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Is Microsoft Trying To Make Windows 10 Mail Worse? (venturebeat.com)
Emil Protalinski via VentureBeat argues that "Windows Mail is unusable, and instead of improving it, Microsoft is looking to drive users away": Microsoft started forcing Mail to use Edge for email links in Windows 10 build 17623 last month. This week, the company started including Office 365 ads right at the bottom of the app. But even these poor decisions are just extra nails in the coffin. Windows Mail has difficulty sending and receiving email. No, I'm not exaggerating for effect. If you have an email open and Windows Mail detects that a new email has hit your inbox, you'll get a notification. Standard stuff. If, however, you then click on said notification, Windows Mail will take you to the open email message, rather than the one that you just clicked on. That's half of the time. The other half of the time this happens, Windows Mail will crash altogether. Apparently having one email open and trying to open another one that just came in is overwhelming for Windows Mail. But that's not the end of it.
Windows Mail is also notorious for not sending emails. Multiple times a week, I open an email, hit reply, type out a quick message, hit send, and alt-tab back to Chrome or Word. Any normal email client will send the message despite the app not being the active window. With Windows Mail, countless times I have wondered why I never got heard back to a specific reply, only to discover hours later, and completely by accident, that the message is still a draft. It's not even sitting in my outbox -- it's just a fucking draft. I end up debating whether to send the email hours late, or if it doesn't make sense to send it anymore. That's not a decision I should have to make. There are of course small features I would like to see added to Windows Mail, like being able to set formatted signatures (as opposed to just plain text), but that's hardly a priority. Windows Mail is unusable, which means Windows 10 doesn't come with an email client. That's incredibly sad.
Windows Mail is also notorious for not sending emails. Multiple times a week, I open an email, hit reply, type out a quick message, hit send, and alt-tab back to Chrome or Word. Any normal email client will send the message despite the app not being the active window. With Windows Mail, countless times I have wondered why I never got heard back to a specific reply, only to discover hours later, and completely by accident, that the message is still a draft. It's not even sitting in my outbox -- it's just a fucking draft. I end up debating whether to send the email hours late, or if it doesn't make sense to send it anymore. That's not a decision I should have to make. There are of course small features I would like to see added to Windows Mail, like being able to set formatted signatures (as opposed to just plain text), but that's hardly a priority. Windows Mail is unusable, which means Windows 10 doesn't come with an email client. That's incredibly sad.
Thunderbird is being updated again. There has already been a new release. Even without that, it is light years ahead of Windows Mail.
*** On the Internet, no one knows you're using a VIC-20
At home, or if YOU are the boss, no problem. For the most part, its the management upstairs who were wined and dined by Redmond "reps" (agents) who dictate the use of sub-standard software in the workplace. Software, what's that? .. I'm a marketing guy myself; but man is this steak good (ref: Matrix). And if entire cities should "rebel" (posterchild: Munich), MS will turn all things around them into hell until they return to the mormon fold. Anything with "American Corporation" associated with its description must be suspected of being evil. Sad but true.
Thunderbird is what I've been predominantly using over the last few years, whether on Windows or Linux, but it isn't without severe flaws, either. The probably most annoying: As soon as an account surpasses a critical number of messages and/or folders, notification of new messages does not work reliably anymore and I have to actively click on the bloody folders to see if there's something new even if I've configured them to be updated whenever the account is being checked for new mail...
Have you tried Opera Mail?
From the Opera Mail download page: "Opera Mail is at the end-of-life stage of its product life cycle. This means neither technical support nor product and security updates will be provided. The product is still available to download, but you will use it at your own risk."
"A Bird In The Hand Will Poop On Your Wrist"-Benny Hill,1982
Windows ME, Vista, Version 8 - Microsoft has been having problems here and there with Windows for some time. In 2015, Nadella combined their hardware efforts with the Windows Universal Platform, allowing for cross platform applications [1]. Things didn't go as hoped. While Windows 10 is popular, overtaking Win 7 by February 2018, overall PC sales has been declining. In fact, they have been losing ground for the last 6 years, with a 2.8% drop in 2017 [2].
Consumer Reports stopped recommending the entire line of Surface PCs in 2017 due to hardware concerns. These days CR rates the Surface Pro 4 positively, but they still claim Microsoft is less reliable than most brands, and Apple is the most reliable laptop brand [3]. BTW, if you're interested, Windows can be installed on a Mac with OS X's dual booting Boot Camp. Best of both worlds.
Now, Terry Myerson, the leader of the Windows and Devices Group, is leaving Microsoft. With his departure, Microsoft is creating 2 new teams that will prioritize Microsoft's cloud and artificial intelligence products. Perhaps this is an effort to appease investors [4]. With Myerson's departure and this re-prioritization, it's no surprise Windows applications like Mail are having problems. I expect more trouble across the Windows spectrum. Microsoft's head is in the clouds, and their application platform is in the sunset, rear window.
[1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-microsoft-ceo-satya-nadella-182823659.html
[2] https://www.zdnet.com/article/windows-10-vs-windows-7-has-microsofts-newest-os-just-reached-a-turning-point/
https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/632157/2017-saw-pc-shipments-decline-six-years-straight/
[3] {May be Paywalled} https://www.consumerreports.org/products/laptop/microsoft-surface-pro-4-384902/overview/
[4] http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/29/news/companies/microsoft-restructuring-windows/index.html
You guys were the incompetent IT staff. Exchange lets you unsend mail. If the receiver has yet to open the email it is erased from their system. If they have opened it they get an email saying to ignore it.
It sounds like due to your unjust hatred of it you never bothered to learn how it actually works so you always looked for the most complex ways to do something rather than the ways the software was designed to function. There are certainly reasons to hate Exchange, but bad IT staff can occur with any tool. You shouldn't blame poor staff education on the tools. You can curse at how bad Emacs and how it's completely shit when all you know is VI shortcuts, or you could learn Emacs for itself. It doesn't sound like you learned Exchange for itself. You're one of the 10 years of 1 year of experience people.