Re: [VM] VM is awesome (was vm-save-buffer)

[Johan Vromans]

On Wed, 4 Nov 2015 20:35:40 -0500
Daniel Barrett <address@hidden> wrote:

> I've been using VM for nearly 25 years and maintain over 3500 mail
> folders with it. I have yet to see another email program that scales
> this well and is this flexible.

Same here, although I have only 1000 mail folders (mbox files).
I think I started with Emacs 16 or 17...

However, when a mail folder gets big (more than 2000 messages or so)
VM really slows down. With big IMAP folders it becomes painfully slow
when saving (due to the local cache of 100+Mb) and autosave (or poll?)
makes Emacs unresponsive for several seconds every couple of minutes.

This was the time I decided I really needed to start looking for an
alternative mail client.

> If VM lacks a feature (example: a trash can), I just make one myself
> in elisp.

I've made many extensions to my VM (and Emacs) environment and you
know what? Sometimes Emacs API changes, VM API changes, BBDB API
changes and the extensions break. I found it's no fun trying to mend a
big lisp function that I wrote 15 years ago and haven't touched ever
since.

So all advantages have their drawbacks as well. Which one outweights
the other is very individual.

> My only criticisms are tiny compared to the immense value that VM
> has brought me over the decades.

Don't get me wrong. I'm still a big fan of Emacs and I'm very happy
with what VM has given me all those years. But I got to the point that
I needed something else for my mail.

(And yes, I did try WanderLust first.)

-- Johan