Have you seen email filtering this limited?

[truemagic]

I've been trying a few email providers and came across this very basic filtering setup. What surprised me is that it doesn't support multiple conditions, and the matching criteria are limited to just "is" and "contains."

Screenshots: [Link] [Link]

Now for a fun one: can you guess which provider this is?

[JeremyNicoll]

Originally Posted by truemagic

I've been trying a few email providers and came across this very basic filtering setup. What surprised me is that it doesn't support multiple conditions, and the matching criteria are limited to just "is" and "contains."

Goodness - that's primitive. (I've no idea which provider it is.)

I'd be lost without being able to filter on any header (especially those derived from the SMTP envelope), multiple conditions, and regex.

[dojyx]

Originally Posted by truemagic

I've been trying a few email providers and came across this very basic filtering setup. What surprised me is that it doesn't support multiple conditions, and the matching criteria are limited to just "is" and "contains."

Screenshots: [Link] [Link]

Now for a fun one: can you guess which provider this is?

I_n_b_o_k_s_s

[jarland]

It looks like stripped down sieve filtering. Honestly I get it. Even the more knowledgeable people screw themselves with sieve filters and then blame their mail host. When you're trying to make something for people of all different levels of competence, simple has value.

[RFK]

Originally Posted by truemagic

Now for a fun one: can you guess which provider this is?

Which one?

[JeremyNicoll]

Originally Posted by RFK

Which one?

The screenshots look like they're from the same system.

[Bamb0]

The more basic the more I like it.. Like my friend Jeffs site.. Not hard to use

[JeremyNicoll]

Originally Posted by Bamb0

The more basic the more I like it.. Like my friend Jeffs site.. Not hard to use

But also more or less useless. Filtering on "To:" (especially) is no good. You need to filter on who the mail's actually been sent to (ie the SMTP envelope data).. "From:" is also (on spam) often unreliable garbage.

IMO a decent provider will provide thorough filtering too - by all means put it behind an "advanced" link if you don't want to scare people.

[truemagic]

Now for a fun one: can you guess which provider this is?

Answer: inbox.eu

I’m on the free trial, and while the pricing is appealing, I don’t think I’ll be subscribing.

[hadaso]

Originally Posted by JeremyNicoll

... Filtering on "To:" (especially) is no good. You need to filter on who the mail's actually been sent to (ie the SMTP envelope data)...

Most users have only one email address and don't understand the concept of "envelope". They would filter on "To" or "Cc" to separate mail that only have them on "Cc" (or "Bcc") from mail where they are the main recipient.

[JeremyNicoll]

Originally Posted by hadaso

Most users have only one email address and don't understand the concept of "envelope". They would filter on "To" or "Cc" to separate mail that only have them on "Cc" (or "Bcc") from mail where they are the main recipient.

But if a user only receives a mail because they were BCCed, nothing in "To:" or "CC:" is reliably always relevant. Of course on non-spam email "To:" &/ "CC:" will sometimes be relevant.

[dojyx]

Additionally, the FROM filter allows only one email address.

[truemagic]

Originally Posted by jarland

It looks like stripped down sieve filtering. Honestly I get it. Even the more knowledgeable people screw themselves with sieve filters and then blame their mail host. When you're trying to make something for people of all different levels of competence, simple has value.

I've experienced sieve scripts as well, and they can easily go wrong, so I prefer a UI that helps shape the sieve script behind the scenes, just like RoundCube and Horde do, where they allow you to export the sieve script from whatever you configured in the UI. That's really cool.

I understand not everyone uses filtering. In my early years of using email, everything just went into the main inbox, but as I got older, I started to appreciate having everything organized into folders, which saves me time and reduces the mess.

Originally Posted by hadaso

Most users have only one email address and don't understand the concept of "envelope". They would filter on "To" or "Cc" to separate mail that only have them on "Cc" (or "Bcc") from mail where they are the main recipient.

Originally Posted by JeremyNicoll

But if a user only receives a mail because they were BCCed, nothing in "To:" or "CC:" is reliably always relevant. Of course on non-spam email "To:" &/ "CC:" will sometimes be relevant.

Yes, that's where I appreciate filtering by header. Even Netflix sends marketing emails with a generic @netflix.com, but you can filter them by header, for example, if it does not contain "List-Unsubscribe: netflix.com" ? straight to Trash

Originally Posted by dojyx

Additionally, the FROM filter allows only one email address.

Exactly, that's what makes it very hard to use for "advanced" users like me lol, because my needs are more complex than having just one condition. A workaround is to do it on a client, for example FairEmail, but that's a pain.

[JeremyNicoll]

Originally Posted by truemagic

I've experienced sieve scripts as well, and they can easily go wrong, so I prefer a UI that helps shape the sieve script behind the scenes, just like RoundCube and Horde do, where they allow you to export the sieve script from whatever you configured in the UI.

Fastmail also does (you choose to edit the generated sieve script then c&p all of it into a text file). My other mail-provider uses Roundcube & I save both its & the FM one every few weeks for two reasons: first: if I ever have to recreate my filters it'll be much easier with an uptodate copy of the script;

- secondly - it's much easier to search through a saved script (in a decent text editor) than it is in a gui to find (say) all one's sieve rules which use a particular feature.


I find my sieve scripts don't "go wrong"; but that's because (a) I programmed for much of my working life so know how to program 'defensively' & (b) none of them fully delete mail; the worst they'll do is route mails meeting certain criteria to a test should-probably-delete-these folder. I'll still eyeball what ends up in those folders before (manually) deleting stuff. In Roundcube I regularly download everything that ends up in certain likely-spam folders then post-process those emails checking that nothing unexpected has ended up in any of the folders.

Back in the old dial-up days I DID programatically delete things on [POP3] servers (albeit with rules my own code regenerated every day). As soon as always-on internet connections arrived I found it easier to download everything & filter it in an email client (or now: in a webmail system).

I've recently been experimenting in sieve with different forms of regex expressions - some didn't seem to match when I thought they should. The breakthrough came when I discovered they use the "POSIX" standard. (I've been using regexes on & off since the late 1970s.)