I’ve decided to give Postbox (version 1) a try as my default e-mail client. I love Mail.app’s simplicity, but it has some quirks and I feel I could do better.
Here’s what I like so far:
- A sleek interface for tagging (called topics)
- Quick browsing of attachments in a folder or from a contact
- Archive message immediately with ‘a’
- Gmail-style conversation view
- Pretty good and quick search
- Plug-in potential, although there’s not much available yet.
Here’s what I dislike so far:
- No global folders, i.e. one inbox, trash, sent and drafts for all accounts
- Topics don’t seem to be IMAP-portable, so you have to apply tags both at home and at work
- Message rules can not filter on content, only on message headers
- The message composer is bulky
- Integration with Mac OS X is not as good as Mail.app
- It’s Mozilla-based, not native.
I’m undecided on:
- Tabbed interface. I’m not used to it, I don’t need it and I don’t use it. But it might grow on me.
- Editing messages: not sure why I’d want to do that.
- Facebook and Twitter integration
Postbox does not come for free, while Mail.app and Thunderbird do. So it should really impress be before I switch. I remain unconvinced but hopeful for now.
