Every time I hear about a new email client that will support multiple services, I get excited. Is this finally the one that will free me from Gmail’s native iOS app? And time after time, I am disappointed, all because of one missing feature.
Microsoft just released a native iOS Outlook app. The app is beautiful. Like Apple’s Mail app, it supports most every pop and iMap service under the sun. Outlook looks great and features a Mailbox-like zero inbox scheme. There’s lots to like here. But that one missing feature. Aargh!
Here’s what’s missing: Gmail lets you create and manage labels. Labels are similar to folders, which allow you to organize your email. For example, I might have folders named MonkeyBiz, ToyCannon, and Investments. The first two are startups, the third where I keep track of my investments. With Apple Mail, Microsoft Outlook, and most traditional email clients, when an email comes in about an investment in MonkeyBiz, I have a choice to make. Do I put the email in the MonkeyBiz folder or in Investments? I can’t put it in both.
Gmail uses labels to solve that problem. I can attach any number of labels to an incoming email. If I get an email relating to a MonkeyBiz investment, I can label it as MonkeyBiz and Investments. If I look in my MonkeyBiz folder, I’ll see the email. I’ll also see it when I look in Investments.
Labels are incredibly useful. I just wish email clients supporting gmail would add this feature to the mix so I might have a choice of email clients.
Sounds like you want them to support a feature that is only offered by one provider (unless there are others I don’t know about). I’m not saying it’s not useful, but I don’t know how how a developer could justify adding that over other features that can be used with any email account.
Until you try to use Gmail with a desktop client like Outlook or OS X Mail.app. IMAP support in Gmail fails randomly and frequently. Gmail is very non-standard.
A fair question. I find the feature extremely useful, and I wish that other email devs would add that feature. I wish support for labels could be added as a standard feature for all email clients.
But if you are going to support Gmail, then support Labels. It’s a major part of the feature set. Without it, the implementation is hamstrung.
Pretty much that. Interestingly enough, Microsoft has their own take on this in their desktop outlook clients via Categories. You can create them, have multiple categories applied to a message, etc.
The MacBU created the concept, and it was implemented by the Windows team as well.
Gmail is definitely non-standard, but I believe it is the most widely used email service on the planet. In a sense, they are establishing a standard.
As to stability, that’s my experience as well. Using Gmail anywhere but in a Gmail specific client or in a web-wrapped client is difficult.
I’d use Categories if it made its way to the mainstream. Any solution that lets me tag an email with multiple tags. To be clear, I’m not a proponent of Gmail, I’m a proponent of this feature.
It’s not that they’re agreeing to support Gmail, they’re supporting IMAP. Labels is not a part of the IMAP standard, it’s a hack on top of it which is why it causes so many issues with other clients. As there is no standard for labels Google are free to change it at any point, potentially breaking any of these apps.
The thing is, Google don’t want you to use third party clients. They can’t track you as well, and they can’t serve you ads. That’s why they killed off exchange support for Gmail, and don’t add push support to their IMAP access. Only by using their official client can mail be pushed directly to your device.
When they made it so I had to use their official client to get push I switched to using my iCloud account (which supports standard IMAP with push) as my main account.
Googles mail implementation is the same non-standard hacks to industry standards we bashed Microsoft for doing for so many years.
But, as I understand it, the IMAP protocol (which Apple, Microsoft and every other email provider use in both their clients and, along with additional proprietary systems, their servers) does not have a concept of labels or meta-tagging. It supports folders. So when you connect to Gmail using the IMAP protocol, it represents labels as folders, because that’s all it can do.
You therefore have a choice: Use what IMAP (the global standard email protocol used and supported by just about everything else on the planet) offers, or develop some completely new code for whatever Google offers through their proprietary API (if there is one).
I suppose a third option might be to extend IMAP and propose a new version, but that would require Google to develop their API in the same direction, and that isn’t under anyone else’s control. Gmail could, if it chose, allow you to move items into folders and keep them in the original locations too.
But berating every other company in the world for not doing what one (admittedly significant) company is doing seems a bit… off.
As you know, labels are not currently part of IMAP. If you need them you’ll need to find a client that supports them and hope Google doesn’t break that client through malice or incompetence.
Frankly, while they’re incredibly useful a non-stamdard feature like this implemented the way it has been is not a wise thing to rely on.
But blame where it belongs for this not working: Google. Done reasonably via IMAP, this would be easy.
Naive question – in these days of deep search functionality, is finding an email that hard? (I presume that’s what labels/folders are mainly about). I dont use labels at all and I dont miss anything. My main inbox is a mess, I agree – but I feel it is not worth spending time mapping emails to labels. When I need to find something I search gmail and often find it in page 1 of the search results.
Nop, it isn’t.
It’s 1/3 of the top 3 (Hotmail and Yahoo mail the other two), and all 3 are more-or-less on the same level currently (around 350 million active users each of them), tho maybe gmail will take over in the next (very) few years (it’s the one growing the fastest).
So…if you think 1/3 of a market is enough to make you (the developers) chase them whenever they change things (which they often do)….
