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Date:      Mon, 19 Oct 1998 13:44:25 +0200
From:      Johann Visagie <wjv@cityip.co.za>
To:        andrew@squiz.co.nz, questions@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Mail client program reccomendations?
Message-ID:  <19981019134425.A2128@cityip.co.za>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.4.01.9810190105320.25530-100000@aniwa.sky>; from Andrew McNaughton on Mon, Oct 19, 1998 at 01:47:14AM %2B1300
References:  <Pine.BSF.4.01.9810190105320.25530-100000@aniwa.sky>

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On Mon, 19 Oct 1998 at 01:47 SAT, Andrew McNaughton wrote:
> 
> I'm interested to know what other people consider to be the better client
> programs for handling large ammounts of email.  I've been using Pine and
> it just doesn't do what I need.  I recieve copies of every item going
> through our newswires, as well as mailing lists and more personal
> discussion and need to be able to archive, manage and quickly access many
> thousands of email messages.  I need to have important stuff brought to my
> attention, and have less important stuff quietly archived. I'm interested
> to hear about commercial packages as well as free ones.

I can give you two recommendations at completely opposite ends of the
spectrum:

The first is the venerable MH.  Unlike elm or pine, MH is not a monolithic
client;  instead, it consists of a bundle of little utilities which are
invoked separately from the command line.  This fits in well with the
traditional Unix paradigm - it means you're free to integrate MH into your
own shell/perl/whatever scripts to your heart's content.

At the opposite end lies mutt, which _is_ a monolithic client, but many
people feel it has more of the functionality required nowadays than does elm
or pine.

Both of the above work even better when coupled with mail filters, such as
those implemented by procmail or the exim MTA.

Personally, I used MH for a year and found it to be a black hole for
productivity and time - I spent all my time customising it.  :-)  Currently,
I use mutt, which is the sort of thing you can install, use, and forget
about.

-- V

Johann Visagie | wjv@CityIP.co.za | Tel: +27 21 419-7878 | ICQ: 20645559

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