Well, I don't use it for real e-mail. I haven't given out the address, and I don't check it regularly. The only reason I got an account was because I wanted to see what Google was up to. After using it, I can confirm that Google appears to have done webmail "right" There are so many little details, it's hard to remember specific ones. But just using it, it "felt" so much better than Hotmail or Yahoo ever did. For example: The interface is very lightweight, but is still visually aesthetic and very functional. Lots of other interface niceties that make e-mail navigation "smooth" I don't know how else to describe it. I have to use Outhouse at work, and it's like a train-wreck for e-mail. Using the GMail interface for mail is far better than any other webmail system I've used, and is probably even better than anything to come out of Washington (excepting PINE...) Now I know how to describe it - expected behavior. For the most part, the interface works like you would expect it to, without having to read documentation and such. They discourage deleting anything. Hotmail and Yahoo, I imagine is a mad-rush to delete anything not important before you reach your max space. I have working code to uuencode a file, chunk it into 9.9MB blocks, tag the subject with file identification, and e-mail it to my gmail account. The reverse is not yet working. While completely useless as-is, I can conceive of someone creating a very large and robust file-store using GMail accounts. Or P2P software. Or god-knows what else. GMail didn't even blink when I sent a 400MB file, chunked into 40 messages. They encourage moving inactive messages from the Inbox into an Archive folder, rather than creating a folder hierarchy and (either manually or automatically) sorting messages into folders. This is completely backwards from what most people are used to, but it works well. The e-mail search function is convenient (unlike Outlook, where it's 3 clicks away), powerful (unlike Outlook where you have to go through hoops to define exactly which fields to search for what), and accurate (unlike Outlook, where, well, okay I can't think of anything, but I'm sure Outlook screws this up somehow...) If Outlook didn't choke on large folders, and had a more convenient search capability, I would seriously consider moving to this 2-folder system. This is how my dad wants to use e-mail (he just doesn't realize it). He has 1000's of messages in his Inbox - no folders. This is fine for searching and sorting, but IMHO was awful with all of the clutter of 3+ year old messages in his Inbox. The archive folder is actually a pretty good system. More on the interface - most people have heard about the ads. Just like the ads in their search results, they are non-intrusive and barely noticable. In fact, I was on vacation when Google moved to their right-side text ad system, and I didn't even notice the change when I got back, I can confirm that I DID NOT feel a disturbance in the force. It wasn't until I read about it on /. that I realized they were there. Same with gmail. (Not a Star-Wars Weenie) Adam On Wed, 25 Aug 2004, Dan Drake wrote: [NON-Text Body part not included] _______________________________________________ TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota Help beta test TCLUG's potential new home: http://plone.mn-linux.org Got pictures for TCLUG? Beta test http://plone.mn-linux.org/gallery tclug-list at mn-linux.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list