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Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

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Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#261

Post by vladgur »

njhaveri wrote: post #238
sixhobbits wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do still have to trust you though right njhaveri? If I understand it correctly this is a closed source app with unlimited access to GMail. How can users be sure that it doesn't do stuff that you say it doesn't or that you are who you say you are, considering "Mimestream LLC" only has an email address and your HN profile has only ever posted about this one app? Hope that's not too aggressive :) legitimately curious…

This is a very fair concern, and I sympathize with it a lot. I have thought about this a fair bit, and thought about eventually turning this into a "source-available" model (but not yet, I'd at least like to be fully launched on both App Stores first and have some user-base). There are pros and cons to that. At the end of the day, if you install an app from the App Store, you place trust in the developer. App Store R…

How does Mimestream work in terms of MFA? Im not familiar with how Goolge OAuth handles it, but if I granted access to Mimestream app from one machine, can the same grant be used from another(i.e. bad actor's server)?

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#262

Post by aptwebapps »

vladgur wrote: post #260
robenkleene wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great point: "There are no intermediary servers with access to your account or copies of your messages." A number of popular email clients use intermediary servers and that's a complete deal breaker for me. I'd argue that should be a deal breaker for almost anyone. I'm not a security expert, but as far as I can tell, for most people the single biggest security vulnerability is an attacker gaining access to…

I was about to install it until i went through OAuth setup which grants the "Mimestream" application permissions do to a number of things including "Read, compose, send, and permanently delete all your email from Gmail" One can blame it on Google OAuth UI or on Mimestream UI, but its not clear to me whether these privileges are granted to the locally installed application and can only be used by it OR whether these p…

I don't see much difference in the distinction between the client software (written by Mimestream, probably with regular updates) having access to your account, which it obviously has to has, and Mimestream having direct access. But IANA security researcher, so salt liberally.

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#263

Post by vladgur »

aptwebapps wrote: post #262
vladgur wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was about to install it until i went through OAuth setup which grants the "Mimestream" application permissions do to a number of things including "Read, compose, send, and permanently delete all your email from Gmail" One can blame it on Google OAuth UI or on Mimestream UI, but its not clear to me whether these privileges are granted to the locally installed application and can only be used by it OR whether these p…

I don't see much difference in the distinction between the client software (written by Mimestream, probably with regular updates) having access to your account, which it obviously has to has, and Mimestream having direct access. But IANA security researcher, so salt liberally.

I mostly agree -- it takes a level of trust to provide your credentials to a third party app.

However, there are precautions that you can do to minimize the risk of your credentials used without your authorization with a local client software:

1) requiring multi-factor authentication when credentials are used from a new location/device/ip... 2) A local firewall(like little snitch for osx) that surfaces any unexpected outbound requests.

These obviously wont be much help if you grant some other server permission to access your email.

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#266

Post by bfgmartin »

heipei wrote: post #185

What is the advantage of this over using the Gmail web ui? The Gmail web ui works great for me, has keyboard shortcuts, push notifications, works on all operating systems, supports multiple accounts with the /u/1/ subpath, etc. What does this offer that I'd be willing to pay for it and lock myself in to Mac OS exclusively?

Way faster and uses less memory. Unified inbox. And the killer feature for me is Command-Tab - being able to keyboard switch from my email to the browser.

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#267

Post by bfgmartin »

mshick wrote: post #243

Thanks for this fantastic app. I love the native Gmail features with this level of polish, speed and OS integration. I would love to see — and would definitely pay for — a similar approach to Google Calendar. Unfortunately CalDAV-based clients only offer a fraction of the web client functionality.

+100

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#268

Post by domoritz »

njhaveri wrote: post #2

Hi HN! In the past, I spent over 7 years working on Apple Mail, and today I am really excited to share a new email client I'm building: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail. Mimestream is written in Swift, and uses AppKit+SwiftUI for a clean, stock appearance. It's designed to be fast, lightweight, and use a minimal amount of disk space. Mimestream's advantages over using the Gmail web interface includes…

The app looks sleek. Do you plan to also support Gmail's smart compose feature or is that beyond what a native app can support?

Re: Show HN: Mimestream, a native macOS email client for Gmail

#269

Post by prashaantt »

I held off from updating to Catalina last year and hope to go directly to Big Sur this year, so I can’t try this out yet but I just gave my email to your website, hoping I’d receive updates on the progress.

While we’re on this topic, do you have any plans to add custom integrations with 3rd party services like Todoist and Bear? That’s one reason I’ve switched to Spark and I’d be extremely happy to pay you for it.

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