Postbox
Latest
Marco Arment on the Mac App Store's future
Marco Arment, the creator of Instapaper, weighed in with his thoughts on the future of the Mac App Store. He argued that, unless Apple changes some of its rigid policies, the Mac App Store is doomed. He pointed to the recent departure of the email client Postbox, which in part was the result of Apple's strict sandboxing requirements, as an example of what the future holds for the Mac App Store. Because of Apple's policies, Arment predicts that an increasing number of developers are going to leave the Mac App Store. Arment writes, "The problem with sandboxing isn't that any particular app is incompatible with the current entitlements. It's a deeper problem than that: Apple is significantly reducing the number of apps that can be sold in the Store after people have already bought them." This developer departure will not only affect developers, it will also affect customers who bought a piece of software that is now gone from the App Store. Arment says that even he has "lost all confidence that the apps I buy in the App Store today will still be there next month or next year." It isn't just sandboxing that's causing some developers to leave. The lack of a paid upgrade system, no access to important customer information and no volume discounts are making some developers return to selling their software through their own storefronts. Arment makes a compelling argument for buying apps directly from the developer instead of through the Mac App Store, even through the App Store is convenient. You should take the time to read his post and consider what he says the next time you click on the "Buy App" button. #next_pages_container { width: 5px; hight: 5px; position: absolute; top: -100px; left: -100px; z-index: 2147483647 !important; }
Postbox 3 launches with more social, more integration
We've tracked the progress of the Postbox email client for a while now, and it keeps getting better. Postbox -- an evolution of the Mozilla email client -- combines ease-of-use and email power tools to create a full-featured client with great polish. Version 3.0 brings with it not only new features, but a variety of improvements to system integration as well. More GMail features, including native "Label" support, "Important" view, "Send and Archive," support for GMail shortcuts and the ability to add detected dates as Google Calendar events. More social features, such as importing avatars from Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and more, displaying job titles and company names from LinkedIn, easy access to LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter profiles and the ability to update Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn right from the email client. More integration with services including Dropbox, Evernote, iCal/Google Calendar, and Growl 1.3. Version 3 also adds Lion Full Screen support and multi-touch gestures. There's more, including a new "Favorites Bar" that's worth checking out. Postbox also includes the ability to create a set of "canned responses" -- templates tailored for various types of repetitive inquiries -- quickly accessible when replying. Postbox has come a long way as far as being "Mac-like," and this release is looking great to me so far. If you bought Postbox after August 15th, 2011, this upgrade is free. Previous users can upgrade for US$9.95. A new Postbox license runs US$29.95. If you're looking for an alternative to Mail with a full suite of social and system integration features, Postbox is a good bet.
MacLegion 2011 fall bundle now available
MacLegion has announced their fall bundle for 2011. This year's bundle features 10 Mac apps worth US$639 for the low price of $49.95. The apps in this year's bundle are: Corel Painter Essentials 4 RapidWeaver 5 BannerZest Pro 3 Postbox 2.5 DEVONthink Pro 2.2 Swift Publisher +Extras 2.3 Disk Drill Pro 1.4 CheckUp 3 Voila 3.1 Fumy 1.5 The sale runs until September 28, and the first 9,000 customers who buy the bundle also get a copy of CleanMyMac (a $29.95 value) for free. The MacLegion bundles also entitle buyers to full after-sales support as well as valid upgrade paths for software releases, just as if you had bought each app individually from the developers.
Postbox 2.5 out with new Mac theme, 64-bit mode
Postbox is a favored alternate email client among the TUAW staff and version 2.5 was just released with a number of updates. This includes Postbox now running in 64-bit mode along with a new theme, interface and icon set that does much to make it look similar to the built-in Mail app, but retain Postbox's distinct style. Double-row vertical thread view is now supported along with a streamlined message view. In addition to all of this is a major price reduction. When Postbox 2 was released, it was US$39.95. It's now $19.95 with upgrades from Postbox 1 being $14.95. Postbox 2.5 requires OS X 10.6 and higher and is currently available through Postbox's site. The 2.5 version will be available via the Mac App Store soon.
Postbox 2.0 available now!
