I would like list developments that have happened in the area of "Login at startup" and other issues that have surfaced since the landing of that feature work.
We fixed several bugs (14301, 60668, 67327 ) to make user startup experience much better and to provide the flexibility of getting new messages for multiple accounts. A checkbox in each (POP and IMAP) server panel with pref "Log onto this account at startup of mail" allowed users to select one or more accounts for which he/she wishes to get new messages for. This is turned 'off' by default. Part of this discussion is also to invite people's ideas on the default state of this pref given the type the account (POP or IMAP). Also, a point to note here is that all those accounts created prior to this feature will never this pref. So, logically "login at startup" is turned 'off' for those accounts too.
Prior to effecting the above change, we always selected default account Inbox (twisty open server and select Inbox, if needed) and downloaded messages for that account (POP or IMAP). So, with the advent pref "Log onto this account at startup", we needed to obey that pref and stop getting new messages for default accounts unless otherwise chosen by the user. So, if the user selects to not to login at startup onto the default account, today the account name is selected (to avoid server query particularly in case of IMAP) and AccountCentral page is displayed on the right-hand side. So, all those users who never had this pref turned 'on' (remember, as explained in the above paragraph, all those who have had mail accounts prior to this login pref, logically had this option unchecked). So. a segment of people started getting AccountCentral page on the right-hand side as the default account name is selected in the folder pane on the left-hand side. I agree that it is confusing to those who are not aware of login at start pref. One solution here is that user can go to the server settings of the default account and select to login at startup, then Inbox for default account is selected (causing the thread pane and message pane to appear instead of AccountCentral on the right) and new messages are fetched at the next startup. However, it is not very obvious for a novice user. So, as suggested in bug (66460 ), having a checkbox on the AccountCentral page that says "Next time, take me to the Inbox directly" or something similar would help people get to the inbox directly and get new messages in subsequent sessions.
So, with so many scenarios in front of us, we have couple of choices to make about the startup behavior wrt to following issues.
1. Login at startup pref : Possibly rename/rephrase it to "Check for new mail at startup" to make it more clear and close to the actions we would like to perform.
2. Pref behavior :
| Pref state \ Account Type (state) |
POP (default account) |
POP(non default account) |
IMAP (default account) |
IMAP (non default account) |
| "on" |
Select the Inbox, login if needed (i.e., if password is not remembered) and
run Biff so that we get an indication on the account level if there are new
messages to download. |
Login if needed and either get new messages here OR just run Biff like we did for default |
Select the Inbox. This will automatically cause the login (brings up password
dialog if needed) and gets new messages. Known and expected behavior. |
Login and hence cause get new messages. |
| "off" |
Just select the Inbox. |
No action needed here. |
Select Account folder. AccountCentral is displayed on the right. As mentioned
earlier, we can have a checkbox that will give user a choice to go to Inbox directly.
If the user decides to check that box 'on', then pref to 'check mail at startup'
will be automatically turned 'on'. |
No action needed here. |
3. Pref default value : From all the discussions that have been going on in the newsgroups and bugs, here are the set of default values.
| Pref \Account type |
POP (default account) |
POP (non default) |
IMAP (default account |
IMAP (non default) |
| Check new mail at startup |
off |
off |
on |
off |
4. Any suggestions wrt AccountCentral, with or without the check box I have mentioned, are welcome (bug 66376).
The goal is to provide a good startup experience with mail application. Some of the ideas mentioned above are collected from the bugs and the previous and news articles. Thanks to all those who have participating in these issues. It will be nice to hear feedback from all of you on these issues. Please feel free to correct any of the above or to propose something better.
thanks
bhuvan
