The best thing about moving away from Apple Mail is that I feel eMClient is a superior mail platform.
The worst part is the amount of additional spam I am finding in my Inbox on a daily basis. In fact, since moving to eMClient I am seeing spam from senders I have never seen before.
I need to better control my spam situation rather than simply relying on moving messages to the junk folder and blacklisting the address or domain.
An idea occurred to me and I am going to propose it to see if it would actually work…
When I was using Apple Mail I was using a great plug-in spam filter called SpamSieve. Anyone that is on a Mac should know that name. It’s a great add-on that lets you train GOOD and BAD incoming mail. I am not associated with this company so this is not an advertisement and the plug-in doesn’t even work with eMClient.
What if I ran Apple Mail with the SpamSieve plugin silently in the background, fully reduced from view at the same time I was running eMClient?
Wouldn’t the Apple Mail with the spam filter catch all the extra spam eMClient catch and throw it into its own junk folder? emClient would simply copy those actions through iMap syncing.
And if it would work, and since I have 2 other Mac laptops, could I run that Apple Mail with a spam filter on a computer that is running continuously so that whatever filtering is being done is propagated to every other computer I own via regular iMap email syncing (which Google and iCloud support)?
Sure, but typically that is done on the server. Doesn’t your email provider have spam detection?
I believe @skybat runs MailWasher on his server, which will intercept the spam in real time, so you should not get it in any of the devices/apps connecting to that account. Maybe he could advise you further.
Google has Spam detection and does an excellent good job of filtering it all out.
iCloud does not as far as I can tell. That is where most of the spam mail problems exist.
I looked into MailWasher and that is a Windows-only software.
So, you are saying I can run Apple Mail and SpamSieve silently in the background on a computer that is always running and it will take care of my spam issues while using eMClient across all my devices?
Well that is just one example, but they do have a server version.
Yes, it is not very elegant, but it will work. If that app removes the spam from the Inbox using IMAP, it is removing it from your server, so any other app or device connecting to the same account will also have those messages removed from the Inbox.
I agree that eMclient is a superior application. However, I really miss SpamSieve. I had mine trained on PowerMail such that I almost never received spam. Now with eMclient I get spam all of the time, even with server side spam filtering. Either that or the server traps legitimate mail that I was expecting because it thinks it is spam. No doubt, the best combination would be eMclient with SpamSieve support.
I had requested SpamSieve support from eMclient in the past, but they strongly believe server side spam filtering is the way to go. I choose to stick with eMclient anyway and put up with the spam, but I did so begrudgingly.
I agree with them that server side spam filtering is the way to go. So if you’re having issues with the server side spam filtering then I would contact your provider, and if they are not much help then consider a different provider.
One reason server side spam filtering is the way top go is that when you create white-lists and black-lists, along with training the spam filter, being that it is server side it will work equally between all your email clients connecting to the server along with the webmail. If you use a client based solution, then it only works for that client in the way it was trained specific for that client. Not the ideal solution.
So I can see why they take the stance they do about spam filtering being best handled by the server only.
I personally do not think server-side spam filtering is the answer for most. It’s expensive and not widely available to home consumers. I have Verizon as a provider and they don’t offer it.
I wish we could convince Gary and the team to consider allowing SpamSieve as a plug-in. Again, I have no affiliation with the company, but I have talked to Michael over the years when I have had support issues and he has said he is always open to working with new email clients.
Spam is an issue with eMClient for anyone just depending on whatever is being filtered. My only option right now is to run Apple Mail and SpamSieve silently in the background to combat it. However, again, I hope that in an effort to bring something even more worthwhile to an already great client, that SpamSieve (or similar) support would be considered.
@NJRonbo I do for the reasons I explained in my prior message, server-side spam filtering should be the norm. I assume when you say it is expensive and not widely available you talk about a separate 3rd party service for spam filtering. Spam filtering should be included with your email hosting already, and if it is not working correctly then you should contact the support for your email hosting and let them know the issues and possible solutions. If they don’t offer spam filtering at all, I wouldn’t use that email service since that is a must have feature to have some type of server side spam filtering and white/black lists. I see it only being expensive, troublesome, and complex when you have to pay for a separate service for the spam filtering, and use plug-ins to make it work in various email clients.
So spam is a server side issue, not a client side issue. If you need to add spam filtering to your client, then you have a really sub-par email hosting service, and are trying to compensate for that email service’s inadequateness so I don’t see this issue being with eM Client as you say. If you are in a situation where your provider doesn’t offer it or it is not good, and can’t change providers, then the correct thing to do would be to use a 3rd party service based spam filtering to proxy your email through before it goes to your current provider, for example using SonicWall.
In theory, server side spam filtering sounds good. Especially if you use webmail and multiple email clients. But in practice, SpamSieve blows it away. At least I haven’t found anything on the server side that performs better. I have wasted so much time and energy trying find a server side service that performs as well that I have completely given up. I have personally seen outstanding results by using both server side and client side filtering tools in concert. So, the approaches are not mutually exclusive.
