[Design] Re: e-mail feature suggestion - msgs received recently

[selva r]

The messages on this thread seem to reflect what is
likely the situation with email users in general. 
While most users appear to use folders to sort out
mail from various senders ex. family, friends, etc.,
some prefer to use color coding for this purpose. 
Hence, while some may wish to use color for time
dependent aging of emails, others may find this
undesirable.  The best way around this dilemma may be
to allow for both options to be set by the user.  As
Mimi pointed out, color is a valuable commodity. 
Hence, we should not be dictating to the user how
color will be used in the application but rather,
allow the user to decide how best to use this valuable
commodity in their email lives.  

One possible model for allowing this type of
versatility of Chandler’s email subapplication may be
as follows.  The default setting for Chandler may be
to use folders for triaging of email based on sender
id as most clients now do including Apple’s .mac,
Yahoo, Netscape, etc.  This allows us to set color’s
default usage in the email subapp for time dependent
aging of email.  Under this default set up, if the
user right clicks on the email sender id in the email
list view then the contextual menu might include:

1)  assign this sender to an email IN BOX folder
2)  assign this sender to Chandler’s NOW Box
3) assign a color for messages received from this
sender

Option 3 could be displayed but greyed out partially
so that the user can not choose this if color is being
used to time age emails.  If the user tries to click
this option any way, then a dialogue box could be
displayed to advise them to go to Edit -> Preferences
-> Color and turn off the color dependent aging of
emails feature before this option can be set.

Option 1 allows the user to easily triage all mail
from this sender to a particular existing email folder
or create a new folder to accommodate this sender.

If Option 2  is selected then this allows all emails
from this sender (ex. Mom) to also be automatically
triaged into Chandler’s NOW Box without having to
manually flag it so that mom’s emails are not lost
amongst the background noise of other email messages. 
This system also helps prevent Chandler’s NOW box from
being flooded with unnecessary emails such as those
from busy discussion groups, etc.  For these senders,
the user could be allowed to manually select which
emails are sent to the NOW box so that Chandler’s main
PIM system is kept at a manageable volume without
having to “scan”and flag the entire list of incoming
email regularly.

I also have a comment about Chandler’s NOW box system
in general.  Although the main purpose of a PIM is to
take care of daily routines and organize them
efficiently for the user, there is the inevitable
situation where, in the course of doing our daily
routines, we come across some email or web content
that is of such great interest to us that we do not
want to just dump it into a general  “DONE” box but
rather, we want to keep it in a special archive for
future reference.  In addition, in the course of
generating short notes in Chandler’s Note
subapplication, we may jot down some quick notes on
our Palm Pilot or smartphone that we want to archive
in a more organized manner than in a general DONE box.
  Hence, I would find it very useful if, in addition
to a general DONE box, a fourth box was added to the
NOW, LATER, DONE system which might be called
something like,  LIBRARY.  Here, the user could keep
particularly important email documents, quick NOTES,
and in the future, web content if Chandler
incorporates a browser.  A separate box for archiving
particularly important content that we come across
during the course of our daily routines, I feel would
be a very useful function for Chandler to incorporate.
 

In order to be most useful, a  LIBRARY box should
allow for highly customizable filing of this reference
data so that it can be classified under a tree system
that would be most useful to the user.  If the file
format for data content in this box was selected to be
OAISIS XML then this may allow future editions of
Chandler to easily detect and plug into OpenOffice
since their next upgrade will use OASIS XML as their
default file format. Developing Chandler as a plug-in
to OpenOffice also allows us to more easily use the
same filters for MSWord, Excel, and PPT email
attachments as those of OpenOffice. 

On a separate but related note, I should point out
that for many, our daily routines still involve a lot
of printed data rather than electronic data.  Hence, I
think Chandler should, at some point, eventually
consider customizing GOCR (the open source optical
character recognition software for scanners) as a
separate plug-in for Chandler so that printed
documents could also be filed into the common OASIS
XML LIBRARY box which may be shared between Chandler
and OpenOffice.

On a final note, Mimi mentioned that color should be
used for NOW, LATER, DONE box buttons.  However, I
would prefer another option.  Previously, we had
discussed the possibility of allowing for a floating
button bar for Chandler’s subapplications that could
be dragged and docked on any side of the screen or
underneath Chandler’s menu bar so that the user has
quick access to any of Chandler’s potential
subapplications including say Addressbook, Datebook,
QuickNotes, Email, Browser.  I would prefer the NOW,
LATER, DONE box icons to be included within this
button bar so that I can also access these just as I
would any other Chandler subapplication.  The use of
color for this system rather than icons normally used
for button systems would be a waste of the valuable
commodity of color in my opinion.  

OK.  Let the flames begin. :^)

Have a happy and prosperous New Year OSAF members!

– Selva

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