First, I use AT&T for my primary e-mail accounts but am currently running through Bell South DSL for the faster access. I still have to dial up to AT&T to send my e-mail while using Mozilla/Netscape 6.2.1. The reason is that I cannot find a way in the prefs.js file or in the UI of the SMTP server settings to specify the outgoing port and authentication. I have even tried adding the ":465" in the server field and the prefs.js file. Neither worked. Currently, AT&T claims that only Outlook (Express) supports these features. I have been waiting since the release of 6.0 in the hopes that this would be added. If this is related to the SSL and Cryptography that will be available sometime after the Mozilla 1.0 release, then I will just keep dialing up to send e-mail.
Secondly, the Profile Manager is lacking a very important feature. The ability to merge profiles, or at least, to import the entire mail settings and messages from one profile into another. I used several different profiles before Mozilla/Netscape 6. I still do because in these new products there is no way to import the e-mail and newsgroups messages, settings, filters and other preferences and log files into one profile in Mozilla/Netscape 6. This would be a very nice feature to keep from losing or having to maintain multiple profiles. It is so difficult to transplant all the messages, filters and other settings. I would do this by hand but I do not know where to begin. I tried to import them through Outlook Express, but success was limited. I had to edit the prefs.js file manually to straighten out the servers (POP3 and SMTP) and remove some old ones. The filters and address books still require rebuilding or reconciling though.
The first problem is the simplest of the two and
probably should have been added earlier because the incoming SSL POP works
fine. The merging of profiles on the other hand, could take a while
and involve major redesign of the profile structure. I have decided
to maintain my Netscape 4.77 system until I can work around these problems.
These are only requests and suggestions. Though I would
like to see them in the next release, I doubt they would be that easy to
implement. Thank you for your ears to hear and minds to contemplate
the wisdom, or lack of, these suggestions.
