[gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Grant]

I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The
email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird
spends a lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just
slow.  Would something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other
recommendations?

- Grant

Re: [gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Paul Hartman]

On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 10:15 AM, Grant <emailgrant@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The
> email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird
> spends a lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just
> slow.  Would something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other
> recommendations?

Is it running on your local machine? I think the amount of data
downloaded should be the same for any client which uses the same
protocol, I would think.

Obviously you can disable image loading for HTML emails. You could
also set it to download headers only, and bodies only when you open a
message. You can set Thunderbird to not check for new mail except for
when you tell it to.

You might also consider a web-based e-mail solution.

Figuring out where the slowness is worst (do you have 1000 emails in
your inbox?) and try to come up with a way to avoid it.

Good luck,
Paul

Re: [gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Momesso Andrea]

On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 08:15:05AM -0700, Grant wrote:
> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The
> email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird
> spends a lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just
> slow.  Would something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other
> recommendations?
> 
> - Grant
>

When I use my gprs connection (5kb/s max download speed on well covered
areas) I feel confortable with mutt over gmail's imap.

Obviously I avoid opening messages with big attachments (mutt shows the
size of the message in a summary without opening it)

[gentoo-user] Re: {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Grant Edwards]

On 2008-10-21, Grant <emailgrant@gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.
> The email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.
> Thunderbird spends a lot of time loading or whatever and
> squirrelmail is just slow.  Would something like mutt be an
> improvement?

I've used mutt over a 14Kbps link with latencies in the
200-300ms range. You'll need to configure it so that it doesn't
check for new mail very often, and limit the number of
mailboxes it's checking for incoming mail.  You'll also want to
make sure that header caching is enabled.  I think the cache
supoprt is built by default these days, but you'll need to
enable it by setting the header_cache configuration variable in
your .muttrc file so that it points to the file where you want
the header cache database stored.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow! !  I'm in a very
                                  at               clever and adorable INSANE
                               visi.com            ASYLUM!!

Re: [gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Willie Wong]

On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 08:15:05AM -0700, Penguin Lover Grant squawked:
> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The
> email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird
> spends a lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just
> slow.  Would something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other
> recommendations?

Sorry, I don't quite understand your setup:

Are you:

  a) Running a remote desktop / X over ssh type scenario where you run
  Thunderbird from a server on your client over a slow internet
  connection? If so, then certainly using a text-based client like
  Mutt will help. 

  b) Reading mail that is stored remotedly on a local computer? via
  IMAP? In this case I cannot say, not having used Thunderbird or
  squirrelmail. This really depends on how efficiently the individual
  clients are coded, and the best way to find out is to just try them
  out and see if you get an improvement. Theoretically the limit
  imposed on the mail clients by your slow internet connection should
  be the same.

  c) doing something else completely?

Can you explain what you mean by Thunderbird "loading"? Loading what?
The program itself? Or a particular e-mail? 

As it stands, your e-mail really doesn't give us much information
about what your setup is and what you would like to improve. 

One thing that I just thought of: often it maybe faster (if you have
the access) to ssh into the mail server and run mutt there compared to
using IMAP. Especially with e-mails with attached pictures and HTML
mark-up: if you parse those on the server with lynx and send only the
text through the ssh, it will often be faster than downloading the
entire mail and parsing it locally. 

Regards, 

W
-- 
If you buy the paperback version of Maxwell's _Treatise_, on the cover, 
this diagram is drawn... worked out in the 1870's, without a pocket 
calculator...
       ~Prof. Kirk T. McDonald, DeathEM, P-town PHY 304
Sortir en Pantoufles: up 683 days, 14:34

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[John J. Foster]

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On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 03:42:04PM +0000, Grant Edwards wrote:
> On 2008-10-21, Grant <emailgrant@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.
> > The email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.
> > Thunderbird spends a lot of time loading or whatever and
> > squirrelmail is just slow.  Would something like mutt be an
> > improvement?
> 
> I've used mutt over a 14Kbps link with latencies in the
> 200-300ms range. You'll need to configure it so that it doesn't
> check for new mail very often, and limit the number of
> mailboxes it's checking for incoming mail.  You'll also want to
> make sure that header caching is enabled.  I think the cache
> supoprt is built by default these days, but you'll need to
> enable it by setting the header_cache configuration variable in
> your .muttrc file so that it points to the file where you want
> the header cache database stored.
> 
I have to 2nd the mutt recommendation. Been using it for years as my
only email client. (Works well with a fast connection, too!)

festus

-- 
Reputation's changeable. Situation's tolerable.
But Baby you're adorable. Handle me with Care.

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Re: [gentoo-user] {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Pe'ter, Csa'sza'r]

Hi,

I am not very experienced with different email clients, however have you
seen Tinymail, Modest and may be some other?

http://www.tinymail.org/trac/tinymail

Tinymail is just a library for mobile environments. It is mainly
designed and written by Philip Van Hoof. He mentions TMut, Modest as
examples of clients using Tinymail.

May be these are good, may be not. I don't know. I just had the fortune
to work with Philip and on Modest for a month. I liked the style of him
and the team of Modest. I hope these will be successful softwares.

Pe'ter Csa'sza'r


Grant írta:
> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The
> email client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird
> spends a lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just
> slow.  Would something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other
> recommendations?
> 
> - Grant
> 

[gentoo-user] Re: {OT} Email client for a SLOW connection

[Vitus Jensen]

Am Tue, 21 Oct 2008 08:15:05 -0700 schrieb Grant:

> I'm on an excruciatingly slow internet connection right now.  The email
> client seems to be the major productivity blocker.  Thunderbird spends a
> lot of time loading or whatever and squirrelmail is just slow.  Would
> something like mutt be an improvement?  Any other recommendations?

Pine

Thunderbird will always download complete messages whenever click on 
one.  Given MIME mails and IMAP servers Pine will will only download the 
interesting parts of the mail.  This means only the text OR the HTML 
part; or when you receive mailinglists in MIME digests only the mail you 
are interesting in.

Of course, you need an IMAP server which correctly supports IMAP 
(fastmail.fm is good, gmx.net is bad).

Vitus

-- 
Vitus Jensen, Hannover, Germany, Earth, Milky Way, Universe (current)