Comment by pmontra
3 months ago
Probably the nothing to install experience. Every Android phone comes with Gmail and every device has a web browser. Do people have to install Gmail on iOS?
I'm using Thunderbird with POP3 accounts, download on my laptop then remove from the server, daily backups. My phone has K9 (the old one with the UI I like) and I never remove messages from the phone. When I send mail from the phone I bcc myself so I can see the message from my laptop later.
Why? Because I don't like to leave my mail forever on somebody's else server. They can lock me out at any time (it will probably never happen) and my mail is mine.
Would I recommend this to anybody? Of course not.
Is it a problem not to have access to all of my mail when I don't have my laptop with me? It never happened to be a problem and it's always less likely to be a problem because of all the messages that are exchanged outside email and on mobile first platforms, even for work.
Thank goodness, Gmail does not come on iOS. No other apps are pre installed except Apple's, and I am always very thankful for that when I set up a Samsung tablet as a kiosk and have to delete sponsored apps, AI apps, Spotify, Microsoft apps, Samsung apps, Google apps, kids apps...horrible experience.
> Do people have to install Gmail on iOS?
Why would Gmail be pre-installed on iOS?
They aren't sure, that's why they are asking..
The Apple Mail client works very well with Gmail. The only real negative is that it’s not true push email, though it is largely close enough.
The thing I miss most about macOS now that I’ve gone all-in on Linux is actually Apple Mail. It’s just a simple and clean Mail app.
My current choice is Evolution and I’ve had very good luck with it so far. But ultimately the best Mail experience is on my iPhone.
I was using Thunderbird/BetterBird, but now that a Windows client isn’t a requirement for me anymore, I much prefer Evolution. Thunderbird is a notable pain when it comes to an inability to reliably export/import your user profile to other machines. It’s also such a cluttered application and I find the calendar UI to be horrendous. Good luck using a trackpad to scroll through months of the year.
iOS comes with a mail client. It connects to my exchange, gmail and Zoho accounts.
You don’t install gmail, you connect a mail client to it or visit it in a web browser.
And a great email client at that. Both iOS and macOS's. I can't imagine trading it for some web UI.
“Great” isn’t how I would describe it. Searching for “delivery” from my inbox, when the third email in my inbox has a literal subject line of “delivery notification”? Zero results.
It’s great if you never search for email I guess.
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When I open Gmail, whether an app or on the web, it already has the latest emails loaded. When I open Mail.app, I have to wait for them to download.
This is why Gmail is nicer in many areas.
This is obviously better, but until just now it never occurred to me that this would be the way iOS users would engage with gmail, since I've only ever used Android. I always thought the iOS built-in email app was just for Apple mail or something.
TIL. We really do live in separate bubbles.
If your concern is just having access to your emails if someday shit hits the fan and you’re locked out, why no smtp ? Seems easier.
SMTP is to send mail and that's how I send it from my laptop and from my phone. POP3 is to read from a mailbox.
Or imap !
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