Searching in Outlook

The ability to search and quickly find what you're looking for is obviously important.  We have become used to this with Google (although Google doesn't suffice for certain types of searches), but for some people, searching for files, email, etc. at work seems to be a hopeless task, and this situation is accepted.  

For Outlook 2003, the Advanced Find dialog box is extremely useful to narrow down your search.  It is available from the search bar, under Options on the far right.  Alternatively, just press Ctrl+Shift+F.  It is easier to use than using the search bar itself.

One caveat to Outlook searches is that if you are searching for text that is within a section of XML tags in the body of an email message, as may happen with technical discussions, Outlook is unable to search within those XML tags so the email you want will be missing from your results.  This is despite the fact that Outlook will search inside attachments, including ZIP files, and find text within XML tags for those attachments.  This behavior is consistent between Outlook 2003 and Outlook Web App (Client Access server version: 14.3.123.0).
 

Mail filters and Linux email clients

I currently work in an environment where we are simply inundated with emails.  This comes from a desire to be more open and transparent but the vast majority of the emails are notifications from automated jobs, bounced emails, source repository check-ins, ...  Mail filters are essential so that the important emails can stand out.  Features of mail filters differs depending on the client used:

	Filter settings exportable/restorable?	Cross-client tags/labels?	Can create filter from existing message?	Can execute filters immediately on existing email?
Thunderbird	Yes, but Thunderbird profile directory is huge, containing mail for off-line browsing too	Yes (“tags”)	Appears to be No	Yes
Evolution	Yes	Yes (“labels”)	Yes	Yes, but execution is slow
Zimbra (web mail)	Appears to be No	Yes, but weird names (which can be renamed for Zimbra)	Yes	Appears to be No

Other considerations:

• Server-side filters are best (no need to have client program running to process incoming mail) but immediate execution (i.e. to act on an existing folder of email) is necessary
• Filters can move messages into client-side folders if the mail is of little interest, or server-side folders (for cross-client access). Note that it may be necessary to “subscribe” to server-side folders (e.g. in Evolution, Folders > Subscriptions). Using client-side folders will allow you to keep within your mail quota
• In Evolution, for filters to work the way you expect, Edit > Preferences > Receiving Options tab > check "Apply filters to new messages in INBOX on this server"

Yahoo Mail versus Gmail: feature comparison

I've been a long-standing user of Yahoo Mail.  Gmail was a different way of thinking so I was hesitant to use Gmail.  Now that I'm using both their web clients and also accessing the accounts in Zimbra, I'm starting to see each of their advantages and disadvantages more clearly.

	Yahoo Mail	Gmail
Conversations	Not available with the web client although Zimbra does try to collect email into conversations, but sometimes does not associate the correct emails together	Yes, available.  With more use, I've grown more accustomed to it.  Will continue to evaluate.
Search	Yahoo's search is no slouch.  Searches attachments and allows you to further filter by folder	Haven't used enough to judge but I remember when my wife searched her Gmail (in 2009?), PDF attachments weren't peeked into; could be fixed by now
Contacts	Recently (as recently as early 2010), access to Contacts seems to be unstable such that addresses that are in my Contact are deemed to be missing and direct access to the Contacts list is occasionally not available	So far, seems stable
Folders versus Labels/Tags	Folders; simple to understand and use but can have limits since a piece of mail can only exist in one folder at a time	Now that I am using Delicious social bookmarking, starting to understand the power of tags as a piece of mail can now have multiple tags.  More flexible but can be more "work" to organize
Synchronization with phone	Not available with my Windows Mobile phone as far as I know	Yes, via ActiveSync for Windows Mobile so able to sync mail, contacts and default calendar.  For other devices
Open to other email clients	Other than Zimbra, don't know of any other clients	Openly uses standards such as IMAP and SMTP so any email client that understands these protocols can access Gmail
Security	Only on login	By default, uses a SSL connection (i.e. https) through-out.  Although that doesn't mean you can send/receive confidential information as others might be using less secure email clients
Archiving	Equivalent to moving to a folder (can be viewed as both tagging and archiving)	Explicitly available

Zimbra Desktop and managing your free webmail accounts

Zimbra Desktop is useful for aggregating your various webmail accounts.  You know those email accounts that you check so seldomly?  Zimbra can help keep track of them.  Assuming Yahoo Mail, Gmail, and Hotmail are the leading free webmail providers, Zimbra has support for all of them.

As far as I know, it is the only desktop software that is able to sync with a free Yahoo account.  There is no problem with Gmail since Google openly allows POP and IMAP access to Gmail (Zimbra also has a pre-configured Gmail set-up for convenience).  Finally, Microsoft does seem to allow Hotmail access over POP; here are the settings to use.  One annoying thing for Hotmail in Zimbra is that your mail is deleted from the Hotmail server's mailbox after you've downloaded from the Hotmail server to Zimbra, and folders you may have created in Hotmail are not sync'd to Zimbra.    

You can also add your work or ISP mail accounts to Zimbra Desktop as long as you know the POP or IMAP and SMTP settings to use.  Zimbra itself is a decent email client so it's ideal as a one-stop-shop for your email.