31 Oct, 2007
Gmail IMAP nothing but heartache
Posted by: Dave In: Apple |Communication |Google |Usability |Web
The good: Google introduced IMAP protocol for Gmail, allowing multiple platforms (web, phone, desktop application) to synch gmail seemlessly. For example, if I delete an email from my desktop Mac Mail application, it will be deleted across all the access points I use to manage email. Or so the theory goes.
The bad: It’s a fucking disaster if you are using a Mac. I fiddled with it for 2+ hours this evening and managed to crash Mac Mail at least a dozen times and download over 200+ spams to my Blackberry (I’m just lucky I didnt’ have more than 200+ emails in my Gmail account at the time. Normally I have over a thousand, but cleaned it out recently). Do you know how long it takes to delete 200+ emails on a Blackberry? Well, I do.
The ugly: I am back to POP3 access. It works fine and with the right filters in Gmail, does exactly what I need it to do. Unfortunalely, it’s not nearly as useful as IMAP could be.
At least I’m not the only person having these problems.
-Dave
