In reply to eMail from 2012-07-30 17:42:32 when Derek Martin wrote:
> > > {...} and because the internet landscape has made it hard for
> > > users to run their own services (thank you, spammers).
> >
> > Using built-in SMTP-client or a standalone SMTP-client doesn't
> > make a difference for the ISP, it can't tell what software
> > executes the SMTP.
>
> No, but it makes a difference to the USER. Mutt is already hard to
> configure. If you have to configure sendmail to talk SMTP on the
> MSP port, enable STARTTLS, pop-before-smtp, etc. you need to learn
> a lot about sendmail. No one should need to do that just to be
> able to send an e-mail.
Why not?
You don't need to be a scientist about chemistry and physics to
drive a car, but you must learn some basics before you are allowed.
The more advanced the car & features, the more you must know.
Technically you can drive without permission by simply pressing the
pedals, but we demand more for some good reason.
If everything works out of the black box, you never get to think
about how it all works.
Back to your previous comment:
independent of the spammers the "how to use" hasn't changed, they
didn't make it harder to establish the standard setup.
I'm talking about the qualification required for that which hasn't
changed, not the ability to setup half-baked open-relays which then
are denied by the ISPs.
> > > It's really not reasonable to expect or ask users to be fully
> > > knowledgable about setting up and maintaining a full-fledged
> > > MTA just so they can send e-mail. It's way out of the scope of
> > > most people's needs.
> >
> > a) Popular distros provide easy to use MTA support.
> > b) being totally dumb about how eMail works isn't desirable
> > either. ;)
>
> Sure it is. Most people who use e-mail have no interest in
> learning all the ins and outs of how e-mail works. They just want
> to communicate effectively with their colleagues/family/etc.
OK, I see we're coming from opposite extremes, at least you make it
appear so.
I don't expect "fully knowledgable", I ask for basics, while you
would "let pass" totally ignorant folks.
> I happen to know a lot about e-mail, since I needed to in order to
> do my job; but if that weren't the case, I wouldn't care one bit
> about how it all works.
And that's wrong... did it hurt you to know something more than how
to push "send"-button?
> > > Computers are meant to work for humans, not the other way
> > > around.
> >
> > Nothing wrong with that, but somebody has to make the computers
> > work. Why not everybody for her/himself?
>
> Because it's a pointless waste of time. If the programmer can do
> it once, the users don't need to each do it every time... That's
> exactly the sort of efficiencies that computers are good at
> addressing and should be addressing.
Everything of value is because of the effort put into it.
"one-size-fits-all" doesn't work, there is little that suits all evenly.
Everything which is so basic that it would, doesn't require
something like mutt, there are simpler tools better suited for those
simple cases. Mutt's purpose is to go beyond.
You wouldn't recommend to use typo3 to run a simple single-homepage,
would you? Why would you tweak typo3 to make it better for this
case when there are other tools already covering this area?
Are we seeking world-domination, monopoly, to get rid of all
alternatives?
> > > But there are times when one giant monolithic application with a
> > > simple interface and reasonable defaults really is what you need.
> >
> > There are enough of this kind around, mutt needs/ed not to become
> > another one of them.
>
> Many of us don't agree. Mutt solves a whole class of mail-related
> problems that other clients don't solve, or solve poorly; but at the
> same time, there are a lot of things that people who use e-mail do
> that mutt doesn't handle well.
That's where mutt is strong: it lets you use a tool that does it
already good enough.
> The biggest one IMO is HTML mail... It's very popular, as it
> allows people formatting options that are very useful for written
> communications. Mutt handles this rather poorly. Reading HTML mail
> is clunky, and AFAIK there really are no good options for
> generating it with Mutt's tool chain.
Reading: see wiki-FAQ. :)
Sending: use an HTML-Editor and adjust the content-type.
What's your problem?
I do well with plain-text responses to HTML eMails, and I didn't
notice a significant increase, even less so a dependency on it.
Actually I guess people just don't care generally for anything, so
they likewise don't for pretty-ing up their mails but simply
fire&forget them, afterall mostly they just act as memos rather than
literature artifacts worth the trouble. For anything really complex
they use office and send the stuff as application/octet-stream.
Quite in the spirit of mutt. ;)
> You can say HTML can be handled by a web browser, and you'd be
> right -- but that solution is clunky at best, and if you need to
> retain formatting for others later in the thread, you really need
> another e-mail client.
Or better HTML-Editor or preparation of the response-file.
> > I like things to be simple & easy to use, too.
> > But within its own area of operation.
>
> Mutt's area of operation is e-mail... are you saying that
> submission of e-mail via SMTP is not related to e-mail? =8^)
Your specification is too generic, likewise you could say it is to
communicate with people, then you could integrate IM, irc, and all
the other crap, too.
Mutt's area is providing a ui to manage mail-stores and to provide
an integration of tools which process mails beyond that store.
> If you take this philosophy to its extreme, there is no need for
> Mutt at all; you can simply tie together all the other pieces
> together with some shell scripts!
You could, and some do (mh), for even more advanced uses than mutt
is good for. :)
> > Has humankind been dumbed down? Should we support this trend? ;)
>
> No! [Well, maybe.] It's because computers and computer science
> have been around long enough that this stuff should just work, and
> be easy.
> Sadly, somehow, that's still not the case for e-mail.
Because it is not as simple, it becomes a complexer matter the more
you want it to do for you.
> Mutt is very powerful, but it is far from the perfect MUA.
I guess we both should leave mutt as it is and go our own
paths, since "perfect" depends on what you&I look for. ;)
I'm curious what we both would end up with... :)
(if I only had the time... and nothing else more urgent to do)
--
© Rado S. -- You must provide YOUR effort for your goal!
EVERY effort counts: at least to show your attitude.
You're responsible for ALL you do: you get what you give.