I’ve been using gmail for a long long time (’04, when you still needed invites to get an account), and don’t use labels…I never liked the gmail UI, so I moved to IMAP as soon as they implemented it, and use it as a regular mail server. Also, google likes to kill services, and I don’t want to get used to something nobody else does in a service that’s so basic and necessary….IMAP is universal 🙂
I’ll defer to Robert regarding support Gmail vs supporting IMAP. I agree with you on the labels though. They can be very useful and would be a nice feature for all email accounts. I’d like to see it supported in email standards so labels are not lost when moving to another email client.
Indeed they do. I was happy when my employer moved our email to Office 365 and allowed us to use Outlook for this feature and a handful of others. They can be very useful.
AirMail on OS X and Boxer on iOS both seem to support labels just fine (I use both with no issues).
This is a personal example. I use Outlook (Exchange), not Gmail, but the concept is the same.
I teach a class in addition to my normal work, but all email comes to the same account. I assign a label to emails that are related to my class so I can use a search folder to filter. Searching is difficult because I don’t always know what the student is writing me about. I don’t always know which student to search for. Sometimes there is no obvious keyword for me to remember to search for. The label/search folder system works best for me in this case.
Labels have been the bane of using Gmail since Day #1, because they do not adhere to the normal IMAP protocol. So every mail client on the planet has to adapt itself to work in some funky way, just because of Google’s implementation of labels. If you want an email in 2 folders, then just duplicate it into 2 folders.
Also, in addition to what Robert Davey said:
You can have multiple email accounts in your email, lets say only one of them is Gmail. How would you suggest to implement labels that you can apply only to some email messages. That’s UX nightmare and a lot of terribly confused users.
Labels are useful, I agree, but unless you are building email client exclusively for Gmail they are basically impossible to implement.
I’ve really bought into the gmail labels system and Mailplane has been a great gmail “shell”. I wish I could find a similar app for iOS because I don’t enjoy using the one google provides.
Disagree 1,000%. As someone who has used email since before the Web even existed, I’ve seen a lot of clients come and go, and written and received a lot of email. Google’s weird treatment of email as if it were code might be great for some geeks and developers, but it makes no sense at all to the average person and is a HUGE departure from the way all other email clients work.
To support this weird behaviour from a competitor in their own clients, (regardless of how helpful it might be for those who are committed to the Google system), would be madness.
Until they knife gmail for inbox.
actually, IMAP does have a proposed metadata standard. RFC5464, proposed in 2009 by Cyrus Daboo from Apple.
pretty much. And they actively punish you for IMAP usage by severely limiting the number of connections an IMAP client can make.
They claim it’s a performance issue.
Right.
Ahh Tags vs Folders. Put in in the “Tags can be superior” camp as well for the same reasons.
Count me in as one of those average people who doesn’t find Gmail labels helpful at all. I’m fine with folders and Rules, or whatever my next mail client might call them.
Stole the words right from me. You need to be blaming Google, Dave. Don’t blame the developers writing IMAP clients. Google wants you to use the GMail app, end of story. If you want the full feature-set of GMail, you’re going to be stuck using Google’s app, and I don’t foresee that changing anytime soon.
You would think it’d be a no brainer for Apple to do this, as they seem to really be pushing Tags in the finder. From the comments it looks more like an IMAP technical limitation, not an oversight by Apple. But having said that, don’t Smart Mailboxes do essentially the same thing? I’m fairly certain I can have the same email associated with 2 (or more) smart mailboxes.
As a side note, if you ever want to bring your finder to it’s knees, try tagging a list of 10,000 items (in my case photos for a job). Crashed every single computer in my office… I’d like to see Apple fix that before they tackle my email with even more items….
if you’re microsoft, you make them client only, and let them apply to everything regardless of source. In some cases, they sync with the server (exchange) in others, they don’t.
there is an RFC about this, but no one seems to support it. Then again, IMAP is a mess.
I shared you view before I began using an iPhone. The problem I have is that rules and folders are handled on the server for my accounts. This causes me to lose visibility to my email. Labels allows my email to remain in my inbox, but still be categorized. I retain visibility on my iPhone and I can use a set of search folders on my computer. I manually move messages that I want to keep long term into folders.
Outlook does okay with it. The problem is less google’s IMAP shim and more their connection limitations
as a point of knowledge, there is actually an RFC that is a start in dealing with this: RFC 5464.
I don’t care if labels are non-standard IMAP, I’d like to see an email apps support them as well. They are a much better system than using standard folders.
Yeah, just like Sparrow did. I really hope the Airmail team develops an iOS version.
Because if there’s one thing Apple won’t cotton to, it’s using proprietary standards to achieve a better outcome.
So why not just stick with the Gmail native iOS app?
RFC 5464 specifies metadata for mailboxes only. The more suitable one here is RFC 5257 (IMAP-ANNOTATE) wish allows meta data on a per message basis.
