SN1009: eM Client

[internet]

I'm a long-time user of Thunderbird. Sure, it remains an ugly pig despite its recent veneer of lipstick but from my perspective that's easy to look past for the mere fact it's FOSS.

I was surprised to hear @Steve discuss his decision to move from Thunderbird to eM Client (which I'd never heard of) on SN1009. Of course I would not expect a proprietor of closed-source software to adopt my own "FOSS unless no alternatives exist" mantra and, moreover, my professional experience includes many years in the proprietary (B2B) software industry.

However, I am curious if the privacy implications of trusting a foreign* developer with the entirety of ones written communications was considered in your decision to switch?

I understand everyone stack-ranks requirements in their own manner and respect the probability that, for you (and many), features+UI outweigh the concerns I'd have further to the above. Also I get that your data isn't stored on their servers. In this case it was merely the switch from FOSS to closed-source SW for something like email that cue'd my internal sad trombone.

Would love your thoughts if you're not too deep in the xOTP weeds

* Not intended as a nationalistic / ethnocentric observation, rather the likelihood of immunity to legal oversight in the US.

 

[Fuzzball]

Not germane to the OP, but I actually use GoldMine CRM, which downloads emails to my own database and doesn't operate in IMAP mode like others. The advantage is that I have every email, with file attachments, that I have sent or received since 1997.

 

[Philip]

The killer feature for me in Thunderbird is email filters - much more powerful than eMClient rules from what I can see from a cursory glance at the docs. In particular, I can set up a single rule "If From, To, CC or Bcc is in address book Family: Move to Family in Local Folders" - saves around 30 individual rules, and a good many more with some other address books. The range of options on a rule match is also much greater.

If it looks old fashioned and clunky? I don't care. I probably do too! Having first got my grubby mits on a computer 60 years ago, I just wish they'd stop changing!

 

[AlanD]

The killer feature for me in Thunderbird is email filters - much more powerful than eMClient rules from what I can see from a cursory glance at the docs. In particular, I can set up a single rule "If From, To, CC or Bcc is in address book Family: Move to Family in Local Folders" - saves around 30 individual rules, and a good many more with some other address books. The range of options on a rule match is also much greater.

I agree about the email filters. I get DMARC reports for a couple of mail servers. Thunderbird has a rule to detach the report, store it in a specified directory, and mark the email as read. Some days that will save me about 50 clicks doing it manually.

 

[a viewer]

Have most of my email history archived by Mail Archiver X, and seems that em client doesn't do applescript so this isn't a viable option since I couldn't archive my mails.

Would imagine that em client becomes more relevant if you use different os.

also they do have a one time payment life-time-updates option for $110