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List:       kmail-devel
Subject:    3 small (but important) improvements for KMail
From:       Dan Allen <dan () mojavelinux ! com>
Date:       2004-02-29 16:32:36
Message-ID: 200402291132.36360.dan () mojavelinux ! com
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Folks,

I have started using KMail lately as my primary email client because I am so 
impressed with the KDE tools and was confident KMail would be no exception.  
However, in using it a discovered a few oddities that I wanted to share.

* Retaining Scroll Offset:

I like to keep my messages sorted with the newest message listed first.  
However, I have found that KMail does not work as expected (and how other 
email clients work) when new mail arrives.  If I leave the message list 
scrolled all the way to the top and a new message arrives, the scrolling does 
not reset itself to the top of the list so that the new message comes into 
view.  Instead, I have to move my mouse over to the message list and scroll 
back to the top.  It would be better if the new message would trigger a 
scroll event in the case where the pane is already scrolled to the top.

* Refresh IMAP Mailbox:

I use IMAP for my mail, which is set to check messages every 10 minutes.  
However, when I am actively sending messages I often like to "trigger" a 
check sooner.  To accomplish this solely for my IMAP inbox, I use the 
technique of clicking on another folder and then back to the inbox and voila, 
the new (expected) message shows up.  Therefore, it seems natural to add an 
"IMAP sync" option to the context menu for an IMAP folder.  This differs from 
"Check mail" in the sense that you are only synchronizing a single IMAP 
folder, a feature unique to IMAP.

* Arrow Keys on Message List/Preview Pane:

I absolutely love how KMail detects the location of the mouse cursor so that 
mouse-wheel scrolling is applied to the appropriate pane without having to 
"click to focus".  Bravo!

However, I have discovered that the arrow keys do not follow this same 
detection scheme.  If the mouse is over the message list and the arrow keys 
are used, the message still scrolls.  This overlook makes it difficult for 
those of us that use a laptop and resort often to the keyboard for 
navigation.

I am actually going to continue here for all missing keyboard features.  In 
Konqueror, the "hjkl" keys can be used for scrolling and when combined with 
the SHIFT key, actually exhibit a smooth scroll feature.  However, not all of 
these keys work in the preview pane.  The "j" works fine, but then the "k" 
selects all message in the message list.  Hence you can go down but not up.  
To remain consist, I would expect the keys that work in Konqueror to work 
exactly the same in the preview pane.  Combined with a shortcut key for "Next 
Message", a user could read mail without having to use the mouse at all once 
the preview pane had focus.

Dan
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