Ask HN: What features would you like to see in Email?
We're developing a web-based mail client which is currently integrated with Gmail. Was wondering if there are features not currently available in Gmail or your typical email setup that you would like to see.
Our current direction is aimed at simplifying email and how it's used (aka Facebook messages). We also want to speed up the way you find emails through UI simplications.
Thanks for any suggestions.
10 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 34.5 ms ] threadMake it get out of the way. We do not want to see it we want it to work. Plain and simple no "extra functionality" that we did not ask for. have it simply interface with things we already use, whether that be services or websites and have it let us get back to our work faster.
As it stands email is what drags productivity down in a lot of offices and that is not what it was meant for, integrate your system where we can read and respond no matter what computer we're on or operating system we're running quickly and then get out of our way so we can go back to our tasks.
maybe features that will alert us to emails from certain users with a pop up while not alerting us of others where we know the mail will be less important.
just a few thoughts, there is tons more I could say here but I'm sure most people could care less what I think. hope that helps with your research
The type of innovation I'm talking about is analogous to what Facebook has done with messages. We're not taking this exact approach but we are looking at doing similar types of simplifications.
I'd receive or could create a new Google doc, a wiki, a blank 'pastebin' type document, a Google Wave type thing, etc. It would sit in my inbox, exactly like an email. But clicking the subject would load the new type of file right there rather than take me to an email.
I don't want links/notifications of the new service, I want to click on an 'email' in my inbox and have it instead load the other service, right there. Does that make sense?
It would certainly make getting at the content inside an email faster. This would mean you'd have to put enough smarts in the email parser to determine what kind of content is inside the email and then take the appropriate action.
This is in my opinion why Google Wave failed. No one wants another inbox to check. But, instead of an email, having the option to send a "super email" with advanced features? And right from your same email inbox? Yes please.
So instead of getting an email notification that someone has shared a Google doc with me, the doc just shows up in my inbox. It's not an email being parsed to show me the content, it's just... the content.
It was to create a tagging system where you would tag the emails you find important with words of your own choosing. For example, if you get a lot of dinner invites, and you need to find a specific one- it helps tagging that email as Mary, Japanese festival, banana to show results that filter out those keywords