Re: Using R-mail in Emacs

[Bob Proulx]

Bob Newell wrote:
> Bob Proulx writes:
> > ...  But I find doing even simple things quite difficult to
> > impossible.  I would never recommend gnus for email.
> 
> I can understand the pain. When I attempted the switch from viewmail
> (vm) to gnus, it was ... what am I doing to myself? But ...
> 
> Gnus takes a lot of patience, really a lot. It starts to pay off,
> though. When I integrated BBDB that was a huge leap forward, and many
> things became possible that were difficult with other clients.

Adding BBDB would be a significant increase in functionality.  I can
see where in combination that it would be very powerful.

> I would say, though, that it took me months to get to that stage,
> and years to get to where I am now, where gnus is part of my regular
> workflow and is virtually indispensible.

I would love to see you write a tutorial article on how you set up and
more importantly how you use gnus and bbdb in your environment.  That
would be really useful! :-)

> I think a lot of people just don't want to go to that much trouble (or
> are not fanatical enough[1], take your pick), and I completely get that,
> when something like Gmail's web client is really easy to use and is
> quickly learned.

Yes.  The seductively easy interface is like the dark side of the
force.  If it pulls you in then there is no recovery.

  The gates of hell are open night and day.
  Smooth the descent and easy the way.
  But to come back, to cheerful skies,
  in this the task and mighty labor lies.
    --Virgil, Aeneid, iv. 128. (Dryden, Trans.)

> You mentioned mutt--- that certainly works quite well (I use it once in
> a while when in a rush and not wanting to start up Emacs) although it
> just doesn't have the flexibility and sheer power of Gnus (but you never
> said it did).

I understand your view that gnus+bbdb+additionals is very powerful.  I
would love to get to that point.  But on the other side of things mutt
is also extremely powerful and very fast.  Mutt is by far the fastest
mail client I have ever used.  And also the most powerful.  Especially
the search capability.

In mutt I will often look for something.  I remember that I was in the
conversation.  I limit the view to only threads that I participated.
Then I will remember a unique word or tag or concept that was in there
somewhere and search for it.  Often in conjuction with a header or
some other criteria.  Or other combinations.  I almost always find
what I am looking for in the first search and the response is always
almost immediate.  Very fast.  Very powerful.

It seems to me that you and I could each give a glowing advocacy for
each of our respective tools and the process would sound about the
same.  But in each case we would have a different tool named. :-)

> Gnus plays to a niche audience of devotees. As someone further up in
> this now long thread pointed out, there isn't much it can't do (though
> "do it easily" was definitely not claimed).

At some point I will get a little bit of time and get back into
reading newsgroups.  Using gnus.  It has been just long enough that I
will need to review the keybindings again.  And at that time there
will be basic actions that I think would make perfect sense but will
be difficult to do.  I'll write up my experience with it and kindly
ask you to review it and teach me the error of my ways.

The problem is almost certainly one of documentation.  If I could
figure it out without looking at the source code but only from reading
documentation then I would be happier using it and could possibly
recommend it.  It is possible that simply with improvements to the
gnus info and the emacs wiki pages that all could be resolved. :-)

Bob