Mail

I don’t really use Apple Mail myself — these days I do all my email via the Gmail web interface. Plenty of people out there do use Mail.app, and may find the Take Control of Apple Mail in Leopard ebook useful:

You’ll learn how to use and customize the Mail window, control the size and styling of incoming messages, and make rules to move messages into different mailboxes automatically. The book covers outgoing mail, showing you smart ways to address messages, send attachments, and send HTML-based messages. But, that’s not all! You’ll also find advice about setting up accounts, solving account connection problems and other bug-a-boos, handling spam, managing attachments, making backups, searching, signatures, notes and to-do items, Data Detectors, and more.

Book Info: 95 pages; Published 13-May-08; 1.2 MB download; Free sample with Table of Contents, Introduction, Quick Start, and section starts. US$10.

I’ve bought and read other Take Control books before now, and they’ve always been well-written, well-produced and worth the cost.

Popularity: 25% [?]

After watching the Macworld 2008 Keynote live blogging I found that Software Update wasn’t bringing up the goods so I downloaded and installed iTunes 7.6. That gave me the 1.1.3 update for my iPod touch, and offered me a paid software upgrade.

After a bit of updating and unplugging I now have fancy new features working nicely on my iPod touch, including Mail, a Weather widget, Stocks (don’t care about this one), and Notes (hooray!), as per Major software upgrade available for iPod touch:

With the installation of this major software upgrade, the best iPod becomes even more: the world’s best Wi-Fi mobile device. The upgrade—available from iTunes for just [US]$19.99—adds five more great mobile applications to iPod touch: Mail, Maps, Stocks, Weather, and Notes. It also includes such new features as Web Clips, a customizable home screen, and the ability to watch iTunes Movie Rentals on iPod touch.

OK, that thing about movie rentals is just a tease — in New Zealand we don’t have movies or TV shows in the iTunes Store, though rentals are promised for later this year, apparently.

I love the jiggling icons when you customise the home screen, and have moved the apps I most use to the edges of the screen for easy access.

Maps gave me some nice driving directions from my home to the Webstock venue (in case I forget how to get there), but Wellington’s very tricky, being on hills and all. The directions had me making a right turn by the monastery and driving down what is either a footpath with steps or no footpath at all — there’s definitely no road there.

I haven’t yet discovered how to set a Home address. And that picture of our house … still several years out of date. Must read a tutorial or watch a demo: “Your location could not be determined.” What’s that about?

Update:

Get directions and check traffic with Google Maps. Even find yourself, wherever you are. Using some local Wi-Fi networks (if Wi-Fi is turned on), iPod touch finds your approximate location and gives directions from there.

Via: iPod touch Maps.

I’ll be glad to add notes to the Notes app, instead of hijacking an Address Book entry’s Notes field. Weather confirmed that today’s nice and warm and sunny.

Mail gave me a bit of a shock. I’m now so used to using Gmail’s web interface on Mac or iPod that I wondered why I had several separate messages for one ‘conversation’ in my In Box. Writing a test message though was cool: I typed m in the To: field and was able to select an Address Book entry from the list of those containing the letter m.

It was darned easy to set up: it required only name, email address and password, after selecting Gmail as the provider. Mail seems a bit slow though: after selecting an InBox message it swiftly changes to the message content screen, but the content takes a while to show up.

Oh, and I know I may have a small mind — easily amused — but I’ll delete messages all day just to see the animation of the wee trash can tilting, opening its lid and sucking in the message. But then I still love the ‘puff of smoke’ when deleting items from the Dock on the Mac.

Worth NZ$30? Yes.

Popularity: 20% [?]

Lifehacker Australia’s timely post, Opt out of receiving junk mail, appeared in my feed reader as I returned from our letterbox with an unwanted ‘free’ newspaper in my hand. [Name and shame: it's The Wellingtonian.]

I thought there was nothing to be done about junk mail - but I was wrong!

The Australian Catalogue Association has a code of conduct saying members and their deliverers will not deliver materials to addresses displaying a “No Advertising Material” sign.

… Note that this won’t stop all unsolicited mail - newspapers are exempted, along with political pamphlets.

Let me step back a year or two …

When we had our house extended a while ago we also had our front garden landscaped. It’s now full of gorgeous, thriving, native grasses and shrubs. It was the right time to dispose of the clunky, old, leaky letterbox and buy an (expensive) sleek, shiny, waterproof, locking, Gioiosa letterbox. A small letterbox. When I flashed the plastic to buy it, I had in mind that we don’t receive a lot of dead tree mail.

We live on a steep footpath, a good 50 metres or more from the road. At that time whatever young person was employed to deliver unwanted advertising material to letterboxes didn’t make it down as far as us. I’d been lulled into a false sense of postal ‘lightness’.

But then, maybe a year ago, something changed. Our letterbox would routinely be crammed with junk mail every Thursday after recycling collection. Suddenly the real mail had nowhere left to go: the postie would squash it into the top of the mailbox, leaving it sticking out into the wind and rain while the unwanted junk was snug and dry inside the box, filling it up.

About a month ago I decided I’d had enough. I didn’t want to deface our beautiful letterbox, but I headed down to Mitre 10 and perused the collection of “No circulars please” stickers. I bought one that was minimally offensive to me and placed it prominently on the box.

And sure enough, it has somewhat reduced the number and amount of advertising leaflets. It’s done nothing to stop the ‘free’ newspapers, though.

This really bugs me. Someone somewhere is cutting down a forest, burning fossil fuel to transport and manufacture newsprint, wasting electricity to apply ink and then creating more air pollution to deliver to my letterbox something I absolutely don’t want. I don’t buy or read newspapers! Why would I want a ‘free’ newspaper?

Then I have to spend time and energy carrying this detritus up the path to be collected by the recycling truck who are burning fossil fuel to take it away again.

I wish it were email spam. Then I could unsubscribe and the law would make them stop sending me their junk.

I’ve tried emailing the newspapers. [Name and shame: City Life, South and East are another perpetrator of this ought-to-be-a-crime.] They don’t care. City Life didn’t respond to my email. The Wellingtonian did:

I will again forward to the contractor, but please understand, that the
newspaper isn’t classed as a circular.

It seems that if I’m to make any headway I need some giant notice that lists every conceivable piece and type of material I don’t want in my letterbox. ‘Not a circular’ indeed! What a load of garbage.

Consumer were friendly, but didn’t have good news for me:

… the bad news is that there’s no easy way to stop this. You’ve done the right thing by putting signs on your letterbox, but the free newspapers are correct in telling you that they’re not circulars.

They did advise me to try contacting the Marketing Association, but I’m pretty sure I added my name to one of their lists ages ago.

You know how there are things that just really, really annoy you? Well this is one of them as far as I’m concerned — I don’t pay for the damn things so I can’t stop them. I wonder what would happen if I posted them back, minus a stamp? I wonder if trespass could come into play?

Any useful ideas, anyone?

Popularity: 20% [?]