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How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

theinvisibl.com

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Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#11

Post by kessler »

sp4rki wrote: post #8
kessler wrote: post #6

This is a great breakdown, thanks. Now can you explain why so often I receive an email on the iPhone and one of two things happens: 1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears. 2. If I'm in MobileMail.app a new email arrives and I see it up top for a few seconds, a…

Come on man. What does this have to do with the article? In any case, I have had no such problems with my iphones, so I'd say you either got a faulty unit or maybe it's a service provider issue.

I think it's somewhat relevant since the article discusses incoming mail handling in MobileMail.app. And obviously it's not a hardware issue or 'faulty unit' as you say. It's a well documented issue.

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#12

Post by ugh »

kessler wrote: post #6

This is a great breakdown, thanks. Now can you explain why so often I receive an email on the iPhone and one of two things happens: 1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears. 2. If I'm in MobileMail.app a new email arrives and I see it up top for a few seconds, a…

What does this (potentially rare [0]) bug have to do with the article? Why should the author of the article be able to know the reason for this bug? Why are you asking that question here?

[0] I personally never encountered it.

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#13

Post by atarashi »

kessler wrote: post #6

This is a great breakdown, thanks. Now can you explain why so often I receive an email on the iPhone and one of two things happens: 1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears. 2. If I'm in MobileMail.app a new email arrives and I see it up top for a few seconds, a…

1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears.

Your iPhone is connected to a push server; the server sends your phone a few bytes that indicate a new message is available to be downloaded, but it does not begin downloading the message itself until you enter MobileMail.app. (Messages.app is different since your carrier pushes messages in their entirety).

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#14

Post by alanfalcon »

This is why there's a sentence on page 41 of the User Experience book I'm reading which reads "Apple, Apple, Apple, iPod, iPod, iPod, iPhone, iPhone, iPhone[1]."

Any good UX culture should catch these kinds of details and implement them right, the problem is the lack of good UX cultures beyond a couple prominent examples.

[1]Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#15

Post by mcav »

junofan wrote: post #4

On a related note, I feel like the iPhone is less "eager" to rotate after being held in the same orientation for a while. E.g. I browse Safari in landscape mode for ten minutes, rotate the phone to portrait, and it takes a few extra seconds for the transition to register. Anybody else noticed this?

I think my iPhone's rotation algorithm is this:

When I want it to not rotate, it rotates anyway. I must then fuddle with the multitasking bar to hit the Lock Orientation button.

When I want it to rotate, it seems to take ages before it rotates. Or, I forget that I have rotation lock on, and then have to turn it off first.

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#17

Post by liamk »

kessler wrote: post #6

This is a great breakdown, thanks. Now can you explain why so often I receive an email on the iPhone and one of two things happens: 1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears. 2. If I'm in MobileMail.app a new email arrives and I see it up top for a few seconds, a…

I have the exact same issue - I use gmail and IMAP with iPhone3G.

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#19

Post by 2arrs2ells »

liamk wrote: post #17
kessler wrote: post #6

This is a great breakdown, thanks. Now can you explain why so often I receive an email on the iPhone and one of two things happens: 1. I'm not in MobileMail.app, get a notification that an email arrives, but when I enter the app, nothing is there. When I manually hit the refresh mail button, the new message downloads and appears. 2. If I'm in MobileMail.app a new email arrives and I see it up top for a few seconds, a…

I have the exact same issue - I use gmail and IMAP with iPhone3G.

You should try gmail + ActiveSync push. Made the leap a week ago, and the whole mail experience feels a lot smoother.

Re: How the iPhone mail app decides when to show you new mail

#20

Post by joe_the_user »

kevinchen wrote: post #3

Very interesting findings. But, can you imagine the author explaining something more complicated?

Applications are becoming like furniture. We live in them.

It's working looking in gruesome detail at how efficient and comfortable a given app is.

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