Introduction

E-mail is the "killer app" of the Internet; an enormous amount of messages are exchanged every day, and while web-based mail has become very popular in recent years, many people still prefer the added speed and flexibility of a mail client application.

The mail client is in principal a very simple application which allows the user to read and send mail, but all modern mail clients include a host of features to help better manage the ever-increasing number of messages we have to deal with. Graphical mail clients allows for easy sorting of messages into folders, easy searching on a number of criteria, address book management and automatic filtering based on custom-defined rules.

The development of new features does not stop there, however, and the next generation of mail clients includes features such as virtual folders (also known as search folders), faster and more flexible searching, easier creation of filters and lots of small things to make common tasks quicker. This review is a comparison of the features available in the next generation of mail clients and their usability in dealing with large number of messages.

Reviewed mail clients:
(click on icon to jump directly to review)

Except for Evolution (the latest stable version is recommended over the tested development version), all of these mail clients were quite stable and I did not encounter any problems which would preclude me from recommending them for daily use.

Note that Outlook has been included for completeness, both because of its popularity and for use as a reference. I did not include Eudora, even though the latest version does include unique features such as a Content Concentrator, Contextual Filing, MoodWatch and Email Usage Stats, as it is both closed source and not available for any UNIX platforms.

Quick overview of supported features:

1. Follow-up search refers to being able to easily create entries in the calendar directly from an e-mail..
2. Full index search refers to all messages, including body text, being indexed and searchable without reading everything from storage.
3. Handle mailing lists refers to begin able to automatically create filters on mailing lists.
4. KMail has no built-in spam filter, however, with some extra setup it can be used with a variety of external spam filters such as SpamAssassin, BogoFilter, and also web-based SpamBayes and POPFile.

How I reviewed

In order to get a feel for how each mail client handles daily tasks, I conducted my review by performing a number of tasks:

• Download a reasonably large amount of messages, about 2100 in total
• Create some additional folders and set up filters for sorting messages to them
• Add some contacts to the address book
• Perform several searches
• Compose and reply to a few messages
• Set up some virtual folders (for mail clients which support this)

To provide a way to compare the different mail clients, I then divided the review into the following sections:

• Mail import from other mail clients
• Account setup
• Filters
• Address book
• Searching
• Reading messages
• Composing messages
• IMAP
• Virtual folders
• Encryption

Note that I did not actually test the encryption features and I just comment on whether or not they are present. Also, while several of the mail clients now include integrated support for detecting spam mail, I did not test this feature as I plan to take a closer look at this aspect in a future review, and also perform a comparison with external spam filters such as SpamBayes and POPFile.

Please see the Frequently asked questions section for additional information.

 Evolution

Evolution is the mail client included in GNOME, but it is also much more than just an e-mail client. It includes full groupware functionality; address book, calendar and task management. With an extra plugin it can even communicate with a Microsoft Exchange server for better interoperability with the Windows world. Depending on your environment, this can be an important point to consider, although it is not free.

Evolution includes most everything you would expect from a modern mail client. The main view follows the popular 3-way split with the message folder tree on the left, the message index on the top and the preview pane on the bottom. It also includes a small search bar above the message index for quickly finding mail without having to open another window. The interface is clean and gives a good overview.

Mail import: Evolution can only import from UNIX mbox files and some older versions of Netscape. This makes migration from Windows clients such as Outlook Express problematic to say the least. The easiest solution might in fact be using KMail to migrate the mail to mbox format and then import it into Evolution.

Account setup: A setup wizard makes creating new accounts a snap. Simply fill in the information about the type of the mail server (POP/IMAP) and the other required information and you are done. It also supports automatic querying of the server for supported authentication types.

Filters: By right-clicking on a message and selecting the "Create rule from message" option, filters can be created directly based on subject, sender, recipient or even thread. Virtual folders can also be created this way.

There is a wide selection of filter rules, from the basic subject/to/from to date, message size, spam status, attachments included, status, label, source account, regex and even piping the message to a shell command and checking the return value.

The possible actions to take are equally rich and includes moving/copying to folders, change status/score/label and also piping the message to a shell command. The only limitation is that either all the rules have to match, or just one; you cannot create a rule matching on a specific sender and then either before a date or bigger than a given size for example. This is not a big limitation, however, and advanced users can use regex to create more complex searches. There is no tool for helping with regex creation, however.

Address book: Adding a person to the address book is as easy as right-clicking on a message or e-mail address and selecting "Add Sender to Addressbook". The address book is integrated with the contact list, and you can actually have several address books (separating personal and work contacts for example).

