Palm Pre Email App Review
Wednesday, 17 June 2009
Palm Pre Email App: I blotted out some of the emails. Yes Duker, that's the email saying I have a comment from you.
The Palm Pre comes with a pretty slick, yet somewhat anti-utilitarian email app. There are only a few anti-utilitarian features in it, so I’m going to file this with my praises.
Hint: For the best results when first syncing your email on your palm pre, sync your contacts first, especially if you want to sync with Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server.
Palm Pre Email App Pros:
1. Syncing is amazingly smooth. When you pull your Palm Pre out of the box, you really can just tap the email app in the quickstart dock at the bottom, tap the account set-up button, type in your email address and password, and the Palm Pre does the rest. Again, I advise you do this same process with contacts first in the contacts app.
2. Intuitive and Ergonomic Design. Flipping through emails is a breeze, even one handed with your thumb. The Trash button and other buttons are intuitively placed and simply non-cluttery on the email view page. To delete an email in the In-Box is a simple swipe off the page with a thumb or finger.
3. Spam Emails, R.I.P. Because of how easy and natural-feeling it is to delete email in the In-Box view, spam emails suddenly become less daunting. It is easy to flip up and down through your new emails and spot spammy emails, and do away with them instantly. The funny thing is that the Palm Pre also highlights the subject line in red font if the sender has selected the red urgent flag (at least that’s what it is in Microsoft Outlook), however, the only people that typically use that flag are spammers, making it even that much easier to spot them in my inbox.
4. Notifications are Non Obtrusive. This is more of a praise for WebOS, which is the greatest current Mobile OS available in my mind. Email notifications appear at the bottom of the screen and are easily dismissible by dragging them off the edge of the screen.
Palm Pre Email App Cons:
1. Not quick enough. The Palm Pre in general can use a little boost in processor speed, RAM, or something (don’t look at me, I’m no engineer) to make things snappier. Although the Pre has the same processor as the iPhone, it is running WebOS, a much more demanding operating system than any other phone has ever had to run up to date. The problem that results, is when I’m in my In-Box deleting away at some spam, and the phone does not detect that I made a swipe with my finger and thinks rather that I selected the spam email in a momentary processor brain-fart, the email pops up after a few agonizing seconds. At that point I am forced to select the trash icon as soon as I can, which takes another extra second to erase the spam message allowing me to continue down the list. This typically happens at least once a day for me.
2. Not Good for High Volume. This is kind of the same gripe as number 1, that the app is just not very quick. Since I work for an online retailer where we receive a message notifying us of each sale where we get hundreds and hundreds a day, I am dealing with quite a large volume of emails to simply glance at and throw away. The email app needs an optional view that allows you to scan and toss emails. I would gladly pay $20 for an app that synced with Microsoft Exchange Server as cleanly as the Palm Pre’s email app, but had that optional view to scan a dozen or so emails simultaneously, or with a digital zoom where you point while a dozen messages are sitting side by side, something. Surprise me.
Overall, the email app that comes with the phone is impressive and gets the job done for the most part, even if it means that I have to reserve those sales emails for when I actually get into work.
No. 1 — June 22nd, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Any tips on seeing older emails in your inbox?? I use Yahoo, and the Pre only shows 2 emails from “older” than today or yesterday. On the other hand I can see very old emails if they’re in a folder other than my inbox, so if i know i’ll want to view an email on my Pre, I can relocate it into a “save” or “draft” folder or something of the like.
Is there a way to change the settings so that my entire inbox is seen?
Thanks!
No. 2 — June 27th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Would I be able to use the PRE is my email is Groupwise?
No. 3 — June 30th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
Deleting email is so easy - but I have on occasion “swiped” the wrong email off the page There does not appear to be an “are you sure?” or “undo” function, and I cannot figure out how to recover deleted email.
I am specifically using the email app with AOL mail. The “trash” box is not an option in the folder list like it is on AOL webmail, nor does the email end up in the web trash folder.
