up reading through the 'backup' interface far more than the offline / pop3 interface..

Its the best of all worlds for me.

Edited July 7, 2008 by LivinLOS

[Crushdepth]

I despair of both Outlook and Thunderbird so I downloaded The Bat today and had a play with it. I really like the no-bullshit interface. Having tabs on the inbox to filter the read/unread/flagged messages is great, and the full-width reading pane is very nice on the eyes.

Very tempted to buy it. Only thing is that the license is per-computer, and I don't really want to buy three licenses! Pity they don't have a multi-machine 'personal use' option.

Edited July 7, 2008 by Crushdepth

[PattayaDavid]

I downloaded and installed "The Bat". It seems to be a pretty good mail client. I was able to import all of my messages, folders and contacts from Outlook. The one feature that I could not import from Outlook was my Rules and Alerts settings. As I said, I have setup a lot of individual folders in Outlook to store my messages. I use Outlooks Rules and Alerts feature extensively to direct my mail to the appropriate folder when it arrives in the Inbox. I can't find this feature in "The Bat" nor can I import my rules from Outlook. This is one feature I would hate to give up.

Also, Gmail did not list "The Bat" as one of its IMAP clients. Has anyone tried to setup Gmail IMAP accounts in "The Bat"?

Thanks,

Pattayadavid

[A_Traveller]

See my post #17 re Gmail connexion.

HTH

Regards

PS Re 'Rules & Alerts' Look at Accounts -> Sorting Office/Filters //

Edited July 9, 2008 by A_Traveller

[sabaijai]

I downloaded and installed "The Bat". It seems to be a pretty good mail client. I was able to import all of my messages, folders and contacts from Outlook. The one feature that I could not import from Outlook was my Rules and Alerts settings. As I said, I have setup a lot of individual folders in Outlook to store my messages. I use Outlooks Rules and Alerts feature extensively to direct my mail to the appropriate folder when it arrives in the Inbox. I can't find this feature in "The Bat" nor can I import my rules from Outlook. This is one feature I would hate to give up.

Also, Gmail did not list "The Bat" as one of its IMAP clients. Has anyone tried to setup Gmail IMAP accounts in "The Bat"?

Thanks,

Pattayadavid

Does the Bat import Eudora archives?

[Rice_King]

Sorry, but I should have added Outlook and Outlook Express to my "NOT" list.... It's a Virus attack target...

CS,

Could you please elaborate on the virus vulnerabilities of Outlook and how those vulnerabilities compare to Thunderbird, Eudora, or any of the other mail clients? I am using Outlook 2007 and will disable it in a heartbeat if substantial evidence of Outlook security breaches can be provided to me.

Thanks!

--RK

[A_Traveller]

I note the term 'target' which is ambiguous, however, there has been some concern about possible intrusions but if one practices safe e-mail client protocols {See below} the risks are further limited. I would though say if you are a Windows user {XP} and you are not using Outlook Express it is wise to remove it from the system, if you are using it ensure you keep your IE updated since that will reduce OE risks. I should note that all the main clients are also 'targets' including Thunderbird and Eudora, and all suffer from intrusion vectors.

[safe E-mail]

Don't use email client as administrative user.

View e-mails as plain text

Ensure virus software is up to date and linked to check incoming mails.

Regards

[CosmicSurfer]

Sorry, but I should have added Outlook and Outlook Express to my "NOT" list.... It's a Virus attack target...

CS,

Could you please elaborate on the virus vulnerabilities of Outlook and how those vulnerabilities compare to Thunderbird, Eudora, or any of the other mail clients? I am using Outlook 2007 and will disable it in a heartbeat if substantial evidence of Outlook security breaches can be provided to me.

Thanks!

--RK

I agree that the term "Target" is a little loose, but it is an historical fact that "Outlook Express"... being that it was Free and on the DeskTop since Win '95 ... (if memory serves) and also mostly used by less-conversant computer users, made it a taget for the easy distribution of Viruses.... add the ubiquitous nature of MS Office and Outlook, it makes it the same kind of Natural Target that makes Windows & IE more of a target than Mac O/S and Mozilla (Netscape & Firefox) etc.

As for Eudora (and other comparable E-mail programs of that time), first more attention was paid to virus protection and security in the basic programming, and secondly, it was generally used by more knowledgable and experienced users. Both these factors limited its value to virus writers on one hand, and made it less vulnerable on the other.

I can't speak for Thunderbird, etc. as I've never used them. As I've said in my O/P, I've been a loyal user of Eudora almost since it's inception.. If my memory is correct, I think I started using Eudora shortly after the advent of "Mosaic". It think the program I used was made by "Spry" ????... Pre-IE, Maybe around Netscape v1.0, maybe earlier... Surely sometime around the introduction of Win 95, as I was a beta tester and Original Content provider for the introduction of MSN.

Anyway, as I've said previously, I use Outlook as my PIM and backup for my Palm Treo, But I don't have Outlook configured for Internet access, and the same with Outlook Express... It couldn't connect, even if it wanted to.

I have no reason to change my protocol on this.. It works for me...

Hmmmm... I just visited the Eudora home page, just for the Hel_l of it, and this is what I found:

Qualcomm and other contributors are developing a new, open source version of Eudora which is currently in early beta test, and can be downloaded from our betas page.

The latest beta release of Eudora, version 8.0.0b3 (which includes the Penelope extension version 0.1a22) is now available for download. Use the links below to download. Please see the README for information on how to submit bug reports and new feature requests.

