I used Outlook Express as my email client from its first release until just a week or so ago. Since then, I’ve been trying out eM Client, since I’ll need a different mail client when XP support ends in a couple months and I’m forced to switch to Windows 7.
Overall, eM Client looks like it may work out for me, but there are a number of things I’m not happy with that I think you should consider changing:
Make the Toolbar buttons configurable for icons-only, icons + text, and text-only.
Make the Toolbar configurable so that users can choose which buttons are shown or not shown and the order in which they are shown.
Make additional functions and associated toolbar buttons available that can also be configured to be shown or not shown in the toolbar (see #2). For example, add ‘Mark as read’, ‘Mark as unread’, ‘Print’, ‘View header’, etc. Also, make separators available that can be added, removed, and positioned anywhere in the toolbar.
Make it possible to drag-and-drop the toolbar, the Menu bar, the Search bar, and the Status bar so they can be repositioned (and resized for width). It should be possible to put all four bars on a single horizontal line in whatever order you want or to place them above or below each other in one, two, three, or four lines.
Since the Status bar has very limited functionality, make it possible to toggle it on and off (to save space) using a toolbar button and/or a command in the View menu (see #3 and #4). Add a context-menu option for the toolbars to toggle any of the four bars on and off.
Make it possible to drag-and-drop top-level folders (the ones immediately under Local Folders) up and down to other positions in the folder list. At present, these folders can only be dragged-and-dropped into or out of other folders. An option should be added in the View menu to choose between sorting the folders in numeric-alpha order, alpha-numeric order, or no order. The no-order option would also enable drag-and-drop for creating your own custom order.
Make it possible to add and position separator bars (like the one below Junk E-mail) between folders in the list. There should be no limits on the number of separator bars or on where they can be positioned.
Increase the configurability of the message header area (above the message content) so that users can choose which standard lines from message headers are shown or not shown in addition to From and To (for example, Delivery-date, Reply-To, Content-type, X-Spam-Flag, etc.).
The title bar, message header area (above the message content), and the Mail, Calendar, Tasks, and Contacts buttons all waste valuable space because they are too larger vertically. Make all of the user-interface components shorter to conserve valuable space that can then be used in the message list, the message-content area, or the folder list.
The way the message Rules are implemented, they don’t function reliably, and there are some options missing. For example, there is no option for a rule to mark messages as Unread.
The context menu for messages in the message list does not include any of the Move to Junk options. Add Just move to Junk’, ‘Move to Junk and blacklist email’, and ‘Move to Junk and blacklist domain’ to this context menu.
Folders in the folder list that contain unread messages should have their names in bold type.
When eM Client is running, the desktop and windows belonging to other applications are redrawn much more frequently than normal.
The Restore button is missing from the title bar.
Parts of the user interface disappear intermittently and do not come back until you move the mouse cursor over the places they should be. This happens most often with the buttons in the toolbar, but it occasionally happens with the folder list and the other user-interface components.
The moving dots just above the message content are distracting, annoying, and unnecessary. Get rid of them.
The ‘Invite to eM Client’ button in the toolbar is redundant (this command is also in the Help menu) and is a waste of space. Do away with the toolbar button.
I hope you’ll seriously consider implementing all of these ideas and fixing the bugs I described. I’m sure that these changes will significantly improve eM Client and make it possible for you to add new users and help keep current users.
Regarding the moving dots from point 16: they are only shown when contents of the e-mail is being downloaded (like images). They go away when the e-mail is completely downloaded.
I think the button ‘invite to eM Client’ is only shown in the free version, not in the paid version.
Sean: To each his own. Maybe it would be better if they just added an option in Settings where you could turn the dots on or off. Then we’d all be happy. (As you can tell from my post, I’m all about configurability. The more configurable an app is, the more people it will satisfy.)
Regarding the ‘Invite to eM Client’ button, I’ll look forward to using the paid version if I decide to stick with eM Client. I’m still at the point where I’m evaluating it to see if it satisfies my requirements, so for now, I’ll be using the free version a while longer.
BTW, I’ve been experiencing another problem: a few times a day, eM Client crashes (it just terminates and disappears). This usually happens when I’ve selected a message containing HTML and graphics and it’s loading some of the images. When I restart it, it usually loads the same message without any problem (after it finishes checking the condition of the message database, of course). So, it seems as though the crash isn’t caused by some part of the content of a particular message. Does eM Client use the IE/Trident engine already in place on the user’s PC to render HTML?
So, do you think the eM Client crashes I described are more likely an IE problem than an eM Client problem? Maybe I’ll try removing and then reinstalling IE. For the most part, I use Firefox, not IE for browsing, so I don’t know if IE has somehow become unstable.
This is not planned for current version, there are some chances for this to be in next version but I will not promise it.
same response as above.
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This is not planned
This is not planned, you can do it already in Tools - Accounts if you click on account and use arrow buttons to move it.
This is not planned
This is not currently planned.
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We are currently not planning to alter rules, it is working exactly as intended and without problems.
Usually users just don’t realize that rules works only for unread messages on their first synchronization
This is already placed on toolbar
This is not planned
I have never seen this behaviour, could you make screenshot or video of it?
File - Restore…
This is most likely some bug, could you create screenshot of it when it will happen for you again?
This is sign that messaged is being downloaded, it is indicator of activity, we do not plan to remove it.
Pro users does not see this button, removing for free users is not planned.
To following point I have seen the same behavior also:
Parts of the user interface disappear intermittently and do not come back until you move the mouse cursor over the places they should be. This happens most often with the buttons in the toolbar, but it occasionally happens with the folder list and the other user-interface components.
You ask for screenshots: I have attached below.
To my Environment:
XP Pro
eM Client 6.0.22344.0
and I have also Firefox in the background (39.0)
I totally agree regarding the must-have enhacements to the toolbars and the UI in general. We now really need to see those features in version 7 now. The current version 6 is already way too old and needs a major overhaul in many points including the rules management!
Hence please release a beta of version 7 very soon. We have been waiting way too long now. I hope our high expectations in the new version won’t be disappointed since we have requested many enhancements and new features over the past months and years now.
I really like emClient and have dropped Thunderbird for many reasons. OTH the plugin system of TB hasn’t been that bad at all and the community could do their own enhacements which is missing within emClient. For this reason we really need new features and improvements as requested many times here and elsewhere.
If you always answer this is not planned and… this is working as intended and won’t be changed… your are obviously ignoring your users and loyal customers in the long run.
The email client The Bat, that I’ve used for a long time before Thunderbird and before emClient, now starts to pass you by and with the release of the current new version and the implementation of Carddav support it’s starting to become an alternative to emClient again. If TheBat will support Caldav, too, it would be an alternative worth looking into again. TheBat has got a better rules management, too.
Please don’t ignore serious feature requests and implement them faster if requested many times by many users and there are a lot of them! Just saying: toolbar enhancements and more customizable UI and more flexible rules management, sorting of folders, better and more flexible archiving management and much more. Those requests can be found in your databse for many months and years now and were totally ignored so far or moved to the next (major) version which was never done.
Hence we are urgently waiting for those features and are obviously putting our hopes in version7.
