home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc
- Path: sparky!uunet!europa.asd.contel.com!darwin.sura.net!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!batcomputer!cornell!uw-beaver!news.u.washington.edu!news
- From: Mark Crispin <mrc@Tomobiki-Cho.CAC.Washington.EDU>
- Subject: re: Are there any POP/IMAP based mail clients under MS-windows ?
- In-Reply-To: <1dv89nINNpt3@alpha.db.erau.edu>
- Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
- Message-ID: <MS-C.721634211.1103527590.mrc@Tomobiki-Cho.CAC.Washington.EDU>
- To: James Burwell <jimb@db.erau.edu>
- Sender: news@u.washington.edu (USENET News System)
- Organization: University of Washington
- Mime-Version: 1.0
- Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 05:56:51 GMT
- Lines: 87
-
- Here is a message about a Windows IMAP client that may interest you:
-
- Message-Id: <m0mPLXr-000VJNC@isasun-3.edm.isac.ca>
- From: steve@edm.isac.ca (Steve Hole)
- Subject: ECS Beta available via anonymous ftp
- To: ecs-info@edm.isac.ca
- Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 17:52:28 -0600
- X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL4]
-
- A BETA demonstration version of ECS is available via anonymous ftp from
-
- ftp.srv.ualberta.ca
-
- in the directory
-
- /pub/networking/win/mail/ecs.tar.Z
-
- We encourage you to get the software and try it out. This version of
- ecs is released for demonstration purposes only - IT IS NOT IN THE
- PUBLIC DOMAIN. As I have mentioned earlier, we are not currently
- charging for the product, and are in the process of evaluating different
- forms of funding for the software.
-
- One of the funding strategies that we have discussed is the concept of
- "funding groups". A funding group will be a collection of organizations
- that jointly fund the development of a specific set of new mailer
- features.
-
- The idea is to tag the work associated with developing a new set of
- features with a cost, then break the cost up into "shares".
- Organizations who are interested in getting the features can commit to
- one or more shares. Once all the shares are committed to, work will
- begin on the feature set.
-
- For our part, ISA will commit to a development schedule, deliverables,
- and support. Anyone purchasing shares will get unlimited copies of the
- software for all time, including all other improvements made by other
- funding groups, plus the source code.
-
- For example, we presume that a secure version of the mailer would be of
- interest to several organizations - especially if they do any defense
- work. We are going through an evaluation period right now to try to
- discover what the effort will be to provide Privancy Enhanced Mail (PEM)
- capabilities and secure authorization (via Kerberos and perhaps OSISEC).
- Once the evaluation is complete, we will have a good idea what it will
- cost us in resources to do this work. We will then break the cost into
- shares and offer it to the customer base.
-
- Obviously there are some problems with this model. The trick is going
- to be identifying feature groups, costs and equitables shares. Those
- groups involved in large feature sets will potentially pay much more
- than groups with smaller feature sets, yet everyone gets access to all
- the features in the end. Also, what about organizations or even
- individuals that don't participate - should they get the software for
- free? Perhaps some sort of scaled share plan would be better, depending
- on the number of machines you run it on.
-
- To my mind, the share mechanism is good way (1) providing funding for
- *new* feature development, (2) getting the work that is really in demand
- (the high demand features will sell shares more quickly) done quickly,
- (3) still provide software that comes with source code and can be given
- away. If an organization is interested in getting a new set of features
- right away, and cost is no object, then they may pick up all the shares
- in the group, just to get it done.
-
- So, I am looking for feedback on the following items:
-
- (1) What do you think of the interface? What would you do to improve
- it? What other platforms and environments would you like it to support?
-
- (2) What do you think of the functionality? What would you do to
- improve it? Don't be scared to go nuts here ...
-
- (3) What do you think of the funding group strategy? Is it viable?
- Keep in mind that it is a proposal only, and we are very flexible. Do
- you have some other funding mechanism that might do the trick for us?
-
- Please try to post your responses to the mailing list itself - even if
- it is about something that you don't like, or a defect. Hopefully it
- will start some good creative discussion. Cheers.
-
- --
- Steve Hole Director of Research and Communications
- ISA Corporation mail: steve@edm.isac.ca
- Edmonton, Alberta, Canada phone: (403) 420-8081
-
-
-