From what I can figure out, I can create a folder in my saved email, call it “trash” and point the Palm Pre app to put deleted email there - but perhaps there is an easier, more straight-forward solution that I am missing…
No. 4 — July 9th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
To recover accidentally deleted email.. go to your trash folder and open the message you accidentally deleted. The upper left email menu… move to folder… and select your inbox or folder of choice. There’s your undo.
No. 5 — July 9th, 2009 at 11:18 pm
Becca… to see older emails in your inbox…
When in top level of email app… email menu(top left)… preferences and accounts… choose account to change… scroll down to sync options… click the “show email” option and you can choose from 1 day to ALL which would show everything in your inbox as see on the mail server itself.
If you’re using a POP server and your PC client is set to pull messages from the server, you won’t be able to see those messages on the Pre, since it will have been removed from the server.
No. 6 — July 16th, 2009 at 10:26 am
When I reply to an email, the prior text loses its formating and becomes hard to read. How do I fix this issue? It makes reply’s and forward’s not worth doing. It is killing me…..HELP
No. 7 — July 16th, 2009 at 10:54 am
Never mind… I found the fix: http://predev.wikidot.com/fix-broken-formatting-for-reply-forward-e-mails
Enjoy
No. 8 — July 16th, 2009 at 10:57 am
Steve, thanks for the find! I think we’ve all been suffering from the same problem (and our email recipients have been suffering too)
No. 9 — August 4th, 2009 at 10:37 am
i’m trying to get my college email on my Pre. I just switched from a blackberry…any clue how to do that because when i put my email and password it does not work that way and it asks for incoming server outgoing server port # etc. Any help would be appreciated!
No. 10 — August 13th, 2009 at 9:47 am
Can I sync my outlook email with the palm pre?
If I read a email on my device I want it read in outlook automaticly. How can i do this?
No. 11 — August 20th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
My boss just got a Pre. When he forwards email to me the address for the original sender does not get forwarded along with the message. Very annoying. If anyone has a fix for this that I can pass along to my boss please post it!
No. 12 — August 30th, 2009 at 8:14 pm
Re: #10
Scott, as yet there is no solution to this. One can not as yet sync one’s e-mails between MS Outlook and Palm Pre. I have tried to use Pocket Mirror, The Missing Sync and even used IMAP server for my e-mails but none of them worked in consistently scalable way for me. So I am switching back to Palm Treo Pro because I need to have all data including e-mails synchronized between my phone and PC.
No. 13 — October 10th, 2009 at 9:23 am
I think the Trash button is horribly placed. It is easy to hit accidentally when gesturing.
Also, if you do accidentally trash something the “move to folder” commands don’t work at all so you have to get it back into your inbox using another email client (ie laptop)
I use email a ton for work and I am unimpressed with the email client on the pre.
No. 14 — October 27th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
totally agree about accidental deletes. i keep just barely noticing important emails that have been silently deleted by a stray touch. my solution is to set my trash folder to the “all mail” folder on gmail. at least that way i won’t ditch the email, although i still miss some.
we need a preference to confirm delete button presses.
No. 15 — November 30th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
I just got my Pre and love it. I have to say thank you for this article as I was unaware that you can “swipe” emails away in the inbox view. I have a questions as well that I hope you can answer. When I send an email (using hotmail) with an attachment from my Pre to another Pre user (hotmail user as well) the attachment does not show on the recipient’s Pre. If the email is opened from the hotmail website on a PC the attachment is there and if an email is sent from the hotmail website on a pc then the attachment shows on the Pre just fine. Please help to shed som light on this mystery.
Thanks,
Mandy
No. 16 — November 30th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
mandy– when you’re trying to send the attachment from the pre, are you simply forwarding another email with the attachment? i believe in some cases it will not automatically attach the file, you have to download it to your pre and then reattach sometimes i think. other than that, it could just be a bug.
No. 17 — December 9th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
I’m having the same problem and so is my daughter’s pre. I used to be able to send attachments and pictures no problems but it stopped working on Monday. ( Dec 7th) Does anyone have a solution? I appreciate the help,
Thanks, Jake