Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac • Hacker News Board

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#31

Post by dgallagher » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:02 PM UTC

johnconroy2 wrote: post #30

dgallagher wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

menuling From a Cocoa perspective it's actually called an NSStatusItem (Status Item), appearing the NSStatusBar (Status Bar). From a user perspective (per Apple's Human Interface Guidelines), it's called a "Menu Bar Extra" appearing inside the "Menu Bar". Though I think that's a little bit stupid for a name. Apple does warn developers from making NSStatusItem's/Menu Bar Extra's: http://developer.apple.com/library/mac…

Hold down command and drag to reorder

Control-Click only works for Apple's Menu Bar Extra's, not 3rd party one's, unfortunately. :)

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#32

Post by natemartin » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:05 PM UTC

Interesting UI, but it seems to only show my inbox, not all of my other labels in gmail. I filter a lot of messages, so my inbox alone isn't too useful.

Nice start though.

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#33

Post by Terretta » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:05 PM UTC

Though it seems the opposite of minimalist, I really like MailPlane for managing multiple Gmail accounts at once on the Mac, without any syncing:

http://mailplaneapp.com/

For starters, it incorporates Rapportive in place of the Gmail ads.

Plus, if you like minimal interfaces, MailPlane supports custom CSS, so you can apply Helvetimail or similar clean and designed interfaces:

http://www.josefrichter.com/helvetimail/

http://jimmitchell.org/projects/mailplane_clean_css/

The ability to have multiple Gmail accounts open in a dedicated mail app is worth every one of 2,495 pennies.

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#34

Post by bobbywilson0 » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:08 PM UTC

I like the concept behind this app, and would definitely switch to it from mailplane if a few things were ironed out.

Here is my feedback thus far.

- I think this is a very nice editing of gmails features, I prefer it to the wrapping of gmail's interface that mailplane does

- The interface feels very "Tweetie"-ish, which I think is a good thing

- The tooltips feel really out of place and are obtrusive and unexpected

- I need inline spellcheck for composing messages

- I don't mind the menuling, but either it is showing something other than unread messages or calculating them wrong, also I would like some options off the menuling like compose, or mailplanes fancy do not disturb feature

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#35

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:09 PM UTC

johnconroy2 wrote: post #30

dgallagher wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

menuling From a Cocoa perspective it's actually called an NSStatusItem (Status Item), appearing the NSStatusBar (Status Bar). From a user perspective (per Apple's Human Interface Guidelines), it's called a "Menu Bar Extra" appearing inside the "Menu Bar". Though I think that's a little bit stupid for a name. Apple does warn developers from making NSStatusItem's/Menu Bar Extra's: http://developer.apple.com/library/mac…

Hold down command and drag to reorder

[deleted]

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#36

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:14 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#37

Post by alibosworth » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:15 PM UTC

BEWARE: it appears as though it was auto sending (and then deleting) my replies every time it autosaved.

I see this http://cl.ly/2g4u at the bottom of the thread in gmail. If I check my trash in gmail I see multiple versions of my reply in various states, all with a sent time (they don't appear in the sent folder).

At worst it is sending out your email continually as you type it, at best its autosaving feature clutters up your gmail trash with every autosave.

Anyone else see this behaviour?

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#38

Post by saint-loup » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:18 PM UTC

I have a quite limited use of email (with no 'inbox zero' problem... maybe I should worry :]), so a minimalist mail app would be perfect. I'll give it a try.

Edit: talking about a minimalist app being "not so miminal" is a great way to introduce it.

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#39

Post by Caged » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:22 PM UTC

9oliYQjP wrote: post #4

A nice little preview. I can see its appeal although I'm not sure I'm ready to make the switch. One little pet peeve though. Why do so many Mac apps want to create a menuling now? It's not the Windows system tray. There's no good reason why this mail client needs a menuling. It can communicate everything through its Dock icon.

I agree that some applications have very little need to add an status bar item. Fortunately, most of the ones I use allow you to turn the feature off.

On the other hand, I hide the dock on my laptop. Having a status bar item in application like this is pretty valuable for me as it allows me (in the case of Mailplane) to quickly navigate my accounts and see newer emails without focusing the main application.

Re: Sparrow - The New Mail for Mac

#40

Post by dasil003 » Mon, Oct 04, 2010, 9:30 PM UTC

The reason I switched to gmail from Mail a few years ago was because of performance concerns. Of course now that I have an SSD I have far fewer performance problems in general, but even so my mail program needs to be fast and solid. Offline email access would be nice, and multiple accounts would definitely be nice because I seem to lose about 1 very important email a month due to my forwarding scheme from one gmail account to another, but it's gonna take more than a polished UI to make me switch back to a desktop client.