 |
 |
Hotmail was born circa 1997. MSU's first Webmail client was born near that time circa 1998, written by a brilliant student, Charles Henrich, under tutelage of Chuck Severance. Both had UIs superior to the current mail.msu.edu. It's 2009. /rich On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 1:31 PM, Hoort, Brian <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Why is it that all of a sudden web-interfaces to email are expected to be > "professional"? I would argue that email web interfaces are still maturing > (Outlook Web App 2010 is really, really close to the real thing; the rest > aren't even close). If you want a professional interface, use an email > client, as Mr. Schrock suggests. MSU's email service experienced from a > client is quite good. I suspect that the web interface will improve over > time. > > Brian Hoort > > > -----Original Message----- > From: MSU Network Administrators Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On > Behalf Of Gary Schrock > Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2009 1:14 PM > To: [log in to unmask] > Subject: Re: [MSUNAG] A note about MSU's first e-mail system, circa 1983 -- > and in 2009 > > While I won't argue with you on the whole forwarding email being a pain > to find in the current MSU system (I've had that same problem many a > time, and get completely frustrated by it myself), the whole > amature/professional part I think is entirely in the eye of the beholder. > > As an example, I'm not convinced I'd consider gmail a "professional" > email service. I don't consider a service that locks you into a method > of displaying your emails that's completely different than what you can > get in basically every other email client/service anywhere to be > professional. Locking you into the conversation method of sorting email > is to me a sign of an incomplete, immature product. To me, google is > only usable through using a client, because the web based browser of > theirs is complete junk IMHO. (And I recognize that many people don't > have that same opinion.) Google's also had some reliability problems > lately (both being down, and at least some circumstances where email was > being delivered to the wrong recipients). The whole deliver email to a > wrong recipient is something that anyone using it for to do > correspondence having to do with grants should really think about, > because it could easily be an issue. > > Now, is MSU's system professional? Maybe, but it definitely has its own > flaws, and quite frankly, I'm not overly convinced that some of its more > recent changes haven't been steps backwards instead of forwards. (The > whole filters only run when you log into the web based part of the email > is one of those things that I think was an odd decision, and causes some > of my users problems). I also have some users that seem to get an > inordinate amount of spam through the MSU system that I'm surprised its > not stopping, and can't help but wonder if that's related to the whole > filter issue. > > MSU's help for their email systems also seems to have taken a step back. > Before they did the last conversion, it used to be you could pretty > easily get from the mail.msu.edu page to a page that gives you > information about setting up clients to check mail. Now it seems you > have to jump through a couple of pages, and search your way through the > FAQ to get to that point. > > Of course, personally, my solution was to run my own :). Largely > because back in the 90's, I found MSU's system to be so unreliable, that > the people I worked for just couldn't trust it to do its job properly. > I will admit that MSU's system has been a lot more reliable these days > than it used to be. > > Gary > > Richard Wiggins wrote: > > A couple things happened at the same time in the last couple of days. I > > desperately needed to communicate with MSU HR using an msu.edu > > <http://msu.edu> address, and WIlliam Safire died. > > > > Increasingly MSU treats e-mail as official. It's really important to be > > able to forward your MSU e-mail to a professional service, as opposed to > > mail.msu.edu <http://mail.msu.edu>. Since mail.msu.edu > > <http://mail.msu.edu> is amateur, MSU needs to make it easy to forward > > to a professional service. > > > > I literally spent an hour trying to figure out how to set forwarding in > > the new mail.msu.edu <http://mail.msu.edu> interface. I may not be the > > sharpest knife in the drawer, but I could not discern how to accomplish > > a simple task that MSU requires thousands to complete. > > > > When I wrote MSU's first e-mail system in 1983, it was state of the > > art. That's because there was no art. It was primitive. We had no > > clue. That was 1983. It is 2009. We should be smarter now. I wasn't > > around when MSU chose its current e-mail system. But to bury a vital > > function such as forwarding -- which is now an essential thinig, > > which MSU demands -- under an obscure tab labeled "MSU Prefs"-- this is > > not just primitive. It is incompetent. > > > > It also took more than 24 hours for my former colleagues at ATS to cough > > up simple information vital to me -- how do I set forwarding in this > > poor interface. We were better at FAQs in 1957 than we are in 2009. > > My colleagues are good people but the standard of service is poor. > > Questions should be answered in minutes, not days. And if the primary > > campus e-mail service hides forwarding under a label of "MSU Prefs" > > given a ribbon bar of normal options for the app, there is a problem. > > > > > > http://wigblog.blogspot.com/2009/09/when-william-safire-quoted-me-on-e-mail. > html >