Searching: For quick searches the search bar on top of the message index can be used; it supports the most common search fields directly, and you can use the "advanced" option which opens the normal search dialog. Here the same rich selection of rules (minus the pipe to shell command) as for message filters can be selected. The search can also be given a name and saved; it will then be available on the search menu. There is also a search editor for editing the saved searches.

One missing feature is the searching of sub-folders; there is no option to enable this.

Reading messages: The message index includes by default the most important columns (attachment, status, from, subject and date), but this can be easily changed by right-clicking on the message index header. Showing a threaded view in the message index is supported. It is very convenient to read messages in the preview pane; quoted text is grayed, but the level of nesting is not indicated by different colors. One interesting feature is that the mail header also shows the mail client used by the sender if the information is available. Double clicking on a message brings it up in its own window, but this is only necessary if the preview pane is disabled. Since the default security settings does not allow HTML mail to download any external resources this should be completely safe.

One small annoyance is the inability to search just the message text of the current message; you have to search all messages in the current view.

Composing messages: Reply to sender, reply to all, reply to list and all forwarding modes (inline, attached, quoted and as-is) are all supported. The composer window is easy to use and different from- address and signatures can be selected. The fields shown can be turned off or on from the "View" menu; by default the CC and BCC fields are not shown. Evolution supports writing HTML e-mail with options for changing font size and color. Options for signing and encrypting are available from the "Security" menu. The editor supports undo and search/replace.

IMAP: Support for IMAP is very good; IMAP folders work the same way as normal folders and all the normal options also apply to them. Server-side searching is supported, also for virtual folders. The message filters work on IMAP folders and there is also a per-folder option of copying the content locally for offline operation. In short, the IMAP support is mature and very well integrated.

Virtual folders: Creating a virtual folder is done by selecting "Create Virtual folder from Search" on the Search menu; all the same options as for normal searches are supported, and the (non-virtual) source folders can be specified. Note that a search folder cannot be edited once created. They work quickly, however, and you can also do searches within a virtual folder just like for normal folders.

Encryption: Supports S/MIME signing and encryption.

Notes:

• Only audio notification on new mail is supported. The soundcard can often be busy because of legacy applications, however, and a visual cue would have been nice.
• You can create follow-ups from e-mails, which integrate with the calendar. This can be a very useful feature as mail has a tendency to become lost in the inbox if not dealt with immediately.
• It seems the stable Evolution 1.4.5 does indeed support mail import, from both mbox files (to which most clients can export) as well as Outlook Express mbx files.

 Kontact

Kontact is the new groupware application in KDE 3.2, and was made by integrating existing KDE applications in a common view; note that the applications can still be run stand-alone. KMail is used for e-mail, KAddressBook for managing contacts, while KOrganizer provides the calendar. There is also KNotes for quickly taking small notes.

The level of integration is very good and there is no indication that these are actually separate applications working together. The Summary view in Kontact gives a quick overview of unread mail status, upcoming events from the calendar and even birthdays from the address book. Updated news from KDE Dot news is also included via the RSS plugin; more feeds can easily be added from the configuration dialog. Kontact works by having plugin components which can be selected from a toolbar on the left. The plugins to view are naturally configurable, and it is easy to see how more useful functionality could be included; a weather plugin seems to be present, however, it requires additional setup to become active.

KMail

Selecting Mail from the Kontact menubar brings up KMail. Already very functional in the previous version shipped with KDE 3.1 it has been improved by supporting more flexible searches and virtual folders, several IMAP related improvements (this needs more work, however; see the IMAP section), on-the-fly spell checking and also lots of small cleanups and improvements all over. KMail is a modern and full-featured mail client.

Mail import: KMail supports importing mail directly from Outlook Express 4-6 and Pegasus mail. This makes migrating from Windows very easy and should be a great help to users migrating to Linux.

Account setup: A wizard guides the user through the process of setting up accounts. KMail separates mail accounts from identities, which include personal settings such as which folder to put sent mail in, crypto settings, the dictionary to use, signature, etc. Incoming and outgoing mail accounts are configured separately, and KMail can also automatically check which authentication methods the server supports.

Filters: Right-clicking on a message and selecting "Create filter" allows for easy filter creation. Most mail headers can be selected from the menu, but piping to a shell command is not supported; this is unlikely to be missed by many, however. The filter actions are extensive and allow both the basic actions such as moving/copying to folders, but also options like forwarding/bouncing, executing a shell command, adding/removing a header or even rewriting it. This can be used to easily remove [mailing-list-name] from the subject field of mailing lists for example. You can choose if you want the filter to be applied to incoming messages, outgoing and for manual filtering. Regex matching is supported and complex expressions can easily be created with the graphical regex editor; more on this in the search section.

