Marc Blank . . . Are you out there?

aviduser

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I am wondering whether anyone has heard from/of Marc Blank developing an email app for Android. He was the developer of a great email app for Treo (Chatter email) which was WORLDS better than the stock email app for Android.

It seems that he was considering developing such an app for Android at one point, but the news is quiet. Anyone hear anything new?

And, if by some stroke of luck Marc is on these forums, we would love to hear from you.

Cheers,

aviduser
 

Gekko

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IMO Chattermail was OK for its time but it's primitive by today's standards. also unnecessary. i tried it and always found it buggy and unintuitive - although i know many loved it.

the Gmail app and the HTC Mail app are great.
 

aviduser

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Perhaps, but I found it to be the best app on the Treo. More importantly, it was head and shoulders above the stock Android email app (nexus one) -- even under Froyo.

There is simply no control over about a zillion options--display oldest on top or bottom, how long to keep messages in inbox, signatures in replies, multiple signatures (per account), the list goes on.

I think Android has some great stuff going for it. But it is seriously lacking in three key areas: (1) email application, (2) calendar application, and (3) contacts management. My 1999 Palm V did (2) and (3) better and my 2005 Treo did all three better.

So . . . if Marc is out there and writing software, here's a vote for Chatter for Android.

aviduser
 

meyerweb#CB

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When he quit Palm, it was reported it was because of the limitations of the Javascript development environment provided by Palm.

Aviduser, I agree completely. I can live with the current email apps, but the calendar is a killer for me. The Android and HTC calendars are probably the worst I've seen on any platform, except maybe the Pre. I'm eagerly awaiting the release of Pimlical for Android, or iRT Calendar Pro.
 

Gekko

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Perhaps, but I found it to be the best app on the Treo. More importantly, it was head and shoulders above the stock Android email app (nexus one) -- even under Froyo.

There is simply no control over about a zillion options--display oldest on top or bottom, how long to keep messages in inbox, signatures in replies, multiple signatures (per account), the list goes on.

I think Android has some great stuff going for it. But it is seriously lacking in three key areas: (1) email application, (2) calendar application, and (3) contacts management. My 1999 Palm V did (2) and (3) better and my 2005 Treo did all three better.

So . . . if Marc is out there and writing software, here's a vote for Chatter for Android.

aviduser

try the Jorte Calendar app if you haven't already.
 

bclinger#IM

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I used ChatterEmail back on the Treo 600 and kept up with it up to the Centro. Excellent application and well supported. Did the job and did it very fast. I also say it would be great to see Marc develop a similar application for this OS. I also agree that Palm did a much better job with PIMs.
 

meyerweb#CB

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try the Jorte Calendar app if you haven't already.

I use Jorte, and it's an improvement, but since it's a widget it's still dependent on the underlying calendar app for a good bit of its functionality, and that underlying app still sucks.

I think my calendar desires will be met by iRT Calendar Pro, or Pimlical (from the Datebk+ folks) when they are available later this year.
 

Gekko

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I use Jorte, and it's an improvement, but since it's a widget it's still dependent on the underlying calendar app for a good bit of its functionality, and that underlying app still sucks.

I think my calendar desires will be met by iRT Calendar Pro, or Pimlical (from the Datebk+ folks) when they are available later this year.

unlike most of the other Android Calendar Apps, Jorte is more than just a widget. i have grown to like it over the old PalmOS Calendar App. i've also grown to like the EVO's "People" App over the old PalmOS Contacts App. (i used Palms for 10+ years).

the only thing i miss from PalmOS is a better Select/Copy/Cut/Paste but i think that's coming with Froyo.
 

aviduser

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I am eagerly awaiting Pimlical for Android. I hope it comes soon. I started with DateBk3 and progressed to DateBk6. Great, great calendar app. Even better than most desktop calendars.

On the email front, well, I tried K-9 yesterday/last night and this morning. It has lots of control and features, but did not seem to reliably fetch mail from my Lotus Notes IMAP server. Great features and controls are worthless if it can't get the mail! I went to the gym today and in that short time (less than 2 hours) K-9 killed my battery. Totally. And it did not have the half-dozen new emails in my inbox. UNINSTALLED.

Let's hope for a better offering. Anyone got the chops to write a good one?

aviduser
 

edanks

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Have you tried MailDroid? Most reviews have it better than K-9.

"On the email front, well, I tried K-9 yesterday/last night and this morning. It has lots of control and features, but did not seem to reliably fetch mail from my Lotus Notes IMAP server. Great features and controls are worthless if it can't get the mail! I went to the gym today and in that short time (less than 2 hours) K-9 killed my battery. Totally. And it did not have the half-dozen new emails in my inbox. UNINSTALLED."
 

ottscay

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Just got onto a DX from a BB Storm, and while I really like most of it, I have to agree that the email and calendar functions are pretty weak. The on-phone calendar is almost unusable in some ways; I can even get an event to re-occur every two weeks on my phone, so I'm forced to do it online with Google Calendar to get it correct. While it's nice for them to auto-sync, it's frustrating to have such basic functions not enabled in the phone UI.

Gmail is the only usable stock client IMO. I've installed MailDroid, which is quite a lot better than the stock email client (and with a couple of UI tweaks and support for folders could probably be as good as most any other email client on other platforms). Here's hoping that it continues to get improved, and/or Gingerbread has a better email client. Android won't be taken too seriously by the enterprise market if it can't the most basic productivity apps usable.
 

Gekko

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Just got onto a DX from a BB Storm, and while I really like most of it, I have to agree that the email and calendar functions are pretty weak. The on-phone calendar is almost unusable in some ways; I can even get an event to re-occur every two weeks on my phone, so I'm forced to do it online with Google Calendar to get it correct. While it's nice for them to auto-sync, it's frustrating to have such basic functions not enabled in the phone UI.

Gmail is the only usable stock client IMO. I've installed MailDroid, which is quite a lot better than the stock email client (and with a couple of UI tweaks and support for folders could probably be as good as most any other email client on other platforms). Here's hoping that it continues to get improved, and/or Gingerbread has a better email client. Android won't be taken too seriously by the enterprise market if it can't the most basic productivity apps usable.

Jorte - What is Jorte?
 

CalJohnson

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I am wondering whether anyone has heard from/of Marc Blank developing an email app for Android. He was the developer of a great email app for Treo (Chatter email) which was WORLDS better than the stock email app for Android.

It seems that he was considering developing such an app for Android at one point, but the news is quiet. Anyone hear anything new?

And, if by some stroke of luck Marc is on these forums, we would love to hear from you.

Cheers,

aviduser
I believe he works for Google now and rumour has it he's quite the a-hole.
 

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