Hi, I tried using an email client over a year ago, and after trying almost all of them in the span of a week I gave up in frustration. Would anyone have a recommendation ? For an email client :

  • That is actively maintained
  • That is not controlled by a company that could pull a Mozilla on it (Thunderbird)
  • That isn’t proprietary
  • That doesn’t need 77 dependencies and 450 GB (WTF KMail 😭 )
  • That is reasonably fast and light and not too bloated (I just want to read emails, I don’t need a full app suite…)
  • That supports POP
  • That supports writing HTML messages (sorry Claws, I really liked you but occasionally I kinda need to write formatted messages to preserve other people’s sanity 😅 )
  • That supports reading HTML messages without showing the HTML version as attachments so that every single email has the paperclip icon and I can’t tell which messages have real attachments (Sylpheed I think ?)
  • That supports MailDir format for portability (why isn’t it the default everywhere already instead of weird non-portable formats ? 😭 )
  • If possible, that doesn’t have an interface that’s so awful it’s a pain to find anything (Thunderbird)

I also tested Geary and another one but I don’t remember much about it… I can’t find out whether Geary does support POP and maildir, its documentation page is… well it’s a list 8 lines long, but on a page called “Documentation” so it’s technically counts as documentation I guess ? 😅 https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Geary/Documentation

Any recommendation would be greatly appreciated !

  • @[email protected]
    8•2 days ago

    Personally, I use mu4e (part of the mu software) to read, organise, compose and send emails. It uses a text-based interface, and runs from within the GNU EMacs editor. Emails are stored locally in the Maildir format.

    • It is actively maintained and open source, and not controlled by a company
    • Apart from xapian and EMacs, chances are that you have the dependencies already installed
    • Mails can be composed in HTML format, but this may take a few extra tweaks. (I do not do this myself.)
    • Emails have to be stored in the Maildir format to be indexed using mu and viewed with mu4e
    • Neither POP nor IMAP are directly supported. To fetch or sync emails from/with an external server, external applications can be called, like mbsync (for IMAP), offlineimap (same), or fetchmail in unison with a locally running postfix MTA (for POP)

    I am not sure if I can recommend this solution, as it can be a bit technical compared with other email clients. For me, it is entirely worth it, though.

    • rhabarba
      4•2 days ago

      +1 for mu4e, really awesome software. There are a few HTML composing tweaks possible, I use org-msg that lets me compose HTML with org. (See my configuration.)

      • @[email protected]OP
        2•2 days ago

        Oh I didn’t know terminal mail clients could do html formatting so I excluded them, it’s nice to know that’s not the case, thanks for the info !

        • rhabarba
          2•2 days ago

          HTML is text and org is basically a better Markdown. :-)

          • @[email protected]OP
            2•2 days ago

            Well yes HTML is technically text but who actually want to write HTML tags by hand in email ? 😭

            I’m guessing org is a better solution to not do that ?

            • rhabarba
              1•2 days ago

              HTML is not that bad. I’d still argue that writing HTML e-mails is just a really bad idea. But yes, org has a somewhat cleaner syntax.

    • @[email protected]OPEnglish
      3•2 days ago

      mu4e

      I hadn’t heard of it, thanks for the recommendation I’ll check it out ! It’s nice to see I haven’t tried everything yet 😀

      • @[email protected]
        1•16 hours ago

        If you’re going there, give mutt a go. It’s an extremely efficient experience, once you have got the basics down.

        • rhabarba
          1•13 hours ago

          But multi-account usage in Mutt is really… leaving room for improvement.

    • @[email protected]English
      2•2 days ago

      I use not much and Emacs. I use msmtp and mbsync. I was going to recommend that. The only issue I have is that I can’t figure out how to sync my sent mails across my accounts. So that if I send a message via service a, it lands in the sent folder of service a. Do you have any tips for me?