What is so terrible for people about using an email client? I find using the Gmail web interface to be frustrating because they've removed the ability to pop out the compose view into it's own window, so I can't easily reference information in another browser tab while writing an email for instance. Meanwhile, Gmail has excellent IMAP support, which lets me use Thunderbird + Enigmail to get excellent PGP support.
Nothing is terrible, I suppose, but in the web client I personally enjoy the fast search, filtering, labeling, split pane smart inboxes, integration with Calendar, modal keyboard shortcuts (they aren't operative when you're typing in a text box but are active otherwise) and non-intrusive threading (conversation-view).
The fact that all this is the same on my Macbook Pro, on my Arch Linux desktop, or when I reboot to Windows, without any effort on my part to synchronize settings makes this all rather excellent.
Nothing. Except Thunderbird+Enigmail is not something that is going to appeal to the masses. Web-based mail came along and all of a sudden it didn't matter where you were in the world, you could log in and check your email from any computer.
Encryption means nothing unless both parties are using using it (obviously), and if it's only a few users who are encrypting emails using Thunderbird+Enigmail then there's that "why are you encrypting, you must have something to hide" and so the theory goes that you are more likely to catch the eye of big brother who then keeps a closer eye on you... if everyone is encrypting everything then we are all on the same footing.
Unfortunately things need to be made easy for the masses to adopt, like the way iMessages works, which is seemless. I don't want to worry about which pgp server upload my key, or having to go to 10 different places to revoke my key.
You still can. You have to shift + click or ctrl + click the Compose button. Or if the compose windows is already open you can do the same with its maximize icon.
I use the gmail priority inbox and have not seen a single mail client that is able to replicate that. It's incredibly powerful, showing me the emails first that are labeled as important and are unread, then the already read and starred emails, then everything else. This vertical split into three sections is quite important to its power. Combined with some data crunching algorithms that learn what is important to me it's very easy to keep working on only the important things, even though you might get flooded. I'm so dependend on it that Thunderbird simply doesn't cut it. The only reason I use Thunderbird is for these people who really,really want to encrypt mails. Otherwise it doesn't get even a little close to what I want. Do you know if it's possible to get this in Thunderbird?
PS: Not even the Android Gmail client can replicate that. It can show my important labeled mails, but also shows the already read ones and doesn't have that split.
You can shift-click the "full screen" button on the compose window to pop it out into a separate window. There is a tool tip that appears if you hover over it.
My main issue is that search and labels just don't work as well as in gmail webapp.
Also, I'm sending 90% of emails from my phone anyway and I don't know of any good client that works both with gmail (with transparent caching of recent/viewed messages) and gpg.
