Email Feature Clusters

by DuckySherwood for ChaoLam

This page talks about dependencies between email features. Chao and I will use this to figure out which email features should go into which release(s). (This is essentially an internal document that I'm letting other people see, more than a document designed for wide collaboration.)

< Current OSAF Thinking >

There are a number of email features that other features depend upon. These are listed below.

POP/IMAP/SMTP/SSL/MIME/SMIME

These are all extremely difficult to do because they require interoperating with a bunch of different implementations of protocols. I strongly suggest that we not start from scratch, but use code that someone else wrote.

This means that we need to explore a number of versions of open-source code, being sensitive to the licensing. Then we need to pick one; we might need to "wrap" it appropriately to make it work with Python.

These libraries are needed for (among other things):

• pre-fetch bodies of messages in background
• load headers first
• keep message bodies on IMAP server, cache locally
• download only specified folders
• show % of quota used
• move messages between remote and local
• expunge on delete option
• attachments
  • display inline
  • open
  • choose helper app
  • manage attachments well
• manually poll server

threading messages

• Link to other messages
  • that respond to this message
  • in this thread
  • that this message is forwarded from
• SummarizedConversations20031222

HTML rendering

There's been talk of using something other than wxWindows' HTML renderer , well, the wxHTMLWindow is ugly. Leading candidates are Gecko and wxMozilla. [Chao: wxWindows is also looking to improve this with native components on mac (safari) and windows (IE)] HTML rendering is required to:

• display HTML messages
  • display images inline
  • rewrap lines nicely
  • set style sheet
• compose HTML messages
  • allow adding/subtracting a level of quoting
• strip HTML formatting (not so see tags, but only the plain text)
• strip extraneous quotes
• show quoted material in a different color
• show quoted material with vertical bars
• switch between compose formats on the fly
• enable/disable iframe
• underline misspelled words inline (requires spell checker)
• underline grammatical errors (requires grammar checker)

templates

• simple templates
  • signatures
  • needed for auto-suggest
  • reply/forward with template
  • compose new message starting with template
  • complex templates
    • auto-suggest/"mail merge" features (e.g. "Dear $FromName")
    • complex signatures
    • customized citation line (uses same UI?)
    • reply/forward with template
    • compose new message starting with template

Agents

• Filtering framework
  • API for probabilistic filtering and virus scanning
  • sharing filters (note security issues)
  • (huge number of filter actions and conditions)
  • vacation messages
  • run filters when X happens
  • auto-respond
  • auto-suggest
  • named filters (useful for import/export/sharing)
    • named sets of filters
  • filter import/export/sharing
  • filter manually, on incoming, on outgoing
• Time-delayed actions (see also threading?)
  • Poll server every X minutes
  • delete from server in X days
  • delay sending message until X
  • delay notifying until X
  • delay displaying message until X
  • automated backups

Tasks

• easy creation of a Task from a message

Contacts

• add sender to Contacts list
• choose TO/CC/BCC address from Contacts
  • choose one of several email addresses for a contact
• nicknames
  • group nicknames
    • filter condition: "is in group nickname"
    • hierarchical group nicknames (handy for filters)
  • different nicknames for different email addresses e.g. jimHome and JimWork^?
• set attributes (probably already exists)
  • filter condition "sender has attribute X" e.g. "sender has attribute category=Friends"
  • add sender to Contacts wtih category (e.g. set category=Friends)
• autocompletion
• blacklists
• whitelists
  • add sender to whitelist
  • whitelist people user sends to
• preferred reply format
  • filter action: set reply format based on correspondent's preferred format

smart parsing

• automatic recognition of names/phone#s/other Contact info in messages
• add appointment to calendar (with prompt!)
• add task to task list (with prompt)

return receipts

• acknowledge/request manually
• acknowledge/request automatically for
  • everybody
  • whitelist
  • same domain
  • people flagged in Contacts

mailing list manager

• reply-to-list button
• better whitelisting

autocompletion

• autocomplete email addresses based on {Contacts, past senders, past recipients}

security

• public folders
• Andy's secure email
• digitally signed email

General application framework and wigetry

• queries
  • saved queries (so can "move to a different folder")
  • full-text search of all email messages
• change attributes e.g. read/unread, category, flags
• delete messages
• spawn another window
• OutlineTableView^?
• Media handlers (for attachments, Chandler Items that are shared)
• sharing/collaboration (for sharing filters)
• control/command-A to select all
• spellchecking
  • in multiple languages
  • with easy sequence for fixing
  • with easy sequence for adding word to dictionary
• single-column sort
• multi-column sort

Hard things

Poor information and/or legal restrictions

• Download AOL email
• Download email from Exchange server
• Download email from Hotmail
• Download email from Yahoo

Difficult design; much thinking and scratching of the head

• message annotation
• line rewrapping
• public folders
• attachment management
• sort by subject disregarding Re and Fwd
• good wrapping of URLs

Many many corner cases to interoperate with

• Multi-lingual support, including "re" and "fwd" turds
• bursting digests

High difficulty per interested user

• Palm conduit
• Web interface
• JavaScript
• ActiveX^?
• Smart handling of digests without bursting

Medium difficulty per interested user

• change signatures on the fly

Medium difficulty but high utility

• import mbox format
• switch personas on the fly (changing FROM address, .sig, style sheets, SMTP server, PGP key, etc)
• good offline handling
  • queue messages for sending on return
  • download for offline use
• flexible notifications
• good/easy archiving
• spellchecking that doesn't barf on URLs or email addresses

easy and Good Idea

• pre-loaded filters and views
• "remember attachment" checkbox
• "done" button
• "next message" button
• import/export from/to mbox format

ProposedEmailFeatureImplementationOrder

MinimumEmailFeatureSet

SpecificDebatableEmailFeatures

< End current OSAF Thinking >

-- DuckySherwood OSAF - 07 May 2003