As everyone knows, one of the great things about Mail.app is the slick way that it integrates with other OS X apps.

Find the iPhoto picture you want to email, click on the Mail button, and – hey presto – there it is, nicely formatted in a new email and ready to go.

In the spirit of Christmas cheer, here’s an iPhoto hack that gives the same joy to others. iPhoto Mailer Patcher adds the same “optimise and email a picture” support for Claris Emailer, GyazMail, Mailsmith, Outlook Express, PowerMail and QuickMail Pro.

The Mozilla stable, including Thunderbird, miss out because they are not “AppleScriptable” enough for iPhoto to work with them.

iPhoto Mailer Patcher is freeware, comes in various flavours depending on your iPhoto version and is available from the developer’s web site.

Maybe you know some poor soul whose life would be better for finding out about it.

Christopher Biagini at Assorted Geekery has written an extensive review of what he considers credible alternatives to Mail.app. It’s not easy for these apps, he says:

It?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s tough to compete with an app that?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s bundled with the OS, so each of these guys know that they have to bring something special to the table in order to get people to switch.

Mailsmith has BBEdit?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s text-fu magic, GyazMail pimps its Cocoa-ness, and Thunderbird rocks extensibility and cross-platform goodness.

But for Christopher, Apple Mail rises to the top. There is only “one email client to rule them all”.