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Ask HN: Idea for a minimal desktop email client – would you use this?

23 points| nikkwong | 6 years ago | reply

Hey everyone, I'm trying to validate an idea and would love your feedback.

I'm big into email but not big into clutter; and the more windows I have open on my desktop the more cluttered my mind is. To this point, I've built a very minimal email desktop client that helps me stay on top of my inbox without having to keep a dedicated window open.

Would you use this? If there is enough feedback, I'd be interested in finishing the code and releasing an MVP. It's customizable so you can choose fonts/bgs/sizes to your liking.

Overview:

https://www.getfractals.com/static/2017/Frame%205.png

Compact:

https://www.getfractals.com/static/2017/Frame%206%20(2).png

Compose view:

https://www.getfractals.com/static/2017/Frame%202.png

Read view:

https://www.getfractals.com/static/2017/Frame%203.png

Minimize view:

https://www.getfractals.com/static/2017/Frame%204.png

Thank you so much for reading.

44 comments

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[+] zzo38computer|6 years ago|reply
I use Heirloom-mailx. I made a status indicator to indicate how many email messages there are, so I need not keep a dedicated window open to know if there are any messages; rather, the same window is used for the system load, memory usage, and date/time. But, I have my own email server, and don't use Mac OS X. Maybe what you have might be useful for some people who use Mac OS X, but I don't. But I think if you like it, you can write it anyways even for your own use, and then you can also publish it even if it doesn't have the options used by other users; I write software for my own use (but also publish it) and so can you, if you like to do so.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
I do like to do that, yeah. I am a windows/mac user and actually spend more time on windows so I would be hesitant to neglect windows.

Sort of meta but I am sort of in between jobs right now and am just looking for purpose and meaning. The last product I built that was strongly received was 6 years ago and the failure to find product-market-fit since then has really eaten at me. So I want to spend my hours toiling away at things that people find useful, unlike most of my Show HN submissions. We humans are so deeply social and after a while I find there needs to be some external validation or I start to question why I'm doing what I'm doing. Anyways thank you for your insightful comment.

[+] latexr|6 years ago|reply
You may not need a dedicated window open, but it does look like you need dedicated space. It’s unclear how your program would interact with other windows or a cluttered Desktop. It also doesn’t seem practical for multiple accounts.

From your screenshots it doesn’t look like I’d use it, even though I’m unhappy with essentially every email client out now (Sparrow was the last good one).

[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Thanks for the feedback, that's super helpful. I suppose in a way you are my target market since you're unhappy with current clients though. If I do go ahead and finish making it, would you be willing to try it in exchange for more of this valuable feedback?

Thanks so much.

[+] stazz1|6 years ago|reply
It borders on the line of maximal instead of minimal because it integrates into a greater interface instead of creating a fresh screen. I like that, I think it would be important to organize in some strong ways, like several "Visions" or "Aspects" (simply tabs) that could have thematic views on e-mail. What if I want to leave an e-mail unread but don't want it sitting on the desktop? I think that it's a nice idea but there should be preference for notes to myself rather than messages from others, so maybe you can add some fields for "notes to self" that could sit between e-mails, and e-mails could be grayed out until I mouse over them. Those are the kinds of features I personally would love to have.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Actually these sound like the types of things that I would really like to have too. I remember for the longest time I was trying to find some sticky note app that had a transparent background rather than those god-awful yellow default backgrounds that draw way too much visual attention.

Just to make sure I'm understanding, you're talking about potentially having a few tabs, one possibly being email, another possibly being notes, etc? Would love to see if I could do something around that, maybe in a v2, a spinoff, or something or other.

[+] Stratoscope|6 years ago|reply
Would you mind adding those image links in a comment? The URLs in your post aren't clickable, but they should be if they are in a comment. Thanks!
[+] dang|6 years ago|reply
Please don't put Show HN in the title if a thing doesn't exist for people to try out yet. This is in the rules: https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Sorry Dang. Was not aware of that. Have not broken that rule in the past, and won't do again.
[+] ken|6 years ago|reply
I have many problems with email but I don't see how this solves any of them. How do I see who these were sent to, or what mailing lists they come from? What do the chevron and gear icons do? How does it scroll when I have more than 4 emails? How does search work? How does composing work when I have more than one draft in progress? Does it just ignore my folders/flags/accounts? How do I move/minimize/etc these views if they don't have normal window frames?

