IMAP-use mailing list (was Re: UX- download messages upfront, or as needed?)

[Michael McCracken]

Download all the headers and such first, and once that's done start
downloading the bodies?  Is this what the iPhone does?

I've always thought it would be like that.
And keep a second connection open for "emergencies". Like when you select
a message that has not yet been downloaded, just go ahead and use the second
connection to get it.

The “second connection” idea is a good one, though I’m not keen on the idea
of just having a second connection open *all the time*; it strikes me as
being perhaps being wasteful of server resources. Having said that, how many
connections does a typical client open currently?
(It’d be quite useful if we could get some IMAP server authors on the list
for things like this…)

The IMAP-use mailing list archives might be useful for this kind of question:

http://mailman2.u.washington.edu/pipermail/imap-use/

The list itself is very quiet these days, but there are probably still
some knowledgeable people listening.

-mike

I’d like to see some degree of intelligence: e.g., a slight delay before
actually utilising the second connection, both in case the user is just
scrolling through messages and the focus would have changed by the time the
message was actually downloaded, and also in case the message we’re
downloading at the point the one we don’t have is focussed has finished.
Hmm, perhaps focussing an undownloaded message causes it to get inserted
into a “fetch this next” queue, but removed again if the focus changes or
before it’s started, or if the current activity on the connection is taking
too long and the second connection needs to be utilised?
M.
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