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From: Mike Rosenberg on 10 Feb 2010 17:11
William Clark <clark(a)nospam.matsceng.ohio-state.edu> wrote:

> To me the problem does lie with Mail, not because the program is faulty
> per se, but because it gives absolutely no assistance to anyone setting
> it up - you have to figure it our by yourself (or with help from this
> ng). Most similar programs have some sort of interactive dialog built in
> to help the ignorant.

The problem with that notion is that the mail hosting company decides
exactly which server settings you have to use. No interactive dialog can
tell you what to try - you have to find out from the powers that be.

Starting with Leopard, Mail will attempt to do that for you
automatically, and in many cases it gets things right. I don't think
Entourage or Thunderbird do that. I know for sure Eudora doesn't,
referring to the real Eudora, not the relabelled Thunderbird version,
and I've seen some cases where that Eudora can't connect at all to
servers that newer apps can.

--
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From: Richard Maine on 10 Feb 2010 18:01
Mike Rosenberg <mikePOST(a)TOGROUPmacconsult.com> wrote:

> William Clark <clark(a)nospam.matsceng.ohio-state.edu> wrote:
>
> > To me the problem does lie with Mail, not because the program is faulty
> > per se, but because it gives absolutely no assistance to anyone setting
> > it up - you have to figure it our by yourself (or with help from this
> > ng). Most similar programs have some sort of interactive dialog built in
> > to help the ignorant.
>
> The problem with that notion is that the mail hosting company decides
> exactly which server settings you have to use. No interactive dialog can
> tell you what to try - you have to find out from the powers that be.

For one particular, there is no way that Mail is going to know what user
name you need for authentication. Different hosting companies use
different patterns; there isn't a general answer. If you know the setup
of a particular company, you can give a suggestion based on that, but
you can't tell in general for an arbitrary hosting company.

--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
From: Mike Rosenberg on 11 Feb 2010 08:59
William Clark <clark(a)nospam.matsceng.ohio-state.edu> wrote:

> > It would seem to me that the mail server's organization should publish
> > setup instructions for their server on a few, if not most of the mail
> > clients in common use. One or two examples are usually enough to help
> > set up a client for which there are no specific instructions.
>
> Such examples could have been included with Mail.

He meant one or two examples from the mail server's organization. Seeing
instructions for, say, Outlook Express and Thunderbird, should help one
figure out how to set up other mail clients using the specified
settings.

> Fair enough, but it really is not a quirky set up - it's about as
> vanilla as can be for someone on the road.

Vanilla? Well, if we're using that analogy, have you ever noticed how
many varieties of vanilla ice cream one brand may sell?

Setting up to use an SMTP server could require just port 25, 465, just
port 587, it could allow 465 and 587 (but usually not 25 if it includes
those two). Password authentication is pretty standard, but it can
require just the user name or the entire email address. SSL may be
required, and if it's not, having it on generally won't work.

Comcast for the longest time had port 25 without authentication when
you're at home using their cable internet, some variation of the above
when you're away, and while they haven't officially abandoned port 25,
no authentication, sometimes it simply stops working reliably or at all
for some users.

AT&T has been setting up new users and attempting to migrate old users
to their Yahoo servers. Here, in former Bellsouth country, the old
mail.bellsouth.net on port 25 with no authentication, never fails to
work when one's at home, but the Yahoo smtp settings are far from
reliable from any location.

--
My latest dance performance <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_9pudbFisE>

Mac and geek T-shirts & gifts <http://designsbymike.net/shop/mac.cgi>
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From: Mike Rosenberg on 12 Feb 2010 08:41
William Clark <wclark2(a)colnospamumbus.rr.com> wrote:

> > The Mail help section on adding accounts leads you to
> > <https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1277> which would have aided you in
> > obtaining the proper configuration.
>
> Well, it didn't, because I could not find anything that referred to
> anything prior to 10.5.

Before you responde, did you even look at the page Tom provided?
Apparently not, because it says:

"Products Affected
Mail, Mac OS X 10.4, Mac OS X 10.3, Mac OS X 10.2, Mac OS X 10.1, Mac OS
X 10.5, Mac OS X 10.6, iPhone"

"Are you having issues sending, receiving, or configuring Mail? If so,
ask your Internet service provider (or email provider if it's different
than your ISP) the following questions to verify that your account is
set up correctly in Mail. You can print (or copy and paste to a text
document) and keep this "cheat sheet" to record your email provider's
settings for future reference. This sheet can make it easier for you
when configuring Mail in Mac OS X or on iPhone or iPod touch, or when
contacting your provider."

It then provides a table with all the server settings one needs to know
from their mail hosting provider to configure _any_ mail client.

--
My latest dance performance <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_9pudbFisE>

Mac and geek T-shirts & gifts <http://designsbymike.net/shop/mac.cgi>
Prius shirts/bumper stickers <http://designsbymike.net/shop/prius.cgi>
From: Richard Maine on 12 Feb 2010 11:47
Mike Rosenberg <mikePOST(a)TOGROUPmacconsult.com> wrote:

> William Clark <wclark2(a)colnospamumbus.rr.com> wrote:
>
> > Actually, I am. I'm just not a psychic, which I needed to be in this
> > case.
>
> No, you simply needed to ask the people in charge of your mail servers
> what settings are required to connect to those specific servers.
>
> What you seem to want is for the programmers at Apple to be psychic.

I see more that he wants to blame someone else for his difficulty and
they seemed handy.

I am somehow reminded of a user of one of my application programs who
came to me a decade or two (hmm, probably closer to 2) ago reporting
that the program no longer worked. That was pretty much the entire
report, with no more details. The program still seemed to be working
fine as far as I could see, so I went to watch him try to run it.

Turns out that the problem was that he could no longer log into the
central computer (this was in the days when most of our apps were run on
a central computer instead of desktops). Most of what he did on the
computer was run my app, so I guess he thought of it as all part of the
same thing and reported it as a problem relating to my app.

Oh, and the reason he couldn't log onto the central computer was that he
had forgotten his user name... which was the same as his last name. When
I reminded him that it was the same as his last name, that wasn't quite
enough prompt for him to come up with it. Not one of his better days.
:-) He (and I) had gone to college in the late 60's and I'm moderately
sure he had experimented with some drugs (which wasn't my style). Most
of the time he was reasonably bright, but every so often he would have
brief periods that I'm suspicious were much delayed symptoms of the
prior drug use; some of them can so that.

--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
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