Re: Balsa UI changes - developer needed

[Albrecht Dreß <albrecht dress arcor de>]

Am 13.07.04 18:07 schrieb(en) Wookey:
> (as the original word docs)
> http://www.aleph1.co.uk/armlinux/docs/Slash_Design_UI_change_spec_All_apps.doc
> http://www.aleph1.co.uk/armlinux/docs/Slash_Design_UI_change_spec_Balsa.doc

Ouch. These [spit] Microsnot formats are bad, even if OOO is now able to  
read them. They may contain viruses and all sorts of other nasty things,  
so you really should avoid to distribute them, even if Linux is not  
affected. Use pdf or something like that...

> (or as html)
> http://www.aleph1.co.uk/armlinux/docs/Slash_Design_UI_change_spec_All_apps.html
> http://www.aleph1.co.uk/armlinux/docs/Slash_Design_UI_change_spec_Balsa.html

Hmmm, Mozilla displays just empty pages?

> Displaying attachments
>
> Outlook and others just show you the text of the message (in whichever
> format it best can), and indicate if there are any conventional
> "attachments".

If *only* the text is shown, this would IMHO break the rfc (don't remember  
which one; 2135? :-) which says that attachments with disposition type  
"inline" should be displayed automatically...

> I want very much to do those two things. Balsa does the first already
> (ISTM - doesn't it?) But not the second- attachment symbols appear on
> almost every
> email in the list.
>
> Can Balsa look into the contents of each mail, and then do better - eg
> maybe
> something like:
>
> Only display attachment symbols in the list by emails that really have
> them, and:
>
>   Handle "message parts" differently when there are attachments - eg
>   by adding a third tab, "Attachments", which just lists them, and
>   lets you click them? (And ideally, by then not showing the "Message
>   parts" tab for ANY message, unless some "Show message parts" option
>   is ticked in Tools|Options?

In 2.2.0, there is a button in the top-level headers box to pop up a menu  
to select all "real" attachments form, i.e. multipart/signed and similar  
stuff is hidden. I could try a backport to 2.0, but that needs some time.  
We all have a job and a family...

>   When there are attachments, we should call that second tab
> "Attachments".
>   And it should not list things like the plain text version of the main
> e-mail
>   (or any other version like HTML). Just attachments - every other email

This is problematic if you get mails where the content of the text/plain  
and text/html parts is actually different. I don't know if it's allowed  
according to the rfc's, but they exist - e.g. Apple's adv mails contain a  
message that the MUA does'n display html in the plain part, and the adv in  
the html one. I configured balsa to display text/plain if possible (inter  
alia as the html font is sometimes so tiny that it's unreadable, which is  
gone with the bleeding edge gtkhtml, afaik).

> app
>   just shows you the message, and then the attachments.
>
>   So, no "mixed parts". (And the other tab should be called Message, not
>   Content.)
>
> If there is a reason why Balsa is the way it is, here, please let me  
> know
> what it is. Or perhaps you have better ideas on this topic?

The structure view is in particular important for signed and/or encrypted  
messages where it is sometimes difficult to say which parts were actually  
protected by which signature. The structure view reveals which parts are  
in which container (multipart/signed). This can be pretty difficult if you  
think e.g. of forwarding a multipart/signed message as attachment, and  
signing the complete aggregate again, but with a different key, which may  
have different trust and validity. This is extremely important in an  
environment where crypto is necessary. So, if you want to have crypto, you  
IMHO need it...

A second point is that you can select multiple attachments in the  
structure view, and then select "Save all" in the right-click popup, which  
sometimes is handy.

Just my € 0.01...

Cheers, Albrecht.

--
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Albrecht Dreß  -  Johanna-Kirchner-Straße 13  -  D-53123 Bonn (Germany)
      Phone (+49) 228 6199571  -  mailto:albrecht dress arcor de
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