This is the danger of judging any design by Lorem Ipsum. If it's not using real data, I don't trust it to be a real design.

JWZ said in 1998, "Mozilla is big because your needs are big. Your needs are big because the Internet is big. There are lots of small, lean web browsers out there that, incidentally, do almost nothing useful."

The standard window frame controls are not a problem to me. In fact, my #1 gripe with every program that tried to customize them (e.g., Pixelmator, Affinity, Firefox, 1Password) is that they screwed it up somehow and everything would be better if they'd just used standard controls.

[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Yeah, I mean these things would all have to be figured out, and my guess is I have a decent enough understanding of UX to be able to create a solution that works well. Whether or not you and others feel the same way will determine whether the product becomes successful or not.
[+] blablabla123|6 years ago|reply
For home use and personal E-Mail I prefer a client that can be opened and closed. At the same time I disabled all notifications on my Desktop where possible. So I might not be in your target group. Although for work use I lean more towards a more present mail client.

In any case, I think that's a cool direction. I have a love-hate relationship with Thunderbird since it has so many features that I don't use and some features I need - at work for instance Exchange support or Encryption - have only flaky plugin support. Also I totally not use HTML mail, on the other hand console clients just don't work for me. So I end up using Web mail clients which is not super practical always...

[+] mtm7|6 years ago|reply
This is one of the most refreshing designs I've seen in months. It's absolutely beautiful. I'd be interested in a Mac version.

I don't know anything about the engineering behind an email client, so I'm curious about the security aspect – would my emails ever touch your server?

Side note: you could post this on Dribbble if you want more beta users.

[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Thanks so much. Do you mind if I email you when it is ready and you can see if you like it? No emails would go through me, there would be no centralized server; you would authenticate and then your client would ping the mailserver that you authenticated to.

That's a great idea to post it to Dribbble. I never gave my Dribbble account much love, do you have any idea how to get it some exposure there? Thanks a bunch.

[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Edit: It is quite lovely to have gotten some people to look at this idea of mine. I think I will go ahead and polish the code up and try to release it this week. If you would like to try it out you can email me at [email protected] and I will send a link out when it is ready. Maybe spin up a landing page too. Thank you so much.
[+] factorialboy|6 years ago|reply
How will it handle inboxes with 30+ emails in them? And the whole archiving / labeling / folders process? I'd love to see concepts for those. I am, on the lookoit, for a nicer email client.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
I have concepts for those that I think would work well. Not sure how much time I want to spend on an MVP but those items are probably necessary.
[+] hesk|6 years ago|reply
It looks beautiful but how does it handle other windows on the desktop?
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Hey thanks! In my imagination it would just be like a desktop widget so it would probably sit behind everything else, although; I suppose I could offer different options (pin-to-front) if anyone would be interested in that.
[+] artfulhippo|6 years ago|reply
I would love to use it but I wouldn’t pay. I hope you continue development but I understand if you don’t, since it’s hard to compete with many free alternatives.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Yeah, I wouldn't expect it to cost anything but maybe there would be some premium features, or something.

Thanks so much. This was the first comment I read that sort of validated the concept, and is very encouraging.

[+] rohan1024|6 years ago|reply
Hey none of your links are clickable nor they take me to relevant webpage if I copy them. The browser ends up searching the URL
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Ah burn. Strange because it's working for me. Thank you so much for letting me know. Probably because they are not URL encoded. I just changed them, do you mind trying again and see if it works. Thanks!!
[+] slenk|6 years ago|reply
I need something for Windows so badly. Thunderbird is just so...meh...and there is nothing else that I know of.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Yeah I'm mostly a windows user, so I would love to help with this. Would you mind testing an initial build and telling me what you like/dislike/want? Thank you.
[+] Semiapies|6 years ago|reply
The interface looks too much like desktop notifications to me.
[+] Lendal|6 years ago|reply
Darn, I was looking for a telnet client that only connects to port 25.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
Haha. I'd agree that would be about as minimal as it could get.
[+] mirimir|6 years ago|reply
Those are some huge image files.
[+] nikkwong|6 years ago|reply
You're right! I apologize. I was just trying to validate this ultra-fast and see if anyone was interested; I'll go ahead and resize them. I'm usually very scrupulous about that kind of thing.