Eudora OSE 1.0
A group of Eudora’s original developers has at long last released Eudora OSE 1.0, an open-source email client based on Mozilla’s Thunderbird email program, but boasting features and interface elements pulled from the classic Eudora that so many people used and liked. Eudora, of course, began life in the late 1980s, but Qualcomm stopped development of the paid version of the software four years ago with version 6.2.4 (see “Eudora Goes Open Source with Thunderbird,” 16 October 2006). Progress on Penelope, as the open-source update to Eudora was code-named, moved slowly, with the first beta
release a year later (see “Penelope Project Ships Eudora 8.0.0b1,” 5 September 2007), and the final release after three more years. Many long-time Eudora users have switched to other email programs, but for those who either aren’t happy after the switch or who have held on to Eudora 6.2.4, Eudora OSE is worth a look. The developers advise users updating from the beta versions of Eudora OSE to back up mailbox and preference files before installing the new release. (Free, 21.1 MB)
I've been using the beta releases for the past years - Eudora classic broke after I updated to Snow Leopard. Its gotten better with every release. Its very much like Eudora classic but not always.
One thing to be aware of if you use Time Machine: all mails is now stored in a SQL repository and everytime you save new mail the repository gets updated. I filled a 1TB TM disk up in a few weeks - 2G got saved every hour every day.
Time Machine will let you exclude items on a file-by-file basis (maybe folders too—I don’t know). If there's some way to export a day’s email on a timed basis then you could let Time Machine backup those files instead... I'll have to see what's possible because I still miss Eudora.
Not sure why Eudora broke on your Snow Leopard Mac; it works fine on mine. Try turning off the Eudora sounds -- especially those that are unique to Eudora (the System sounds are probably OK).
Well, once you switch you cannot go back (and get your email). The problem was in the bowels of Rosetta - I filed an Apple Bug report on it. What would happen is you would start typing, then get a blue screen, then the Window Server would crash, and you would lose all work. I tracked down where the problem was for Apple but as far as I know they never fixed it. Google Eudora/Rosetta. The problem also affected old Office apps - anything using Rosetta. Problem did not exist in Leopard. Many people had the problem, but no all - probably hardware related.
An update on the Time Machine issue - it turns out the Mail folders are still text based, but there is a search cache that continually updates, causing large TM updates every hour. HOWEVER, you can tell Time Machine to ignore it, which is what I did. Look for a file named "global-messages-db.sqlite" in our Profile under ~/Library.
On the broader topic of email clients being developed for MacOS...
Has letters.app fizzled?
http://www.macworld.com/article/145815/2010/01/letters.html
I'm still hanging on with Eudora and want know my options
- nello
I'd give Letters.app a 5% chance of being completed. That said, there was some activity in the github repository in September, so it's not completely dead.
http://github.com/ccgus/letters
I've been using Eudora OSE 1.0 (which actually shipped a couple of months ago) since August and it's not bad. It's missing some features of Eudora Classic, but it has some new ones... result: daily frustrations alongside pleasant surprises. With a half-dozen iKey macros I've made, plus careful changes in Prefs, it's functional.
However, I recently realized that it's only based on Tbird 3.0, and 3.1+ is out. Again, frustrations. I'd gladly pay some company to keep OSE/Penelope up to date and add old Classic features. Sigh.
The "Pencil Edit" feature is very important, and should be included in the next iteration of Eudora OSE. This feature is so useful, and is constantly selected to alter the Subject and clean up body text to suit. A must-have tool.
Please include it.
As long as Apple continues to include Rosetta in the OS upgrades, I'll stick with Eudora 6.2.4 - - especially since my wife would inflict bodily harm upon my person if I tried to switch to another mail client!
I agree. I have a few glitches with Eudora 6.2.4 and OS 10.6, but not enough for me to change as yet. But will Rosetta be present in 10.7? I'm inclined to doubt it.
This new Eudora seems to import attachments and inline images satisfactorily. That's been a problem with all other replacements. So, when I need to change I can keep my old mail in the new Eudora, whatever I choose for new mail.
Eudora 6.2 is like a wonderful old shoe that's hard to leave behind. Still, progress is inevitable, I guess. Can anyone confirm for me that an OSE install can co-exist with Classic -- including importing my Classic mailboxes -- without wrecking my Classic setup?
Has anyone tried using Email Merge X with Eudora OSE? It works fine with Eudora 6.2.
I also wonder about Tucker's question. If I don't like OSE, can I go back to 6.2 easily?
Hi:
I downloaded the application, but upon installation it failed to find anything re my accounts including logins and passwords. Even with re-entering the information, it still couldn't get it right.
Fortunately, I backed-up everything before installation and was able to return to the old Eudora -- thank God.
My advice, proceed with caution. While this application *may* work, it doesn't find current settings and be prepared to renter everything to get it to work.
Cheers,
tedd
I've had Eudora since before time began, and I just loved it. Had to switch to Thunderbird to get my work email at home.
The new Eudora I just installed grabs all my mail from Thunderbird, not the old Eudora!
There should not be any problem with installing both Eudora OSE and Classic, as the import puts everything into a Thunderbird folder in ~/Library, so one still has the old Eudora folder.
As far as I could see the initial installation offers to import, but not from Eudora. However, an import from Eudora can be done later. I didn't really check to see the old account information.
I've been following the development of Mozilla Eudora and Mail Forge but o far neither has tempted me across from Eudora 6.2.4 which continues to run well on OSX 10.6.4 for me. My 16 years of Eudora mail now cruises at 167Mb without attachments.
Have any of the following functions been added to Eudora OSE or MailForge? Pencil Edit, a search as brilliant as the old Eudora (Spotlight is useless by comparison) and the ability to amend subjects.