Address book: Adding people to the address book can be done by right-clicking on an e-mail address; there is no option for this when right-clicking a message, but this might be a good thing since that context menu already has a number of other options. The address book is very well integrated with the Kontact applications, and has an impressive number of options; contacts can be grouped by category, and I already mentioned that if you specify the birthday of a contact you will automatically be reminded of this on the Summary page.

You can also enter geo data for the location of the contact, a very nice touch.

Searching / Virtual folders: This version of KMail comes with greatly enhanced search capabilities. More than two search rules can now be used, and the header options are the same as for filters, with the exception of "age in days" which is not there for some mysterious reason. Also notably missing is whether the message has attachments or not.

The folder to search, and whether to include sub-folders can be selected. Entering a name for the search on the bottom and clicking "Open" creates a new virtual folder. These folders work exactly the same way as normal folders, and selecting search while viewing one brings up the search used to create it with the option of modifying it and/or renaming the virtual folder. It does not seem possible to copy a virtual folder, however, so a new search will have to be created from scratch in this case. In general the virtual folders work very well, and is a welcomed addition to the KMail feature set. Perhaps in the next version there will be the possibility of creating sub-folders also for virtual folders, thus removing much of the need for having separate physical folders at all.

One notable thing I would like to mention is the graphical regex editor: when selecting "match regex" one can click "Edit" and the regex editor is opened.

Here one can construct complex regular expressions without knowing any details of how regex works. Using the question mark button to get help on the different buttons will enable most anybody to easily make use of the power of regex. Nicely done!

Reading messages: The message index shows the message status (each message can have several), subject, to/from depending on folder and the date. Optionally the size can be displayed, but here it should be possible to add more items. A message threading view is supported.

The preview pane is normally used to read messages, but double-clicking on a message brings it up in its own window. HTML mail is only displayed as text by default, with a header asking the user to click to enable rendering for this message only if he thinks it is legitimate (this restriction can be relaxed if desired). Quoted text is not colored by default, but this is quick to enable in the configuration; also different colors depending on the level of nesting is supported. Colors for most other things can also be changed.

Unfortunately missing is the ability to easily create follow-ups to e-mails, which then appear in the calendar; this would be a much-welcomed feature which hopefully will appear in the next KMail version.

Composing messages: All the usual suspects are present: Reply to sender, reply to all, reply to list and all forwarding modes (inline, attached, quoted and as-is). The composer window has been cleaned up and several less-used options removed from the default view; the result looks very nice. Using the "View" menu, however, additional header fields can be displayed and things like sender identity, dictionary, sent-mail folder and outgoing server can be set. The message can be signed and/or encrypted, and public keys attached. On-the-fly spell checking with the selected dictionary helps to avoid spelling errors. The "Edit" menu has several useful options like "Paste as quotation", "Clean spaces" (in case you pasted text containing line separators), and also add/remove a level of quotation from selected text. And if you mark some text when reading a message, only the marked text will be quoted when replying.

One notable feature is that if the message mentions any of the words "attachment" or "attached" and you did not actually attach something you will be asked if you intended to do this; a small, but very useful feature. This is configurable, among a lot of other things, like the text used for quoting.

IMAP: IMAP is supported, however, it is not yet as mature as it could be. In particular, server-side searching is not supported (which makes searching IMAP folders very limited), and offline operation is still experimental. Hopefully the next version will correct this as otherwise IMAP works quite well.

Encryption: GPG is supported out of the box, and S/MIME is supported through the Aegypten project. This requires crypto-plugins to be configured, however, something which is not done automatically. The next version of KMail (due out this spring) should have this functionality built-in.

Notes:

• KMail supports the general notification framework in Kontact, which makes it easy to set up notification on new mail arrivals. Several options are supported; showing an icon in the system tray, playing a sound, log to file, execute a program or use a popup window (with the option of making it a passive window as to not interrupt other work).
• POP filters can be set up to not download messages exceeding a defined size and matching certain criteria. This is most useful simply for deferring the downloading of large messages, especially for people on slow connections, but any criteria can be used.
• All keyboard shortcuts can be configured. While the defaults are very well thought out, it can be useful to be able to assign keys to often-used functions.
• Does not have labels, but since a message can have several status flags this is handled in a more uniform way.

 Opera

Opera M2 is being touted as a "revolutionary" mail client, and it is certainly different from other mail clients. The most important differences is that it is very tightly integrated with the browser, and it doesn't have traditional mail folders. All mail is stored in a flat database, and different views are used instead; this is basically taking the virtual folder concept to its extreme: everything is a virtual folder. The implementation of this in M2 is very well done, however, and the mail client tries to do as much as possible automatically.