But as with most IMAP extension RFCs, especially with experimental ones, they are sparsely or irregularly implemented by servers so it makes it very difficult for clients to support them (try explaining to a wide customer base that feature X wont work because their IMAP server doesn’t support an arcane RFC. )
Google does provide its own IMAP extension (X-GM-EXT-1) that provides the ability to read and write labels (and other gmail metadata (https://developers.google.com/gmail/imap_extensions) and some clients do actually support it (for example Mail.app does actually communicate with Gmail Servers behind the scenes with this extension since Mavericks) — it still doesn’t mean that the outward representation of gmail labels in Mail.app makes any sense (Mail.app still just treats labels as folders) And you need software such as MailTags to extend Mail.app to display multiple labels on the messages themselves (disclaimer — I am the author of MailTags)
The main problem is putting together a client that is not going to work differentially on a message by message basis if the user has different servers. It should not be incumbent on the user to understand that Msg X is from Server Y (Gmail) so it supports Feature Z (labels) but Msg A is not so it doesn’t have this feature.
So now we have two standards. Given the number of standards IMAP supports, I’m pretty sure there’s one covering telling you that you’re pretty every monday.
However, that the RFC exists doesn’t mean it’s worth the effort to implement, not without clear customer request. Given the pain involved in IMAP period, i understand why most extensions are ignored.
The concept of labels is nice, but as you show, going from concept to working usable code is less nice. creating something that isn’t client specific (MailTags) or server-specific, (exchange/gmail) that every client and server will support in a consistent, interoperable manner beyond the basics is wishful thinking writ large.
As far as how Mavs/Yos treat labels, well, that makes sense, because in the gmail web client, that’s how labels are treated. They’re basically used as pseudo folders. This is nowhere as clear as in the ability to nest labels. If labels are naught but tags, then there’s no real advantage in nesting them.
The problem is, labels are GMail’s version of folders, and therein lies the problem. They aren’t just tags, they’re the core of how you file mail in Gmail.
For you. For many people. But not for all the people.
I’m a hidebound older person who’s still less than comfortable with the idea of managing multiple categories of email on a small screen because I’ve rarely had to do so while on the job. That may change.
I agree with others, that’s Google’s fault. Gmail is a service above and beyond just email. Anyone can make the email portion (getting messages) but only Google has access to the tags that you add on in their ecosystem. Once there is a tag there it’s no longer JUST email, it’s morphed into something else that is closed off from other potential clients. I’m not a developer but I don’t think Google has opened that up to everyone have they?
Instead of supporting a hack where labels pretend to be folders, perhaps we should be trying to convince whoever is in charge of the IMAP standard to implement tags; a standard solution that allows you the flexibility of keeping your folder organization while adding another way of grouping files on top of it.
I wish these new Mail apps would support IMAP. Seems like one of the first things that should be on the list.
What’s really annoying is Apple supports labels in the file system in Mac OSX now and not many programs leverage them. They have a clear example of someone else using them in email and a motivation to better support a very popular (for some, not me) email system and ignore it. Bugger….
I’ve always found Gmail search to be good enough to not need to use labels, and there is a study out there that making labels does not save as much time finding emails as it takes.
Interesting – thanks!
I would speculate that it’s in response to this very issue – It could be the groundwork for an attempt to coerce Google into using this new standard and thus making their currently unique functionality less unique…
I hate to view emails conversations, what is then the point of copying the text of the received email when replying? But as long as I can turn it off, I don’t mid it if it’s implemented, in Outlook (as it happened in Acomply) there’s is not dam option to turn this “feature” off.
And the same happens with labels, it emulates folders and offers the flexibility of symbolic linking a file in various folders without taking extra expace… As long as I can use theme for a classic folder structure, it’s fine with me.
And having the possibility of using the more the more flexible system of tagging when I think that I needed, the better as it support both topological approach to email (flexibility is always a plus).
Beside If you get a lot into automating actions and using advanced filtering for incoming and out going email, then labeling makes much easier to set up IFFT or Zapier to act upon certain emails.
this is just what I’m facing right now, I really love gmail as mail client, not just because of the labels feature (which I think are very powerful!), but because of its powerful search engine (which I think I can explore somehow as well on Mail), the thing on Mail is how I organize the mails the way Dave here is exposing, I don’t see a way to organize the mails w/ labels (as gmail does) or tags / categories (as m. outlook does) … I expect the Mail coming version brings new features on these matters …
so you’re saying “deep search functionality” can replace “labels / categories” feature? … I would say: “yes and no” … I’m a fan of the powerful search functionality feature (on gmail), but I have to say: a view from a label / category search is way much better and a faster solution than thinking on a the attributes and values of a deep search (commands, operators, grouping, …) don’t you think so?
… it seems to be the solution (duplicating emails) … but to me “duplication” makes no sense, it sounds like “having more than once the same thing for nothing”, am I correct? … nevertheless … is the solution, right? … I mean, there’s no other way to “classify” an email (for instance) in more than one topic (label, category, tag)?
I think this is exactly one of the (if not the only) reason(s) I found “labels” (tags, categories) not only powerful but very useful … “retain visibility” … by classifying mails on folders you have to “move” (duplicate) them from the inbox to those folders losing (exactly that) … visibility.
You’re looking for Indev Software’s MailTags plug-in for Apple Mail.