README:

==============================================================================

EUDORA VERSION 8.0

==============================================================================

Eudora is a mail and news application from Qualcomm based on the open source

Thunderbird client from Mozilla. It's *not* our intention to compete with

Thunderbird; rather, we want to complement it.

Qualcomm is committed to both preserving the Eudora user experience and to

maintaining maximum compatibility, for both developers and users, with

Thunderbird. It is our goal to build a single development community around

Thunderbird and Eudora, so that both mailers advance faster than they

previously have.

Whereas "Eudora" is a branded version of Thunderbird with some extra

features added by the Eudora developers, "Penelope" is an extension (also

called an "add-on") that is used in Eudora and can also be used with

Thunderbird. The Eudora installer includes the corresponding version of

Penelope along with it so there is no need to install Penelope if you are

installing Eudora. Most features in Penelope can be accessed when used with

Thunderbird, but there are a few that require Eudora in order to work

correctly and it's not something that gets tested.

Sometimes in documentation there is a need to differentiate the older

versions of Eudora made by Qualcomm from current Thunderbird-based versions

of Eudora. This will normally be done by labeling the older versions of

Eudora as "original Eudora" or "Classic Eudora".

The main web page for Eudora/Penelope can be found at

<http://wiki.mozilla.org/Penelope>.

We encourage people to help the progress of Penelope, whether you know how

to write code or not. This was one of the main drivers to our decision to

go open source with Eudora. More details can be found here:

<http://wiki.mozilla.org/Penelope#Get_Involved>.

Hmmmmm..... Now I really have to re-evaluate my feelings about Thunderbird....

Perplexed... Betrayed..... Eudora is pulling an "OBAMA".. getting to close to the enemy.

Well, time to do my research and see if I need to open myself to a new world of possibility.

CS

Edited July 10, 2008 by CosmicSurfer

[nikster]

Hmmmmm..... Now I really have to re-evaluate my feelings about Thunderbird....

Perplexed... Betrayed..... Eudora is pulling an "OBAMA".. getting to close to the enemy.

Well, time to do my research and see if I need to open myself to a new world of possibility.

CS

Indeed - isn't that exactly what you were looking for? Namely... Eudora! Mozilla/Netscape was a clumsy, ugly browser until Firefox came along and made it nice. Thunderbird gets all the basics right but it could benefit tremendously from an ease-of-use infusion by Eudora devs.

[CosmicSurfer]

Hmmmmm..... Now I really have to re-evaluate my feelings about Thunderbird....

Perplexed... Betrayed..... Eudora is pulling an "OBAMA".. getting to close to the enemy.

Well, time to do my research and see if I need to open myself to a new world of possibility.

CS

Indeed - isn't that exactly what you were looking for? Namely... Eudora! Mozilla/Netscape was a clumsy, ugly browser until Firefox came along and made it nice. Thunderbird gets all the basics right but it could benefit tremendously from an ease-of-use infusion by Eudora devs.

Can Thunderbird be run WITHOUT installing FireFox ???

From the looks of the Eudora site, they are developing an open Source version of Eudora... Ver 8.xx. wihich incoporaqtes some ThunderBird technology.

The developers are the original Eudora Team from Qualcomm. They already have a beta posted....

I guess I'll hold off on any switch and hold on to my Eudora 7.1 for a while longer.. then try out the new Ver 8.xx

Like I said... a Die-Hard user,

CS

[A_Traveller]

Thunderbird + Penelope as I noted almost a week ago ago might fit your requirement except originally you had some issue with the Mozilla products. Thunderbird is a stand alone installation and does not require Firefox to be installed on the PC for it to work.

The Penelope development team includes Steve Dorner {author of Eudora for Mac} & Jeff Beckley {co-author of Eudora for Windows}.

Regards

Edited July 11, 2008 by A_Traveller

[cathyy]

Incredimail is so vile that it ought to be illegal. I've had to scrape it off a number of systems.

And so have I. Unless the people distributing Incredimail have made fundamental changes to their operating procedures, it installs a variety of malware along with all those smilies. I was unable to prevent my own husband from installing it on his first PC. After the OS reinstall he knew better.

I would recommend The Bat!, as I loved it some 10 years or so ago, when I last ran a Windows computer, but anybody who actually likes Incredimail is highly unlikely to appreciate a sophisticated and powerful mail client. You deserve Outlook Express. Anything else is too good for you.

[CosmicSurfer]

Incredimail is so vile that it ought to be illegal. I've had to scrape it off a number of systems.

And so have I. Unless the people distributing Incredimail have made fundamental changes to their operating procedures, it installs a variety of malware along with all those smilies. I was unable to prevent my own husband from installing it on his first PC. After the OS reinstall he knew better.

I would recommend The Bat!, as I loved it some 10 years or so ago, when I last ran a Windows computer, but anybody who actually likes Incredimail is highly unlikely to appreciate a sophisticated and powerful mail client. You deserve Outlook Express. Anything else is too good for you.

I'm not sure who you are addressing your comment to, as it can't be to me (the Original Poster), as I'm sure you read the whole thread and know that I'm a Eudora man.. I've never used Incredimail, never would.. never will... Knew about the Spyware and Malware from day one.

Nor, would I ever use Outlook Express... as I explained in detail above...

And I don't think you were addressing JSixpack either.... as he agrees with you about it being vile....

I guess you were just talking to yourself.

BTW... Please don't Flame in my Threads.

Thank You

CS

[cathyy]

Sorry I was unclear, I didn't read all the names well enough. My fault entirely. The Incredimail comments were to Ken. You, the OP, seem to know better, and I do most heartily recommend The Bat! to you. But not to Ken. He wants smilies and stationery.