Note: Although some of the screenshots are from the first preview of version 7.50 the review has been updated to account for new features in the second preview.

M2 ships with a number of default virtual folders divided into categories:

• On the top are all the "Unread" messages.
• Under "All messages" traditional folders such as "Received" (containing all messages in the database), "Outbox", "Sent", "Drafts", "Trash" and "Spam" can be found.
• Under "Filters" are all your custom-made virtual folders. More on this in the filters section.
• Under "Active contacts" the most recent people you have communicated with or added to the address book are present and contains all mail involving said person; the list is automatically trimmed to ten people each time M2 starts.
• Under "Labels" you will find all messages with the specific label set; M2 supports seven labels, which can only be changed by editing a configuration file manually (the procedure is documented fortunately). They can be easily renamed, however. A message can only have one label.
• Under "Active threads" are all the threads you are participating in.
• Under "Searches" you will find all the most recent searches. M2 has a very quick full text index, and typing in a search term in the "Start search" field will automatically create a search matching all mail with that term.
• Under "Attachments" you will find all mail with any attachments of the given type, whether documents, images, music or archives.
• Under "Newsfeeds" are RSS feeds you subscribe to. This very useful feature gives you updated news directly from within M2. The update frequency of each feed can be separately configured.
• Finally under "Mailing lists" you will find all the mailing lists you receive (if they use the List-id header that is).

The idea of all this is to help you easily keep an overview of your current e-mail communication, and M2 automatically adapts the "Active contacts" and "Active threads". This works very well in practice and while the other virtual folders could be created in other mail clients this automatic adaptation is unique to M2.

The tight integration with the browser part of Opera means that the mail view is just another side panel along with bookmarks, contacts, notes and transfers. The actual message index and mail view, as well as the composer, opens as tabs just as normal web pages; if you are already used to the very well done Opera interface, navigation is a snap. Mouse gestures also work for M2 pages.

In short, M2 is in many ways revolutionary and makes it easy to take advantage of next generation mail clients features without having to do much manual setup.

Mail import: M2 imports from Outlook Express and Netscape on Windows, but not under Linux unfortunately. One solution might be to import the mail under Windows and copy the M2 mail store to Linux; note that I have not tried this.

Account setup: Selecting "New account" from the Mail menu starts a wizard for setting up an account, and makes this process very easy for both POP and IMAP servers. The dialog only asks for the a minimal amount of information, but does not have the option of automatically querying the server for supported authentication options.

Create filters / virtual folders: Since M2 does not have traditional folders there is no need for traditional filters; instead a virtual folder is created. M2 supports the most important message fields, but the selection is more limited than Evolution or KMail. There is no option to search on message size, labels or attachments (you can argue these are already supported since they have their own virtual folders, but still it could be useful to include them in custom views) or date. There is, however, support for specifying AND/OR on a per-rule basis. Regex matching is supported, but they must be written manually.

Notable is the support for creating sub-filters; such filters can be set to only include messages in parents, and search rules can thus be inherited. Since messages can also be assigned to virtual folders (analogous to the copy function in traditional mail clients) even if they do not match the search criteria, it is easy to use this to simulate normal mail folders, but with more advanced functionality. Also, the "Spam" folder as well as all virtual folders can be set to learn from messages added and removed from the folder; one supposes this uses a Bayesian approach similar to the buckets found in the POPFile spam filter. Again a very useful feature as there is no need to create complex rules; simply drag messages to the folder and M2 will assign similar messages there automatically.

Address book: Right-clicking on a message and selecting "Add contact" adds the sender to the contact list. The contact list is accessed as a sidebar, and the quick find makes it easy to locate individuals. There is no support for grouping, however, and only basic information can be entered on each contact. Double clicking on a contact views all messages involving him/her, and the contact is also added to the "Active contacts". Clicking the compose button opens a composer tab.

Searching: One of the main features of M2 is the very quick search facilities. Simple word searches can be created using the "Start search" field, but there is also the option of more traditional searches. Selecting "Search" from the mail menu brings up the search dialog, which is quite limited compared to other mail clients; it is apparent that this is only meant as a last resort. You can only search on one header field, but an option for only searching the last year or month is present. Selecting "Each word" instead of "Entire phrase" enables Google-style searching on each word, with the option of putting "-" in front of words to exclude them. The search can be limited to a single virtual folder and optionally its subfolders.

Note that these searches are significantly slower compared to the close to instantaneous other searches in M2, especially when searching a large number of messages. It is clear that this feature is not meant for frequent use.

