[jmincey]

I can only assume that the Apple developers on the Mail project either never actually use Mail themselves or that they only have a single e-mail account they use with it. Unlike Thunderbird, which groups all mail boxes by account, Apple's Mail groups them by type. In other words, all the inboxes are together, the sent boxes, the drafts and trash and junk mail boxes are together. In short, the mail boxes of multiple accounts are all mixed among each other.
This has the effect of scattering the mail boxes of a single account up and down the breadth of the Mailboxes sidebar, and I find myself often inadvertently clicking on the wrong mail box. And this is with only two accounts; I can't even imagine the cluttered mess with three.
Grouping mail boxes all per account is much easier to navigate, more visually logical, and it is the more common approach taken by e-mail client applications, and yet Apple doesn't present this view even as an option.
This is a deal-breaker for me, and I had had hopes that Mail 3 would finally conform to this standard in the industry, but, alas, it has not done so.
Of course, even if one day Apple does add this feature, I will have to buy the next major release of OS X to get it, since the feature set of Mail 3 will be frozen and forever tied to Leopard. I will get only bug fixes and security updates with the product from now on. It doesn't matter if the development cycle of a mail client is much shorter than that of an entire OS release -- all bundled apps with OS X are bound to the OS X cycle. So we all have the assurance that the features of Mail, Safari, and iChat are frozen solid.
So, Apple Mail, I guess I'll see you in another 18-24 months. Or, I could just use another mail client which is updated more regularly and be done with it.

[peetz]

I notice that Mail 3 has a suggestion facility in the menus. Send it to Apple as a suggestion. For me, too, that feature would be awful. In MS Outlook, I'm logged into several accounts at one time.

[jmincey]

I have already done precisely that; I've sent it as a suggestion (in diplomatic language). Here I'm a bit more candid.

[jmincey]

It appears that decreasing a quote level from one to zero in selected text of Apple's Mail causes that text to lose its paragraph separations. This is very annoying behavior. I wonder if it's a bug of longstanding or something newly introduced in this current version.

[Typhoon14]

I will agree that this behavior is quite annoying. I use three email accounts with mail and have gotten used to it, but I definitely like Thunderbird approach better.
Now, that said, Apple's Mail is one of my favourite and most used applications. I've never found another mail application that combines the power, ease of use, and integration with other components seen in Mail. Thunderbird, would be the closest, but I just don't find Thunderbird's interface nearly as nice to use, and there are some surprisingly basic things missing (for example, there is no way to specify which mailbox on an IMAP server to use for certain tasks trash, for example, without going in and editing the config file manually). I guess what I'm asking is, what is the competition with better features and more frequent updates that Mail falls behind? I certainly have yet to find it.

[d00d]

Quote:

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Grouping mail boxes all per account is much easier to navigate, more visually logical, and it is the more common approach taken by e-mail client applications, and yet Apple doesn't present this view even as an option.

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I actually highly prefer the Mail.app approach (I actually was emulating this behavior in Entourage before I switched).
So, let's be clear, being easier to navigate and visually logical is subjective. It may be common, but I think it sucks and if Apple dropped the current implementation, I'll be angry. That said, if you're in love with the more traditional organization, more power to you as long as it doesn't impact me.

[jmincey]

I have no wish for Apple to drop the current sidebar view but only for it to add a new one. I would like to see a user preference for how to sort mailboxes; and the user can choose to sort either by type or by account. I have a personal account and a work account and I generally operate within one sphere at a time before moving to another. As such, I move from the inbox of my work account to the sent box of my work account -- rather than to go from one inbox to the next.
So for me it's all about work flow. If I'm corresponding with family and friends via my personal account, I want to confine mouse movements to the minimum possible spread. But as it is now, if I check the mail of my personal account and then want to check for any junk, I have to move the mouse a great distance down the sidebar. I always have to pay attention as to where I'm clicking.
In contrast, in Thunderbird all the mailboxes and folders of a specific account are neatly tucked away and indented under that account's name. So this reduces all my mouse movements (and it also reduces my errors and is more friendly to muscle memory).
But I appreciate and respect that others prefer a different approach -- hence my call for this as a user-selectable option.

[jmincey]

It appears that unlike Thunderbird, Apple Mail has no way to cancel an IMAP synch attempt that is in progress. There is no abort, no escaping, no CMD-period, no nothing. It just continues to run its course and is impervious to all keyboard interrupts.
At least with Thunderbird you can tell the mail client to cease whatever it's trying to do.

[d00d]

The stop buttons in the activity window don't work for you?

[d00d]

Yeah, my workflow is to centralize my accounts. I can handle context without needing a reminder of the account I'm in. The whole reason I use an email client with multiple accounts is to bring things together, not keep them apart. Maybe just me though.

[jmincey]

Quote:

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The stop buttons in the activity window don't work for you?

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Duh, it's been so long since I've used Mail, I had forgotten about that. It's pretty clumsy though -- that I have to go to the Window menu, select the activity window, and then click on a stop icon. (Either that or press cmd-0 and then click.)
What does Apple have against the universal escape key or its own convention of cmd-period?
Anyway, thanks, Derik, for reminding me about that.

[jmincey]

What I think Apple Mail should do is support tabs. This way I can have even four mail accounts open -- each in its own tab with a sidebar of mailboxes and folders all to itself and which I can navigate as easily as different web sites in a tabbed browser.
Not all uses of Mail are about consumers. Sometimes there can be business or IT implications for the use of Mail. Those who need multiple accounts will find the current Mail sidebar a complete mess to navigate -- especially when they add custom folders to each account.
Supporting tabs in Mail solves this completely.

[d00d]

Quote:

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What does Apple have against the universal escape key or its own convention of cmd-period?

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The action taken by that needs to be apparent based upon the current focus. For the most part, the focus in the main Mail window has nothing to do with the network activity.

[Walt_Basil]

I too prefer the view offered by Mail (and a former Entourage use). Shortcut to remember is Apple-0 (zero) I think. Could be Option, as I'm not at my Mac right now to verify. Funny how my fingers memorize position rather than actual keys, no? But that will bring up your activity window.
Another funny thing I realized from this discussion (mention of E'rage) is that I have not re-installed my copy of Office since my fresh install of Leopard. hmm. Maybe, I really don't need it eh? ;-) In my windows world, that would have been the first thing I installed.
Something I miss from the Version 1 Mail - drawers. I wish my mailboxes could be viewed from a drawer. Small thing.