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Windows 8 Mail Leaves Users Pining For the Desktop — or Even Their Phones
jbrodkin writes "The e-mail client in Windows 8 is the shell of a potentially good application — but Microsoft hasn't given it the proper care it deserves. With less than a month before Windows 8 hits RTM, Mail is a mess that doesn't support IMAP, can't connect to servers with self-signed certificates, and lacks basic features like flagging messages for followup. Metro Mail is feature-deficient compared not just to other desktop and tablet apps — it's behind Microsoft's own phone platform. Whether used on a tablet or desktop, this in-depth look concludes that Metro Mail in its current form will have users pining for a real desktop application."
They're stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Give Windows 8 users a real email client and cannibalize Outlook/Office sales
Give Windows 8 users a stripped down client and get pilloried in the press and taken to the woodshed by Apple.
Good ol' Microsoft internal politics at its finest.
Tablets are great, and an optimized tablet UI can be both intuitive and efficient so long as you're using a fucking tablet.
Seriously... it's like MS is trying to put the umbrella down the chimney up for this one.
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. --Will
THIS is one of MS's biggest problems IMHO.
Compare that to some of their competitors that will suddenly toss out a fully functional product, available NOW. Not complete and polished maybe, but at least it works acceptably well just out of the gate, and isn't months away from release.
That crap only works when selling to businesses. If they're going to compete in the private sector they're going to have to get their act straight and get some hustle going.
Semifunctional products scheduled for release months from now won't compete well with products that work that are available today. You'll either enter the market with few available new customers or catch all sorts of bad PR about needing several patches just to get it working as expected/advertised (or both) like the others already in the market already do.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
people still use email clients!?
I certainly do. Best way for me to manage my multiple email accounts with multiple servers.
This thing has a Vista-rushed-to-market feel about it.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I converted back from web-based shit email (had enough of google's mail, yahoo's mail and all the rest of the big CRAP mail ui's they throw at us) and I went back to thunderbird. have been loving it for the last year or so, now. its great. local typing, no lost stuff, no hangs, no delays, no network-reachability issues or timeouts, no ads, no jscript, no worries about blocking and maintenance.
my life is a whole lot simpler using good old IMAP and local email pulled down.
the cloud can go fuck itself ;) I'm back with local apps and enjoying the speed of my machine and a *stable* UI experience.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
This thing has a Vista-rushed-to-market feel about it.
The thing about vista almost everyone who ended up with, spent money upgrading to 7 because it fixed everything.
This thing has a Vista-rushed-to-market feel about it.
I agree. Every other roll out MS has done was a money grab. 98 should have been 98SE, ME should have been XP. Vista should have been 7. I have been telling people for a year to avoid 8 until it is 8+ or whatever. Of course they would avoid using "+" on anything because it might bring Google to mind... but if history is any gauge 8 will suck so hard you'll need a CRT to avoid screen puckering.
You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
No, it supports Exchange, Hotmail and Gmail. If you tell me "supports IMAP" I'd better be able to point it at my IMAP server and have it work or you're a goddamn liar.
You? Your pretty much a 'I only use google products' hipster.
Lots of us have many mail accounts, and many/most/all of them are not with Google. A good mail client is invaluable when you use many mail servers.
Adblock doesn't download for offline viewing and backup, or replace the whole web page interface.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."