Reading messages: Double clicking any virtual folder opens its messages in a tab. The message index includes by default the most common columns as well as status, size, attachments and label. Using the "View" drop-down box it is possible to set several view options, like thread messages, only display recent messages, turn off display of mailing lists, only view messages matching at least one filter, and also several options relating to the display interface. Buttons on the top gives easy access to common functions such as reply and forward. There is also a quick find field for quickly finding messages.

Another interesting feature is the "Quick reply" field on the bottom; simply type in some text, click the "Quick reply" button and a reply is sent without further action on your part. The message is quoted and your signature inserted, so this can save some time as there is no need to open a new window.

Composing messages: The composer opens in a new tab and is very straight-forward. It is easy to add contacts from the address book, header fields can be shown/hidden with the "View" drop-down box and there is a separate area for dropping attachments. The message can be sent or saved as a draft for future editing. There is no support for writing HTML mail, however, nor is there any signing/encryption support. The last item might be a show-stopper for some people, but it is planned for a future M2 version.

IMAP: M2 tries its best to support IMAP well, although it is not a perfect fit with M2's concept of a heavily indexed flat database. Messages are indexed as they are downloaded, however, but there does not seem to be support for server-side searches, which somewhat limits its usefulness. With that said the IMAP support works, and if you choose to download message bodies as well as headers you will get all the benefits of M2's search features. If you want a folder structure on the IMAP server you will have to organize it yourself, however.

Encryption: Currently not supported, but apparently planned for an unspecified, later version. A workaround is to use a proxy server doing the signing/encryption.

Notes:

• Opera is closed source, but free if you choose the ad-sponsored version. The fee to register is currently only $39, however, and there are additional discounts for students. The price includes both the browser and M2, as well as several other included features such as a news reader (actually part of M2) and a basic IRC client.
• The Opera browser supports WAP pages directly, thus negating the need for using an emulator.
• Although many parts of Opera cannot be changed via the GUI there is still a lot of room for customization by editing .ini files. The procedures for doing this are also often documented in the extensive and very readable documentation.
• The Opera browser is also available for several hand-held devices, and supports small screen rendering, which makes even normal web pages quite readable on small screens. You can try it out in the normal Opera browser by clicking shift-F11.

 Mozilla 1.6 / Thunderbird 0.5

The Mozilla browser suite includes a mail client, but recently the Mozilla browser and Mozilla mailer have been split into separate projects; the new mail client is called Thunderbird. The differences between Mozilla Mail and Thunderbird are still small, however, with the changes mostly affecting appearance and configuration. I will therefore review them as one, with the main focus being on Mozilla. I comment on the differences at the end.

Mozilla Mail is a traditional, but modern, mail client. While it does not (yet) support virtual folders, all other expected features are there. Like the Opera browser it is available on a host of platforms, but unlike Opera it is open source and completely free, in both senses of the word.

Note: Although Mozilla Mail uses by default a look reminiscent of the old Netscape, I have used the included "Modern" theme in all screenshots as I think it looks much more, well, modern. The choice of default look is consistent with it being presented as a more traditional mail client.

Mail import: The Windows version supports importing from Netscape Communicator, Outlook and Outlook Express and Eudora. Other versions only support import from Communicator, however, so for migrating from Windows one solution is to first move to Mozilla Mail on Windows and then copying the mail files to Linux.

Account setup: An account wizard makes setting up new accounts quick and easy. Each account gets its own set of mail folders. This might be a bit inconvenient if you prefer to have one set of folders for all accounts, but using filters you can still achieve this.

Filters: Right-clicking on an e-mail address allows you to create a filter on the sender, or you can create it from the "Message Filters" option on the tools menu. Message filters are set up separately for each account and you can match on the most common headers or specify your own header name. Regex matching is not supported, however. The actions are not as numerous as for KMail, but includes "Delete from POP server" which can be useful in many circumstances. Since the actions are performed in order you can keep a local copy of the message and delete it from the server; one use for this is deleting spam from the server while keeping other mail there, but still retaining a local copy.

Address book:

Adding to the address book is as simple as right-clicking on an e-mail address and selecting "Add to Address Book", and the recipients of mail you send are also added automatically. You can enter a number of information items on each contact, and the address book is well integrated with the composer. While you cannot organize the contacts into categories, searching is quick and easy; there is also an advanced search option on par with message searching with support for adding several rules.

Searching: The search dialog is similar to the filter dialog, but some extra search fields are available, for example attachment and junk status. You can also specify before/after date, something missing from the other mail clients. Also, one nice option is that you can specify "is/isn't in my address book" for the "Sender" field. Regex is not supported. You can select to search only in a specific folder, and optionally its subfolders. Rules must all match or just one, so some types of searches cannot be created. In general the searches are very quick even for larger number of messages. Message bodies are not indexed, however, so full text searches can still take some time.