SpamSieve isn’t a tedious tool that requires manually setting whitelists and blacklists, and It doesn’t rely on blacklists and whitelists alone. SpamSieve characterizes your mail and your reading habits using a machine learning process that is mind blowing impressive. It has saved me hundreds of hours in dealing with unwanted mail and to me it is worth more than the cost of any email service I could ever purchase.
It used to be that the best email clients supported SpamSieve, but those tools are all but history. Now the new generation of email clients simply ignores the problem, and I have more than 20 years of training SpamSieve now wasted.
Services like SonicWall aren’t a bad alternative, but not ideal if one has many email accounts and predefined filtering for managing email from hundreds of clients. The cost adds up. Also, the knowledge base and rule sets aren’t very portable. The vendor lock-in is disturbing and minor changes to licensing can have profoundly negative impacts on both cost and administrative time to the tune of orders of magnitude. Never again.
In theory, server side spam filtering sounds good. Especially if you use webmail and multiple email clients. But in practice, SpamSieve blows it away
I have wasted so much time and energy trying find a server side service that performs as well that I have completely given up
I disagree that SpamSieve is better than all modern Mail server side AI Spam Technology.
My main mailboxes are Gmail.com and Outlook.com and I personally find the default server side spam filtering works like a charm. I’ve never needed to use any external spam filtering program. Recommend both mail servers.
They also have great spam reporting tools that work really well if you do happen to get anything in your Inbox which is also very rare I’ve found.
SpamSieve is an incredible piece of software for those that don’t want to go with server-side filtering.
As I noted earlier, my ISP is Verizon. They don’t offer server-side filtering and I’m not changing a provider I am very content with just because I installed eMClient. Any services outside of that to control server-side spam are very expensive.
SpamSieve is one of the most popular pieces of software on the Mac platform because it’s so effective in fighting spam without having to go with an expensive server-side solution. After doing an initial training of marking GOOD vs. BAD mail, it just works!
There are definitely two camps of thought here on what kind of spam filtering is best. That’s fine. Both sides’ opinions should be respected.
However, in the same argument, I think both sides should be considered when it comes to designing eMClient. Why not open it up to a plug-in for those of us that don’t want a server-side solution?
Spam is definitely a problem for eMClient since moving away from Apple Mail and SpamSieve. We former users definitely notice it. We have a forum here where we have the ability to suggest improvements to the client. Some of us have been politely suggesting that eMClient be opened up to supporting SpamSieve. While it may go against the ideals that the eMClient software developers had set forth, I am hoping they realize that there is an opportunity to make a more attractive product for people like me who had been looking to move away from Apple email.
I read about how unhappy Mac users are with a stock email application that hasn’t been updated much in over a decade. That is why there are so many alternatives out there (Spark, Edison, PostBox, Airmail, etc.). Most of the clients I mentioned offer some kind of spam filtering or have SpamSieve integration (Airmail, Outlook, and PostBox do). That’s perfect for the average person that doesn’t know much about web-side filtering and/or doesn’t want to spend the exorbitant yearly costs that services charge for it. SpamSieve is a one-time purchase (I think under $40) and it does an incredible job once trained.
I understand your point and it makes sense for the average person.
I have had better results combining server side and client side solutions and SpamSieve is just one that I am most familiar with. It performed exceptionally well for me on the client side and was very affordable. I wish eM Client supported a good server side solution, because it is the best email client.
Both Gmail and Outlook have server side solutions I use. I am sure they work well enough for most people who only have one or two email addresses they check regularly and check their email from different clients. But, they are not up to my standards.
My email experience failed a few years ago when my previous email client that supported SpamSieve closed shop. There was nothing Google or Microsoft could offer to get me back to the same place and now spend way too much time setting up whitelists, blacklists and other filters on those platforms. Plus, the user experience in mail server maintenance is terrible. I know I am the anomaly, but I manage several mail server accounts for various clients and work with partners who assign me email accounts on their company’s mail servers. It would be a lot easier to have a server side solution that cold filter all of my mail regardless of the mail service provider, since I check a lot of different mailboxes daily where I do not choose the source of the mail.
Why not open it up to a plug-in for those of us that don’t want a server-side solution?
The problem with opening eM Client up to allow third party plugins is eg: you might then potentially get malware, spyware and viruses. So I suspect that’s why eM Client as a company don’t do it.
I wanted to provide an update for those of you on the Mac platform who have been dealing with increased spam while using eMClient…
For the past three days, I have been silently running Apple Mail with the SpamSieve plugin in the background while running eMClient in the foreground. I made certain that I turned off all Apple Mail notifications and disabled all its rules. Essentially, I am letting eMClient run the show.
I have already noticed a significant improvement in spam handling to the point that I now get zero spam in my eMClient Inbox. SpamSieve is effectively moving anything that would end up in my Inbox to a junk folder.
Just offering this workaround as one that has worked well for me and for which I see significant spam reduction.