Submitted by “We are proud to announce that the next version of SkyOS will ship with a new Mail client. In contrast to the already available Mozilla Thunderbird mail client, the new Mail application completely integrates with SkyOS. For instance, all mails are stored as separate files with various attributes attach to it. So you can easily and quickly find every mail using the SkyOS Viewer and its query system.”
SkyOS Adds Native Mail Client
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Adam Scheinberg
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Sounds a lot like using email in BeOS
As far as I can see from the screenshots presented, the Mail application seems to contain a HTML renderer, too:
http://www.skyos.org/images/temp/2.png
So it’s much more than a mail client, cool! (Okay, HTML and mails… well, this is… I won’t go into detail, you can imagine what I would say.)
The storage representation of the mails – separate files – reminds me to the MH format mailboxes (in opposite to the mbox format) which is for example used by the Sylpheed mail client. You can of course see advantages and disadvantages in this MH like format, but personally, I prefer single files over fat message conglomerates.
Sorry, I don’t know about BeOS and SkyOS to make a statement of higher inner values…
the html renderer is an integrated GUI component that uses the gecko engine. Any skyos application can embed this component just like if it was a textfield or listbox.
Release the damn thing once and for all.
Indeed is amazing the product but for God Sake release a final version and later if you (Robert) would like with yet another beta cycle it will be just fine, but are less a real version and non-beta version.
Just Gmail has remained beta as SkyOS.
For instance, all mails are stored as separate files with various attributes attach to it.
So… they reinvented maildir?
No they reinvented the BeOS way.
Maildir is just an edulcorated copy of what BeOS has been using for a decade, without the indexed xattrs.
Yeah, the storage is very similar to what BeOS does, as well as the way attributes and indexes are used.
From the API point of view I’m not sure if the BeOS API had/has all the Mail related classes right in the API too. (which makes writing new apps with support for sending/receiving/managing mails and the user created mailboxes quite easy).
Anyway, BeOS stores and handles mails in a very efficient way (from the user point of view), it would be a shame not to “reinvent” it for other systems.
Edited 2008-06-11 16:43 UTC
I’ve always like the BeOS way. Glad to see something mostly the same in SkyOS
I really should fork out the cash for the beta…
Yes, it does. The Mail Kit exposes BMailMessage & co API so developers could use the mail system in a system-wide consistent (and easy) way.
Unless the SkyOS filesystem mimics BFS, it is not really the BeOS way. BFS worked in parallel with a database, which gave the filesystem the flexibility to do things like sort mail. Can anyone with a greater knowledge of SkyOS[‘s filesystem] enlighten me?
it doesn’t only mimic BeFS, it’s using a derivative of openBeFS
and I hope that robert coordinates his efforts with the haiku-team.
would be great if both stored mails the same way
Edited 2008-06-11 17:57 UTC
Well, BFS didn’t work in parallel with a database, but BFS is more or less “the database” itself. But you a right if you talked about SkyOS which in addition to the filesystem “database” also uses a SQL based database to fully index file content too.
I believe the initial filesystem of BeOS was more or less like that, but it probably wasn’t called BFS then either I don’t think.
I believe it was eventually dubbed something like “OFS” (and included as a filesystem add-on for later versions of BeOS to be able to read still).
But that’s pretty much before my time using BeOS, so I’m just regurgitating what I’ve heard/read.
this article talks a bit about BeOSs first “fs”
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/03/29/windows_on_a_database_slice…
That is a great read – thanks for posting it! A post-Be interview with Dominic and Benoit, can’t believe I managed to miss that.
So SkyOS does use a database in a similar way to BeOS? Perhaps it’s time I give SkyOS a try, I’ve been meaning to for while.
the filesystem in BeOS is capable of keeping metadata and indexing files.
The database in skyos adds indexing of file content (for some specific file types) to that.
Considering Maildir has been around as long as BeOS has, I highly doubt DJB copied from BeOS’ method. If anything it’s coincidental timing.
Maildir and BeOS/Haiku and now SkyOS all use the same one mail, one file design, true. Dunno who did it first for sure, though.
But where Maildir moves email/file from tmp to new to cur sub-folder, BeOS/Haiku/SkyOS simply takes advantage of BFS built-in attributes and indexes features: they changes attribute value and that all. That way, no emails/files moves behind your back *ever*.
The filesystem in SkyOS IS the OpenBeOS file system adapted to SkyOS. It should look a lot like the old BeOS way!
I just hope RS willingly works with the Haiku devs as he earlier said he would.
Edited 2008-06-12 15:19 UTC
SkyOS still not available for general release, film at eleven….
–bornagainpenguin