There is also a quick filter/search above the message index view where common filters such as "Unread", "Important", "People I know", "Last 5 days" etc. can be selected. You can also quickly search on subject/sender.

Reading messages: The messages of the current folder are displayed in the message index, with a preview of the message below. The message index shows by default the most common columns, with the option of easily showing several more by clicking on a small button to the right of the last header. The selected message is shown in the display pane; note that HTML mail is shown by default, and images are also loaded by default. This can be a security problem as spammers often use this to track which e-mails are actually read, but this can be disabled in the preferences fortunately. Still it would have been better with this disabled by default and rather have a small button labeled "Show images" in the message header area. A threading message view is supported, and double-clicking a message brings it up in its own window as expected.

Composing messages: You can select reply or reply to all, and both attached and inline forwarding is supported. There is no as-is forwarding option, however. The composer window can look a bit crowded on a first look, but it is quite easy to use. The type of each header field can be selected from a drop-down menu, which avoids having to select which header fields to show. There is an area for dropping attachments, the address book is well integrated and signing/encrypting can be enabled by clicking the "Security" button. The composer has full support for writing HTML mail, and a spell checker is even included; it does not underline misspelled words as you type, however.

IMAP: There is excellent IMAP support; this fits very well with Mozilla Mail's concept of separate folders for each account and the only distinction is that IMAP folders are on the server instead of stored locally. Server-side searching is supported, so you will not lose much by storing all mail on the server.

Virtual folders: Unfortunately virtual folders are not currently supported.

Encryption: Mozilla Mail comes with integrated support for S/MIME and signing and encryption is thus well supported. If you want GPG support (inline PGP and GPG/MIME) you need to download a plugin called Enigmail.

 Differences between Mozilla 1.6 and Thunderbird 0.5

As mentioned in the introduction, the differences between the two mail clients are still small as Thunderbird is based on Mozilla Mail. There are some noteworthy changes, however, and one of the first encountered is the configuration dialog. Viewed side-by-side (Thunderbird to the right) we can see that although almost all of the options are the same they can be found in different locations; since Thunderbird is only a mail client the dialog has been optimized for just configuring this aspect. And indeed, to this reviewer at least, it does seem more logical and easier to navigate. One option only found in the Thunderbird configuration dialog is the "Attachments" option where you can set a folder for saving all attachments to, and thus avoid having to select one each time.

A big part of Thunderbird is the support for themes and extensions. A wide selection of both is available, and although a new theme only gives a different look and does not change the functionality, a pleasing look can go a long way to feeling better about ones choice of mail client. The extensions are more interesting, however, as they can add new useful features; as of this writing 28 extensions are available from the official site. It should be noted that several of these add back features already included in Mozilla Mail, but not in Thunderbird (like the "Add Sender to Address Book" option when right-clicking a message), but others add new items. Worth mentioning are:

• Outbox adds a "Send Later" button to the Compose window.
• Quick Reply adds a small edit box and a send button below the email preview, similar to Opera M2.
• QuickNote is a note taking extension with several features, including tabs.
• Quote Colors adds an user interface for configuring text and background colors for different quote levels when displaying messages.
• Weather can show local weather conditions.

A look at the changes for Thunderbird 0.5 mentions support for multiple identities per mail account, however, setting it up requires manual editing of configuration files as the user interface has yet to be written. Other improvements are better Palm address book sync, an improved version of the offline extension and improved spell checking.

The Thunderbird roadmap mentions interesting features such as storing the user profile on a USB device for easier portability between machines, and integrating a RSS feed reader. Although no specific dates are mentioned these are planned for 2004.

Mozilla Mail and Thunderbird will stay in close sync for the foreseeable feature, with Thunderbird focusing on improving the user experience of the mail component. Users are thus free to choose if they want the more integrated Mozilla Mail or the separate Thunderbird (which goes nicely along with Firefox, the stand alone web browser based on Mozilla).

Notes:

• Support for placing the signature above the quoted text when replying to mail.
• Supports showing emoticons (smilies) graphically.

 Outlook

Microsoft Outlook is part of the Microsoft Office suite, and includes groupware functions such as a calendar, an advanced address book and planning tasks in addition to the mail component. The default view shows a summary of unread mail and upcoming appointments, tasks, birthdays and anniversaries. The sidebar is used for quickly jumping between the included functions.

Mail import: Outlook supports importing from a large number of sources, including Netscape 4.x and Outlook Express, and even plain text files. Since no one is likely to migrate from Linux to Windows and Outlook this should be more than sufficient.