We've covered Postbox in the past, and I've been using it regularly since the beta. Version 2.0 was just officially released, and there's a lot to love in the latest incarnation of this Mail.app replacement. Postbox already had some great organization capabilities, including "Conversation" views for email threads, and "Topics" for tagging messages and quickly sorting them. With version 2.0, organization is faster and even easier, thanks to features like Quick Move and some new keyboard shortcuts. There's even a Quick Reply feature that lets you respond to a message from within the message or thread by hitting Shift+R (a lot like GMail). There are also keyboard shortcuts for navigating mailboxes and accounts without touching your mouse. The new Universal Inbox and Account Groups views make it easy to manage multiple accounts and multiple inboxes from one screen. Combined with the tab features of Postbox, you can effectively handle quite a few accounts with very little effort. There are also new "Focus" panes, where you can view To-Dos and filter by Has Attachment, Unread, Topics, Favorite Contacts, and Dates. For a full list of new features, check out the Feature List at the Postbox website. Postbox is free to try, and US$39.95 for a license. There's also a free version, Postbox Express, if you don't need all of the extra bells and whistles. There's even a Windows version available! Check it out (especially if you're a keyboard lover or running Mail.app with Mail Act-On or similar).
Postbox adds Things and OmniFocus support
The first time I heard about Postbox, it was a relatively new email client for the Mac. Based on the details in the first announcement and my trial run, I was very intrigued. I recall telling the rest of TUAW that -- if its stated goals were achieved -- it had the potential to take over my Mail.app setup. See, I love my setup, but everything that I really like about Mail has been added by plugins, and those plugins require a certain performance and stability sacrifice. It would be bittersweet to part with everything I've built there, but it would be a welcome change if it were a step up. With better task management, great search features, tabbed views, a plugin architecture and more, Postbox has always struck me as a serious challenger. Since the last time we mentioned it, Postbox (which is Mozilla-powered) has continued to become more Mac-like, with system-wide Address Book sync, notification integration with iCal, Spotlight indexing, and more drag and drop features. There's even a way to instantly transfer photos to iPhoto, making it easy to save all of those travel pictures your mom decided to send ... one attachment at a time. Most important (to me), the most recent release (1.1.2) has added integration features for task managers Things and OmniFocus.
Postbox Beta 8 solves issues, adds QuickLook support
If you're in the market for a new email client to try, I mentioned Postbox a few weeks ago. Late yesterday, the Postbox team released beta 8, which features an improved conversation view, and new and improved support for QuickLook, Flickr, Hotmail, and Growl. The beta also fixes many bugs found by users (including myself) and performance enhancements. Also, Postbox is heeding user suggestions to become more Mac-like, including keyboard shortcuts in menus, improved notification for unread messages in the dock, and the aforementioned QuickLook and Growl integration. Full release notes are available on the Postbox website. Performance appears to be about the same -- which is to say pretty good -- and indexing on my 2006-vintage black MacBook still occasionally ramps the fans up to hurricane strength. I've been using Postbox as my primary email client for about three weeks, and its held up to my demanding workflow, but still has a ways to go before it becomes the killer email app. Still, if you're a high-volume email consumer, Postbox is a solid option for you. Postbox is free (and will continue to be free, so far as we know), universal binary, and requires Mac OS X 10.4 or higher.
TUAW First Look: Postbox Public Beta
Postbox, the email client built for heavy email users, entered Public Beta on Sunday. Postbox is designed to allow you to search, organize, and manage your email more more efficiently. Postbox includes a powerful search tool that lets you use Gmail-style search terms (like "from:Steve" or "before August 2008") to easily find messages. The Gmail-like features don't end there: Postbox automatically organizes threaded emails by subject. Messages can be tagged with one or more topics for easy recall later. Perhaps Postbox's greatest feature is its ability to recognize what's in your email, and keep it front-and-center. For instance, if you're composing a new message, you can use the Compose sidebar to find attachments in other messages to drag into your new message. The inspector panel on the preview window highlights links, addresses and attachments in the message so you can get to them easily. For me, I use my inbox like a to-do list. Thankfully, Postbox has a built-in Archive utility that lets you specify an archive folder for each account (which I already had set up). Once you're done with a message, clicking Archive or pressing A moves that message (or many messages) right into your archive. Add to this to-dos, integrated search, social network integration, message annotation, tabbed browsing, and a high-security Mozilla foundation, and you've got an amazing Swiss Army-knife tool for hard-core emailers.
