MegaPixel Maven posts a tip on resizing photos in Mail.app using the “Image Size” drop box in the bottom right-hand corner of the Compose window.

As the author points out, you can use this function to reduce an image in the Compose window to Large (1280×800 pixels), Medium (640×400) or Small (320×200) sizes.

Three points:

• Mail does a really bad job of reducing the image. Rob Griffiths ran some tests on this when the tip was posed on macOSXHints last year. He discovered that Photoshop is between 61% and 73% more efficient at the same tasks. Even iPhoto itself does a better job.
• Another option is to use a utility like Downisze or Scale to Mail, which will resize your images efficiently without the need to fire up a monster like Photoshop.
• If you use Claris Emailer, GyazMail, Mailsmith, Outlook Express, PowerMail or QuickMail Pro, Simon Jacquier’s iPhoto Mailer Patcher lets you hack iPhoto to set your email client as the recipient of resized photos. Instructions can be found in an earlier Hawk Wings post.

iphoto, mail.app, apple mail, images, photos, resizing, mailsmith, powermail, gyazmail, tips

In a recent MacNotables podcast, Adam Engst (TidBITS publisher), Andy Ihnatko, Dan Frakes, and Chuck Joiner discuss what they like and don’t like about their current and past email clients.

They discuss Eudora, Mail, Entourage, PowerMail, Mailsmith, Gmail, and even Elm.

The promo on the podcast’s web page reads:

Think that the choice of email clients is easy? Think again. The MacNotables ride into town on their favorite email clients and you’ll be surprised at what programs get the nod and why. Should you use the free option? Pay for a stand alone program? Use part of a productivity suite? Switch to web mail? There are no obvious answers but the panel gives you some things to consider and talk about where they would like to see email go in this bonus-length session.

The MacNotables podcast, I read on its web site , is “the podcasting home to some of the Macintosh industry’s best known and most visible personalities”.

Have a listen .

It was interesting to hear of plans to rewrite Eudora completely from the ground up. Too late, methinks, although not everyone will agree.mail.app, apple mail, Eudora, mailsmith, entourage, powermail, gmail, email, review

In Apple’s Discussions, Tom Weir discovers again why he had ditched Mail.app for Mailsmith.

He was lured back by Tiger, MailTags and MailTemplates, but after transferring his 20,000+ emails over, he launched Mail and found that it couldn’t find his mail. As a result, “I had to recreate and re-import and futz all day with it. Which is why I had given up on it and gone and bought a mail program,” he says.

End result: “Back to dull, dull, but very stable Mailsmith. Mail isn’t ready for professional use.”

Meanwhile, over at the Notes/Domino 6 and 7 forum, Mike Brown is roasting Mail as a pretty boy that can’t compare to the power of Notes when it comes to attachments.

Testing on Panther Mail, he finds that Mail handles the editing of attachments in draft emails in some really weird ways. Sometimes the edits are there, sometimes not. With Notes, changes are always saved into the attachment.

End result: “One up to Notes, methinks.”mail.app, apple mail, mailsmith, Notes, Domino, attachments, switching

One of the really nice things about Mail.app is the way it works closely with other iApps like iCal, Address Book and iPhoto. But Mail doesn’t have the stranglehold on integration.

A while ago, I posted about iPhoto Mailer Patcher, a hack for iPhoto that allows you to set Claris Emailer, GyazMail, Mailsmith, Outlook Express, PowerMail or QuickMail Pro as the default email client to which iPhoto sends resized images for you to email.

ZappTek provides hacks to help other email clients send iCal notifications. There are patches for Entourage, Eudora, Mailsmith, PowerMail and GyazMail.

Because it lacks AppleScript support, Thunderbird misses out on both counts.

Think carefully though. The developer warns that you will need to reinstall iCal in order to undo the installer’s modifications, if you change your mind later.mail.app, apple mail, iphoto, ical, notification, GyazMail, Mailsmith, PowerMail, Eudora, Thunderbird

John Gruber is the author of Daring Fireball. His primary computer is a 15-inch PowerBook G4 named Joker.

HW: How long have you been using Mail.app? What other clients have you used (and why did you stop)?

JG: I’ve only been using Mail regularly since early September 2005, when we began eating our own dog food and switched our mail server at Joyent (the company I work for) to our own product, which supports IMAP but not POP.

I use Mail only to access my Joyent email account. I use Mailsmith to access all my other email, and have used it since version 1.0 in 1998. I’d still be using Mailsmith for my Joyent email if it weren’t for the fact that Mailsmith only supports POP.

(To be clear: I wholeheartedly endorse our decision at Joyent to only support IMAP clients.)

Also, you don’t want to get me started on calling Apple Mail “Mail.app”.

HW: What plugins and extensions do you use to make your email experience better?

JG: None.

HW: What’s your favourite thing about Apple Mail?

JG: The way it allows you to paste images inline within plain text messages.

HW: What’s your pet hate about Apple Mail?

JG: When it comes to writing, its mail composition environment is clumsy and primitive.

HW: If you could tell the Apple Mail development team one thing, what would it be?

JG: That the way Mail attempts to handle quoted passages in replies (in plain text messages) is cute if you want to be a top-poster who quotes the entire message you’re replying to, but frustrating and annoying if you want to do the right thing.

- – - -

You can read other interviews with developers and Mac identities talking about their Mail.app experiences by following this tag cloud link.Talking Mail.app, likes, dislikes, mail.app, apple mail, John Gruber, Mailsmith

NetShred is a stand-alone app that protects your privacy on the Internet by shredding the browsing histories and caches of your browsers and email clients.

It supports all the main browsers and the following email clients – Mail.app 1 and 2, Eudora 5, Eudora 6, Mailsmith 2.x, Mozilla 1.x and Netscape 7.x.

After launching the app (a process that can be automated so that occurs at start-up) , its main screen presents you will an overview of its abilities:

Installed browsers are highlighted in green, active ones in red.

Caches and histories can only be securely shredded when the app is closed. You can either do this manually, or set NetShred X to perform the shredding automatically when you exit the app.

The Preference Pane provides further options:

Here you can set the degree of automation that you want, what you would like the app to shred, what degree of shredding you require and how many write-overs you would like.

A further tab allows you to specify which browsers and email clients NetShred should monitor and shred.

In this day and age people have more reason than ever to think about their online privacy. NetShred X takes care of that for you and is a good complement to ShredIt, a general purpose shredder from the same developer.

NetShred is shareware (USD 19.95). A fully featured demo is available from the developer’s web site.

Before Christmas, I blogged about iPhoto Mailer Patcher. It was a time to share the love.

iPhoto Mailer Patcher is an AppleScript-based utility for iPhoto that allows you to set Claris Emailer, GyazMail, Mailsmith, Outlook Express, PowerMail or QuickMail Pro as the default email client to which iPhoto sends resized images for you to email.

By default, iPhoto only supports Eudora, Mail.app, Entourage and AOL.

But the Patcher only works with iPhoto 4. To get it work with iPhoto 5 you will need to follow the instructions left by the developer Simon Jacquier in the comments to the original post.

The instructions and some screenshots follow the jump.

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