Account setup: A wizard walks the user through the process of creating accounts. Supported are connecting to a Microsoft Exchange server, POP3, IMAP and also Hotmail or MSN accounts. All expected features are supported (like leaving mail on server, deleting it after a set number of days and do not download mail larger than a certain size).

Filters: Right-clicking on a message and selecting "Create rule" opens the "Create rule" wizard. Outlook has a huge number of options for matching messages, but strangely enough there is no automatic option for selecting the recipient, and this must be typed in manually. The list of possible actions to take is equally impressive, and the third screen of the wizard allows for defining exceptions. The message filtering part of Outlook is very powerful, but still easy enough for everyone to use.

Address book: The address book is well integrated and supports filling in a large number of items. This includes birthdays and anniversaries, which will show up in the calendar and "Outlook Today" summary screen. Right-clicking on a contact gives not only the option to send e-mail, but also send the contact information itself or schedule an appointment. Contacts can also be grouped into categories for easier organizing.

Searching: Selecting "Find" on the tools menu shows a quick search bar above the message index. From here one can search the current mail folder or all folders. For more advanced searches there is the "Advanced Find" function which supports searching messages, contacts, files and most other things you might want to search. Under the "Messages" tab the most common criteria can be quickly specified, while under the advanced you can select arbitrary fields and the number of predefined fields are in the hundreds. The criteria you specify must all match, however. Searches can be saved in separate files and later opened.

Reading messages: The default message index has the most common fields shown by default, and more can of course be enabled; the number of available fields are again in the hundreds. Normally mail is read from the preview pane, which displays HTML mail by default and also loads images with the advantages and disadvantages of that. Internet Explorer is of course used for the actual display and you are thus potentially vulnerable to the exploit of the week. Double-clicking on a message brings it up in its own window as expected.

One nifty feature is the "Group by", which groups the messages by a given field, and fields can be nested. This is a more general form of the familiar threaded view.

Composing messages: Reply, reply to all and inline forward are supported, and attached forward as well as forward as-is can be optionally enabled. For the message composing Microsoft Word is used by default and all its features, such as spell checking, can thus be used. Most of the features, especially related to fonts and graphics, are naturally most useful when writing HTML mail. By clicking the "Options" button you can set a number of options for the message, however, including signing or encrypting. Automatic signatures is supported and are inserted above the quoted text.

IMAP: The support for IMAP is reasonable, however, the user interface tends to freeze up while waiting for contact with the server. This can be annoying on slower connections. Server-side searches do not seem to be supported unfortunately, and only messages actually downloaded will be searched.

Virtual folders: Microsoft Outlook does not support this feature.

Encryption: S/MIME encryption is supported and once set up it is easy to sign and encrypt messages.

Notes: Outlook suffers from the same symptom as other programs in the Office package: a huge number of options, more than most people will ever need, and it is easy to get lost in the sea of dialog and drop-down boxes. The Office Assistant always tries to be helpful and pops up when you least expect him.

Conclusion

All these modern e-mail clients include all the common features expected today. The question, of course, is which to choose for the important task of managing your mail. Unfortunately there is no one-size-fits-all, so the choice depends on how much control you want and your environment. If you

• want to take advantage of advanced features, but without the hassle of configuration, Opera M2 might be just what you are looking for. It aims automate as much of the e-mail experience as possible and making it easy for you to keep on top of your communication and quickly find messages you are looking for. It also integrates tightly with the browser component, arguably the best browser currently available, and if you are not already using Opera you might consider switching browser as well.
• are a KDE user and want more control of how you manage your mail the choice to go with Kontact should be an easy one. KMail is easy to use, supports all the latest features and benefits directly from being part of KDE by leveraging the large number of applications included, for example the graphical regex editor. Kontact has an integrated calendar, also giving you groupware functionality.
• are a GNOME user and want an advanced e-mail client with integrated groupware functionality, you should go with Evolution. It has a wide feature set, and while not as configurable as KMail it should take care of most needs. It is arguably more mature than Kontact having been in existence longer, and also sports very good IMAP support as well as optional, although not free, Microsoft Exchange connectivity.
• are using a different window manager, want a mature e-mail client and do not currently need advanced features such as search folders, you should go with Mozilla Mail. Having been in development for a long time it is very stable, fast, and supports most features you could have a need for. This is a more traditional mail client and a safe choice.
• will primarily be using IMAP your choice should be between Evolution and Mozilla. As Evolution goes hand in hand with GNOME you will probably be better off with Mozilla if that is not an option, and especially if you do not need groupware functionality and search folders.
• are a Windows user and do not want to make the switch to Linux at this time your options are Opera M2, Mozilla Mail or Outlook. If you have already bought Microsoft Office and need the groupware functionality then Outlook is for you. Mozilla is again the safe choice if you do not want the different experience provided by M2.

There you have it. Having read this review you now hopefully have a better idea of what to switch to if you are in the market for a new mail client, what you can look forward to in the next version of your current client or what you are missing out on if you are not using one of these. The amount of e-mail you have to deal with will only increase in the future, but fortunately those of us making the right choice will also have the tools to manage.

Quick summary

Client:	Evolution
Homepage:	http://www.ximian.com/products/evolution/
License:	GPL
Pros:	Groupware functionality, search folders, good IMAP support, optional Microsoft Exchange connectivity, GNOME centered
Cons:	GNOME centered
Bottom line:	For GNOME users wanting an advanced mail client with groupware functionality or Linux users need to access Microsoft Exchange

Client:	Kontact
Homepage:	http://www.kontact.org/
License:	GPL
Pros:	Groupware functionality, search folders, very configurable, leverages KDE apps like the graphical regex editor, KDE centered
Cons:	Still immature IMAP, missing follow-up feature, KDE centered
Bottom line:	For KDE users wanting an advanced mail client with groupware functionality

Client:	Opera M2
Homepage:	http://www.opera.com/products/user/m2/
License:	Closed source; free ad-sponsored version or pay $39
Pros:	Adapts to the user automatically, very quick searches including message bodies, integrated with Opera browser, includes RSS and IRC, multi-platform
Cons:	Not free, not very configurable, takes some time to adjust to the new experience, missing encryption support, no IMAP server search
Bottom line:	For users wanting an advanced and slick mail client, but without the hassle of configuration

Client:	Mozilla Mail / Thunderbird
Homepage:	http://www.mozilla.org/mailnews/ http://www.mozilla.org/projects/thunderbird/
License:	GPL
Pros:	Mature, stable, supports most advanced features, excellent IMAP support, multi-platform
Cons:	No search folders, separate folders for each account
Bottom line:	For users wanting a modern, mature and traditional mail client

Client:	Microsoft Outlook
Homepage:	http://www.microsoft.com/outlook/
License:	Closed source; part of the expensive Microsoft Office suite
Pros:	Groupware functionality, hundreds of (though mostly useless) options, Microsoft Exchange connectivity
Cons:	Expensive, Windows-only, easy to get lost in all the options, no IMAP server search
Bottom line:	Only consider it if you must work in Windows and need the groupware and/or Exchange connectivity

Final words

This review is extensive and I might have left out something important from your favorite mail client or written something in error. I very much appreciate feedback, but try to keep it polite. I will update this article if any significant errors or omissions comes to my attention, so please check back in a few days.

I hope you enjoyed reading this review as much as I did writing it, and, of course, feel free to send me comments.

Frequently asked questions

• Why didn't you use the newest version of Microsoft Outlook? This doesn't seem like a fair comparison
• Why didn't you include the Polarbar Mailer, Balsa, Sylpheed or some other mail client in your review?

Q: Why didn't you use the newest version of Microsoft Outlook? This doesn't seem like a fair comparison.

A: The only reason Outlook was even included was to serve as a reference with what is commonly available for the majority of users (which still run Windows unfortunately) today.

Using the latest Office 2003 would not have done most of them any good, as upgrading can cost hundreds of dollars (or more!), and might not be an option for some time. After reading the review they can, however, immediately decide it is time to try out one of the alternatives, several of which are multi platform.

Also, I only had Office XP at hand when writing the review, which only helps to better illustrates my point I think.

Q: Why didn't you include the Polarbar Mailer, Balsa, Sylpheed or some other mail client in your review?

A: Before I started writing the review I did a search for which clients I wanted to include. Since this review is all about the next generation of mail clients I only included those which I found to fit this description. Some comments about other mail clients:

• Polarbar Mailer is written in Java and is thus multi-platform. It is free as in beer, but not, however, open-source. After testing it I will say it has potential, but I found too many problems to include it in my review. I did not find it very user friendly as it lacks setup wizards, several menu options did not work (even such important things as message searching) and the user interface is not very polished. In short, I would not yet recommend this mail client for daily use.
• Balsa is a GNOME-based mail client with most basic features one expects from a modern client. However, as it is not what I would call next generation, especially compared to GNOME-based Evolution, I chose not to include it in the review.
• Sylpheed is a GTK+ based mail client which supports most basic features, but which I also deemed not next generation enough to include. Its main advantage seems to be its good support of Japanese and i18n.

Revisions

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